The

"Say It Loud, We're Hacks And We're Proud!. .. "

... 10 says the Schlockthropus, star of a new monster movie spook called SCHLOCK (see page 9) , and we couldn't agree with him more. Mainly because this is our long-promised and (hopefully) equally long-awaited All-Mumbling, All-Stumbling , All-Low Budget, All-Worst Issue an issue wherein you will ...

SEE! THE CANDID CONFES­FESSIONS OF A MONSTER MOVIE MOGUL!

SEE! THE 50 WORST MON­STER MOVIES EVER MADE!

SEE! COMIC BOOKS THAT CAN RUIN YOUR MIND!

SEE! TEENAGE MONSTERS RUN AMOK THROUGH CHEAP CARDBOARD SETS!

SEE! THE MONSTER TIMES COURAGEOUSLY BAITLE THE FORCES OF GOOD TASTE, ARTISTIC MERIT, AND RE­DEEMING SOCIAL VALUE TO BRING YOU THIS ONCE-IN-A­LIFETIME SUPER-SPECIAL SCHLOCK & SHOCK ISSUE '" THE WORST OF THE MONSTER TIMES!!!

So take a deep breath , hold onto 'your head, and prepare yourself for the Worst. (And remember: Mediocrily Lives !)

Volume 1 Number 30

Thanks go to Al P lor the use 01 their Teenage Werewolf, wi thout whose presence this special WorSI issue couldn't be considered com­plete. Additional kudos go to TMT art director Larry Brill whO trans­l erred the still to our cover without making a single mistake.

lIelcome to the Wonderful World of Failure. THE MONSTER TIMES bids you enter that

monstrous mansion of medioc:rity, that perverse palace of poverty, that dismal domicile of dismay­The House That Hacks. Built. That's right, ' this entire issue of TMT is devoted entirely to the very Worst products of Monsterdom's oft-muddled mind, those shock & schlock films and comics that bave managed, in fields already notorious for their lack of time, money, talent and care, and despite innumerable odds and stiff competition, to claw their way to the very nadir of the borror industry. It is to the money-mad mini-moguls responsible for assembling these atrocious examples of Sc:hlock Art that we humbly dedicate this issue.

Of course, tbe process of selecting the very worst films Monsterdom has bad to offer is a highly subjective one, Some of the fright films featured. in this issue may seem to some to be merely bad. as opposed to absolutely awful-one monster's meat is another monster 's poison and all like that-but we've invested a lot of long painful hours of research and viewing into this issue and our decisions were not reached lightly. At any rate. we've put together a sinister survey of the 50 All-Time Worst Monster Movies Ever Made, an exhaustive roster of the celluloid damned that you ought to be aware and wary of. Hardier readers will also want to devour every sour word of Jason Thomas' lilmbook 01 THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH, the best monster musical of 1964, as well as check out the rest of our repellent offerings,

Now for the good news, TMT is proud to announce that the dehut issue of our first companion publication, INSIDE COMICS, will be out shortly. INSIDE COMICS will be a hard-hitting, no-bolds-barred magazine about every aspect of the Comics industry and will he run by TMT's resident youthfui fiery idealist. Joe Brancatelli, See his column on page 25 for further details about this exciting publishing break­through,

The TMT Dept. of Corrections would like to point out a few unforgivable errors that appeared in the last couple issues, On page 12 in TMT 28, a still Irom THE RETURN OF COUNT YORGA is incorrectly identified as being from DRACULA A,D_ 1972. whereas a still from DRACULA A,D, 1972 is incorrectly identified on page 13 as being Irom THE RETURN OF COUNT YORGA. On page 9 of TMT 29-Boris Karloffs real name should have read William Henry PRA'IT. not Platt, Many thanks to aU our hawk-eyed readers who like nothing better tban to see us make mistakes,

In conclusion, we'd just like to say that we feel that, wbat with the country and economy coUapsing and the many crises and shortages arising, any show of undue optimism at this point in time would be in questionable taste at best. We promise you'll find precious little of it in THIS issue, •

THE MONSTER TIMES IS PRODUCE4J AND CREATED BY LARRY BRILL AND LES WALDSTEIN . Editor-i n-chiel: JOE KANE. Managing Edi tor: JOE BRANCATELLI . ProcluctionlTypesett ing Director: RONALD BOOKSTAFF . Media Editor: R. ALLEN LEIDER. Associate Edi lQrs : MARK FRANK, MARK EVANIER. ST EVE VERTLIEB, JIM WNOROSKI , BILL FERET. Contributing Writers: GODZILLA, DON THOMPSON, JOE THOMASINO, D.A . LATIMER, GARY GERANI , ALAN BRANDMAN , BUDDY WEISS , DON FIOTO. DAVID STIDWORTHY, GARY BROWN, RON HAYDOCK, GARY SVEHLA. RONN STEINITZ, LON TALBOT, SEYMOUR, DAVID BARTHOLOMEW, JASON THOMAS, EO SU MMER, GEOFF OLDHAM. Contribu ting Art ists: TOM ARM· STRONG, FRANK BRUNNER, TOM SUTTON, NEAL ADAMS , ~RAY MORROW, BILL NELSON, JIM JANES, BERNI WRIGHT­SON, JEFF JONES, ERNIE CO LON, JOHN BYRNE, MIKE KALUTA. Contr ibuting Photographers: BARRY GLUSKY, EMANUEL MARIS. Circulation: RONN STEINITZ, SUSAN BROWN, BILL KOEH LEIN . Advertising Manager : LARRY BRILL Creepy Consultant: THE CREEP. West Coast Representative: LARRY WALDSTEIN.

THE MONSTER TIMES, No. 3D, February 1974, is published monthly by The Monster Times Publishing Company, Inc. , 11 West 17th Street , New YorX , New Yorl!l0011. All rights reserved by The Monster Times Publishing Company, Inc. Nothing may be reprinted In whole or part in any manner without express wrillen permi ssion from the publisher. SUBSCRIPTIONS : U.S.A. : 56 lor 12 issues, $11 for 24 issues, 520 for 52 issues, Canada: 512 lor 24 issues. Foreign : $20 lor 24 Issues. Please allow six weeks for subscriptions to become ellective. SUBSCRIBER CHANGE OF ADDRESS: Allow eight weeks' notice, and please send an address impri nt lrom a recent issue or stale exactly how label Is addressed . All subscriptions , inquiries, address changes or undeliverable copies should be sent 10 : The Monster Times, Post Office Box 595, Old Chelsea Station , New Yorl!, New Yorl! 10011. Printed In Canada. Distributed by The Kable News Company , Inc.

The Monster Times

The World's First Newspaper of Horror, Sci-Fi and Fantasy

3 6 9

10 11

15 19

MONSTER MAIL: More ye lps of joy and howls of protest fro m TMT readers 'round the world.

HORROR OF PARTY BEACH!: Hordes of hungry horrors descend on a small Long Island community that deserves no better fate in TMT's fil mbook of THE HORROR OF PARTY

WORLD'S WORST COMICS!: Doug Murray remin isces about some of Comicdom 's neglected masterpieces of artistic disaster.

WHAT'S UP, SCHLOCK?: A series of beastly banana murders and a rampag ing ape person , among other things , in a preview of SCHLOCK, a new monster movie

THE MONSTER SCENE THAT WOULDN'T DIE!: A special edition of our beloved Monster Scene, featuring a tedious Terror guaranteed to waste several minutes of your potentially precious time.

ROCK AROUND THE SCHLOCK!: TMT editor Joe takes a typically backwards glance at the lamented , teenage monsters of the Frightening 50s .

THE INFERIOR 5: Comics whiz Joe Brancatelli profiles the In ferior 5, ~ational Comics' sati ri cal superheroes.

BLOOD VALLEY DAYS!: Ron Haydock paints a behind-the-scenes portrait of fi lmmaker the mfln responsible for Tj:::tE MANIACS ARE LOOSE and other

IT CAME FROM OUT OF THE STUDIO!: 19 Gary Levinson conducts a cand id interview with independent monster moviemaker William Grefe , of DEATH CURSE OF TAATU fame.

FURTHER ADVENTURES OF HUGO HEADSTONE: Who, you ask, is Hugo Headstone? He's the world 's worst monster magazine mogul and the star of ou r comic strip this issue.

TElETYPE TERRORS: 24 Bei ng our usual exciting round-up of the latest nefarious news from the realms of films , com ics, magazines, books . .. and even real Iile.

50 FAMOUS FRIGHT FILM FAILURES!: 29 Capsule reviews of 50-count 'em-50 of the All-Time Worst Monster Movies Ever Made compiled by TMT schlock scholars Jason Thomas and Joe Kane.

HORROR HOST HAUNTS DETROIT

To the edHGf' I WOUld like lO congratulate the entire slall 01

THE MONSTER Tl MES for putting out such a uniQue and well-done product! What a thrill it IS to nave a newspaper devoted exclusively to the world 01 Imagination and the macabre!

The reason I am writing to you (besides to praise your work) is in regards 10 your mentionmg in Issue #25 that you were ptanmng an article on GHOULARDI. Wel l, I would like to tell you abOut two other horror show hosts operating oul 01 Cleveland whom you may also be interested in writing aboul

The lirst one is THE GHOUL. who is in reality 24-year-old Ron Sweed. His shOw is seen m Cleveland , DetrOIt, San Francisco and Boston on the KaIser Broadcasting Station. THE GHOUL go: nis start in show business thanks 10 Erme Anderson. who played GHOULARDI.

THE GHOUL is both wild and funny. He has a moustache and goatee. spectacles with one lens smoked over and the olher lens missing, and a cap of strmgy brown lur. Because the Qualtty of the films he ShOWS is not always hIgh, he tnes to gain vIewers with wild an\!cs At the be9tnnmg of his show. he will bring ou t the everllng's lilm in a garbage can. trying to set fire to It while he baltles the studio's ProlectionlSt. Throughout his shows he plays parts ,01 rock songs, has satiric sketches, and. in general, acts outrageously.

Another great horror ::muw nost is 45-year-old Lawson Joseph Deming. Coming from Cleveland, Deming is seen in Detroit on WJBK-TV, playing a cultured vampire named SIR GRAVES GHASTLY. GHASTLY is less frenetic Ihan the GHOUL, bul still lunny. He tells jokes. pulls bizarre sight gags, and trades Quips with Digger Deeper (played by Waller Selbman), his crazed hunChbaCked-assistant. Deming. a gilled mimic, also appears in the show as the glamorous Tillie Trollhouse, Walter (Graves' alter-ego), The Glob (a huge mouth). and , The Cool Ghoul (the disembodied head 01 a 1950's motorcyclist). There are other bizarre characlers tOO numerous to name, and GRAVES is probably closer to the traditional concept of the horror show host than is THE GHOUL. Both shows are lots 01 fun. however.

carmen Minchella East Detroit, Mich.

Horror hosls seem to be popping up all over the place lately . The horror boom we've all been experiencing has employed dozens 01 previously unemployable monsters as horror hosts .

Who said Dick Nixon hasn'l done wonders lor this counlry. U's coming up horror all over.

A LUGOSt LOVER?

Totheedi tor. .. Alter seeing issue 26, t considered TMT to be

a very favorable magazine. When I saw issue 27 I was inctinedto buy il and I did.

Aller read ing several articles. among them ··The Decline and Fall 01 8ela Lugosi ," twas shocked.

I never thought that your newspaper would do as such. I. and I'm sure many other readers also. would not like to see material on the private lives oltne horror fi lm stars.

Bela Lugosi was a good aclor and I don't think you should publish all the bad occurances in his liletime. Have you no respect for the dead?

If you say that he overacted and was a drug addict. why are you lilling the TMT pages with SUCh "bum"actor's life?

Sir:ce the damage has been done. it's too late to repair the scars of dissapointmenT in the hearts of the true fans of Lugosi. But now that il is over. why not publish all the bad things in Ihelileof Karloff.

I don't rcally expect you to print thIS letter, as that you may lose some readers, mainly the lans 01 Lugosi. Also. very seldom do you print the letters putting down your paper. But you can't hide the Iruth.

1 have to admit t would mucn ratner read your material than the work in castle 01 Franken­stein or a Marvel publication. It is the second in the field of monster mags .

Marshall F. Harris Freeman. Va.

The whole stall of THE MONSTER TIMES was saddened to see your letter. We took special care nol to be shrill or sensational in the arlicle uThe Decline and Fall 01 Bel. Lugosi."

We are indeed sorry that you did not lind It to your liking. However, it Is a tact that Bela Lugosi was a drug addict. It is also a fact that Bela Lugosl accepted roles thai he needn't have. These are lacts . We did not exploit them or make them sordid , nor did we try to debase Lugosl. However, we lelt it a responsibility to report Ihem. Many young readers want nothing better than to be an actor. They often are only shown Ihe Glamorous side. And when that happens , they get only a warped perspective. .

We have the greatest respect and admiration lor Bela lugosi. And we never called him a " bum. " Indeed, you are the one who Is name­calling.

aUICK PRAISE

To theedi lor: Time is 01 the essence and I write this letter

rather hastily, but I had to write to you about Ihe latest issue on Destroy All Monsters ! It was one of the best issues I've read and the center­fold nearly rocked me out 01 my collin. Your tilmbooks are great and Mr. Ferel's Teletype is one of the best articles in each issue. Your paper is excelled by none and iI's a bloody shame it is not produced more ollen like il was in earlier issues.

JohnPeruliO Revere, Mass.

Thanks lor the kind words, John. Hope we never disappoint you.

The reason we can no longer publish every two weekS is simple . II would be impossible for us to continue turning out l ine issues every two weeks. Operating at that break-neck speed only lowers the Quality 01 THE MONSTER TIMES. What would you rather have: two issue 01 mediocre material, or one issue of superior material?

Wedig the laller. However, we are not blind 10 the fact that our

readers want more material trom us. That's why we're doing a new magazine, INSIDE COMICS. Check out Joe Brancatelli 's column on the leletype page lor all the informalion.

Got a gripe? Somethin' you want to get 011 your hairy chest? Or, perchance, a nice nota of praise for your friendly fiends at TMT? Then send them straight to us. Remember: It takes all kinds .. . and so do we. Address all correspondences to: To the Editor, THE MONSTER TIMES, Box 595, Old Chelsea Station , New Yorl!, New York 10011.

The Monster Times

Question : What was the best monster musical of 1964? Answer: THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH -which also happened to have the distinction of being the ONLY monster musical of 1964. It also had the additional honor of being one of the WORST movies of that or any other year, managing not only to merge bad rock'n'roll with atrocious acting, inept direction , and ludicrous fish monsters, but to singlehandedly revive the longdead black stereotype of the lovable, obese Negro maid, complete with shuffling feet and frequent shouts of " Yassuh! " All things consid­ered, THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH seemed the paws-down choice to kick off our Worst Issue, and TMT scare scholar Jason Thomas turned in the following frightful filmbook of that under­standably unsung opus that asked the musical question : Can a horde of lonely mutants find happiness and fulfillment in the ali en environs of a small Long Island community inhabited solely by terrible Grade Z actors? For the answer to that and other vital questions, read on!

tugboat chugs its lazy way out to sea, carrying a dangerous cargo: large drums filled with radioactive waste material. When t he vessel reaches a predesignated ipot. its crew members dump the "hot" cans over the side. Naturally. one of the containers hits a sharp rock or other obstacle and spr ings a leak as soon as it hi ts boltom. spreading t he lethal contents throughout t he murky water a nd suffocat ing the poor fis h. Subsequently, tiny sea organisms are drawn to some skeletons that happen to be lying around (apparenlly dumped by another tugboat). They swarm around the bones. and before long the in tense radia t ion causes the li ving crea t.ures t.o adhere to the calcium_ Within moment.s. incredibly dumb-looking monst.er s begin to form! As soon as t he unbelievable transformation is completed. the fanged sea beasts start to move. and one of the hungry little dev ils makes its way toward the surface!

MONSTERS ON THE MOVE!

A bit later. a sexy young lady just happens to be getting a suntan while lying on t he rocks near "world famous" Party Beach. Not too far away. a mult it ude of

college students. mot.orcycle creeps, and beach bums are grooving on what appears to be a free concer t for lover s of awful rock and roll music. performed by the illustrious Del-Aires. The bikini-c lad woman is alone. of course, unaware that one of the new-born sea creatures is t. reading water and ogling her from a distance. The voyeuristic monster deeides t.o get a closer look at the beauty and

• quietly climbs up on the rocks and creeps toward her. Predictably, she does not see the fiendis h thing until it is almost upon her. Once she does. though, s he starts screaming bloody murder! The poor. frightened monster gets understandably anx ious and decides to quiet her by slashillg her to pieces.

Somehow heari ng the frantic cries over the blar ing music. the people leave the party to fi nd out what is wrong. A moment later. someone s pots t he unfortunate victim. The crowd r uns to look and/ or help, and the sight that greets them is one of a horribly mangled woman. She is lying on her stomach. right where she was was hed up on the beach.

The headline of the next edition of The Daily Tribune dramatically reads, "Sea

page 4

Monster Kills Girl!" Off to one side. just below the gruesome photograph of the messed·up victim. is an article entitled. "Panic in New York; Menagerie Breaks Loose: '

Since the wounds were "obviously" made by some kind of wild animal, and because there were particles of green scale tissue found under the woman's fingernails, the astute town police are immediately convinced that the murderer is a sea monster! So is everyone else in the immediate .vicinity. (This is probably the first and last time in movie history that the authorities are willing to believe the truth right off the bal.)

Late that night, two girls are walking home from a dance. They are pretty jittery. mainly because the streets are so dark. One of the females thinks that she hears someone following them. But no one else is about-except for a hungry monster, which is about ... to pounce on them! They scream, the attacker roars, and death claims two more.

The headline of the np.xt edition of The 'Daily Tribune dramatically reads, "Mon­sters Strike Again!" Off to one side, just below the gruesome photograph of the messed-up victims, is an article entitled, "Panic in New York; Menagerie Breaks Loose."

CREATURES CRASH TEEN BASH The following evening ... Elaine Gavin,

the neurotic daughter of the friendly neighborhood scientist who's investigat­ing t he murders, turns down an invitation to a sorority slumber party. There are quite a few pajama-clad girls in attendance (reelistically, all of them are atiractive), and they think that some members of a fraternity are planning to crash the affair. In anticipation of the expected intruders, the teenage cuties set up a harmless booby trap at the door. Soon afterward, the girls hear movement outside. They turn out the lights and grab pillows to beat the guys with. As they wait in the darkness. the unidentified figures approach the house. Suddenly, the booby trap is triggered, and the girls rush forwa rd- right into the open arms of a monster! Other creatures smash their way in through the windows and the back door, and t hey waste no time in ripping apart the screaming dolls! Only a few girls manage to escape with their lives. The others are torn to shreds in a mass orgy of blood.

The headline of the next edition of The Daily Tribune dramatically reads, "Mass Murder at Slumber Party!" Off to one side. next to the gruesome photograph of the messed-up victims. is an article entitled, "Panic in New York; MenageriE Breaks Loose."

The wily murderers get sassier, and their attacks increase. An attractive girl is swimming alone in a private pool, and suddenly a monster pops up and joins her!

To thi nk that Ihese ambitious sea creatures started life as mere skeletal remains wasting away on the ocean floor. Bu t thanks to modern science they were able to enjoy fruitful , satisfying l ives carrying out inventive acts of wanton destruction .

The water turns a deep red as she is slaughtered-in broad daylight! That evening. three young women drive through the plagued town on t.heir way to New York. Toward sunset, they suffer a flat tire on a forest. road near Glenwood Quarry .. As soon as night falls, the sea-things come nut of the nearby water, their inhuman senses leading them straight to the car, where they immediately massacre the delectable damsels. Later on, a pair of drunks leave a party. Seeing a parked truck, t hey go over and ask the driver where the nearest bar is. He does not answer, and they see that he is dead \ His face is hall-gone, evidence that the merci~ss creatures struck right in the middle of town!

Not all of the victims are found. Some are carried into t he water and brought to the contaminated area. After they are turned into beasties, they go around

killing other people and bringing some of them to be transformed into dumb-looking sea creatures. (Apparently, only the most attractive folks are chosen to become blood fiends.) Thus. the ranks of the inhumans are always on the increase. sort of like with vampires, while the normal populace declines in kind.

HORRIBLE HOMICIDES HIT HOME!

The number of unexplained homicides soon exceeds 30, and the locals are really flipping out. No one is safe! At the urgings of the police, hardly anyone vent ures out after dark anymore (including the police). Party Beach is renamed Dead Man's Surf, and all the hip musicians are starving because there are no more gigs. Everybody hat.es the messy monsters. especially the town's sanitation depart ment.

The headline of the next edition of The Daily Tribune dramatically reads, "Mon­

sters Still at Large!" Off to one side, next to the gruesome photo­graph of a messed-up victim, is an article entitled, "Panic in

Ne,,:, York: Menagt!rie Breaks Loose.

night the authorities get a break. the monsters emerge from their

Sea monster heads for nearby town to piCk up a copy of THE DAIL Y TRIBUNE and read his lavorite headline : " Sea Monsters Still At Large! "

natural habitat and enter the town, one of the uglies sees some mannequins in a department store window. The aquatic dummy moves closer, thinking that the wooden dummies are real. It wonders why they do not try to flee as it draws closer, but it doesn't really care whether they do or not. Suddenly, the beast finds that someth ing is blocking its advance! Angered by t he invisible barrier, it smashes its way through the window and assau lts the figures! When it is quite finish ed. it moves on, thoroughly disappointed that there's no blood to drink. But one of its hands remains behind. severed by the thick glass. It writhes in the soft light of the store, wondering where ' the rest of its stupid body is.

Doctor Gavin and the police examine the still-living hand in the scientist's basement laboratory. After a while. Gavin astutely dedu ces that the limb is composed of microscopic sea life that was somehow mutated by atomic radiation. He

Pajama partying girls are dismayed to find that visitors

are not college pra nksters

but hungry monsters.

The Monster Times

explains that, since each cell is totally independent of the others. no portion of the creatures can die unless complete disintegration takes place. He really lowers the proverbial boom by stating that the beasts need human blood and other precious stuff like that to survive.

LOVABLE STEREOTYPE THWARTS MONSTER!

Quite unexpectedly. Eulabelle. Gavin's lovable old Negro cook, enters the lah and sees t he moving hand. She screams that it's alive and accidentally overturns a beaker full of sodium. As soon as the chemical hits the severed hand. the limb bursts into flames! Seconds later, there is a bright flash of light, and the hand is almost totally disintegrated! Doctor Gavin lakes a look, and determines that the ornery sea organisms are dead: The frightened woman apologizes for her actions. completely unaware that she has saved the world.

The police. Dr. Gavin. Elaine and some ,.()ther volunteers begin searching for the radioactive monsters with geiger counters provided by the local civilian defense unit. Chemical warehouses are contacted by Doctor Gavin's assistant. and a large supply of sodium is amassed in a hurry.

Later. Dr. Gavin returns home and asks the cook where his daughter is. She informs him that Elaine is searching for the monsters over at Glenwood Quarry­alone! (Smart move!) Remembering that three women had been killed near there. Gavin panics and tells his gaping companion to send the police over to the quarry right away. Grabbing a ll the sodium he has in his laboratory, he sets out to find his dull-wilted daugh ter.

Meanwhile. Elaine is being chased by a bunch of the slow-moving creatures. Although she manages to break her ankle between some rocks. she continues to run in terror. Just as the s lobbering beasts are about to begin chomping on her. Daddy arrives! He starts throwing the sodium. and the beasts light up and go snap, crack le and pop! By this time, it is past nightfall. The darkness is pierced by the creaLures as t hey momentanly erupt Into incandescent flames. As soon as the chemical touches them, they ignite!

Unfortunately, the time soon comes for Doctor Gavin to tell his shrieking daughter t hat their small supply of sodium has run out. The inhuman attackers are overjoyed by this news. and they see their opportunity for revenge, Gavin and Elaine try to flee. but the scientist gets himself mauled by the monsters! He is not killed

Sea monster s trikes again ; this t ime a young swimmer is the victim . The Party Beach creatures rank among the greediest ever to s talk across the

Man mangled by murderous member of monstrous menagerie. While the monsters preferred a steady diet of pretty girls , they 'd set lie for anything-even truckdrivers-in a pinch .

(strangely enough. everyone else whom the fish-faces grabbed were out for good). The fiends plan to do Elaine in next, but the town's entire police force-three men- arrives in time to save her. (A lot of the cops must have quit when they heard about the creatures .) Leading them. naturally, is her brave, scientist-type boyfriend.

MONSTERS MEET FIERY FINlSH- WORLD SA VED!

The foolhardy rescuers burn a path to the terrified woman and then huddle around her. The mons ters, their numbers apparently without limit, keep charging. More and more arrive. only to be turned in to small-scale fireworks displays by the good guys. Night seems to t urn to day with the frequent bursts of light. Thick layers of smoke swarm all around the fighters . Many creatures are set aflame. but even more come to replace them. The sodium supply dwindles. but the angry beasts continue their onslaught. Miracu­lously (isn't it always that way?), the chemical lasts just long enough to destroy all of the sea-things. The remains of the monsters continue to snap. crackle and pop as the weary heroes help Dr. Gavin and his homely daughter to the waiting cars.

The threat is over, but one day the monsters may rise again from the ocean-to the ' regret of moviegoers everywhere. •

last of the Party Beach beasts waves gOOdbye before going up in flames at the long-awaited conclusion of THE HORROR OF PARTY BEACH , a movie that will be long remembered by monster fans of a masochistic bent .

HORROR OF PARTY BEACH (1964) 82 minutes. Produced and direc ted by Det Tenney . Scfeenpl~y by Richard Hilliard. Starring John Scott , Allee Lyon , Allen Laurel, Marilyn Clark, Eulabelle Mode.

6

Picking the worst comic books ever produced is no easy task . Most of the comic books ever produced could be classified as some of the worst comic books ever produced. You could make a solid case for just about anything ever to hit the comic racks.

But , as cream always rises to the top (or so the milk people tell us), the ultimate products of comic schlock also stand ,out . And here 'to give those offending comics their just desserts is Doug Murray, eminent comic book scholar, who knows garbage when he sees i t. (WhiclT is a good vi rtue to have when you're an eminent comic scholar! )

P iCking the Worst Comic Book Ever is no easy task. There have been so many candidates for that dubio us honor over the years that se lecting only one is well-nigh impossible. Striving to be fair, I have eliminated all titles before 1955-rea50n­ing that books done in thaI period, from the monstrous Atl as fantasy comics to the many atrocious superheroes, were done for a different , less sophisticated audience and, as such, would be unfair ly judged by cu rrent c riteria .

Further, 1 eliminated all titles designed for spec ial interests. Thus all those Romance t itles from Night Nurse to Young Love, and all the funny animal titles. from Woody Woodpecker to the HoundCats , are out. After these eliminations , then , and a carefu l perusal of the remaining material, nahowed the list to the following four:

THE SHADOW- Archie Comics THE GEEK- National

PREZ- National DRACULA- Dell.

THE SHADOW was another of the Grot,lP's many attempts to enter the superhero field . After limited success with Fly Man , the Jaguar, and the Mighty Crusaders, the powers-that-be at Archie hit upon the idea o f tak ing an old, establi shed c haracter (T he Shadow) , up-dating him and usi ng h im as a comic superhero. Borrowing the basic schtick of the o ld radio Shadow (i nvisibilit y through hypnosis) and add ing certa in embellish­ments (a purple costume and mask), Archie took their revamped character and loosed him on an unsuspecting world. The results were, to say the least . less Ihan sat isfying . Those who remembered the orig inal Shadow with fondness (and there were many) were appalled at this lackluster, tasteless imitation. Those new to the character were simply appalled. The mag quickly faded into the obscurity it so richly deserved.

The Shadow doesn't deserve the title of Worst Ever , however . The idea of resu rrecting the most popular hero of the forties was a good one, and had the Archie people been more true to the original , perhaps the book wou ld have been a success, as National's version (with a fine. painstak ing period art of Mike Kaluta) now is. In any case, il deserves the label of a good try .

The cover of the debut issue of THE GEEK announced : " Here Is The Rea l-life Scene of the Dangers in Hippie-Land!" Sounds far out, right? Like-righ t on? Well , it was n't. In fact, this overground attempt to ri p off the " countercu l­ture" circa t 968 was so inept that even hard-core co mics fana t ics turned thumbs down .

The Monster Times

This snappy inside cover from Dell's DRACULA It t shows you how to become a superhero in three quick , easy-to-fo llow steps. Advertised by Dell as a " Collectors Issue," DR ACULA was vo ted by comics maven Murray

as the Worst Comic Ever Produced.

SIMON STRIKES OUT

THE GEEK was Joe Simon's first comeback attempt at National. Tired of spending years as the second banana of the Simon-K irby leam . Joe had decided to strike out on his own and convinced National to give him a shot at a couple of his own creations. The Geek was Brother Power. an abandoned tailor's dummy that. when struck by lightning , was given life. fantastic st rength. and less than fantastic intelligence. Befriended by the young hippies who had an inadvertent hand in his creation , the Geek was soon using his powers to fight against the oppressions of " normal " society and the depredations of other splinter groups (biker gangs for the most part) .

This book. badly written (especially the dialogue). poorly drawn in typ ical Simon style. sti ll doesn't deserve the tille of Worst Ever. The basic underlying story of The Geek is an allegory. Indeed. the Geek's rise from dummy to shop foreman with many more advances ahead of him is typical Horatio Alger st uff and does have a place in the American mythos.

PREZ is Joe Simon's latest attempt at that elusive comeback . After the demise of the Geek , Simon had gone back to his editorial chores at National and plotted his return . The result was Prez. Prez is the first teenaged President of the U.S. Init ially g iven his start by a political boss, Prez soon declares his independence and his intention to do his best for his countrymen .

The book's main weakness is the unreality of the whole situat ion. The Boss has a Happy Face. just like those smile buttons you see everywhere, and the idea that a political unknown , a teenager, from back-country America could rise to immediate National Prominence is a naive one at best.

Again though , the book's saving grace is the fact that its premise is one in keep ing with our national ideals. The idea that anyone, no matter how humble, can become president (untrue though it might be) is a cornerstone of the American polit ical system - or at least the American po l itical fantasy. Again, l ike The Shadow and The Geek , the basic idea of Prez saves it from w in ning the tille of Worst Ever.

in justice, co rrupti on , evil , and g reed which fills this earth in the hope that somehow my example will be an example to all men."

Presents the Terrible Five, then , under threat of lawsu it from National Periodicals, who owned the Captain Marvel character since its settlement with Fawcett, fo lded quietly and without fanfare.

TO BEE OR NOT TO BEE

NEW YO RK'S MECCA FOR S·F FREAKS

" Eighlh A,. 141-0210

0 .. " l l . m to 10pm Tu. ·Sun

page 7

The Dracula superhero lasted one more issue (in which he emigrated 10 America and fought Admiral Maltemps and his giant. jet-propelled zeppelins) , before retiring to the comic book crypt- hope­fully for good.

co~~:,Na~~~~~~~h!~o~~~~~~ ~o; t~at~:~ ... _____________ _

After tailing with THE GEEK, art ist/wri ter Joe Simon tried aga in with PREZ and succeeded only in demo nstra tin g his remarkable- and frightening-cons i stency.

FROM DRACULA TO DRECKULA

DRACULA , then, is my choice fo r Worst Comic Ever Honors. Dracula was Del l's attempt to cash in on the popularity of the vampire movie and the success of Marvel's Dracula tille (Tomb of Dracula) . Dell , seeing these t rends. decided to do someth ing about it and use the original title Dracula (which they had a claim on because of their Movie Class ic line) lor a new superhero book.

The Dracula of the title is a descendant of the original Count. Unhappy al the (understandable) rancor attached to his name, this Dracula, a young scient ist, is attempting to do something about it. Using the blood of bats (what else?) he has developed a serum that wil l allow damaged brain cells to repair themselves. This, he feels , will permi t the cure of insanity and retardation, truly a feat the world would praise.

Finishing his task , he places the beaker conta ining the completed serum in a rack, inadvertently spilling some (embryon ic superheros are always c lumsy) in his drinking glass. Unaware of this error, he drinks a toast to his success. Im mediately the serum takes effect, and , instead of having h is brain cells healed , he f ind s himself transformed into ... a bat.

Returning to human form (why I'm nol quite sure), he wonders what he can do with this strange power. But fate (and the comic writer) give him a quick answer. At the Irontiers of his count ry, a convoy of trucks bearing so ld iers and guided missiles appears. Their leader, Boris Eval (g reat name for a vi llain, heh?), soon makes it known that his intentions are something less than friendly. He takes over the country (one guard is no match for his trained legions) and proceeds to set up

:~~:~~s~lfe n~ac~:~; ~I~~~~~~I~ lor a s inister

Chancing upon Castle Dracu la (it's a very small count ry), Eval decides to take it over as his headquarters , and, finding Dracula the scient ist there , forces him to work for his nefarious cause.

FROM BAT TO WORSE

However , Dracu la, a puny S8-pound weakl ing in c ivi lian form, is more powerful as a bat and, w ith the help of other bats, he manages to overcome Eval 's armies and ki ll the ch ief vi llain. The entire experience convinces him that he shou ld use his powers to fight for good, and , after a series of exercises to bui ld u p his human body and a trip to the tai lor for t he inevit­able su per costume, he takes the Dracula pledge (i mmortal ized on the zine's inside back cover):

'" pledge by the strange powers which have become mine to light against the

The Dracula books had many faults . They were poorly written, and apparently the people responsible were not sure if they wanted to be serious or not. The artwork was atrocious and the whole concept strenuously inane-even for a com ic book . Att!3mpting to cash in on the Dracula name, in a superhero comic, seems less than inspired (not to mention downright dumb). The resulting t ravesty is truly worthy of the title-trumpet blast and drum rol l - Worst comic Ever. The best summation is a l ine from the Dracula Comic itself-

" Now run along before we have you arrested tor imper­sonating a super-hero."

Amen!!!

Runners-up for the title of Worst Comic Ever inc lude a lot of all-time losers. Take the fol lowing, for example:

THE OWl-a Gold Key comic of 1968. Another example of Gold Key's (and Dell 's)

had been lim ited to such titles as Casper the Friendly Ghost and lit tle Audrey , was anot'her winner . A 25d giant, it featu red three main characters in separate stories. B-Man , the ti tl e character , started out interes t ingly enough as a man mad at earth for the way iI's treated him. Seems he was attacked by g iant bees (yes, bees) from Deimos , one of the Martian moons. The bees were brought to Earth in a government spaceship and their stings changed the metabol ism of Barry E. Eames (note the initia ls) , making him l ike unto a native of Deimos. The Government, predictably enough , placed him in a hospital for study , bu t Eames escaped , traveled to Deimos for inst ruct ion in his new powers, and returned to plunder the world. All in all , an interesting i dea. However, ir the second issue, a decision by the queen Sea (sic) of Deimos to conquer the earth makes Eames remember his humanity and causes him to renounce his life of crime. Now intent on becoming a crime-f ighter, Eames becomes a member of the F.8ee. 1. (their spelling , not mine). II's all downhill from there.

In what rank among the worst panels ever concocted, THE OWL activates the Owl·bomb while pil oting his lIy ing Owlmobile in his light aga inst the "Skull· Faced Duo" wh ose " lrenziedly­swinging an tics" included severa l attempts to do The Owl in. the artist/writer team of Siegel & Gill managed to save them the t rouble, however, by success fully doing the job themselves.

desire to break in to the superhero field. The Owl was just what the name impl ied , a superhero in an owl su it, · flying an owl-plane and having a companion named Owl Girl (what else?). The Owl 's powers are basically super-scientific. His owl­plane houses contro ls for Owlos, owl-like robots who can batter criminals in to sub­mission or blow them into atoms. They can also be taken over by criminals (very weak control systems) and used against the police. The OWl-gun seems a simple stun-ray and it must have a slippery grip since Owl constantly drops it so that his enemies can retrieve it and use it against him. All in all , another all-time disaster.

CAPTAIN MARVEl-a 1966 ripoff from M-F productions, this Captain Marvel bore no relation to either the famous Fawcett character (a.k.a. the Big Red Cheese) or to Marvel"s Mar-Veil. This Captain Marvel depended on the lure of his famous name and his power to sp lit , yes , split his body into numerous segments in order to fight his foes (he accomplished this by yelling the magic word "Split" at the top of his tungs !) If you can picture a superh ero with a head here, an arm there, a leg here, torso there, etc. , you can get some idea of what the who le mess looked like. The comic lasted fo ur issues and spawned a 25d companion, the apt ly-titled Captain Marvel

Also featured in the Bee-Man comiC were such great characters as the Glowing Gladiator, a reincarnation o f Hannibal who fights evil w ith ~a magic sword, and MagicMaster. a kind of genie who helps the young son of a murdered magician fight evil sorcerers. The gimmick here was that the story line is interrupted at intervals to give short lessons in magic, much the sort you see on the back of a Good 'n' Plenty box. For that matter the stories are about as entertaining as the Iront of a Good 'n° Plenty box .

SUPER HEROES -Another of Dell 's attempts to crack the market , the super­heroes of the title were the Fab 4-teen­agers who. through sheer force of will, could enter the bodies of androids and thus gain miraculous powers. The androids, incidentally, are display pieces in the Dell Hall of Heroes , along wi th such all- lime comic g reats as Nukla and Taka the Jungle King. Why androids with super powers are used as exh ibits is never explained.

After three issues with the kids switch­ing bodies back and fo rth , the fou rth , and (fortunately) f inal , issue features a story wherein they are imbued with the andro ids' powers in thei r own bod ies, thus setti ng up the usual secret-identity rigamarole.

THE GREAT REPRINTS RIP-OFF

The Geek 's "groovey (s ic) body" is chained to a freak show wall and not even his " fab strength" CRYPT OF SHADOWS, JOURNEY INTO will save him now . But don 't " geek out ," fans, fhe Geek's " lazy" hippie friends haye arriyed in th e nick. MYSTERY , SUPERNATURAL TALES, ETC.

Th is is a who le ser ies of reprin t t itl es put out by Marvel Com ics apparently for the sale purpose of making a lot of easy money. The stor ies are generally from o ld Atlas comics and featu re some of the worst scripting and artwork extant. Reprints are cheap to put out since the sole expense is the printing bi ll. Artists are not given any money on reprinted work, so a reprint book needs fewer sates to be successful and can serve as af] easy source of extra funds. Seems to me that a reprint l ine thai doesn·t at least print the best mater ial ava ilable is merely an attempt to rip off the collectcrs who buy everything and those unwary few who know not what they do . •

IvnUus: SEEN THE MOVIE I READ THE PAPER •••

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A sinister series of bizarre murders leaves a terror discarded peels and broken in its -wake! The killings are so brutal that even the placid residents of Los Angeles are forced to react ! Fear grips the city of smog , stars and cars as the body count continues to rise! Who or what is responsible? Why, it is the schlockthropus-a menacing simian as slippery as the banana peels he leaves at the scenes of his crimes and the star of a new monster movie spoof called SCHLOCK. TMT Media Editor tells all about it below ...

GO APE. YOUNG MAN Is it King Kong? Mighty Joe Young? Or

maybe th e TMT a pe? Nope, it's SCHLOCK, from the film of the same name now making the rounds of the ne ighborhood theatres in an attempt to br ing some sorely-needed humor into the jugular vein. SCHLOCK is a missing Ii nk-a schlockthropus-released from an icy prison to go on a rampage of banana murders in Los Angeles. SCHLOCK, played by creator/director John Landis, is a sort of simian Buster Keaton. who has a comedic nare for the old. time-worn apeman theme worked to death in countless B films. SCHLOCK was never intended Lo be a serious horror film and as such might be a letdown for those who go into it expecting another ape-thriller.

SCHLOCK has a whol e list o[ interesting characters to use as foils. His arch enemy is Detective Sgt. Wino of the L.A. Police. Assisting Sgt. Wino is TV newsman Joe Putzman, who holds a body count contest on live television as the banana murders progress. They are called 'banana murders' because at t he scene of each of t he mini· massacres. piles of banana peels are found mixed with the piles of corpses.

ECLECTIC APEMAN Producer James O'Rourke and

director Landis have taken great pains to cover as much monster· ground as possible when lampooning their

Schlock takes a young friend in paw and scru t ini zes poster tro m KI NG KO NG VS. GODZILlA , no doubt dream ing of the day when he can make i t in to the heavyweigh t monster class .

Schlock enjoys a mou th l ui 01 mi lk d uring a break In action . SCHLOCK, " Mightier than K ing Kong" and " Larger than The Incredible Shrinki ng Man," was completed many moons ago but has yet to see release in New York theaters.

~ SCH LOCK IT TO ME," quips dazed lady In the hirsute clutches

01 the screen'S lirst Schlock

thropus. star of a new monster

movie satire to (hopefully ) end

all monster movie satires.

Schlock (played by fil m maker

John Landis ) Is par1ialto

bananas . milk and murder and eventually find s

happiness with a blind gi rl who

thinks he's a dog .

[rom KING KONG to TROG THE TERRmLE. They have Schlock visit supermarkets. t heatres showing horror films, and even spoof t he famous. monster­meets·child scene from FRANKEN­STEIN, Some of the bits are nonsensical. however. and geared for the younger audiences. This spoils the fun for t he serious horror fan who can appreciate a fe w well-placed barbs about t hose dreadful apeman films we all have had to suffer t hrough ... like the George Zucco

in his racoon coat. make-up for t he

l" ch lockthro'puswas created by 20-year-old Baker, who learned his craft well at

the elbow of TV make·up expert Dick Smith. Smith did the make-up for t he TV versions of DORIAN GREY and JEKYL & HYDE, and recently. with Baker. did the ter ror-filled movie version of THE EXORCIST. Baker was honored by the knowledge t hat he received praise from J ohn Chambers. who crea ted the PLANET OF THE APES make·ups. [or his own bestial creation.

Of course. there were problems with the film. For instance. director Landis saved time by driving to work in his car- and in his Schlock make-up. Imagine the sight of a large ape in glasses and straw hat driving a Pinto up the freeway at rush hour!

Monster comedies Lhat are intended as comedies are rare and SCHLOCK is the best one yet, despite its flaws. Most of the naws result from a lack of control over the situations which tend to grow silly and become devoid of style or meaning. Is an ape playing a piano really that funny?

Ta\en at face value, SCHLOCK is a brilliant attempt at monster humor which comes oCf in part and Cails at some strategic moments. The action. however, holds your attention even th rough some of the most routinely dull acting in years. That's one of the problems with these amateur productions the lack of resources. I know that all aspiring actors need a chance to air their talents but. with all due respect for the producers and distributors, not in a theatre at three bucks a throw. For that same fee I can get Heston, McDowall and a host of finer actors. If SCHLOCK is intended to compete, then future 'schlocks' should concentrate on acting-the essence of any film because acting makes eved the most improbable script believable if done well-and not on fancy make·up. regard· less of how well·done. Some of the most terri fying films ever done had no visible monsters.

So if you're r ich or if there is a good double bill. invest your three clams for a few chuckles and couple of banana murders. St:HLOCK is a neat expp.riment.

You weren ' t expecting us to mar this otherwise atrocious issue with a typical high-quality edition of our usually excellent -Monster Scene, were you? Instead of the usual great stulf , we're u sing this page to run all the loose IlIIer material that 's been gathering cobwebs on the TMT shelves-a TMT. Trivia Quiz, a TMT Horrorscope (without which you won' t know your incredible luture) and a rare contribution from Ih. TMT Dept. of Praise. We would have lolsted 'unher useless items on you but, fonunetely , we fan out of room .

TMTTERROR TRIVIA QUIZ

BY Bill FERET and JOE KANE

It's time to tighten your th inking electrodes , put pen in paw and prepare to lest your H .Q. (Horror Quotient) by taking the TMT Terror Trivia Quiz . Regular readers 01 TMT already know that it is not our policy to let monster fans 011 lightly , and we'll be the lirst to admit that our terror test i s a fiendish one , lull 01 tough, probing questions (the kind monsters like). But we think that the monster mavens who read TMT would be highly ollended were we to spri ng an easy , undemanding quiz on them. To calculate your score , add up the points next to all questions answered correctly and multiply by tw o. All those who get a grade 01 50 or tes s w ill. 01 course , be expected to 10rWard explanatory notes apologiz. ing in abjecl terms lor their poor performances. Minus further ado then , here's our TRIV iA QUIZ :

I , Whal famous aclor was the only one to have the distinction of playing the Mummy. Dracu la , Frankenstein Monster and the Wolf Man? 11 pt .]

2, What was Ihe name of Ihe song that Terry Moore played to pacify MIGHTY JOE YOUNG? [1 pl. ]

3, Academy Aw ard winning aclo r Clilf Robert son played what TV space hero early in his career? 11 pt. ]

4, Fay Wray was Ihe firs t to scream at KING KONG , but what damsel in distress did all the screaming in the sequel. SON OF KONG? /1 pt. ]

5 Complete the following film l ilies by supplying the m issing word . [8 pIS .) THE INCR EDIBLE .. " .. .. MA N, n i E AMAZING ..... .. ... MAN, THE HIDEOUS SU N .. .... .. .. TERROR FROM THE YEA R" CATMAN OF .. TH E HORRIB LE DR, . THE AWFUL OR ., THE DIABOLICAL DR .

6 . How many heads does Ghidrah , the 3-Headed Monster have? 11 pt .)

7 What famous fiend terrorized the BOWERY AT MIDNIGHT in the 1942 Monogram quick ie of the same name? j 1 pl .]

8, Whal was Boris Karlo fl's real name? Bela Lugosi 's? Rondo Hat­ton's? Glenn Strange's? 14 pts .]

9 . What SC i-ii film of the 50s centered around a Russian invasion o f the U ,S,? 11 pt .}

10. Match Ihe hero with the movie monslerhe ballled: [10pIS.] (1) Tim Ho lt (6) Brian Donlevy (2) Kenneth TOb.ey (7) Don Sullivan (3) Dave O'B riO/f (8) Ra ymond Burr (4) Forrest Tucker (9) Jack Kelly (5) Richard Carlson (10) Guy Madison

tal CR EATURE FRO LAGOON fb) BEAST OF HOLLOW MOUNTAIN tc) GODZILLA (d ) SHE DEVIL (e) THE THING (f) DEVIL BAT (g ) THE CRAWLING EYE (h) THE MONSTER THAT

CHALLENGED TH E WORLD Ii) THE GIANT GILA MONSTER (j) THE CREEPING UNKNOWN

11, Buster Crabbe is synonymous WI th the character Fla sh Gordon , but another aCIor played Flash on TV , Name him. 11 pl. )

12, Mulliple Choice . [S pIs,) You can destroy a vampire with all of the followmg, except one , Which one? (a) wooden s take (b) wolfbane (c) sunl ight (d ) cruci f ix The " 7th Planet" is' (a) Jupiter (b) Mars Ic) Krypton (d) Uranus Mexico's answer 10 Christopher Lee

" . fa} Paul Naschy (c) German Robles Ib) Abel Salazar (d) Fernando Mendez A, dementeo (;osmetlcs tycoon who IUfned herself mto a mons ter was featured in whIch of the following films? ia) THE WASP WOMAN \b ) THE LEECH WOMAN (c ) THE CAT GIRL (d ) SH E DEVIL

THETMT DEPT.

l ite en Ihe hope of fendmg somelhlng ­no mailer how small or insignificant ­that we could honestly praise, pat on the back and proclaIm. sans shame :

OF PRAISE Presents

A SALUTE TO NEE-XON!

After going over this entire issue with a careful, critical eye (which has since been reTurned 10 its original owner), your Hendly TMT editors were afraid we might be giving you the impressiOn that we're a Ihoroughly naSTy. negative !ot. What WiTh the whole issue deVOTed 10 Ihe worst 01 Ihis, The worst of that. alld even the worst 01 the other Thing, It looked to US as Ihough there was nothing thai could touch our cold, cotd hearts, nothing thai could squeeze even so mUCh as a singte grunt Of approval ou l of us, We want 10 stress that nothing-not even the President Of these Unlled SIates-cou!d be furt her from the trulh !n order to demonstrate this, we took II upon oursetves to search all(! scour through drawer ar'ICI

"Thank you fOf a job well done," Well. we're happy to report That we

tound that something-a cover Irom DC's FROM BEYOND THE UNKNOWN No 17 which oeplcts the encredlb!e viSIon of a disturbed Jovian (that's a resIdent at Jupiter) who keeps flashing strange images 01 a world called Earth, a wortd dominated by a man called Nil(on. White l he story I i sell-~The impoS$ible World Named Earth!"­doesn't have much to do with Nixon (or "Nee-Xon" as the Jovlans refer 10 hIm), we found the cover itself a refreshing change of the current pace. Fo. here Mr. NIxon is nOl depicted-as he so often is nowadays-wagging an angry lingel at a Clew of nosy newsmen or forming an involuntary list while fending off rude questions, nOf is he pIctured in a pose of dejection, staling Sltently and sut!enly as, one by one, hl$ formerly loyal henchmen eIther reSIgn at! around hIm a. are hauled olf to !all No, on Ihls comic book cover , we are spa.ed the SIght 01 the captain gOIng down wll h hIS rapidly SInking shIp 01 state Instead , we ale treated to a plclu1e of a healthy. happy Presldent­eyes a-lwlnkte and cheeks at! of a rosy' hue-standing In a pose 0 1 trlum;;h and

In which 01 the fOllowing films did Boris KarloH not play the Franken­stein Monsler? (a) FRANKENSTEIN (b ) BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (e) SON OF FRANKENSTEIN (d ) GHOST OF FRANKENSTEIN

t 3. What do you call those things Sticking out of the Frankenstein Monster's neck? 11 pl. ]

14, Complete the fo l lowing film titles by underlining the correcl word, INVASION OF THE (HEAD. BODY , PURSE) SNATCHERS. DAY TFiE WORLD (WEPT , YAWN ED, ENDED). THE EARTH DIES (SCREAMING, LAUGHING . TRYING ). THE DA Y THE EARTH STOO D (TALL , STR AIGHT , STILL ),

, 5. Th e name of Ihe World's 1 st Newspaper of Horror, Sci-Fi and Fantasy is ." .. .... ? [I pl. ]

True 0 1 False : IS pis .) Harryhausen designed KI NG

BLACULA was Ihe name of Ihe screen 's lirst Jewish Vampire. The end o f the world is at hand . I! monsters didn' t exisl, man would have had to invent them ,

17 , " Do you realize that during the Dark Ages we WOuld have been burned at the stake as wizards lor thIS?" was a line ultered by which of Ihe follOWing actors ? II pt. ] (a) Bela Lugosi in DRACULA fb) Ernest Theslger in BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN IC ) John Carradine In CAPTIVE WILD WOMAN

18, The 1931 FRANKENSTEIN and DRA CULA were produced by whal film studio? 11 p l.]

19, Who was Ihe host o f TV's SCIENCE FICTION THEATER seri es ? )1 p l. ) 20 , 00 you think Ihis l es t was worth laking? l l pt ..] •

The Monster Times

Ever wonder about what's in store lor Crystal Ball Dept. have been hard at you in your incredible futu re? The work t ryi ng to answer that ques\inn lines t minds from Ihe TMT Mystical and have finally come up with your ..

TMT HORRORsCOPE AR IES (March 2~-Apri' 19) Sorry , Anes. bu t have we go t bad news for you ! You Wi ll be abduc ted by ahens from outer space who w ill el(hibit you al an Interplanetary sideshow, You WIll be tormented by hecklers and grossly underpaid, bu t we urge you NOT 10 complaIn , They have no regards for workers ' rights up there .

LIBRA (September 23·0ctober 22) You wi ll be recelveng a much·needed, com pany-paId vacatIon , Unfortunate­ty , you will spend .t on a st range Pac ifIC i sle where It will be suddenly disrupted by a huge ape who will kidnap your wife and lake her to New York with h im, They'll be a hit for awhile but will cut you ou t the considerable profilS .

TAURUS (April 20- Ma y 20): Beware , Taurus. You will be set upon by drool ing f iends who will beat you, tort ure you, hack you in to litUe pieces and teave you for dead , What's worse, it will lake several days before you l ully recuperat e ,

GEMINI (May 21-June 20) : You'll have too much on your mind. Gemini. Your splil personality wi ll splil yet again and there will be FOUR 01 you to worry about. Your shrink bills will double,

CA NCER (June 21·Ju ly 22) You WIll corne down wi lh a mys terious Ill ness, That's bad! But Ihe lit ness will not be pam ful ThaI's good! You wil t be reqUIred to consul! yo ur doctor That's bad! But your doc lor WIll tel ! you over the phone thaT Ir s nothHlg se reous . Tnat's good I BUT he's gomg on vacalion and can't see you , That's bad ! However . he wi ll have a replace· rnent look at you , That's good! Bu t Ihe replacemenl IS a " mad " doctor. ThaI 'S bad! He WIll remove your brain and PUT it in the body o f a gori lla , That's bad too. but he' l l also take 20 00 0 11 your bill and Ihars not bad al all nowadays,

LEO (July 23-Augus l 22 ) ' Things will be looking good for a lime. bul will alter dras t ically when yOur apartmen t is invaded by hostile po tt ergeists who WIll make rude noises. mock your m osl cherished values and throw el(pensive objects around , Neighbors WIll comp lain of th e commotion and have you evicted ,

VIRGO (August 23-September 22) : Your shdeng lovelil e i s due lor a p Ick -up . You WIll meet a tall. dark , handsome s trang er , He wi ll be very ch arming , appealing and polite , Un lortunalely , he will also be a va'mpere , He will lake your blood. cut II WIth ketchup and peddle it on the streets of Tra nss ylvan ia , You wi ll be understandably u~ se1.

proudly flashing hiS famous two­handed v lor Victory salute. At! in at! , a slghl/oreven the sorest of eyes,

Sure, irs easy to critIcize M. , Nixon , a man whose name and administration have become synonymous with decep­tion, corruptio'l, duplicity, mendacity. ClIme In the White House, BlgbrOlherty surveIllance lactics, covert operations both l o.elgn and domesllC, deadpan fanatICIsm, subservIence to the IIch and powerful, indiflerence to the poor and powerless, and only God (and Nlxonl knows what else. But there's another Side to the man who made paranOia the new aliona! pastime .. and we Ihmk lhat side is eloquently captu.ed by the comic book cover on vlewhe.e,

AI any rale. we hope Ihls amply proves Ihat your TMT edilors can condone as wen as COndemn. No rna He. what further acc usations, insullS and innuendos are hurled a! our fearlul leade. , we'd Just like to take this opportunlly to say a simple, humble, 'Thank you. Goalather."

Wnew , that's certam!y a laud 011 our m.nds

As IS wet! known, yOu can 1001 some of Ihc people an of Ihe " me and all of 1I1e people some of the lime. bul Mr N I ~on has demonstrated ,"at even if you 1001 n(l(le 01 the people none of Ihe Tlmp. vou Cdn gel away WI llI il •

SCORPIO (October 23-November 21 ): You are a fine human specimen, You are unusually brave, loyal, even-tem­pered. generous , kind to child ren and small animals and Ihe object of everyone's respec t. None 01 these virtues will help you , however. when World War III breaks oul.

SAGITTARIU S (November 22·Decem­ber 21 ) : A funny thing will happen to you on the way to work . You will be approached by a shabby hard·luck monster. He will teli you he hasn't had a bite in th ree days, You will b ite him , He will fail 10 see the humor , You will be in big trouble ,

CAPRICORN (December 22.January, 19) : You will be l eeli ng paranoid all monlh, You wi ll thin k that peop le are Ou l lo get you . You will be suspiC iOUS o f everyone . You will feel convinced that you are losing your m ind , Relax, Capricorn! You're not losing your mind . They ARE out to get you

AOUARIUS (January 20-February 18): Don'l look now, Scorpio. but there's an 8 loot monSler behind you who th lllks you're making fun 01 him,

PISCES (February 19-March 20) : We WI sh we had somelhing positive to lell you. Pisces. but in your case we feel the best policy i s to follow the old adage, "The less said, Ihe more unspoken," What's going to happen 10 you is in such bad laste that we'd ralher not say anything, •

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The Monster Times 11

TWIN TEEN TERROR·BILL!

The most amazing motion picture

of our time!

Ti' IVVA

EENAGE WEREWOLF

YVONNE LIME. WHIT BISSELL· TONY MARSHAll ~ Ir IDIUII CMJI ...... If" f1I\II Jr •• ,.,..,lrUill

Michael Landon as the high schoollroublemaker whose transfor­mation into the peachfuzz lycanthrope gave him license to un leash h is adolescen t aggressions and teenage lusts. Together with the Teenage Frankenstein, he sta rted a teen terror trend t hai las ted for a lmost two whole yea rs.

TMT Editl:>r Joe Kane has been busily ruining eye & mind alike watching awful monster movies ever since he was knee-high to a popcorn machine. While he's knee-high to most popcorn chines , he now ruins his WRITING about his monstrous movie memories. A former teen­ager himself (and not a very exemplary one at that), he now turns his attention to the Teenage Monster craze of the 50s, an eerie area that, even in the midst of the current Grease Age nostalgia boom, has gone largely over­looked . He seeks to explain why below .. .

A s anyone who went through the Grease Age of the 50s and lived to tell about it knows, teenagers were a much-maligned minor ity in those dark days, misunderstood fiends capable of striking terror into the fast-beating hearts of intimidated adu lts with a single flick of the switchblade. And during the 50s, after decades of horror movies ruled by over­middleagcd monsters. Hollywood schlock merchants discovered that t.eenagers could be every bit as chill ing and profitable as the genre's more decrepit characters-seni le mad doctors. ancient aliens. varicose va mpires and downright prehistoric monsters. Besides. it just didn't. seem right that the horror movie screen. which was largely stared at by teenagers and pre-adolescents. continue to be dominated. like the rest of the world, by tired-blood junkies and other monsters of the Then Generation. A lot of your standard monsters were well past their prime and. frankly, it was beginning to show. Many of them looked like they should have been worrying about laying paws on their next social security check rather than a fresh victim. Take GodzilJa , for example, currently the genre's most

durable monster bUL a mi llion years old if he's a day-years enough Lo span 50,000 generation gaps. These monslers, iL was decided, could not longer paw it like they lIsed La. Never mind Beauty; it's a wonder it wasn'ta coronary killed the Beast.

Teenagers seemed a natural when the time came to revitalize the aging ranks of Monslerdom. After all, during the 50s. when people weren't fretting over the Bomb or the Inte rn ational Godless Commie Conspiracy, they were quite often focusing their wide-lensed paranoia on the rock-crazed teenaged hoods who

were already slashing up the screen in hot rod epics like DRAGSTRIP RIOT and THE COOL AND THE CRAZY. j.d. flicks lik e J UVEN ILE JUNGLE. HIGH SCHOOL CAESAR, and TEENAGE CRIME-WAVE, as well as in such serious probes into adolescent ennui as BLACK­BOARD JUNGLE and REBEL WITH· OUT A CAUSE. That aliens were already in our midst was not to be disputed.

NIGHTMARE OF RHYTHM

The 50s were rife with stale riffs anyway: boredom was in its heyday and people looked towards the unnatural disasters of the age for entertainment and vicarious intensity, seeking to be fed their kicks intravenously by hooking up to super·t hreat.s like the aforementioned Bomb, the Red Menace, and Rock'n'Rol!. Many people have probably forgotten the hysteria, te rror, and panic-stricken prose that gree ted the arrival of rock'n'roll, <rnd the insane passions it alleged ly ignited in t.he souls of the young. An assistant district attorney in Massachusetts de­scribed the effect of rock music on the impressionable and inherently lewd minds of our nation's youngfolk in the following livewire words. "Tin Pan Alley has unleashed a new monster," the distraught D,A, wrote, "a sort of nightmare of rhythm. Some of our disc jockeys have put emotional TNT on their turntables, Rock 'n'roll gives young hoodlums an excuse t.o get together. It inflames teenagers .....

All across the coun try, scandal after scandal rocked t he American public, ever threatening to knock it off the balls of its poorly arched feet. In Asbury Park, New J ersey, 25 "vibrating teenagers" had to be hospitalized in the aftermath of a riotous record hop, Rock'n'roll was banned from city swimming pools in San Antonio, Texas when local authorities objected to the "spastic gyrations" it induced in nearly naked teenage bathers, Elvis Presley, the once and future King of Rock'n'RolI. was labeled a "whirling dervish of sex" by one irate minister, and

The Original Teenage Rock'n'roll Monster­Elvis Presley. A l ittle older now, a bit more Jowl around that famous sneer, but still in there twitchin ',

page 12

his records were publicly burned in purifi­cation riluals that replaced the scent of burning witch· fl esh with that of smoking plastic. The claws of the rock'n'roll monster we re knuck le-deep in writh ing teenage flesh and were twisting it to its will , as the youth of our nation , the future leaders of the land, danced a mindless mambo into the ot her limits of sin and degradation.

So, with the image of the American teenager as spastic. vibrating, lust­inflamed monster growing with alarming a lacrity . the time seemed right to int roduce . th is snarling. jiving. barely human creature into t he horror film as well. Since no one appr eciated this image more than th~ ,typical American teenager himself, the audience for teenage monster movies was already there and waiting to half-watch them in drive-ins all over the land. The firs t to wrap their hands around the crank of the Grade B monster movie machine we re the moguls at American: International Pictures. a newly formed schlock studio whose specialty was youth movies. AlP would lead the way in both the juvenile delinquent and horror movie fie lds. as they would in the 60s in beach movies and biker films.

I WAS A ROCK'N'ROLL TEENAGE COMMIE MONSTER

FROM OUTER SPACE To appeal to the teen crowd, some films

placed teenagers in the r ole of world· saviors keeping civilization-as-they·knew. it safe from , among other t hreats. THE BLOB (battled by a young Steve McQueen in 1958), THE SPIDER (1958), the INVASION OF THE SAUCERMEN (1957), and THE GIANT GILA MON· STER (1959). But most of the films featured the teenager as the monster itself. usually a misguided creature provoked by deranged. evil adults into embark ing on rampages of anti-social adolescent revenge. The first and most famous of these were AlP's I WAS A TEENAGE FRANKENSTEIN and I WAS A TEENAGE WEREWOLF, both released in 1957, with Gary Conway and Michael Landon (who later became 'Little J oe' on TV's BONA.J:1ZAl respectively as t he 50s Frankenstein Monster and the peachfuzz lycanthrope. While t here wasn't a hell of a lot to choose between them, TEENAGE WEREWOLF held a slim critical edge over his frightfaced counter­part. if only for Landon's adequate portrayal of the title character. Both the

THE SHE CREATURE

One o f the Frightening F ifties' most durab le fiends was a less-than.lovely lady named THE SHE CREATURE . Fashioned by A lP monster maker Paul Blaisdell, the hard-work ing amphibian originally starred In THE SH E CREATU RE in 1956, reappeared the fOllowing year in VOODOO WOMAN , and turned up again in two ter­rible leen terror films, HOW TO MAKE A MONSTER (1958) and GHOST OF DRAG­STRIP HOllOW (1959J . The gilled girrs multiple appearances were more the result 01 economic considera t ions (the monster took many months and much money to makeJthan popular demand. however, and her horrific ubiq uity serves as ye l another example 01 AlP's lIa ir lor self-advert ise· men t. The She Creature f inally ret ired in 1959, 10 the delight 01 many and Ihe dismay 01 few . 0

Teenage Werewolf. ..emse lves in the employ of the same veteran character actor, Whit Bissel, who played a demented father· figure to the offensive offspring-in the former as a descendant of Dr. Franken· stein, in the latter as a typically mad shrink. I WAS A TEENAGE FRANKEN· STEIN deserves some kind of recognition for the sheer guts displayed by its make-up man, who fashioned one of the most outlandish masks ever to hide the otherwis e bland good looks of a forge ttable Grade B actor .

Predictably enough, the above titles proved so successful that AlP immediate­ly saw fit to unleash a teenage female vampire in BLOOD OF DRACULA 1I957), a film that had nothing to do with Dracula. and one that was pretty bloodless to boot. Like many a screen teenager , the female vampire (played by Sand ra Harrison) was born into a world she didn't even create, a victim of forces she- and the audience­could barely comprehend. Abandoned by her parents at an a ll-girls ' school (with t he exception of a creepy teenage ca retaker who, being the on ly male around, becomes the sole beneficiary of the girls' amatory affections ), t he girl, who demonstrates early in the proceedings that she is possessed of a violent temper and headstrong nature, is promptly hypno­ti zed and turned into a bloodsucker by a warped schoolteacher seeking revenge on those who would scoff at her "scientific experimen ts," While a lso integrating distorted teen e phemera into an otherwise complete ly sta ndard , c1iche·shackled plot, BLOOD OF DRACULA is even worse than the two previous teenage outings in that it is not only bad but uncompromis· ingly dull , and even in terrupts th inaction at one point with a ty pical poverty row AlP product ion number in which a fri e nd of the care taker's sings a greasy ode to adolescence. BLOOD OF DRACU,LA a lso makes the mistake of doling out its acne-scarred absurdities wi th a stra igh t (if not pos itively blank) face. th us committing the most gr ievous offense a Grade B monster movie can commi t: the cr ime of taking itself ser ious ly.

WITH A LITILE HELP FROM THEIR FIENDS

The teenage monsters discussed above were greeted with so lucrative a response that AlP promptly brought back the

FRANKENSTEIN 'S DAUGHTER wa s a teen­age drppou t hooked on a dangerous drug call ed Degeneral which not only took a terrible toll on her mind and di sposition but also turned her into a rampaging monsler with a horribly blemi shed lace that no amount of Clears­s i l could cure ,

Te.e nage Frankens t e in and Teenage Wer ewolf for a high school reunion in HOW TO MAKE A MONSTER. let loose the following year, 1958 (and teenage monster scholars endless ly debate wheth­er 1957 or 1958 should be considered as the yea r for teenage monster movies­personally I have no opinion; it's too crucia l a decision to be made by the likes of me). HOW TO MAKE A MONSTER chronicles the adventures of a mad Hollywood make·up man whose own s pecial greasepain t rec ipe contains a secret ingredient which, again with the he lp of a little hypnot ism .. is capable of mak ing deadly monsters out of lifeless aC lors. But flOW TO MAKE A MONSTER fail ed to li ve up to the standa rds se t by the prev ious films-not an easy fea t. considering those standards. HOW TO MAKE A MONSTER was. despi te its catchy t it le. a pretty plodding e ffort, with the shrill neurotic make·up ma n (Hobert H. Harr is) getting his revenge, with a lit tle help from his fie nds (Gary Conway and Gary Clarke) . on the thick heads of the movie studio. who are planning to phase out horror films in favor of musica ls, thereby pu tting him and the teenage monster actors out of work. The studio itse lf bears more than a

r esemblance to the AlP studios where, of course, the film was actually shot, and the only satisfying aspect of HOW TO MAKE A MONSTER is the methodica l elimina­t ion of the mindless moguls at the hands of

Before becoming the MAN FROM U.N .C.L.E. , Robert Vaughn made ends meet by play ing the restless TEENAGE CAVEMAN back in 1958.

The Monster Times

the mad make-up monsters. Countless horror film fans have d oubtlessl y entertained similar fantasies about t he .A.IP execs.

page 13

teenage troublemakers grow to gargan­t uan propor tions while their minds remain the same, but this was the last attempt to pr('sent. the greaser as monster. Other hor ror fil ms exploited t he boundless terror possibilities of children, films like CHILDREN OF THE DAMNED (1964), VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED (1960), THESE ARE THE DAMNED (1961 ). THE GAMMA PEOPLE (1956), and THE SPACE CHILDREN (1958), but they're another story. No horror film has yet to explore wha t it is probably the most horrifying concept of a ll. though-a conscienceless. innocent, rampaging 50 foot infant. a monster of insatiable needs. But may be t hat's too terrifying a thought f(lr even horror film audiences to accept.

More rece ntly film s like Sta nley Kubrick's A CLOCKWORK ORANG E, Barry Shear's WILD IN THE STREETS (1968). and a camp biker -monster opus called WEREWOLVES ON WHEELS [see TMT #25 ) used youngsters as figures of evil , bu t the age of the pompadoured rock'n'roll grease monster is over. With all t he 50s nostalgia that's been in abundance of late, there seem to have been few tears

AlP always exhibited an ir ritating flair for se lf·adver t isement. and shots 9f film posters from previous AlP productions, movie marquees announcing other AIP fli cks, and other se lf-referentia l shtiks abound in the early AlP films. Their next two productions wit h teen terror elements were full of references to earlier works. In DIARY OF A HIGH SCHOOL BRIDE, (l959), for example, a non-horror fi lm that had its mome nt.s, a jealous teenage psychotic (Chr is Robinson) abducts the high school bride of the t itle and takes her ' to his fa ther's place-which just happens to be a movie studio .. The young degener­ate shows her a lobby pos ter from one of his father's films, which happens to be from SCREAMING SKULL, an earlier AlP production. None of this had anything to do with ot her events depicted in the film, of course, but AlP execs seem unable to resist plugging as many of their films as possible, any way they can. Every movie marquee glimpsed briefly will invariably feature the title of an AlP film (in their ·TERROR FROM THE YEAR .,000 characters in the film took time off to see I WAS A TEENAGE FRANKENSTEIN) and in DIARY OF A HIGH SCH90L BRIDE, this self-advertising gimmick reatly cheapened the effect of an otherwise almost bearable film.

Plastic spider attacks equally plastic moon maiden in Astor's MISSilE TO THE MOONJ remake of CAT-WOMEN OF THE MOON (1954) with a pairof juvenile delinquents thrown In for relevance.

AlP's next teen terror film, a "comedy" ·entitled GHOST OF DRAGSTRIP HOL­LOW (1959), also featured similar plugs, including a guest appearance by the title monster of AlP's THE SHE CREATURE, who shares house-haunting honors with a gang of teenage defectives. With all the deftness and levity of an elephant telling a people joke, the AlP writers labor for laughs in the most inane manner imaginable. offering a vision of the world

TEENAGE CA VEMAN(1958) starred a young Robert Vaughn and was the worst of the lot. The plot hinges on the title character's quest for knowledge, a fairly futile project. all things considered. Despite the warnings of the older members of the cave community. ,the teenage hero ventures into the Forbidden Land, only to discover that the film is over before anything of even .the slightest significance has managed to take place. That sort of thing can happen at even the best of film studios and almost

The Teenage Werewolf (Gary Clarite) and Teenage Frankenstein (Gary Conway) had a high school reunion in HOW TO MAKE A MONSTER in 1958, another banner year for teenage fiends. AlP , InCidentally, is planning to re-release several of its abominable "beach movies" with Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello soon.

so uncompromisingly anti-creative and banal that the overall effect is terrifying indeed.

AlP's next effort, BUCKET OF BLOOD. was not exactly a teenage monster offering (its hero was at least 20) but it was an improvement over earlier film" like the INVASION OF THE SAUCERMEN. in whir.h a local lovers' lane is terrorized by slow-thinking, bug-eyed creatures (and those were only the teenagers-the Saucermen were even worse)_ BUCKET OF BLOOD (19.9) starred Dick Miller (a character actor who deserves a footnote by vu-tue of his having appeared in almost every Roger Corman movie) as a would-be "beatnik" who, in order to prove his artistic worth to his slick hipster peers, lops off human heads. coats them with clay, and passes them off as sculptures. Needless to say, he quickly becomes the hero of the B movie coffee house crowd (who, of course, are unaware of his grisly work habits) until he is inevitably found out. BUCKET OF BLOOD was AlP's and Roger Corman's idea of a black comedy but. while it's better than most of its predecessors. is not worthy of the lavish attention it's received from obscure horror film pedants.

happened at AlP. A surprise endmg informs the audience that the cavedwel­lers are actually our descendants, t~e only remnants of a civilization felled by nuclear warfare.

MOST TERROR TEENS Other studios also tried their hand at

ma~ufacturing teenage monster movies. Umversal released MONSTER ON CAM­PUS (1958), in which a 50s college student rev.erts to an even more primitive state; whIle Warner Brothers was represented ·by a 1959 effort called TEENAGERS FROM OUTER SPACE (19.9). Indepen­dent film companies also chipped in. Astor Films contributed FRANKENSTEIN'S DAUGHTER (1958) and MISSILE TU THE MOON (19.9). In FRANKEN­STEIN'S DAUGHTER, a promiscuous teenager is injected with a disfiguring and anxiety-provoking drug called Degeneral, causing her to run amok in the California suburbs before being burned in the requisite lab fire. MISSILE TO THE MOON concerned itself with the criminal adv e nt ures of a pair of ju venile delinquents (Tommy Cook and Gary Clarke) who stowaway on the title vehicle in what ranks as the lowest-budgeted space probe even in Grade B monster

movie history. Howco-International pr., duced the succinctly titled TEENAGE MONSTER (1958), in which a mad mutant teenager literally comes out of the closet in which his embarrassed mother keeps him locked to terrorize a Western town. and Governor Films was responsible for TEENAGE ZOMBIES (1960), w.ho got that way through the efforts of mad Commie scientist-spies operating off the Florida coast.

By 1960. the teenage terrorism seemed to have just about run its course, at least in the B monster movie format. Fairway-International, another indepen­dent outfit, produced THE SADIST in 1963, a film based loosely on the Charles Starkweather killings, and EEGAH!, a

. horror stalks terrified teen in press­ar! from Howco's TEENAGE MONSTER,

the first, but one of the most obscure, of the teenage terror fitms.

1962 release that culminated in a battle of shed over the disappearance of the teen wits between an inarticulate and rudely monster movies-indeed, they've been awakened Stone Age giant and an equally hardly mentioned at all. If this piece inarticulate rock singer. Warner Brothers accomplished nothing else. I'd like to think did a teenage version of H.G. Wells' "Food it has at least demonstrated why the of the Gods" in 1965 (VILLAGE OF THE teenage monster movies have been so GIANTS). in which the bodies of a gang of thoroughly and painlessly forgotten. •

Dig it. Daddy_o, Ihe::oe cool cos .

blast your flesh oU SOoner'n 10:I~tC:~~ .f~on~ ~~~~~~~ce are a boss bUnch of bad Th Y weapons can stop th I go-gelters whO 'll

ey blast the II h em. NOle'en ';p gunS!

es off hUmans!

leenage '88If,.IDS from Another Worlf OD a Bay-OUD Bampage I

The Monster Times

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The Monster nmes

When we send TMT's jack-ol-all­schlocks, M.C. Richards , out on an assignment, we can never be sure 01 what he'll come back with. Which explains why he's seen so olten in our pages.

But when M.C. came back with this story, we knew he had hit

upon the perfect leature lor this, our TMT worst issue. No stranger to med iocrity himself , M.C . returned with this report on Comicdom's Inlerior Five (which does not reler to the live major comic companies ... at least not in this case.)

doer. He was also a foi l for more of Dumb Bunny 's tomfoolery:

The Blimp: ';1 had a fight with my g irl! She lefl in a huff!"

Dumb Bunny: "A Huff? Really? I wish I could afford one of those little foreign cars!"

The only thing missing was someone playing a violin.

15

DRACULA LIVES. but It's anything but a vampl.e. Instead . DRACULA is Ihe lille 01 12 ne ... magazines di.eci Irom England . Each issue is in lull color Ihroughout the hook . lealunng the art 01 such Spanish greals as Esteban MerOla :who dMS thechllrecte' WOLFF). EnriCh Sic a nd J . M. Bea. These 12 bookscont.'n art likeyou·.,e n.ver SUfI belore In your lit.! And Ihe COlor is superbly done. All on heavy card· board·iike s lock to insure long readability .

TBEINEPTADVENTURESOF WHITE FEATHER-White Feather was

the group's archery expert; he was also the group's coward-ai -heart. In real life, he was successful photographer William King. His father was The Freedom Brigade's archer and the same was expected of him. Usua ll y. he just ran off in search of a suitable hiding place. Even that would get him in trouble. For instance :

AU Ihese bookS are in English lexl. meant 10' Ihe Brilis h Isles, bUI imported by THE MONSTER TIMES lor TMT reeders . The re are 12 iSSUes ollhese lull colol IIllran· ganus. They can be purchased in lotsol.ix, in 1015 01 tw.'v. 01 indivlduatly. A ~musl h ..... addillon 10 YOUI comic .rtllbr.ry . Tn.g"'leslbarbariansandlh.~ltie"lfId'es

ComiC books and their characters have never been known for their modesty. For their bravado , maybe ... and certainly for their mediocrity, general ineptitude and incredibly boring nature. But never for their modesty.

Comic companies, given the inferior nature of their products, would offset their lack of quality by choosing names dripping with machismo: Best , Better, Marvel, Mighty, Super and many others. They'd name their comic titles with simi lar disregard for their contents: WORLD'S FINEST , TOP COMICS. KING COMICS, SEN SATION COMICS, THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD , ALL HERO COMICS , ALL SELECT COMICS, BANNER COM ICS. TALES OF VALOR , BIG SHOT COMICS , LEADING COMICS , SLAM BANG COMICS and dozens of others . Naturally they weren 't slouches when it came to giving their characters fancy handles either: Mr. Fantastic, Captain Fearless, Mr. Miracle, Amazing Man, Superman , Wonder Woman, Captain Courageous, The King, Mr. Free­dom, Mr. Justice and DynamiC Man were just a few of the long-john clad super-good guys who've been in the comics.

The li st of names that suggest comic greatness goes on and on, for pages without end , In fact, just about the only exception (except for a company tha"; called itself "Standard Comics," before switching to " Belter Comics" and finally "Best Comics") is an obscure little group known as THE INFERIOR FIVE.

Since most of the com ics that sported the great names-names that conjured up images of valor and heroic derring-do­were really rotten , what could possibly be said about a group called The Inferior Five?

Very little. In fact. if this wasn ', THE MONSTER TIMES' " worst issue," no th ing at all. In its own way , the title "'nferior Five" was just as boastful as " Mr. Fantast ic :' Th is motley litHe menagerie was worse than inferior. They were simply incompetent.

NO LAUGHING MATTER

Luckily , we think, the group was played strictly for laughs. Unfortunately , they weren 't too successfu l in producing that commodity either. They made a total of 15 appearances (three in a magazine called SHOWCASE and 12 in their own magazine, aptly titled THE INFERIOR FIVE. True to form , two of the group 's appearances were nothing more than reprints of earlier misadventures). But wherever the group popped up, they usually managed to get in some heavy-handed satire on the comic world such as it was in the mid 19605. They'd lampoon the red , white and blue-coated superhero team-ups like The Justice League, The Justice Society, The Fantastic Four and The Avengers; they'd spoof those initial-laden super·spy groups popular during the 1960s (conseq'uently, The Man From U.N.C. l.E. would appear as C.O.U.S. I.N . F .R.E.D., and T.H. R.U.S. H. would become H.U.A.R.I.C.A.N.E .) ; they would even take their swipes at individual heroes from both of the big comic companies.

The origin of the group was told many times, each time more tiresome than the previous one. It seems that during the

halycon days of the super-groups, an organization called The Freedom Brigade would run around doing their free-lance law enforcement thing. After an appropri­ate period, the Brigade finally gave up the ghost and , having nothing better to do, intermarried amongst themselves ,

UNFUNNY FIVE

The resulti ng "offspring" were the members of The Inferior Five. Taken individually , they were unmitigated losers. Taken collectively , they were the strongest argument ever made for planned parent· hood. In order of descending inferiority they were :

MERRYMAN-Merryman was your everyday, run-ol-the-mill , sand-kicked-in­his-face, 97-pound weakling. With glasses. Myron (Merryman) Victor had absolutely nothing in' the way of super-powers, and was therefore immediately made leader of the group . He picked a costume apropos to his inability : a purple jester's suit. For what it's worth, Merryman was also a cartoonist who drew a character called Wonderfetla. Besides having super­parents , his paternal grandfather was the legendary Yellow Jacket (you remember him : he drove the Gold Bug and had a faithful Oriental assistant , Plato).

OUMB BUNNY-There isn 't much you can say about Athena (Dumb Bunny) Tremor that her name doesn't already tell you. She was incredibly brainless. But she was also incred ib ly strong. A high fashion model by trade , and a scatterbra ined female by deSign , Dumb Bunny was the repository fo r all the old Henny Youngman jokes. Take this one, for example:

Villain: "What have we here? The Yellow Streak (another villain} and a super·hero who was trying to capture him!"

White Feather : " No! Honest! I'm Peter Pan and I'm looking forlhe lost boys! "

AWt(WAROMAN- The last of our underqualified little crew was Leander (Awkwardman) Brent, parHime free-lance writer and beachcomber. Leander was , surprisingly enough, endowed with true, super.heroic ability. He was invincible, could leap tall buildings at a single bound and all that stuff. Except , as his name implies, he was unbelievably clumsy. He'd trip over his own feet , someone else's feet , or even a crack in the street. You'd think Awkwardman's shortcomings would lead to great comedic sketches. However, the best the writer/artist combination team could provide was Awkwardman knocking the cover scene and several panels on their side every once in a while.

That mottey bunch of "super-heroes" collected at their parents' now-dilapidated headquarters and set out to save the world, however ineptly. progressed,

they developed the Lukewarm line (for whenever the police commissioner-per­ish forbid-needed them in an emergency). the Inferi-Car (previously , they'd ride by subway to the scene of a crime) and finally got themselves a new hideout-a deserted ghost town which they purchased for $23.95.

All blockbuster material , right , gang?

CRIME DOESN'T SLAY

The Inferior Five's villains weren 't much to rave about either. Their premier enemy was a cut-rate Lex Luther imitator. He'd create "mi raculous" inventions out of material salvaged from his junk-yard . He once t ried to manufacture a laser beam gun with an imitation ruby sto len from a gumball machine.

In later issues they met other "biggies"

inhllbll Ihese magazines.

Howl-provoking panel features INFERIOR FIVE-The Blimp, Dumb Awkwardman, White Feather and Merryman-shoppIng for appropriate TMT still can't figure out what's supposed to be so funny about humor anyway.

Criminal inflating rubber doll: "You wouldn 't hit a woman with a baby, would you?"

Dumb Bunny : "No ... I'd hit her with a grown man!"

THE BLIMP-The Blimp was really Herman Cramer. Herman weighed about 400 pounds, which didn't do much for Herman in either of his identities. As Herman Cramer, proprietor of Herman's Diner, he was constantly devouring the r~staurant's food supply. As The Blimp, hiS excessive weight limited his ability to hovering tentatively over any potential evil-

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The Monster Times page 19

GHOST WRITING IN ~lQOAVALLEY BY RON HAYDOCK

Chances are you've never heard of the star of thi s article. While Ray Dennis Steckler is a name thai gives rise mostly to puzzled expressions and blank stares, in some places-like the Sky HI Drive·ln in Las Vegas-the man is nothing less than legend . His unusual fright films , rarely seen on the East Coast , rank among the fastest and weirdest ever made, and sport such flam boy· antly schlocky titles as TEENAGE PSYCHO MEETS BLOODY MARY and THE INCREDIBLY STRANGE CREATURES WHO STOPPED LIVING AND BeCAME MIXED·UP ZOMBIES . Writer Ron Haydock turned in this behind-the-scenes profile of the man behind the above-mentioned monsters, Ray Dennis Steckler, which begins herewith ...

I n Spring , 1971, o~ a Death Valley ranch far from Las Vegas and m i les trom the nearest town of Pahrump, Nevada, Ray Dennis Steckler was directing a suspenseful night se-

~~~nhc: af~~ ITh~~ ;C~i~~~~R , a horror

The scene called for CarOl Craig (played by Carolyn Brand l) to awaken from a fitful. tossing sl umber in her new ranch house and walk, in a trance- l ike stat e, to an o ld , cursed house. According to legend, Ihe house was sti ll being haunted by the Chooper . an Ind ian god of vengeance.

More than a hundred years before , the Chooper had monstrouSly slain Ihe pioneering Wallon family, who then lived in the house. Ed Wallon , the father, had shot and k illed the son 01 an Indian chief, t hinking the play­fully snooping in the darkness

to be a menacing prowler. In retribu­tion, the chief had his medicine man summon up the Chooper, who proceeded to des troy the Walton family . But the legends claimed that to this day, anyone daring to venture into the Walton house would meet a sim i lar lale . Th e Chooper, they said , s t ill lurked with in.

BEWARE OF GOD

But now. hypnotically lured to the o ld house, Carol Craig was crossing her p ropert y, each step bringin g her c loser to Ihe Walton house. With Steckler direcling, she moved through Ihe night and c limbed the weather­beaten s tep s of the cursed hou se, Presumably. she too would meet a bloody death at the hands of the legendary Chooper.

She s tepped up to the small po rch and saw the doorway waiting to be c rossed . Just as she was on the verge o f actually steppi ng in s ide , a movement caused her to snap out her trance and back to reality .

" Oh! Dan iel!"" she said . II was only her foreman Daniel standing in the doorway. "You scared me!"

Daniel (played by Jason Wayne) hooked a thumb over hi s shoulder in Ihe di rect ion 0 1 the death-haunted house. He had always believed the legend and always warned people about ii-especially those who tried to challenge the legend by spending a night in the house.

" I wouldn't go in there , Miss Carol," he said grim ly . " Only bad things happen in there . The Chooper will get you. I think you'd just beller com e on back to bed now. Come on ."

Daniel returned Ihe ranch heiress to the safety o f her room, thwarting the ever-present , lurking menace of the demon Chooper .

After rehears ing this sequence a few times , prio r 10 actually film ing It. Ray Steckler turned 10 me with a

"What do you think o f it? " " The scene looks l ine to me," I

said, "except for one lillie thing, Ray ,"

"Whal's thatT" "" It's no t in the script ." " Well ."" said Steckler, " besides

that.. " " The scene plays as well as the

rodeo sequence and the scene where the Chooper murders the sheriff. " I

said, ""Those scenes aren't in Ihe script either."

"Well , I'm going to shootlhis scene anyway!"" he insisted . Steckler turned back to the cast, c rew and ca mera. "And I've got an idea for another scene ... "

"",that isn't in the script either ," I said .

Ca rolyn Brandt is attacked by scissor-wielding in Steckler's THE INCREDIBL Y STRANGE CREA TURES WHO STOPPED LIVING AND BECAME MIXED-UP ZOMBIES which , if nothing else, at least run s

" Right." And a few minutes later, he was filming this Chooper night sequence he had impu lsively created and verbally written right on the spot.

And, sometimes, that's how horror movies are made.

Even horror movies. But especially Ray DenniS SteCk­

ler's horror m ovies.

STECKLER'S STRANGE CREATIONS

THE INCREDIBLY ST RANGE CREATURES WHO STOPPED LIVING AND BECAME MIXED UP ZOMBIES.

THE MANIACS ARE LOOSE. LEMON GROVE KIDS MEET THE

MONSTERS, BLOODY JACK .

CAME FROM OUT OF THE STUDIO!

AN INTERVIEW WITH by GARY l. LEVINSON WI LLiAM GRE FE

You know , like when you're making monster pictures and, you-you know-ya gotta anticipate what the public's bent is at the time. Now , you've got your aliens and this and that but the main thing , I mean in this business, is to get one jump ahead of your movie-going public without their getting bored by your subject , see? And one of the best at getting this jump is William Grefe, the director responsible for bringing THE STING OF DEATH and DEATH CURSE OF TARTU to the screen, and who ranks right up there with Herschell (BLOOD FEAST) lewis, larry (IT'S ALIVE) Buchanan and TV (ASTRO ZOMBIES) Mikels as one of the fastest fiends ever to operate a clapboard. We sent TMT reporter Gary Levinson to talk with Mr. Grefe , who explains himself better than we ever could herein . ..

you have heard of him. then probably you know William Grefe for low budget films like STING OF DEATH , DEATH CU RSE OF TARTU , THE HOOKED GENER ATION . or any of about a dozen o thers, all shot with little lime or money, and all but one makmg their investors very happy with Iheir big profits ,

I recently visited William Grefe at his o ffi ce at Ihe Ivan Tors Studios . Grefe had succeeded Ricou Browning as president o f the Tors studios, bul WIth the success of STANLEY. he has qull tha i job lor Ihe presidency of another company . so he can be more

active in filmmaking. After a moment's pause to admire a sculpture of STANLEY that lay coiled atop Grefe' s desk, the in terview began. TMT : How did you s tart your career in movies? GREFE : Well. first I started as an actor in summer stock. And then I did Off·Broadway with the Cherry Lane Playhouse. And then I turn ed to writing and t wrote for television, and the fi rst screenplay thaI I sold was called THE CHECKERED FlAG , and they had me on the set lor rewrites, Just as a writer. And when we were

II you're nol , IrequlI,n l PIllIon 01 In Ve'lllS dttn-ins. Ihere's • good th,nct you missed THE LEMON GROVE KIOS MEET THE MONSTERS •• 111m Ihal borrow&d Ihe old 80wery Boys sChl iek I nd loned In sp~ subplots .nd myrl.d mo~s l.r, 101 good measure.

Ray Steck ler produced all of Ihese litms and , throughout their produc­tion, he hal'; never faithfully remained with the written scr ipts. THE CHOOPER was no exception.

Even though one entire scr ipt had been written , revised and revised again, when Steckler went to work he changed It some more. He threw out much of what had previously been written and replaced i t with scenes thai just happened to come to mind ­scenes like Carol Craig's walk to the cursed Wallon house.

Though such modus operand i may irk the cast and crew, who sudden ly lind themselves involved In scenes Ihey never knew existed , Steckler's spontaneity often resulted in stand· out sequences. They didn 't always satisfy the storyline, but they were

ShOOting th e film the lirst day, the dire<:tor came down i ll and Just couldn 't perform and all , so they were t rying to get hold 01 a New York or Cal ifornia director . And then they had a meeting in the motel up at Sebr ing. It was a racing film , and we were filming it at the Sebring Grand Prix there, and so anyway , they deter­mined 1\ wou ld be too much o f a loss lactor to bri ng in somebody fro m New York or Cal ifornia 'cause a week , ten days would be gone by . And so the cameraman w ho was an old pro, had been around about forty years in the business , said, he said 'What the hell , the writer knows all about the script­Make him the director .' So they drafted me in the molel room thaI night. And the next day I s larted directing the pic ture, and that's the way I go t started in the directi ng end, and Ihen the next one, RACING FEVER , I wrote , produced , and d irec ted it. TMT : How much do you have to say about the cas ling, script , and final print? GREFE : One hundred percent. Never made a picture yet that I haven't had one hundred percent editing , one hundred oercent cast ing , one hun­dred percent script, everything . TMT : Is that usual tor the 111m industry? GREFE : (laugh) No. But under independent oroductions, I mean . lOal"S jus t what r ye InSllj l tlO upon . And I've always had one hundred percent of every thing from Ihe beginning to the answer pri nt. TMT : I always thought directors had to tight for control. GREFE : Well, when a director fights, that's normally when you have , let's say, Paramount or Warner Brothers financ ing the picture . They put up al l the money and then they hire a d i rec to r . The. djrector has to do a lot o f lighting. You know he doesn 't have a hundred percen t con trol on the final cui and all. Bu t in indepenaen t production if you're independent enough, Ihen you just say, " This is ii, and thi s is the way it's going to be ." And that's Ihe way I've always work8f1 And then when you make a aeal with a OISlflDulOr you tell him he takes it the way il is, or he doesn't take it.

BAD DREAM FACTORY

TMT : Was STANLEY inspired by any

SOlid sequences nevertheless. THE CHOOPER was a six: day

wonder and we shot the picture both day and night. During the shooting , most of the cast and crew took up living quarters right inside the ranch· house, with the Chooper's terrible old house on ly a stone's throwaway. Mak ing the film under these c ircum ­stances was much akin to camping out-with a camera .

STECKLER STARTS OUT

Before he began making his own pictures or producing films i n association with George J , Morgan, a juke box king, Steckler was directing , ph otographing and acting in f i lms for other producers l ike Ralph Cushman , with whom he made DRIVERS INTO HELL in 1960, and Arch Hall Sr. ,

01 the other animal dims like WILLARD or ... ? GREFE : Well, definitely, because WILLARD was the biggest grossing piclure last summer and I was Irying to think how to capital ize on this, and Ihe way STANLE Y came about is quite a s to ry in itself. I was out in Los Angeles making a deal lor the studio (Ivan Tors') with Mark Robson lor Universal. They were going to do a picture here called LIMBO , and I'd been out there all week and everybody was talking abou l the success 01 WILLARD. And I wen t back to the

veteran western actor turned produ­cer , he worked with on EEGAH and WILD GUITAR in 1961 . In addi t ion to dIrecting or photographlllg these p ictures, Steckler himself had roles in all of Ihem and part icularly in EEGAH , a tale about OJ prehIstoric caveman (Richaro Kell) wh o had been l ound ali ve out In the desert mountains near Palm Spflngs, and

, who lellll1 love wit h Marilyn Mann ing, the star oltne film . Near the climax of the epic, with Eegah now run nmg wild through Palm Springs itself. the mon ste r man turned up at a swimming pool party where Ray Steckler and CarOlyn Brandt were guests. And here , by the pool , Steck ler confronted the ram pagmg creat ure lor a moment. Bu t for on ly a momen t , as the g iant caveman growled With m enace and Ihen eas il y tossed the obstinate Sleck ier right inlO the pool, before conlinulOg on his besllal way .

Shortly alter comp leting the se and o ther movies. Steckler bega n branch­ing o il in to his own productions, through he has always con tinued free-lancing for other producer~ through the years. and has photo­graphed such diverse productions as a ViC Oamone tetevi sion special, Playboy Magazine's annual promo­tional film and many ABC-TV WIDE WORLD OF SPORTS program s.

Steckler'S firs t production on hi s own was GOOF ON THE LOO SE (1962), a black & whIte leaturelle highlighted by a guest appearance by the Frankenstein monster, played by Rick Dennis. The next year Steckler produced, directed and co-wrote his first lull-length leatu re film, THE INCREDIBLK STRANGE CREATURES WHO STOPPED LIVING AND BE­CAME MIXED UP ZOMBIES ; a color monster musical starring Cash Flagg and Carolyn Brandt that, at the lime, was not only the world's first such Monste r Musical-comple t e wi lh carniva l se lling , original music , choreographed dancing girls, and even zombie monsters strutting to the bea t of THE MIXED UP fOMBIE STOMP-but also an offbeat , romp­ing , avant-garde horror spectacle that has since become a rather popular movie on TV Shock Theatres and on general late-night television program-

motel room and fell asleep that night and I dreamt the whole STANLEY story, just like I went to the movies . And I woke up next morning and I said . " Wow. this is really something else, you know? " I said, " I think I've got it ." So I went to see Red Jacobs. who's head of Crown International Pictu res, and they had handled THE" WI LD REBELS lor me whIch did lantas tic business. As a low budget picture it grossed three mi l lion dollars. So I said to Red, I said I've golthiS far out story, Red , and I want to tell you about it. And so he brOughl

THE INCREDIBLY STRANGE STECK LER

THE INCREDIBLY STRAN GE CREATURES was a Morgan-Sieckler produc t ion about a Qu ite mad fortune telier named Estrella (Breit O 'Hara) who lured'unsusp&Cllng vic tims IOtO her ten t on a carnIval mIdway and then threw acid 10 their laces and changed them mlo m indless zombies with a hypnotic wneel device , thus placing them complete ly under her control. With the aid 01 a hunchback servant, Ortega (Jack Brad y). she kepi all her little pet s 10 a secrel cage in her tent, using them periodically for purposes 01 revenge Near the climax though , the zombie monsters broke toose and , altel killing bolh Estrella and Ortega , ran amok al ihe carnival. The police, however , atrlved to sheel down the monsters, and then went after Cash Flagg , who had also been turned in lo a lombie by Estrella.

Incidentally, all the monster guises seen in the film were c reated by Tom Scherman, who had originally come to H ollywood from back east as a result of winning an American International Pictures movie contest for creat ing the most gruesome monster masks.

The Monster Times

T HE INCREDIBLY STRAN GE CREATURES ;s a choice example o f a Ray Dennis Steckler film . Although the movie is certainly in the horror genre, it was made through a main­st ream-eye ' s view, and th i s is probably one of the main reasons it has somet imes been relerred to as a hOITor film for people who don't like horror films. Conversely , the main­s tream view is probabty al so one of the reasons why dyed-in-!he-crypt. puri st monster fans have sometimes voiced a great objection to it. Donald F. Glut , writer and coilector. for one, has said the p Ic ture i s one of the worst "horror films" he has ever seen. But Allen M. Widem. writin g in MOTION PICTUR E HERALD , took an opposite stand , say ing that Sleckier's film " is to be :ommended lor un iqueness although It w i ll need specialized sell ing to get inItIal altendanceaterted .··

No mailer the controversy about thi s or any of Steckler's other litms , reviewers have always commented more than favorably on Ihe vis ual end 01 his pictu res. Calvin Th omas BeCk . editor a,nd publisher o f CASTLE OF FRANKENSTEIN , said in a 1966 review 01 THE INCREDIBLY STRANGE

These ,ubbe"laced li.nds ..... r. only Iwo 01 Sleekl. ,·, INCREOIBlY STRANGE CRE AT URES .

in all his entourage of press and public rela t ions men and all 01 that and distributors, and I told them the story in about l en minutes , and he said fan l as tic, you wanna make a deal? I said sure, so we shook hand s on a deal, without even a script or an y thing. All I had was a story in my head. And thp.n I called a writer I know, Gary Crutcher (THE NAME OF THE GAME IS KILL), ou t on the coast, and he met me and then about Ihree hours at the airport , I was leaving for Miami that n ight, I wrote it all down on a yellow legal pad. He went ahead and wrote the screenplay in two weeks, and two weeks later we were shOOting the picture . TMT : How come you didn' t do the script? GREFE : Because recently , in the last three or four years, my head hasn 't been clea r to sit dow n and concen trate on screenplays. I mean I s larted as a writer and when I was a writer I"d lock myself away for a month or six weeks or whatever it took, and I had no thing else on my mind but writing . But now , in an executive capac ity, and prodUCing , and directing , my head's not clear to concentrate, But I stili get actively involved in the slory development. TMT : Is there going to be a sequel to STAN LEY? GREF E : Very possib ly . They ' re talking about it. And we'll just have to wail and see if we think it's gonna be a commerc ial success. TMT : What do you have for the luture? GREFE : I have a lo t lor the l uture , but I can't put it in writing, because, you know , I'm a f irm believer in , you know , you have to second guess the public. And you Iry to look into the c rysta t bal l and see what they want six. eigh t , ten months from now. And if you divulge whal you 're gonna do, well there' lI be two or Ihree other producers trying to jump on the bandwagon . TMT : Will you be doing more horror or action fi lm? GREFE : Well , I always believe suspense thrillers are a definite asset and the public always l ikes them , so there probably will be several in my future.

MOVIES THAT MOVE

TMT : Do you have any preference in the kind 01 m ovi e you make?

GREFE : Well , I l ove action su spense thriller Iype things . I bel ieve in having a movie move and entertaining the public. I don't believe in, you know , stagnant tons of d ialogue and all. Because the name 01 it i s st ill mnlinn pictures. And the Chinese said il a thousand years ago, a picture is worth a thousand word s. And so if you can get a visual Image on the sc re,!!n , you dan', need the dialogue. Naturally my pictures have dialogue, but I s till want thing s happening constanliy. TMT : O f aU your moviBS , which one do you thi nk is the best? GREFE : The next one . The next one is the best. (laugh) TMT : What's the worst one? GREFE : I don't know if there's any worst. You know , I just m ake the films and once the film is shot I sort ollorge l ... oout it and go on to the next one, so the next one is always the bes t one . It 's a situation, you kn ow a situation, some pictu res are, you cons ider bad or the public or whatever doesn ' t like them , and 1 lake into consideration the cost factor, how it was shot. Like TARTU I shot in seven days, and you know there's not many people that can shoot a feature film in seven days and get it where It"s a commercial vehicle that goes on the screen and makes money. And when you're doIng a million dollar pic ture you can do fifteen, twenty takes to one, you can cover it all different ways , you can take your lime. Then if you miss, you're a complete idiot. Because you've got all the l ilm shot and you can put it together however you wan l : But in low budgets, when you're shooting one take to one, and you're moving, shooting ten, twelve pages a day. you just got to move like gangbusters. And if they turn oul successfu l, iI's just a miracle .

TMT : 00 you know who Roger :orm anis? GREFE : Sure. He's one of Ihe best . TMT : You remind me of him . I haven' t met him , but I think your careers are similar. GREFE: Very similar. And Roger is a fine filmmaker. And the interesting thing about Roger Corman is in Europe he's respected and he's known as one 01 the greatest di rectors in the world. In the United States the c ritics and vario us people, they are not tuned into Iilmmak ing enough . And they don't kn ow th e

•

Cash Flagg-S' eekle. ', 'op hootor protege and one 01 the .eoy bes , Hunu Halt impressionIs ' s a.ound-linds hlm selt I lmounded by a shrieking Cindy Smith and a mu.de.ous Mad Mummy in ano,her . e,ion_paeked scene h om THE LEMON GROVE KIDS MEET THE MONSTE RS,

CREATURES that while he didn't particularly care for the movie, the film nevertheless disp layed "excellent pho tography and invenlive direc ti on," When reviewing THE THRILL KILL· ER S, another Steckler film , Beck again commented on "exciting photography and impressive direc­tion ," adding that " Steckler's visual ta lents would be great on half decent produclions."

One reason the photography in Sleckter's films has always been noled is that Steckler himself is one of the best Iree-Iance photographers work­ing. William Zsigmund , who photo­graphed McCASEAND MRS. MILLER , and Laslo Kovacs , who shot EASY RIDER and POCKET MONEY , have

mechanics o f it. They say, oh Roger Corman makes horror pict ures and this and that , where in Europe they respect him 'cause they know he makes low budgets and know how he perlorm s, and they think he's a miracle worker , So that's the difference between Europe and the United States . Just like many o f my lilms have done lantastic business in Europe, and then I've got a lot 01 European writeups that are, you know , praise my films . and in the United States, i t's a lilly-fifty deal. some 01 the critics love 'em. Some hate ·em . So I don ', pay much attention to the crHics, What I do is I

~:~;I~etnhl!~ng~O t~~teu~~i~~t:~~i~~~t~ that's the main thing .

GREFE'S GREATEST GROSSER

TMT : Which of your movies i s the biggesi grosser, and which i s the smallest?

GREFE : ' To dale STANLEY is the biggest grosser . In the firSI two months it made th ree and a hall million dollars . And the lowest grosser probabty is a picture called THE NAKED ZOO , which I did, and the main reason that it didn't gross was the financing was very compli· cated and got screwed up ... I don't think it was the film's fault , I mean this might be an ego trip on my part. I think H was a good subject matter. Distribution is the key, you know, once you've got a good lilm in the

both praised his camera work. Zsigmund and Kovacs, ironically enough. had worked lor Steckler shooting THE INCREDISL Y STRANGE CREATUR ES and THE MANIACS ARE LOOSE , and have insisted many times since that they learned much of their craft from him.

Steckler's films have had many impressive visuat moments . The broad daylight hypnotic murder sequence and the final chase by the ocean in THE INCREDIBLY STRANGE CREA­TURES ; the axe murders in THE MANIACS ARE LOOSE ; the bloody violence of BLOODY JACK . However , besides the more monstrous aspects of his camera, Steckler has directed that same camera to move in and

TMT: When you put a budget on a film , what 's included in that? GREFE : Everything (laugh). Actors, crew, cast, the laboratory costs, lilm, titles, everything you can think of, rentat of houses. studios, TMT : Prints? GREFE : No, prints, no, the budget Is onty 10 the answer print, which is the final print. After that, they strike an inner negative , or an LT ., and make prints from that. But you normally don ' t figure the print cost in the production budget.

TMT : Have yo u cons idered movi ng to big budget IIIms, the way Corman has? GREFE : ' Move up to big budgets, I don't know . I mean I've had some opportunities, and the trouble is Ihat when you make a big budget , you've got to figure in order to get a return on your investment. you've got to make two and a half limes negative cost. So if you make a film say lor two hundred thousand dollars ..

TMT : Is that what STANLEY cos t? GREFE : Weill won't (taugh), leI's say two hundred thousand . In any even t yeu need a return 01 lour hundred and lifty thousand before you break even . TMT : Why is that? GREFE : Well, that's just rule of thumb . when you figure prints and advertising and all thaI. But il you make a one million dollar picture, you've got to have two and a half

capture less violen t scenes like the near- fantasy ice skating sequence in WILD GUITAR , the panoramic outdoor and rodeo sequences in THE CHOO PER . the romantic interludes in SUPER COOL and , on a less serious note, the zany antics in the Lemon Grove Kids f ilms.

THEY SHALL BE RELEASED

Besides the fact that Ray Steckler will make a film in sometimes a rather unorthodox fashion (twenty minutes of BLOODY JACK , tor example. was Iilmed before any k ind 01 script was ever written), some 01 h is films have been released in rather unorthodox · slyle too . And THE MANIACS ARE LOOSE. starrinQ Cash Flagg, Liz

million befo'ie you break even, so that big budgets aren ' t what they're cracked up to be. A lot 01, like STANLEY has out g rossed films costing four and live million dol lars. And when you get involved in tha t and their success you sort of, I mean Roger Corman , the only way he direc ts a big budget picture is jf it's a major studio and they pay him a big director's fee. Bu t when he does i't with his own money or his people's money, he sticks to low budget, and the guy has been ve ry, ve r y successful.

TMT : How do you pay for the 111m? Don' t you have to get the financing befo re?

GR EFE : Oh yeah, yeah . I get individual private financing, rather than from the distributor, except on STANLEY it was with a distributor.

A SNAKE IN THE CAST

TMT : How do you cast your pictures?

GREFE : Well, normally, li ke on let's say STANLEY. STANLEY was such a

~ rUSh job we didn't even have the script. and we had 10 shoot it thirty days later , So I pretty well caSI il Irom my head , I knew actors that were avaitabte. and I knew ac tors that would fit the specific rotes that we nee"ed, so I more or less cast the whole th ing without too much reading of parts and so forth. But normal procedure, when you have sullicient lime, you call agents . You I agents , I want someone to playa old man , and this type or

Renay and Carolyn Brandt , is typicatol the unusual, though very successful way distributor Joe Cars ton has been booking many of Steckler's films in theatres ,

A shock suspense story , THE MANIACS ARE LOOSE tells about a trio of escaped mental patients (Gary Kent, Herb Robins and Keith O'B rien) who are roaming around with axes, terrorizing everybody who comes their way and decapitating many of their victims. Mad Dog Click , a fourth maniac (played by Cash Flagg), is also running loose in the world. and ge tting HIS kicks by not only killing people-becau!'l" " People are no

and the ones that read and you think are the best are the ones you go with, TMT : If you weren' t making movies , what would you do for a living? GREFE : Well, prior to the movie business, I was in the real estate business . Then , tha t was just a means to the end, I've always. ever si nce I was a lillIe kId , all I wanted to do was make movie!'l . and be involved In motion pictures. So if f wasn't making lilms, I don't know what I'd be doing right now. TMT : Do you have any hobbies , besides filmmaking ? GREFE : Not too many. The only thing , I love automobile raCing , and I love automobiles . And if I have any hobby, I'd say automobiles and guns. I'm sort o f a gun collec tor. I like weapons and guns. But really. I mean my hobby is filmmaking . (laugh) That's what I eat, live , and breathe. twenly-four hours a day, TMT : How does someone get into a 111m ca reer w ithout experience? GREFE : The roughest thing in the world . The main thing is pat ience, perseverance, and keep studying, and training, observing constan t ly ..

ART ATTACK

TMT : Do you have any advice for young filmmakers?

page 21

good, t hate people! "-but also by kidnapping liz Renay , who plays a love-starved Hollywood wife . But as II all this gutsy shock and horror was not Quite enough to serve audiences, distributor Joe Cars ton had an idea to add even more ShOCking momen ts to the picture. Moments that literal ly come right off the movie screen and into the audience .

Carston named his idea HALLU­CINOGENIC HYPNO· VISION and for it he f ilmed a speciat introduction which showed the Great Ormond, a real hypnotist, telling the aud ience that he is going to hypnotize them into bel ieving that at certain portions o f the film the maniacs Irom the fi lm will not on ly be running loose on screen but right there in the audience as well. So whenever the audience suddenly sees a spiraling hypnotic wheel on screen, they should know the maniacs will be AMONG THEM in a very few seconds ,

To effect this added shock , Carston sent Cash Flagg, the star of the film, to the Don Post Studios in North Hollywood where

I of the people today, they want to go out , they want to do their own thing, and they wan t to more or less dictate all 01 the things that are needed , And they want someone to just hand them a coupte hundred thousand to do their own thing, but unfortunately the pat ron o f the arts o f Cyrano De Bergerac's time is long gone, and you don't have people handing you a hundred thousand, or two hundred thousand, or three hundred thousand aod say do your own thing , They are only giving you the money for a return on thei r investment, so therefore filmmaking is a commerciat art. And the public is the final judge. And if you have a fine, line film and the public doesn'l go see it, you've go t nothing . Becau se I get my satisfaction out o f knowing Ihat my films play before ten million people around the world, and after two or th ree years, they go on television and play to co unll ess other millions. And when you know millions 01 people are going to, see your work, well, that is the satisfaction you need , But if you make a grea t film and it's lor yourself and you sIt there and you've blown two hundred thousand down the drain. and you're the only one who likes it, you really haven't achieved anything . Your investors aren't going to come back the second lime and give you the money to make a second film .

page 22

,~.~ ;.--.;r:;::: ":.<:1 "- ' ::'-- . - "-

, ". -, ~

Hugo Headstone Is a horror !andom legend . His loul deeds and

devastating diversity C=~~~~R~ have kepllandom laugh· i ng for many yurs (which says a lot about 'andam's sense 01

I humor). , In any case, writerl

artist Dick Bojarski pre­sents TMT readers with another chapter In the continuing u 9a of the wortd's most disgusting horror magazine pub-tisher. 1----___ ...:::.:::.::.;....1

The Monster Times

THAT NEW CHRIS LEE FEATURE GIVES

ME AN IDEA.' 'WHY DON'T W'(DO AN INTERVI EW'

~;_ •••• _iiii~~~~:ON CHRIS LEE?

OUR MAGAZINE IS IN A SLUMP! WE'VE BEEN REPRINTING STUFF FROM

OTHER MAGS TOO LONG - THIS LEE INTERVIEW' IS THE. pE.RF'e:c.r THING

TO ATTRACT NEW' READERS.' .

DON'T CHANGE THE SUBJECT NO'vl- IF YOU HOPE TO BETTER

YOURS£LF, YOU CAN START BY GETTING THE LEE

INTERVIEW' __

DON'T FORGET TO IMPRESS UPON LEE THE IMPORTANCE OF OUR MAGAZINE IN THE

WORLD OF FANDOM __ IF I-JE HAS ANY SENSE AT ALL - HE WILL REALIZE THAT THE MERE MENTION OF HIS NAME IN DISGUSTING MONSTERS WILL ENHANCE HIS REPUTATION __ IN OTHER WORDS,

'viE CANT AFfORD TO PAY HIM MOHEY __

The Monster Times

.,..~

CNlttsTOjalCR t.a: ~ITS

<::::;:::> !)LOOD

OF

DRACULA

I B£T MR. LEE CANT WAIT TO BE

PROFILED IN DISGUSTING MONSTERS!

I'M AFRAID TO PIECES­

EVERYWHERE I GO - I SEE A STRANGE UGLY­

LOOKING LITTLE MAN!

page 23

. .. is our way of getting the latest hot·off·the·wire Info to you, serving up all the news ot what's_ cookin' in every medium, from ' the rare to the well-done: pre­views , reviews , bulletins and controversial comments on hor­ror, fantasy & sci-fi happenings in films, books, comics and even real life, We have spared .no costs , time or tender egos in bringing you this expanded edition of our beloved Teletype page, so feel free to send us letters lull of lavish praise for our selfless efforts to keep you 'in-Ihe·know , '

' here's som e talk around of maybe b ri nging Heinlein's c lassic STRAN­GER IN A STRANGE LAND to the screen via John Schlesinger , o f MID­NIGHT COWBOY fame. Rock star David Bowie may s ta r. Also look fo r CHILDHOOD' S END , Arthur C. Clarke's SF classic to make Its l il m appearance shortly.

Cine-arl Product ions will tens the sci-fi adventure THE FORTEC CON­SPIRACY .

Wall Disney 's produc t ion of ISLAND AT THE TOP OF THE WORLD wi ll be ready lor a yuletide release. David Hariman Sl ars,

Ken Ru ssell, the cinema t ic genius who presented us with the superb THE BO Y FRIEND and the su r-reel THE DEVILS. witl be directing the cinematic version of TOMMY , in association with Th e Who, its crea tors. The Ballet Canad ien per­formed a brilliant dance version of the rock oper~ that I though t incompar­ab le, If anyone can top their magnifi ­cent ellort, Ru s!el l's the man.

Joan Bennett, former star of DARK SHADOWS , will star, along wi th Stuart Whitman, late of NIGHT OF THE lEPU S , in the Australian production ca lled INN OF THE DAMNED . It'S a costume Ihrrller set in 1896. (Make a great co- feature for the Paramount oldie OUT OF THIS WOR LD ,)

Gillo Pontecorvo is looking lor someone to p lay Christ in h is new lI alian pic, TIME OF THE WORLD'S END .

Speaking of pics, ·THE PYX , a gory murder-mys tery that's been steering up Quite a bit 01 publicity w ith its prostitute character , may net an Oscar nomination for Karen Black . Her role is the "controversial" one.

Gtamour Queen lana Turner shares top billing with Trevor Howard in PER SEC UTION . now lenSing at Pinewood studios in london, while the British comedy team o f Mike and Bernie Winter will make their cinema t ic debut in SPEAKING OF SPOOKS , I'm sure it will be spooktacular ,

20th Century Fox's HEX ought 10 be arriving on the scene soon. II's an

The ever-suave. ever-sophisticated David N iven is really sinking his teeth into his new starr ing role in the

incredulous combination o f hippie motorcyclists, country-and-western, and witchcraft. Sort of an Edgar Al len Potpourri.

Producer Irwin Allen , cap tain of the POSEIDON ADVENTURE , wi ll again be at Ihe helm on 20th'S CIRCUS . Alistair Maclean, author 0 1 GUNS OF NAVARONE. will write the suspense yarn in conjunction with Ringling Bros . and Barnum etc. Film due for full-color AND 3-0.

Ewa Aulin, who made her screen debu t as C ANDY . loses her sweet­tooth in the Fitm Ventures Interna­tional production of BLOOD CERE­MONY . She'll play an Elizabeth 8athory-type character, and her bath-story will be done in virgin's blood . (I wonder why regular blood won't do; the other's awlully hard to

find these days .) DOC SAVAGE, MAN OF BRONZE,

rolls in late December lor Warners. No one has been cas t for the lead as yet, but George Pat will produce and M ichael Anderson will handle directo­rial chores.

Kung Fu Manchu? Sort o f Hammer and the Shaw bros are joining forces on THE LEGEND OF THE SEVEN GOLDEN VAMPIRES , Roy Ward Baker directs Peter Cushing and Julie Ege , both vet Britishers , in Hong Kong . " Ah So. Dr . Frankenhawa. "

DON'T LOOK NOW (thaI's the l itle). seems to be something of a sleeper.

" Iang-in-cheek"' produc t ion of VAM­PIRA , now shooting in London .

The Julie Christie-Donald Sutherlano psycho-thriller has been receiving rave reviews. DO look Now ,

Un iversal will be offering a sort 01 underground AIRPORT in their new production 01 EARTHOUA KE . The title disaster ta kes place in L.A ,

The William Castle pic starring Marcet Marceau has been tille­changed from SHOCK to SHANKS The master mime Marceau essays a dual-rOle . "'Sh anks lor the memories ." Another ti t le change : The Vincen t Price slarrer RE VENGE OF DR . DEATH IS now MADHOUSE.

A super secret project due Irom Paramount is PHASE IV . Descr ibed as an ecological horror. this one concern s ants . Normal everyday-type ants . but WIth human intelligence. who hold an entire city for ran som . tl's out in paperback lorm, too . Vet 8ril ish actor N igel Davenport stars. Saul Bass. title artist. makes h iS dlfectorial debut.

A Spanish lilm due for release, AUTOPSY , claims to display an actual autopsy on the screen "'reat and without tricks."' Hmmm? Could slart a "do-it-yourself" craze .

On the tube. ABC is again the champion-ghoulie . On January 4th they are offering a documentary On thei r WIDE WORLD OF ENTERTAIN­MENT dea ling with ghosts, witchcraft and the Devil. Chris Lee is set lor an interview at Dracula's caslle, and there'll be o ther castles and haunted abodes around the world .

Set lor an A BC Movie-of-the-Week is THE CAT WOMAN . Great cast , headed by David " THE FLY" Hedison , Stuart Whitman. Meredith Baxter , Keye Luke and horror lavorites John Carradine and that " Grand Guignol " gal. Gale Sondergaard . Ir s about a reincarnated Egyptian goddess. " Bastet. " who takes the form 01 a killer cat.

One of my all -time lavoril e authors. Dick (l AM lEGEND) Malheson , is script ing THE HUNTER for another ABC M-O-T-W o fferi ng. Clint Walker and Peter Graves star. The animal they are hunting has Ihem hunt ing each other.

The Science Fiction Bookshop has opened in the West Vi llage at 8th Avenue and Horatio Street. The interior somewhat resembles a spaceship .

And last. but hardly least, those of my readers who travel abroad may lind a kick al LE STYX on the rue Huc hetle near Notre Dame. They show no thing but horror films , with French subtitles. At the t ime I was there they were showing LE NUIT DE MORTS VIVANTS (that's NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD), Their marQuee and lacade are worth a look alone, BrlOg atong a bottle of French champ-pain! Cest bon. •

In addition to being a sci.f!" scholar and all-around Wizard of Ihe weird , ED SUMMER owns and operates the Supersnipe Bookstore, a well-stocked, sprawling fan's paradise special­izing in comics, film books, and other tomes & items dealing with fanlasy . In return for the above plug, Ed will be scurrying about 10 bring you Ihe latest scoops from the wond of science fiction , where anything can happen and once in a while does.

A CREATION CON

ccord ing to the B ible, CREATION took six days . leaving one day fo r res\. CREATION CON lasls on ly three days. but there are so many gOOdies and surprises c ra mmed in between January 4 and 6 that it'll take the remainder of the week for you to catch your breath.

Th e Hotel Biltmore in New York Cit y will be overfl ow ing with comic fans . Isaac Asimov , THE FEARLESS VAMPIRE KILLERS , Kaluta, Bode , Rex Maxon, auclions , dealers room. movies and displays galore!

Creation 1974 has one 01 the most diverse and exciting f ilm shows ever: From Robert Wise's chilli ng . unlor­getlable masterpiece of the super­normat THE HAUNTING , to the classic nuttiness of the MARX BROTHERS in GO WEST. With the cooperation of FILMS INCORPO­RATED , the world's largest 16mm rental li brary, CREATION will bring you: DEVIL DOLL , the 1936 tale of witchcraft which has been unseen for years; TH E DIRTY DOZEN . Robert Aldrich's controversial epic of war ; Chuck (The Road Runner) Jones' one and only l eature cartoon THE PHANTOM TOLLBOOTH ; George Pal's years-ahead-of -its-time CON­QUEST OF SPACE : Walt Disney's ICHABOD AND MR . TOAD containing the mad , zany WIND IN THE WillOWS and the spooky, chuc k le­filled LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOL­l OW : for Western fans, RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY by Sam (THE WILD BUNCH) Peck inpah, considered to be his masterpiece ; the complete American version 01 Roman Polan­ski's THE FEAR LESS VAMPIRE KILLERS or PARDON ME BU T YO UR TEETH ARE IN MY NECK : a tribute 10 Walt Kelly, POGO'S BIRTHDAY PARTY by Chuck Jones: and MORE, MORE, MORE . Nightly from 7 :30 p .m. 10 the wee hours. Films for youngsters have been scheduled to lit early bedtimes.

Neal Adams will answer all of your Quest ions and Vaughn Bode presen l s his new CHEECH WIZARD canoon concert. Bruce Jones. Marv Wolfman, len Wein and S teve Engelhardt on an excll ing wr iter's panel. Gltodano, Kalu la and AI Williamson cont ribu te to the firs t ever panel on 'Inking. Science liclion w riters Bova, Goutart and Carter chat informally on their work, Roy Krenket, the masterful ACE BOOKS cover painter, wi ll make a rare publiC appearance to discuss o il painting s.

_lsaac Asimov plans top-no tch titillalion for your ear drums. THE CHILDREN OF THE NIGHT mix monsters and music in a unique rock concert.

EXCLUSIVE! A CREATION FIRST! The first public display o f stills, art and more Irom Paramount Pictures'

WALT KELLY

1913-1973

The Monster Times

startling. new science f iction thriller PHASE IV , di rected by the award­winning Saul Bass !!! See it at CREATI ON before its initia l release!!

Th is year's art display features the private collection 01 Rex (TARZAN ) Maxon wh ich inc ludes the work of his con temporaries, including Hal Foster and o ther luminaries o f the 30 's and 40·s . Se lec t pieces from this collection wi ll be o ffe red for AUCTION at the two big, excit ing NO-MINIMUM-BID auctions . Also up for sale will be a first edition collec tion 01 Robert Howard and H ,P. lovecraft.

FLASH! Unpublished, o riginal let­ters from Robert H oward to l . Sprague De Camp will go up for bid !

Original art fans will be ab le to bid lor the work 01 A .C .B .A . pros Adams and Kalu ta , DRAWN TO ORDER . All proceeds go to Charity .

BOSTON COMIC WORKS will display art along with Jet! Jones,

Gray Morrow, ana many su rpri ses from art chairman Doug Murray.

The KEYNOTE SPEECH is yet to be announced. but it will definitely be fo ll owed by the CREATION AWARDS CEREMONY which, In the past, has honored Barry Smi th , Bill Gaines and Joe Kubert.

PRIZES!! Come in COSTUME, join Ihe COSTUME PARADE and win a piece of ORIGINAL ART !!

The NATIONAL LAMPOON has mumbled some l hing about dropping by . so keep an eye on your valuables.

Putp. Fan tasy and Sci Fi fans have a treat in store when Hans Santesson, lawrence Janifer and a few su rprise experts get toge ther to chew over the good Old days .

last, and ce rtainly the MOST , the DEALER 'S ROOM full of hundreds of thousands 01 comics, S.F. and F . mags, STAR TREK , posters, stills, nos lalgia and collector's items that all you lans and monsters have been dying to get into your hairy c law s or space suit pincers.

That's FridaY,.January 4, noon to 2 a.m.; Saturday , January 5, 10 a.m. to 2 a.m,; Sunday. January 6, 10 a.m , to 7 p.m . at the HOTel BILTMORE at Madison Avenue and 43rd SI. in Manhattan, New York City . Rooms are still available at the hote l , but hurry, they're going quick! (singles $20 , doubles $26) . Membersh ips $2 a day , ora BARGAIN $5 10r All-THREE fun-packed days . For information, write Adam Malin, Chai rman , 16 E. 2nd St .. Freeport , N .Y. 11520. Tell 'em THE MONSTER TIMES sent ya,

The Monster Times

Comlce mawen JOE' BRANCA· TELLI certainly "iedl no Intro­duction. The: Itrllppmg young Managing. Editor of'TMT will be c.lllng 'em I. he ~. 'em ( •• he Illond 01 puHlng II) with Ihe kind -of bumlng honesty and youthful IdMllam rar.ly found In ~ur modem contemporary tim.. of today. With. nose for new. and • sen" of d •• ermlnatlon that I, truly frightening to behold, Joe will be bringing you all the stOODI from Comicdom.

M any 01 you loyal readers of The Monster Times have been clamoring for a new publication . Monster fans wanted more monster magazines, 5-1 fans begged for a journal 01 science fiction, and comic fans wanted a comic magazine . . ·After due cons ideration , The

Monster Times is proud to ann ounce it s new publication . INSIDE COMICS , which will be the first professional magazine about the comic industry . We'll tell you mo re abou t th e magazine later on in th is column, bu t first we'd like 10 explain why we're doing INSIDE COMICS.

II you 've been following this column the last several months, and if you've been reading ou r comic articles throughout the year , you know what a dreadful s tate the com ic companies are in .

Every lacet o f the industry -Irom the prolessional comics to th e under­ground comix to the burgeoning fanzine market-is making a mad grab for an ever-d windling audience , They're aller your patronage and they're after you r money. And, u nfo rtu nately, the more unsc ru pulous co mic people will t ake you r money any way they can get it from you.

That's why The Monster Times is "reating INSIDE COMICS. We th ink

ol£Q U should know who runs the industry and how they are runn ing II. The Monster Times doesn't believe comic fans should have to rely on badly-ru n fan news magazines that are only public relations shills for the indus try . We don't believe you shou ld have to rely only on what Carmine Inlan tino, Stan Lee or Jim Warren want to tell you . Further, we don 't think you Should have to rely on any professional l o r thei r version of the truth .

We think you're entitled to the whol e sto ry of the comic indus try, We think that as buyers and fans of the comics, you're entitled to know everyt h ing . The good and the bad. he heartening and the sordid. We think you should know when one 01 the big companies is screwing up. And we think you should know when artists and w r iters and lans are being ripped off b y the powers that be .

In Sho rt. we think you shou ld know everything that goes on in the comic indus try. N o t ju s t what the comic bigwigs want to tell you.

That's why we think INSID E COMICS is a magazine you must read if you're at all interested in the comic medium , We thin k that INSIDE CO MICS wi ll develop into the magazine that will keep the fans informed , Informed o f everything that's going on-no t just what the big guys want you to hear .

INSIDE COM ICS w ill give you forthright. h onest and u nbiased reporting o f the comic induslry . We're going out to get the best wri ters in the field to staff the magazine. Many of them you've seen in The Monster Times . INSIDE COMICS will be published quarterly and WILL ONLY BE AVAILABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE MONSTER TIMES. II will not be available on any newsstand. Each issue will be 40 pages , crammed with articles and inf ormation about the com ic field.

Info rmalion that, as a fan of the industry . you mus t know. Already lined up lor the first issue (which will be ready to mail on January 15. 1974) are the following articles :

" The Great Comic Art Rip-Oil" by Joe Branc atell i. Did you know that over 1900 pages o f original artwork were stolen f rom the vaults of National Periodical Publications? Did you know that National wi ll be prosecuting if they find you in possession of that stolen artwork? did you know thai Neal Adams will no

conducted b y Keit h Green .

longer be working for National unless he gets his artwork back? All these questions are answered in this article ,

" Inside ACBA." One 01 INSIDE COM ICS repor ters allended several meetings of ACBA (The Academy of Comic Book Arts) and he's w r illen a long article on the gOlngs.on in the comic book's professional society . Some of the inciden ts will astound you, others will make you laugh. But many others will make you wonder about the people who write and draw the comic books you buy .

" The Vanishing co mic Books" by Joe Brancatelli. Did you know that National Periodicals recently can­celled eight titles. simply becausE

there was no paper to print them on? Did you know that for the foreseea ble fu ture comic companies will have to produce 20 %' less comic books . agai n because there is no paper to p rint them on? And d id you kn ow that u nless th ings change drastically , comic books may all be out 01 business , simply because there is no paper? F ind out all about the massive paper shortage which may cause the end 01 the comic book .

" People Who've Ripped Me Off" by R , Crum b . Th e most famous underground comix artist. R, Crumb, tell s abo ut how the underground publishers steal his work , w ithhold hiS money and keep what is rightfully hiS . Crumb, who has changed the life-style of America itself. finally speaks out on how America and its publi shers have been ripping him 011 .

" The Ins ide Report ." This is a regular section of items of interest. In this issue, you'll learn about how Wall Disney Studios have now computerized the prod uction of Mickey Mouse , YOU'll learn how Na tional Periodicals fakes thei r letter columns by us ing staff people to write the letters. You'll learn abou t the TV station in Los Angeles that was forced to take cartoons off the air and ban many other programs. You'll learn about how THE NATIONAL LAMPOON was sued by VOlkswagen o f America for $30 million, because a comic fan wrote a fake ad lor THE NATIONAL LAMPOON EN CYC LOPE­DIA O F HUMOR . Not to mention a dozen other ilems no one else wants to talk about.

Also included in the f irst issue will be long leller pages. where the reader can speak ou t on any topic o f his choice. comprehensive fanzine re­views and many more items we're going to surprise you w ith .

As we mentioned before, INSIDE COM ICS can be purchased onl y through the mail. The cost of a single issue is $1. A full year's subscription is $4 (for four issues). With a full year's sub. you get a free complimen­tary 25 word classified advertisement that will run in a near future issue of INSIDE COMICS. The address to write IS : INSIDE COMICS, The Mons ter Times Publishing Company , P,O , Box 595 , Old Chelsea Station , New York , New York 10011. A coupon is provided elsewhere in thiS issue. 01 course , i f you 'd rather not cut up your Issue of TMT, a leller will suffice ,

We I hink YO u ' ll find INSIDE COMICS lascinating and informative . We'd like you to try It. •

CON-CALENDAR border on 1M Insane, but the people are friendly and there's always a good chance you'lI pick up some rare item for your collection. And Ihey're great places 10 meet people-tamous, Infamous and plaIn unknown .

THE CON·CALENDAR is an e.clusive I.,ture of TMT. Across the country , comic nuls. sf fans, monsler lreaks and the like are constantly gathering 10 buy, sell , trade, collect and lislen to speeches. As with most gatherings 01 tans, the conventions often

DATE CONVENTION LOCATION

COMIC BOOK MARKET

If you've n_been lo a Mcon,Mwe highly recommend you try one. They vary In size, emphasis, and qualily , of course , but they'ree1t tun to attend. We at TMT will do our part by keeping you informed 01 ell upcoming cons.

PRICE FEATURES

COMIC BOOK 'lec. t6 Phil Seuling THE HOTel McALPIN

51 althecloor DEALERS DISPLAY 621 AvenueZ New Yoril City Brooklyn, New Yoril No special guesls

3fdSunday NOSTALGIA Howard Johnson comic books,

every month 4ChurchSIreei Motor lodge ,,. pulps , lays,

Waltham , Mass, 02154 movies, auctions

COSMIC CON3 Yoril Universlly Inquire Films, Jan. 25-27 4700 Keele Winters College 1o, MllnyGuests

Downsview , Onl. . Cllnlda Downsview , Ontario rates and Surprises

CREATION 52 a day allhedoor ; January Adam MaUn BILTMORE HOTEL S4 for all SURPRISES , .. 16 East 2nd St. NewYoril City Ihree days in advance. GALORE!!!

Freeport, N.Y. 11520

INTERNATIONAL AMERICANA HOTel S4for all4dlYs Ertlerprise Crew February 15 STAR TREK CONVENTION 53fd Street and 71h Ave. in advance, esguests. 10 18,1974 P.O, BO)l 3t27 NewYoril City 53 for non-attending Large dealers room

NewYOft , N.Y. 10008 membership Costume Parade

HOLLYWOOD HOLLYWOOD lealurefilms,

til Sunday COMIC CON WOMAN'S CLUB ", cartoons

ev.rymonth 635 N. Citrus Ave, Hollywood, Calli .

50IIf undert 2 & lois of Hollywood, Calif , 90036 Iradlngs and guesls

THE FIRST ISSUE OF INSIDE COMIX MAY WELL BE THE BEST SINGLE ISSUE

OF ANY COMIC ART FAN MAGAZINE YOU'VE EVER READ! BUT YOU CAN ONLY GET ,T

FROM US BY MAIL!

Wh4n WII thlllllllmi you l pent 201t1 on I comic book and lelt you gal your moneY'1 worth?

When wss the list IIml you bought I Iinline lor I couptl 01 dolllrl, Ihen lound you gol rippecl-oll?

How mlny limes hawl you bought I comic book looking lor work b~ your flvorile artlsl or wrUer. only to lind they took him off Ihe book wUhoultelling In~one?

These i re probtem i lielngill Comic!lns . And while THE MONSTER TIMES do" III II un to help, il Cln onl~ devote I lew pages eleh month to comic •. Thl". wh~ , 10 Inswer the demlnd lor I good , proleulon_ ally·produeed ml gnlnl lboul Ihe comic industry , THE MONSTER TtMES II publlsh­inq INSIDE ' CO MICS . AItd 11 '1 rwedv for Immedie,e mlltlng ,

INSIDE COMICS II I mlVlltnl like ~OU'v1 n .. er I .. n belore. Publi shed qUlrtlrl~ lind onl~ I Vl ltlbl1 through thl mill) Ind edited by Joe Brwncalllll. TMT'I Mlnlglng Editor, INSIDE COMtCS will till you IVlrything '1'11,.11 to know lboul 11'11 comle. Industry. You'll nlver lind II on In)' newllllnd-IN. SIDE COMtCS II tor 11'11 fin , Thl fIrst 'SlUI, tor 1.lmpl. , eontl'n' thl loll ow ing mll.rill :

-thl story ot thl ml .. lvi 1900 Plgi originll Irt rip-ott trom Nillonli Comles

- I long Inll""lew with Roblrt Crumb, und~rground king-tumed_Illmar

_ the ItOry on why Charlton Comics closed down lor two compll tl months

-everythIng ~ou IlwI~ ' wl nled to know I bout ACBA , Ihe prolell loni l orglnilltlon 01 comicartlsl,andw.llars.

_how thl Werren Pubill hing Company I. Irying to buy Ihe ul'ldlrgroultd coml. industry .

There'. plent~ more Intorml tlon j.mmed Into INSI DE COMICS, bUI WI .Impl~ don'l h.ve Ihl .oom 10 lett ~ou II I II now ( • • e TMT'I Telelyp.column for more Info). You'lI jusl have lo ,ee the IIrsl Issue 10 believe It. II onlyco. I, $1 I nd Is aVlllabl, only Irom THE MONSTER TIMES. II ~ou'd like to subscribe, lind $4 lor lout Issues . As.n I dded bonus 10 subscribers. 10 show you wI'rl out 10 hetp, WI'II gl •• ~ou a Iree 30 word clsssitied . dvlrtillmeni.

INSIDE CO MICS Is I mlglzlne Ilk. you'n never belore seen In your liIe. 1I ~ou Ir •• t _ II InterlSted In the comic book medlum_o. Ihe comiC " ripl . und.rground coml .. , o. monster comics or an~lh lng r.l.ted to eomt.-you simply cannol . lIord to be wllhoullNSIDE COMICS.

AS I 'pecill bonus, each issue 01 INSIDE CO MICS will conl.ln completl , comprehen­, Ive rewlew s of ever~ I, n magazine published . The .. ', 1 101 01 good lanzlnlS­I nd I lot 01 b.d ones. We Ihlnk ~ou , hould know .... 'hlch on.,.re whlch-belorl you buy Ihlm.

INSIDE COMICS. like THE MONSTER TIMES belore II , will be In innoullon unlike .nylhlng ~ou 've .. If read . When THE MONSTER TtMES Illks. people lI,ten ,

And THE MONSTER TtMES SI~' ~ou Cln'z Iflotd NOT 10 gil INSIDE COMICS.

r I:S:';-C~M~C; - - ... - - - - - - - 301 I ADI."lonoZ ThaMonSltf Times I lIWU I1 7SI,"1 I NewYortt. NewVortt 10011

I PI.,SI tnll' my onto yll. l lou. IIIUl I I subscription 10 INSIDE COMICS. I enclose 11.00

.. :li="'IOs.;b~=F~E~":':~~:S :::':'1:; I minI . , : ...:;:'s! S~,:~iC . Jusl s.>d me IN 11 ... 1 IIIUI , I

I I I

City ....

... Zlp ......

AS , ontoyllf Chlrte-rsubsc:.ibtr,lundlr.I...cI1 .m entlUed 10 I FREE 30 word cl." lIIed In I IuIUII INSIDE COMICS. INoll: n.me Ind addflll mUll be counled in tollq

------------------~

monsters-no t to mention days and weeks ,

Gel your MonsterCalendar now. Be the envy o f at! the calendar buffs everywhere . Just lilt out the coupon and send 52 .50($2.00 for the calendar and SOd; fo r pos tage and handling) and your Mons ter Calendar will be on the way .

Just tn t ime lor 1974 , we might add!

r:e: H:::M:.:K:::-"301 I P,O. BOltSU, OlOCHElSEA STATION I 1974 MONSTER ",w ,o" .",w,o"..... I

TIMES CALENDAR I O." Mon,'. '" P'.".,.ndm. , I Imagine a monSter for every day of the I Monsler ~~f~~~ar O~t T$~ ~~~ I ~~~rE;~~~ t~:~~~vt~ i i.HNEo:~v~~!~I~ I each lor which I enc lose I IS the fabulou s, stupendous .. . not to I 5.. I ~~~~~~~~~~AR , t974 MONSTER I TOTAL ENCLOSED $.... I Ja~~~~y r;;.~~~~~y~~c;~~:~~~rt~~~~~ I Name.. I ~~c~tr~t~;~i t'ht ~ ~~n's~:r ~~~~~ 7r~c~ I Address ., I the venerated pages o f THE MON· I City.. II STER TIME S. Monsters for Janu:lfy and February and every m on th you I State ................. Zip ........... . .. I can think 01. It's a treasure chest 01 l-~~ _______ ""

page 26

MONSTER TIMES BOOKSHELF THE MONSTER TIMES BOOKSHELF Is the ani, place where rau held We'll gol the best bergalns around put them ,II under one can P'c~ up all your favorite Ilems In the horror fanlasy and comic rool and .... e·re lust weitlng for you to pick 01,11 your favontes'

FABULOUS FRANK FRAZETTA POSTERS

;J THE MONSTER TIMES, P.O. Box 595, Old Chelsea Station New York. N.Y. 10011

Now is your chance io get the posters you've always wa nted. We've got monsters. heroes. warriors. vi llains and even comic characters . You got knotho les on your wa ll s? No sweat , buy a bunch 01 posters . They're all mailed in sturdy cardboard mailing tubes.

Name ______________________ ___

Address ----------------------

City -------------------------

State _______________ Zip ______ ___

I enclose lull payment $ ____________ _

,,~

S2.~

I 'ow I""" I ,e,,, I "'" I MANY NIIM8ER p6ZfkGEI PRICE

. .1'18 Sl~W

\ SI95

I .PN

SJ4S I I

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The Monster Times

A sel ol,nret'!JeflJoncs

~~ccn~~~s~,~'iVg;~2~ Av""aole Su,\;yla" v eacr. o< asasel ol lnree

JEFF JONES

.~ ~~p;"--., -I~: .~ (~.

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P23. AAOUElWElC H.30" 1'2.4. WEREWOlF ,30"by b y 4' ''. $U)()DIUS 4'' ~ 41 ', $1 OOpI US 45c

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W[I P29 K ING KDNG III I.3(l 1'28 SPIDER.MAN tcolor j. t •. :1 S l 00 Il l u~ ." " '0 hl ·: l S2 {)(l DI,,~ 45c L. __ ____________ _______________ ______________ ___ ~:.:;:i:ii::=:::;,;~:.::.:i ________ ... _____________ •

The Monster Times

MONSTERS 1·~~~mu[UJ~[~ & VAMPIRES & GORlllAf

I ZOMBIES & MOVIE MAKERS When we first approached TMT Editor Joe Kane and writer Jason Thomas about jointly compiling 8

list of the very worst horror films ever made, their bright, beady eyes immediately lit up with unrestrained sadistic joy. Even when we told them of all the tiresome hours o f- research involved In such a monstrous project , their evil enthusiasm refused to flag a Jot. Then we told them how much we were going to pay them for their labors _ .. and STILL they wanted to do It! Only when we informed them that they would actually have to WATCH these films did their grisly glee dim to dark despair. By that time though, it was too late for our scare scholars to go back on their respective words , so-with heavy hearts and bloodshot eyes- they presented us with the following roster of the celluloid damned . ..

THE WORLD'S FIFTY

WORST MONSTER FILMS EVER

BY JASON THOMAS & JOE KANE

The 101l0wing is a list of what we -consider to be the very worst horror films ever made. Of course , any such list Is bound to be a highly subjective one, and the fright flicks that appear on said list do not necessarily reilect the views of the TMT staff, management or even the writers of this piece. And while we recognize the right 01- Qualified experts to present an opposing view, that doesn't mean we'll respect that right and grant any equal time. In lact , we think It's pretty nice of us to even recognize it.

When we first set about compiling a list 01 horrible horror films, we came up wilh well over a hundred titles . There have been , so many really bad horror films that the only way we could narrow it down to what we felt were the 50 absolute worst was by eliminallng any lilm that exhibited so much as a single spark of inlelligence, that contained even one adequate scene, or featured perform­ances that rose, even if ever so

slighlly, above the level of the abysmal. Also, we didn't want to come up with a list of films so obscure that TMT readers had probably never heard 01 any 01 them. For example, only a couple of the many blood'n 'gore movies of the 60s are represented here , mainly because we feel they don't deserve to dominate anything-not even a list of the 50 worst films. We've also stuck largely to American films, since bad dubbing can make a merely mediocre monster movie seem more terrible than it really is (there are a few exceptions, though, 01 foreign films

atrocious enough to make this list anyway).

Since '-most of these films are equally bad, we've listed them in alphabetIcal order, rather than order of incompetence . Each litle is followed by the year it was made and, wherever possible, the name of its director. Sharp·eyed readers will note that there are a goodly number of directorial repeaters on the list- l arry Buchanan appears no fewer than 7 times , while William Beaudine is a lour-time loser, and Herchell G. Lewis , Jerry Warren, William Grefe (interviewed on page 19) and Edward D. Wood Jr. all put in more than one appearance.

At any rate , Ihese are our choices for the worst horror Iilms ever made. You can compare ou r list to your own or hang it on your wall or leave it cru mpled beyond recognition in some lorgotten corner 01 you r home, according to your wonts. Just don't come complaining to us if you see one or more of your favorite litms on this list.

1. ASTOUNDING SHE MONSTER (1958) . Ronnie Ashcroft. The title character spends a tot of time pursuing the rest of the tiny cast th rough the woods, while an offscreen narrator tries desperately to hold some kind of plot together . Recommended as a late-night sleep­ing aid only. With Robert Clarke, Kenne Duncan, Marylin Harvey.

2. ASTRO ZOMBIES (1968). T.V. Mikels. John Carradlne and his demented hunchbacked henchman produce battery-operated "as tro zom· bies" in a dingy basement lab while

government agents trail nefarious foreign spies with both Russian and Mexican accents. Its chief crime is Its

r~rm~~~~~;~n~~~a:K~.e . ~~~h T~::~ Canadine , Wendell Corey, Tura Satana, Rafael Campos.

3. ATTACK OF THE GIANT LEECHES (1959) . Bernard L. Kowalski. The lirst ten minutes are fa irly good, but then the plot takes an enormous dip into subterranean depths. The most expensive items used are a few small explosives and two cheap·looking leech costumes that are supposed to be intelligent and bloodthirsty! With Ken Clark, Yvette Vickers, Bruno

4. BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOK­LYN GORILLA (1953) . William Beau­dine. The two good guy "ac tors" are subhuman cop ies of Martin and Lewis. The plot is so bad that lugosi must have really been desperate to do this one [He was ... see TMT 1t27). To make things worse, the story ends right In the middle! With Bela Lugosi , Duke Mitchell , Sammy Petrillo , Muriel Landers.

5. BILLY THE KID VS . DRACULA (1965). William Beaudine . It had to happen sometime. The film works so hard at being bad that it's not even good camp, although there are a number of classic bad lines. With John Carradine, Bing Russell, Melin­da Plowman , Chuck Courtney .

6. BLOOD FEAST (1963). Herschell Gordon Lewis . The lirst 01 a long tine 01 blood 'n'gore movies , this one set the siCkening standard the others have, unfortunatety , lived up to . The bloodthirsty adventures of a mad Egyptian caterer were covered in detai l 10 TMT 1t24 . With Connie Mason , Thomas WOod, Scott Arnold .

7. BLOOD OF DRACULA'S CASTlE (1969). At Adamson . Not counting skinflicks, this is probably the very worst Dracula mtlvie ever made. ­OebO'1ai r Orac and his aging mate are living in a caslte-in 20th century America!-with a butler (John Carra­dine, of course) and a demented oaf named Mango. We've seen bad Dracula films bel ore, but this is the stake that must have really broken the Grand Vampire's heart. With John Carradine , Alex D'Arcy, Paula Ray­mond , Robert Dix .

8. BRIDE OF THE MONSTER (1956). Edward O. Wood Jr. This , one of Lugosi 's las t features , is a real loser. He's a scientist who's trying to turn men (and women) into mindless gian ts. His first success is with "Lobo" (Tor JohnSOn), who was a mindless giant to begin with. In the

CURSE OF THE SWAMP CREATURE

With his mlnel

t'HE'i~' OF BLOOD Is about to tose his hud

~ m~~~~~~: 01 the same name. Insomniacs Bewa,e : Thi s 111m has been picked up by several stations anel Is '*ngshown ....... different tlUe on late, late shows throughout thetanel. Be forewarned Is all.

end, lugosi suffers the same shortly before he's eaten up by a rubber octopus. With Bela Lugosl , Ed Parker. William Benedict , Loretta King .

9. CAPE CANAVERAL MONSTERS (1960). Phil Tucker. The title for this winner should have been TEENAGE GENIUSES MEET THE CAPE CANA­VERAL CREEPS. The on ly good thing about this insipid alien invasion garbage is the ending, moslly because it's just thaI. With Scott Peters , Katherine Victor , Jason Johnson.

10. CAPTIVE WOMEN (1952). Stuarl Gilmore. A vision of a Fun Cily of the future (29th century) that's even more horrible than the present one. This inept, ptodd ing effort features bar­barians and mutants- victims 01 atomic warfare-battling it out in the wrecked subway stations of a destroyed New '(ork City. With sch tock it's loaded. With Robert Clarke , Margaret Field , William Schaller! , Ron Randell .

11. CAT-WOM EN OF THE MOON (1954) . Arthur Hilton. Enjoyab l y terrible flick has usual crew of bland , sexist 50's spacemen land on planet inhabited solely by beautiful "babes." They're greeted with a casual "Welcome to the moon," delivered in great deadpan style. With Sonny Tufts , Victor Jory , Marie Windsor, William Phipps.

12. CREATURE OF DESTRUCTION. (1967) . Larry Buchanan . A cheap, aw ful remake of SHE CREATURE,

Continued on next page

page 28

which wasn't terribly terrilic the first lime around . The production looks like it was scripted and direc ted by a \a lentless hack (which it was). The "mons ter:' which was also employed in Irs ALIVE!. is a wet suit with claws attached and a tunny face painted on! With Les Tremayne , Pal Delaney, Aron Kincaid .

13. CURSE OF : THE SWAMP C REATURE (1966). Larry Buchanan. This is another zinger thaI's reserved for the late, late show. John Agar's worst fi lm 10 date, in wh ich he does nothing but sit around and smoke cigarettes. The mosl elaborate thing in the show is a 1 Oct fright mask. With John Agar, Francine York, Bill Thurman .

14 . DEATH CU RSE OF TARTU (1967). William Grefe . A group 01 people meet up with a zombie who can assume the form of any Hving creature on Earth . Sounds good . but it wasn'!. A lot 01 animals guest-star in this farce, and they seem to be more intelligent than the actors. Incidentally, even the conclusion 01 this bomb is unacceptable. With Fred Pinero , Babette Sherri ll. Sherman Hayes.

An accursed SWAMP CREATURE

15. DR. TERROR 'S GALLERY OF HORROR (1967) . David L . Hewitt. Not one atrocious lale, but five of them! Awful acting. stolen plots , wooden dialogue, poor color, abysmal direct­ing, atrocious etc ., with John Carradine and Lon Cl:1aney, too! With Rochelle Hudson . Roger Gentry, Vic McGee.

16. THE EVIL BRAIN FROM SPACE (1958). Chogi Akasaka·. Japan outdid itself with this one. The monsters come close to being good , bul the heroes. plot, scrip t and direction (did I forget anything?) are incredibly bad . Throughout the film, Starman, an Oriental superhero, gets 10 practice acrobatics with the ag i le villains and loss obvious dummies around. With Ken Utsui. Junko Ikeuchi, Reiko Seta.

17 . THE EYE CREATURES (1965). Larry Buchanan. This is a grade Z remake of INVASION OF ' THE SAUCER MEN. which was bad enough in its original form! In this version, the '·teenagers" have been replaced by young men. Ihe Air Force personnel are unusually slow-witted, and the creatures have shot up to notmal size. Don't even see the o riginal, allhough it was beller. With John Ashley, ShIrley Mcline, Cynthia Hull

THE EYE CREATURES eyeing 'Iletim, .

18. FIRE MAIDENS FROM OUTER SPACE (1965). Cy Roth. Except for the ctassical music and the nice­looking tad ies, the re's nothing enjoyable about this dud. Th e descendants of Atlantis are alive and well on another ptanet, menaced by a nut in black tights and a Halloween mask! The producer risked his enUre fortune by buying real smoke bombs for this tow-budget catast rophe. With Anthony Dexter, Paul Carpenter, Susan Shaw .

19. FR ANK ENSTEIN MEETS THE SPACE MONSTER (1965) . Robert Gaffney. This was supposedly meant to be tongue-in-cheek. and it sure succeeded! Franky is a crazy robo t, the monster is a clumsy muscleman, the actors and actre ss~s are emotionless, and the plot is asinine And it all takes place in Puerto Rico. With James Karen, Marylin Hanold, David Kerman .

20. GOOZtllA VS . TH E MONSTER (1971). This could have been good as a straight flick, but somebody decided to make it into an idiotic kiddie show! The villainous smog-eater is original and kinda cu le , but the theme song can drive you . right up a ceiling. Sorry, Big G. fans . With Godzilla. Smog MonSler.

21. HOMICIDAL (1961) . William Castle. While nol a chea p quickie like most 01 the films cited here nor, in tight 01 subsequent films , excessively bloody, HOMICIDAL still manag.e~ to create an amb ience of sUff1clent tastelessness to make this Its!. The brutal decapitation o f an etderly

woman was the picture's high point in terms of revulsion. With Glenn Corbett, Pa lricia Breslin, James Westerfield. Jean Arless.

22 . HORROR OF PARTY BEACH (see page 3).

23 . I DRINK YOUR BLOOD (1971). David Durston. Horace Bones, free­lance ritualistic killer, leads a band of crazed "hippies" on an orgy of bloodletting . As inept as it is o ffensive. With Bhaskar, Jadine Wong.

24. I EAT YOU R SK IN (1964). Det Tenney. Not as bad as I DRIN K YOUR BLOOD, this flick about hungry zombies and evil voodoo doin's on a Caribbean island is territl1e enough in

~::I~w~r~~ht tt~/i.:~~n~ a DS:Oop't~n ~~~ brought you HORROR OF PARTY BEACH . With William Joyce, Heather Hewitt, Walter Coy.

I OF THE AN IMAL PEOPLE (1960). Jerry Warren. A foreign nick. with American scenes added. dealing with Eskimos men­aced by outer space creatures . The shaggy titan looks sick. and the miniature sets would have looked better if they had been Aurora models . John Carradine narra ted, but he was smart enough not to show his face in this mess, except in the film's prologue . With Robert Burton, Sarbara Wilson. .

26. INVASION OF THE STAR CREATURES (1961). Bruno VeSota . The second worst science·fiction

movie ever made. Two doglaces try 10 be funny (and fai l terribly) when cap tured by a pair of amazons and their walking salad-men. The stock footage from TV's ROCKY JONES, SPACE RANGER is enjoyab le for nostalgia freaks, bullha t only lasts a lew seconds. With Bob Ball , F rankie Ray. Gloria Victor, Dolores Reed.

27. IT'S ALIVE! (1 968). Larry Buchanan . Crazy man captures people and feeds them to a fellow wearin g a ludicrous zipper suit with teeth. (ShadeS of CREATURE OF DESTRUCTION!) This one is so bad that TV doesn·t even air it before 1 : 00 in the morning. With Tom my Kirk, Shirley Bonne, Carveth Austerhouse.

28. JESSE JAMES MEETS FRANK· EN STEIN 'S DAUGHTER (1965). Wil­liam Beaudine. You can't fight the inevitable! Jesse James sees brawny sidekick turned into a monster named " Igor" and confronts the mad Maria Frankenstein while cardboard sets continually threaten to topple in mid-scene. WHh John Lupton , Cal Bolder, Narda Onyx .

29 . KillER SHREWS (1959). Ray Kellogg. The old HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES gimmick is used in this imbecilic production. Absurd masks are tied onto angry dogs (who are probably angry because of the masks). and we're expected to believe that they're gigantic shrews! Awful. With James Best. Il\grid Goude, Ken Curtis .

30. LATITUDE ZERO (1969). Inoshiro Honda. Cesar Romero is at his worst in this inept science-fiction "th r iller." The usual super-city beneath the sea is used in the picture, and ii's being menaced by Romero and his mutated creatures . Remember the good old days, when he and Joseph Cation (yup, he's in it too) used IQ be fairly good? Well, they're gone lorever! With Akira Takarada, Patricia Medina, Richard Jaeckel.

31 . MONSTER A GO-GO (1965). The title atone should keep away anyone with any smarts. It's the usual as trona u t -g oes·u p-norma I-a nd­comes-down-strange theme , this time having the spaceman (a real ugly chap) grow to about 50 leellall. It's a combination of the worst elements of a number of flicks, and rather revOlting. With Phil Morlan, June Travis, George Perry.

32. MONSTER' FROM THE OCEAN FLOOR (1954). Wyott Ordung. This one had good potential, but the script could have used a lot more appearances by the monster. We almost never see ;1. When we finally do see the thing. It'S nothing but a small moael oem!; manipu lated via very vIslh!c strings! With Anne Kimball, Stuart Wade, Wyatt Ordung.

33 . MONSTER FROM r HE SURF (a.k.a. BEACH GIR LS A ND THE MONSTERS) (1965). Jon Hall. Jon Hall attempts 10 relieve surfside boredom by donning sea monster suit and doing in local lovelies. Incred ibly cheap. slow and dull-willed . Watch il if you must-but you'll hate yourself in the morning. With Sue Casey, Walker Edmiston. Read Morgan .

34. MONSTROSITY (1964). Joseph Mascelli. Api tille lor abominable film about transplanting old lady's brain into bodies of nubile upstairs maids . Even the zombies are duller than usual. With ,Frank Gerstle, Erika Peters, Judy Bamber

35 . MY SON, THE VAMPIRE (1952). John Gilling. Another Lugosi loser. He's supposed to be a vampire, but may nol be . In any event, he's a mad scientist who's out to get a transves­tite! The robot is cu te , but tClO easily dismantled. Made as a Brit ish comedy, it's actually rather pitiful. With Lugosi , Arthur Lucan , Hattie Jacques.

36. NAVY VS. THE NIGHT MON­STERS (1965) . Michael A. Hoey. The "actors" are considerably less talent­ed than the plants (and they're lake!) . The two harried herOines are worth ogl ing ai, if that's your bent , but they don' t appear in enough 01 the lootage. Read a book instead! Wilh Anthony Eistey, Mamie Van Doren, Pamela Mason . Bill r.ray .

37. PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE {1956 . Edward D. Wood Jr. Just before he died, Beta Lugosi made some scenes for this sci-Ii dud . Tor Johnson (who talks for a moment!) and Vampira are also cast as zombies raised from their graves by alien invaders. The script and everything else were highly heiR-'uI-in making this one of the biggest wastes of time ever . Wi th Gregory Walcott, Lvle Talbot, Mona McKinnon .

38 .. 0UEEN OF OUTER SPACE (1956) Edward Bernds . Btand 50's space crew crash lands on Venus and f ind ?sa Zsa Gabor , the only Ven usian with a Hungarian accent. " How could a bunch of women come up w ith a gizmo like that?·, asks c rew m ember about scientific invention ... Not only is the film terrible, but sexist to boot! With Eri<; Flem ing, Laurie Mitchell, Paul Birch.

39. SANTA CLAU S CONQUERS THE MARTIAN S (1964). Nicholas Webster. Absolutely the worsl science·f iction flick ever made, bar none! With John Call, Leonard Hicks.

~ I ••

40. SCARED TO DEATH (1947). Christy Cabanne. BORED TO DEATH would be a more appropria te title for this "sleeper" (narrated by a woman's corpse, no less). We wish we cou ld say this was Bela Lugosi's worst, but he went on to top himself in BRIDE OF THE MONSTER and other l imor turkeys. With Lugos i , Georg e Zucco, Joyce Compton.

The Monster Times

"Haven't I seen me someplace before???"

THE CREATURE OF DESTRUCTION bore a striking resemblance .. . right down to the very last zipper ... to the monster trom Irs ALIVE!

-::-'li lstilm, a rotten remake

~~~~Etr~~nrl also bored many • masochistic monster fan.

41. SHE DEMONS (1959) . . Richard Cunha. Deranged Naz i scientist

-dabbles in scar tissue experiments that result in the creation 01 the title creatures. Bad acting and direction 'Perfectly complement abominable script. With Tod Griffin, Ir ish McCalla, Victor Sen Yung .

42. SLIME PEOPLE (1963). Robert Hullon. The creatures are walking garbage heaps wi th spears. They've come up from beneath the earth to take over, and they're super-strong and nearly indestruc tible . And power­ful ug ly, too. But they only come up in one place, and at the end of the movie the sloppy, slurpy things are dr iven b.ack inlo the SOi l-probably by the terrib le script. With Robert Hutton, Susan Hart , Robert Burton.

Mutantirom the YEAR 2889.

43. TASTE OF BLOOD (1967) Herschel! G. Lewis. A slug from a bottle of Dracu la's blood turns a businessman into a vampire. This one gets our vote as THE all-time worst horro r movie, nol only because of i ts 'dazzling ineptitude but because of its 2 hour running time. That's right-120 minutes of unspeakable boredom . Absolutely unforgivable. With Bill Rogers, Thomas Wood, Gail Janis.

44 . TEENAGE ZOMBIES (1960). Jerry Warren. Dumb spies fulfill Nixon's dream by learning how to lurn people into obedient robots. Some m ind less '· teenagers" manage to turn the tables on the vi llains and save the free world for internal, rather than foreign, man i pulation. So ho ist a flag , already! With Don Sullivan, Steve Conte, Katherine Victor.

45. UNDERTAKER AND HIS PALS (1967). David C. Graham . Tasteless trash disguised as comedy serves as another cinematic excuse to maul. molest and mutilate a slew of hapless heroines. Former moyie star Robert Lowery puts in an embarrassed cameo appearance. With Lowery, Ray Dennis, Warrene Ott, Rad Fulton.

46 . UNTAMED WOMEN (1952). Merle Connell. Enjoyably alrocious yarn abou t shipwrecked crew landing on island teeming with prehistoric monsters (all stock footage) , hairy caveman , and untamed women. Contains the immortal line, "Shoot anything with hair that moves. " With Doris Merrick, Mikel Conrad, Morgan Jones.

\ 47. VOODOO MAN . (1944) . William 8eaudine. Anyone who li ves through seeing this atrocity wonders why a voodoo priesl would work in a gas station . The flick could have been a lot worse, bul it was saved by the fact that it was on ly, an hour long . Probably Carradine's first bad role, although Lu gosi was quite good in it. Despite the fair efforts o f Bela and George Zucco, however, the film was a real loser. With Wanda McKay, Hen ry Halt.

48 . YEAR-2889 (1968). Larry Buchan­an . A rotten remake of DAY THE WORLD ENDED, which could have used ·some help as it was . This verSion is far worse , however. because of .non-ac tors and crummy make-up. Wtth Paul Peterson. Charla Doarty, Quinn O·Hara.

49. ZOMBIES ON BROADWAY (1945). Gordon Douglas. Two zanies conduct a zombie hunl for a New York night club act. but run inlo interference in the form of Bela Lugosi , a prisoner of yet another Grade Z movie. The on ly good thi ng about Ihe lilm is its title , which sounds more like cinema verite in our book. With Wally Brown, Alan Carney, Sheldon leonard

50 . ZONTAR, THE THING FROM VENUS (1966). Larry Buchanan. A ro tten remake of IT CONQUERED THE WORLD. By not st'ick ing to new versions of a lready /terrible films , Buchanan 's ci nematic ~rimes become more serious. See the original instead, which wasn't terrible - on the contrary, it was perfectly mediocre. With John Agar. Anthony Houston , Susan Bju rman.

DISHONORABLE MENTIONS :

ATTACK OF THE MAYAN MUMMY, BEAST OF BLOOD, BLOOD THIRST, BLOODTHIRSTY BUTCHERS, BOW­ERY AT MIDNIGHT, BRAIN THAT WOULDN 'T DIE , CAPTIVE WILD WOMAN , COLOR ME BLOOD RED , CREATURE FROM THE HAUNTED SEA , CRY OF THE BANSHEE , CURSE OF NOSTRADAMUS, DAY THE EARTH FROZE , OEVIL GIRL FROM MARS , DIABOLICAL DR. Z, DISEMBODIED, DUNGEON OF HOR­ROR , EEGAH !, FLYING SERPENT, FRANKENSTEIN 1970. FR A NKEN­STEIN'S DAUGHTER , FROM HELL IT CAME. GHASTLY ONES, GHOST OF DRAGSTRIP HOLLOW, HOW TO MAKE A MONSTER, I WAS A TEEN ­AG E FR ANK ENSTEIN , IN CREDIBLE PETRIFIED WOR LO. IN VASION USA , KtNG DINOSAUR , MAD DOCTOR OF BLOOD ISLAND , MESA OF LOST WOMEN. MISSILE TO THE MOON , RETURN OF THE APEMAN , ROBOT MONSTER. TEENAGERS FROM OUTER SPACE, TORTURE DUN­GEON , 2000 MANIACS, UNKNOWN TERR OR, VOYAGE TO THE PLANET OF PREHISTORIC WOM EN, WASP WOMAN , WIZAR D OF MA RS many, many more .

liHOST WRITING IN BLOOD VALLEY

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 21

then cast the act or's face and head in plaster to make a mold so that he co uld create realistic. Iile-like rubber masks of Flagg 'S screen character Mad Dog Click. When Carston laler received shipments 01 Ihese masks, he sprayed them with a phosphores­cent spray and then had cardboard axes made. Carston, himself a former professional mag ici an. senl the packages ou t to theatres that were going to play THE MANIACS ARE LOOSE . And during the run of the film at the theatre, the managers would hire local fellows , or even use his own ushers. to wear th e Mad Dog Cl ick masks, wave the axes. and run

page 29

special theatrics.

A HORRIFYING HISTORY

Jim Harmon and I part ially scripted THE LEMON GROVE KIDS MEET THE MONSTERS and the film has abou t as unusual a history as any o f Ray Dennis Steckler's movies.

OrlgmaUy, THE LEMON GROVE KIDS MEET THE MONSTERS was a full length feature film called THE LEMON GROVE KIDS .&: T THE BIG RACE. a family film about a group of neighborhood teenagers headed by Slug O'Hoolihan (Mike Kannon) and Gopher (Cash Flagg) who become mvolved with Big Ed Narzak (Coleman Francis), a Lemon Town crime czar making heavy bets on a carnival day race in which the Lemon Grovers were to race their big rivals, KiUer Krump's Gang (Herb Robins was Killer) . And to insure Big Ed's winning a 101 of

Sleckl,r's THE TEENAGE PSYCHO MEETS 8LOODY MARY 1.lIed 10 ' ns pi" • 'e,n te"o, 111m f.~i~.I . bu. i. WIS the lI,sllull-lenglh ''''u" '0 be !timed in 810od~-Vislon . not to mention being unlfke.ny.hingbelote.

out .nto the au(:lIence whenever the spiraling hypnotic wheel appeared on screen.

Carston'S special handling of THE MANIACS ARE LOOSE has proven very successful wherever it has played, parlicularly at the Sky Hi Drive-In in Las Vegas in 1971 where the li.lm racked u.p the bigges t boxofflce the drive-In seen in

money from the race, the Saboteur (Ed McWatters) went 10 work setting up all sorts of obs tacles for the Lemon Grovers to overcome. These obstacles included wrong -way signs, kidnappings , atomic bomb plots and, during the cou rse of the frantic race , Gopher of the Lemon Grovers even ran in to some monsters- Th e Mad Mummy and Kogar the Gorilla.

After Steckler finished THE LEMON GROVE KIDS AT THE BIG RACE he decided to cut it down from a feature film to a thirty minute short called THE LEMON GROVE KIDS MEET THE MONSTERS . But even though Joe Carston was able to secure some '"A" slot bookings for the shorl. and even added a stage show to the fi lm , most theatres weren't interested in short films. Meantime, Steckler had filmed another Lemon Grove short, THE GREEN GRASSHOPPER FROM

SPACE AND THE VAMPIRE

Yel another pai, 01 INCREOl8LY STRANGE CREATURES . S teckle,'s current pro)ecl is ano.hef Vegas·baSe<:! horror tenlatl~ely Iilled THE BOG PEOPLE. and we're sure 'hat it witt maint.in the same levetol quality tound in Ray·searlieflilms.

more than eight monthS. Besides THE MANIAC S ARE

LOOSE , Joe Carston has been distributing Steckler's TEE N AGE PSYCHO MEETS BLOODY MARY and THE LEMON GROVE KI DS MEET THE MONSTERS in simitar unorthodox fashion. But while Carston's specia l brand of showmanship has paid off well for these films, he said that his next Steckler release, SUPER COO L -a .mod private. eye film involv ing a girl In a snakeskin costume. Ihe theft of $100.000 worth 01 uncut hero in. and an amateur detective whose idol is Humphrey Bogart-this film will probably be released without any

LADY , whicn featured a Green Grasshopper Man, Carolyn Brandt as the lady vampire, a flying saucer and even magic wands that could make people disappear instantly ; and Cars ton took this second lemon Grove short. ed i ted il to the original short, which , o f course, had originally been a full length film, and then he went inlo release with a new. longer. 70-minute film called, again, THE LEM ON GROVE KIDS MEET THE MONSTERS!

ts this any way to make a monster movie? you ask . Well, if you happen to be Ray Dennis Steckler, then the answer is yes! •

page 30

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TMT 21. TH E TOTAL FRANKENSTEIN , $1 . F ,l mbOO~ 193 t 's f RANKENSTEIN. a c0m­p le te FRANKENSTEIN I llmograptly. the real Cas­tte Frar.lo.ens teon. "The De­clrneol FranksenSlein." in­t(!f"Vlew wlth Glen !Franken­Slern) Slrange. "'franken­stein'n Ihe Comics: ' and a cotor cenlerloldwithallthe FRANKENSTEINS 01 the

TMT 128, HUNCHBACK SPECIAL, ll ... A spKial Lon Cl"Ianeyl Hunchbiock Issue with centerlold puppet 01 lhe Hunch­MCIt, en artic le and I lIuslratlons on Chaney's make-up lech­niq LHI . Also. PLASTIC MAN. Willis O'Brlen's BLACK SCORPION. new Hammer releases and the WAX- MUSEUM.

TMT 6. ZOMBIES ON PA· RADE. Sl . Feal ures a zom/)Ie 111m sUlvey. "Zomb,es in lhe Com,cs. " THE A STRO ZOMBI ES. THE OM(G A MAN. a Dan Green ComiC stltp. lev,ew 01 Bem, Wn· ghtson's BADTIME STOR­IES NIGHT OF THE lIV· ING DEAD and a 10mbI(' colo . cen ter folO You '" never want to see l om/)le5

'MT. 14. WICKED WOLF. MAN . 51 . Featu'es II IiImllOOk and co lor cente<fold of WOLF­MAN . article on comic's cJ\auv,niSI pig. THE PHAN· TOM . GODZILLA. "'Ben'nd lhe Scenes al SILENT RUN­NING.- .&\Ilew of SCIENCE FICTION FILM . CON­OUEST OF THE PLANET QFTHE APES and an inle< _ view w,th Pete< Cushiog.

TMT 22. GREEN SLIME BLUES. S1. F, lmbook on GREEN SLIME. Pfeview on THE VAULT Of HORROR. God· l lllavs. GhIO/an. GENESIS H. iIl"l ,cle on New York's CREEP . results o . Ihe Monsler PoH. re¥lew 01 lhe KLINE PORTFOLIO. and a t"p tO l he Amlt us Siudios. AlSO. TMT"s eXClusive Mt MONSTERMORE seeIng isbelie¥ing !

TMT ' 29. ABOMINABLE SNOWMAN . $1. F,lmbool<

the Un....".1 Films Ctassic HOUSE OF fRA NKEN STEI N . E. C . comits. tete.olsion cartoon guide. two Abominable Snowman a!Titles. Glenn Strange memorial, SIN­BAD'S GOLDEN VOYAGE. AlSO FROM HELL IT CAME AND Death is a Way 01 L,re

The Monster Times

TMT 15 , VALLEY OF GWANOI. $I . Fllmbook a~ centerfotd on THE VALLEY OF GWANGI. all inlerview wi th Alfred Hitchcock. " Vamp ires in lhe COmICS.- preview 01 BLACKULA. THE PLANT MONSTERS. review 01 HPL magazine. Godlilla's own Column. some (eal mono s ier s and CHILDREN SHOULDN'T PLAY WITH O£AD T1U:~Ci~.

TMT 23. GADZOOKS , GODZILLA, SI . A Speclal.a page magaz,ne issue oJ TMT (SevOled 10 GOOZILLA and hi s Iriends. Incl uO'"g a GODZILLA I llmbook. fou. cotor GOD­ZILLA pos ters. the friendS 01 GODZILLA. Tom Sut­ton ' s super comic strip RAT! and mOle on lhe Greatest Beast in Ihe World, Godzllla.

TMT B. HAMMER HOR· RORS. Fitf\"lOOOk and color center-10Id on Hammer's HOR­ROR OF DRACULA . A "Hammer Hor.OI H",ory"". " TI"Ie HAmmer Heritage:' Ihe complete Horror check­IISI. terror l oyS on London. Hamme'Sbeauhlulladies. rev'ews o. HORRORS. and DR ACUL A All Hammer. All HorrOl!

TMT 16, GODZILLA FOR ~RESIOENT! , SI . Our spectacular luue break i ng theslorv Ihal Gool i lla is running 'or presidenl . wilh a color Cenlerlold to matell . Also included are afllCI" on MIGHTY JOE YOUNG , COUNT YORGA and Slill more PLANT MONSTERS. An intl!f\liew ..... ith Vincent Pflce. and "COmics ·Go 10 Conego."'

TMT 24, REGAL RODAN !SI) Fi lmbookon RODAN wilh a lree Color centerfold of saml. Also Basil WaNerton comics ' THEATRE Of BLOOO. Review 01 HIS TORY OF COMICS vot . 2. lhe Last 01 The PI.nel 01 The Apes and much more In our special BILL OF RIGHTSissll!!.

- - ;H~:~N~;E~ ;I;~~P~O~;O:;9;- - jOI Old Chelsea Station, New York , N.Y. 10011

Please send me lheM super coIlectOl's Items .s SOOfl .. . possible ..• II not soonerl (Not. : II )'OU wanl )'OUr baclI issun MIlt .i. lSi Class Mail , plUM tI\Close an .ckIlUonal 35 c«t1S per issue ordared.)

1112.00\ No. 14ISI .ooj

=:: ~Ir, ::l ::: ~: ~:: ::I No. 4IS1 .oo\ No. 17 111.001

::: :[:~ ::l ::: ::!::::I No. 11 IS1.001 No. 20 IS1.ool No. 12 [SI .oo\ No. 21 IJ1 .oo] No. 13 1S2.OO1 NO. 22 /S1 .OO)

No. 23 [Sl .oo\ No. 241S1 ·oo\ No. 25 IS1 .ool No. 26 ISI .oo\ No. 271S1 .ool

rvSalut' IS1 .ooj No.:lBISI.oo]

No. 29 (Sl .oo)

TOTAL ENClOSED$ ___ _

NAME .... .

ADDRESS .... ..

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The Monster Times

ORDIEI " I WOULDN'T BE CAUGHT DEAD WITHOUT

A CO PY OF THE MONSTER TIMES! "

Even II you're still among the living, you won' , wan t to be caught without one eilher. Nol only will a subscription to THE MONSTER TIMES, the world's ,jrst and only newspaper of Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy , immediately improve your soc ial status but will put you " in the know" about all the latest horror happenings in f ilm , comics, theater, and every other area where monsters rush in. THE MONSTER TIMES has also been acclaimed for its near·miracu­louS healing powers , has cleared up innumerable cases of acne (several cases arrived Just loday! ), has made weak men strong and st rong men stronger . and has irrevocably altered the face of civilization-as­we-know-I!. Why , we co uldn't even make such claims If we had an y intentions 01 baCking them up!

So don' t leave yourself in the lonely lurch 01 ignorance and fear. Join the ever-growing cult 01 satisfied MONSTER TIMES subscr ib: ers who've found their way by having each and every fasci nating, fantasy-and-fact-fi lled issue delivered to their door . Just fill oulthe coupon below and join ou r friend the Frankenstein Monster In making this world a saler 'place for m onster ... and do it today­our friend Isn', no led for his patience!

With every sub of • yelr or more, the .d~er1lse comics or s!ills or pulps, etc . or for lubscriber gets I tree 25-word cllsslfled ad , anything else, provided it's In good taste! 10 be run on our Fan-Fllr p.ge. You c.n Subscribe ! .•• Subscribe!

THE MONSTER nMES , P.O. Box 585, Old CheI ... Station, New YCKk, New York 10011 30 :

I think THE MONSTER nMES I. Juat wh.It 1-.. bMn looking lor! Enclosed lIS ...•

o ~.OOfor12Ia"'". 0 S1UIOlor24 1uu.1. 0 $20.00 for 52 11IlHtI. 0 $12.00 lor 24 I ....... (min. canacHan Older) 0 520.00 lor 24 I ....... (min. Foreign Ofdef)

I I I

• All new subscriber (tor a sub 01 one )'Mror more), ..

=~~~!a~I~~::.-rFREEOfctwgeln tolM ...........••••.............••.••..•.•...•...•..•... :

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Our 100 pagelllultf1lt.ct catalogue can tum .n ordlnlry collection Into a Super Col­Iectlon.Orglv.you

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.. neta ot comica from the GokIen age to the Presenl.

Plus : Monster '~~_~ maoazlnes. Mad magazln .. , Science Fiction pulp., p,lper­backs. Arbm HOUle, Mlraoe, Advent and other hard covers deal­Ing with aclence fiction and the comic •.

Thl. work! of .uper fant .. y Iwalt. you . SEND $l .00TO : PASSAIC BOOK CENTER 514 MAIN AVE. Dept. M-T PASSAIC, N .J . 07055

GIANT TMT MOKmR MONEY!

Now available by popular demand­MONSTER MONEY. ExclU Sively Irom THE MONSTER TIMES BOOKSHElF. this monster money is a sure lire Item fOf any monster Ian Each piece of money is a gianl 7 lt 17 Inches in s ize.

MONSTER MONEY IS available by the packet , With silt pieces 01 m oney to the set. The MUMM Y's mug adorns the $1 b i ll. WOLFMAN decorates th e $5 bill, DR ACULA appear s on the $10 bill. TH E BIG G. appears on the $20 bill. and old FRANKENSTEIN comes to ..!.I~e on the $1 00 bill.

Money only 75 cen ts per package p lu s 25 cents for postage and mailing. The bigges l bargain m town!

r :E:'::::M:.:K:::-"301 I PO .OX$'5.0LOCHELS£ASTATIO N I I NEW 'fO AK. NEW 'fOAl( 10011 •

I Dear Monslers : Please send me : I I Money a~e~' . 0~1 e:~ns:~~ I I which I enclose S.. I I N.me... I I Address .. I I C· I

" y.. I ! ":1~~:~.=.~.~i~.~.~. :...J

I am tooking for color "Lost In Space" stlus. Send prices to: John Medvitte. 6S6 Gaynor PI " W. Hemp., N.Y. 11552.

FOR SALE AND WANT·

~~ : :1i~nFmi.t~,{ f ;~~ memorabitia on horror and sci·lil Send your list and I'll send mine. JOHN DULANEY. 146 W. 4th 51.. NYC, NY 10012.

Wanl ed: Old Marvet comics that are in lair condition and have a fair price. Karl Nelson, 4g Makmak Bay, Winnipeg. Canada.

page 31

THE MONSTER TIMES FAN FAIR Is another reader service 01 MT. Care to buy. seU or trade movie sUUs. old comics or tapes of old radio programs? Or maybe buy or advertise a lan·produced maga· zlne? An ad costs only 10cenls per word (minimum, 2S words).

Make aU checks and money orders payable to THE MONSTER TIMES AND MAIL YOUR CLEARLY PRtNTED OR TYPEWRITTEN AD ON THE COUPON BELOW TO : THE MONSTER TIMES. Box 595. Old Chetsea Station. New Yorll. N.Y. 1001 1. We reserve the right to refuse ads which would not be deemed appropriate to our publication .

Please include your name and address in the word count .

Wanted information on make-up and costume techniques used In Boris Karloff and Lon Chaney

~~orS~iI~~'b~~~S B~~~: Louisville, Ky .

Wanted famous mono sters 01 filmland from issue 99 down. Pay 50ct 10 $1 .00. Matthew Biro, Box 105. Kitchawan Road , South Salem, NY 10590.

Sought : HorrorlSci-Fi souridlr~ks (& 45's) & check hsts. 'zines on same (& horror<:omedy).

~lr~1~~:~~~~m~~~~g1! reduced rates. Also sell/ trade lor back issues

~1~t~~·nF:r~·~li:~~:js= YOI'kI1367 .

I am looking specifically

tf~m~::sFif~~P~~hr~~ topher Lee. be it movie

Space and Time, fan­dom's longesl running ficllon zine, featuring horror Ilaniasy I science liction art and stories.

~rd~nC\~z~~~' e'3?,~ 1181h 51. . ApI. 4-M. Kew gac?~rs, N.Y. 11415.

Need articles lor new fanzine. Send a stamp for the lisl. Tommy

~1~~~bJr~ ~:~~: ~r;~~;~ ~~af;J~~f~~r:: I DlN9SAURS in the ested in items tram any MOVIes. Send today lor source : local papers. my free IISI 01 8xl 0 magazines. el c. Also scenes al reasonable interested in posters. prices. AIChi:ifd A~ss . lobbies. etc. from Ham- 1608 t;lorthwlnd onve. mer Films. Contact me if I SI. LoUIS. Mo. 63136.

~~veh~~~ :~re . o~~~~ Wanted Comics old & Palmer. 5720 2nd Sireet new. Send selling list to South. Arlington, Va. Don Moskow, 16 Marlin 22204 . Ct .• Sea Cliff , NY 11579. - - --- - - -- -I

Enclosed is $ ___ for m y ___ word (min imum 25) classified ad .

NAME ________ ADDRESS _______ _

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1

1

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I

_I

page 32

NEXT ISSUE! Unless you're cheating by peeking at a copy which you haven't even bought yet, you've just suffered through our long·threatened and finall y delivered Al l-Worst issue . Next time we'l l be taking you away from all this and back into the Wonderful World of High Quality with OU T special Ali -World-Conquer­ing , AII-M ind-Con tro lling , AU -Men­acing, ALL-MARTIAN ISSUE. That's rig ht , an entire issue devoted to the dire denizens and eagle-hearted exp lorers of the Angry Red Planet.

Among our Martian highligh ts w il l be a detailed filmbook on H.G. Wells' WAR OF THE WORLDS . considered by many to be the best Martian movie ever made. We' ll also be presenting an in -depth survey of most (i f not all) Mars-oriented movies ever to make it to the screen, plus a close look at a con troversial c lassic, INVADERS FROM MARS . Ray Bradbury will be aboard for our Mars Trek to air his views on life on thi s and ot her I Ron Haydock

contributes a piece on Martian make-ups , and other stimulating stories w itl focus on Mart ians In the ComiCS, Martian bubble gum cards and even THE 3 STOOGES IN ORBIT , a fi lm that saw that durable tr io battle a crew of unlikely Martians .

Our All-Martian issue 'will be out of this world, to say the least. So next lime you find yourself rocket ing by your friendly neighborhood newsstand , rememb er to pause long enough to pick up a copy . You don't wanna be among the Angry Red Readers to m iss it, do you?

The Monster Times

1974 INTERNATIONAL

srAR CONVENTION

FEBRUARY 15TH-18TH By now everybod y know s It ... STAR TREK LIVES I And the people that made it come alive a,.

holding another convention-THE THIRD ANNUAL INTERNATIONAL STAR TREK CONVENTION .

Thi s speclat guests at this yeb"s conven ti on will be DeForest Ke lley (Or, McCoy ) Nlchell!! Nichols (Lt . Uhura), George Takel (Lt . Sulu) and Walter Koenig (EnSign Chekov).

Where lis this year's Con going to be held? Well , 10 accommodate the 10,000 expected attendees, we've rented oul Ihe world-renown AMERICANA HOTEl in Mid-Town New ~rk City for the lour day Trek-in , which runs from Friday , February 151h through Monday, the 181h.

Along with our honored guests , we've got a gaggle 01 other goodies Ihat you've come to expect from Ihe INTERNATIONAL STAR TREK CON : film episodes from the STAR TREK program ; a la rge. spacious dealers' room , loaded with Ihe lalest of STAR TREK malerlal ; an art show ; NASA Oisplays and a LIFE-SIZED mock up of the bridge of the U.S.S. Enterprize . It do •• everything but fly . Special Surprise guests . We've al so a load 01 special exhibits and film showing that we're not at liberty to tell you about yet. YOU'll just have to be there ,

To get In on all the tun , write tor our free Progress Report , which will contain all pertinent Inlormatlon about the convention . The address to write,js : LS , T .C" Box 3127 , New York , New York t0008 .

And remember ...

STAR TREK LIVES