Number 2414: The ghost spotter

“Grimm, Ghost Spotter” is a character from the Iger studio, published in Bomber Comics #1 (1944), from Elliott Publishing Co. This first episode also appeared the year before in Harvey Comics’ War Adventures Comics. I don’t know why the same Grimm story showed up the next year in a wholly different publication, but a guess is that Harvey had hired Iger to do some features, and then there was some problem, so Iger took Grimm the Ghost Spotter back and put him in another comic book.

The ghostly manifestation in the story reminds me of the later ghost tales from ACG’s line of supernatural comics (Adventures Into the Unknown, Forbidden Worlds, etc.) where ghosts are more of a physical presence than something diaphanous hovering between the afterlife and our world. Back here in the land of the living, I’d be grim, too, if I were facing apparitions like this.

Number 2115: The Grimm ghost spotter

“Grimm, Ghost Spotter” appeared in the four issues of Bomber Comics, from 1944. But this episode is a reprint of a story that appeared a couple of months earlier in Harvey’s War Victory Comics #3 (Winter, 1943). I am not sure how all of this happened, but the contents of Bomber #1 appear to be reprinted from various sources, with the indicia listing the publisher as “Elliott Publishing Co.” I believe it may have been a company formed to print some comic books using a willing third party’s paper ration. To compound confusion, the Grand Comics Database lists the story as it appeared in War Victory as having art by Rudy Palais with a ? after his name, to show they aren’t sure. For Bomber Comics they list the artist as just ?

I am used to seeing comic book stories by Rudy Palais having characters dripping sweat. I don’t see sweat, but I think it may be a comic book sweatshop job with various artists working on it.

I like that Grimm goes to work carrying a ghost disintegrator, which in his line of work would be a handy device to have. But the unknown writer* must not have consulted the Monster Manual. Grimm says the countess is a zombie, but she doesn’t cast a reflection in the mirror. I thought it was vampires who don’t have reflections. Well, neither do I, but that's because I close my eyes when I look into a mirror so I don’t have to see myself.

From Bomber Comics #1 (1944):

*I assume the name “Don Weaver” is a pseudonym.