Number 1714: Mystery Tales...or mystery fails?

Both of these short stories are from Atlas Comics’ Mystery Tales #1 (1952) and represent to me what is both fun and yet challenging about these types of comics. “The Little Black Box” is a variation on the genie mythology. The wishes granted to the one who releases the genie come with a hefty price...sometimes a life. What bothers me is that the characters, the Seven Sisters of Evil, appear on page 1, and then are just dropped. Personally, I thought they were interesting and it disappoints me they didn’t bookend the tale. They could have shown up in the last panel and said, “Hee-hee, we warned you!” or something equally as trite, just to complete the circle. I think the writer missed on this one. The art by Joe Maneely is excellent, as always.

“The Horror on Channel 15” is a story from the early days of television. The main character conducts a search of haunted places to find inspiration for his new horror programming. In both a haunted house and cemetery he sees what appear to be genuine ghostly manifestations. So why not just film the real ghosts, eh? Nowadays there are hours of “reality” programming showing people wandering around “haunted” places after dark, using their night-vision goggles, only to come up with nothing. And yet this guy sees ghosts his first time out! Too bad he didn’t bring a camera. The terrific art is by Pete Tumlinson.

Number 905


The Eyes of Greed!


Howard Peter "Pete" Tumlinson was an illustrator who drew for Timely/Marvel/Atlas during the '40s and '50s, working in a variety of genres, but is known for his stint on Kid Colt. When he left comics in the mid-'50s he went into illustration. Earlier, before the war, he was a student at Texas A&M, where he created a character called Old Sarge for the campus humor magazine, The Battalion. You can read an article about it here.

Tumlinson is an artist I haven't really heard much about, one of those journeymen comic book artists who worked in the field for a time and then left. I think what Tumlinson left behind was pretty good. I've got two horror stories by him, which show that besides drawing cowboys and horses he could also draw the weird stuff Atlas was known for.

"The Eyes" has some real atmosphere to it, although the ending seems more like a shaggy dog story. It comes from Astonishing #30 in 1954; "Greed" is from Astonishing Tales #36, and is included because I was struck by how much the aliens in this mid-'50s story look like Kodos and Kang, from the annual The Simpsons Treehouse of Horror episodes. I scanned "Greed" from the early '70s reprint in Weird Wonder Tales #5.

Pete Tumlinson died in 2008, age 87.