One of my fanboy “soapbox rants” is how lousy DC and Marvel are at collecting comics outside of the heroes. Both companies have a long mystery of putting out war, romance, and western comics, but good luck trying to find them. At the beginning of the Bronze Age, both DC and Marvel started putting out those spooky anthologies, but there hasn’t been that effort to release those comics to a new audience.
Until now, that is. Fantagraphics and Marvel have teamed uptogether to release the 1969 spooky anthology Tower of Shadows. Actually, Fantagraphics has been collecting Atlas editions for some time now. In a recent column, I talked abouttheir Venus collection. It started as romance and, by the end, became a horror anthology, with Bill Everett writing and drawing. If you’ve only seen his Sub-Mariner work—you’re in for a ghoulish surprise.
Lost Marvels No. 1: Tower of Shadows collects an essential part of Marvel’s history. It isn’t just the heroes that made Marvel what it is today. Comics like Mille the Model, the Atlas comics, war, and western at one time or another was Marvel’s bread-and-butter. It wasn’t only the likes of Kirby, Ditko, and Lee. Not to take away from their contributions, but Marie Severin, her brother John and Stan Goldberg. I recently did a column on “The Other Stan,” who did a great deal of the coloring for Marvel during the Silver Age.
Tower of Shadows came out at a fascinating time for Marvel and comics as a whole. First, Marvel switched distributors, and for the first time in nearly a decade, they could put as many titles as they wanted. And, for the first time since the 1950s, horror comics—or, as I like to call them, spooky tales were coming back. The previous year, DC changed the format of both House of Mystery and House of Secrets to horror, and Marvel decided to give it a try.
Even though Marvel was restricted by the Comic Code (Yes, Virginia, once upon a time, there was a code for decades that dictated what type of comics could be published), it was an attempt to recreate the feel of EC Comics. It lasted a mere eightissues before switching formats due to poor sales. There are many reasons why it didn’t gain more attention. Marvel fans liketheir heroes. A different distribution model, even because it was before its time.
But poor sales do not equate to a poor comic. From a historical perspective, many creators often got their start and learned the trade in these anthology books. Len Wein’s “The Moving Finger Writhes…!” in issue three was among the first stories he had published. Same with “One Little Indian!” by Marv Wolfman.The same goes with artists. Known for, among other things, Conan Barry Windsor-Smith had some of his earliest work here.
For other creators, it was almost like going home. EC Comics artists Johnny Craig (“From Beyond the Brink!”, issue two) and Wally Wood (“Sanctuary!”, issue eight) had stories. Don Heck, who had spent the 60s drawing Iron Man in Tales of Suspenseand The Avengers drew “Witch Hunt!” (issue 2). Heck drew a lot of horror back in the 1950s, check them out for a darker, different side to Don Heck.
The collection often serves to see creators outside of what you usually see their work in. You get John Buscema in issue one. Marie Severin covers the second issue. You get Neal Adams and Jim Steranko.
For a fan who often complains about the lack of these types of comics for new generations of fans—I think this makes a fantastic read. For the time, it was an amazing collection of creators who were both icons and, one day, would become icons. There are some truly classic tales, and like all classics, they hold up over time.
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