After the institution of the Comic Code, EC, like all but a couple of publishers, submitted their books to the newly formed board. As you can well imagine, things didn't go smoothly for them, and *this* was the issue where Bill Gaines gave up the ghost and decided to yank his entire comic line.

This issue featured a rare reprint of an earlier EC tale (after another story didn't pass the Code), but even it ran into trouble. Printed is the panel that got rejected by the Code from its original printing in Weird Fantasy #18.

Why it got rejected? Because it showed a black man sweating.

A Black man drawn correctly, too, and not as some caricature. I'm trying to figure out who they used as their reference, that face looks familiar somehow.

EC had some of the best artists ever assembled by a comic publisher. The stuff Wally Wood was doing back then was just amazing. Johnny Craig, Reed Crandall, Jack Davis, Bill Elder, George Evans, Graham Ingals (who Sam Keith seems to have ripped a lot of his style from), Jack Kamen (one of my under-rated faves--he drew amazing women), Bernie Kriegstein (who illustrated "Master Race" which almost always shows up on best comic lists), Joe Orlando, Harvey Kurtzman (kooky style, but I liked it), John Severin, Al Williamson, and a good number of bit players like Frank Frazetta and Basil Wolverton.

The stories weren't bad either. Mostly written by Bill Gaines and Al Feldstein, but with adapted works of Ray Bradbury and even the first ever published work of some little known science fiction writer, Harlen Ellison... wonder what became of him?

EC's probably a bit over-praised, but probably because they were the first comic company that didn't just assume their audience was a bunch of ten year old cretins (to borrow Will Eisner's phrase). The Horror and Crime comics are what got the lion's share of the attention (and they're fun, but repetitious and usually predictable), but they were doing some pulp-level quality sci-fi and their war comics remain some of the best *ever* published. Truly the first comic company that went after literate adults.

That freaking cover is awesome. The guy looks superficially like Hank Aaron, but I don't think he was a sports star by that time.

Wally Wood's sci-fi stuff from the 50s was just freakin' awesome. I don't like the style he used for his super-hero work, but his EC work blows me away every time.

His cartoony style was pretty cool, too.