It’s interesting to me that a relatively small comic book company that essentially went out of business in the mid 1950’s has been reprinting their comics for most of my life. The Archive editions collect single comic series in colorful oversized books. I had never heard of the Artist Series by Fantagraphics and assumed it was new, but the series actually started in 2012. The Will Elder book was published in 2017.The artist series is a completely different way of organizing the stories and this one includes stories from Weird Science, Weird Fantasy, Crime SuspenStories and Tales from the Crypt. The rest of the book is from Elder’s time doing the parody comic, Panic. The one thing it doesn’t include is any of his brilliant work on Mad Magazine.
I only have a few of the EC Archives but I would love to have more. The Archives were oversized and in color. This series is about the dimensions of the original comics and in black and white. I did not realize when I bought this book that it was in black and white and I’m sort of on the fence on that. We are definitely losing something that existed in the original comic but by removing the color we can focus more on the penciling and inking. There’s also something to be said for the more compactness of these books over the Archives. Mostly, it depends on how you want your EC comics presented. Do you want them organized by series or do you want them organized by artist?
The first half of the book is all the war, horror and science fiction stories. Unless I’m mistaken, this is all of the non-humor stories drawn or inked by Will Elder. I love all these stories, but I particularly enjoy the science fiction. Like the Original Star Trek series, there really is no concern about being true to science. These are completely story driven. They also very much have a feel of stories written in the 1950’s, trying to imagine life in the future. Timeless stories, these are not. It may seem like I’m criticizing the stories, but I love these kinds of retro future stories where you can explore space with no concern for time and distance. The horror and crime stories have the classic EC twist ending that really defined the series and made it special to so many people, myself included.
The second half of the book is from Elder’s time working on Mad Magazine’s sister publication, Panic. I’ve always thought of Panic as being a poor man’s Mad magazine, even though Mad and Panic featured the same creators. I bought the oversized, complete collection of Panic back in 1984 and I think I figured out why I always thought of Panic as inferior. As with this series, there is no color in the 1984 and I think it had a subliminal negative effect on my young self. I did check and there was color in the original Panic comics. I really was unfair regarding Panic because the stuff here is fantastic.
Mad and Panic weren’t just good, they were freakishly good and Will Elder was the best of the best along with Wally Wood. I loved them as a teenager, and they have more than stood the test of time. Even though most of the segments here are parodies of comic strips that were cancelled when I was a child or sometimes before I was born, the humor holds up to this day. Elder was insanely talented at emulating other artists and the humor gave me more than a few laugh out loud moments. From my experience, comedy may be the hardest genre to pull off in comics, but EC absolutely nails it. Every once in awhile all the elements come together in entertainment to create magic and this is one of those rare moments. I’m still not 100% sure how I feel about having no color. If it was a cost saving decision than I’m not a fan. If it was to put the focus on the penciling and inking than that does make some sense. I did enjoy the book enough that I’ve already ordered a second.
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![The Million Year Picnic and Other Stories by [Will Elder, Al Feldstein]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51716LO4+YL._SY346_.jpg)
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From the Publisher
The EC Comics Library is Fantagraphics' New York Times bestselling reprint line. Of special interest to classic comics fans and scholars alike, each deluxe hardcover focuses on the EC body of work by one artist, presenting it in a fresh new way and including extensive essays and notes on these classic genre stories by EC experts.
Top reviews from other countries
Orlock
didnt like the fact that half the book was comedy
Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on June 11, 2017
