Crime Does Not Pay: Blackjacked and Pistol-Whipped

Crime Does Not Pay was a notorious comic book magazine that caught the ire of Senator Estes Kefauver and Dr. Fredrick Wertham. The book was filled with murder, torture, sadism towards women and just about every crime and vice ever imagined. While it shocked small town USA during the Comics Scare of the early to mid 1950s, the book actually earned the support of some very unlikely champions. 

Representatives of the Catholic Church, the Boy Scouts of America and educators nationwide praised the book for helping children to the straight and narrow. An overwhelming majority of the stories presented in Crime Does Not Pay were true stories of mobsters such as Lucky Luciano and real life monsters like H.H. Holmes. While the stories were sensationalized to entice readers, publisher Lev Gleason received a number of praises from those working with at-risk youth as seen in a collage inside the front and back covers of this book.

I found this anthology from Dark Horse at a used bookstore about a month ago. My plans were to read it as a part of my 2025 reading challenge. Unfortunately, I don't think there's enough prose material about the history of the book and it's co-creators, Bob Wood and Charles Biro, to count this as a book about the history of comics. That's not to say that I didn't enjoy the book. But less than 30 pages of research from Denis Kitchen compared to about 200 pages of comics is a bit of a stretch for item #40 on my challenge.

This is pre-code comics at it's very best and very worst. The storytelling is amazing. There's a slew of comic book legends making their way in the industry in this book such as Bob Montana and George Tuska. However, the gratuitous violence paved the way for a legion of imitators and ushered in the books that would result in the coming of the Comics Code.

At the time of Crime Does Not Pay's debut with the 2nd class mail skirting 22nd issue, EC Comics had yet to introduce its readers to horror comics. Without this title, the Crypt Keeper, Vault Keeper and the Old Witch might never been created. Crime introduced fans to the concept of the host narrator with the top hat donning Mr. Crime. With his dripping fangs, maniacal smile and inch-long fingernails, Mr. Crime was more than just a narrator, he was a part of the story, playing the devil on each crook's shoulder in hopes of helping them execute the perfect crime. Only it was never to be with most criminals being executed by law enforcement at story's end.

Crime Does Not Pay lasted for an impressive 147 issues. However, by the end of its run, the book has become a victim of censorship it brought about, with later titles having far less emphasis over crime and becoming more of a police procedural comic. Ironically, one of the creators of the book would not learn from the lessons against hard living as espoused in the pages of Crime Does Not Pay. In 1958, Wood would go on a week-long bender with a divorcee full of drinking and arguing before ultimately taking the woman's life in a fit of rage because 'she wouldn't clam up.' 

The question I'm left with is 'do I keep this book?' I'm leaning towards no. Not because I hated it. It's more for the fact that this is an album of the series' true crime tales. Had this been an omnibus of several full issues, I would keep it. I think there's too great a chance that I'll find some Dark Horse archives for a good price or some of the single issue reprints making a need to own this book obsolete. So I'll trade it in for something else to add to my collection. Maybe I'll get lucky and find that prose book about comic book history I need for my reading challenge!

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.

A Smithsonian Book of Comic-Book Comics

This is one of those books I remember having from my first collection (that was stolen). This book was published in 1981; meaning I was 3 or 4 when it was released. I don't think that's when my parents bought it for me. I somehow remember seeing this book advertised on TV and wanting it really, really bad. I also remember opening the book from its shipping box on my parents' kitchen table and looking through it and being disappointed...

Over the years, as I read the book again and again, I came to appreciate it a little more each time. When I found this book recently once more at my favorite used book store, I finally understood this book's brilliance!

This book isn't comprehensive. While Superman, Batman and Captain Marvel are examined in this book, other important early superheroes like Captain America and Wonder Woman are noticeably not just absent, I don't think either are mentioned in any of the essays written by comic book historians J. Michael Barrier and Martin T. Williams. 

This book covers comics published up to 1955, right when the industry imposed the self regulated Comics Code Authority. A good stopping point if you were writing a multi-volume look at the history of comic books. EC Comics was the main target of the evils found in comic books from Dr. Wertham and state senators. As a result, no less than 5 stories from that legendary publisher are included in this book. Yet none of them are of the sci-fi or horror titles that ignited the comic book scare of the 1950s!

A number of legendary creators are examined. There are works from Walt Kelly and his critter creation, Pogo, John Stanley's version of Little Lulu and Tubby and Will Eisner's The Spirit. A seasonal story from Carl Barks starring Donald Duck and Uncle Scrooge are also included. I would have finished this book a couple of weeks ago. But I wanted to enjoy Barks' 'A Letter to Santa' during the holiday season. Thus I waited. 

To my big surprise, the stories I was the most enamored with were the Scribbly stories, featuring the Ma Hunkel Red Tornado stories. Created by Sheldon Mayer (Golden Age Green Lantern), these stories were clever parodies of the age of mystery men, lively illustrated and just oh-so fun to read. To my knowledge, those stories have never been collected. Thus, other than the 4 stories comprised here, unless I max out my credit cards, I'm probably never going to get to read Ma's further adventures. 

I really enjoyed this collection. The artwork is so starkly different from what I grew up with and primitive compared to modern comics. The scripts are like works of art. They capture the dialect and tone of the times. For a kid born anywhere after 1977, these things are like trying to read Shakespeare. When I was young, everything just looked off and I couldn't really understand the stories. Now I am 45 and I felt like I was in the presence of greatness. and well into that presence I was. 

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars,