22Pages.com (Comic Books & Action Figures)

As someone who is interested in the history of comics, I love the huge variety of black and white reprint compilations that have become available in the last few years. The Marvel Essentials series are a must have, and thankfully DC has followed suit in reprinting their library in black and white at an affordable price. Some of the books in this series so far were disappointing (Green Lantern and Justice League America were both dull, of interest only due to completing one's exposure to the full continuity of some of the DC universe.)

There are two showcase collections that everyone should pick up though, as examples of innovative work in the comic form that are still relevant to the contemporary reader. The first book I liked, Jonah Hex, I'll be writing about in a later post. The second book I've liked is The House of Mystery Volume 1.

House of Mystery reminds me of tales from the crypt or the twilight zone, with each issue being a series of horror / sci-fi tales with dark twists and turns. Due to the large number of stories, in each issue there's usually something really good.

The collection reprints issues 174 to 194, and is jam packed with famous artists and writers such as Jack Kirby, Marv Wolfman, Wally Wood, and Neal Adams. The quality of the stories is high, and since there are so many stories in each issue, you are exposed to a great variety of styles in a short period of time.

The dark tone is punctuated by a great amount of humor. One of my favorite features of the series is that each issue has a foreboding Page 13 done by Sergio Aragones. Page 13 sometimes warns you that you are cursed, or offers you some creepy game to play. It's nice to see Aragones working with some radically different subject matters than I would normally associate him work.

All in all, I've thoroughly enjoyed this book, and would recommend it to anyone that likes compact, dark stories with a touch of humor. I think people working in the form today should take a good look at this compilation about the merits of a series that is more episodic in nature. I would love to see something like this done as a contemporary project.