Written by Al Feldstein, Nick Meglin
Art by Wallace Wood, Basil Wolverton,
Will Elder, Jack Davis, Joe Orlando
Foreword by Bob Fingerman
Published by Dark Horse Comics
Having already written extensively about E.C. Comics’ Panic in Volume One of Fantagraphics’ The Life and Legend of Wallace Wood a decade ago, it was fun to revisit the stories by the other artists, too, in the latest volume of Dark Horse’s E.C. Archives, Panic Volume One.
Since anything I said here might not be said as well as I said it in 2016, I decided that my review of Panic here will consist partially of an edited version of that part of my chapter in the book. If any of this sounds familiar, now you know why.
This new book consists of newly colored reprints of every page of the first six Pre-Code issues of Panic’s 12-issue run from 1954. Despite being based on Marie Severin’s original hues, the new color adds shadows and depth that weren’t put there by any of the artists and to my mind detract rather than enhance the work. A relatively minor complaint, though, when one considers how clever, funny, and well-drawn this stuff is.
Behind the scenes at E.C., one of Kurtzman’s war titles was canceled and the other given over to John Severin, who had to give up his work on MAD to take it over. All of this freed Jack Davis, Will Elder and Wally Wood to be used in Panic in exactly the same ways as in MAD. But Panic was actually a very different animal from MAD.
One simple reason for that was that in spite of their shared heritage of Jewish humor, Feldstein was NOT Kurtzman. Harvey was more like an intellectual, neurotic Woody Allen to Al’s Borscht Belt stand-up comic. Both could be hilarious but they simply didn’t see things in the same ways.
In a way, since Feldstein would go on to edit MAD for several decades beginning in 1956, one can look at Panic as a legitimate precursor to the magazine version of MAD perhaps more so even than Kurtzman’s color MAD comics!
Out of the gate, Panic gained notoriety for being banned in Boston for a Will Elder panel in its first issue featuring Santa Claus riding a sleigh with a “Just Divorced” sign on the back. It may seem incomprehensible now, but Santa is, of course, Saint Nicholas…and saints simply did NOT get divorces!
Along with Elder, Davis was there, augmented with Joe Orlando and Jack Kamen. Wally Wood wasn’t in that first issue. With issue two, though, Wood served up a tasty send-up of the Humphrey Bogart-Katharine Hepburn movie The African Queen as African Scream! Without Kurtzman’s thumbnail layouts, one presumes that all the artists were here on their own but they smoothly show that they have learned how to do it all themselves.
Editor Feldstein kept Wood on the movie parodies with the remaining issues, giving him also, in this volume, The Quiet Man, Hondo, Executive Suite, and How to Marry a Millionaire.
As in MAD, Willie Elder matches Wood note for note, here giving the reader more of his trademark comic strip parodies including madcap versions of The Phantom, Dick Tracy, Smitty, and Li’l Abner. It’s also Elder who does the art chores on the infamous Night Before Christmas parody.
This book ends with Jack Davis doing a parody of the then well-known magazine, Popular Mechanics. Done more like an illustrated article than a comic strip, it was more similar to what was to come a little later in Feldstein’s MAD magazine.
Panic was the very first E.C. Comic I collected back when I could afford to collect E.C. Comics and it’s always held a special place in my collector’s heart. The coloring caveat aside, Dark Horse and company are doing a wonderful thing exposing these stories to a new audience in affordable collections.
Booksteve recommends.
