Monday, December 06, 2010

A Mangled Media Gift Guide! DC Horrors!

I don't know about you, but I sure do love giving Christmas gifts to all my friends whose tastes run along the lines of my own.  While a sweater may satisfy some, a razor may rile up another and a stack of sweat socks may provoke salivation in yet another, I just love know that the gifts I give will thrill, titallate or shock the recipient for a good long time after the wrapper falls away like Laura Gemser's clothing in an Emmanuelle flick. 
Now, I'm not saying outrageous gag gifts, but the kinds that really deliver an experience worth having...and sharing!


HORROR...AS BIG AS A BALD HEAD!

First up...THE DC SHOWCASE horror volumes! You can get them very easily, and well discounted, via Amazon.com or any comics retailer.  For those that aren't familiar with them, these are budget priced reprints that put an enormous amount of content in black and white for comics readers to enjoy.  The price of collecting many of the individual issues would go beyond "cost prohibitive" in most cases, and with these books, and the Marvel Essentials line as well, you have a ton of history and work available at your fingertips.

So far you can pick up The House of Secrets Volume 1 and 2, The House of Mystery Volume 1, 2 and 3 and the most headclonking of the lot, Secrets of Sinister House (of Love)
The first two series are truly essential for any fan of horror comics!  While Marvel was reprinting old tales or forging the horror heroes of the Bronze Age in a howl of flaming motorcycles and crossovers with The Thing, DC was going the true horror tales route and getting some of the finest creators of the time to spin tales of bloody mayhem!!  In the nearly 2500 pages of content (which will cost you a little more than 50 dollars via Amazon) you get work from Alex Toth, Bernie Wrightson, Sergio Aragones, Joe Orlando, Gil Kane, Wally Wood, Jerry Grandenetti, Ruben Yandoc, John Albano, Alex Nino, Nestor Redondo, Sonny Trinidad and many many MANY more! 

But if your lucky horror pal loves the strangest of the lot, Secrets of Sinister House (of Love) is the one to get.  Swerving from feature length gothic horror romances (ahem, Dark Shadows rips) to the best of the imported artists, this is a really unique volume.  Be it the utter oddity of Alex Nino and his tale Bedlam or the Gothy groovy of Frank Robbins and Alex Toth's feature length Bride of the Falconeer, every page brings something both cool looking, and more than a little off kilter, to your eyeballs. And those eyeballs shall BURN for your failing to blink as you peruse all 496 pages of this book!! 

Happy shopping, and wait until a box containing these volumes lands at your home, it will be THE THING ON THE DOORSTEP because it is so huge!

5 comments:

Jack J said...

Christ, are you the State-side version of me? I collect trashy war flicks, I've got a bald head,
A-N-D I've got all those horror reprints!! Haha.

Well, I still need to get Secrets of Sinister House (of Love) but I've got the other 5.

And soon the Vampirella Archives are gonna come out. Argh!

Mike H said...

SECRETS OF SINISTER HOUSE was my favorite DC title. I know, they were all pretty much the same but that one just spoke to me!

I'm bald too. Small world!!

David A. Zuzelo said...

Hah, that is awesome Jack, it is the coalition of Bald Boom Boom Fanatics!
Mike, that is easily the one to get, it has some weird feature length stories that are loads of fun because you can see they are trying for something a little out of the norm for the horror line. Not always successful, but fun. And then it goes bizarre with Nino and Company!!

Douglas A. Waltz said...

Another bald guy here, but I have all the Marvel horror Essentials. So far the only DC purchase I have made is Enemy Ace. Do they have a Weird War volume? I would get that. Or Haunted Tank.

David A. Zuzelo said...

Me as well Doug, I actually collect all those Essentials (yep, I have THE ESSENTIAL DAZZLER...both volumes!!)
There is a Haunted Tank and Unknown Soldier book. War That Time Forgot is also out there!

Once time frees up a bit, I'll be posting a ton of ideas for holidays!