Fantagraphics adds to its EC Comics Library with Kamen’s Kalamity and Other Stories. Another collection featuring artist Jack Kamen in “27 shockers from the Crypt, Vault, and Haunt of EC.” Thirteen of those 27 are the “Grim Fairy Tales” while the titular tale is Jack’s “origin” story. Rounding out the collection are seven stories illustrated by various artists from the EC stable.
Buy Kamen’s Kalamity and Other StoriesI’ve been eyeing the EC Comics world for many years wondering where to even begin and Kamen’s Kalamity was a great place to start. At the time of EC’s horror height, Jack Kamen was not considered its best artist or a fan favorite but he was the workhorse at EC in the early 1950s. Jack was reliable and always made his “dead” lines. In more recent years, fans have come around to Jack’s realistic style of drawing. His lines are crisp and sharp (especially emphasized in these black and white prints), his characters are lifelike, and his ladies are well-put-together knockouts, sometimes literally. From the titular story, we learn that “Happy Jack” was initially hired on to ink some of the romance stories (which explains his femme fatales) and he didn’t really care for the graphic gore stories that EC was becoming known for, making Jack a bit of an odd fit when he was assigned to illustrate horror tales. Jack would eventually catch on and become “horrible” enough to continue drawing for the horror issues, creating his own niche as the writers began to hand him less graphic things to draw.
The tales of terror in this volume mostly center around love triangles and love gone wrong but also incorporate classic monsters like werewolves, vampires, and zombies. Jack was chosen for these stories penned by various staff writers (Otto Binder, Al Feldstein, Gardner Fox, Jack Oleck, and Carl Wessler) because the horror element in these tales mostly lies in the twist ending where we find out someone has been duped or lured in to be one of those terrible creatures’ next victim. Most of the gory stuff is implied, though there are some frames of bloody madness which include beheadings, a head transplant done by a scorned husband, plenty of maulings, and angry mob violence.
The real treasure of this book though are the “Grim Fairy Tales.” All 13 of those drawn by Jack are here and they truly are the highlight of his work. His love for twisted endings (and gorgeous dames) comes shining through as each tale puts an odd, darker spin on classic fairy tales like Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Little Red Riding Hood, and Hansel & Gretel. “Happy” Jack is in his element within the frames of these twisted tales.
Fantagraphics’ Kamen’s Kalamity has a great introduction by Thommy Burns that provides a quick look at the stories ahead and gives some background on EC and Jack. At the end of the book, we get a nice, short biography of Jack, written by S.C. Ringgenberg, where we learn a bit more about his art and life, how and why he went into the advertising world, and how he got himself and some fellow artists work with an illustrated encyclopedia. Most interesting is that Jack would eventually go on to draw up designs that his inventor son Dean would come up with, most notably the Segway PT.
I thoroughly enjoyed feasting upon Kamen’s Kalamity and Other Stories, not only for its Grim Tales but also for the info it provided on Jack Kamen and EC comics in general. As someone curious about the legendary comic brand since the days when HBO aired Tales From the Crypt, I will be adding more of the Fantagraphics EC Library to my comic-book collection.
