Number 489


The Space Suitors


I've written about this story before. There's nothing very original about "The Space Suitors," from EC's Shock Suspenstories #11. It has a standard EC sex and revenge plot: a cheating wife and her partner conspire to murder the husband, and in the end get their EC-style justice. (Sex and infidelity are the basis of three of the four stories in this issue.) It has a science fiction setting, which doesn't have anything to do with the core of the story, just makes that EC-style justice seem all the more horrible. Reed Crandall's artwork raises it above the ordinary. He makes all of the EC clichés seem much fresher.

Nowadays gory stuff is so commonplace that any routine episode of one of the CSI TV programs can contain more gore than any pre-Code comic book, but in 1954 when "The Space Suitors" was published it would have been a startling experience for anyone not familiar with comic books to come across the panel of the murdered man's exploded head. It sure was for my brother, who was about 10-years-old when I shoved it in his face and said, "Look!" with all of the sadistic glee any big brother has in torturing a younger sibling. My brother never looked at another EC comic book after that. That was OK with me. Milt's "bloated ruptured face" helped keep my brother away from my collection.