Saturday, 18 December 2010

Steranko Saturdays: Tower Of Shadows no. 1


OK, so it's not quite the psychedelic treat I promised last week
( It's on its way ), but I couldn't resist a quick look at James Steranko's macabre masterpiece At The Stroke Of Midnight from Tower Of Shadows no. 1, September 1969.

Above is Steranko's inexplicably rejected original cover, which was replaced by a more traditional, but dull, illustration by "Jazzy" Johnny Romita. Jaunty Jim's cover was probably too far ahead of its time and even "The House Of Ideas" wasn't quite ready for it. But I'm sure a certain Mr. Miller was paying attention.....

And here's the splash page for the creepy chronicle itself. If you want to read the complete spooky story ( and why wouldn't you? ) then Joe has the whole thing over at his blog. Tell 'im cerebus660 sent ya!
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2 comments:

  1. Booksteve18 December 2010 at 03:34

    True story! I swear. This Steranko story scared me SO much as a ten year old that I couldn't keep it in my collection. I'm not sure what I did with it but I either gave it or traded it to a friend after it sat around the house for weeks with me too creeped out by the ending of that story to touch the book! That would have been in 1969.

    About 5 years ago, at my local comic shop (founded in 1980), I was digging through the dollar boxes and found a copy. I thought maybe I should give it another try nearly 40 years later so I flipped through it. It was in pretty good shape but for having had the original cover price blacked out at some point by a black crayon. On the back cover, there was a price pencilled in but crossed out. On the inside front cover there was a different price pencilled in in very different handwriting.

    BUT...at the bottom of the splash page...were my initials. From 1968-1978 I defaced all my comics with my initials AND THERE THEY WERE IN MY OWN HANDWRITING!!!! This was my original copy from 1969! It had obviously passed through several hands in that time but had come back to me! I bought it immediately of course but...in a way...that scared me even more!

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  2. Simon B 18 December 2010 at 09:07

    That's a GREAT story, Steve! That comic was waiting for you... all that time...
    Brrrr!! Spooky!

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