EC Comics( 2 points)

 EC comics is geared more towards adults as its stories deal with adult themes such as murder, psychology, ideas of war, marriage, etc. These are shown, specifically murder and psychology, in the Vault of Horror issue 1 in each short story. It starts with an artist who tries to steal the identity of another far more talented artist, and ends with revenge and humans coaxed in wax. It’s brutal, but it’s not simple action, the characters have pretty “adult” motivations, albeit a bit goofy and light hearted, such as insecurity, a desire for wealth and praise, etc. I also liked the next short story as well because it again deals with psychology and murder, while using those ideas to flip the overdone story of a killer werewolf on its head. It is later revealed that there were no werewolves, and the true killer was using hypnosis to trick the “werewolf” into assuming guilt. The last story of this issue, also portrays murder and psychology with a heavy lean in psychology. The women thinks she is being chased by her husband who intends to murder her. I thought it was interesting how it is revealed she was an unreliable narrator, and she was probably just schizophrenic. 

The adult concepts of war and marriage are shown in Weird Science issue 5. It starts with a pretty amusing, what I assume to be satirical, tale of a guy who goes to the future to bring back a “Deluxe wife.” It deals with ideas of what men saw as the “perfect wife” in the 50s, which was completely submissive and molded to the husband. I found it satirical because it almost felt like it was making fun of the concept of those ideals by calling her the “deluxe model” versus the regular one that nags, at least from a 2020 perspective. This story is followed by a future society that escapes earth during the atomic crisis, and returns to find it in the same place. I thought this was interesting because it reflected the worries of a nuclear attack at the time during the Cold War era, and it displayed the concept of history repeating itself.

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