*Vintage UK/Australian Reprints of US Material: In the early 1950s, a small number of horror comics (around 40) were produced by a variety of UK publishers reprinting US pre-code horror stories in black and white. Just as in the USA, these became notorious and subject to censorship which led to their discontinuation. There’s a lot of information online about the banning of UK horror comics if you want to know more, and I particularly recommend a youtube video by Canadian Dave Dustin on the subject (see the Links page in our Extras section for more information). These UK horror comics have become both extremely rare and much sought after in recent years, and we’re delighted to have issue #1 (and only) of Comics To Hold You Spellbound from Thorpe & Porter from 1953, reprinting the cover and contents of Atlas’s Spellbound #3. Plus, since this comic is double the size of a standard US comic, there are also stories from Astonishing #13 and Adventures Into Weird Worlds #6, also from Atlas. Cover by Russ Heath, art by Ogden Whitney, Fred Kida, Sol Brodsky, Manny Stallman, Mike Sekowsky, Bernie Krigstein, Joe Sinnott, Ross Andru and others.
PICTURED: COMICS TO HOLD YOU SPELLBOUND #1 GD+ £175 Solid cover image with great colour. Wear at spine with short split at top and 3 cm split at bottom. A couple of short horizontal tears at spine. Back cover looks like it has had tape applied, which has now been removed with a line of brown residue, but no damage. Minor edge wear to right, slight creasing at bottom right corner. Decent staples and pages, all firmly attached. SOLD