Tales of Evil

A horror anthology series with no regularly featured characters, Tales of Evil included stories of a demon conjuror, a werewolf, and a vampire in its inaugural issue from Seaboard Periodicals’ Atlas line in 1975. The second issue starred the Bog Beast, backed up with a ghost story and another werewolf story.

The third issue starred The Man-Monster, a conceited playboy mutated into an amphibious form by an unknown substance unearthed by an offshore oil rig. The Man-Monster, incidentally, battles a costumed villain named Hell-Blazer. The story concludes with the note “to be continued in the first exciting issue of The Man-Monster.” Also appearing in that issue was a second tale of the Bog Beast.

There was, of course, no fourth issue as the Atlas line ended and went dormant for 36 years.

Man-Monster #1, by the way, was scheduled for September 1975 and would have featured the first cross-title team-up of Atlas characters as the Man-Monster fought Demon-Hunter. Who knew it would be 2011 before Atlas characters would team up? It happened in the revived Atlas’s Wulf #1 when the story brought Lomax (from Police Action) and Wulf (from Wulf the Barbarian) together.