“The Dane Curse!”
Writer: Budd Lewis
Artist: Luis Bermejo
So Restin with his friend Rogan are fighting off the superstitious villagers of Sarnath in 1781. They use crucifixes to drive off the villagers but the cowardly leader takes children hostage. Thus Restin and Lucinda are put on trail for witchcraft. Restin pleads guilty and asks that Lucinda be spared since she was under his spell. The judge agrees but plans to burn Lucinda alive anyway. While in jail Restin tests the blood of the infected and finds a cure. It is supernatural based and he uses an exorcism to drive out the evil spirit. It succeeds and forms one big demon. Back in the future Ambrose Bierce, his grandfather and others are battling the evil goop coming from the ground. A rip in the time space continuum occurs. Bierce jumps in and this resets the universe. Restin finds himself back in 1981 New England with no memory of what happened.
“The Nu Zud Kamish Hero of the Milky Way”
Writer: John Ellis Sech
Artist: E.R. Cruz
Zud Kamish is some sort of hero for hire. He has lost all his money in a casino but managed to get money for a return trip home for his family using loaded dice. On the cruise ship a pig-headed alien takes hostages because he lost all his money in the casinos. Zud shoots him and saves the day. He is the good.
On an alien world a man named Shoka kills two aliens and the woman who double-crossed him. After breaking the woman’s neck he laughs. He is the bad.
Zud is hired to guard an ambassador with an elephant’s head who started the Zombie Wars. Shoka tries to poison the ambassador but Zud notices and finds it was an acid and not Ambrosia. He throws it in Shoka’s face and he runs off vowing revenge. Later he plants a bomb that kills Zud’s family. This is the dead.
“Space Force: Shipwrecked!”
Writer: Jean-Claude Forest
Artist: Paul Gillon
At the end of the twentieth century aliens invade Earth with deadly spores. A man and woman are sent into space in suspended animation. After a millennium Christopher Savage is revived and he is on Venus. The floating city he is on has run aground. So he leads a party to a military base for help. When he arrives at Anastasia III he finds it was overrun by the alien Evadors. They meet a patrol that survived and search the base. They find one survivor who claims the aliens are the rats and starts shooting them. Then one of the robots attacks but luckily the humans have some sort of creature that can tear them apart. They leave the base to go back to the stranded floating city.
“Haggarth”
Writer & Artist: Victor De La Fuente
Two men are in the jungle when they meet Haggarth. Haggarth needs their canoe to get an injured man to safety. In return he will help them. Haggarth is unaware that the men are looking for Kanthar Rocks which would give them power. Along the way Haggarth rescues an Amazon warrior. This comes in handy since the Amazon warrior is the princess and help when the two men are captured.
I got this issue of Eerie since it had the final installment of the Rook story after his magazine was cancelled. The final Rook story was a bit confusing and went all over the place. Who knew the writer Ambrose Bierce was such an expert of time travel. Still I liked it. There is something charming about these old Warren stories.
The other stories were also quite enjoyable. Zud Kamish was a kooky space opera type story with anthropomorphic type aliens that wore suits and smoked cigars. It was a play on the old western The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly. Seemed like it was set up for future installments.
The other two were continuations of ongoing stories that would continue next issue. I liked both as one was a good old sci-fi and the other a sword & sorcery. In fact I could enjoy this series and will someday check out the reprint collections. It was sad that the Rook was cancelled but had a good run and there are also many more stories in the pages of Eerie. Of course it didn’t matter much it the Rook was cancelled or not since soon after Warren went bankrupt after losing a lawsuit to Harlan Ellison for plagiarism.