660 VAMPIRES AND ZOMBIES
Movie Association of America’s new rating system in 1968, comics also looked to cash
in on the macabre. Films such as George R. Romero’s Night of the Living Dead (1968)
helped shape the minds and visual expectations for the next decade as they have contin-
ued to do to the present.
Th erefore, while the Comics Code clearly indicated that stories with zombies were
off limits and vampires would be limited; this did not prevent these tales from publi-
cation in horror comics during this time. By the late 1960s, publishers were bypassing
the Comics Code altogether by publishing their “comics” as black and white maga-
zines, thereby not needing the Comics Code’s Seal of Approval. Th e tradition was
started by EC Comics in the 1950s with their publication of Mad as a magazine
but others followed this tradition including Warren Publishing with Creepie (1964),
Eerie (1966), and Forrest J. Ackerman’s Vampirella (1969). Th e initial run of Vampirella
presented the title character as hostess and even character in a few stories in each
issue. In comics, Vampirella is the fi rst sympathetic recurring vampire to appear, and
her pleasing, voluptuous appearance led to legions of fans.
Seeing the success of bypassing the code, Marvel Comics moved forward with its
imprint, Curtis Magazines (also known as Marvel Monster Group), to publish some of its
most famous monster stories including Dracula Lives (1973), Tales of the Zombie (1973),
and Vampire Tales (1973). Tales of
the Zombie portrayed a revamped
character from a short piece pre-
viously published in Menace #5
(1953), Simon Garth. Brought
back from death by voodoo magic,
Garth is enlisted repeatedly to do
harm and occasional good. He
is the earliest sympathetic recur-
ring zombie to appear in comics.
Within the actual comic books,
the word “zombie” was prohibited,
so publishers used other replace-
ments including Marvel Comics
use of the term, “zuvembies.”
Marvel Comics also responded
to the relaxed code with the cre-
ation of the character Morbius. Th is
“Living Vampire” fi rst appeared
in Amazing Spider-Man #101 in
October, 1971, then continued in
the horror anthology series, Adven-
tures into Fear starting with #20 and
fi nally, into the Vampire Tales comicBela Lugosi as Count Dracula in the 1931 film Dracula,
directed by Tod Browning. Universal Pictures/Photofest