Elvira, Mistress of the Dark #1 - Marvel

Another one of those "Marvel published this?" discoveries, a comic book adaptation of the Elvira, Mistress of the Dark movie!

The movie industry is like comics sometimes, where a movie meant to capitalize on a hot trend or character comes just this side of too late, and debuts when the trend is cooling down. Often, the movie (or comic) is kind of lame, which is only one more nail in the coffin(an apt metaphor for Elvira).

I remember when the Elvira movie came out--1988--and thinking that it seemed a little late. I eventually did see it, and while I found(and still find) Cassandra Peterson as Elvira charming, the movie had a real slap-dash, thrown-together feel and it was not a great success.

Marvel certainly put an interesting group of people together for the adaptation though--the cover is by the unlikely team of Ernie Colon and our pal Joe Jusko, with the interior art by Colon and Romeo Tanghal. And it's written by Sid Jacobson, Colon's old creative partner from a thousand issues of Richie Rich!

I thought that was a brilliant stroke, getting Jacobson and Colon to do the honors, because their style keeps the story moving at a brisk clip, and trying to get someone realistic to do the art might have killed whatever whimsy might've been found within the story.
Lots of classic Colon faces show up here, like Elvira's sleazy agent(left) and he draws her with all of her...gifts on display, but it looks cute and sexy as opposed to sleazy and exploitative. I think one of the biggest things going for Elvira was that her persona was very aware of what she looked like and always seemed in control, as opposed to playing it as a dim-wit who didn't know her massive boobs were hanging out.

The plot concerns Elvira getting fired from her late-night TV gig and deciding to open an act of Vegas, except that she needs $50K to do it. Luckily, an old Aunt of hers has died, and left Elvira her beloved dog Algonquin and her creepy old house! Of course, that doesn't go over well with the tight-asses who run the town with an iron grip.

Colon throws in lots of fun bits, like in this panel where Elvira is about to be told what her Aunt left her. I love the pure look of bliss she has on her face, and then you've got the varied reactions to her...presence from the other inheritors. My tongue would probably hang out like that if I was in the same room as Elvira, too.

This was the only Elvira comic Marvel ever published, coming a year or so after DC tried making her the host of their new horror anthology, Elvira's House of Mystery. The GCDB doesn't even list this title, it was such a blip on Marvel's publication schedule. Too bad, since I think I would've loved to see Jacobson and Colon do some original Elvira adventures.

Ironically, Elvira would come back in comics as the star of her own title from Claypool, in a title that ran for an astonishing 175 issues--a hell of a run for any character. Props to Elvira and Claypool for finding the right ingredients to make her a big-time comic book star!