If you follow the CHS on social media, you might have seen a "remix" yesterday I created of the cover for Famous Monsters of Filmland #82, which showcased House of Dark Shadows. I like the original cover just fine, but always wondered what we might have gotten had Forest J. Ackerman asked Basil Gogos to create the cover rather than the graphic design department. Basil is sadly no longer with us, so I knocked together a colorful homage to his Barnabas Collins cover from issue #59 on Famous Monsters. It wasn't intended as a criticism of the original cover ... it was just something fun to do. (I'm not fit to carry Basil's water, so the complete impossibilty that I might create something as good has his work was actually a liberating. It's OK to fail!)
Today I took a stab at the cover of Famous Monsters #88, and this felt a little more like a crusade. Nothing against James Storm (he's terrific on Dark Shadows) but the cover devoted to Night of Dark Shadows is among the worst in the magazine's proud run. It's just a weirdly tinted photo from a scene that's not even of real significance to the film ... WTF, guys? The Frid cover was an excuse to polish my vandalism skills, but the Night of Dark Shadows issue was an opportunity to right a wrong. I mean, Lara Parker should have been on that cover, right?
Below are my vandalized covers, as well as thumbnails as they were originally published.
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