Here's the original script scan I promised you guys. Moench actually gave a few unpublished scripts to Hunter Goatley for his Planet of the Apes website, and they provide some fascinating insight into how Doug writes. Most of the script is spent discussing visuals, not dialogue nor plot. In fact, on page 11, Moench even gets into the symbolism of having amphibians present in the background:

pota.goatley.com/moench/moench-future-history-chronicles-vi.pdf


Moench's contributions to the visual aspects of his stories should never be underestimated, nor should their potential symbolism.

Later on, he's Julie Schwartz.

"The Sum of its Parts" (from Creepy #50, January 1973)

artist: Reed Crandall

grade: C-



plot synopsis: Neatly cut body parts are being delivered to people all over London, making the police scurry to solve the mystery of who the parts came from and why this is being done. Ultimately, the people who discovered the various parts all end up losing the same body parts they found (the guy who found the hands loses his hands, etc). An inspector finally figures out that it's being done by a dead seaman who was a practitioner of voodoo. Each victim had a hand in bringing him to justice for killing his wife, and, symbolically, the body parts represent what they did. He also realizes that, since he was the detective who solved the crime, he'll be the one to lose his head. He tries to avoid this fate but is beheaded as the newly reassembled body tries his head on for a change.


According to Moench, Reed Crandall is one of the few artists he did speak with by phone while writing for Warren, though the content of that conversation (or conversations) is never explained. Moench also explains that Crandall was a hero of his from his childhood, so it stands to reason that he probably didn't offer the guy too much direction. Maybe that explains why the visuals for this story are some of the worst I've seen paired with a Moench story. They're not proportionately wrong or unclear -- just horrifically boring to look at:






Meanwhile, though the story begins with an interesting enough mystery and premise, the solution is even more far-fetched than what you usually find in a Warren mag and isn't all that exciting either, but a lot of that has got to be because of Crandall. It seems likely to me that his restrained artwork was intended -- an homage to late 19th century Victorian comic art, perhaps? -- but it absolutely detracts from the story's impact. What Jose Bea could have done with this story!

"Ecology of Death!" (text piece from Eerie #45, February 1973)

art by Bill DuBay

my grade: B



Plot synopsis: An alien monster is hiding in a young boy's closet and, as it gradually kills and then merges its consciousness with each member of the family in order to stop the father, an executive at NASA, from approving deep exploration into its territory of space, it almost begins to act as a symbol of each family member's inner yearnings to kill one another.


A shockingly different approach for Moench, this is undoubtedly his most disturbing work to date. It also highlights a typical problem with Moench's writing: the closer he comes to genius artistry, the more awkward and pretentious his work feels when it falls a few yards short. This story truly has brilliance to it, especially as the creature's consciousness begins to merge with that of each character's in the internal monologues.


An example, as the creature begins to inhabit the consciousness of the wife:



It's a solid execution of a bold idea, but, regrettably, the entire story doesn't function on that polished a level. For one thing, the dialogue in the beginning is outright obnoxious in how hard it tries:




And then the story is told out of sequence. There may be some brilliant reason for this relating to the idea of the creature being a paradox, but I don't see it. It just comes off as jarring. And why is the creature a paradox? Moench spends forever explaining this, but I'm still not convinced he understands what a paradox is.


Given eight more drafts and a solid editor, I think this story could have been on the level of Lovecraft, but the nature of the comic book industry required Moench to be churning out scripts, left and right, and probably rarely even doing a second draft. It's sad to consider, but what other options did great writers of horror and sci-fi have available to them by the time of 1973? One had to pay the bills.


Incidentally, Bill DuBay does some nice artwork for this story, but the story so thoroughly demands your attention that I barely even noticed the artwork at the bottom of the page:

Man, do I love Russ Heath!

Source: Cooke, Jon. "The Peruvian Connection: Confessions of a Horror Writer." The Warren Companion. Vol. 1. Raleigh: Twomorrows, 2001. 118-125. Print.