JUNGLE GIRL #1 (1942) and NYOKA THE JUNGLE GIRL # ?? (Fawcett)

In 1941, Republic Pictures released the serial The Adventures of Captain Marvel, as well as Jungle Girl, nominally adapting Edgar Rice Burroughs short story “The Land of Hidden Men” into a serial featuring Nyoka Meredith, a newly created character not created by Burroughs. In 1942, Republic released a sort of sequel, The Perils of Nyoka, featuring a similar character in Nyoka Gordon, played by a different actress, with no attributions or credit to Burroughs. Fawcett abridged its 15 chapters into a one-shot called JUNGLE GIRL, taking the title of the first serial as the name of its adaptation of the second (although still prominently displaying the title of the then-current serial on the cover and as the subtitle of the interior story, connecting with comics browsers no matter which of the serial titles they may have recognized). You can watch the first chapter of the serial at: 





You can read this comic at comicbookplus




According to the GCD, the art on the cover and interior is attributed to Harry Anderson

JUNGLE GIRL #1 has a table of contents pages featuring six chapter titles for its “main feature”, none of which correspond directly to the titles of any of the fifteen serial chapters.



Like the serial, this issue tells of Nyoka’s fight against the strange desert queen Vultura, who is aided by her pet gorilla, Satan. Nyoka is the daughter of the late Professor Gordon, and as the only person capable of translating the newly-discovered Tablets of Hippocrates, she is the target of considerable attention and finds herself in many perilous situations.

Interestingly, the comic invents many of its own cliffhangers to end the chapters, rather than sticking to those from the serial (although it does adopt a few of those within the chapters). Since serials weren’t released on the same schedule nationwide, this would have prevented too much spoilage for kids whose newsstand got the comic before their theater rolled the film.



Nyoka is a fairly capable character in both the comic and the serial, demonstrating intelligence and skill in battle, although it looks to me like she’s a little more reliant on her male friend Larry in this comic than in the portions of the serial that I sampled. And unlike the typical jungle girls, she’s well-rooted in the civilized world, not living a primitive life in leopard skins among the apes.



This, though, highlights a bit of a problem with this comic: while it’s called JUNGLE GIRL, the action takes place primarily in the African desert, not the jungle. It’s a lot of fun, and benefits from being based on one of the best of the Republic serials, but it’s not a jungle comic!

(Aside from the inset photo of ‘Kay Aldridge as “Nyoka” in the Republic Serial’ on the cover of JUNGLE GIRL #1, there is no further acknowledgment of Republic in this or in the following issues, with Fawcett claiming the copyright in the indicia. I have no idea what the legal arrangements were, if Republic retained any interest in the property, or if they sold it outright to Fawcett, or if Fawcett just co-opted the property and got away with it because Republic either didn’t know or didn’t care, but several other jungle comics of the era also adapted properties from TV and film without the published legalese we’ve come to expect in more recent years.)
Following that “main feature”, we get to the two “shorts” promised at the start.

“The Three Legionnaires” is a two-page text story credited to Nathaniel Nitkin. The name may sound like a pseudonym, but I’ve found a lot of credits for Nitkin in various magazines and newspapers in the 40’s, and I’ve found the name in the Social Security Death Index for a man who would have been around 30 years old when this was published, so it’s likely Nitkin was the real name of a writer who was availing himself of many opportunities, including several of the obligatory short text stories in the comics of the time. The story, as one would likely guess, features members of the French Foreign Legion and concerns Legionnaires convincing a Tuareg queen in the Sahara to ally her people with the Axis against the Italians. It’s not a jungle story, so I’ll give it no more attention than that.

Then comes “Willy Wynn”, a humor feature about a boy who invents a superglue and tries to sell it to the military. The demonstration is successful, but it’s easily removed by a lady’s nail polished. Not that it matters, because Willy has forgotten the formula anyway!

In the final panel of the “main feature”, the reader was encouraged to write in if they “want to see more adventures of Nyoka, the jungle girl”. Evidently, few cards came in, because it would not be until 1945 that Fawcett returned to the character, picking up with issue 2 of the renamed NYOKA THE JUNGLE GIRL and running through to issue 77 in June 1953.



For contrast, I’m going to skip ahead to issue 75, January 1953 and see how the feature looked once it had a few years of development behind it.



You can read this one at comicbookplus, too!

Nyoka ran photo covers for much of its run, and I don’t think that the cover model was Kay Aldridge, star of the second serial. The model portraying Nyoka is wearing a costume reminiscent of the one Aldridge wore on-screen, but with shorts that are quite a bit less baggy. I suppose in New York City it was easy enough to find models and photographers capable of staging jungle scenes, but I wonder if the majority were taken in one massive photo shoot or whether Fawcett went back periodically to get new ones. Issue 75 most likely wasn’t taken at the same time that most or all of the earlier ones were, because it debuts a new “costume” for the character, one with even skimpier shorts and showing more skin. And it looks to me to be a different model; here’s an earlier issue for comparison:



Did Fawcett commission a new photo cover to show off Nyoka’s new look, or did they run out of the original set and commission or purchase a new set, but no longer had access to the original costume, forcing a change that they then reflected inside? No man can say…

The inside cover features a one page black and white humor strip featuring Egbert the Explorer. It’s a weird one with a final panel that intentionally undercuts the gag:



This issue has a 3-part story called “The Jungle Myth of Terror”, tentatively attributed (according to the GCD) to writer Rod Reed and artist Bert Whitman. It’s got the standard Fawcett look, with neat, clean panels and a light-hearted feel to the lettering:



In chapter 1, Nyoka’s accused of violating hunting restrictions, and she accuses rival hunt guide Mr. Degreey of setting her up with planted evidence of slaughter, in order to steal her business (yeah, I’d probably go for Nyoka, too, as my guide in Africa). Nyoka’s given 24 hours to prove her innocence. Her first clue comes with a visit from Pierre Pastel, an artist who’s hair has been shocked white when he saw and escaped from the mythical griffin, a giant beast with the body of a lion and the head and wings of an eagle. Degreey finds out that Pierre and Nyoka are about to hunt a griffin, and plots to follow and kill them both.

After an intervening non-jungle humor story about Ballyhoo Barney, chapter 2 continues with “The Monster’s Lair”. Degreey’s shot misses Nyoka, but scares away a threating tiger. Degreey sees an opportunity in his failure, planting his hot rifle in Pierre’s tent, putting suspicion on him:



Further events raise Nyoka’s suspicion even more, and Pierre offers to let Nyoka tie him up helpless while she investigates further. This seems like a bad idea, and of course, it is; the griffin appears and carries him off before Nyoka can return to save him:



By the end of the chapter, not only has the griffin gotten away with Pierre, a second griffin has picked up Nyoka’s station wagon, with her in it!
Pause for a half-page humor strip, Trader Tom, and a fun quiz, then the text story, “Gate to Doom” by John Martin. An explorer escapes a long-dead Pharoah’s trap because over the centuries, the Nile’s rise had rusted the iron gates that were intended to capture intruders within the inescapable tomb.

“The Valley of Death!” concludes the Nyoka adventure, as she rescues Pierre from the griffins’ lair, and then graciously saves the evil Degreey:






The issue closes with another humor feature, Colonel Corn and Korny Kobb in “The Job Seeker!”

Maybe my standards have lowered after the dreck I’ve been exposed to in this project, but I’m declaring Nyoka a Jungle Gem. Fawcett’s appealing style and the element of the fantastic help this a lot, but I really liked the way the story continued the cliffhanger chapter endings. If this was a consistent element of the series, it would help the book to stand out over all. Time to skim a couple more issues…
Yes, it looks like this was the standard approach, at least at this stage of the comic’s run: multi-chapter stories with cliffhanger endings leading into each new chapter, divided up with back-up material. That gives NYOKA THE JUNGLE GIRL a distinctive feel as a series, and I look forward to sampling a few more.

But we’re not quite done with Nyoka, because Fawcett was about to go out of the comics business, and would sell the rights to Nyoka to Charlton Comics, who would carry on the series…

I'm interested in seeing if "The Brave and the Bold" is actually more than a Batman & Robin movie. My hunch is that it will incorporate some team-up scenes introducing new characters as they assist Batman in, perhaps, tracking down his errant (and probably in presumably great danger) son Damien. The ideal fan service would be to guest-star at least Green Arrow and Deadman, both of whom were widely hinted/rumored to be part of Gunn's first wave, but why not throw in Wildcat, Sgt. Rock, and the Metal Men, in cameos, at least, for the ultimate B&B adaptation?

Yes, I've read all five volumes and all of his other work. The Familiar and House of Leaves are among the very few books that make me "gush". HoL is probably the better starting point, and it's an entirely different sort of literary accomplishment in that it literally, physically puts the reader into a parallel of the predicament that the main character (at least from one perspective) is in. It's liminal spaces and found footage in literary form, another astonishing piece of art. When you do tackle it--and you absolutely should try, at least!--my advice is to read all the footnotes when you reach them. If you don't, you rob yourself of the essential experience of the work. Some of them you can safely skim, but if you do, at least skim all the way to the end. 
HoL is also the only book I've read where the index--the freaking index!--is worth reading in its entirety! Amazing...

That sounds pretty cool, codystarbuck ! I've never heard of Newman, but I usually get a kick out of stories that team up characters from popular literature like that, so Newman's going on my to-read list. Thanks!

RIMA THE JUNGLE GIRL #6, Feb-Mar 1975, DC Comics



"Safari of Death" is credited to Bob Kanigher, writer, and Nestor Redondo, artist. Abel, a jungle guide operating in the Amazon and the primary supporting cast member of this comic, is being pestered by some unsavory clients who want to be led to the fabled white jaguar, as well as to the legendary Rima, beautiful jungle girl and friend to the beast. Abel lies, telling them that both are myths, promising only to lead them to Ytaioa Mountain, as contracted.

Abel’s deception is exposed when Rima dashes past them with the white jaguar and his mate. The group opens fire, but Rima and the cats escape to a well-hidden cave, where she leaves the jaguars to rest “before your ordeal”. Rima returns to Abel, thinking he may be in danger.



He is indeed—his clients have not taken kindly to being misled about Rima and the jaguar, and Abel is beaten and bound until he is willing to spill the beans. Rima’s on her way, though, trotting fearlessly across a bridge of floating alligators!



She finds and releases Abel, not realizing she is in the crosshairs of the evil hunters who are lying in wait in the jungle.

A rifle shot fells Rima, and the weakened Abel falls alongside her.

Rima’s shoulder injury is nonlethal, but she’s at the group’s mercy, and they threaten to kill her and Abel unless she leads them to the white jaguar. She and Abel still resists, so the gang’s leader, Trask, threatens to burn the forest down. This is enough to convince Abel to give in, but not Rima, who trills a strange song which, unbeknownst to the hunters, is summoning jungle beasts to her aid.
Just as Trask is about to resort to some more direct forms of physical coercion—“I’ll make her squeal, all right!”—the white jaguar arrives and attacks him. The men shoot the jaguar, but it lives long enough to kill them all.



Rima leads Abel back to the cave, where they learn that the jaguar’s mate has given birth to a new albino, ensuring that the legendary white jaguar will endure.

The back-up feature is “Devil’s Doctor”, presented under the banner “Jungle Justice”. “Jungle Justice” was not an ongoing feature in RIMA, though. The first issues had featured a science fiction serial called Space Voyagers written by Kanigher, drawn by Alex Nino, and the final issue, #7, featured the debut of what is probably DC’s least known Bronze Age feature, a Western-influenced science fiction series called Space Marshal, featuring Linc Wade, whose origin story was the only appearance. That story concluded with the encouragement to “follow the startling adventures of Linc Wade, Space Marshal…”, but the cancellation of RIMA meant no such adventures would follow. I don't quite follow why an SF strip seemed like a good choice for backups in this series, but I know some fans have fond memories of Space Voyagers, a trippy little strip indeed.

“Devil’s Doctor”, by Bob Kanigher and artist Ric Estrada, is quite likely something that was prepared for the inventory of WEIRD WAR TALES, with “Jungle Justice” plastered over the usual WWT introductory caption where the skull-faced soldier/host usually made initial comments on the story to come.



The story follows Dr. Adoph Kessel, a medical experimenter at a Nazi concentration camp during WWII, who picks child prisoners to take to the sinister Block 9. No one returns from Block 9, where Kessel experiments with shrinking humans.



Kessel’s a famed plastic surgeon as well as a mad scientist, and he’s flown to the African front to aid disfigured and disabled German soldiers. His plane is shot down, but he survives and is taken by Pygmies. He sees an opportunity to continue his experiments; after all, the Pygmies are already partway shrunk! Turns out the Pygmies have already perfected the art of shrinking humans themselves:



It doesn't exactly coalesce, but I find myself appreciating Ric Estrada's art a lot more now than I did as a teenager. There are some nicely moody panels in this one. 

RIMA is quite an odd little series, introduced under the editorship of Joe Kubert one year after DC took over publishing Tarzan. It seems to have filled in the gap left when KORAK, SON OF TARZAN went on hiatus. KORAK returned to the schedule in May/Jun 1975, the month after RIMA was cancelled as of her 7th issue.

Like Tarzan, RIMA was a literary adaptation, based on William Henry Hudson’s novel Green Mansions: A Romance of the Tropical Forest (1904). That, however, was never explicitly acknowledged in the comic’s credits or letters pages. It’s unlikely that many comics readers of the time were aware of the novel, unless they had caught an airing of the 1959 film adaptation starring Audrey Hepburn, or the CLASSICS ILLUSTRATED issue illustrated by Alex Blum.





The novel, which I’ve only experienced in abridged audio book, is not a typical pulpy jungle adventure, but a more literary and evocative tale, heavy on descriptions of nature and light on action—not the usual reading material of a typical 1970’s comics fan.

While the story in this issue is rather slight, it’s not without its charms, owing not just to Nestor Redondo’s lush rendering and Rima’s undeniable sex appeal, at least to those readers who, like me, were very attracted to a conventionally ideal female form. Kanigher peppers his story with a bit of jungle action and seedy implications of impending sexual assault, but RIMA has an atmosphere unlike any of the other jungle comics I’ve read. Rima is hinted to be almost supernatural, and her kinship with the jungle wildlife is not exactly the typical master/servant relationship, where the jungle hero commands the beasts and communicates with them directly. It’s more like she is one of them, a natural denizen of the jungle ecosphere bridging the wildlife and intelligent humanity.

Returning to Redondo, while he—with, possibly, his Filipino studio of assistants—delivered some gorgeous work, it looks to me like Joe Kubert was supplying detailed layouts from which they worked. The pages are filled with hallmarks of Kubert’s compositional style, such as inset panels, and camera angles and poses and expressions common in Kubert’s credited work. This isn’t the only comic in which I see strong evidence that Kubert’s vision was behind far more comics in the 70’s than those that bore his direct byline; RAGMAN and UNKNOWN SOLDIER are other examples. I’m only modestly talented with the pencil, but I think I could have delivered professional quality work if I had Joe Kubert’s layouts to work from, but Redondo’s finishes were unquestionably gorgeous throughout Rima’s brief run.

So yes, RIMA THE JUNGLE GIRL is a definite Jungle Gem. Her series was gone too soon, and the character has been little seen since. She made a few appearances on television’s Super Friends cartoon, and was featured in DC’s pulp-inspired FIRST WAVE series of 2010, which featured the team of Doc Savage, Batman The Bat Man, and The Spirit meeting characters like Rima, the Avenger, and the Blackhawks. It even resurrected Rima’s 70’s vintage logo on one cover:

JUNGLE LIL #1 (April 1950) and FEATURE STORIES MAGAZINE #3 (August 1950), Fox Features Syndicate



You can read this comic here!comicbookplus.com/?dlid=37020
Jungle Lil had a big break, receiving her own series, but she was replaced as of issue 2 by DOROTHY LAMOUR JUNGLE PRINCESS, who we’ve previously sampled here.

Jungle Lil debuts in “Betrayer of the Kombe Dead!!” Kramer and Inez, who are searching for diamonds in Africa based on Professor Sault’s note, provide the exposition needed to summarize Jungle Lil’s origin, and it’s a familiar one: Sault, his wife, and daughter went down in a plane crash in Africa, never to be heard from again. We pick up the rest of the story from Lil herself, discussing with Chief Korfu’s son, Prince Robi, how the orphaned Lil was adopted and raised by the chief, over the objections of the witch doctor Jocu, despite the legend that “the child goddess shall come in fire from the heavens”. Her only legacy, besides the wreckage of the plane she arrived in, is a baby photo identifying her as “Jungle Lil” and a locket with her parent’s pictures:



Kramer and Inez recognize Lil, and, with a photo of her father, try to connive their way into the diamond-filled burial ground, but only Jungle Lil and the chief are allowed there. They drug Lil, and Inez dyes her blonde hair red, conspiring with Jocu to get her access the tombs, disguised as the goddess Lil.

The young Prince Robi is suspicious when he spies the disguised Inez fighting with Jungle Lil’s parrot, Tuila, and he discovers the perfidious deception, but is capture by the thieves’ native crew.
Lil, meanwhile, is bound and attacked by a lion, which she easily dispatches once her bonds break.

Korfu sends men after the supposedly treacherous “Lil”, to witch doctor Jocu’s delight. She’s captured, and her argument that hair can be dyed is doubted. Inez, meanwhile, has washed out the dye, and claims innocence when all of them are brought before the chief. Tuila flies in, and through the traditional ability of jungle heroes and heroines to talk to animals, Lil learns from the bird that Prince Robi is held captive, leading (awkwardly) to a standoff:



Tuila saves the day by attacking Kramer before he can shoot, Korfu spears the witch doctor, who plunges into crocodile-infested waters, and the villains are sent to face white man’s justice. Lil forgives the tribe for distrusting her, and peace returns to the kraal.


Pretty standard stuff, and Jungle Lil is generic, with the modest twist being that she lives with the tribe as an adopted native, albeit with the usual “goddess” stature.

Bwaäni headlines the backup story that follows, “The Slaves of the Idol Thieves’ Caravan!” This one features the art of Joe Orlando.



Bwaäni is the son of his people’s chief, and he’s evidently a lazy kid, brushing off his peers to go fishing with “the white man’s stick” instead of the traditional spear-fishing. Chief Kayota disparages his son, but mom Mashumba points out that as heir to the chief, it’s best the lad stick to safer activities.

Little do they realize Bwaäni is without guards at the river, other than his pet chimp, Cheeta (seriously, Fox?). Bwaäni hears a bird cry that—somehow—indicates a white person in the jungle (no, Bwaäni doesn’t seem to talk to animals, these birds just apparently squawk a special way at the sight of a Caucasian).

This particular Caucasian is the wicked Mistress Solta, who is bribing some of an unnamed tribe to steal the jeweled idol of the Azende tribe. Her plot goes a little deeper though: she intends for Tinoko, a member of Bwaäni’s Mbena tribe, to be seen, starting a tribal war between the Mbena and Azende. When that happens, she’s planning to run off with the thieves.

Tinoko makes the grab, and the Azende do spot him, but he eludes them. On his way back with the loot, Tinoko is attacked by a panther, but he is saved by his fellow tribesman, Bwaäni.
Back at the kraal, Soltra is threatening the returning Tinoko, and Bwaäni intervenes again, but cannot stop Soltra from finishing off the thief with her “boomstick”. Bwaäni is taken for a slave as Soltra and her native collaborators get ready to head out. Later, though, Bwaäni escapes (thanks to Cheeta), rescues an elephant, and leads it and its herd in a stampede against Soltra. He captures the villains, returns the idol, resolving the dispute. He leaves the thieves bound at the temple, and returns home, his parents not suspecting their “lazy” son of having been the hero of the day.

This one was a little confusing, since there are three tribes involved, and the villainous tribe is described only with this: “Many miles away, close to the kraal of the Azende, terrible enemies of the Mbena tribe are gathering!” I initially read this as implying that this tribe was the Mbena, and that they were terrible enemies of the Azende. But no, this was a tribe of enemies to the Mbena, setting up a war between their enemies the Mbena and this other tribe, the Azende. On that first read, it seemed as if Soltra was planning to flee with Horab, who was betraying his own tribe, rather than with the entirety of Horab’s thieving tribe. That unintentionally suggested an interracial romance, which I thought was pretty daring stuff, but no, it’s just sloppy scripting.

Joe Orlando’s art here is a little more refined than some of the other stuff credited to him we’ve seen before in Fox jungle comics.

I do respect the basic premise here: with the supposed slacker prince secretly a highly capable jungle adventurer, and that it was the native boy who was the hero, not another abandoned white kid.
“Jungle Oil” is the two-page text story. This is an Amazon jungle story, for a change, with Texas oil man Frank Martins down on his luck and taking a job in Brazil looking for oil. He and his guide face a hostile tribe of Bastonia Indians, whose aggressive actions inadvertently reveal that the oil the tribe were trying to hide had its source on state property, giving Martins profitable news to bring back to his bosses.

This one was a chore to read, with little pay-off.

“The Ghosts of the Bandza Kraal!” brings Jungle Lil back for a second adventure, with art attributed to Vern Henkel.



Lil saves the life of a native who tells how his village attacked “a huge shadow bird with wings that circled round over its back”—a helicopter. The chopper crashes and burns down their village, and the previously peaceful Bandza tribe attacked the helpless victims, taking them captive. Seems the Bandza are operating on the instructions of the ghost of their Chief Koola, who appears to them amidst flame:



It’s all a hoax by the white men with the choppers, who are taking slaves to mine “nutranite”, the world’s rarest mineral. Lil uncovers the deception, bringing peace between the tribes as the villains’ attempt to flee leads to them both dying as they fall from the whirlybird:



JUNGLE LIL was forgettable, familiar stuff, but not particularly bad stuff. The art was too crude to provide the kind of sex appeal that certainly fueled sales for many a jungle queen, and the characters were the usual ones: good chief, evil witch doctor, noble prince, and easily-duped rival tribesmen. Writers who didn’t know anything about genuine African civilizations, social structures, civic responsibilities, religions, and comprehension of the larger world would continue to assemble the tropes and come up with repetitive fare like this.

Lil cropped up a few months later with a story in FEATURE STORIES #3, which, despite the numbering, appears to be one in a long line of one-shot comics with various titles, themes, and numbering.



You can read this comic here!

FEATURE STORIES MAGAZINE #3 is subtitled “Jungle Thrills”. The cover, by an unidentified artist, is rather crude, but I admit I like the outdated feel of the logo, with its mixture of three different letter forms and desperate use of speed lines.

FSM #3 seems to aggregate some leftovers from cancelled jungle comics. There are two Jungle Jill stories presumably intended for the second issue that Dorothy Lamour usurped, and one Zegra story; I haven’t gotten to Zegra yet, but her comic had been cancelled over a year earlier.

Jungle Lil is up first in “The Map of Death”, which has Lil protecting a white girl who is fleeing from a villain that’s after the treasure map she is carrying. There’s attacking tribesmen duped by an evil white guy, who dies in the conflict, and it ends with the map burned and the white men’s weapons destroyed, as Lil vows to remain among the Kombe tribe:



I had wonder whether, if JUNGLE LIL had continued, she would evolve into the more common jungle goddess type, living apart and traveling to solve problems throughout the jungle, but if this story is any indication, the creators were going to keep her as a “local”, giving her the benefit of a small supporting cast, at least.

Next comes Zegra in “Games of Havoc”, with art from the wonderful Jack Kamen.



This one is reminiscent of the stories Kamen was best known for at EC, with squabbling husband and wife involved in unsavory criminal activity. Their attempt to hide out in Zegra’s jungle doesn’t work out well, especially for the woman:



Mack gets his just deserts, too, when a jungle beast he unleashes on Zegra turns on him instead.

This story, at least, is a Jungle Gem. Is there anyone better than Jack Kamen at depicting sleazy criminal lovers who secretly loathe each other?

“Sacred Jewel” is the obligatory two-page text story. It’s a somewhat interesting tale of a duchess who commissions an escort on a jungle mission, with some romance unexpectedly mixed in.

Finally, Jungle Lil returns for “Lands of the Mandrill Queen”. It’s crudely rendered but it spices things up with bats:



…and talking mandrill/men and an ancient hidden civilization led by a wicked white queen:



I only did it because I had to sample one of every jungle comic I could, but with these two issues, I’ve now read every Jungle Lil story published. There’s not a lot to praise or condemn about it, it just is what it is, and it might have provided a few undiscriminating kids with a few minutes of reading enjoyment and jungle thrills.

I do have to wonder about the name, though. “Jungle Lil” strikes me as an odd choice, one that immediately suggests a catchier one: “Jungle Jill”. It wouldn’t surprise me if that was the initial idea, abandoned for fear of treading too closely on the well-known “Jungle Jim” trademark.

Here's something similar that crossed my mind as I was driving down to Birmingham today: what comics or features were promoted under one title but eventually published under a different one? For instance, the Bullpen Bulletins promised The Mark of Satan (Son of Satan), House of Dracula (Tomb of Dracula), Gothic Thrillers (Supernatural Thrillers), Victims of Dracula (Curse of Dracula), and my favorite, J. Jonah Jameson Presents My Son the Man-Wolf (Man-Wolf). DC advertised Crisis on Infinite Earths: the History of the DC Universe (split into separate projects).
Can anyone think of other examples?