WALLACE WOOD'S JEKYLL AND HYDE

STARTLING TERROR TALES
Vol. 1 No. 10
May 1952
Star Publications, Inc. (Star Comics)
Editor: L.B. Cole?
Scripts: ?
Art: Wallace Wood
Cover: L.B. Cole
Pages: 36
Cover price: 10 cents

Ask anybody who the top Silver Age comic book artists were and the name Wallace Wood will invariably pop up as one of them. During his prime (which was a long time), Wood's style was his own and many others emulated it, especially those who had assisted him with his various works.

This first comic book adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" was drawn by Wood at the time when his Eisner-esque lines were becoming more his own. Some criticize his draftsmanship here as too rough, but I believe his later sophistication is showing through in many panels. Not long after, Wood would be convincing MAD magazine publisher William Gaines to start a line of science-fiction comics. Wood's work for Avon Comics around that same period is remarkable.

The two illustrated stories in this issue originally appeared in Fox Comics' A STAR PRESENTATION #3, May 1950 and has been reprinted numerous times over. The text story, by an unnamed writer, is a true crime story.