Tales of the Zombie was a horror magazine (magazines were used when Marvel wanted to include nudity or more graphic violence than allowed by the Comic Code Authority) starring Simon Garth the Zombie.
Until I read the first issue of this magazine, I thought Garth first appeared in Dracula Lives! #2. But this magazine reprints an old, pre-code horror story titled “Zombie! A Man Without a Soul!”
He’s not named, but the zombie clearly is Garth–and the other characters in the story are similar (but not identical) to the ones in Garth’s origin, which is the original content of this magazine.
“Altar of the Damned” by Roy Thomas and Steve Gerber, with art by the great John Buscema, gives us an extended origin for Simon Garth. He was a wealthy coffee magnate and, of course, an asshole.
Simon catches his gardener watching his daughter skinny dipping, and fires him. Of course the gardener knows a gypsy. And the gardener is an even bigger asshole. He kills Simon Garth and forces the Gypsy to use voodoo to raise him from the dead as his slave, so he can have all Garth’s wealth.
But the spell doesn’t completely work. Garth rises, but he’s a blank-minded zombie.
He’s got some strength, too.
He kills a hunter’s dogs, and, because this is a Steve Gerber joint, the hunter sees what death really is about and decides not to hunt anymore.
And he can use tools…
…when he disarms a mugger and kills him.
So there’s the set-up. It’s a lot like Man-Thing, frankly–a mindless, shambling creature drawn to violence who (other than those poor dogs) only seems to kill people who deserve it.
Grade C+. Fairly standard Gerber, whose writing can elevate even the most mundane concepts.