Last Marvel Zombie Cover for 19 Years, Journey into Unknown Worlds #28

Posted in: Comics, Vintage Paper | Tagged: Harry Anderson, marvel zombies

Last Marvel Zombie Cover for 19 Years, Journey into Unknown Worlds #28

Journey into Unknown Worlds #28 appears to be the last time a zombie appeared on a Marvel cover for 19 years. The highest-graded CGC 8.5 copy is up for auction.

Published Tue, 22 Oct 2024 16:02:10 -0500
by Mark Seifert
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Article Summary

• Discover the significance of Journey into Unknown Worlds #28 zombie cover in comic history.
• Explore Martin Goodman's strategic shift in response to 1950s moral panic in comics.
• Learn why zombies vanished from Marvel covers for nearly two decades.

In our recent discussion on Harry Anderson's zombie cover for Marvel Tales #124, which hit newsstands in March 1954, we talked about how this was the month that Marvel publisher Martin Goodman began to make the changes that would allow Marvel to survive the comic book moral panic era that was hitting its peak at that time. The announcement of the development of the Comics Code was still about six months in the future, and Senate hearings on the industry would come late the next month, but the pressure to change was already in the air. That month would be the last time zombies (or werewolves, skeletons, and vampires, among other horror creatures) appeared on Marvel covers for quite some time.  In fact, it appears that Anderson's cover for Journey into Unknown Worlds #28, with its Library of Congress copyright date (effectively an on-sale date) of March 29, would be the last time a zombie would be featured on a Marvel comic book cover until 1973.

Goodman seems to have already had a pretty good idea of the upcoming code restrictions because when the Comics Code guidelines were published months later, they included restrictions against "scenes dealing with, or instruments associated with walking dead, torture, vampires and vampirism, ghouls, cannibalism, and werewolfism."  A handful of Marvel zombie (and other horror creature) stories trickled out in the subsequent months before the Code took effect, but Journey into Unknown Worlds #28 would mark their last cover appearance by a zombie at Marvel for quite some time.

It appears that 1973's Zombie #1, which featured a Pre-Code Bill Everett character, became the first Marvel zombie to appear on a cover since Journey into Unknown Worlds #28.  This followed February 1971 revisions in Comics Code guidelines, with previously-banned horror types such as vampires (Morbius in Amazing Spider-Man #101, 1971), and werewolves (Werewolf by Night in Marvel Spotlight #2, 1972), also making their return.  Notably, Zombie was a Marvel magazine not subject to Code approval, but Code-approved Jungle Action #9 featured a zombie cover in 1974.

Harry Anderson produced some incredible horror covers at Marvel during the Pre-Code era, and his 1954 cover for Journey into Unknown Worlds #28 is noteworthy indeed.  The last Marvel zombie cover for 19 years the highest-graded CGC 8.5 copy of Journey into Unknown Worlds #28 is up for auction in the 2024 October 24 – 25 Pre-Code Horror & Crime Comics Showcase Auction #40272 at Heritage Auctions.

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