Vampire Tales #6
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeVampire Tales #6 (August 1974) delivers the second published appearance of Lilith, Dracula's Daughter — just weeks after her debut in Giant-Size Chillers Featuring the Curse of Dracula #1 — and serves as the first full solo showcase for the character, establishing her modern-era framework of sharing a body with her human host, Angel O'Hara, and introducing supporting character Martin Gold, who would follow Steve Gerber into later projects including The Legion of Night. Because Vampire Tales was published as a black-and-white magazine rather than a Comics Code-sanctioned comic book, it operated outside the CCA's reach, permitting Gerber and the creative team to tackle morally charged urban subject matter — an axe murderer targeting women, a Harlem community protecting a vampire in exchange for 'cleaned streets' — with a directness that newsstand color comics of the era could not match. The issue also stands as a notable intersection point within Marvel's mid-1970s horror publishing initiative, appearing simultaneously with Lilith's debut in the color Tomb of Dracula line and cross-pollinating the magazine and standard comic-book continuities in a way that was unusual for the period.
In "Lilith Daughter of Dracula," a series of brutal murders leaves Martin Gold haunted and imprisoned—only to be freed when new killings occur during his incarceration. As his sanity frays, he brings Angel O'Hara home, unaware she’s the one who will face the true horror lurking in the shadows. When the Axe Man strikes again, the line between vengeance and transformation blurs.
In "Angie's Soul," reporter Angela "Angie" Freeman digs into the murder of a junkie, uncovering a trail that leads her into a deadly conspiracy. As she teams up with cop Jimmy Sarran, Angie begins to suspect a vampire is behind the killings—only to discover her own brother Thomas is entangled in the secret, protecting the People's Defense Association of Harlem with a monstrous purpose. With the help of Father Lyons and Mrs. Santo, Angie must unravel the truth before she becomes the next sacrifice.
George Crandall, worn down by time, answers an ad seeking a warm-blooded man—and finds Mina, a vampiress who promises eternity. When his wife, Mrs. Crandall, makes a final, desperate choice about his fate, the line between life and death blurs in the flicker of flames.
In "The Color of Crimson Gold," a desperate peasant’s fateful purchase of a treasure map sets off a chain of betrayals and bloodshed. Tevye, a cunning peddler, seeks to feed a coven of vampires by luring more victims, while Tovarr, a gypsy with a wary eye, follows the map into a cursed cave—only to uncover a deadly conspiracy. As shadows deepen and the line between hunter and hunted blurs, a final reckoning unfolds beneath the weight of gold and vengeance.
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The issue was cover-dated August 1974 and carried an on-sale date of June 4, 1974, edited under Roy Thomas as editor-in-chief with Marv Wolfman serving as issue editor — a creative infrastructure that also supervised Dracula Lives! and the Tomb of Dracula color series, creating an unusually coherent shared mythology across multiple Marvel horror titles. Steve Gerber wrote the lead Lilith story (penciled by Bob Brown and inked by Tom Palmer), continuing the character thread Wolfman and Gene Colan had established in Giant-Size Chillers #1, while additional stories in the anthology were contributed by Chris Claremont (with artist Balcells), Doug Moench (with Alfredo Alcala), and Doug Moench again (with Vicente Alcazar). The striking painted cover portrait of Lilith was produced by Boris Vallejo, whose naturalistic illustration style was becoming a recognizable signature of Marvel's black-and-white magazine line.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Published August 1974 (on-sale June 4, 1974) by Magazine Management / Curtis Magazines under the Marvel Monster Group banner; edited by Roy Thomas (EIC) and Marv Wolfman.
- Contains the second published appearance of Lilith (Lilith Drake, Earth-616), Dracula's Daughter — her debut having been Giant-Size Chillers Featuring the Curse of Dracula #1 (June 1974), created by Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan.
- First appearance of Martin Gold, the human supporting character in Lilith's solo stories; Gerber later used Gold in the two-issue miniseries The Legion of Night.
- Angel O'Hara appears here in the context of being Lilith's human host — her role as the primary vessel for Lilith's modern-era identity is developed in this issue as she moves to Greenwich Village and meets Martin Gold.
- The Lilith lead story — titled 'Blood Death' in reprint sources — was written by Steve Gerber with pencils by Bob Brown and inks by Tom Palmer; it continues narrative threads directly from Giant-Size Chillers #1.
- The issue is an anthology containing multiple stories: the Lilith/Angel O'Hara story; a vampire story set in Harlem with an introduced reporter character, Angela Freeman; a comedic horror short ('A Novel Way to Die'); and features on TV's Dark Shadows and a non-fiction article drawn from Montague Summers' The Vampire: His Kith & Kin.
- Shang-Chi (Master of Kung Fu) and Simon Garth (the Zombie) appear in separate anthology segments, reflecting the broad Marvel horror-adjacent character roster that the magazine format accommodated outside standard continuity constraints.
- The 'Blood Death' Lilith story was later reprinted in Vampire Tales Annual #1 (1975); the full run of stories from issues #1–6 (including this issue's content) has been collected in both a Dark Horse hardcover archival edition and the Marvel Masterworks: Tomb of Dracula Vol. 3.
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Reprints
Reprinted in Corriere della Paura #8 (1975), Vampire Tales Annual #1 (1975), Castle of Horror #1 (1978), Castle of Horror #3 (1978), Horror #12 (1988), Horror Strip #1 (1994), Vampire Tales #2 (2011), Morbius the Living Vampire Omnibus #[nn] (2019), Morbius Epic Collection #1 (2020), Marvel Horror Lives Again! Omnibus #[nn] (2020), Demon! #1, Varmblodig #1/1974
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