The EC Archives: Shock Suspenstories, Volume 1 »

EC Comics (Entertaining Comics) were all published from the late 1940s until around 1956, when the Comics Code Authority whitewashed all comic books to remove all themes of horror and violence. Psychiatrist Fredric Wertham and Senator Estes Kefauver's Committee on Juvenile Delinquency attacked horror comics as causes of the rise in juvenile delinquency and crimes by minors. These comic books were accused of having no redeeming value to society and were effectively banned by the actions of these groups in creating the Comics Code. EC Comics were superior to other comics of the 1950s because of a higher quality of writing and artwork, and they were widely imitated by other comics publishers. The subject matter for EC Comics were horror, science fiction/fantasy, crime stories, war stories and stories with a social message that generally had a twist or "shock" ending.

This volume reprints the first six complete issues (24 stories) of the comic book Shock SuspenStories, originally published in 1952, and features a mixture of horror, crime, war and social issue-based stories, characterized by ironic "O. Henry" type twist endings, and including the first attempts in the comics medium to teach moral lessons about racial prejudice, anti-Semitism, gang violence, corrupt officials, etc.