I've written before about how Creem magazine was, as I put it, my "teenage bible". Other influences on me during my formative years were magazines devoted to horror, science fiction and fantasy films...magazines such as the legendary Famous Monsters of Filmland, Castle of Frankenstein, and the publication represented above-The Monster Times. the central conceit behind TMT was that it was supposed to be a newspaper of information and review about films of those genres, so it was published on newpaper stock in a tabloid format. As a result, mint condition copies of TMT are very rare and most are yellowed and somewhat beat up. Mine are a bit yellowed but are in pretty good shape, and I have a run of all but two or three. While it may have been printed on less than first-rate material, the writing within was all that and then some...humorous, insightful, intelligent. And most issues sported art by many of the up-and-coming artists of the early 70s like Kaluta, Wrightson, Jeff Jones, and others. One highlight of the entire run was the all-worst issue, issue 30, which spotlighted terrible comics and films to date and was very entertaining, helping foster my love of low budget crappy films which persists to this day. Anyway, if you're curious about the Monster Times and monster magzines of the 50s-60s and 70s, here are links to sites which feature cover galleries of just about every monster mag that counts. To go straight to the Monster Times gallery, click on the cover above, the first issue of TMT I ever bought, #24. I ordered most of the ones I didn't have not long after...
