House of Hammer

The House of Hammer was a British black-and-white magazine featuring articles and comics related to the Hammer Film Productions series of horror and science fiction films. The brainchild of Dez Skinn, almost every issue of the magazine featured a comics adaptations of a Hammer film, as well as an original comics backup story, such as the long-running feature Van Helsing's Terror Tales.

Contributors to the magazine included some of the UK's top comics talents, such as Steve Moore, Brian Bolland, John Bolton, Trevor Goring, David Lloyd, John Stokes, and Brian Lewis. Lewis painted most of the covers, usually featuring the Hammer film being adapted in comics form in the interior pages. Regular columns by Denis Gifford and Ramsey Campbell were also part of the mix.

Known colloquially as "HoH," the magazine endured a few name changes, becoming Hammer's House of Horror, then Hammer's Halls of Horror, and then simply Halls of Horror. (Adding to the confusion, the U.S. edition of the magazine was originally known as House of Horror.) HoH was published from 1976 to 1978, went on hiatus for more than three years, and then returned from 1982 to 1984. Originally published by Williams Publishing (formerly known as Thorpe & Porter), the British publishing arm of Warner Communications, the magazine was later produced by Skinn's own company, Quality Communications. It published 30 issues in all.



Issue # 6
This issue features a 15 page comics adaption of the Hammer film "Dracula Prince of Darkness", written by Donne Avenell with gorgeous artwork by John Bolton. It also features a 4 page Van Helsing's Terror Tales entitled "Mavoisin's Mirror", written by Chris Lowder with art by Brian Lewis. Also included are a number of feature articles and reviews.