Ryan B reads Reflection Of Death



 

As the old Crypt-Keeper has recently brought to my attention, it has been many a full moon since I covered a story from Tales from the Crypt. So, to avoid any personal loss of life or limb I suppose I should return to that place where I spent most of my misspent youth, The Crypt of Terror.

This evening’s offering is a little mind screw courtesy of Al Feldstein and Issue # 23 of Tales from the Crypt.

Take it away, Crypty...

 

I didn't see that twist coming, did you?

Okay, so maybe you did, but it's still a classic tale. So classic in fact that it was adapted. And you know what thaaat means...

Tom?

 

 

 

Hey cats! It's your old pal, Tom Bones here to fill you in on the live action version of Reflection Of Death.

 

So far this story has only been adapted once, and that was for the 1972 anthology movie, Tales from the Crypt, directed by Freddie Francis and produced by Amicus Productions.

 

 

 

The Reflection of Death segment of the movie stars Ian Hendry and Angela Grant. Hendry plays the main character who has had his name changed from Al (which it was in the comic) to Carl. Oddly enough the character actually named Carl in the comic is nowhere to bee seen in this version and is replaced with a character named Susan (played by Grant). Susan is Carl's lover who he is cheating on his wife and children with. The reason the two of them are driving  together in the first place in fact is because Carl and Susan are going out of town for a lovers tryst.

 

 

 

Besides this change the rest of the story is very faithful to the original. Carl wakes up after the accident on the side of the road and scares a hobo under a bridge and then a motorist. When he goes home, though, of course he finds and scares his wife (who has remarried) instead of finding his house abandoned. Then he goes to see Susan who is blind and that's where he finds out he's dead just like in the comic.

 

 

 

Of course the story ends with the same twist. Carl wakes from this horrible dream only to have it actually come true. But in this version he totally deserves the bad things that happen to him, as The Crypt-Keeper (Played by Ralph Richardson) points out. He is an adulterer after all.