Welcome to Comic Book Legends Revealed! This is the six hundred and tenth week of examinations of comic book legends and whether they are true or false.

Here's Part 1 of this week's Comic Book Legends Revealed! Let's continue!

COMIC LEGEND:

Dell did a Dracula comic book because they weren't bound by the Comics Code Authority.

STATUS:

True

This one is a fun reader suggestion, as it allows me to spotlight one of the weirdest comic book superheroes of all-time.

Reader Ray W. wrote in to ask why Dell was allowed to get away with doing a Dracula superhero during the 1960s when vampires were banned by the Comics Code.

For years, Dell was right up there with DC Comics as the largest comic book company around, mostly centered by their extremely popular Disney licensed comic books.

dell-disney

However, Ray is correct, during the 1960s, Dell tried out a Dracula superhero comic book, which is one of the weirdest idea for a superhero ever...

dracula-1a
dracula-1-a
dracula-1-b
dracula-1-c

And then he trained...

dracula-1-d
dracula-1-e

And then he got a costume...

dracula-1-f

But even before that, they did a more traditional take on Dracula, as well...

dracula-1

So what gives? The Comics Code specifically stated, "Scenes dealing with, or instruments associated with walking dead, torture, vampires and vampirism, ghouls, cannibalism, and werewolfism are prohibited."

Here's the thing that a lot of folks don't know, though. Despite being the #1 kid-friendly comic book company during the 1950s, Dell said, "No thanks" to the Comics Code.

They instead had their own "Dell Code," which was really just "A Pledge to Parents" that stated: "The Dell code eliminates entirely, rather than regulates, objectionable material"

So they could really do whatever they wanted, and it, of course, never hurt them sales-wise, which only highlights how silly the Comics Code was (I mean, I get it, it kept people off of the comic book companies back), as one of the biggest companies just said, "No thanks," and it wasn't even an issue at all!

And luckily, we got one of the weirdest comic book superheroes of all-time out of the process.

Thanks to Ray for the suggestion!

Check out my latest Movie Legends Revealed at CBR: Was Captain America originally going to die on "Captain America: Civil War"?

Check back Sunday for part 3 of this week's legends!

And remember, if you have a legend that you're curious about, drop me a line at either brianc@cbr.com or cronb01@aol.com!