Character
Cain and Abel are a pair of characters from DC Comics based on the biblical Cain and Abel. They are key figures in DC's "Mystery" line of the late 1960s and 1970s, which became th…
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Investigate this subjectCain and Abel are a pair of characters from DC Comics based on the biblical Cain and Abel. They are key figures in DC's "Mystery" line of the late 1960s and 1970s, which became the mature-readers imprint Vertigo in 1993.
Cain and Abel are a pair of characters from DC Comics based on the biblical Cain and Abel. They are key figures in DC's "Mystery" line of the late 1960s and 1970s, which became the mature-readers imprint Vertigo in 1993.
Cain and Abel are based on the biblical Cain and Abel, but are altogether different characters from their Biblical counterparts. Cain and Abel are one of many key figures in DC's "Mystery" line-up referred to as horror hosts of the late 1960s and 1970s, which later became a part of the mature-readers imprint Vertigo. They were depicted as brothers and they are also sons of DC Comics' Eve (another DC horror host based on the Biblical figure Eve). In 1993, host characters like Cain, Abel, Eve and Lucien were retconned as a part of the Dreaming in the critically acclaimed Sandman comic books. The character Cain is also commonly associated with his pet gargoyle Gregory.
In 1968, Cain was created to "host" the EC-style horror comic anthologies The House of Mystery (which had begun publishing in 1950). Cain, "the Able Care-Taker", created by Bob Haney, Jack Sparling and Joe Orlando, first appeared in The House of Mystery #175 (July–August 1968), modeled on writer Len Wein, who was new to the field. (A photograph of Wein as Cain can be found in Elvira's House of Mystery #4 (June 1986).)
The House of Mystery was cancelled in 1983. The final issue showed Cain in front of the House for sale, with his bags packed, and Gregory, his pet gargoyle, behind him. In the mid-1980s, Cain became a supporting character in Blue Devil (as caretaker of the "House of Weirdness"), with Abel and Gregory making occasional appearances as well.
In 1969, Abel was created to "host" the companion EC-style horror anthology The House of Secrets (which in its Silver Age run, was published from 1956 to 1966). In 1969, DC editor Joe Orlando created the design for Abel, based on his assistant, Mark Hanerfeld:
I started out basing it on the biblical Cain and Abel but then I turned to the people that were around me. It's just a writer's trick to take people's personalities and inject them into your characters. Mark stuttered when he got nervous. He was short and heavy so Abel was short and heavy. Abel was a good counterpoint to Cain who was tall and thin.
Abel's first comics appearance was in DC Special #4 (July–September 1969), ironically written by Hanerfeld and illustrated by Bill Draut. The House of Secrets was revived with #81 (August–September 1969) and Abel began hosting immediately.
In 1978, The House of Secrets (along with another horror title, The Witching Hour) was merged into The Unexpected (which itself was canceled in 1982).
During the 1970s, Cain and Abel (along with Eve) also co-hosted the horror/humor anthology Plop! Both comics had been running Dial H for Hero and Eclipso, respectively, before the introduction of the new host characters.
The cover of Vertigo's mostly-reprint Welcome Back to the House of Mystery (July 1998) showed Cain returning to the House with Abel and Gregory. Both of the anthologies that Cain and Abel debuted in are cited as one of the comic books that Neil Gaiman grew up with which helped pave the way for Cain and Abel revival within The Sandman comic books.
On the letters page of Weird Mystery Tales #3 (November 1972), Destiny stated that Cain, along with Abel and Eve, were not the same characters as their Biblical counterparts, whom Destiny said he found much more pleasant. Cain, Eve and, to a lesser extent, Abel, subsequently taunt Destiny for being dull. The Dreaming's early issues (#1–4, #8) established that Cain and Abel are their biblical counterparts. It was annotated that they did not know whether they were or if they had false memories but found evidence tying them to their biblical counterparts during the story. In the 8th issue, their wives, Jumella (Abel's twin and Cain's wife) and Aclima (Cain's twin and Abel's wife), who are also their twin sisters, and Seth were introduced to the DC Universe.
Cain told tales about people who boarded the House of Mystery. Abel stammeringly took abuse from Cain and the House of Secrets, and had an "imaginary" (always in quotes) girlfriend named Goldie who berated him too. Goldie was the imaginary friend of Dick Giordano's son. Abel told the stories directly to Goldie in the early issues, although he always appeared to be alone. He said that she was a ghost.
Cain is a thin, long-limbed man with an angular, drawn face, glasses, a tufty beard, and hair drawn into two points above his ears. He is often cruel to Abel, but he is jovial and a friendly storyteller to children and does everything he can to help Superman; he has no qualms about trapping innocent people inside his television set, however, and he was employed by a vicious mink furrier. Abel is a nervous, stammering, kind-hearted man, also with a tufty beard and black hair that comes to points above his ears. He is shorter and fatter than Cain, with a more open face. The only time Abel does not stutter is when he is telling a story (The Sandman vol. 2 #40). Cain owns a large, green gargoyle named Gregory, who first appears (as a baby) in The House of Mystery #175 – apparently the offspring of enchanted sculptures who come to the house for a French sculptor who murdered the artist who designed them. Gregory grew to maturity during the series, and continued to appear in Sandman stories. He ate the Earth-1 counterparts of writer Paul Kupperberg and editor Jack C. Harris. Cain had a black cat named Oskar, who did not get along with Gregory.
Abel moves in with Cain in the House of Mystery shortly before DC Special #4. Cain calls it a temporary situation until the House of Secrets is transported, which occurred in House of Secrets #81 one month later. Their ages are vague, but Abel tells a story he claims to have heard from Cain (who frightened him with it as a child in 1957); the story originally appeared in Tales of the Unexpected #17 (September 1957).
In the final issue of T
Source: Cain and Abel (comics) (CC BY-SA)
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