Originally Posted by rw2516

The war comics were pretty violent also pre-code. Other things that disappered after the code were bondage covers and lingerie panels and drug use. No more psychos shooting up LSD and then chopping up pretty girls in lingerie with an axe.
Fu Manchu always gets away in the end with the words, "I shall return". Republic Pictures made a serial in the 1940's titled The Drums of Fu Manchu. They had trouble releasing it because Fu Manchu gets away and the Hays Code didn't allow for criminals to escape punishment.

As a kid in the 60s I once got ahold of a pre-code horror comic. There was this story about a young couple and their baby who take a vacation at a cabin in the woods. The couple is woken up in the middle of the night by their baby crying. They run into the baby's room and there is a giant rat, the size of a St. Bernard eating the baby. They drive the rat off. The baby is dead. The mother is so distraught she is bedridden. The father/husband builds a giant mouse trap and sets it inside their bedroom door on the floor in case the rat comes back.
Later, the husband is outside the cabin chopping firewood. He hears his wife scream. He runs to her carrying the axe. The giant rat is on her bed eating off her arms and legs. The husband runs into the bedroom weilding the axe. He forgets about the giant mousetrap and trips over it, springing the trap which cuts him in half at the waist. His top half flies through the air and he plants the axe in the rat's head which squirts rat brains.
Have never forgotten that comic and never will.