Instant Harem Girls, just add water
From WEIRD SCIENCE# 15, October 1952. Story by William Gaines and Al Feldstein, art by Jack Kamen. When I read this as a kid, it seemed like a funny little skit very much in the droll TWILIGHT ZONE style. But thinking about it later, something unsettled me.
I had figured these harem girls were some sort of artificial life, not human any more than a metal robot and programmed to respond to whoever activated them. But I don't see any mention of that. As far as I can tell, these are real flesh-and-blood women who were "dehydrated" in the future after being given powerful post-hypnotic commands. And Melvin here blithely murders one after another of them because he can't figure out how to properly resurrect them.
The only way to make this at least bearable (unless you take it as a dark comedy on the lines of ARSENIC AND OLD LACE where the old ladies poison a series of men) is to conclude that these women were actually killed when they were first dehydrated. I'd say that's a reasonable judgement (but then I also think the Star Trek transporters kill everyone in them and just creates a duplicate). In that case, Melvin is only animating a simulation of the original person, which may or may not have the original's memories. It's a bit ghoulish, he intends to have sex with what are essentially living zombies, but still not quite as bad.
This still doesn't answer why these women suffer this fate. We don't know anything about the future society, except that there is still a Wisconsin and the culture has taboos against minors or married men having sex with these revenants. There's nothing in the story to give clues. Maybe these women were condemned criminals given the death penalty and choosing this provides money for their families; maybe they were prisoners of war. Who knows, maybe there is a whole culure of freeze-dried servants, ranging from chaffeurs to bouncers to gardeners in the Wisconsin of 2952.
I had figured these harem girls were some sort of artificial life, not human any more than a metal robot and programmed to respond to whoever activated them. But I don't see any mention of that. As far as I can tell, these are real flesh-and-blood women who were "dehydrated" in the future after being given powerful post-hypnotic commands. And Melvin here blithely murders one after another of them because he can't figure out how to properly resurrect them.
The only way to make this at least bearable (unless you take it as a dark comedy on the lines of ARSENIC AND OLD LACE where the old ladies poison a series of men) is to conclude that these women were actually killed when they were first dehydrated. I'd say that's a reasonable judgement (but then I also think the Star Trek transporters kill everyone in them and just creates a duplicate). In that case, Melvin is only animating a simulation of the original person, which may or may not have the original's memories. It's a bit ghoulish, he intends to have sex with what are essentially living zombies, but still not quite as bad.
This still doesn't answer why these women suffer this fate. We don't know anything about the future society, except that there is still a Wisconsin and the culture has taboos against minors or married men having sex with these revenants. There's nothing in the story to give clues. Maybe these women were condemned criminals given the death penalty and choosing this provides money for their families; maybe they were prisoners of war. Who knows, maybe there is a whole culure of freeze-dried servants, ranging from chaffeurs to bouncers to gardeners in the Wisconsin of 2952.