Superman #200

Người đăng: vanmai yeu em on Thứ Sáu, 30 tháng 3, 2012

I believe this was the last of the Imaginary Stories published in Superman; it may have been the last anywhere in Weisinger's domain.  (Correction: My commenters note that there were several Imaginary Stories after this one, including in Superman). Note that rather oddly there is no cover hype about this being the 200th issue.  This is somewhat strange; only  a few months later DC would publish Batman's 200th ish with great fanfare.

In the story, Jor-El, Lara, and Kal-El survive the destruction of Krypton.  Brainiac, who's a good guy in this story, shrinks Kryptonopolis instead of Kandor, in order to save it, but is unable to do the same for the rest of the planet:

Krypton explodes before that happens.  And the element which powers his enlarging ray has also burned out, so he cannot expand Kryptonopolis on another uninhabited planet until he finds more.  So the El family ages, with little brother Knor coming along a few years later to become a buddy for Kal.

Eventually Brainiac finds the expanding element, but before he can use it his ship is hit by a meteor and crashes on Earth.  Fortunately, he had transferred a little of the element to Jor-El, who realizes he can enlarge one person to send out to the planet to become its protector.

And so, Kryptonopolis has a contest to see who will become Superman:
The contestants are eliminated one by one, until only Kal and Knor are left.  Note in particular that this segment echoes the origin of Wonder Woman, who was selected to take Steve Trevor back to the USA in a very similar competition.   In the finale, contrary to the cover scene, both men have to battle robots:
But Knor succeeds just before Kal can blind his robot, and so Earth ends up with the little brother, who goes to work for the Daily Planet as Ken Clarkson.  His initial outing, foiling a jailbreak, goes successfully, but the next time around some aliens are prepared:
Fortunately Kal managed to synthesize some of the expanding element, and so he tries to rescue Knor.  And when the aliens expose him to the Green K, we get a surprise:
Of course, if you're paying attention, you're probably wondering why the Green K killed Knor, but had a Red K effect on Kal.  It turns out that Knor was just rendered immobile by the Kryptonite.  When they both recover from the effects they send the aliens packing, and afterwards, Kal heads northward:

There is a note at the end of the story saying that just as this is Superman's 200th issue, it's the 100th anniversary of Canada being a "United Federation" (actually a Dominion).

Comments: Overall the story seems a little light, with few of the twists and turns that usually took place under Weisinger's editorship.

As noted earlier, there is not a lot of hype about the 200th issue, unlike the forthcoming Batman #200, which included a long conversation between two Bat-fans, a reprint of the first page from Detective #27 and a cover hyping the "200th Smash Issue".  There is some mention of it in the letters page:
But Chet Barker's math is wrong; at that point it was over 29 years since Action #1.
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Number 1131: Mo Gollub's Leonora the Beautiful

Người đăng: vanmai yeu em



According to biographical information available online for Morris “Mo” Gollub, he worked at Disney in animation, and got into comic books thanks to “his friend, Walt Kelly.”

I must say, Mo moved in the best circles.

Gollub illustrated some comics, including “Leonora the Beautiful,”attributed to him by the Grand Comics Database. It's from Fairy Tale Parade, Four Color #114 (1946). But he is primarily known as an illustrator, and cover artist for Dell. He did some knockout covers, including these for Turok #11 (1955) and Tarzan #121 (1960). Tyrannosaurus lover that I am, these two dramatic covers are among my favorites.

Turok Son of Stone #11, 1956.

Tarzan #121, 1960

Not only did Gollub draw great dinosaurs, but he had a firm grasp of anatomy, as shown in the original art for a Tarzan cover. This striking painting displays his knowledge not only of the human figure, but  animals as well.

Tarzan #71, 1955.

“Leonora the Beautiful” is not a typical comic book story because it is told in captions. I don’t think captions-only always works in a comic book story, but it does here.

Mo Gollub, who was born in 1910, died in 1984.










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The Slipped Mickey Click Flip

Người đăng: vanmai yeu em on Thứ Tư, 28 tháng 3, 2012

Concluding our Creepy Fest with one from Corban and Moench, from the July 1973 issue of Creepy #54. THOIA friend Trevor M sends over the scans plus an intro: "...for me the greatest masterpiece ever published by Warren, in my subjective opinion, was this surrealist story -- which certainly generated the most mail they ever got. It was also featured in the crusty professor John Adkin's Richardson's seminal cartooning book: Complete Book of Cartooning. Along with the singular Eisner page, it completely focused all us serious students on greatness possible in cartooning."  Enjoy creeps! We'll see ya in April...










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Number 1130: The Talking Head

Người đăng: vanmai yeu em



It’s an election year in America, and television is full of talking heads. Those are people who sit around a table and endlessly talk politics, political strategy, polls, statistics...blah, blah, blah, blah, BLAH! I’m a voter, and I know for whom I’m voting. I suspect many other citizens are the same, but we put up with these damn talking heads...I wish I had a job where I got paid a huge amount of money to be a gasbag. As it is, I'm doing my gasbagging right here for free.

On to today’s post, which, beyond the title, has nothing to do with my rant on television. “The Talking Head” is a Ghost Rider tale, drawn by Dick Ayers for Best Of the West #4. That title used the four Western stars of the ME Comics line: Durango Kid, Straight Arrow, Ghost Rider and Tim Holt. Best Of the West was a very nice comic book which had a run of twelve quarterly issues between 1951 and 1954.

The Indian babe, Fawn Woman, reminds me of what Harvey Kurtzman once said in Mad: “. . . if they'd had girls like this, the Wild West would have been a lot wilder!”







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Grimm Fairy Tales #68

Người đăng: vanmai yeu em on Thứ Hai, 26 tháng 3, 2012

Grimm Fairy Tales #68
2012 | 30 pages | CBR | 17.8 MB
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Salem's Daughter - The Haunting # 5

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Salem's Daughter - The Haunting # 5
2012 | 32 pages | CBR | 15.3 MB
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Grimm Fairy Tales - Myths And Legends #13

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Grimm Fairy Tales - Myths And Legends #13
2012 | 32 pages | CBR | 16.4 MB
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Jurassic Strike Force 5 #2

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Jurassic Strike Force 5 #2
2012 | English | CBR | 16.1 MB
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Grimm Fairy Tales - Alice In Wonderland #2

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Grimm Fairy Tales - Alice In Wonderland #2
2012 | 36 pages | CBR | 21.5 MB
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Grimm Fairy Tales - The Library #4

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Grimm Fairy Tales - The Library #4
2012 | 32 pages | CBR | 30.9 MB
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Grimm Fairy Tales - Neverland Hook #3

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Grimm Fairy Tales - Neverland Hook #3
2012 | 38 pages | CBR | 36.7 MB
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Grimm Fairy Tales Myths And Legends #12

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Grimm Fairy Tales Myths And Legends #12
2012 | 34 pages | CBR | 32.3 MB
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Grimm Fairy Tales #67

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Grimm Fairy Tales #67
2012 | 37 pages | 37 pages | 32.7 MB
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Jurassic Strike Force 5 #1

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Jurassic Strike Force 5 #1
2012 | 33 pages | CBR | 27.7 MB
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