Number 1592: The one-and-done costumed heroes

“The Case of the Crumpling Skyscrapers” is the one and only appearance of Rocky Ford and Judith Allen, private investigators. At night they take on disguises, he as the Scarlet Nemesis, she as the Black Orchid. The gimmick is they don’t know each other when their masks are on. Duh. Don Markstein’s Toonopedia has this to say about the characters:

“. . . comic book characters can be awfully dense about not recognizing each other if there's a mask in the way . . . But their relationship was never given a chance to develop. The Black Orchid and The Scarlet Nemesis had only one adventure, then disappeared without a trace.”

The article credits George Tuska with the art. Jim Vadeboncoeur Jr credits Ken Battefield and an unknown inker for the job. I am with Jim on this — it is not a Tuska job.

There is another character in this story, an eccentric “retired millionaire,” Jim Crow. Crow wants to knock down all the buildings to make more room for the pigeons. Can it be that there was a writer and an editor in those days who did not recognize the name “Jim Crow” as being the term used for racial segregation in the American South? You can read more about Jim Crow. This story, from All New Short Story Comics #2 (1943) is a curiosity that leaves one puzzled.

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Number 1588: The bride has crabs!

Here are a couple of terror tales from Harvey Comics’ golden age of horror, the early '50s. Both of these particular stories are tied together by having creepy crustaceans, crabs, as monsters.

First up, from Chamber of Chills #7 (1952), “The Crawling Death!” is credited to Abe Simon, pencils, and Don Perlin, inks, in the Grand Comics Database. Secondly, “The Bride of the Crab” is from Chamber of Chills #12 (1952), and is not a story of Pappy’s honeymoon with Mrs. Pappy, although I can be mighty crabby. The story is drawn by Moe Marcus. Karswell posted it back in 2008 in The Horrors Of It All, and you can go there to check it out by tapping the link with your claw.

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Number 1574: Stuntman doubles down

The origin of Simon and Kirby’s post WWII hero, Stuntman, was presented in Stuntman #1, published in 1946, and as the blog Kirby Museum explains, “. . . Stuntman and Boy Explorers [another S and K title for Harvey Comics] were caught in a post-war comic book glut. With the end of paper rationing, publishers and printers went wild and an over abundance of comic books hit the newsstands.” Stuntman stories showed up in a couple more issues of the title, and then some inventory was released in Green Hornet Comics, but Stuntman himself was done.

The comic has one of those Prince and the Pauper plots, where two people who have never met are so alike they can pass for one another. I have always found this sort of thing even more unbelievable than grown men putting on costumes and masks to fight villains, unless they are identical twins separated at birth. It is because of my “comic book mind,” as Mrs. Pappy calls it. I can suspend disbelief when superheroes do their superheroics, while rejecting other plot devices in comic book stories I consider impossible in real life. In addition, Don Daring, when meeting his lookalike, acrobatic Fred Drake, proclaims, “I’m Don Daring the movie star and amateur detective!” Yeah, Don...sur-r-r-r-r-re you are. Only in this case it turns out to be true.

The dwarf character “Ian Spine” is repulsive. Simon and Kirby, like many other producers of popular culture years ago, used real-life physical defects to create a cruel stereotype of a character who is invariably ugly and abnormal.

I love the classic faux book cover. I also like the header on page one, “Save this first issue of STUNTMAN comics...it will be a valuable souvenir someday...” “Someday” is here, and yes it is valuable.

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Number 1564: Two Alarming Tales by Kirby

Two stories from Alarming Tales #2 (1958) make up my 40th posting for Jack Kirby. I could do a lot more, too...that guy made up the history of comic art for decades and examples are all over the place. I chose these today for sentimental reasons. I liked them when I bought this issue off the spinner rack in 1958, and was taken — as always — by the power of Kirby’s art. “The Fireballs” is credited to Kirby and George Roussos, and “I Want To Be a Man” has a tentative credit for Kirby inking his own pencils.

Both stories are credited to scripts by Kirby, but it seems to me someone else edited them or rewrote them to remove the exclamation points Kirby liked. He usually used two (!!) and if he had something special to emphasize, he used three (!!!) As an aside, I believe sentences are just fine ending in a period, and exclamation points should be used sparingly! Never use two!! or three!!!

“I Want To Be a Man” I took from the Heritage Auctions website, and once again, thanks to those fine folks for doing these great scans. In 2004 the story sold for a bargain price, $1,897.50, but was resold the next year for $4,600.00. I would guess it’s worth much more now. It’s not only very well drawn, but it has a poignant ending, which I sniffled over as an 11-year-old, and I find it still affecting all these years later.

(Note the name of the character, Ed Snowden. I kid you not.)

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Kirby stories from Alarming Tales #1 here. Just click on the thumbnail:

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Number 1563: Barry Kuda

Jeez, “Barry Kuda.” How obvious can it get with a character name? Names like that used to be popular at one time. I give Barry Kuda low marks for a name. Relatively high marks for artwork, though, which according to comic art spotter Jim Vadeboncoeur could be Al Plastino.

Like this story, some of the other art in Harvey’s All-New Short Story Comics #2 (1943), is Lou Fine-inspired. It is inspiration that affected several artists early in their career. Even Joe Kubert uses the style in a story he has in the issue, drawn when he was 16-years-old. I will probably show that some day. Even though some artists were smitten by Fine’s style, not all matched Fine’s skill. Still, this particular story is well drawn.

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