Number 1590: The planet that admired Earth

Clejos Andra is a planet full of Earth-groupies. People from that planet visited our planet in the 1920s and liked it so much they went home and emulated our culture. (From what is shown it's American culture.) Five hundred years in the future some Earth people visit Clejos Andra and are welcomed with open arms, only to turn on their adoring hosts with treachery and violence. It would be my guess that any aliens from space doing any visiting on our planet would learn in no time we can be a very violent and hostile bunch. I don’t know why the Clejos Andrans missed that aspect of our culture during their stay.

Despite the genial goofiness of most of the story there is that nasty behavior on the part of the Earth crew. But while the commander is a badass, at least one of his crew has a conscience. He pipes up with, “. . .But can’t we humans rise above greed and blood-baths? Can’t I put a little pity into you, in God’s name?” The psychopathic captain responds: “I've taken all I can from you — you muddled liberal! You’ve dared to criticise me, cast doubt on my plans — and that’s mutiny!” he says as he ss-putts! his outspoken crewman with a ray gun blast. Early in the story he had ejected two crew members into space for fighting. This captain brooks no nonsense. Any infraction is a capital offense.

I wasn’t expecting that dark story thread to weave through what is otherwise a silly plot from a silly ACG comic book. It’s drawn by Pete Costanza and written by editor Richard E. Hughes under his pen-name of Shane O’Shea. It’s the second posting from our theme week of Skiffy Stories (see Monday’s post for an explanation), and it originally appeared in Unknown Worlds #28 (1963).

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Number 1507: Halluci-Herbie-nation

In re-reading old Herbie stories, written by ACG editor Richard E. Hughes under his pen-name, Shane O'Shea, it’s not surprising to see the mind-altering qualities. They were published in the 1960s, and have a hallucinatory quality reminiscent of the decade.

The absurd goings-on of the story, “Professor Flipdome’s Screwy Machine,” from Herbie #4 (1964), drawn in artist Ogden Whitney’s precise and deadpan art style, adds to the feeling that there is something beyond the usual mind-blowing quality of some comic books.

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I scanned the stories from the 1964 first issue of Herbie to bring in the New Year of 2010. Just click on the cover thumbnail:

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Number 1479: Queen of Uranus

Snickering aside over the title of this little opus from Forbidden Worlds #78 (1959), this story is the kind that appears well-intentioned, but the result is not.

The message is if you aren’t beautiful, you don’t deserve to be loved. Poor Miss Purdy, she doesn’t doll herself up so she can’t attract a man or even have respect from the schoolchildren she teaches. Ah, but then an alien from Uranus arrives and he is smitten by Miss Purdy looking just the way she is! Of course, going by the values of the society from whence she comes she thinks, “If he loves me the way I look now, I should improve on my looks just for him.” It backfires in that case, and yet after that rejection Miss Purdy finds true happiness here on Earth with her students and principal by putting on a false face. Happy ending.

The story is drawn by Ogden Whitney, and written by the editor, Richard E. Hughes, using the name Thomas R. Drew. These are new scans. I showed this story before several years ago, and made the same complaints.

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Number 1390: “All that glitters...”

For a time in the 1950s comic artist John Forte’s work could be found prominently in ACG titles. He went from there to DC where he did the Bizarro World stories in Adventure Comics, written by Jerry Siegel. He then became the first artist for the Legion of Superheroes. He died young in 1965.

I never really saw him as a superhero artist, although his Bizarro stories are some of my favorites of the era. My affection for Forte is for his work on mystery and supernatural. This particular story, “The Glittering Nightmare,” is credited to Forte and writer Shane O’Shea (actually ACG editor Richard E. Hughes). It has a scientist obsessed with a project that ruins his marriage and an alien lifeform taking on earthly shapes, reminding us of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. I showed this story in the early days of this blog, but these are my new and improved scans.

From Forbidden Worlds #76 (1959):

Some pre-Comics Code Forte here. Just click the picture.

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Number 1364: Funky Funnies: Herbie and Ticklepuss!

We have reached the last of our Funky Funnies theme week, with entries from Basil Wolverton, Bill Holman, Gill Fox and now from the team of Richard E. Hughes and Ogden Whitney, who created one of the greatest 1960s comic characters, Herbie Popnecker. Herbie has a perfect camouflage for his extraordinary powers: a corpulent body, a blank look through his goggle-eyed lenses, an obsessive-compulsive need for lollipops. No one should mistake his appearance for who he really is. Herbie is much more than what meets the eye. Among things like the power of levitation and ability to talk to animals, Herbie knows famous people. In this story he encounters Ava Gardner and Gregory Peck. He even demonstrates to Gregory how to properly kiss a woman. It's just all in a day's doings for our “fat little nothing,” (as his cruel and verbally abusive father, Pincus Popnecker, calls him). Herbie is very attractive to the opposite sex, as we see here and as we have seen in the past when he's had dalliances with none other than Elizabeth Taylor and Jackie Kennedy. In “A Caveman Named Herbie” he not only makes a starlet swoon, but he catches the eye of a prehistoric dreamgirl, Ticklepuss. Oh, that I should have Herbie’s charms! No woman would be safe!

It's all from Herbie #6 (1964):

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A couple more Herbie stories. Just click the pictures:

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