More Relevant Comics--Payola?

The Payola scandal involved (as this cover implies) the effort by record companies to bribe deejays to play their records. It hit the newspapers in November 1959; this is the April 1960 issue of Archie. In something of a rarity for Archie at the time, the cover actually refers to a story inside, where the kids at Riverdale High pay Archie to spin their records.

More about →

Number 56

The Kill-Crazy Carlins

Fred Guardineer was a fine but underrated comic book artist of the Golden Age. He's probably underrated because he didn't do superheroes or flashy longjohns-wearing characters. If there are the equivalent of movie stars for comic book artists, then Guardineer was a character actor.

Guardineer's excellent crime story, "Mother Of Murderers" was presented in Pappy's Number 2. This story, "The Kill-Crazy Carlins," came from Black Diamond Western #17, January 1950, and was one of a special genre, the Western crime story. That's appropriate, since it was published by Lev Gleason, edited by Charles Biro and Bob Wood, the same group that did Crime Does Not Pay, where "Mother Of Murderers" appeared.

Dr. Fredric Wertham M.D., in Seduction Of The Innocent, claimed all comic books were crime comic books, so that's no big surprise. The story follows a typical crime comics arc: The killers commit a lot of crimes, get hunted down by law enforcement, get punished in the end by death.

What I notice about the story is an air of authenticity in characters, clothing and buildings I don't usually see in Western comic books, which usually closely followed the popular idea of the Wild West promoted in movies. I'm not saying it's 100% authentic, because the sheriff is a clean cut blond hero stereotype straight out of Hollywood Central Casting. But I like the touches Guardineer throws in to give it an 1876 look, or at least more of that look than readers in 1950 were used to seeing.

More about →

Classic Stories of the 1960s: Super-Menace

A friend of mine suggested I review this terrific story from Superman #137 (May 1960):



It starts with a brief retelling of Superman's origin, with one striking new detail: The rocket which Superman came to Earth in had hit an alien space ship which bathed the rocket in a duplicator ray. The second rocket also landed on Earth, but this time near the hideout of a gangster and his moll. At first they worry that the super-infant inside has been sent by their enemies to kill them, but then they discover that he's actually friendly. They decide to pretend to love the boy, whom they dub Super-Brat so that when he grows up, he will help them with crime.

In the second act, both Superboy and his doppelganger, now referred to as Super-Bully, are teenagers. Super-Bully despises Superboy, and dreams of defeating him. This seems quite possible when he discovers that unlike the real Kal-El, he's immune to Kryptonite. In a bit of irony, Super-Bully actually helps out Clark. While Superboy is busy, he changes into Clark's clothes and visits Lana Lang, who tries out some Kryptonite to find out if Superboy is secretly her neighbor. Super-Bully also tries imitating his rival with Krypto, but this turns out badly as the super-dog recognizes that this is not his master.

The final sequence tells us about Super-Menace's adulthood. His crime boss father wants him to go kill Superman, knowing that this will result in his daddy becoming the leader of the crime syndicate. But the gangster mistakenly admits that he never really loved Super-Menace, and the latter overhears this.

The battle between Superman and Super-Menace initially starts out pretty even, but of course with the latter's invulnerability to Kryptonite, it isn't long before he brings down some meteors of Green K. They both discover that Super-Menace is actually a "force manifestation" and not really alive.

But as he watches his enemy dying, he wonders if the mobster and his moll never really loved him, perhaps the other things he was taught by them were untrue as well. He saves Superman, then rushes off to confront the couple who raised him. He converts himself into pure energy, ending his life as well as theirs.

Comments: A terrific story with many entertaining features. For example, this was a precursor to the Reverse Flash; a character exactly like a hero but evil. In addition, the sad ending echoes Frankenstein in some ways (the movie, of course, not the book). It also includes a brief retelling of Superman's origin.

More about →

Journey Into Mystery #91-94

Overall, these stories don't move the character forward. Stan still seems to be struggling to find someone tough enough to fight Thor to a standstill, and when he does find a worthy foe, he simply lets the Thunder God appeal to Odin for assistance. This is of course Deus Ex Machina writ large.

In JIM #91, Thor faces Sandu the Sorceror, whose normal powers of ESP and levitation have been enhanced a thousand times by Loki. He starts by robbing banks by teleporting them to a location where he can take the money at leisure. But he quickly realizes that the world is helpless against him and decides to become its ruler. However, when it appears that Thor is about to be killed Odin sends him a belt that makes him even stronger. Sandu at one point transports Thor's hammer to another dimension, and seemingly has him helpless. But he foolishly tries to take control of the hammer and in his attempts he expends his magical power, resulting in the hammer returning to Earth.

Loki battles Thor personally in JIM #91. But, amusingly, there is a subplot involving a wounded gangster who needs Don Blake to operate on him, just as in JIM #89, only two months earlier. Once again a major part of the plot involves separating Thor from his hammer. This time, Thor travels to Asgard and fashions different hammers from wood and stone around him to defeat his enemy. However, there is one odd thing; despite being separated from his hammer for a long time, he does not revert to his Don Blake identity. Perhaps the 60-second limitation only applies on Earth?

In JIM #92, Thor again battles the communists. Are we seeing a pattern here? Aliens and commies and Loki, oh my! Chen Lu, a Chicomm scientist, turns himself into the Radioactive Man. He hypnotizes Thor and forces him to discard his hammer. However, this actually works to Thor's advantage as when he reverts to his Don Blake identity he is no longer under the Radioactive Man's control. He locates the hammer at the bottom of the Hudson and (somewhat unbelievably) swims down to the bottom to retrieve it. With his hammer back he sends the Radioactive Man back to China inside a tornado, causing a nuclear explosion there.

It's Loki's turn once again in JIM #93. He manages to turn Thor evil by distracting him so that the hammer conks the Thunder God on the noggin, resulting in a personality change. Thor comes to Asgard and frees his evil brother. Then they return together to Earth, where Thor destroys many famous landmarks, like the Golden Gate Bridge, the Taj Mahal, the Eiffel Tower and the Leaning Tower of Pisa. A delegation from the United Nations comes forward offering mankind's surrender, but Loki wants control of Asgard. The delegation turns out to be Odin and other gods in disguise, who manage to restore Thor's original, good, personality, and he defeats Loki.

More about →

Number 55

COVERING UP: Classic covers of Golden Age Comics

Trolling around the Internet is an interesting experience for me, because I keep running into things I haven't seen before. Just when I thought there weren't any Golden Age comics I hadn't seen before, I find a couple that are new to me.

Click on pictures for full-size images.

The first cover, Down With Crime #7, from November 1952, is a Fawcett Comic, with a cover that looks to be by Bernard Baily. I'm astonished a girl would have her window open to let a guy in, especially a guy wearing a gas mask and carrying a gun! At least she has a gun in the drawer to reach for, and she has the Hollywood style of hair: in bed with no hair out of place. Since I don't have the comic book itself to look at I'm not sure if the cover illustrates a story inside, but it reminds me of a famous true story I read years ago.

In a Texas town during WWII a woman reported that during the night a gasmask-wearing weirdo had opened her window and sprayed gas into her room. Within a short period of time other women were reporting the same thing. At first the reports were taken seriously, but quickly it was determined to be a case of mass hysteria. It was believed the power of suggestion and war jitters were making people imagine such crazy events. I don't know if there has ever been a resolution to this story, except that it's commonly used as an illustration of how delusional hysteria can become infectious.

The second cover, Crime Mysteries #4, also from November 1952, reminds me of Seduction Of The Innocent, by Dr. Fredric Wertham, M.D. That book reprinted an illustration of two crooks--and you could tell they were crooks, because they were wearing little Lone Ranger-style masks--had a girl on an operating table, tubes coming out of her. One crook is saying, "We'll drain this dame dry!" Dr. Wertham's caption mentioned (and I'm paraphrasing because I don't have the book to reference the exact quote): "Outside the forbidden pages of de Sade you will find draining a woman's blood only in a comic book."
Crime Mysteries was part of a group of comic books that are tied to DC Comics. Twenty years earlier DC's owners were the publishers of the notorious Spicy pulp magazines. After the pulps went out of the business some of the same people associated with the Spicy line published comic books. It's kind of a murky tale, with the illustrated examples in the website, DC's "Other" Comics.

The whole early history of comics is somewhat shadowy and murky. Some of it deals with semi-pornographers, the Mafia and organized crime.

In the DC's "Other" Comics website there is a link to a bibliography detailing the earliest years of the comics. The bibliography includes my favorite article on the subject, "DC's Tangled Roots," by Will Murray, from Comic Book Marketplace #53, November 1997.

More about →

Thor Prototype at DC?

It's well-established that prototypes for many Marvel characters appeared in the horror mags the company specialized in prior to the release of Fantastic Four #1. But it also appears that Stan Lee wasn't above lifting a hero or two from his competitors as well. I had always known there was a Batman story featuring the Mighty Thor out there, what I did not realize is that it so clearly presaged Marvel's later character.

Here's the cover of the issue in question:



Let's trace the elements of similarity. Hammer flies back to him automatically? Check. Refers to his opponents as "mortals"? Check. Winged helmet? Check.



Secretly a meek, unassuming man? Changes back into Thor when he touches the hammer? Check, check.



Obviously there are dissimilarities as well; this Thor has red hair and a beard, and the man who changes into him has no memory of his Thor persona when he changes back. But overall, it's pretty obvious where Stan got the inspiration for one of his major characters of the Silver Age.

More about →

Number 54


Frankenstein Friday: Silas Grunch Gets His


This is the first story from Frankenstein Comics #7, May-June, 1947.The thing that strikes me the most when looking at this story is how hurried the artwork looks. It doesn't have the careful penciling and inking that characterized the earlier Frankenstein stories. At this point it was reputed that writer/artist Dick Briefer was producing so much so quickly that he was even drawing on the back of wallpaper in order to get his work done.

He also gives credit in the final panel to Ed Goggin for helping with these tales. I'm not sure what kind of help Goggin gave. Story? Artwork? Briefer doesn't say.
The story of an old miser who hates kids and gets his just due in the end sure wasn't new when this story was published. I think it was the basis for several movies, even some Our Gang short comedies. It was something of a plot staple in those days. Its literary antecedents can be found in A Christmas Carol and Silas Marner. Misers have always been popular to hate.

More about →