Planet Comics #37Wartime Fiction House books usually had a mix of art quality, and writing, typical of those early days in the comic book industry. And this is no different to me, from most of the Planet Comics from that time, that I've read.
The Lost WorldTwo different alien races of beings from two different planets trying to conquer and dominate a 3rd planet, was a well-used plot back in the early 1940s. Renee's art is decent for its time, although her figures seem to be too elongated. I like the extreme difference in the physical make-up of these two rival sentient alien species. Usually, when they are rivals, they are all humanlike in body form. In this story, one is humanlike, while the other, is not even vertebrate, while its individual members are all tied together in a single, social unit mind (like an ant or bee colony). That is an interesting concept, that they could operate with higher intelligence than just acting roboticly, solely from instinct. After working 20+ years in North and northeast African and Middle Eastern desert countries. I never enjoyed reading comic book stories set in desertified planets, with virtually no plantlife. How do the higher-level animals and sentient beings that live there survive? What do they eat, when, seemingly, there is no plantlife basis to support a food chain?
The Voltas are certainly ugly enough. And it is typical to see the remains of the World readers knew, after it had been destroyed in an apocalyptical catastrophic World War III. Overall it seems that this episode of a seemingly interesting on-going story, is too short to my taste. But, this 10-page episode is longer than many episodic serialised long stories from that period (many of which were 8, or 6 pages, and those in early flagship monthly newspaper strip anthologies were only 2 to 4 pages. I just get the feeling that more different things could have happened in 10 pages.
Mysta of The MoonMysta has an amazingly powerful telescope that can view close-up on distant planets in far-away solar systems (and, perhaps even other galaxies). Growing biological robots from plantlife, that can act at their controller's bidding, with many humanlike abilities, is an interesting idea. The hunchbacked, old Human villain is an interesting character. I liked the concept that despite the plantmens' mobility, like a garden, they, as a group. can become infested, and taken over by weeds.
Red CometAt least the writer of this story realised that the planet, Uranus, due to its extreme distance from our Sun, should have a very cold ambient surface temperature. But, it would be much, much too cold for Humans to survive there, without some unusual heat source that is not normal in planets of its size and age (e.g. after its inner core has cooled down from the heat which was produced by the event which triggered its formation (birth). This is a problem of so many stories with settings on planets very distant from any star. Such stories need to include some explanation of the heat source that allows life to exist there. And I could picture Lura outside in the extreme cold with her legs still unovered, and not freezing to death almost instantly (which would be the case on the real Uranus, in tempratures of hundreds of degrees below the freezing point of water. A Human's blood would freeze quickly. But the person would die well before that. The "crystal" (e.g. "glass" ball Lura is inside, would freeze and shatter in the real bitter cold, but she would have died long before that, with the cold being conducted through the glass instantly, in any case. And, of course, the bird
couldn't have existed in Uranus' real 1945 conditions. And, of course, The Red Comet and Zorix wearing shorts is alo ridiculous. Would they wear shorts on a tourist rip to Antarctica during the southern winter?
I don't like the use of magic in stories. Zorix uses magic to imprison Lura and Red Comet inside the tiny glass sphere, and Red Comet uses his magical "super power of fantastic growth, to escape (e.g. burst the spherical container. Then, he uses his super strength to throw Zorix's tiny spherical prison as far as The Land of The Ice Men (past Naru's border with them). This story has all the features that are the main reasons why I never liked superhero fantasies. But, the artwork is certainly good.
Space RangersTalk about The Nazi movement "going underground" after Germany's defeat at the end of WWII, this is very symbolic! Germans who still wanted to take over The World, living well below The Planet's surface, and evolving through natural selection, into a species of "Flame People), whose bodies run so hot that flames emanate from their skin! And they are still evil, and because The Earth's surface is much too cold for their bodies, they decide to jolt The Earth off its orbit, and send it moving slowly towards The Sun! But how "slow" is that, really, when, seemingly, instantly, The World becomes much hotter, and plant life and animals die, instantly, in front of the bewildered Human onlookers (who are only uncomfortably hot. Rather silly, and poorly thought out. The Space Rangers "invent "liquid ice", and spray it onto the Flame People's bodies to kill them, and save The World! And one of their scientists magically sent The Earth back to its proper distance from The Sun, and proper orbit configuration! If I'm going to read "Fairy Tales", I'd rather see the stories drawn in a more cartoony style.
Gale AllenAnother excellently-drawn Fran Hopper story. More magic, with humans aging very quickly, because their planetoid is much too close to its sun. But, if THAT were really true, the planetoid would be uninhabitable, and aging would be irrelevant. Real Satyrs don't help the story. The Earthmen escape, because their weapons expert configures the paralyzing ray gun to backfire, disabling the enemy's Satyr guard, who was forcing the captured Earthmen to the sacrifice area. They simply go back to their spaceship. Not a lot happened in this short, 6-page story.
Star PirateA robot army working for an evil Human who buys Human slaves could be interesting. After their shipment to his headquarters, he shoots them with a Paralyzer ray gun, and then dips them in tallow, to preserve them. He experiments with them into making animal/human hybrids, for jhis own purposes, with the goal to dominate The Earth. Star knocks the villain unconscious, and shoots the tallowed Humans with a reversed (unparalyzing) ray, freeing them. Then they load the spaceship with the freed slaves and set off an explosion, blowing up the villain's asteroid.
Overall AssessmentThis book contains some interesting, albeit not to well thought out stories, and some good and some subpar artwork. It was worth a dime in 1945. But, I wouldn't have bought it in 1949-55 even from the 5¢ bargain shelves, as I could have read books like this for free in my own house from my older cousins' stash. Even then, I probably would have only skimmed through the pages and decided not to actually read it.
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Topic: Reading Group #297 Female Artists - Mills, Renee & Hopper (Read 2224 times)
