Comic Book Plus Forum
Comic And Book Related => Comic Book Plus Reading Group => Topic started by: K1ngcat on September 05, 2022, 12:00:46 AM
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Hi People!
We're going back in time to the year of 1939 when mixed bag comics were fairly new and varied in quality. For your reading enjoyment please have a butcher's at these two lovelies...
Wonderworld Comics #7 Fox Features https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=60250
Top Notch Comics#1 Archie/MLJ Comics https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=22232
Consider, compare, and let me know what you make of the contents, I look forward to hearing your views.
All the best
K1ngcat
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Well with Wonderworld comics we have a product of the Eisner and Iger shop, which gives us an opportunity to have an in-depth about that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eisner_%26_Iger
Eisner & Iger was a comic book "packager" that produced comics on demand for publishers entering the new medium during the late-1930s and 1940s period fans and historians call the Golden Age of Comic Books. Many of comic books' most significant creators, including Jack Kirby, entered the field through its doors.
And Top Notch is early MLJ - so we are still back at the beginning of the golden age and we can see where the modern US comic industry got started. And a couple of nice ones to read.
Well done, Kingcat!
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Hi everyone - Just a few preliminary thoughts on the Wonderworld one.
1. The cover is like clickbait today in that it's scary images would grab the attention of some readers (and later the critics of comic books). It fits with the first story about 'The Flame', but the rest of the stories seem a lot milder. So kids who bought it hoping for a scary or suspenseful ride might have been disappointed with some of the other stories. Conversely, there may have been others who wouldn't pick it up because of that cover and then missed out on some other stories they might have liked. Probably always an issue when you have a diverse collection of comics in the same book. Maybe they were hoping to appeal to siblings of different ages? So if the teenage boy bought the comic, his sister and younger brother would also find things they liked?
2. I hadn't heard of 'Patty O'Day - Newsreel Reporter', so will have to check out more of her stories. It got me thinking about other girl reporters of this era. Lois Lane is the most famous of this and any other era. But I also came across a 1947 Brenda Starr girl reporter comic on this site (in the Ajax-Farrell group). In the Mad Hatter comic from last week, there was a reporter called Barbara Blake, though I guess she disappeared with the Mad Hatter after a few stories. There's Iris West, the reporter girlfriend of the Silver Age Flash, but I couldn't think of any other Golden Era ones. Does anyone know of any others? Among the career girls, having a role as a reporter would have put them in the thick of the action, so it was probably a good move.
3. No doubt this has been said somewhere on this site, but I also noticed there were a few educational features as well as comics (e.g., a short story, a page on wonders that are true, and a page on movie stars). I read somewhere that educational material was cheaper to post than comic books. So if a comic book included some educational features, it reduced the postage.
I haven't read the rest yet. but thought I'd start with those few comments. Any thoughts?
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It got me thinking about other girl reporters of this era.
There were quite a few, being a reporter or a photographer were glamor jobs in that era. Unfortunately I can't remember any right now and a search did not turn up a site or a page dedicated to Female Reporters in Golden Age comics. Someone needs to compile one, i think! Might be a book in it!
Cheers!
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It got me thinking about other girl reporters of this era.
There were quite a few, being a reporter or a photographer were glamor jobs in that era. Unfortunately I can't remember any right now and a search did not turn up a site or a page dedicated to Female Reporters in Golden Age comics. Someone needs to compile one, i think! Might be a book in it!
Cheers!
The Hangman's partner Thelma Gordon was also a reporter. I included a couple of issues in Reading Group #266. The Tiger and The Ruby in #7 https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=22227 where she shanghais him into helping her chase down a story is fun.
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Hi everyone - Just a few preliminary thoughts on the Wonderworld one.
1. The cover is like clickbait today in that it's scary images would grab the attention of some readers (and later the critics of comic books). It fits with the first story about 'The Flame', but the rest of the stories seem a lot milder. (1) So kids who bought it hoping for a scary or suspenseful ride might have been disappointed with some of the other stories. Conversely, there may have been others who wouldn't pick it up because of that cover and then missed out on some other stories they might have liked. Probably always an issue when you have a diverse collection of comics in the same book. (1) Maybe they were hoping to appeal to siblings of different ages? So if the teenage boy bought the comic, his sister and younger brother would also find things they liked?
2. I hadn't heard of 'Patty O'Day - Newsreel Reporter', so will have to check out more of her stories. It got me thinking about other girl reporters of this era. Lois Lane is the most famous of this and any other era. But I also came across a 1947 Brenda Starr girl reporter comic on this site (in the Ajax-Farrell group). In the Mad Hatter comic from last week, there was a reporter called Barbara Blake, though I guess she disappeared with the Mad Hatter after a few stories. There's Iris West, the reporter girlfriend of the Silver Age Flash, but I couldn't think of any other Golden Era ones. Does anyone know of any others? Among the career girls, having a role as a reporter would have put them in the thick of the action, so it was probably a good move.
3. No doubt this has been said somewhere on this site, but I also noticed there were a few educational features as well as comics (e.g., a short story, a page on wonders that are true, and a page on movie stars). I read somewhere that educational material was cheaper to post than comic books. (2) So if a comic book included some educational features, it reduced the postage.
I haven't read the rest yet. but thought I'd start with those few comments. Any thoughts?
(1) From 1935, when a few more than just "Famous Funnies" also entered the comic book production field and 1939 when comic books with mixed reprints of newspaper strips, and new, drawn just for comic books stories and other features dominated the comic book shelves, the comic book producers were trying to sell books that would appeal to ALL family members, who had shared the comics section of the Sunday newspaper with each other before comic book newspaper strip reprints started. They could use feedback from these new comics to determine which individual features in these multi-genre publisher's showcase, were the most popular. Then, they could publish spinoff quarterly or bi-monthly new titles featuring mostly those single, most popular characters.
Eastern Color Printing Co. started with "Famous Funnies".
Western Publishing started with The Comics/The Funnies, later adding Super Comics and Crackajack Comics as hybrid reprints and new features. Western soon also started later showcase titles including , "Four Color Comics", "Feature Comics" and "Large Feature Comics".
Jerry Eiger's (Iger's) and Will Eisner's Eisner-Iger Syndicate started "Jumbo Comics", which remained with Iger's Fiction House after their break-up).
Chesler Publishing started with "Comics Pages" and "Star Comics", and "Funny Pages", all of which were soon sold to Centaur Publishing.
National Allied Publications, predecessor of D.C., started with New Fun Comics Magazine, which morphed into "More Fun Comics", and later added "New Comics" and "New Adventure Comics", and giants like Big All American Comic Book, New Book Of Comics, and The Big BookOf Fun Comics.
United Features Syndicate started with "Tip Top Comics", and later added "Comics On Parade" and "Sparkler Comics" both featuring a range of different genres of their popular newspaper strips.
Every one of these mid-1930s pioneer publishers of the US comic book industry started publishing new, spinoff bi-monthly or quarterly titles based on one very popular new character or old, newspaper strip character by 1939 or 1940. Some of them also published new single-genre "Showcase Titles", containing various different, old and new characters.
For example, Eastern Color Printing (through its subsidiary Columbia Comic Corp.) started "Big Shot Comics, which was another multi-genre showcase title, and later started Mickey Finn, Sparky Watts, Dixie Dugan, Big Chief Wahoo and Skyman.
United Features later spun off "Fritzi Ritz", United Comics (all comedy series), and "The Captain and The Kids".
Western Publishing later started "Walt Disney's Comics & Stories", "Looney Tunes & Merrie Melodies(WB)"(spinning off "Bugs Bunny" and "Porky Pig", "Our Gang Comics"(spinning off "Tom & Jerry"), "The Funnies" was taken over production wise, by Walter Lantz", who changed it to "New Funnies", and used it for a showcase for his animation characters, with b-monthly spinoffs for "Andy Panda" and "Woody Woodpecker". And a new animal showcase title, Animal Comics, with much Walt Kelly work was started, from which the Pogo comic book series stemmed. Dell also spun off "Popeye", and several non-comedy series from testing them in their "Four Color Comics" series.
D.C. Comics changed "New Adventure Comics" to "Adventure Comics", and added "Detective Comics", "Superman", "Batman" and many other action-adventure-based titles, as well as those from other genres. They also started a few cartoon-based funny animal showcase catch-all titles, "Comic Cavalcade"(which had started as a superhero/action-based showcase title), "Leading Comics"-same as "Comics Cavalcade", changed to funny animal as "Leading Screen Comics", and later spun off "Fox & Crow", Funny Folks, "Funny Stuff", and "Animal Antics" (all drawn by Sangor Studio animators).
Fiction House started "Fight Comics", "Jungle Comics", "Planet Comics", "Rangers Comics", and "The Spirit" reprinted Eisner's syndicated newspaper comics section, while "Sheena, Queen of The Jungle" spun off from "Jumbo Comics"
Soon, during 1939-41, newer comic book companies were also joining that field, and often starting with multi-genre showcase titles: Like Arnold/Quality Publications, with "National Comics", "Feature Funnies/Feature Comics", "Smash Comics", and "Hit Comics", leading later to single genre titles, like "All Humor", "GI Combat", "Doll Man", and Funny Animal, and Romance comics.
"Prize Comics" started out as multi-Genre, as did "Crown Comics".
Whereas, Fawcett seemed to start out in comic books, right away with single-genre titles (Action/Superhero, Military, Western, Comedy, Funny Animal, Romance, Jungle), and not use multi-genre showcase titles, at all, despite their 1940 start.
(2) True. Monthly, bi-Monthly and Quarterly titles would qualify for the lower, bulk, 2nd class Book postage rate, IF they had "educational material" in them (which meant from 1940-1952(?) (or 1953), at least 2 pages of text, and/or at least one non-fiction text story or information page. Starting around 1954, it seems that the text page minimum was reduced to one single page.
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It got me thinking about other girl reporters of this era.
There were quite a few, being a reporter or a photographer were glamor jobs in that era. Unfortunately I can't remember any right now and a search did not turn up a site or a page dedicated to Female Reporters in Golden Age comics. Someone needs to compile one, i think! Might be a book in it!
Cheers!
Great idea. I'm not sure I'll have enough for a book, but I'll start compiling a list. There might be an article in it.
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The Hangman's partner Thelma Gordon was also a reporter. I included a couple of issues in Reading Group #266. The Tiger and The Ruby in #7 https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=22227 where she shanghais him into helping her chase down a story is fun.
Thank you for that. I've started a list and have added that link so I can have a look. Thanks for the tip.
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(1) From 1935, when a few more than just "Famous Funnies" also entered the comic book production field and 1939 when comic books with mixed reprints of newspaper strips, and new, drawn just for comic books stories and other features dominated the comic book shelves, the comic book producers were trying to sell books that would appeal to ALL family members, who had shared the comics section of the Sunday newspaper with each other before comic book newspaper strip reprints started. They could use feedback from these new comics to determine which individual features in these multi-genre publisher's showcase, were the most popular. Then, they could publish spinoff quarterly or bi-monthly new titles featuring mostly those single, most popular characters.
(2) True. Monthly, bi-Monthly and Quarterly titles would qualify for the lower, bulk, 2nd class Book postage rate, IF they had "educational material" in them (which meant from 1940-1952(?) (or 1953), at least 2 pages of text, and/or at least one non-fiction text story or information page. Starting around 1954, it seems that the text page minimum was reduced to one single page.
Thank you for all of that great info about compilations. At this early stage, I guess they were trying out a lot of new things to see which ideas went well.
I first came across the educational component in an archive volume of early Superman comics I own. They had a number of two-page short stories and the occasional non-fiction page where they would give facts about someone, like a famous sportsperson. As well as saving on postage, it was probably a good idea that provided more variety. Though the funniest example I've seen was in a facsimile edition of a 1960 Justice League Comic I own. The Justice League were battling 'Starro' who looked like a starfish, so they included an educational page on different types of starfish. That was probably stretching it a bit, but it was indeed a tie-in. I'll have to keep an eye out for other educational features.
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I'm not sure I'll have enough for a book, but I'll start compiling a list. There might be an article in it.
A good place to start would be to establish context. Being a Reporter - not called a 'Journalist' then?- seems to
have been one of the first acceptable professions for a woman - along with 'Secretary'. So when did that happen? And what role did female reporters play in the stories? Memory says, since reporters, in fiction, are looking for stories, they were at times at the centre of the action. There were also female reporters in movies. You've got me thinking!
Spiderman, in the 60's, had a romance with Betty Brant on the Daily Bugle.
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(1) From 1935, when a few more than just "Famous Funnies" also entered the comic book production field and 1939 when comic books with mixed reprints of newspaper strips, and new, drawn just for comic books stories and other features dominated the comic book shelves, the comic book producers were trying to sell books that would appeal to ALL family members, who had shared the comics section of the Sunday newspaper with each other before comic book newspaper strip reprints started. They could use feedback from these new comics to determine which individual features in these multi-genre publisher's showcase, were the most popular. Then, they could publish spinoff quarterly or bi-monthly new titles featuring mostly those single, most popular characters.
(2) True. Monthly, bi-Monthly and Quarterly titles would qualify for the lower, bulk, 2nd class Book postage rate, IF they had "educational material" in them (which meant from 1940-1952(?) (or 1953), at least 2 pages of text, and/or at least one non-fiction text story or information page. Starting around 1954, it seems that the text page minimum was reduced to one single page.
Thank you for all of that great info about compilations. At this early stage, I guess they were trying out a lot of new things to see which ideas went well.
I first came across the educational component in an archive volume of early Superman comics I own. They had a number of two-page short stories and the occasional non-fiction page where they would give facts about someone, like a famous sportsperson. As well as saving on postage, it was probably a good idea that provided more variety. Though the funniest example I've seen was in a facsimile edition of a 1960 Justice League Comic I own. The Justice League were battling 'Starro' who looked like a starfish, so they included an educational page on different types of starfish. That was probably stretching it a bit, but it was indeed a tie-in. I'll have to keep an eye out for other educational features.
True, but I think there was another important factor, as well, in addition to getting the 2nd class postage permit. The text stories and, especially, the history and science information pages, helped parents, who, otherwise might, or would surely, be skeptical about whether or not these comic books were "worthwhile reading" for their young and early teenage children. This was especially important for the younger kids, who may or may not have had their own money to purchase them, and depended upon their strict parents to buy them. Those 2 to 4 pages of "literature", could provide "reading practise" and/or historical or science fact learning, that just mike kick the book over the tenuous line of "minimum acceptable redeeming value" for the buying parent. And, for the older child, who had a newspaper delivery route, or mowed neighbours' lawns for spending money, or earned a meagre allowance for doing chores at home, and bought his or her own comic books, they could show their parents the so-called redeeming value pages to prove they were NOT wasting their money on "worthless drivel". I grew up during the 1940s and 1950s, (in Canada, and The Netherlands, and a bit, later in USA, and you can believe me that parents were a LOT more strict with their kids than they have been over the last 60+ years. (probably just as true for The UK and Australia, I'd wager).
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I'm not sure I'll have enough for a book, but I'll start compiling a list. There might be an article in it.
A good place to start would be to establish context. Being a Reporter - not called a 'Journalist' then?- seems to have been one of the first acceptable professions for a woman - along with 'Secretary'. So when did that happen? And what role did female reporters play in the stories? Memory says, since reporters, in fiction, are looking for stories, they were at times at the centre of the action. There were also female reporters in movies. You've got me thinking!
Spiderman, in the 60's, had a romance with Betty Brant on the Daily Bugle.
There had been, for a long time, women's careers such as schoolteacher, nurse, cook, housemaid, and the like before the 1940s. But, during World War I women had taken many jobs that men left to fight as soldiers, and at the start of World War II, that became much more of a factor, with USA mobilising much more fully. Women were getting much higher pay than ever for their work, and being seen to take on much more responsibility, and succeed in doing so. However, even given that, I don't remember ANY female reporters who reported "HARD News" during the 1940s and 1950s. There were, of course, women reporting on Fashion events, State/Provincial, Regional, and City Fairs, High Societal events, and some cultural events, and perhaps they were just starting to get into high class Music and Literature Reviews (but that was only begrudgingly given up as they had almost completely dominated by men).
But, I think that the new way of looking at women's capabilities for adequately handling war industry manufacturing jobs that sometimes included lower-level management positions gave more hope that women's roles in other industries would expand and reach higher-level positions. And THAT was used by comic book publishers to try to get female readers to also buy their new comic book publications. A very conscientious, young, female wannabe reporter, who was fashion, or cooking reporter/advisor, or was the newspaper's Gossip columnist, begging her editor for the chance to report on a REAL (Hard News) story, was the plot of so many 1940s US films I could be listing them "till the cows come home", and I can remember a few late 1940s and early 1950s UK films with that plot, as well.
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Though the funniest example I've seen was in a facsimile edition of a 1960 Justice League Comic I own. The Justice League were battling 'Starro' who looked like a starfish, so they included an educational page on different types of starfish.
Going off on a tangent, I still remember the JLA comic you mentioned, and Starro the Conqueror has recently been resuscitated as the villain in James Gunn's movie The Suicide Squad. That's not a recommendation for the movie, just an observation! ;)
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Though the funniest example I've seen was in a facsimile edition of a 1960 Justice League Comic I own. The Justice League were battling 'Starro' who looked like a starfish, so they included an educational page on different types of starfish.
Going off on a tangent, I still remember the JLA comic you mentioned, and Starro the Conqueror has recently been resuscitated as the villain in James Gunn's movie The Suicide Squad. That's not a recommendation for the movie, just an observation! ;)
Starro was certainly a bizarre villain. I'm not sure I'll be rushing off to see that movie - LOL But I did like seeing all of the Justice League in action.
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I'm not sure I'll have enough for a book, but I'll start compiling a list. There might be an article in it.
A good place to start would be to establish context. Being a Reporter - not called a 'Journalist' then?- seems to
have been one of the first acceptable professions for a woman - along with 'Secretary'. So when did that happen? And what role did female reporters play in the stories? Memory says, since reporters, in fiction, are looking for stories, they were at times at the centre of the action. There were also female reporters in movies. You've got me thinking!
Spiderman, in the 60's, had a romance with Betty Brant on the Daily Bugle.
Thanks for that. I read a 1960s Spider-man comic recently that included Betty Brant. I did a quick google search earlier, and found a newspaper reporter called Jane Arden who was in newspaper strips from 1928, so she predates Lois Lane by 10 years. There are some of her comics in Feature Comics (under Quality Comics) from about Issue 21 on this site, but haven't had a chance to have a thorough look yet. Also thought of Vicki Vale from the Batman comics who started in late 40s, but I don't know a lot about her. This list could end up longer than I think! And yes, context is important. I have the Lois Lane 80th anniversary celebration book, and the articles included with it talk about how Lois changed depending on what was happening at the times. A very interesting read.
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I'm not sure I'll have enough for a book, but I'll start compiling a list. There might be an article in it.
A good place to start would be to establish context. Being a Reporter - not called a 'Journalist' then?- seems to have been one of the first acceptable professions for a woman - along with 'Secretary'. So when did that happen? And what role did female reporters play in the stories? Memory says, since reporters, in fiction, are looking for stories, they were at times at the centre of the action. There were also female reporters in movies. You've got me thinking!
Spiderman, in the 60's, had a romance with Betty Brant on the Daily Bugle.
There had been, for a long time, women's careers such as schoolteacher, nurse, cook, housemaid, and the like before the 1940s. But, during World War I women had taken many jobs that men left to fight as soldiers, and at the start of World War II, that became much more of a factor, with USA mobilising much more fully. Women were getting much higher pay than ever for their work, and being seen to take on much more responsibility, and succeed in doing so. However, even given that, I don't remember ANY female reporters who reported "HARD News" during the 1940s and 1950s. There were, of course, women reporting on Fashion events, State/Provincial, Regional, and City Fairs, High Societal events, and some cultural events, and perhaps they were just starting to get into high class Music and Literature Reviews (but that was only begrudgingly given up as they had almost completely dominated by men).
But, I think that the new way of looking at women's capabilities for adequately handling war industry manufacturing jobs that sometimes included lower-level management positions gave more hope that women's roles in other industries would expand and reach higher-level positions. And THAT was used by comic book publishers to try to get female readers to also buy their new comic book publications. A very conscientious, young, female wannabe reporter, who was fashion, or cooking reporter/advisor, or was the newspaper's Gossip columnist, begging her editor for the chance to report on a REAL (Hard News) story, was the plot of so many 1940s US films I could be listing them "till the cows come home", and I can remember a few late 1940s and early 1950s UK films with that plot, as well.
Yes, good points there. Lois Lane was probably doing hard-nosed news stories long before actual female reporters were given the same opportunity, or at least the same opportunity on a regular basis. Though with so many men away during the war, I wonder how many women might have filled in on some of those bigger stories and then had to return to the fashion pages when the men returned? Perhaps there were more opportunities for reporting different kinds of stories in magazines rather than newspapers.
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(1) From 1935, when a few more than just "Famous Funnies" also entered the comic book production field and 1939 when comic books with mixed reprints of newspaper strips, and new, drawn just for comic books stories and other features dominated the comic book shelves, the comic book producers were trying to sell books that would appeal to ALL family members, who had shared the comics section of the Sunday newspaper with each other before comic book newspaper strip reprints started. They could use feedback from these new comics to determine which individual features in these multi-genre publisher's showcase, were the most popular. Then, they could publish spinoff quarterly or bi-monthly new titles featuring mostly those single, most popular characters.
(2) True. Monthly, bi-Monthly and Quarterly titles would qualify for the lower, bulk, 2nd class Book postage rate, IF they had "educational material" in them (which meant from 1940-1952(?) (or 1953), at least 2 pages of text, and/or at least one non-fiction text story or information page. Starting around 1954, it seems that the text page minimum was reduced to one single page.
Thank you for all of that great info about compilations. At this early stage, I guess they were trying out a lot of new things to see which ideas went well.
I first came across the educational component in an archive volume of early Superman comics I own. They had a number of two-page short stories and the occasional non-fiction page where they would give facts about someone, like a famous sportsperson. As well as saving on postage, it was probably a good idea that provided more variety. Though the funniest example I've seen was in a facsimile edition of a 1960 Justice League Comic I own. The Justice League were battling 'Starro' who looked like a starfish, so they included an educational page on different types of starfish. That was probably stretching it a bit, but it was indeed a tie-in. I'll have to keep an eye out for other educational features.
True, but I think there was another important factor, as well, in addition to getting the 2nd class postage permit. The text stories and, especially, the history and science information pages, helped parents, who, otherwise might, or would surely, be skeptical about whether or not these comic books were "worthwhile reading" for their young and early teenage children. This was especially important for the younger kids, who may or may not have had their own money to purchase them, and depended upon their strict parents to buy them. Those 2 to 4 pages of "literature", could provide "reading practise" and/or historical or science fact learning, that just mike kick the book over the tenuous line of "minimum acceptable redeeming value" for the buying parent. And, for the older child, who had a newspaper delivery route, or mowed neighbours' lawns for spending money, or earned a meagre allowance for doing chores at home, and bought his or her own comic books, they could show their parents the so-called redeeming value pages to prove they were NOT wasting their money on "worthless drivel". I grew up during the 1940s and 1950s, (in Canada, and The Netherlands, and a bit, later in USA, and you can believe me that parents were a LOT more strict with their kids than they have been over the last 60+ years. (probably just as true for The UK and Australia, I'd wager).
Yes, I think you're right there, and was probably even more critical in the lead-up to Wertham's 'Seduction of the Innocent' and the Comics Code. I'm a child of the 60s, so I'm not sure how parents would have viewed comic books here in that era. By the time I was looking at comics, my local stores had lots of Disney, Looney Tunes, Hanna-Barbera and Archie; or they're probably the ones I noticed. No doubt there were ones aimed at boys as well. But yes, parents were still strict about what their children read. One of my older cousins gave me a whole stack of her old pop music magazines, and my Mum burned them all after I asked her what one of the words meant - LOL - I would have only been about 8 or 9 at the time. Now I prefer Golden Age and Silver Age comics.
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One of my older cousins gave me a whole stack of her old pop music magazines, and my Mum burned them all after I asked her what one of the words meant - LOL - I would have only been about 8 or 9 at the time. Now I prefer Golden Age and Silver Age comics.
Geez, QQ, that's harsh. Makes me curious to know what that word was! :) My parents were both teachers but they seemed oblivious to the fact that I was (unwittingly) reading pre-code comics thanks to 50s reprints of 40s material. The worst my Mum ever did was to insist that I "share" my comics. That's six issues of original Lee & Kirby X-Men I'll never get back! :(
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Quite a few points there I'd like to respond to.
One of my older cousins gave me a whole stack of her old pop music magazines, and my Mum burned them all after I asked her what one of the words meant - LOL - I would have only been about 8 or 9 at the time.
I can fully understand your mum's reaction. A lot of the success of RocknRoll audience in the 60's came from a female audience and magazines were created - and there were quite a lot of them and they were quite popular - full of photographs designed to appeal to females - believe me, for girls older than 9 years old, it worked.
The Justice League were battling 'Starro' who looked like a starfish,
Starro was a Gardner Fox creation. Fox had a second career as a writer of Science Fiction stories.
Grant Morrison [I think it was he] when he revived the Justice League - still some of his best work - saw the potential, revived Starro and used the creature to good effect. Starro has been used a number of times since, but the emphasis is on the mind-controlling aspect and the unpleasantness of having a giant starfish glued to your face.
Also thought of Vicki Vale from the Batman comics who started in late 40s, but I don't know a lot about her.
Vicki Vale was the featured love interest in the Michael Keaton Batman movie.
All you'd need to know about Viki Vale.
https://batman.fandom.com/wiki/Vicki_Vale
RE Superman, the adult Lana Lang has at times - we are talking about 80 years of Superman stories - also been a reporter, although she was a TV news anchor.
https://www.supermansupersite.com/lana.html
After Clark and Lana graduated from high school, Lana went to college, and eventually became a television reporter for Metropolis TV station WMET-TV. As an adult, Lana became a rival to Lois Lane for Superman's affection in various 1960s stories, often appearing in the title Superman's Girlfriend, Lois Lane.
During the 1970s and early 1980s, Lana became an anchorwoman for WGBS-TV's evening news in Metropolis, as a co-anchor to Clark Kent.
Cheers!
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One of my older cousins gave me a whole stack of her old pop music magazines, and my Mum burned them all after I asked her what one of the words meant - LOL - I would have only been about 8 or 9 at the time. Now I prefer Golden Age and Silver Age comics.
Geez, QQ, that's harsh. Makes me curious to know what that word was! :) My parents were both teachers but they seemed oblivious to the fact that I was (unwittingly) reading pre-code comics thanks to 50s reprints of 40s material. The worst my Mum ever did was to insist that I "share" my comics. That's six issues of original Lee & Kirby X-Men I'll never get back! :(
My Mum usually wouldn't be that extreme. It was a fairly edgy pop music magazine called Go-Set and they had a columnist who used some choice words. Probably suitable for my cousin who was 9 years older than me, but not for an 8-year old.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go-Set
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Quite a few points there I'd like to respond to.
I can fully understand your mum's reaction. A lot of the success of RocknRoll audience in the 60's came from a female audience and magazines were created - and there were quite a lot of them and they were quite popular - full of photographs designed to appeal to females - believe me, for girls older than 9 years old, it worked.
The Justice League were battling 'Starro' who looked like a starfish,
Starro was a Gardner Fox creation. Fox had a second career as a writer of Science Fiction stories.
Grant Morrison [I think it was he] when he revived the Justice League - still some of his best work - saw the potential, revived Starro and used the creature to good effect. Starro has been used a number of times since, but the emphasis is on the mind-controlling aspect and the unpleasantness of having a giant starfish glued to your face.
Also thought of Vicki Vale from the Batman comics who started in late 40s, but I don't know a lot about her.
Vicki Vale was the featured love interest in the Michael Keaton Batman movie.
All you'd need to know about Viki Vale.
https://batman.fandom.com/wiki/Vicki_Vale
RE Superman, the adult Lana Lang has at times - we are talking about 80 years of Superman stories - also been a reporter, although she was a TV news anchor.
https://www.supermansupersite.com/lana.html
After Clark and Lana graduated from high school, Lana went to college, and eventually became a television reporter for Metropolis TV station WMET-TV. As an adult, Lana became a rival to Lois Lane for Superman's affection in various 1960s stories, often appearing in the title Superman's Girlfriend, Lois Lane.
During the 1970s and early 1980s, Lana became an anchorwoman for WGBS-TV's evening news in Metropolis, as a co-anchor to Clark Kent.
Cheers!
The magazine was Go-Set, so you're probably familiar with that. A bit more like 'Rolling Stone' so probably not really aimed at younger kids. The Tiger Beat pop type magazines of the time were a bit more family friendly.
Thanks for the extra info about Starro - the mind-controlling aspect is interesting. I just had trouble with them chasing a giant cosmic starfish in that 1960s comic. LOL - And thanks for the extra info about Vicki Vale and Lana Lang. Will make a note to look up those sites.
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My youngest niece was about eight when a boy at school called her a faggot. She asked my mom what the word meant and mom didn't know either so they looked it up in the dictionary. My neice, who was very skinny at the time, began crying when she found she had been called a bundle of sticks.
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My youngest niece was about eight when a boy at school called her a faggot. She asked my mom what the word meant and mom didn't know either so they looked it up in the dictionary. My niece, who was very skinny at the time, began crying when she found she had been called a bundle of sticks.
Oh dear. It's interesting how language changes over time and words and phrases take on different meanings. That would be an interesting study in itself to see what terms used in these classic comics would be considered politically incorrect today. I'm sure those kinds of studies have been done. Always interesting to see how the original readers would have viewed them.
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I've read most of the Top Notch comic and have a couple of comments.
On the second last page before the ads, they have a blurb about how the comic came to be and what they hope to achieve. They say they didn't rush in, but did a lot of thinking about what readers would like and this is the result. Their vision is 'streamlined fiction, stepped up to meet today's fast pace of living'. If they thought it was fast-paced in 1939, I wonder what they'd think now? But the comics do fit with that action-based style. It's worth reading that page for some insights into their process.
They mention that they're still learning [re how to do comics], and one thing I noticed was that the narration boxes for the comics were often at the bottom of the panel, and sometimes this made the reading confusing. For example, there were times when I read the dialogue and then the box at the bottom, as you would usually do, but found that the narration box was really meant to come first. So I guess at this stage, a lot of writers, illustrators and publishers were still getting the hang of how to put it all together. Though Superman comics I've read from that same era didn't have that problem.
Also there were a lot of educational features - A fact page about boxing and another about sport; a page of interesting facts (in which Hong Kong was still British); a four-page pulp fiction short story with illustrations; a puzzle page; and a true crime comic that showed how forensic techniques were used to catch a real counterfeiter. My favourite part of that story was the bit where they show you how to forge a signature. I'm not sure that's what they wanted kids to learn from a story, but I bet some tried it out.
And a piece of pub quiz trivia -- On the page about boxers, it mentioned that one of them had fought Max Baer. My first thought was that he was the fellow who played Jethro in The Beverley Hillbillies, but I knew the fellow in the comic book would be too old. So I looked him up and discovered that Max Baer Snr was indeed a boxer, and his son Max Baer Jnr was indeed Jethro in The Beverley Hillbillies. I'm sure that piece of info will come in handy one day! :D
All in all, I think they probably achieved their aim. This would have been quite an exciting and fun comic for kids at the time. Thanks for selecting it.
What do others think?
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My youngest niece was about eight when a boy at school called her a faggot. She asked my mom what the word meant and mom didn't know either so they looked it up in the dictionary. My neice, who was very skinny at the time, began crying when she found she had been called a bundle of sticks.
That's sad. Do you think she'd have been any happier knowing she'd been named after a British meatball made from pork and offal? :o
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I've read most of the Top Notch comic and have a couple of comments.
On the second last page before the ads, they have a blurb about how the comic came to be and what they hope to achieve. They say they didn't rush in, but did a lot of thinking about what readers would like and this is the result. Their vision is 'streamlined fiction, stepped up to meet today's fast pace of living'. If they thought it was fast-paced in 1939, I wonder what they'd think now? But the comics do fit with that action-based style. It's worth reading that page for some insights into their process.
They mention that they're still learning [re how to do comics], and one thing I noticed was that the narration boxes for the comics were often at the bottom of the panel, and sometimes this made the reading confusing. For example, there were times when I read the dialogue and then the box at the bottom, as you would usually do, but found that the narration box was really meant to come first. So I guess at this stage, a lot of writers, illustrators and publishers were still getting the hang of how to put it all together. Though Superman comics I've read from that same era didn't have that problem.
Also there were a lot of educational features - A fact page about boxing and another about sport; a page of interesting facts (in which Hong Kong was still British); a four-page pulp fiction short story with illustrations; a puzzle page; and a true crime comic that showed how forensic techniques were used to catch a real counterfeiter. My favourite part of that story was the bit where they show you how to forge a signature. I'm not sure that's what they wanted kids to learn from a story, but I bet some tried it out.
And a piece of pub quiz trivia -- On the page about boxers, it mentioned that one of them had fought Max Baer. My first thought was that he was the fellow who played Jethro in The Beverley Hillbillies, but I knew the fellow in the comic book would be too old. So I looked him up and discovered that Max Baer Snr was indeed a boxer, and his son Max Baer Jnr was indeed Jethro in The Beverley Hillbillies. I'm sure that piece of info will come in handy one day! :D
All in all, I think they probably achieved their aim. This would have been quite an exciting and fun comic for kids at the time. Thanks for selecting it.
What do others think?
I found Top Notch #1 pretty impressive in the art department, and there was a satisfying blend of subject matter which compares more than favourably with a lot of other mixed bag comics of the same era (though to my mind not quite up to the standard of Wonderworld, which as noted earlier, was a product of the famed Eisner/Iger studio.)
My main complaint is that their stories seem to end very suddenly. I'm often left turning the page onto a cartoon or a sports feature, and turning back again, thinking, oh, wait- was that the end? Most interesting to me is the last feature, Master Forgers, which GCD dismisses as "packaged by the Harry Chesler shop" but clearly bears the style and the signature of Jack Cole, creator of the inimitable Plastic Man.
But things change, and later The Wizard would become more of a superhero figure with tights and a cape, and was paired with The Shield - arguably a forerunner of Captain America. He also got his own kid sidekick, Roy the Super Boy. Visual standards deteriorated a bit but they still had some strong artists, like Irv Novick, Harry Lucey, and (my favourite) Bob Fujitani.
The same holds true for Wonderworld, if you go ahead another ten issues or so, even if the characters remain the same, the art quality declines fairly sharply. But in general that's a regular characteristic of comics- you start off with your best writers and artists, and once you've got a title up and running, you move on and start something else, leaving the established features to the "also-rans." I'm sure they still do it now.
Thanks for your appreciation of Top Notch, I look forward to your assessment of Wonderworld.
All the best
K1ngcat
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I've read most of the Top Notch comic and have a couple of comments.
On the second last page before the ads, they have a blurb about how the comic came to be and what they hope to achieve. They say they didn't rush in, but did a lot of thinking about what readers would like and this is the result. Their vision is 'streamlined fiction, stepped up to meet today's fast pace of living'. If they thought it was fast-paced in 1939, I wonder what they'd think now? But the comics do fit with that action-based style. It's worth reading that page for some insights into their process.
They mention that they're still learning [re how to do comics], and one thing I noticed was that the narration boxes for the comics were often at the bottom of the panel, and sometimes this made the reading confusing. For example, there were times when I read the dialogue and then the box at the bottom, as you would usually do, but found that the narration box was really meant to come first. So I guess at this stage, a lot of writers, illustrators and publishers were still getting the hang of how to put it all together. Though Superman comics I've read from that same era didn't have that problem.
Also there were a lot of educational features - A fact page about boxing and another about sport; a page of interesting facts (in which Hong Kong was still British); a four-page pulp fiction short story with illustrations; a puzzle page; and a true crime comic that showed how forensic techniques were used to catch a real counterfeiter. My favourite part of that story was the bit where they show you how to forge a signature. I'm not sure that's what they wanted kids to learn from a story, but I bet some tried it out.
All in all, I think they probably achieved their aim. This would have been quite an exciting and fun comic for kids at the time. Thanks for selecting it.
What do others think?
I found Top Notch #1 pretty impressive in the art department, and there was a satisfying blend of subject matter which compares more than favourably with a lot of other mixed bag comics of the same era (though to my mind not quite up to the standard of Wonderworld, which as noted earlier, was a product of the famed Eisner/Iger studio.)
My main complaint is that their stories seem to end very suddenly. I'm often left turning the page onto a cartoon or a sports feature, and turning back again, thinking, oh, wait- was that the end? Most interesting to me is the last feature, Master Forgers, which GCD dismisses as "packaged by the Harry Chesler shop" but clearly bears the style and the signature of Jack Cole, creator of the inimitable Plastic Man.
But things change, and later The Wizard would become more of a superhero figure with tights and a cape, and was paired with The Shield - arguably a forerunner of Captain America. He also got his own kid sidekick, Roy the Super Boy. Visual standards deteriorated a bit but they still had some strong artists, like Irv Novick, Harry Lucey, and (my favourite) Bob Fujitani.
The same holds true for Wonderworld, if you go ahead another ten issues or so, even if the characters remain the same, the art quality declines fairly sharply. But in general that's a regular characteristic of comics- you start off with your best writers and artists, and once you've got a title up and running, you move on and start something else, leaving the established features to the "also-rans." I'm sure they still do it now.
Thanks for your appreciation of Top Notch, I look forward to your assessment of Wonderworld.
All the best
K1ngcat
Yes I agree that some of the stories end abruptly. I too turned the page a few times and was surprised to discover a funny comic when I thought the other story was still going. There were also a few plot holes. Maybe their desire to provide those fast-paced stories meant they missed a few steps along the way. I wonder if the writers and artists for each story had to keep to a certain number of pages and didn't always quite have enough room to flesh out the story.
Thanks for the extra information about the Wizard and the Shield. I'll have to check out other editions.
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The Shield - arguably a forerunner of Captain America.
Shield (Archie Comics)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shield_%28Archie_Comics%29
The Shield is the name of several superheroes created by MLJ (now known as Archie Comics). Appearing months before Captain America, the Shield has the distinction of being the first superhero with a costume based upon United States patriotic iconography. The character appeared in Pep Comics from issue #1 (Jan 1940) to #65 (Jan 1948).[1]
Cheers!
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The Shield - arguably a forerunner of Captain America.
Shield (Archie Comics)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shield_%28Archie_Comics%29
The Shield is the name of several superheroes created by MLJ (now known as Archie Comics). Appearing months before Captain America, the Shield has the distinction of being the first superhero with a costume based upon United States patriotic iconography. The character appeared in Pep Comics from issue #1 (Jan 1940) to #65 (Jan 1948).[1]
Cheers!
Thanks for that link. I had already checked out the first Pep comic that Archie appeared in, so will have to check out the Shield. My reading list is getting longer and longer! :D
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He becomes an FBI agent (whose secret identity is known only to FBI Chief J. Edgar Hoover)
Another character know for his affinity for flamboyant costumes.
PS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKHqEKwy90A
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Wonderworld Comics #7
The Flame
Okay, although the Kikoos backstory seems like there's a more interesting story left untold. Hundreds of years old, bulletproof, kept isolated by an unnamed government, I mean geeze, you just waste them as mooks to an unnamed crime boss???
Yarko the Great
"-and into the well with ye!" LOL! Did Burke care how deep the well was? Did he care if there was water to cushion their fall? Did he care that they could either break their necks or drown? Apparently not! Pure Golden Age character unlike those Silver Age wimps who respected a criminal's life. ;)
As for the story, eh, it was okay, but the more I read stories with magic characters the more obvious it is that their powers are all plot dependent. Need the hero captured? He's easily captured. Need him to freeze the bad guys? He freezes the bad guys. Need a little drama? Oh, the freeze spell wore off! There is little rhyme or reason to what he can or can't do except the needs of the author. Sometimes magicians will have an in-built flaw like the magician must speak the spell or use a magic item, but too often magic just serves as a "Get out of plot free" card.
Shorty Shortcake in Guatemala
Ummmmmm... okay. Given the silliness of the story, it's hard to apply any standard of reality to it. It does have the feel of a movie cartoon to it.
Patty O'Day
Readable, but it seems like it's missing something. It's just "this happens, and that happens, and something else happens, and Patty gets a big scoop. Ho hum." Several dramatic things happen without any real sense of drama. It feels like a sketch for a longer, more dramatic story.
Dr. Fung
Okay.
Tommy Taylor in India
Eh. Tommy really isn't needed in this story. This is basically an excuse to rattle off some factoids about India and poorly disguising it as a story.
Tex Maxon
Okay.
Wonders That Are True!
Okay factoid page.
Don Quixote in Modern Times
Cute. :)
K-51
Okay.
Mob Buster Robinson
Feels like a knock-off of Dell's Mr. District Attorney comic written about half as well.
Wonderworld Stamp Club
Nice bio.
Movie Memos
Okay.
Looking up info on this Glenda Carrol & it turns out it's a pen name for Bernard Baily.
Spark Stevens
Fast moving story (probably to keep the readers from thinking too hard about about the questionable story points. ;) ), but at least it was entertaining.
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Wonderworld Comics #7
The Flame
Okay, although the Kikoos backstory seems like there's a more interesting story left untold. Hundreds of years old, bulletproof, kept isolated by an unnamed government, I mean geeze, you just waste them as mooks to an unnamed crime boss???
Yarko the Great
"-and into the well with ye!" LOL! Did Burke care how deep the well was? Did he care if there was water to cushion their fall? Did he care that they could either break their necks or drown? Apparently not! Pure Golden Age character unlike those Silver Age wimps who respected a criminal's life. ;)
As for the story, eh, it was okay, but the more I read stories with magic characters the more obvious it is that their powers are all plot dependent. Need the hero captured? He's easily captured. Need him to freeze the bad guys? He freezes the bad guys. Need a little drama? Oh, the freeze spell wore off! There is little rhyme or reason to what he can or can't do except the needs of the author. Sometimes magicians will have an in-built flaw like the magician must speak the spell or use a magic item, but too often magic just serves as a "Get out of plot free" card.
Shorty Shortcake in Guatemala
Ummmmmm... okay. Given the silliness of the story, it's hard to apply any standard of reality to it. It does have the feel of a movie cartoon to it.
Re the Kikoos, yes logically the fact that these bizarre creatures even exist, let alone that they could be brought to the USA and set to work for a mob boss is entirely ridiculous. But as a pre-teen comics reader who'd only ever previously read DC post code comics, they were a whole new world. I'd never seen comics being so scary before, let alone so tastefully illustrated, so to hell with logic! I first came across this story in a reprint mag called The Adventure Album, here:
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=64525
and it was a revelation. Please excuse my colouring, I'd never seen the Flame before and it made sense to me that he'd be dressed in red. It still does. I think the yellow costume sucks.
Yes magicians are an awkward bunch, they can all do exactly what they want, as long as the plot calls for it. Ibis is the worst of the lot. Yarko here is a little more amusing thanks to the character of Det. Burke, and I don't now think we can ignore the unspoken racism in the fact that heathens and infidels can be thrown down wells willy-nilly, even if they are fat-shamers, but as Lou Reed said, "those were different times."
As for Shorty Shortcake, strangely this is the last kind of thing I'd expected from Iger, but a man draws what a man's gotta draw...
Thanks for your comments SS, looking forward to more!
All the best
K1ngcat
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It got me thinking about other girl reporters of this era. Lois Lane is the most famous of this and any other era.
Amazing Man Comics #11 https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=24360 features the introduction of two female reporters, Zona Henderson in the Amazing Man story and Nancy in the Shark story. (It seemed like Nancy would become a recurring character, but I don't think she made many appearances after this.)
Crackajack Funnies #26 https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=78059 In the Owl story we have the introduction of Belle Wayne a reporter who is also the fiance of the Owl's secret identity. Later on she takes the identity of Owl Girl.
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It got me thinking about other girl reporters of this era. Lois Lane is the most famous of this and any other era.
Amazing Man Comics #11 https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=24360 features the introduction of two female reporters, Zona Henderson in the Amazing Man story and Nancy in the Shark story. (It seemed like Nancy would become a recurring character, but I don't think she made many appearances after this.)
Crackajack Funnies #26 https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=78059 In the Owl story we have the introduction of Belle Wayne a reporter who is also the fiance of the Owl's secret identity. Later on she takes the identity of Owl Girl.
Thanks for those links. I've started a list of girl reporters, so will add those to my list. Thank you.
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Wonderworld Comics #7
Patty O'Day
Readable, but it seems like it's missing something. It's just "this happens, and that happens, and something else happens, and Patty gets a big scoop. Ho hum." Several dramatic things happen without any real sense of drama. It feels like a sketch for a longer, more dramatic story.
Yes, I had the same feeling about Patty O'Day. On the one hand, I liked to see a gung-ho woman in the thick of the action taking newsreels, but I agree with you about the plot. I haven't had a chance yet, but I'm intending to check out her other appearances in other issues to see if that changes. So much on my reading list, so little time ::)
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Yes magicians are an awkward bunch, they can all do exactly what they want, as long as the plot calls for it. Ibis is the worst of the lot. Yarko here is a little more amusing thanks to the character of Det. Burke, and I don't now think we can ignore the unspoken racism in the fact that heathens and infidels can be thrown down wells willy-nilly, even if they are fat-shamers, but as Lou Reed said, "those were different times."
Yes, there are certainly a lot of racist and sexist comments in some of these early comics, but they were a product of their times and it's interesting to see how things have changed over the years (or not). Though I do wonder how people from different racial and ethnic groups feel when they read some of these old comics. It's one thing seeing them in their historical context, but some of the terms used and the accompanying attitudes and actions must still cut when reading them.
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Here is my review of Wonderworld Comics 7:
(1) The Flame
The idea of a tribe of super-strong, small-brained, or weak-brained, over-violent, semi-humans, being used as a personal army of thugs has been used before, in various guises (including Island of Lost Souls (Dr. Moreau), and similar situations to this one (a lost tribe in a secluded valley - used by a power hungry villain to terrorise the nearest outposts of civilization). As is usual with such horror stories, the science makes no sense. These "monsters" can live hundreds of years, because of their country's environment (of course-not explained), and their is so tough bullets bounce off of it. Made tough by the cold, dry winds of The Gobi Desert. After hundreds of years of life, they have unbelievable strength, and yet are skin and bone, with no musculature taking up space. They have the minds of children, and love to hurt other people, and so, can be cajoled by evil men into doing their bidding. Why would they follow orders from strangers? Why not just commit their thuggery on their own? The artwork on this story is excellent. The colouring could be better, to my taste.
(2) Yarko The Great - Master of Magic
Another Magician who uses magic to foil criminals. I always thought Magicians just fooled not-so-observant people by using slight-of-hand. I didn't know they could make images of themselves be seen by anyone they wished (and not by others in the same place) many miles away from where they are, by using only their mental powers, and also talk to selected people at those distances. So, Yarko, the magician nips in the bud, a revolt of a tiny disaffected Maghrebi tribe or group who wants freedom from France's rule in Saharan Algeria, Morocco, or Tunisia? Good thing for The French Empire that Yarko was there. I guess that Captain DuPre' will NOT be able to recount everything as it occurred in his report, for fear of being relieved of his duties, and sent to a "rest home". The artwork on this story is fairly primitive, as were many during the late 1930s and early 1940s.
(3) Shorty Shortcake in Guatamala
This comedy is quite a change-of-pace from tis book's first 2 stories. The premise of that little child being tougher and so much better a fighter than grown sailors, vaqueros, and all-around thugs is refreshing for one story, but would get old very quickly. The joke of the ridiculously long Spanish family surnames is all too common, and too long a list after the point has been made. The artwork is okay, but nothing special.
(4) Patty O'Day - Newsreel Reporter
Here we have, already, another female reporter, only THIS one gets her OWN strip! Much to the delight of Quirky Quokka's curiosity. Well timed! Of course, the young reporters unauthorised trip to the tail end of the plane leads to their seeing something they weren't meant to see (which naturally, is part of a crime being committed. Her partner, Ham, stopped a saboteur from disabling the plane, and also rescued a drowning passenger. The heroine got camera shots of the pilot's landing of the disabled plane on the ocean's surface, and their rescue, and took the film to her newspaper's office on a plane provided by the naval officer, who rescued them. We never find out who the saboteur was, and what his mission was, and why, and who was behind that action. not very satisfying.
(5) Dr. Fung - Master Sleuth of The Orient
Yet another of many clones of "Charlie Chan", and "Mr. Wong". Dr. Fung is old and wise, and Chinese, as is Mr. Wong. But, Fung has an American sidekick. Dan is a good fighter. He takes on five thugs all at once! But, at least this story has a bit of realism, as the five overcome him, and take him prisoner. Brilliant quick-thinking by Fung saves Dan from an agonizing death, and Dan breaks his manacles, and frees und, while the villainess escapes. We must wait until reading the next issue to find out what happens next. The artwork in this story is good, and the storyline makes more sense, and is a lot more believable than that of the other stories, so far.
(6) Tommy Taylor in India - Text "Story"
This is more of a Travelogue/Travel advert, providing information about some tourist attractions one can see in India.
(7) Tex Maxon - Hot Lead Rumba on Crazy Woman Creek
This one, at the very least, has an interesting title. But, I think what the cattle rustlers did in this story, in a short time is far from realistic. They stole cattle from a corral, then drove them along railroad tracks for awhile, and then butchered them, and took their hides and wait for a freight train to come along, and holds up the train and takes the engineer and fireman prisoner, planning to drive the train across a bridge, and some miles morello a town where they can sell the hides. I don't think the story has a time break during which they could have butchered all the cattle, and cleaned the blood off the hides and had them dry out. And wouldn't they get a LOT more money selling the cows alive, on the hoof, rather than just selling uncured hides? Yes, the brands on live cows might be used to incriminate them, but there were always some unsavoury, dishonest characters, who would like to buy cattle cheap, and sell them for more to unscrupulous meat packers. They could have sold them to someone who would sell them to a meatpacker in Kansas City. It's not really realistic. Driving cattle is very slow. Cowboys from the ranch from where the cattle were stolen could have sent a man to get the local Sheriff or Marshal and have them bring a posse of deputies (from other local ranchers), and followed the cow tracks from their corral and along the railroad tracks, and on horses, would have caught up with the thieves very quickly. The scene where the ranch hands find the bones of their cattle is wrong. They shouldn't have found sun-bleached, white bones, but rather, a bloody mess, with meat and fat lying around. The ranchers catching up with the rustlers was realistic. But, it was an irrational plan by the crooks. No one living and working in those rural ranch areas would be that ignorant, and stupid.
{8) Wonders That are True!
I'd bet that "The Man Kills Panther" story was exaggerated. The other entries aren't very interesting.
(9) Don Quixote in Modern Times
An interesting premise, and I like the plot and artwork. I'd have liked to write and draw this strip, back in the mid-to-late 1950s. It would be too tame, and old-fashioned to hold interest of today's kids. Also, I'd rather have had at least 5 or 6 pages of 4-tiers of panels with which to work. Two-page "stories", are really not stories, but are just elongated gags. This one was a quite common cliche. Bu, iQuixote is characterized really well, and is funny enough, based on the artwork. With 6 pages, regularly, I could have running gags with Sancho, and between the two of them, continuing across the entire series.
(10) K-51 Spies At War
With K-51 as the agent's name, I expected that this story would be about The US WWII Canine Service, especially involving a plot (ostensibly Japanese Military) to take over The Philippine Islands. Interesting that a German (von Diableff) was involved. It's a reasonably possible foreshadowing of the fact that The Japanese were heavily considering attacking US land holdings and military installations in The Pacific Region as early as mid 1939. I like the premise, and the action. The artwork is fairly good, the staging is good, but the backgrounds are relatively sparse. All in all, this was my favourite story in this book, so far.
(11) Mob Buster Robinson
This story is unusual, in that a District Attorney, seemingly in New York, The largest, most important city in USA, who is well-known enough to have a nickname based on his reputation as a major buster of organised crime in that city, infiltrates a gang using no real disguise. Actually, someone whose face is so well-known by the public, would actually need to have plastic surgery changing his entire face. Of course, he is recognised by a gang member. And he is all alone against an entire mob. And a miracle happens, that just as the mob leader is about to kill him, the police (who he had alerted earlier) arrive to save him. In real life, he would be fired by the city, for doing something so foolish, and risking losing their city's top criminal prosecutor. The artwork is fairly primitive, with little details shown in the characters' faces. The artist's knowledge of anatomy is weak. The characters are elongated, arms and legs too long, and men all the same size. The staging was okay. Background details were a little sparse and sketchy. But the killer was that the storyline was absurd. How could a novice pass as a master diamond cutter? Did he take a crash course in diamond cutting just before this infiltration operation??? This story was just not well thought out. It appears that the writer and artist were still making up the story while the artist was drawing it!
(12) Movie Memos
Jean Parker is a good likeness. Robert Young doesn't look much like himself. And that was clearly copied from a photo. Not a very good job. Mae West looks TOO Good! She would have loved to have looked like that! Edward Everett Horton looks more like a skinny Robert Mitchum. Not impressive.
(13) Spark Stevens of The Navy
This story has an interesting storyline, with an outside colonial power scheming to take over Cuba, despite The US' "Monroe Doctrine", pledging to keep Eastern Hemisphere colonial powers from taking over any South or North American country's territory. Two naive, careless, and stupid sailors show a Flamenco dancer clacking out morse code messages with her castanets (an unexpectedly innovative story element) that they know what she is doing, landing them as prisoners in a guarded cell of a castle on the ocean shore. They see their US Navy destroyer sailing nearby, and send them morse code signals by reflecting The Sun's rays off a metal food plate. The ship's crew starts bombarding the castle. The prisoners just happen to find a spare length of barbed wire in side their cell, and stick it into their electrical socket, charging the barbed wire surrounding the castle. When the bombing gets worse, and enemy agents try to jump the barbed wire fencing, they get electrocuted. The two seamen prisoners escape, when the chief villain comes to kill them. They find grenades, and use a Jai-alai cesta (hurling glove) to fling them far enough to kill the remaining enemy agents and revolutionaries. After the two sailors are safe, they return to the port town and ask the Flamenco dancer for the "date" they missed. They turn her over to the Naval Shore Police. All in all not too bad. lots of action. The artwork was a bit primitive. The figures are elongated, some of the staging is weird, with body areas cut off that don't need to be, and weird camera angles. Like several other stories in this book, the artists seems to use clothing to hide the fact that he doesn't know Human anatomy very well, and is not used to drawing it accurately.
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(4) Patty O'Day - Newsreel Reporter
Here we have, already, another female reporter, only THIS one gets her OWN strip! Much to the delight of Quirky Quokka's curiosity. Well timed! Of course, the young reporters unauthorised trip to the tail end of the plane leads to their seeing something they weren't meant to see (which naturally, is part of a crime being committed. Her partner, Ham, stopped a saboteur from disabling the plane, and also rescued a drowning passenger. The heroine got camera shots of the pilot's landing of the disabled plane on the ocean's surface, and their rescue, and took the film to her newspaper's office on a plane provided by the naval officer, who rescued them. We never find out who the saboteur was, and what his mission was, and why, and who was behind that action. not very satisfying.
Yes, I was interested to find a female reporter with her own strip, though this wasn't the most riveting story and there are a few loose ends, as you say. But I have high hopes she will go on to bigger and better things, and I intend to check out her other strips. Haven't had time yet.
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This is a little bit of a tangent, but I mentioned the Patty O'Day story in one of my posts, and I decided to look back and see some of her other strips. I discovered that she first appeared in Wonder Comics (the predecessor to Wonderworld Comics). The first story in Wonder World #1 features a superhero called Wonderman. At the end of that comic, it promises another exciting story of Wonderman in the next issue.
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=26891
But in Wonder World #2, there is a note that says: "Sorry there's not enough room in this issue for the Wonder Man, but he'll be back with you soon in bigger and better adventures."
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=29105
A few months ago, I read a book called "The Classic Era of American Comics" by Nicky Wright, and I remember him mentioning Wonderman. So I did a quick search to refresh my memory. Wonderman only appeared in that one issue of Wonder Comics and was never seen again because DC Comics sued them for copyright infringement over the similarities between Wonderman and Superman.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wonder_Man_(Fox_Publications)
Wonder Comics only lasted the two issues and then became Wonderworld Comics. Some of the characters remained the same (e.g., Yarko the Great and Patty O'Day), but no more Wonderman.
(P.S. For some reason that last link doesn't seem to be working, though I've copied and pasted it a few times. But if you click on it, you'll then see another link that does work.)
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I believe one page of the second Wonderman story was found and printed in Nemo magazine. So a second story, at least, was finished, but only the one page has surfaced.
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I believe one page of the second Wonderman story was found and printed in Nemo magazine. So a second story, at least, was finished, but only the one page has surfaced.
That's interesting. They were obviously planning to make Wonderman into a main character until the law suit. Interesting that it happened so early in the era.
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Ironic then that Marvel took advantage of the lapsed copyright to re-use the name as they did with quite a few other lapsed copyright names from the Golden Age. Daredevil and Captain Marvel probably being the most prominent.
This is interesting. Uncovered it yesterday when researching something earlier.
In 1939, Will Eisner was commissioned to create Wonder Man for Victor Fox, an accountant who had previously worked at DC Comics and was becoming a comic book publisher himself. Following Fox's instructions to create a Superman-type character, and using the pen name Willis, Eisner wrote and drew the first issue of Wonder Comics. Eisner said in interviews throughout his later life that he had protested the derivative nature of the character and story, and that when subpoenaed after National Periodical Publications, the company that would evolve into DC Comics, sued Fox, alleging Wonder Man was an illegal copy of Superman, Eisner testified that this was so, undermining Fox's case; Eisner even depicts himself doing so in his semi-autobiographical graphic novel The Dreamer. However, a transcript of the proceeding, uncovered by comics historian Ken Quattro in 2010, indicates Eisner in fact supported Fox and claimed Wonder Man as an original Eisner creation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Eisner
Cheers,
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Ironic then that Marvel took advantage of the lapsed copyright to re-use the name as they did with quite a few other lapsed copyright names from the Golden Age. Daredevil and Captain Marvel probably being the most prominent.
This is interesting. Uncovered it yesterday when researching something earlier.
In 1939, Will Eisner was commissioned to create Wonder Man for Victor Fox, an accountant who had previously worked at DC Comics and was becoming a comic book publisher himself. Following Fox's instructions to create a Superman-type character, and using the pen name Willis, Eisner wrote and drew the first issue of Wonder Comics. Eisner said in interviews throughout his later life that he had protested the derivative nature of the character and story, and that when subpoenaed after National Periodical Publications, the company that would evolve into DC Comics, sued Fox, alleging Wonder Man was an illegal copy of Superman, Eisner testified that this was so, undermining Fox's case; Eisner even depicts himself doing so in his semi-autobiographical graphic novel The Dreamer. However, a transcript of the proceeding, uncovered by comics historian Ken Quattro in 2010, indicates Eisner in fact supported Fox and claimed Wonder Man as an original Eisner creation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Eisner
Cheers,
Thanks for that link. I clicked on the reference at the bottom of the page (Ref. 22) and read the article about the testimony, but when I tried to click on the scanned copies of the actual pages of testimony, I got error messages saying I didn't have permission. The article was interesting though.
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Trying to sneak in some comments...I've been tied up with a project.
Wonderworld #7
It's fascinating to see major talents in their early days. The first thing that struck me is how strong Will Eisner's influence is in Bob Powell's signed work, especially in the hero's face and posing of fight scenes. I could swear Eisner drew the Yarko story. Check out our page 12, panel 1. Both men look like early Eisner characters. Knowing that even back then Eisner worked with a studio, it's possible that he drew (or redrew) other artists' figures. Or maybe it is him. Who knows?
The cover certainly would have caught my eye on the newsstand. Truly creepy monsters, beautiful Lou Fine anatomy, and the inevitable cringing damsel.
The Flame: This is one of several stories in this book that are almost diagrammatic. There is plenty of action and bizarre characters, but the script is written in such a flat "this then this then this" manner that not even the art can make it interesting. One puzzling moment: the villain tortures our hero to "loosen his tongue," but he never asked The Flame to tell him anything to begin with. I guess he just wanted to hear The Flame yell, "Arrrrghrrbl!!"
Yarko the Great, as others have suggested, showcases how boring a "real magic" character can be. Yarko can basically do anything. The script implies that he loses his powers when he's blindfolded but that's not clear. What is clear is that once he's in a cell Yarko can walk through the iron bars and freeze the entire contingent of baddies. So why the heck does he waste ectoplasm having Burke bring the cavalry? He teleports the captive to safety; why not then teleport himself out of there and blow up the fort from the comfort of his own living room?
This problem is what drives me crazy about Ibis the Invincible and his stupid Ibistick. The Ibistick grants Ibis the power to do absolutely anything from make coffee to move planets. When he's faced with a mystery, he could quite easily say, "Ibistick, identify the murderers and send them to jail" and that'd be the end of it. To have any story at all Ibis must choose to do only minor tricks, delaying the big reveal. In the meantime he's knocked over the head or loses the Ibistick down a drain. I would've thought the average kid would have soon tired of this, but Ibis the Invincible lasted a long time so I guess not. But back to the subject.
Our page 15 has a classic artistic cop-out. The villain addresses "my brothers of the border tribes" but in the huge room we see him, a flautist, a dancing girl, and one guy sitting in the corner. On the next page, when "the entire assembly" looks up at Yarko we see two guys sitting in the corner. There seems to be a brother shortage on the border.
Shorty Shortcake offers some laughs though the clunky cartooning makes some sequences hard to read. Interesting to see a couple of of instances of real Spanish, like pobrecito and es verdad! Comic book Spanish was almost always limited to si, senor" and "caramba." As for story logic, isn't it lucky the sheriff happened to have a pet porcupine?
To be continued...
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?Wonderworld #7
It's fascinating to see major talents in their early days. The first thing that struck me is how strong Will Eisner's influence is in Bob Powell's signed work, especially in the hero's face and posing of fight scenes. I could swear Eisner drew the Yarko story. Check out our page 12, panel 1. Both men look like early Eisner characters. Knowing that even back then Eisner worked with a studio, it's possible that he drew (or redrew) other artists' figures. Or maybe it is him. Who knows?
crash, I'm almost certain I see Eisner's hand in the Yarko story, both in the situations and the look of the characters, most notably Burke. If you look at the Yarko strip in WW#5,
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=27927
the look of the villain, his hubris, "I am Vadim, a genius!" and the overhead views like panel 4 page 14, are all highly suggestive of Eisner's plotting and art, if Powell was involved it could have surely only been on the inking side?
Toni Blum gets the scripting credits for that one, is that name known to anyone out there?
Looking forward to the rest of your review
K1ngcat
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Toni Blum gets the scripting credits for that one, is that name known to anyone out there?
Her GCD entry https://www.comics.org/creator/13211/
The Stripper's Guide entry https://strippersguide.blogspot.com/2015/04/ink-slinger-profiles-by-alex-jay-audrey.html
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(1) The Flame
The idea of a tribe of super-strong, small-brained, or weak-brained, over-violent, semi-humans, being used as a personal army of thugs has been used before, in various guises
These critters reminded me of some apelike hominids in a Doc Savage thriller. They weren't too clear in that story on whether these beasts were evolved apes or degenerate humans.
I've heard of a legendary Chimpaneze species called by locals "the Lion Killers". Aparently very large and intelligent, perhaps not chimps at all.
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This is a little bit of a tangent, but I mentioned the Patty O'Day story in one of my posts, and I decided to look back and see some of her other strips. I discovered that she first appeared in Wonder Comics (the predecessor to Wonderworld Comics). The first story in Wonder World #1 features a superhero called Wonderman. At the end of that comic, it promises another exciting story of Wonderman in the next issue.
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=26891
A few months ago, I read a book called "The Classic Era of American Comics" by Nicky Wright, and I remember him mentioning Wonderman. So I did a quick search to refresh my memory. Wonderman only appeared in that one issue of Wonder Comics and was never seen again because DC Comics sued them for copyright infringement over the similarities between Wonderman and Superman.
Thanks for turning that up, QQ, it's a fascinating look into Eisner's early work. The similarities to Superman seem pretty conclusive, including his "timid" alter ego and his ability to "leap" rather than fly - I understand the flying power only came about after the designers of the animated series found leaping didn't cut it outside of comics. The one-panel origin is pretty weak but no worse than all the 40s heroes who had their powers bestowed up them by Tibetan Lamas and the like. It's also interesting to see the "Playboy" Berold character, as Eisner used to write The Flame's adventures under the pen name Basil Berold.
And so Fox Publications was set up by an ex-DC accountant? What a dog! ;)
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This is a little bit of a tangent, but I mentioned the Patty O'Day story in one of my posts, and I decided to look back and see some of her other strips. I discovered that she first appeared in Wonder Comics (the predecessor to Wonderworld Comics). The first story in Wonder World #1 features a superhero called Wonderman. At the end of that comic, it promises another exciting story of Wonderman in the next issue.
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=26891
A few months ago, I read a book called "The Classic Era of American Comics" by Nicky Wright, and I remember him mentioning Wonderman. So I did a quick search to refresh my memory. Wonderman only appeared in that one issue of Wonder Comics and was never seen again because DC Comics sued them for copyright infringement over the similarities between Wonderman and Superman.
Thanks for turning that up, QQ, it's a fascinating look into Eisner's early work. The similarities to Superman seem pretty conclusive, including his "timid" alter ego and his ability to "leap" rather than fly - I understand the flying power only came about after the designers of the animated series found leaping didn't cut it outside of comics. The one-panel origin is pretty weak but no worse than all the 40s heroes who had their powers bestowed up them by Tibetan Lamas and the like. It's also interesting to see the "Playboy" Berold character, as Eisner used to write The Flame's adventures under the pen name Basil Berold.
And so Fox Publications was set up by an ex-DC accountant? What a dog! ;)
That book by Nicky Wright was really detailed in terms of all the different US companies, how they got started, who ran them, who they joined with or who took them over. I can't remember all the ins and outs, as it was a library book I don't have handy, but it has lots of little snippets like that. I must take it out again now I've found this group, as a number of comments people are making are sparking distant memories for me. 'I know I read that somewhere' :D
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This is a little bit of a tangent, but I mentioned the Patty O'Day story in one of my posts, and I decided to look back and see some of her other strips. I discovered that she first appeared in Wonder Comics (the predecessor to Wonderworld Comics). The first story in Wonder World #1 features a superhero called Wonderman. At the end of that comic, it promises another exciting story of Wonderman in the next issue.
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=26891
A few months ago, I read a book called "The Classic Era of American Comics" by Nicky Wright, and I remember him mentioning Wonderman. So I did a quick search to refresh my memory. Wonderman only appeared in that one issue of Wonder Comics and was never seen again because DC Comics sued them for copyright infringement over the similarities between Wonderman and Superman.
Thanks for turning that up, QQ, it's a fascinating look into Eisner's early work. The similarities to Superman seem pretty conclusive, including his "timid" alter ego and his ability to "leap" rather than fly - I understand the flying power only came about after the designers of the animated series found leaping didn't cut it outside of comics. The one-panel origin is pretty weak but no worse than all the 40s heroes who had their powers bestowed up them by Tibetan Lamas and the like. It's also interesting to see the "Playboy" Berold character, as Eisner used to write The Flame's adventures under the pen name Basil Berold.
And so Fox Publications was set up by an ex-DC accountant? What a dog! ;)
That book by Nicky Wright was really detailed in terms of all the different US companies, how they got started, who ran them, who they joined with or who took them over. I can't remember all the ins and outs, as it was a library book I don't have handy, but it has lots of little snippets like that. I must take it out again now I've found this group, as a number of comments people are making are sparking distant memories for me. 'I know I read that somewhere' :D
Maybe it was "American Comic Book Chronicles" published by Two Morrows Publishing? It has very long and detailed different volumes for (1) 1934-39, (2) 1940-44, (3) 1945-49, (4) 1950-59, (5) 1960-69, (6) 1970-79, {8) 1980-89. Different volumes were written by different people. It is a great historical resource to follow the path of that industry.
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Continuing wandering thru Wonderworld...
I have a soft spot for girl reporters--beginning with Hildy Johnson in Hawks' Front Page-- so I was pleased to meet Patty O'Day. She belongs to a subset of early comic book heroes who, though drawn realistically, have sidekicks who are drawn in a cartoony style. I'm not sure where they got that shtick. The sidekicks usually look like Roy Crane characters. Maybe the inspiration was Wash Tubbs. Though the entire strip was drawn in cartoon style, as time went on Captain Easy and the other characters (especially young women) were drawn a little more realistically.
Too often in girl reporter stories the male sidekick does all the physical stuff. This time it makes sense, though. Patty has to run the camera while Ham saves the passengers' lives. But, ah, the camera. That brings up my main gripe with the art. Did Clare Moe ever open a newspaper? Anyone in those days would have known what a movie camera looked like. I don't mean Moe needed to get the details right. His airplanes demonstrate that he wasn't big on reference. But what on earth is that giant lozenge-shaped contraption with two little eyes? And they are eyes. Note our page 26, panel 7. The contraption is checking Patty out. Whatever the thing is, it can fly, because on the last page Patty's footage shows an aerial view of the rescue.
Dr Fung drips with Eisnerism. The fight scenes on our pp. 32-33 could have come from a prewar Spirit story. That Dan has some skull! That appears to be a ball and chain he's beaned with. This seems to be part of a serial but I haven't gone back to check. I'm not sure why there was a ball of yarn on the floor of Loti Fen Kee's torture chamber, but let's hear it for the puddy tat who saves the day.
Powell supplies two very nice illos for the text feature. However most of the true stories sound far-fetched. Did any of this stuff really happen?
Tex Mason: The more I see of Munson Paddock the more I am awed by his facile brushwork. His drapery is a delight to behold. Paddock also had a pleasantly quirky imagination. Remember, he was the guy who came up with the outer space mailman. Here Paddock does a twist on the classic threatened-train trope by having the bad guys get drunk and screw up their boss's plan. Nice train drawings, by the way. Everything else is so good that I forgive Munson for showing Tex' face in only two panels. You have to read the text and/or study his outfit to know which cowpoke is our hero.
Quixote in Modern Times is a pleasant enough two-pager.
Will Eisner liked letter-number spy heroes. K-51 Spies at War covers no new ground but the script is efficient with a lit of action packed in. I do hate those 11-panel pages, though.
The only place I see George Tuska in Mob-Buster Robinson is panel 5 of our page 54. He was already honing his men-in-suits skills in preparation for Crime Does Not Pay. The script is another of those diagrammatic takes eliciting a big "Ho-hum" from this reviewer. As do the stamp and "Believe it or Else" fillers.
Klaus Nordling did more than one of these battling-gob features. I suppose they're aquatic spinoffs of What Price Glory. While I like Nordling's writing and art most of the time, these things bore me stiff. This particular story is even more aggravating because both the sailors look alike and I'm hanged if I can keep them straight from panel to panel.
Great choice for reading, K1ngcat! Now excuse me while I get some target practice with my Johnson Smith Television Rifle.
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Maybe it was "American Comic Book Chronicles" published by Two Morrows Publishing? It has very long and detailed different volumes for (1) 1934-39, (2) 1940-44, (3) 1945-49, (4) 1950-59, (5) 1960-69, (6) 1970-79, (8) 1980-89. Different volumes were written by different people. It is a great historical resource to follow the path of that industry.
The Nicky Wright book I read was just one volume - 'The Classic Era of American Comics' - It had one chapter on each genre (e.g., funny animals, superheroes, crime etc). Those Chronicles sound like they give a lot more detail. I haven't seen those ones, but thanks for the tip.
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Maybe it was "American Comic Book Chronicles" published by Two Morrows Publishing? It has very long and detailed different volumes for (1) 1934-39, (2) 1940-44, (3) 1945-49, (4) 1950-59, (5) 1960-69, (6) 1970-79, (8) 1980-89. Different volumes were written by different people. It is a great historical resource to follow the path of that industry.
The Nicky Wright book I read was just one volume - 'The Classic Era of American Comics' - It had one chapter on each genre (e.g., funny animals, superheroes, crime etc). Those Chronicles sound like they give a lot more detail. I haven't seen those ones, but thanks for the tip.
Thanks Robb & QQ, I'll look into both if I can find them. :)
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Continuing wandering thru Wonderworld...
I have a soft spot for girl reporters--beginning with Hildy Johnson in Hawks' Front Page-- so I was pleased to meet Patty O'Day. She belongs to a subset of early comic book heroes who, though drawn realistically, have sidekicks who are drawn in a cartoony style. I'm not sure where they got that shtick. The sidekicks usually look like Roy Crane characters. Maybe the inspiration was Wash Tubbs. Though the entire strip was drawn in cartoon style, as time went on Captain Easy and the other characters (especially young women) were drawn a little more realistically.
Dr Fung drips with Eisnerism.
Tex Mason: The more I see of Munson Paddock the more I am awed by his facile brushwork. His drapery is a delight to behold. Paddock also had a pleasantly quirky imagination. Remember, he was the guy who came up with the outer space mailman.
Klaus Nordling did more than one of these battling-gob features. I suppose they're aquatic spinoffs of What Price Glory. While I like Nordling's writing and art most of the time, these things bore me stiff.
There's one of our daily Spirits where Ebony and one of his colleagues are vying for the attentions of the same girl. The two guys are drawn as the usual stereotyped big-lip "coons" but the object of their desire is a perfectly normal, and quite pretty, young black girl. I think this sort of stuff happens a lot in comics of that era, though god knows why!
The whole darn issue drips with Eisnerism IMHO. If he wasn't plotting or doing layouts I suspect half the features wouldn't exist. Only Shorty, Patty and Tex sit outside of his influence.
And yes, I don't get the appeal(?) of the "battling gob" features. Nordling did lots of great stuff in other genres, with way better art, which I enjoy a whole lot more!
Thanks for your review, I know you're busy elsewhere. Glad you found stuff to enjoy.
All the best
K1ngcat
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Top Notch Comics 1
The Wizard
Ah, those dirty Jatsonians! I guess we must have wiped their country off the face of the Earth as we never hear about them these days. ;) These fake stand-in countries in pre-war comics amuse me. On the one hand mentioning a real country that your country is not officially at war with could be seen as a provocation. On the other hand the disguise is flimsier than wearing a pair of glasses and expecting no one to figure it out. 8)
As for the Wizard himself... zzz... Too darn super. Of course he's going to stop the bad guys with his super-genius, mental powers, and possible super-strength. How could he not?
Laughing at Life
Cute.
Scott Rand
Weren't sacrifices on pyramids more of an Aztec thing than Egyptian?
I wonder if any archeologists ever found those bullet-ridden Egyptian bodies? ;)
An... interesting story. Dr. Meade and Scott don't seem too interested in studying the past and solving historical mysteries, they just seem to be time tourists looking for adventure and not really caring if their actions might change time or not.
SporTopics
Interesting, most of these bio fillers tend to talk about the subjects history, but this was more of a snapshot of a recent and upcoming fight for Joe Louis and his potential retirement.
Rex Swift
Wow... that was bad.
Jungle Town Show Boat
If it's hot enough to melt the safe wouldn't it burn up the papers inside?
Air Patrol
Parts of this felt like I had read it before. I wonder if one of the Bell Features writers "borrowed" from this story?
Murder Rap
The writer can't decide if a thug's name is Ganz or Gans.
Bit of a complicated plot for a short story. Maybe if it had been written for mystery magazine and been longer it might have worked better, but even for a double-length comic text story it felt like there was too much going on to breathe.
It's Really A Fact!
Okay.
Lucky Coyne
How much time did the scriptwriter have to write this in? Feels like a rush job, a number of typos, even Lucky is referred to as Red at one point. Nobody proofread this story.
Lonesome Luke
Um... it exists... for some reason.
The Mystic
Another rush job.
The West Pointer
Eh. I think they spent more writing his backstory than the actual story.
Impy
Simple, but at least it's amusing.
Speaking of Sports
Okay.
Manhunters!
Okay.
Pokey Forgets to Remember
I'd like to forget this. ;) Okay, not really. Just not very memorable.
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Well Scrounge, don't know what happened just then but I typed a whole review, was checking it, a message popped up that another message had just been posted, and there was your review and mine disappeared.
So now I have to redo the whole thing.
I will come back to this and stick to the relevant points only.
Back now!
Top Notch Comics 01 (1 of 29)
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=22232
The Pearl Harbour Peril - The Wizard.
Two points.
One/ as depicted here the Wizard is a privileged WASP and most recent hero in a line of them stretching from the War of Independence.
His superpower is 'brain power' No, actually its brain power, money and networking.
He invented what is termed a universal solvent but the catch with that is - What do you keep it in?
He is a combination one man Doc Savage and Verne's Robur the conqueror. [The Car]
What is brain power/ High IQ? There are people who have a high Mensa score who have accomplished nothing much. So, for it to be a real thing there must be something more.
2/ Clearly, the 'Jatsonian government' is meant to be understood as Japanese, look at the uniforms on page 13 and the fact that all the faces are hidden.
Very interesting that a story published in 1939 prophesies an attack on a naval base in Pearl Harbour by 'the Jatsonian government'.
Jungle Town Show boat is unusual in that we are reading a comic about an audience watching a show on stage. I would have been tempted to break the forth wall!
Lucky Coyne - The bat and the ball.
Lucky Coyne was a character who had legs - love the name - and was around for quite a while.
Lucky Coyne
(aka “Kensington Slade,” “Jinx Jordan” and “Rocky Stone”)
Created by the Harry “A” Chesler Feature Syndicate
https://thrillingdetective.com/2019/02/22/lucky-coyne/
He would be another candidate for a compilation on CB+
There is a list of his stories on that webpage.
The Ice Cream Cone
From the 'Additional Information'
features Impy from the LITTLE NEMO strip. Bob McCay was the son of Winsor McCay. Another feature that usually appears in Chesler comics.
I thought I recognized that character.
Here is Kevin Burton Smith [Thrilling Detective] on the Harry “A” Chesler syndicate. And this pretty much sums up this book too,
Lucky Coyne was a product of the Harry “A” Chesler syndicate, a sprawling publishing empire and comic book sweatshop studio not exactly known for consistency. Magazine and story titles were changed or recycled, numbering was a joke and art and script credits were more a theory than anything. The syndicate also leased out characters and reprints to numerous other comic publishers, including Centaur, MLJ, Rucker, St.John, and Bell Features Syndicate, all of whom took a whack at Lucky, which explains the lack of any sort of continuity, up to and including his name itself. One story alone, “The Mystery of the Evil Eye,” which originally appeared in Dynamic Comics #1, was subsequently reprinted by Strange Terrors #1, Crime Reporter #2, and Authentic Police Cases #8, and the Lucky stories were redrawn and re-lettered, with Lucky becoming, in various stories, Kensington Slade, Jinx Jordan or Rocky Stone.
In fact, because so many of the stories were untitled, and the publishers were the syndicate and the various publishers were so cavalier about keeping track of things, it’s difficult to say even how many stories Lucky even appeared in, or how many times his stories were regurgitated.
Like I said, no respect.
And that's what the publishers showed the whole book.
Cheers!
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Huh. That's weird, Panther. I wonder what caused the glitch. Sorry you have to retype your review.
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Top Notch Comics 1
The Wizard
Ah, those dirty Jatsonians! I guess we must have wiped their country off the face of the Earth as we never hear about them these days. ;) These fake stand-in countries in pre-war comics amuse me. On the one hand mentioning a real country that your country is not officially at war with could be seen as a provocation. On the other hand the disguise is flimsier than wearing a pair of glasses and expecting no one to figure it out. 8)
Yes I've read some comics from before the US joined the war, and there are some very Japanese-looking characters that come from other places. Also lots of fictitious South American countries. Though I've got some Superman war-time comics that actually have Hitler as one of the characters. Also Silver Age Iron Man comics that have Brezhnev as a character. I guess they had to be careful in the pre-war days, but it's pretty obvious who they mean. I read somewhere that due to the number of Jewish-Americans in the comic industry at that time, some comic book stories, like those involving Superman, were actually warning of the dangers before the war. Interesting to read in terms of time and context.
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I read somewhere that due to the number of Jewish-Americans in the comic industry at that time, some comic book stories, like those involving Superman, were actually warning of the dangers before the war. Interesting to read in terms of time and context.
Nope, not Superman.
Here is the real story - which every comic fan needs to know.
The History Behind Captain America Punching Hitler
https://www.cbr.com/the-history-behind-captain-america-punching-hitler/
It was an act on the part of Simon and Kirby [ Jacob Kurtzberg] that took real Chutzpah!
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Top Notch Comics 1
The Wizard
Ah, those dirty Jatsonians! I guess we must have wiped their country off the face of the Earth as we never hear about them these days. ;) These fake stand-in countries in pre-war comics amuse me. On the one hand mentioning a real country that your country is not officially at war with could be seen as a provocation. On the other hand the disguise is flimsier than wearing a pair of glasses and expecting no one to figure it out. 8)
As for the Wizard himself... zzz... Too darn super. Of course he's going to stop the bad guys with his super-genius, mental powers, and possible super-strength. How could he not?
Scott Rand
An... interesting story. Dr. Meade and Scott don't seem too interested in studying the past and solving historical mysteries, they just seem to be time tourists looking for adventure and not really caring if their actions might change time or not.
Lucky Coyne
How much time did the scriptwriter have to write this in? Feels like a rush job, a number of typos, even Lucky is referred to as Red at one point. Nobody proofread this stor
SS, it may be that mentioning a country that your country wasn't at war with might seem like provocation but only if the other country is reading your country's comics. And using glasses as a diguise? Isn't that the premise Superman was based on?? He seems to have got away with it for a while! ;)
The Wizard is, as you say, too darn super. There's nothing he can't do, except design his own plane. Cars and Subs yes, light aircraft no. And he comes from a long line of super-patriots, yet he puts on a cape to go swimming? He does look kinda like Tony Stark though...
I'm a bit surprised that Scott Rand's Viking pal responded to Latin. Is that actually likely? I spent five years studying Latin and I don't respond to much of it now. It's a very convenient that they find a place where time doesn't pass, as English is probably even harder to learn than Latin. I wish I'd known about that place where time doesn't pass, it could've come in handy when I was younger. ;)
I didn't realise that Lucky Coyne spent all his time masquerading as Bat Yardley, he never flipped his lucky coin once. But at least he was lucky enough not to die in that drive by shooting. Oh well, things changed when Harry Chesler was in charge...
Thanks for your comments, I'm glad you found at least some of Top Notch okay
All the best
K1ngcat
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Top Notch Comics 01 (1 of 29)
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=22232
The Pearl Harbour Peril - The Wizard.
One/ as depicted here the Wizard is a privileged WASP and most recent hero in a line of them stretching from the War of Independence.
His superpower is 'brain power' No, actually its brain power, money and networking.
He invented what is termed a universal solvent but the catch with that is - What do you keep it in?
He is a combination one man Doc Savage and Verne's Robur the conqueror.
Okay Panther, I know that the Wizard is a privileged WASP, but surely so are Bruce Wayne and Tony Stark and they continue to be fairly popular. Money and networking are still useful in the fight against crime and disguised Japanese. Admittedly the long line of patriotic forbears gets a bit sickening though. I think Doc Savage could probably wipe the floor with him!
Thanks for all the fascinating info on Lucky Coyne though. Didn't realise he'd been recycled so many times. I wouldn't worry too much about the disappearing posts, I get that a lot but I usually put it down to my combining gin with prescription painkillers late at night!
Thanks for your input
All the best
K1ngcat
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Okay Panther, I know that the Wizard is a privileged WASP, but surely so are Bruce Wayne and Tony Stark and they continue to be fairly popular. Money and networking are still useful in the fight against crime and disguised Japanese.
Kingcat, I wasn't intending to make value judgements, just outlining the obvious.
Oh, of course money and networking are highly important for superheroes, as well as for the rest of us in real life.
Bruce Wayne, for example, currently has a very extensive network of friends, associates and colleagues.
Three + Robins, 3 Batgirls, one functioning also as Oracle, (the Superhero communication network), relationships with more than one commissioner of police, family connections with the Al Ghul's, the JLA, the Outsiders, 'the big three' - It goes on and on!
But that early origin of the Wizard was the full cliche of a Pulp 'Brainiac' hero of the time. It read like the writer threw everything in but the kitchen sink! That's what I was trying to point out.
Also, in having to re -write that review I neglected to write that the similarity of the styles leads me to believe that all the 'Dramatic' stories in that book were written by the same person.
cheers!
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I read somewhere that due to the number of Jewish-Americans in the comic industry at that time, some comic book stories, like those involving Superman, were actually warning of the dangers before the war. Interesting to read in terms of time and context.
Nope, not Superman.
Here is the real story - which every comic fan needs to know.
The History Behind Captain America Punching Hitler
https://www.cbr.com/the-history-behind-captain-america-punching-hitler/
It was an act on the part of Simon and Kirby [ Jacob Kurtzberg] that took real Chutzpah!
Thanks for that. I've read the article. I have a few volumes of Superman's early years and there was at least one that featured Hitler, but it must have been later.
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https://tradingeconomics.com/russia/stock-market
Thanks for that. I've read the article. I have a few volumes of Superman's early years and there was at least one that featured Hitler, but it must have been later.
There a site with some NAZI propaganda articles that has a critque of a Superman comic in which Supe kidnaps Hitler, Musolini and Tojo and carries them to the Hague to face war crimes charges.
The author of the piece went into a snit over the German soldiers in the story speaking High German AKA Yiddish.
I had a reprint of a very early Superman story in which as Clark Kent he had gone to war as a volunteer in some un named 30's war (perhaps the Spanish Civil War or the Gran Chaco War) and acting as a sniper he had used his ultra keen eyesight to aid in killing a number of enemy troops. Later when he realized he himself was invulnerable to bullets and armed soldiers posed no threat to him he had a crisis of conscience and vowed never to take another human life no matter what the circumstances.
Ever read that one?
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https://tradingeconomics.com/russia/stock-market
Thanks for that. I've read the article. I have a few volumes of Superman's early years and there was at least one that featured Hitler, but it must have been later.
There a site with some NAZI propaganda articles that has a critque of a Superman comic in which Supe kidnaps Hitler, Musolini and Tojo and carries them to the Hague to face war crimes charges.
The author of the piece went into a snit over the German soldiers in the story speaking High German AKA Yiddish.
I had a reprint of a very early Superman story in which as Clark Kent he had gone to war as a volunteer in some un named 30's war (perhaps the Spanish Civil War or the Gran Chaco War) and acting as a sniper he had used his ultra keen eyesight to aid in killing a number of enemy troops. Later when he realized he himself was invulnerable to bullets and armed soldiers posed no threat to him he had a crisis of conscience and vowed never to take another human life no matter what the circumstances.
Ever read that one?
I don't think I've read that one. But I have the book 'Superman: The War Years 1938-1945' by Roy Thomas and there's a 1938 one in there where he goes to the fictitious country of San Monte to stop a war. I've just had a quick look and I don't think it's the one you mean though. That same volume also has a 1940 two-page Superman comic commissioned by Look Magazine in which Superman takes Hitler and Stalin to Geneva where the League of Nations declares them guilty of war crimes. The book was a recent acquisition and I haven't quite finished it. Makes for interesting reading.
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Superman takes Hitler and Stalin to Geneva where the League of Nations declares them guilty of war crimes
Right, the League of Nations rather than the Hague.
There are a lot of issues of popular comics that are very hard to track down. One I remember being hard to find was the issue where Batman was revealed to wear a bullet proof vest under his costume during a fight with tommygun armed crooks in an airship. Far as I know that was the only issue in which he was positively shown to wear body armor. Though during that time frame the illustrators always drew him with an outsized chest compared to his limbs and head.
Flexible body armor of that era was made of specially woven silk about one inch thick. It could stop pistol bullets of fairly low velocity like the .45 ACP or .38 Special but not rifle bullets or higher velocity pistol bullets like the 9MM Luger or 7.63 Mauser. Natural silk can be nearly as tough as Kevlar.
The woven silk armor was also used in WW1 as a machinegunners cape that stopped most grenade ans shell fragments. A Cape of this sort was used by a character developed by Ron L Hubbard , a warlord in an alternate history where WW1 had never truly ended in Europe.
I'm suprised more mortal super heros didn't wear some sort of armor, considering Captain America's uniform had built in armor. Tony Stark carried it to extremes.
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Okay Panther, I know that the Wizard is a privileged WASP, but surely so are Bruce Wayne and Tony Stark and they continue to be fairly popular. Money and networking are still useful in the fight against crime and disguised Japanese.
Kingcat, I wasn't intending to make value judgements, just outlining the obvious.
Oh, of course money and networking are highly important for superheroes, as well as for the rest of us in real life.
Bruce Wayne, for example, currently has a very extensive network of friends, associates and colleagues.
Three + Robins, 3 Batgirls, one functioning also as Oracle, (the Superhero communication network), relationships with more than one commissioner of police, family connections with the Al Ghul's, the JLA, the Outsiders, 'the big three' - It goes on and on!
But that early origin of the Wizard was the full cliche of a Pulp 'Brainiac' hero of the time. It read like the writer threw everything in but the kitchen sink! That's what I was trying to point out.
Also, in having to re -write that review I neglected to write that the similarity of the styles leads me to believe that all the 'Dramatic' stories in that book were written by the same person.
cheers!
Sorry Panther, wasn't trying to make value judgements, just an observation. The rich and idle often seem to turn to crime fighting, perhaps to salve their consciences at being so goddamn rich and idle. We see relatively few poor crime fighters, perhaps you'd consider Spiderman as an example? I have yet to see a homeless person gain super powers though I'm not entirely up to date with the modern comic scene. There are as far as I know no facially disfigured superheroes, and sure as shit there ain't no fat ones! Anyway, no harm intended, the Wizard is as you say, incredibly clichéd and there's no tension in the tale because he wins at everything all the time.
Appreciate your input
All the best
K1ngcat
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Ragman might qualify as poor. Fatman, The Human Flying Saucer. The Blimp - Inferior 5. Cap Marvel Jr.
Thunderbolt Jaxon. Leopard From Lime St.
You're right K1ngcat.
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Sorry Panther, wasn't trying to make value judgements, just an observation. The rich and idle often seem to turn to crime fighting, perhaps to salve their consciences at being so goddamn rich and idle. We see relatively few poor crime fighters, perhaps you'd consider Spiderman as an example? I have yet to see a homeless person gain super powers though I'm not entirely up to date with the modern comic scene. There are as far as I know no facially disfigured superheroes, and sure as shit there ain't no fat ones! Anyway, no harm intended, the Wizard is as you say, incredibly clichéd and there's no tension in the tale because he wins at everything all the time.
Appreciate your input
All the best
K1ngcat
Wasn't ACG's "Herbie" a fat superhero? He was disgustingly obese, but became very strong and could perform athletic and otherwise super feats.
And Quality's "Blimpy", had been an obese, Bhudda-style, stone statue, who came to life, and was made very strong, and was given the power of "shape shifting", and used it to capture criminals and other wrongdoers, might also be considered a "superhero". He could turn back to stone, instantly, just as villains were about to hit him.
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I read somewhere that due to the number of Jewish-Americans in the comic industry at that time, some comic book stories, like those involving Superman, were actually warning of the dangers before the war. Interesting to read in terms of time and context.
Nope, not Superman.
Here is the real story - which every comic fan needs to know.
The History Behind Captain America Punching Hitler
https://www.cbr.com/the-history-behind-captain-america-punching-hitler/
It was an act on the part of Simon and Kirby [ Jacob Kurtzberg] that took real Chutzpah!
Just a PS to my last comment. I still remember reading something about Jewish writers and illustrators at the time, but can't find it now. It may have been in a library book I read. There may have been different motivations behind the wartime stories that different companies put out.
But I did find something regards the timeline. I borrowed a book from the library called 'Marvel Year by Year: A Visual History' and it's the 2022 edition. According to that, the cover with Captain America punching Hitler was March 1941. Superman was fighting Nazis before that. I have the book "Superman: The War Years 1938-1945" by Roy Thomas. One of the stories included is a two-page story in which Superman takes Hitler and Stalin to Geneva to appear before the League of Nations (that I mentioned in another post) and that's dated February 1940, so more than a year before Captain America took them on.
Thanks for the link you sent. It's interesting to see these stories against the backdrop of the times. I also like the Silver Age Iron Man stories set during the Cold War. Lots of food for thought.
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I'm suprised more mortal super heros didn't wear some sort of armor, considering Captain America's uniform had built in armor. Tony Stark carried it to extremes.
I have a volume of the first Iron Man comics from 1963-1964, and I love it. Lots of interesting stories around the Cold War. He had three pretty rapid changes in costume (from heavy grey iron, to gold, to the lightweight gold and red), but definitely a step above in terms of body armour.
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There are as far as I know no facially disfigured superheroes,
Ironjaw? As far as i know there were two Iron Jaws, the golden age one, I think, is a villain and I think the British one is a hero. Please correct me.
There have been several occasions when TwoFace has operated as a hero. And how about Metamorpho?
and sure as shit there ain't no fat ones!
Sorry Blues Man, as Paw has pointed out, there are several. Bouncing Boy [LSH] is another example.
Also there are several weight-challenged sidekicks.
Woozy Winks and Kid Eternity's mentor/sidekick come to mind .
I have yet to see a homeless person gain super powers though I'm not entirely up to date with the modern comic scene.
The Turtles? Living in a sewer?
In the Golden Age, surely Billy Batson qualifies, he was a street kid at the beginning was he not? As was Freddy? Scott Free and Big Barda at the beginning of their careers, are stateless refugees technically, As is J'on J'onz.
And what about Kirby's DC street kid gangs? We never see parents or homes in those books.
Now I think about it, after his Dad died, who took care of Matt Murdock and got him through college?
Even when he started his legal practice, Bruce Wayne he was not!
Which brings up a subject dear to my heart, to whit, the absence of parents, and more often than not, family, and the prevalence of orphans in the back-stories of Superheroes. Particularly in the Golden Age.
Off we go on another tangent! I love it! Ain't we got fun!
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Wasn't ACG's "Herbie" a fat superhero? He was disgustingly obese, but became very strong and could perform athletic and otherwise super feats.
Plus adult women swooned over Herbie. Some serious wish fulfillment on Richard Hughes' part. The triumph of the underdog was a central theme of a vast number of Hughes' stories. You gotta figure it grew from some aspect of his personality.
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Top Notch time!
The Wizard annoyed the heck out of me! The guy can do anything. I got the strong impression that in person he'd be a condescending jerk. But he saves Pearl Harbor, so let him be. The story wastes a lot of space on the Whitney family tree, some of which is confusing...if his father was killed in WWI, how did ol' Blane get here? Maybe that was his uncle or something. Anyway, after the pedigree and life history, there's room only for a laundry list of stuff The Wiz does to foil the Jatsonian plot. The corker is when he figures out exactly what the plot is and where the bomb is by standing for one panel stroking his chin. Does he have psychic powers along with everything else? At least Edd Ashe's drawings are a cut above typical 1939 comic book art.
Scott Rand has a certain charm. It moves at a ridiculous pace and our time travellers crash through history like bulls in a china shop. No Bradbury effect here. Menaced by Romans? Pull out a tommy gun and mow 'em down! I'm not sure exactly what they plan to do with their time car. In this episode they seem just to be out looking for a fight. I did appreciate that our heroes had to teach their new sidekicks English. This remains a rarity in time-travel comics to this very day. Jack Binder's art is still rough, but he got better. One thing that tripped me up was Otto's habit of putting all the captions on the bottom of the panel, even if it made sense to read them first.
Swift of the Secret Service, according to the GCD, was drawn by Charles Biro. He wasn't much of an artist but this is better than a lot of his work. The captions are really messed up in this story. One two-part caption even skips a panel between halves. Several misspellings further mar the text. And the story ends abruptly. Come to think of it, so did the time car story. I guess everyone was still figuring out how to tell comic book stories.
Jungle Town Show Boat is plain weird. It reads like a newspaper strip from the 1910s. The art is equally old-fashioned.
Air Patrol is notable for its really nice Irv Novick art job. Until the final panel I thought Von Schiller was in the last German plane. Guess not.
I usually bypass text stories but I skimmed Murder Rap. It was practically one long fight scene. Tough pulp magazine stuff. Is this Lucky Coyne's debut? If so he forgot to flip a coin.
It's Really a Fact! Or is it? Did Charles "Zimmy" Zimmerman perform those diving and swimming feats without legs???
Lucky Coyne is back, this time as a G-man. Only we don't know the story's about him because it's really about Bat Yardley. This reads like the second half of a serial, but this is the first issue of Top Notch, so I assume the writer was following the pulp author's trick of starting his story in the middle. Still no coin, though.
Lonesome Luke: Well, at least the verse scans.
(To be concluded)
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It's Really a Fact! Or is it? Did Charles "Zimmy" Zimmerman perform those diving and swimming feats without legs???
Mmmm, that got me thinking, so I looked him up. Found this link: https://www.harlemworldmagazine.com/charles-zimmy-the-human-fish-zibelman-at-the-harlem-hospital-1937/
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Amazing! Thanks for finding that piece about "Zimmy." Now I wonder why the comic feature didn't stress the fact that he had no legs. I thought the drawing might have been a printer's error. Cool that he could float forever because without legs his body was unusually buoyant.
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Amazing! Thanks for finding that piece about "Zimmy." Now I wonder why the comic feature didn't stress the fact that he had no legs. I thought the drawing might have been a printer's error. Cool that he could float forever because without legs his body was unusually buoyant.
They mentioned he was legless in the blurb under the picture, but it was easy to miss. Amazing that he could do all of those feats. I'd never heard of him either, so just did a quick google search to see if it was true.
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There are as far as I know no facially disfigured superheroes,
Ironjaw? As far as i know there were two Iron Jaws, the golden age one, I think, is a villain and I think the British one is a hero. Please correct me.
There have been several occasions when TwoFace has operated as a hero. And how about Metamorpho?
and sure as shit there ain't no fat ones!
Sorry Blues Man, as Paw has pointed out, there are several. Bouncing Boy [LSH] is another example.
Also there are several weight-challenged sidekicks.
Woozy Winks and Kid Eternity's mentor/sidekick come to mind .
I have yet to see a homeless person gain super powers though I'm not entirely up to date with the modern comic scene.
The Turtles? Living in a sewer?
In the Golden Age, surely Billy Batson qualifies, he was a street kid at the beginning was he not? As was Freddy? Scott Free and Big Barda at the beginning of their careers, are stateless refugees technically, As is J'on J'onz.
And what about Kirby's DC street kid gangs? We never see parents or homes in those books.
Now I think about it, after his Dad died, who took care of Matt Murdock and got him through college?
Even when he started his legal practice, Bruce Wayne he was not!
Which brings up a subject dear to my heart, to whit, the absence of parents, and more often than not, family, and the prevalence of orphans in the back-stories of Superheroes. Particularly in the Golden Age.
Off we go on another tangent! I love it! Ain't we got fun!
Now I know Iron Jaw the Nazi villain, I don't know any other Iron Jaws except Atlas's Iron Jaw the Barbarian, who's not a superhero, just a very unfortunate version of Conan. Metamorpho was Rex Mason, an ordinary human, who spends a lot of time trying to escape his bizarre transformation and get back to being an ordinary human.
All the fat "heroes" are still really jokes or humour features. The Inferior Five, Fatman, Blimpy, and Woozy are all humour features or comic relief. Herbie is still dubious because as Robb point out he's "disgustingly obese" so the fact that women might swoon over him is still just a fat shaming joke. After all what woman could ever love a fat man? Even Bouncing Boy's powers are based on his girth, not his heroic nature.
I'll give you Freddy Freeman, though even he had to live somewhere albeit a "boarding house"? But I don't think powers have ever been granted to someone living in a cardboard box on the Embankment. I'm not sure about Kid Gangs, presumably they had homes and parents who weren't important to the plot?
And as the panel blurb says, it's not generally known that the famous Ragman is the owner of the Daily Herald newspaper, so probably not entirely homeless. Anyhow I'm very impressed by Zimmy the Fish, he sounds like a real life superhero, though he could've had a more dramatic name!
Appreciate all the suggestions, thanks people.
All the best
K1ngcat
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Tommy Troy. Ragman the DC1976 hero was a Vietnam vet, I remember. His origin confused me about his background.
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Which brings up a subject dear to my heart, to whit, the absence of parents, and more often than not, family, and the prevalence of orphans in the back-stories of Superheroes. Particularly in the Golden Age.
It's a surefire way to present a child hero without getting bogged down by mundane stuff like going to school, being home by dinner, and helping with the dishes. It's somewhat easier now with so many single-working-parent families and two-earner households in which the kids are frequently home alone. But in Golden and Silver Age comics Mom was always home and the whole family was together until bedtime. Unless their parents were in on the secret like the Kents were, superkids had to continually practice subterfuges and invent excuses for leaving the house or coming in late. I'm thinking of the Tomboy strip (in Sterling's Captain Flash), in which Janie pretends to be terrified by crime news and "hides" in her room so she can sneak out the bedroom window. It's hard to believe that never once did her mother, wishing to comfort her, enter Janie's room and discover that she'd flown the coop. This is the same complaint I have with superheroes whose civilian identity is a cop. Sooner or later the chief is going to get fed up with an officer who always disappears when the action starts, only to turn up later with a lame excuse.
So kid heroes are either self-sufficient orphans like Freddy Freeman or, like the Newsboy Legion, under the care of a sympathetic adult who presumably provides meals and shelter. Or, of course, the sidekick of a guardian who's also a superhero like Catman and Kitten. In these cases the child is invariably an orphan for the same reason as before: to free him or her from accountability to their parents. Imagine what a different world it would have been if Dick Grayson had living parents whom he constantly had to hoodwink so he could duck out and fight crime alongside kindly Uncle Bruce. And wouldn't Dr W have liked that!
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Tommy Troy. Ragman the DC1976 hero was a Vietnam vet, I remember. His origin confused me about his background.
Sorry paw, didn't realise we were talking about different Ragmen. I probably wasn't reading much DC in 1976. Didn't Tommy Troy come from an orphanage or similar place run by a corrupt and nasty Mr Creacher, who was defeated by The Fly in the first couple of issues? Where he lived after that I'm honestly not sure.
And, fair enough, Billy Batson was also an orphan and as much a "street kid" as Freddy Freeman, I'm must admit I was thinking more about the huge numbers of rough sleepers and cardboard-box dwellers than people (or beings) rendered stateless by virtue of arriving on this planet from another world. I loved Kirby's "fourth world" in DC but I'm darned if I can remember where Scott Free lived. I also never came across Two Face as a hero, these darn writers will try anything! :D
Looking forward to crash's final words on Top Notch
All the best
K1ngcat
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The rich and idle often seem to turn to crime fighting, perhaps to salve their consciences at being so goddamn rich and idle.
There's an old saying, "I work 8 hours, I sleep 8 hours that leaves 8 hours for fun." The rich and idle have 16 hours for fun (assuming your idea of fun is wearing a weird costume and beating up flamboyant criminals. ;) )
We see relatively few poor crime fighters
[As Jack Nicholson's Joker] Where would they get those magnificent toys? ;) Being a superhero is an expensive hobby.
In the 1970s Man-Bat had a series in Batman Family and part of his gimmick was collecting the rewards on the criminals he caught.
Apparently the later Mr. Scarlet & Pinky stories had the heroes travelling the country because they were so good at stopping criminals Mr. Scarlet was fired as DA.
There are as far as I know no facially disfigured superheroes
That would make it tough to keep an identity secret. "Gosh, Bob, isn't it odd that you and Superdude have matching scars on your cheek?" ;)
There was, however, a pulp hero called the Black Bat whom I believe had facial scars and he sorta made the transition to comics, but he had to change his name because of some other company's bat-named hero.
For a brief period in the 90s the Thing of the Fantastic Four had his face sliced by Wolverine's claws, and later Mr. Fantastic had his face scarred by Doctor Doom using magic.
In an issue of Batman Family (1970s again) Man-Bat teamed up with the Demon, and a cop said to his partner, something like, "Remember when heroes were good-looking?"
There's a manga called Buso Renkin, while not technically superheroes, the author was a big fan of the X-Men and it has a superhero feel to it and the lead female has a scar across her face (https://busorenkin.fandom.com/wiki/Tokiko_Tsumura).
the fact that women might swoon over him is still just a fat shaming joke.
How is that fat shaming?
It's your basic inversion joke. People attracted to someone they wouldn't normally be attracted to. The humor is the same whether the person is fat, a 98 pound weakling, or a duck. (Although in real life ugly guys can get women swooning over them... if they're rich or a rock star. ;) )
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The most disfigured (sort of) super hero would be "Unknown Soldier" who had almost all the flesh blasted from his head by a grenade early in WW2. Plastic surgery of the day could do little so his head (which was never seen till a single shocking episode) looked like a red skull.
He explored the limits of prosthetics and make up and found he could impersonate anyone he could get a photograph of. He became a OSS agent, saboteur and assassin.
The Unknown Soldier inspired the creation of "Darkman" who appeared in several films. He was a scientist tortured and his face and hands doused with acid by gangsters who set fire to his lab which resulted in his already horribly disfigured hands and face being burned beyond recognition. He used his invention, a sythetic skin, to create new faces to impersonate those he wished to torment and set up for destruction. The synthetic flesh was only temporary so he worked against a time limit.
There may have been a comic version of the original story written by Sam Rami.
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There may have been a comic version of the original story written by Sam Rami.
Yeah, there was.And a sequel anyway.
How come I didn't know that until now?
Darkman (1993 comic)
https://darkman.fandom.com/wiki/Darkman_(1993_comic)
2 miniseries apparently.
Darkman
https://comicvine.gamespot.com/darkman/4005-42133/
And a crossover with Army of Darkness? !
Thank you Captain!
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These two were a great way to finish off the summer. When I was a kid, golden age comics would take me days to read, and never at a sitting. You’d always have to come back to them.
WONDERWORLD I liked better because you had Eisner and his future superstars when they were still making their bones. The quality story to story was pretty consistent and you didn’t have that drop off you sometimes get in golden age comics when you get one or two great stories at the front followed by whatever they had in the bullpen that month.
TOP NOTCH seemed a bit more static to me with the panels so rigidly in place you could use them as rulers. The art didn’t grab me as much as the Young Bob and Will from WONDERWOLD, but what could? ‘Crash was dead on about the zombie’s (or whatever they are) in WONDERWOLD. Those would be right at home in an E.C. book.
You would have been happy as a kid to invested the dime for either of these two.
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Thanks SS for the interesting collection of scarred heroes, I'm afraid I've completely forgotten Deadpool, who manages to cover up his scars with an all-over costume. I don't think he has anything that you'd really call a secret Identity.
BTW, I still think Herbie has a fat-shaming element to it inasmuch as if they wrote the same comic without a fat hero, people wouldn't find it as funny. But I take it you've never been fat? ;)
Thanks also to the Captain for reminding me I forgot about Darkman, who like Deadpool had more than just facial scarring.
And thanks too to Morgus, glad you enjoyed the choices, I don't think Top Notch beats Wonderworld either but rigid or not the art in it beats an awful lot of what was being published at the time.
Appreciate all the input
All the best
K1ngcat
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Time to reopen Top Notch #1 and check out the middle and bottom notches.
In the title panel The Mystic appears to be a Mandrake-style magician but he proves to be a non-powered stage magician instead. The story is rather rudimentary and the only time The Mystic's magic skills enter the picture is when the crooks put him into the trick coffin they found in his car. Kind of silly if you stop to think about it: "They're out cold! Let's toss 'em in the lake!" "No, let's look in the trunk instead. Oh, look! A collapsible coffin! We'll use that!" That's why you don't stop to think about it. The artwork isn't bad.
A quick page of word puzzles (they forgot "heel" and "thigh" on the first one), then the issue ends with a whimper. The Westpointer reads like a narrated slide show rather than a story. What little interest there might have been is sucked out by the deadly dull presentation. The art is okay.
Bob McCay seems to have felt overshadowed by his famous dad. Bob was always trying to make Winsor's ideas pay off for him, even to the point of calling himself "Winsor McCay II" and "Winsor McCay, Jr." It's not that his stuff was that bad, it's just a bit sad that he never developed his own artistic personality.
One thing I wanted to mention was the use of an odd narrative device that appeared in some Golden Age stories. This is the caption which is a sentence fragment written in the progressive tense that describes the action in a panel. An example is in our page 47, panel 5. The Mystic is tied to a chair. The caption reads:
"Struggling to slip his bonds..."
I've never seen this construction in a newspaper comic strip, only in comic books. "Diving into the lake..." "Crashing through the wall..." It was so common in certain Better/Nedor stories that I thought it might be the personal quirk of a particular writer. But here it is a couple of years earlier. Most captions would say, "The Mystic struggles to slip his bonds..." or something similar. Interestingly (to me, anyway) I've found this construction in Golden Age Italian comics. Not so much in French comics and never in British ones.
This brings us to the end of Top Notch #1. The stories are kind of lame, but some of the art is pretty good and I'm always interested to see early GA comics because good or bad, many have that flavor of young creators eagerly experimenting with their new medium.
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One thing I wanted to mention was the use of an odd narrative device that appeared in some Golden Age stories. This is the caption which is a sentence fragment written in the progressive tense that describes the action in a panel. An example is in our page 47, panel 5. The Mystic is tied to a chair. The caption reads:
"Struggling to slip his bonds..."
I've never seen this construction in a newspaper comic strip, only in comic books. "Diving into the lake..." "Crashing through the wall..." It was so common in certain Better/Nedor stories that I thought it might be the personal quirk of a particular writer. But here it is a couple of years earlier. Most captions would say, "The Mystic struggles to slip his bonds..." or something similar. Interestingly (to me, anyway) I've found this construction in Golden Age Italian comics. Not so much in French comics and never in British ones.
This brings us to the end of Top Notch #1. The stories are kind of lame, but some of the art is pretty good and I'm always interested to see early GA comics because good or bad, many have that flavor of young creators eagerly experimenting with their new medium.
That was interesting about the use of captions. I hadn't thought of that. There's another unusual one on p. 48 where it shows the rear-view mirror and the caption 'What they saw...' It's almost like it steps out of the story to give the information. I agree it's interesting to look at these older comics, even when some of the stories aren't brilliant, because it's good to see the early writers and artists trying out ideas.
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Review of Top Notch Comics 1
The Wizard
Not a magician like Mandrake, who can use magic to perform impossible feats, but a super-genius engineer, who can design machines of the future, which can travel at super speeds, have impregnable walls, skins, or shells, turn things invisible, etc. , and he can perform stage-style illusions and escapes. Disguised as an ultra upper class playboy, he seems not to be a sympathetic hero with whom common comic book readers can easily identify. This is yet another late 1930s US spy story which presages Japanese plans to attack The US Military bases in Hawaii (specifically, Pearl Harbor). That jibes with the fact that it has been postulated, many times, that US Military Intelligence actually knew about The Japanese plans to bomb Pearl Harbor well before, but didn't do anything about it, as they wanted an excuse to declare war on not only Japan, but also Germany. The fact that The US Navy had its three giant aircraft carriers away at sea, on maneuvers at the time of the attack (allowing them to keep their naval power edge over The Japanese Navy), might seem to many, more than just a lucky coincidence, and could seem to support the theory of their "allowing" the attack to result in such large destruction.
The fact that this is the introduction story for The Wizard added a lot of extra pages of showing his ancestors serving their country, and showing how he became who he is today. Of the 11 story pages (counting the title page), only 5 of them show the actual story in current action. Two whole pages showing his ancestors' dedication to serving their country, with 2 more lost to his own accomplishments in youth takes up half of the story pages. That, to me, is too big a chunk, and so takes away a lot of punch from the story
Scott Rand, in The Worlds of Time
Just as many different publishers' "showcase" monthly comic books had several different genres represented, "Top Notch" had its Superhero, Detective, Military/Spy, and, of course its Sci Fi series. It was missing a Western series, so, on the verge of WWII, it could have 2 military Combat series. Scott Rand has a Time Machine, so his adventures have the possibility to be more interesting to readers by having more variability in their settings. The machine's inventor(Dr. Meade), and Rand's boss, decided they would first go to Rome, at the height of The Empire, in 200 A.D. (I would have chosen A.D. 117). And the author has a Viking (Scandinavian-or North Germanic) attack on the capital city. The time machine (which seems also to be a rocket ship) flies over Rome's harbour, and views a Viking longboat. I'm sure they didn't have longboats that could make cross-sea voyages at that early date (only smaller boats that could hug the shore). Rand and Dr. Meade rescue the last Viking into their ship, and converse with him in "Old Latin". Then they set the timer to Ancient Egypt, where they find a young woman being sacrificed on The Egyptian god Ishtar's altar. (Actually, Ishtar was a Canaanite god - NOT Egyptian). Rand and Thor rescue the woman, but they are trapped by a large group of Egyptians. But Meade shoots them all down with a machine gun, from the Rocket Ship. Meade suspends the ship in a "timeless zone", so they can teach the woman and Thor English. After seemingly hundreds or thousands of "timeless" hours, they have learned enough to communicate, and the group travels to the time of the dinosaurs (only 10 million years ago). Some very funny-looking dinosaurs. As usual, the research done for comic book stories in the late 1930s and early '40s is pretty weak (if any was done at all). As the episode ends Meade sets the dial to 1940 A.D.
The artwork is variable from very good to weak. The story idea is good. But it could have been carried out much better.
Sports personality Page - Boxer, Joe Louis
Good bit of information, excellent likenesses of Louis and Lou Nova (drawn from photos, no doubt).
Swift of The Secret Service
Is that REALLY a WWII US Navy Admiral's uniform???? It looks, to me, more like a European one from the late 1800s. This is only a 6-page story. So, it is very short and choppy, but to the point. As a storywriter and artist, I would rather have had at least 10 pages to tell this story. Even 2 more would have helped a lot. Reminds me of "Dragnet" (Badge 714). Jack Webb. Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! "Just the facts, Ma'm!" No extras whatsoever!
Jungle Town Show Boat
nice, cartoony, artwork by Dick Ryan. Just as it was in Chesler and Centaur books. he worked for MLJ for a few years, too. Silly gags. But interesting late 1800s-style cartoon art.
Air Patrol - Sky Raiders of The Western Front
The British and Americans were way behind The Germans in aircraft technology at the start of WWII. The hero fighter pilot has a flashback to his youth during WWI, but the transition from panels set in the story's current timeframe and those from the flashback are not marked in ANY way (no narrative boxes, footnotes or other indications). I guess comic book story writers were still just experimenting at this time. But, if I am not mistaken breaks between time gaps and flashbacks had already been used in newspaper comic strip continuing stories more than several years before 1941 (probably as far back as the beginning of the 1930s, or even during the 1920s). So, there is no valid excuse for this oversight that is awkward for the reader, and takes him or her out of "living in" the flow of the story. However, I DO like the plot device of having a WWI bad experience by the hero with a villain, give him the chance to inflict punishment on him. The artwork is very nice, and the action is excellent. It held my interest all the way. But, sadly that just points out that the episode is excruciatingly short (at only 5 pages).
Murder Rap - Lucky Coyne Text Story
A super-long 4 pager text Lucky Coyne Detective story. I looked forward to this, as I have generally liked the plots and story telling in action-based GA comics text stories more than the fully-drawn comics stories (probably because the cartoon stories generally have way too few pages to avoid being choppy and leaving out pertinent information). I first read Lucky Coyne as a mid 1940s Canadian Dime Comics reissue of the US Chesler or Centaur comic (probably Dynamic). The story was quite complicated for such a short story (even given four pages of text. It was okay, but nothing special. Kind of unbelievable
that one detective could enter a room filled with 4 thugs, and defeat them, and bring them ALL to the police station to be arrested, only with a little help from an 18 year old girl, who was on the thugs' side when he entered their hotel room.
Lucky Coyne - Undercover Man
Coyne, disguised as hood, Bat Yardley, pretends to deliver Jewels stolen from a Robbery to a gang waiting in his hotel room, and sets them up to be arrested. He only uses a slightly-different coloured and textured wig as his disguise. He has a girlfriend who also is a government secret agent (FBI?), who doubles as a gang moll, and her disguise is a slightly different-coloured wig. Why is it that full-haired wigs ATOP one's own full head of hair, fills EXACTLY the SAME volume that the natural head of hair does. EVEN IF the wig is pulled down to the point of pressing on the head enough to cause a headache, shouldn't the total of the 2 heads of hair be at LEAST 1.5 times as voluminous alone head of hair???
Lonesome Luke Gag
Terribly boring, and unfunny gag. The artwork is nice, but wasted.
The Mystic
With the success of turban topped mystics at the beginning of the 1940s, almost every publisher had their mysterious Eastern mystic in one or another of their showcase anthology monthlies. But, I am shocked that MLJ didn't give theirs a catchy and exotic-sounding name, to try to make him memorable. And the villains are just referred to as the generic "The Gang", instead of giving them a terrifying -sounding gang leader name, and gang name that would provide some colour and memorability. Naturally, The Mystic, in addition to having mystical powers (sees all, knows all), and probably can communicate through mental telepathy, but he is, of course, an escape artist.
They have the weirdly-worded, passively constructed narrative panels (i.e. "Into the car the couple jump."). Then they have whole pages of weirdly-constructed narratives stating exactly what the reader can clearly see in the panel drawings. A big No-No! - according to every story editor I've ever had. And some panels are totally wasted, when they could be used to show more pertinent action. The Mystic and his ladyfriend were captured by the gang, and placed in his stage act's "escape coffin", and throw it into the ocean (ostensibly to drown them). But, of course, they use his trick open side to escape, and the story ends abruptly, without the criminals coming to justice. And the author wasted the last 2 panels with The Mystic explaining to his lady how he saved them. At LEAST, they could have used the last 2 panels to explain how they escaped to the criminals, who are in a jail cell, saying "Bah!" and "Curses!"
What an absolutely terribly constructed excuse for a story! It is an example of just about everything to NOT do!
The West Pointer
We get the story of a hard-working, poor, young man who wants to attend West Point Academy, and become a US Army officer. The bulk of the story shows highlights of his sporting achievements at West Point. It's basically the set-up introduction for the series. It's a bit dull, and the artwork is bland. The figures are well-proportioned and move well in the action scenes, but there is very little detail in the faces, and very sparse backgrounds.
Impy Gag
Nice art, as usual. But not a very clever or interesting gag.
Speaking of Sports
Mildly interesting US sports facts.
Manhunters - Case 1 - Master Forgers
True Stories from The US FBI Files? We learn how some forgers were caught. Interesting information about forgery technology from 100 to 75 years ago. The artwork is passable, but a bit crude.
Pokey Kangaroo Gag
Another well-drawn, but boring Funny Animal, rhyming narrative, gag page by Dick Ryan.
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That jibes with the fact that it has been stated many times that US Military Intelligence actually knew about The Japanese plans to bomb Pearl Harbor well before, but didn't do anything about it, as they wanted an excuse to declare war on not only Japan, but also Germany. The fact that The US Navy had its three giant aircraft carriers away at sea, on maneuvers at the time of the attack (allowing them to keep their naval power edge over The Japanese Navy, seems more than a lucky coincidence, and supports the theory of "allowing" the attack to result in such large destruction.
that is a conspiracy theory which personally offends me a great deal.
This sort of thing should never be stated as a fact, since it is pure speculation, no matter how many times it has been 'stated'.
Rather say, 'It has been postulated'. That's how gossip becomes translated as indisputable fact. A well-known propaganda technique.
1/ The fact that Japan attacked when a great part of the fleet was out at sea, would be a sensible logistical decision on the part of the attacking admiral. The kind of decision that has been made by aggressors as long as we have had warfare.
2/ It also a constant that nations that consider themselves invulnerable discount and dismiss the possibility that an enemy would even consider attacking them even in the face of credible intelligence to the contrary.
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That jibes with the fact that it has been stated many times that US Military Intelligence actually knew about The Japanese plans to bomb Pearl Harbor well before, but didn't do anything about it, as they wanted an excuse to declare war on not only Japan, but also Germany. The fact that The US Navy had its three giant aircraft carriers away at sea, on maneuvers at the time of the attack (allowing them to keep their naval power edge over The Japanese Navy, seems more than a lucky coincidence, and supports the theory of "allowing" the attack to result in such large destruction.
that is a conspiracy theory which personally offends me a great deal.
This sort of thing should never be stated as a fact, since it is pure speculation, no matter how many times it has been 'stated'.
Rather say, 'It has been postulated'. That's how gossip becomes translated as indisputable fact. A well-known propaganda technique.
1/ The fact that Japan attacked when a great part of the fleet was out at sea, would be a sensible logistical decision on the part of the attacking admiral. The kind of decision that has been made by aggressors as long as we have had warfare.
2/ It also a constant that nations that consider themselves invulnerable discount and dismiss the possibility that an enemy would even consider attacking them even in the face of credible intelligence to the contrary.
Sorry. I didn't mean to imply that it was "a fact" that The US Military leaders DELIBERATELY allowed such a large amount of destruction of their naval fleet, and such a lot of lives lost. But, if I remember correctly, it was reported by well-respected authorities that at least one US Military Intelligence agent did report that The Japanese had made a plan to attack Pearl Harbor. I did say that having their 3 aircraft carriers away could support the THEORY of "allowing" the attack. But, your point is well taken. So, I have changed my wording to make it clear that I did not mean to imply that it has been "proven" to be fact. It would be difficult to come up with an idea of what The US military could have done instead of what they did. They were in no position to make a pre-emptive attack. And they certainly couldn't have left Hawaii unprotected by sending their battleships out to sea, eastward towards safety of The US West Coast, especially as even if they believed that the report or reports were true, they could not be sure of when the attack would come, EVEN if the reports mentioned a planned attack date. Enemy intelligence always intentionally leaks false information to keep their foes guessing from among many possibilities.
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But I take it you've never been fat? ;)
LOL! Although that came after high school so I probably don't react to fat comments the same way people who spent their formative years overweight do. (School bullies picked on me for other reasons.)
This is yet another late 1930s US spy story which presages Japanese plans to attack The US Military bases in Hawaii (specifically, Pearl Harbor).
Wasn't Pearl Harbor the biggest US base in the Pacific? It certainly seems to be the most centrally located (they could send out ships east/west/north/south as support) so it just seems like it would be a natural target.
The Uncle Sam story in this issue of National Comics is probably the last comic story to use a fictional attack on Pearl Harbor. https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=27922
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But I take it you've never been fat? ;)
LOL! Although that came after high school so I probably don't react to fat comments the same way people who spent their formative years overweight do. (School bullies picked on me for other reasons.)
Well now you've got me pegged! Yes I was a fat kid, though school bullies also picked on me for being poor (I'd been stupid enough to win a scholarship to what the UK call a "public" school .)
If those had really been the happiest days of my life I'd've slit my wrists long ago! :D
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This is yet another late 1930s US spy story which presages Japanese plans to attack The US Military bases in Hawaii (specifically, Pearl Harbor).
Wasn't Pearl Harbor the biggest US base in the Pacific? It certainly seems to be the most centrally located (they could send out ships east/west/north/south as support) so it just seems like it would be a natural target.
The Uncle Sam story in this issue of National Comics is probably the last comic story to use a fictional attack on Pearl Harbor. https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=27922
Of course it was a natural target. And it was obvious to many, many people that The Japanese were placed in a terrible position for their war efforts in China by The US placing a ban on selling them oil and other petroleum products. And they also knew that USA would not sit back and allow them to take over much of The Pacific Rim Area and Southeast Asia. So, to be able to further their military plans in Asia, they would need to keep The Americans' striking force incapable of striking there, effectively, for as long as possible, while they, themselves would be conquering additional areas, containing the resources they needed. Of course, it was a poor (irrational) strategy and overall plan, given the industrial power, manpower, and other resources of The US, Britain, Australia, and Canada. But, they were hoping that The Germans would quickly knock Russia out of the war, and immediately afterward turn their newly greatly-increased resources in a full concentration on knocking Britain out of the war, as well.
In any case, a LOT of Americans were worried about The Japanese making an attack on Pearl Harbor, some time in 1940 or 1941. They just didn't know when it would occur. There were even blackouts all along The West Coast of USA, expecting bombing attacks by The Japanese, despite the latter having no land base within flying range.
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Yes I was a fat kid, though school bullies also picked on me....
Back in the day, you were looked askance upon if you wore glasses. I didn't only wear glasses, for a while I also wore a patch over one eye as well, so I got called four-eyes and specs and yes, I was bullied.
Oh, and at one point, I was also bullied by a fat kid who sat on me at lunch hour. believe it, or don't!
cheers!
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But I take it you've never been fat? ;)
LOL! Although that came after high school so I probably don't react to fat comments the same way people who spent their formative years overweight do. (School bullies picked on me for other reasons.)
This is yet another late 1930s US spy story which presages Japanese plans to attack The US Military bases in Hawaii (specifically, Pearl Harbor).
Wasn't Pearl Harbor the biggest US base in the Pacific? It certainly seems to be the most centrally located (they could send out ships east/west/north/south as support) so it just seems like it would be a natural target.
The Uncle Sam story in this issue of National Comics is probably the last comic story to use a fictional attack on Pearl Harbor. https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=27922
The listed shelf date of that book is December 1941. It had to have been bound, ready for sale only about 6-7 weeks before the actual attack occurred! That means it must have been written roughly only about 3 months or a little more before the attack. And, despite the stories not stating in words that the "invaders" in Hawaii and Maine were from real, currently existing countries (just called "the enemy"), it was very clear that they were The Japanese and The Germans, even using facsimiles of their current military uniforms. It's difficult to believe that such treatment would be any less controversial than actually stating which countries they were from. They were just defending their own land and people. But it seems that this would have been fodder for The US anti-war factions to claim that the book (and, thus, its publishers) were advocating that USA should join The Allies in The Wars against Germany and Japan. I'm also not sure how much less of an offence to The Governments of Germany and Japan this would be than actually saying outright the names of the attacking military units' home countries. But, I think that their agents and "friendly locals" operating in USA at that time, had a LOT more things to do than check through every American comic book issue to find offending material.
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Yes I was a fat kid, though school bullies also picked on me....
Back in the day, you were looked askance upon if you wore glasses. I didn't only wear glasses, for a while I also wore a patch over one eye as well, so I got called four-eyes and specs and yes, I was bullied.
Oh, and at one point, I was also bullied by a fat kid who sat on me at lunch hour. believe it, or don't!
cheers!
Yes, bullies will use ANY excuse they can find to pick on someone, to take the onus off themselves and their own perceived inadequacy. Personally, I would have thought wearing a patch would make you look "cool", because you'd look like a pirate! Of course that would work best with boys of younger ages. I was picked on, too. Because my family and I were Jewish. Well, we all survived it and still managed to become upstanding citizens, which, I suspect, might not be a good description of how those bullies turned out.
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Scrounge, Robb, Kingcat and myself were also (obviously) readers - that never made you popular, the word 'Nerd' did not exist then, and the Nerd 'type'; was definitely not celebrated as it is now.
Cheer!
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Scrounge, Robb, Kingcat and myself were also (obviously) readers - that never made you popular, the word 'Nerd' did not exist then, and the Nerd 'type'; was definitely not celebrated as it is now.
Cheer!
No, but in my time, they called you a "teacher's pet" if you got good academic grades, or if you were a tattler, or chummy with the teachers. I got good grades, but I was also good enough at sports, and neither a tattler nor teacher's pet. But that meant zilch to kids from homes that were taught to hate others because they are "different", or bear the sins of their long gone forefathers. In any case, I know that, at least, during the late 1940s through the 1960s, in USA, The UK, Canada, and Australia, being bullied is just one of the things a LOT of the young boys must go through. Even if they have no problem in their own class and grade level, insecure older boys will pick on younger boys, because the can. I found that the "prove yourself" fighting was more extensive and common in USA than in Canada. But in The Netherlands, Belgium, Scandinavia and Germany (at least since WWII), it was quite a bit less violent for schoolboys than I witnessed in Canada and USA. I guess the level depends upon the academic level of the school, strictness of the parents in one's neighbourhood, and economic level of the families in the neighbourhood or of the schoolboys. Fights in my schools in Canada were much, much more common than they were in The Netherlands, and those in my cousins schools in USA were even more common than in Canada. My friends in Scandinavia and Germany told me that fights were almost unknown in elementary (basis) school when they attended (from the end of the 1940s through to the early 1960s.
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Wonderworld Comics 07
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=60250
The Flame
This story is so nonsensical that Eisner and Fine would probably prefer to never speak of it again.
Attack on the Infidels
‘Except for that Hindu costume you wear’
Except that Hindus don’t wear Turbans. Sikhs wear turbans.
Because of general ignorance an innocent Sikh was murdered in the Heartland of the USA after 9/11 in the mistaken belief that he was a Muslim terrorist!
Read more at: https://www.ultraswank.net/film/korla-pandit-the-godfather-of-exotica/
https://pictolic.com/en/article/why-do-the-people-of-india-wear-a-turban-we-reveal-the-secret-of-a-spectacular-headdress.
Yarko the Great
can do anything apparently, makes you wonder why he needs a helper or even the army to come to the rescue.
Shorty Shortcake
Doesn’t appeal to me at all. Doesn’t have anything unique about it that grabs my interest.
Sabotage On the Northern Clipper [Patty O'Day]
I note she is a Newsreel reporter, not a newspaper reporter. I know photography, but I don't recognize that camera, can anybody enlighten me?
While the dialogue is obvious and dull, the story isn't too bad, the art is bad, but does the trick.
I also note that Patty gets the credit and does all the thinking, but its the man who does the physical work and the rescue!
Dr. Fung The Villain is another 'Hindu' in a turban - in a country which is predominantly Buddhist!
These stories are so elementary, that it's embarrassing trying to write anything significant about them.
Tommy Taylor in India
Those two spot illos might well be Bob Powell, they are certainly about the best art in the book.
A Hot Lead Rumba On "Crazy Woman Creek"
Also, simple, obvious and dull!
A Day at the Circus
Quite like this, it amuses me! Straight slapstick.
The Plot to Take the Philippines (5 pages)
Japanese invasion of the Philippines happened immediately after Pearl Harbour in 1941.
So, another prophetic story. Eisner must have been keeping up with news reports.
Diamonds of Death
Another comic done strictly by the numbers.
"Spark" Stevens
Tapping out Morse code with castenets? If you say so.
So, overall we get a picture that Eisner and Co, were knocking them out, in this perioud, as fast as they could with no regard to quality at all.
Can I just point out, that the number of 'views' on this fortnight's choice is up to 1445. If you are out there, thanks for checking us out and having a read, and please feel free to join in and comment!
Anyhoo, Something new tomorrow, from me, since Robb has other things to take up his time. Thanks Robb!
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Scrounge, Robb, Kingcat and myself were also (obviously) readers - that never made you popular, the word 'Nerd' did not exist then, and the Nerd 'type'; was definitely not celebrated as it is now.
Cheer!
The sit-com 'Big Bang Theory' made comic book readers and ComicCon attenders cool again :) And if people don't think we're cool now, they don't know what they're missing. I wasn't really bullied at school, but I was the 'goody two-shoes' who got good grades, so that didn't make me most popular kid.
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Scrounge, Robb, Kingcat and myself were also (obviously) readers - that never made you popular, the word 'Nerd' did not exist then, and the Nerd 'type'; was definitely not celebrated as it is now.
Cheer!
No, but in my time, they called you a "teacher's pet" if you got good academic grades, or if you were a tattler, or chummy with the teachers. I got good grades, but I was also good enough at sports, and neither a tattler nor teacher's pet. But that meant zilch to kids from homes that were taught to hate others because they are "different", or bear the sins of their long gone forefathers. In any case, I know that, at least, during the late 1940s through the 1960s, in USA, The UK, Canada, and Australia, being bullied is just one of the things a LOT of the young boys must go through. Even if they have no problem in their own class and grade level, insecure older boys will pick on younger boys, because the can. I found that the "prove yourself" fighting was more extensive and common in USA than in Canada. But in The Netherlands, Belgium, Scandinavia and Germany (at least since WWII), it was quite a bit less violent for schoolboys than I witnessed in Canada and USA. I guess the level depends upon the academic level of the school, strictness of the parents in one's neighbourhood, and economic level of the families in the neighbourhood or of the schoolboys. Fights in my schools in Canada were much, much more common than they were in The Netherlands, and those in my cousins schools in USA were even more common than in Canada. My friends in Scandinavia and Germany told me that fights were almost unknown in elementary (basis) school when they attended (from the end of the 1940s through to the early 1960s.
Thanks for sharing about the cultural differences. That's interesting. I just read a memoir recently about an Australian man whose whole life had been affected by the bullying he received over five years at boarding school in the 1960s/1970s. He's still dealing with the trauma. Very sad what a lot of people have gone through. Here in Australia, they have a lot of anti-bullying programs in schools now, though it still happens of course, especially with social media.
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I wasn't really bullied at school, but I was the 'goody two-shoes' who got good grades, so that didn't make me most popular kid.
As you would well know, that makes you a 'tall poppy' in Australian jargon and Tall Poppies get cut down.
I was never a swot, not interested in good grades, always did well tho and never went out of my way to study.
I found my own reading and learning much moire stimulating, for which reason I was constantly getting into trouble for not paying attention! I was always ahead of the teacher. Except of course, for Maths. Which is a whole other story! And of course, late in life, I end up a Maths teacher, don't I?!
I haven't spent a life traumatized by having been bullied, but I have come to realize, after my 3 score and 10 years, that bullying has affected everything I have ever done in life, but in ways that were not obvious to me.
Cheers!
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I was never a swot, not interested in good grades, always did well tho and never went out of my way to study.
I found my own reading and learning much moire stimulating, for which reason I was constantly getting into trouble for not paying attention! I was always ahead of the teacher. Except of course, for Maths. Which is a whole other story! And of course, late in life, I end up a Maths teacher, don't I?!
I haven't spent a life traumatized by having been bullied, but I have come to realize, after my 3 score and 10 years, that bullying has affected everything I have ever done in life, but in ways that were not obvious to me.
Cheers!
Yet another similarity in our backgrounds! I found getting good grades without trying very hard easy, as well. And I wasn't paying much attention, because I was doing my homework (for my other classes) in class so I could play hockey (cold half of the year) or baseball or basketball (warm half) after school, and read comics in the evening. I almost never did homework at home. My parents didn't bother me about that, because I always got good grades. I also read well ahead of the teacher, and, like you, of course I enjoyed and learned much more from my outside reading.
I wasn't a schoolteacher for very long, but I WAS an on-call, emergency/substitute teacher in elementary schools for a few years, and also taught art in after school programmes for several years, and got a sense for what the full-time professional school teachers deal with in terms of relating to the kids. I also teach storyboarding seminars in my local and regional libraries (government-sponsored cultural programmes) - so I've gotten to know the difference in dealing with the older children and late teens.
And yes, the the traumatisation of being cruelly picked on can make a person have more empathy and sympathy for the downtrodden, or just his or her fellow human being, and THAT is a really useful tool for a teacher (especially a new one) in being open to gaining a good rapport with his or her students. It helped make me abhor violence and make me a "peacemaker" as a pre-teen and teenager (and on into my adulthood), and try hard to be chummy with the kids, while still keeping their respect in the student-teacher relationship. My "sneaking in" drawing activities related to story writing assignments left by the regular teachers (such as cartoon storyboarding in their pre-writing preparation, or just drawing lessons when there was room in the curriculum when no lesson plan was left, made me popular with the students (and that gave me a great feeling). I found the Dutch and Danish students much more well behaved, and willing to learn than the students I taught in USA. But that was because the students I taught in Los Angeles were inner-city kids from low-income broken homes, from traumatic households living in violent gang-dominated neighbourhoods. And in such schools, having empathy and willingness to aim for understanding without pressing things is an important quality to have.
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Well, thanks a millions, guys and gal, we've certainly gone off at some very interesting tangents with this one, it's shocking (and yet somehow not surprising) to discover how many of us have suffered childhood bullying. Thanks for coming forward with your admissions unprompted.
And thanks for so many fascinating and varied analyses of the two comics I posted. I hope you've all found something to enjoy, your time and effort is always appreciated
Looking forward to see what the Panther's got up his sleeve for tomorrow's choice.
All the best
K1ngcat