[MarkWarner]

I for one really liked last weeks's book and I just spotted a comment  that was left a year ago by glypa:

"Things I've learned from this book: - Modern-day pirates still dress like pirates from centuries ago. - They do this in order to be always ready to attend to a masquerade without being noticed by anyone and kidnap people."

Anyway off with the old and on with the new. This week we are going to fly to to the stars and I guess carry straight on as it's a Sci-fi one-shot featuring Captain Rocket.

This can be found at https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=10861 . As a slight change from normally choosing the first story to concentrate on, I rather liked the title of the second one "Monsteroids of the Underworld" so that's our main focus. But this look too cool not to read it cover to cover!

[mr_goldenage]

Loved the art even if the clothes were overdone. Stories? Favorite was Aurora of Jupiter. Others were competent. Thanks ......how about a comp ?

Richard Boucher

[SuperScrounge]

The Graveyard Of The Rocketeers - Okay. I wish they could have avoided the saved-by-a-never-mentioned-invention explanation at the end though. Parts of this story gave off a John Forte vibe, but I'm not that certain. (Some of the art looks too good compared to his Legion work.)

Monsteroids Of The Underworld - Okay.

Mind Stealers - Don't worry, the writers of these stories are safe. ;-) Ehhh, typical for a text story, but nothing special.

Pirate Of The Stratosphere - Pressurizing people for deep space? Wha? There's suspending your disbelief, then there's suspending your disbelief until it's dead, dead, dead.

The Man Who Wanted A World - Wow... a projection of monsters and nobody bothers examining the scene of the attack to see if there was any damage? What's next an alien invader who conquers Earth with shadow puppets? *shakes head* Amusing that the villain's planet was Krypton. (Didn't that explode?) How well-known was Superman's home planet when this story was written?

[betaraybdw]

To start with, I'm liking this cover, The only thing lacking is some sort of hideous alien or monster. but for this genre it has the rest:

1) Beautiful Space babe - check

2) Intrepid Spaceman/Hero - Check

3) Rocket ship - check

4) Ray guns - check

5) completely unworkable spacesuits - Check

6) barren alien landscape - check

I do appreciate being warned about the impending Martian invasion, but me thinks they are too late. Martian Manhunter has been helping out Supergirl of late and he appears to have been here quite some time.

I usually don't mention ads, but I see this one in seemingly half of GA comics. Has anyone ever seen one of those electric spot reducers? Anyone's mom ever have one? Did it work?

The Graveyard of the Rocketeers - pretty standard stuff for the genre, but that 1st image of Rocket's aide, Argo, well...  Woof! is the only apt thing I can think of.  There's some great GGA all around in this story.

Monsteroids of the Underworld - Black Bubbles! (where's DC's Mr Terrific? he must be here somewhere)
Mad Love for using an earth tunneling "rocket". ( Oh and Argo is still "Woof!") pg 17 - boy these villains are Dumb: "Gone!" & "Disappeared!" (C'mon you can still see the stupid belt, just shoot or stab right above it!)

Pirate of the Stratosphere - Those guys in the splash panel have got to be wearing one of the worst sci-fi uniforms ever. I'd understand if they mutiny.  I dig the Ray Haryhausen-esque Robots.  Also like the space-babe villain, Cassandra.

The Man Who Wanted a World! - Aurora = va va voom! Our unknown artist gets extra credit for The 3-headed monsters (Lizardons- great name too) having three different heads instead of the same one three times. (Take that Ghidra!) Our cigar smoking alien on page 30 looks like he should be working for Jabba the Hutt or be on Futurama.

No one is getting any Hugo awards or Pulitzers for this writing. And you just need to ignore the technobabble (emphasis on babble), but this book was a treat for the eyes. Too bad we do not know who drew it.

I do believe I will print this one out and glue it to a short box, it should be very appealing.

Thumbs Up!

[Morgus]

What a great issue! Men were men, and women dressed like cocktail waitresses. Broke out laughing when I saw the wok on the guy head during the first story. And just about popped a valve when I took only a CASUAL look at the ad on the inside cover...that vibrator thingy made me swivel and stare twice until I realized she was only massaging fat away in a totally G rated spot...You have to love the helmets they had on the front cover..THAT was style.

[crashryan]

To begin with, why is it Captain "Rocket" instead of Captain Rocket? In one story they even spell it that way in the balloons, which must have been a pain for the letterer. They should just say, "better known as Captain Rocket" and leave it at that.

To start with "Grave of the Rocketeers:" odd that the writers of this comic equate the stratosphere with outer space. I've always been a fan of the stratosphere. During the 1920s and 1930s, the heyday of airplanes, the stratosphere was mysterious and romantic. By the 1950s when this comic appeared the luster had worn off and space was the place for adventure. Anyway, I love the s-f gobbledygook. Didn't they use a probeoscope for my colonoscopy? The stilted, expository dialogue sounds like parody dialogue from a Bob and Ray skit. Captain Rocket is something of a jerk: "Argo, no one questions my calculations." The story itself is nothing special. The artwork isn't bad. There's a Jay Disbrow vibe to some of the faces, but the figures aren't stiff enough. Note: in the future, off-duty spacemen will wear labels on their clothes identifying their ship and their position. It's so the cops know where to dump them after they pass out at the Jet Trailers Cafe.

The same artist seems to have drawn the "Monsteroids" story. A brief moment of confusion arises when he makes the Terran Borer and the Projecto-turret look similar (and the colorist followed suit). Studies show Gorgo's Black Bubbles prefer cute babes to men four-to-one. Clever guy, that Captain, but not clever enough to made his belt invisible along with the rest of him. Shoot at the belt, monsteroid idiots! Unfortunately, all the converted humans--not to mention the not-yet-converted humans--die when the gas explodes. Well done, Captain Rocket.

"Pirate of the Stratosphere" is ridiculous in trying to equate deep sea diving and "deep space" diving. There should be limits even to pseudo-science. The artwork is very nice. His costume design (for the men, anyway) isn't so hot, though.

"Aurora of Jupiter" gets points for its non-Kirby Kirby monster. More points for the cigar-chomping alien. But if the lizardons are projections, how come all those buildings burn and explode? Best line: "Are we to surrender to these fiend-like dogs?"

The combination of silliness and good art makes this a hit for me. Well, farewell--I am off to Jupiter.

[narfstar]

Monsteriods was full of babble. My ten year old self loved it. Sometimes that is how I like to read comics. It can make them so much more enjoyable. This was one of those times. I did get an adult kick out of the comment that their helmets were gas proof. Well duh.

[Captain Audio]

""Monsteroids of the Underworld" sounds like something that would require twice daily applications of Preparation M.

[MarkWarner]

As usual, I started keeping notes when reading this book, but after just a few pages I thought that it was all going to be a bit "samey" and after reading all the stories I was right.

Captain Rocket, Space Falcon, Aurora of Jupiter are all rather arrogant "know it alls". The women are young and wear the minimum of clothing, and the men are quite frankly camped out. In fact, I strongly suspect that Argo's charms are lost on Captain Rocket, if you know what I mean.

But, this has got me thinking. I wonder how one goes about hiring a scantily clad female assistant, preferably without having to wear a Lycra jumpsuit to do so..

Verdict: Great Zeus this was just about a hit, but there was a lack of variety. So, I certainly would not have paid a hard earned dime for any future issues!

[crashryan]

Mark, I've been searching for a scantily-clad assistant for years without luck. If you chance upon their hiring agency, let me know.

One of the challenges of being a 1930s-40s-50s spacewoman is that the guys get spacesuits that cover their entire bodies, while you get a fishbowl over your head and the rest of you is exposed (literally) to the elements. Or non-elements. Or whatever space is.

[MarkWarner]

I have been watching some original series Star Trek. On the pilot women wore trousers, after that it was much more practical minis. Off topic, I really liked Number One, a brunette Majel Barrett, who later played Nurse Chapel who's charms have certainly grown on me as the years progress.

[mopee167]

Why doe GCD (comics.org) have a question mark (?) for all the credits in Captain Rocket #1 and only.

The book was put together by Harry Harrison, almost completely on his own.
Harry Harrison: "I edited. wrote what I could, drew and inked it..." He didn't do the lettering.

Info from Science-Fiction Comics: The Illustrated History by Mike Benton (Taylor Publishing Co., 1992).

[betaraybdw]

much like Wikipedia, GCD relies on Volunteers to do the work of updating its info. Obviously whoever indexed this comic for GCD may not have seen that publication.

One of the Admins for this site, Narfstar, is also an approver for GCD. I would throw this his way.

I am an occasional indexer for GCD, but I'm low level. Narf or another approver have to okay my edits before they go live.

[SuperScrounge]

I index at the GCD as well. I think if someone removed the question marks from the entries it would help to put the reference in the notes to show where the confirmation came from.

Although "wrote what I could" makes it sound like he only wrote some of the stories.

One of the challenges of being a 1930s-40s-50s spacewoman is that the guys get spacesuits that cover their entire bodies, while you get a fishbowl over your head and the rest of you is exposed (literally) to the elements. Or non-elements. Or whatever space is.

A few years back my webcomic was participating in the Halloween Cameo Caper & that year the setting was on a space ship, so I dressed my two girls, Gertrude & Brunhilda, in sexy spacewomen suits and with the reference picture I supplied so other comics could draw them, I mentioned that the suits had a transparent fabric so it only looked like bare skin was showing.

The funny thing is everybody acted like these suits were more risque than usual despite the fact that the spacesuits actually covered more skin than the metal bikinis I usually draw them in. (Theiss Titilation Theory, I guess.)

[crashryan]

SuperScrounge, your comment reminds me of Alex Raymond's Flash Gordon story set in the Arctic regions (Frigia, I think they called it). He gave everyone baggy transparent coveralls so both men and women could run around in swimsuits without freezing their assets.

[Kracalactaka]

Well, I just knew this issue would make a great decoupage comic box and I was right!

It was was one of my offers for the DCM 6th anniv raffle and 1st winner Jim O. picked it.
http://digitalcomicmuseum.com/forum/index.php/topic,6694.0.html

[narfstar]

that's cool