The Private Practice of Michael Shayne: I agree with the previous reply, it's difficult to adapt a novel into a comic story. A bit confusing with all of the characters introduced.
Danny the Dip: OK, I guess. But I don't read comics for the text stories! 
A Plot to Murder: Was it me, or did it seem that the end of the story was missing?
Excellent art by Edd Ashe throughout.
6.5/10
The Private Practice of Michael Shayne:I agree that it's very difficult to adapt a full length novel, with a complicated plot, and many characters into a less than full book, or even full normal-sized comic book's short length. That story was too complicated to even lay out the plot details, and also weave in any character development, and also show the settings, and still pace the story correctly, in such a short number of pages. It would take at least a few jumbo size books to handle all the details which needed to be covered to make the story understandable (as so many hinge upon previous actions by others). And in a limited number of pages, there is no room to develop characters to see from where motivations rose, and, thus, to pace the story properly.
This story was a jumble of text and visual noise, in which, the reader must flip back to earlier points in the story to try to understand why things are happening, and hope to understand how things connect. It's not entertaining to read it, because there is too much work involved, and pressure to perform.
It reminds me of reading the Don Rosa Uncle Scrooge historical stories or sequel stories, in which the pages and panels are filled with so much happening and so many details that need to be studied to get the references and jokes, that the reader cannot "live" (get lost in) the story, like one does when watching a good film or novel.
A Plot to Murder: I agree that this story is all about the "eye for an eye", twist ending. Its essence COULD even have been shown in only one or two pages. But that would be even less satisfying than its too short, five pages. One of the talents of comic book story writers, scenarists, and story-boarders (who lay out the pages and panels) is telling the story in an optimum length.
A story can be told (in a mixture of visuals and text) in too short a length, too long a length, or the optimum length, for reader enjoyment. This story has a fairly uncomplicated plot. So it can, and should be told in a relatively short size (number of pages). Even given that, to me as a storywriter, scenarist and storyboarder (page and panel layout man), it was told on too few pages. I would say that 8 pages would be ideal for correctly pacing this story, which is totally driven by the (up-to-then) ", "innocent" sister, who turned the tables on her greedy, selfish, and ruthless villain of a sister, to take advantage of the latter's plot.
I would have used the additional 3 pages to further develop the evil sister's hatred of her more reasonable sister to really believe her motivation to frame her, or force her to live in exile from her native land, just so her greedy, conniving self can live in comfort without having to put up with her doddering old husband. That would have required more references to events in their teenage years, and perhaps a couple of flashbacks in both of their thoughts, too better understand their adversarial relationship. Without that, it is hard to believe twin sisters, who come from a single egg, could be so callous and cruel to each other (albeit the "winning" sister, and lesser of the two meanies, is doing her dastardly deed mainly out of self-defence.
I DO agree with the author to NOT show the results of her brilliant plan. It's such a dramatic, and unexpected ending, that it should be dwelled upon, and savoured, rather than eroded slowly, by an epilogue showing her happiness being rich in her sister's place, either together with her sister's rich husband, or free with ALL his money, after he dies. It IS best to end it abruptly, just as the moment of discovery of the irony in a TV show episode from Boris Karloff's "Thriller", "The Twilight Zone", or "One Step Beyond", all of which ended their stories at the point where the ending of events at the climax reveals to the viewer the ironic "just desserts" which the future holds for the villain or unsuspecting person, who was "too curious" for his or her own good.
Danny the Dip:This story way readable, but didn't carry much interest for me, as most comic book text stories need to be too short to really lay out a proper setting, develop the characters as the story moves on to see from where motivation came,and to develop the plot at a proper pace, so the action can follow slowly enough for the reader to "live" somewhat in the story, and not just be reading a story scenario, and knowing all key elements, but not really being entertained.
But, I understand that the text stories were almost exclusively included only to meet The US and Canadian postal regulations, requiring text reading to fit the description of "educational material", or "reading material with some redeeming features", for the monthly, bi-monthly, or quarterly book series to qualify for the significantly lower 2nd Class postage shipping rate.
General Comments ("Great Man! Served under him during The War!")
:All in all, the artwork was very good. The experience of reading these stories was entertaining for me, despite my being a person who, from my beginning of experience with comic books, was almost exclusively a "funny animal" fan, who only strayed a little into "cartoony" Human-figure comedy comics, and whose ONLY deviation from those was occasionally reading "Classics Illustrated".
Author
Topic: #217--Mike Shayne, Private Eye #1 (Read 1131 times)
