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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Topic: Reading Group #279 Wonderworld & Top Notch comics (Read 6050 times)
