Rocky and His Friends (Four Color 1208)
i have to admit that I was a big fan of the Rocky and His Friends and Bullwinkle TV shows, and I collected all their Dell comic books, and the first couple years of their Gold Key comic books, as well. I liked "Fractured Fairy Tales", and Mr. Peabody's Improbable History best. Then, Rocky & Bullwinkle. I didn't like Dudley DooRight of The Mounties, or Aesop & Son as much, but got a slight chuckle from them here and there. I was a big fan of June Foray and her many voices, and the dead-pan attitude of the main male actor, narrator, William Conrad, and the gravelly voice of Paul Frees' Boris.
All in all, the flat reading of dialogue on a comic book page one can dwell on can't compete with the quick, snappy rattling off of one-liners that make up the TV show.
(1) Moose Goes West
This story is a lot like Marx Brothers' farces - just a chain of gags. The story has a thread, of sorts, but really doesn't make any logical sense. Bullwinkle is obsessed with watching Western-themed TV shows, and so, wants to be a cowboy in a Western film and answers a studio's ad for needed actors, while Boris takes a job as the film's script writer. So far, a good premise and set-up for an interesting story. Bullwinkle enters a Western clothing store and mentions that the salesman "doesn't look
'Western' ", The salesman, a bit peeved, returns wearing a Western outfit, and gets irritated well beyond where he should be when Bullwinkle says he wants to rent the outfit, NOT buy it. All this has no bearing at all on the story's plotline, and to boot (pun intended), is not funny in the slightest. So, one and a half pages of precious story room is totally wasted. After Boris and Natasha and their plan to infiltrate US TV with Pottsylvanian propaganda, Bullwinkle is told at the casting office that their Christmas shows are already filmed, so they don't need any reindeer. A half page to set up a joke that is NOT funny. Then, the director's assistent tells him that they'll hire him to play a stagecoach horse. Bullwinkle, insulted, whips out his two sixguns. The director tells him he's hired as the new cowboy star of the film, and introduces him to Boris (the film's writer). Of course, Bullwinkle doesn't recognise him. Boris then fills the guns' cartridge with live bullets, to kill Bullwinkle (which he writes into the script). NONE of this is funny to me. And Boris enters the scene as a villain, to shoot Bullwinkle. But the director wants Bullwinkle to shoot Boris. So Boris and Natasha run out of the studio. Meanwhile, Bullwinkle fires live bullets at the director, to show him that they are just blanks. Again, not funny. As he seems insane, and has ruined all the cameras, the director fires him from the film. The non-story ends back home, with Rocky seeing Bullwinkle watching TV again (apparently Westerns. But NO! We get a gag, attempt at a surprise ending, when Bullwinkle denies that he's still hooked on Westerns. Now he's switched to "Easterns", watching "Charlie Chang" mysteries. - Wasted paper not even remotely capturing the spirit of the TV show.
(2) Peabody's Improbable History - Sword and The Rock
Unlike the "Rocky & His Friends" episode, I think THIS Mr. Peabody comic book adaptation captured the spirit of the TV show more than adequately. I think that the writers were able to do that better because the scope of that feature is much narrower than the Rocky & Friends main feature. So, the writers were able to cover and mimic most, if not all its aspects fairly well (despite not having the benefit of sound). I think the idea of making Arthur wanting to be a minstrel, and uninterested in becoming King, is quite clever, when that is tied together with Mr. Peabody helping Merlin with introducing the sword in the stone as the means of choosing the next king, and also tricking Arthur into being forced to become King by accident. And Peabody's use of a magnetic stone to do that also brings his scientific knowledge into the story, neatly tying that together in an action that allows him and Sherman to again intervene in the past to ensure that World History, the way we perceive and believe it, today, actually happened that way. If this was NOT an adaption of an actual aired TV episode, or a script that the series didn't get to because it was cancelled, we must give lots of credit to this story's writers for hitting it on the mark. Yes, I did notice that their was no clever ending Pun by Mr. Peabody in the story's final panel. I missed it greatly, but the writers still did a very good job on this story.
(3) Frivolous Facts - Text Information Page
BOOOOO! HISSSSS! This text page, only placed in this book to qualify it for receiving the super-discounted 2nd Class Postal Rate, totally wastes a precious page of space that could have added more witty and irreverent humour if it were couched in the spirit of the other features in this book. The qualification rules only state that it must be mostly text (with only a minor amount of page space occupying illustration (10% or less if I remember correctly), to qualify as "containing redeeming educational or social value". The editor should have had the artist who drew "Fractured Fairy Tales" draw the one illustration in a similar style to his or her regular feature, and have the text instilled with a similar ironic and irreverent comical tone (spirit). This page's tidbits of "facts" are true, but as put in Monty Python's Flying Circus, are.... "dreadfully dull and boring".
(4) Boris And Natasha - The Soda Baron
This is a pure comic book idea, to feature Boris & Natasha in their own story, WITHOUT Rocky and Bullwinkle as the prime focus, and allowing the villains to shine. Unfortunately, the use of Boris' and Natasha's natural characteristics' possibilities was weak and poor choices, and the gags in this 2-Page extended gag are commonly-used tropes that are too familiar, expected, and actually neither clever, nor funny. And when those characteristics are combined with simple, stylistic artwork, you have little to entertain the reader. Both the writer and the artist (in his staging) missed the boat on matching the cleverness, ironic, and irreverent tone of the TV show in this one.
(5) Fractured Fairy Tale - Prince of Frogs
Now I remember why I was so disappointed that the comic book version of Rocky and Bullwinkle couldn't match the comedic punch of their TV show, partly because there is no sound (intonation of voice, volume, etc.) to enhance the emotional effect of the dialogue and narrative, nor movement in the gestures to enhance their quality, sound and movement of the figures to indicate the timing of speech and action. When the reader has to invent his or her own timing of words in speech and action occurring on the page, the stories may not be as amusing or entertaining as they were in the TV series, because the writers and comedic actors who created the TV series do that for a living, so we'd hope and expect them to be better at those tasks than the average child, teen, or even adult reader.
I find the artwork of this story boring, and the staging unimaginative, and not reminiscent of the spirit of "Fractured Fairy Tales" on the TV show. In fact, I feel that it is weaker than that of most of the stories from this feature in the other "Rocky and His Friends" and "Bullwinkle" comic books. Almost everything that happens in this story is expected once the premise of The Witch being incompetent, and The Princess being frivolous and not knowing what she wants. I have to admit that there IS, at least a moderately clever double surprise ending in which a Prince pops out of his frog suit disguise, and then the frustrated Witch returns to turn both The Princess and Prince into Frogs (and being in love, they don't mind at all). Bullwinkle kissing the frog in the epilogue (wraparound story) is very expected, which actually takes away the memory(and punch) of the slightly imaginative and moderately clever fairy tale ending.
(6) Peabody's Improbable History - Knock, Knock
Unlike the first Mr. Peabody story in this book, he and Sherman DIDN'T change the course of history by their actions during their time travel. So, that is a minus. But they made up for it, by having the traditional TV series element of Mr. Peabody sneaking in his ending pun as an answer to Sherman's usual story-ending question. And the artwork perfectly displays Peabody's haughty and slightly condescending deadpan expression, as he answers his question, revealing the coincidence that his landlady's name matched the root of the boy's question. That clever ending and strong visual characterisation of Mr. Peabody made this story memorable, and perfectly matches the style and spirit of his segments in the TV show.
Rocky and His Friends - Million Dollar Moose
This story's start, with Bullwinkle having taken on a new hobby - stamp collecting, is quite promising in terms of comedic possibilities. But it DOES include a detail that could become a crucial error made either by the story writer OR the artist IF it wasn't deliberate included by the writer. That is that the artist didn't show the rare stamp dealer CLEARLY pointing to the specific letter he wanted Bullwinkle to place in the postbox on his way out of the building, and/or the artist didn't show some indication of why Bullwinkle picked up the wrong envelope. There were two envelopes sitting atop a table, one partially atop the other. The dealer pointed up in the air, instead of to the table. THAT is a really poor job done by the storyboarder. I assume that the final penciler just followed the storyboard art, and didn't really make sure by following the storyline, himself. So, when the livid rare stamp dealer ran out of his shop waving the correct letter he wanted mailed, calling Bullwinkle an idiot, he comes off as being insane, blaming an innocent soul for his own error of not making sure that Bullwinkle would get the proper envelope in his hand, as opposed to the envelope with the million Dollar stamp on it, left atop a table far from the service counter, where any unscrupulous collector could pick it up and sneak it into his pocket if the shop is crowded, or no one else is looking. I understand that this is light-hearted comedy, but even so, some truths about human nature need to exist even in a fictional Universe in which humans and anthropomorphic animals can talk to each other. I really can't feel fear for Bullwinkle that his home and all his belongs will be taken from him in court proceedings because that maniacal imbecile of a stamp dealer expects Bullwinkle to provide him full payment when it was the latter's own fault it is lost.
I DO like that Boris, disguised as a postman, coincidentally enters the story to steal the million Dollar stamp. He can't possibly know that Bullwinkle tossed it into the Ground Floor postbox. But he just happens to arrive in the building foyer as Bullwinkle tells the guard about the million Dollar stamp. THAT is all in the spirit and style of the TV series. As Rocky pops out with the envelope when Boris opens the box, the fiend grabs it out of The Squirrel's hand. Of course, neither Rocky, nor Bullwinkle recognise him, but chase him anyway. It's funny that Bullwinkle fell down the mail chute into the building's postbox, and is trapped there until the postman returns at midnight. But THAT fact is the story's ending.
So, it is not at all a tight story. Why wouldn't Boris try to rob the owner of the rare stamp shop, just as he had planned to do when he entered the building. He and Natasha could return deep in the night. How did he plan to get his hands on the stamp in the first place? Was he going to rob the store in broad daylight during business hours? This seems to be a story that waffles all over the place, needing a LOT of work to tighten it up. It is so far from working that had I turned it in, my editor might suggest that I don't even try to fix it, but rather abandon it, and just start on a different story.
(7) Peabody's Improbable History - Mistaken Identity - 1 page Gag
Funny gag, despite being an old Vaudeville joke, used by thousands of stand-up comedians. I like the making fun of the film producers who ignore science to fill the seats of the theatres.
As I recall, most of the Rocky and his Friends and Bullwinkle comic books (at least during the Dell period, were better than this one.
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Topic: Reading Group #306 - The Year 1961 - Buck Ryan 78a and Rocky and His Friends (Read 1621 times)
