[bowers]

 Hello all- bowers here. Panther has asked me to pick a subject for this week's reading group so let's get started! I've decided to feature one of the most bizarre characters I've recently run across, namely the Frank Thomas creation- “The Eye”. I believe Dr. Wertham would have had a field day with this hero(?)                    Featured in Centaur's “Keen Detective Funnies” ,as well as his own short-lived comic, The Eye is joined by such stalwarts as The Masked Marvel, Dean Denton -The Scientific Detective, and many more. Also some fun features such as Comicrimes (a visual mystery to solve) and lessons teaching us to become an Amateur G-man. Never know when that might come in handy!
The two books I've chosen are:
Keen Detective Funnies 16 v2n12        https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=15141

Keen Detective Funnies 20                   https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=25530

Please feel free to comment on any and all characters and features you find in these pages!
Cheers, bowers

[The Australian Panther]

For those interested we also have
Frank Thomas Archives v2 - The Complete Eye (Centaur)
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=66922

I'm no expert on Frank Thomas, so I expect to learn a lot from this fortnight.
Thanks Bowers!   

[bowers]

Duh! How could I have forgotten the archive? Thanks for the reminder, Panther! Cheers, bowers

[Quirky Quokka]

Detective Funnies 16 (Part 1)

Thanks for these selections, Bowers. It's taking me a while to read them, so I thought I'd at least get the ball rolling with a few comments about what I've read so far.

The Masked Marvel

On the whole, the art is quite good for that era, though there are a couple of anomalies. For example, at the bottom of the second page, there's a pic of the officer being shot by the gangster. But following on from Panther's comment on a previous comic, the angle of the gun is all wrong. The puff of smoke coming from the gun seems to indicate he's just taken the shot. But he's aiming at the officer's post-shot slumped head rather than where he would have been aiming in the first place. There are also some continuity issues. For example, the nationwide alarm about Roche being on the loose seems to come some time after the escape, as there has been a crime spree in the meantime.

It's interesting that they give a lot of the backstory before the Masked Marvel actually appears (almost 6 pages). That seems uncommon for a lot of Golden Age stories I've read, but does flesh out the issue more. It's very generous of the police chief to say that he wants the Masked Marvel's men in charge of the police squad. Also interesting that not all of the good guys survive, thus showing the very real dangers and costs of fighting for justice. I did wonder if the Masked Marvel gave Roche any parachuting instructions before tossing him out of the plane. Seems like a lot could go wrong with that kind of drop-off. An interesting tale overall. I'd read more of these.

Spark O'Leary

My favourite part was how to tried to conceal the whopping big microphone stand so the fake countess wouldn't know she was being broadcast. Um .. I think she noticed  I did like the format of the story though. Spark's broadcast at the end was like a modern-day true-crime podcast.

Dan Dennis FBI

Interesting technique of interspersing black and white pages with red and black pages. I guess that was a compromise to doing full colour. The last narration box on the second page is sort-of like 'breaking the fourth wall' in asking the reader who the prison guard is who's lurking in the shadows. We find out as soon as we turn the page.

I'm not sure if the premise was meant to be amusing, but the whole idea of an 'organ of destruction' seemed funny to me, especially when it kind of looked like the Yamaha organs that were popular in the 1970s. We had one of those!

My favourite line? "Realizing he must act before the fiend goes on a rampage of destruction, Dan resorts to his ventriloquism." Say what? Maybe that's come up in previous stories, but I found it hilarious to think of ventriloquism as being one of the tools of trade of an FBI agent.

Not the best writing in this one, as there was a lot of repetition, but it made me smile, perhaps unintentionally.

Comicrimes

I liked the one-page Comicrimes features, as it gives the reader a chance to work out the clues. Though I was clueless about the one with the bullets. I live in Australia where most people have never even held a gun. I have no idea what each of those bullets would do - LOL

I also thought the one about the dead thoroughbred had a flaw. The answer is built on the premise that you can bend down under a railing, yet keep your shoeprints in a straight line. But wouldn't most people have to turn a little to get under the railing, thereby breaking the straight line under the railing?

Foggy Night

The action sequences could have been drawn a bit better. I got confused in a couple of points. For example, in the last panel on the third page, the bad guy challenges the trooper to a fight. Then on the next page, the trooper swings the first punch, but the next panel shows the trooper on the ground rather than the bad guy. Then in the next panel, the trooper is on his feet and punching the bad guy. It just doesn't seem to flow well.

Also, the foggy night of the title appeared rather suddenly. There's no fog throughout the story until the last four panels where it's mentioned repeatedly.

That's as far as I've gotten so far. Some interesting qualities in all of them. Will add more as I keep reading.

Cheers

QQ

[bowers]

 Very interesting comments, Quirky! I also wondered about the black and white- black and red pages. I checked some other Centaur comics from nearly the same period, and found that this format was used in other titles as well. One example is Funny Picture Stories v1 n02 from 1936-  https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=88028 , which has several stories using this format and a Dick Kent story, "The Monster Man", which begins in color, switches to black and white and then to a rather minimal black and red! Cost cutting or artistic license gone amok? Cheers, bowers

[SuperScrounge]

Keen Detective Funnies v2 #12

The Masked Marvel
Given that the Masked Marvel has been shown to be an inventer I'm surprised he didn't give his sidekicks bullet resistent vests.

Good thing Roche knew how to work a parachute and that a strong breeze didn't come up to blow him away from the prison. 


Spark O'Leary
“Wow! What a collection of celebrities...”
I wonder if those drawings look like any 1939 celebrities?

A man is murdered, but the party continues?

Spark sure does run around a lot in this story.

The more I think about the crime the less sense it makes. The Countess De Rossini wearing a gem insured for a million dollars, so at first it seems like insurance fraud, but, as we find out she's not the real countess and it's a paste gem, so even if the fake woman convinced an insurance company she was the countess, they would never insure a paste diamond. What would happen when the real countess finds out about this? Why did the woman's accomplice hang around the balcony where the 'robbery' took place? It's like the writer just used a bunch of crime elements, but didn't fully think out the crime.


Dan Dennis F.B.I.
Eh, okay.


Jerry O'Keefe
Ditto.


Fair Exchange
Amusing.


The Doctor's Revenge
Didn't police take fingerprints in 1939?
Hmmm, yes they did as the following activity makes clear. So the police not taking in the gang and fingerprinting them to discover Torske is a big plothole.


The Devil-God Murder Case
It might have been more interesting if the detective had some experience dealing with supernatural threats and did something more than ducking a thrown hatchet and letting random chance end the bad guy's plan.


Junior Detective
Ugh!


The Eye Sees
An interesting opening to the Eye series, although I don't believe that later stories ever revealed more about the mysterious Eye, although, decades later, Malibu would at least 'humanize' the character. Bah dump bump!
(For those who don't get the joke, in the '90s Malibu revived the Centaur characters as The Protectors and turned the Eye into a human wizard who no longer disguises himself as a disembodied eye.)


Dean Denton
So Dean can just break into someone's house with no problem?


Keen Detective Funnies #20

Cover
Aha! So this is where the makers of Superman Returns got the idea for a bullet to the Eye from! 

The Eye
It's hard not to make MAGA jokes about a story involving illegal aliens.
I wonder why the Eye went easy on the illegal aliens instead of just crashing the plane with them on it?


Magnetic Mine Menace
Good thing that cyclotron was aboard.


Dan Dennis
Kinda falls into the 'Solves crime through luck' school.


TNT Todd
I think he went to school with Dan Dennis.


Muddy Evidence
Okay.


Dean Masters
Geeze, don't they have that test where you can test someone's hands for gunshot residue?


Spy Hunters
I wonder how the poor French people in that town felt about the shelling? Somehow I doubt it was, “I hope Suszette is safe!” 


The Masked Marvel
I wonder if the Masked Marvel suspected the Eye of bringing down that plane? 


Spark O'Leary
So-so.

[Morgus]

Some day, someone is going to write a book on why a big floating eye fascinted people over 80 years ago. You had these comics, you had movie later like THE CRAWLING EYE...there had to be a reason, right?? Doggoned if I could figure it out. But it was a nice afternoon read. And you’re right bowers, I think Wertham would have done a whole chapter on it.
It would probably freak him. And that’s not even going into the guy hanging in Keen Detective 20!
Does anybody know how much money they saved with their wonky printing style of colour /to one colour /to no colour? Would it be THAT much?
hey, Q.Q. speaking of microphones, dig the deluxe one in the Johnson Smith ad. Looks about the size of a fist. Lawsy I love those ads. I also would love to try and build a 2 passenger plane that flies from junk yard parts. What could go wrong? Let’s take it for a spin off the top of the house!
Favourite line in both books; ‘turn Roche loose”. Don’t know why, it just cracked me up.
Favourite panel; Spark O’Leary page 17, Keen Detective 16. Anybody else see Ministry of Silly Walks from Monty Python??
Great picks bowers.

[The Australian Panther]

Morgus said,

  Some day, someone is going to write a book on why a big floating eye fascinted people over 80 years ago. You had these comics, you had movie later like THE CRAWLING EYE...there had to be a reason, right?? 

Well, I don't know if 'many' people were fascinated by 'The eye' - Frank Thomas' work, even today is something only as a guilty pleasure for those who are aware of him. He's not seen as a pioneer like Kirby or Eisner for example. More's the pity. 
Chris Beneke, in his introduction to the Frank Thomas archives, to be found here,
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=67670
speculates thusly,
"Thomas may have drawn his inspiration for The Eye Sees from two sources. The Shadow radio series was at that time a phenomenon. The well-known tagline, 'The Shadow knows' may have prompted Thomas to come up with an analogical echo with, 'The Eye sees'.
Also, in 1935, a newly designed One Dollar bill hit the streets. adding the great seal of the United States featuring the all-seeing eye of providence floating above an unfinished 13 step pyramid.
This is pure speculation, but sounds reasonable to me.
cheers!
 

[Quirky Quokka]

hey, Q.Q. speaking of microphones, dig the deluxe one in the Johnson Smith ad. Looks about the size of a fist. Lawsy I love those ads. I also would love to try and build a 2 passenger plane that flies from junk yard parts. What could go wrong? Let’s take it for a spin off the top of the house!

Morgus, if only I'd had that deluxe mike, I could have followed my dream of travelling the world as a singer, though I'm more in the mould of a Joni Mitchell folksie acoustic gal than a radio chanteuse. It just cracked me up when Spark said "I'll see if I can't conceal the mike". Well, you were right about one thing, Spark. You couldn't conceal that mike! But on the Johnson Smith ad, I would have had to go for the Ventrilo so I could throw my voice. Think how handy that would have been. Come to think of it, maybe that's what the FBI guy used in his story. 

Cheers

QQ

[Quirky Quokka]

Morgus said,

  Some day, someone is going to write a book on why a big floating eye fascinted people over 80 years ago. You had these comics, you had movie later like THE CRAWLING EYE...there had to be a reason, right?? 

Well, I don't know if 'many' people were fascinated by 'The eye' - Frank Thomas' work, even today is something only as a guilty pleasure for those who are aware of him. He's not seen as a pioneer like Kirby or Eisner for example. More's the pity. 
Chris Beneke, in his introduction to the Frank Thomas archives, to be found here,
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=67670
speculates thusly,
"Thomas may have drawn his inspiration for The Eye Sees from two sources. The Shadow radio series was at that time a phenomenon. The well-known tagline, 'The Shadow knows' may have prompted Thomas to come up with an analogical echo with, 'The Eye sees'.
Also, in 1935, a newly designed One Dollar bill hit the streets. adding the great seal of the United States featuring the all-seeing eye of providence floating above an unfinished 13 step pyramid.
This is pure speculation, but sounds reasonable to me.
cheers!

And Panther, let's not forget all those lovely conspiracy theories about the eye on the American dollar bill 

https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20201112-the-eye-of-providence-the-symbol-with-a-secret-meaning

Cheers

QQ

[Morgus]

Q.Q., I just had A MILLION DOLLAR IDEA. Get the mic AND the ventrillo. Do the Joni Mitchell chanteuse act world wide, but ALSO include a sort of Mae West/Tina Fey doppelgänger with you that does parodies of those heartfelt songs. (“Bye bye, Miss American Pie. Drove my Honda over Rhonda but she still wouldn’t die.”)

The world is ready for this.

I had forgotten about the all seeing eye on the American money. That used to be good for lots of laughs. We had a local kook who looked like Uncle Sam and would run for government every four years. I’d get some friends over, buy a couple of pizzas and we’d kick back and just listen to the old geek. That was one of his routines.  Only it was the Aliens, not the Masons. Those guys were just dupes of the saucer people.
He was also a rogue scientologist and would try and lure us into the ground floor of HIS cult.
He had brochures and a video he shot in close up telling us when the saucers were coming back. We’d laugh, but he ‘d always come back...for the pizza and to ‘wear us down’.

He was selling trial memberships but we always declined. Told him we didn’’t want to miss an episode of FRENDS.

[Quirky Quokka]

Q.Q., I just had A MILLION DOLLAR IDEA. Get the mic AND the ventrillo. Do the Joni Mitchell chanteuse act world wide, but ALSO include a sort of Mae West/Tina Fey doppelgänger with you that does parodies of those heartfelt songs. (“Bye bye, Miss American Pie. Drove my Honda over Rhonda but she still wouldn’t die.”)

The world is ready for this.

I had forgotten about the all seeing eye on the American money. That used to be good for lots of laughs. We had a local kook who looked like Uncle Sam and would run for government every four years. I’d get some friends over, buy a couple of pizzas and we’d kick back and just listen to the old geek. That was one of his routines.  Only it was the Aliens, not the Masons. Those guys were just dupes of the saucer people.
He was also a rogue scientologist and would try and lure us into the ground floor of HIS cult.
He had brochures and a video he shot in close up telling us when the saucers were coming back. We’d laugh, but he ‘d always come back...for the pizza and to ‘wear us down’.

He was selling trial memberships but we always declined. Told him we didn’’t want to miss an episode of FRENDS.

Great idea, Morgus. I've seen Don McLean in concert three times, but never with those lyrics - LOL I did a great version of 'Don't Cry for Me Argentina' that went 'Don't put your prawns in the freezer, your beer will go flat while you wait, and your prawns will mutate, they'll taste just like shark bait, don't put them in your freezer, put them on your pizza'. Also did a version of Abba's 'Fernando' called 'Throw Mangoes' (There was something in the air that night, it was a fight, with mangoes etc). Though it all came unstuck when I had to sing Roberta Flack's "Killing Me Softly" at a church social once and I could only remember the parody version my friends and I made up that involved 'Killing Me Softly with His Knife'. Rather gruesome, now I think of it. But like a trooper, I abandoned the song when I couldn't think of the real words and sang something else. I don;t think Joni Mitchell has anything to worry about.

Laughed at your story about the Uncle Sam guy. 

Cheers

QQ

[gregjh]

Honest question: does "funnies" imply humour, fun or simply another way of saying pulp fiction? I like this comic Keen Detective Funnies 16 though I can't tell what the priority of the writers was. Was Masked Marvel meant to be a legit hero even though the mask was so small? Were Zr, Zy and Zl meant to be laughed at? If so I wonder what the writers would make of the pronoun politics of today.Why did the story mix elements of satire with what seems to my uniformed mind as unusual levels of violence (killing a cop) with satire and run of the mill hero stuff?

All of which is to say I was unsure, though I can see a good level of quality in the art and story writing all the same. Interesting stuff.

[bowers]

 gregjh, in the U.S., comics were often referred to as "funny books", no matter what the content. Sunday comic sections were also referred to as "the funny papers". Sometimes, in an American movie from the 30's or 40's, you may hear the  wisecrack "so long, see ya in the funny papers!". Don't ask me to explain it, it was just the way people talked at that time! Cheers, bowers

[SuperScrounge]

Honest question: does "funnies" imply humour, fun or simply another way of saying pulp fiction?

On these early comic books the term Funnies is used the same way as the term Comics, so the title could have been Keen Detective Comics instead. Eventually using Funnies in that way became extinct confusing generations of later readers. 

Bowers explanation is also right.

Was Masked Marvel meant to be a legit hero even though the mask was so small?

Yeah.

Were Zr, Zy and Zl meant to be laughed at?

I don't think so. They seem to be based more on the sidekicks of pulp heroes like The Shadow or Doc Savage would have.

If so I wonder what the writers would make of the pronoun politics of today.

Bat guano insane? 

Why did the story mix elements of satire with what seems to my uniformed mind as unusual levels of violence (killing a cop) with satire and run of the mill hero stuff?

This was the early days of superheroes where the characters were more pulp-fiction based as the creators were still figuring out what worked and what didn't.

If the Masked Marvel were created today he'd probably have a flashier costume, more well-defined powers and his sidekicks would be three scantily-clad hot chicks. 

[bowers]

 I couldn't have said it better, SuperScrounge! Also, our younger members should know that comics didn't really become a respected media until the late 60's to the early 70's or so when comic bags first became available. Before that, comics were, more often than not, a "buy, read, swap, and toss" media. They were cheap, usually a dime or a quarter! Yes, there were serious collectors, but nowhere near the percentage of readers today- hence the high prices of back issues! In the early 60's, I can remember buying small bales of Golden Age comics and pulps for a dime, at the local Goodwill shop because people just tossed them! When I quit buying comics in the mid 70's I sold all but a small box of my very favorites. Didn't start up again until my 30's- glad I stuck with it this time! Cheers, bowers

[The Australian Panther]

Before that, comics were, more often than not, a "buy, read, swap, and toss" media. They were cheap, usually a dime or a quarter! Yes, there were serious collectors, but nowhere near the percentage of readers today- hence the high prices of back issues! In the early 60's, I can remember buying small bales of Golden Age comics and pulps for a dime, at the local Goodwill shop because people just tossed them!   

Same thing happened in Australia. My first issue of a Marvel Superhero comic was FF Annual #1 and then Strange Tales Annual #1 both of which would be worth a lot now. I bought to read, not to collect, unfortunately. But I wouldn't have had room to store many anyhow, being a kid and still at home in my Dad's house.
There were many second-hand bookshops at the time but the comics were rarely respected by the proprietors and were rarely in good condition. But what really annoyed me was that the shops used to stamp all comics, mags and books with the shop name, usually on the cover, which considerably lowered the collectabity value.
And Australian comics pre mid-1950's - of the type DownUnder Dan is posting, were impossible to find.   

[The Australian Panther]

I'm going to attempt to stick with the 'Eye' stories. i know I've said that kind of thing before and not stuck to it, so no promises.
Keen Detective Funnies 16 v2n12        https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=15141 

THE EYE SEES
Nice splash panel - would make a great T-Shirt.
The art is not spectacular, but it's what it needs to be. 
I like the idea of not having an origin in the first story, with this character, that adds to the mystery.
"Life was nice in Afghanistan', that grates now. Why did Thomas make them refugees from Afghanistan of all places? They are clearly northern European, so why?
Read on Panther.
Second page, Not only don't we know who or what 'the Eye' is, we have no idea why[she? he? it?]  has decided to help Mattes.
Next page. The Eye is known by an Afghanistani mystic.
The Eye can destroy planes, but can't write a letter apparently.
The narrative is straight-forward and standard, but it's clear and clean and better than average for the period. 
There is enough mystery in the character to make the average kid come back for more in the next issue.
Reminds me of DC's the SPECTRE. 

[The Australian Panther]

Keen Detective Funnies 20      https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=25530

One of my favorite covers.

Thomas doesn't have story titles. Like it.
Here we find, the EYE is, 'A symbol of the haunting voice of man's inner conscience.' And the Eye is 'HE' although how an EYE has a designated sex, I don't know.
In 4 issues, the art has improved considerably. Thomas clearly loves to draw, as evidenced by the detail he puts in that does not directly contribute to the narrative.
To whit;-
Second Page, panel #4
> the feet coming out from under the bedclothes. the pants on the chair.
Third page> you can tell it's cold because every panel of the daughter shows her strruggling with her coat to keep warm. Love the car in the last panel.
Third  page> must be well into the day by now, and grandpa has gone back to bed!
By this time, apparently the general public is aware of the EYE.
"Look! is that the Eye?' 'The Eye? Where? Where!'
Both stories involve refugees/migrants and Aeroplanes.
Coincidence? or elements of particular interests to Frank Thomas?
Thomas clearly enjoys what he is doing. He inhabits a fantasy world of his own and writes and draws what he wants with a strong element of whimsy.
Thank you Bowers!
I haven't read much of Thomas' work yet. I will have to remedy that.
cheers!

[Robb_K]

Keen Detective Funnies v2 #12

The Masked Marvel
Given that the Masked Marvel has been shown to be an inventer I'm surprised he didn't give his sidekicks bullet resistent vests.

Good thing Roche knew how to work a parachute and that a strong breeze didn't come up to blow him away from the prison. 


Spark O'Leary
“Wow! What a collection of celebrities...”
I wonder if those drawings look like any 1939 celebrities?

A man is murdered, but the party continues?

Spark sure does run around a lot in this story.

The more I think about the crime the less sense it makes. The Countess De Rossini wearing a gem insured for a million dollars, so at first it seems like insurance fraud, but, as we find out she's not the real countess and it's a paste gem, so even if the fake woman convinced an insurance company she was the countess, they would never insure a paste diamond. What would happen when the real countess finds out about this? Why did the woman's accomplice hang around the balcony where the 'robbery' took place? It's like the writer just used a bunch of crime elements, but didn't fully think out the crime.


Dan Dennis F.B.I.
Eh, okay.


Jerry O'Keefe
Ditto.


Fair Exchange
Amusing.


The Doctor's Revenge
Didn't police take fingerprints in 1939?
Hmmm, yes they did as the following activity makes clear. So the police not taking in the gang and fingerprinting them to discover Torske is a big plothole.


The Devil-God Murder Case
It might have been more interesting if the detective had some experience dealing with supernatural threats and did something more than ducking a thrown hatchet and letting random chance end the bad guy's plan.


Junior Detective
Ugh!


The Eye Sees
An interesting opening to the Eye series, although I don't believe that later stories ever revealed more about the mysterious Eye, although, decades later, Malibu would at least 'humanize' the character. Bah dump bump!
(For those who don't get the joke, in the '90s Malibu revived the Centaur characters as The Protectors and turned the Eye into a human wizard who no longer disguises himself as a disembodied eye.)


Dean Denton
So Dean can just break into someone's house with no problem?


Keen Detective Funnies #20

Cover
Aha! So this is where the makers of Superman Returns got the idea for a bullet to the Eye from! 

The Eye
It's hard not to make MAGA jokes about a story involving illegal aliens.
I wonder why the Eye went easy on the illegal aliens instead of just crashing the plane with them on it?


Magnetic Mine Menace
Good thing that cyclotron was aboard.


Dan Dennis
Kinda falls into the 'Solves crime through luck' school.


TNT Todd
I think he went to school with Dan Dennis.


Muddy Evidence
Okay.


Dean Masters
Geeze, don't they have that test where you can test someone's hands for gunshot residue?


Spy Hunters
I wonder how the poor French people in that town felt about the shelling? Somehow I doubt it was, “I hope Suszette is safe!” 


The Masked Marvel
I wonder if the Masked Marvel suspected the Eye of bringing down that plane? 


Spark O'Leary
So-so.

I spent a decent part of my youth watching 1930s and 1940s US and British films.  I don't recognise even one of the so-called "celebrities" in the "Spark O'Leary" story in "Keen Detective Comics Vol. 2 No. 12".  I think they were just generic comic book characters, with the artist making no attempt to draw existing current American  celebrities.  But the crude, cartoony, non-detailed style of the drawings wouldn't likely have allowed the artist to draw the people in a manner we'd be able to recognise, in any case.  But, we know from many comic books of the period, that Milton Berle, Abbott and Costello, The Marx Brothers, Edgar Bergen, Our Gang, Frank Sinatra, Margaret O'Brian, Shirley Temple, and many more celebrities were drawn in styles from realistic to very exaggerated, cartoony charicatures, which were easily recognisable.

[bowers]

 I'm wondering how anyone would react when a giant disembodied (flaming?) eye appears  before them and says "I am your friend, but you must obey me..." Would you obey out of fear? Would you run like hell? Or would you calmly and enthusiastically embrace the situation, as did the characters in these stories?
I have a very hard time thinking of The Eye as a hero... especially when, in both stories, he taunts his victims before he kills them! None of this moral mumbo-jumbo for him! But, yet, he is a fascinating character.
I think Thomas was having fun doing these stories and maybe pushing the boundaries to see what he could get away with! I was looking through his body of work and was surprised to find he also wrote some Little Lulu scripts. Maybe that explains why some of them were a bit on the dark side. Cheers, bowers

[SuperScrounge]

I don't recognise even one of the so-called "celebrities" in the "Spark O'Leary" story in "Keen Detective Comics Vol. 2 No. 12".

I didn't think of it while reading, but now I realize that Spark is saying this line about celebrities ON THE RADIO. The audience can't see what he's looking at, so he could just be making up seeing any celebrities at the party. The radio audience wouldn't know. 

I'm wondering how anyone would react when a giant disembodied (flaming?) eye appears  before them and says "I am your friend, but you must obey me..." Would you obey out of fear? Would you run like hell? Or would you calmly and enthusiastically embrace the situation, as did the characters in these stories?

What's the line from Airplane? "Man did I pick the wrong week to give up drinking." 

[Robb_K]

The Eye - by Frank Thomas
This is an inventive (for the time) use of a non "being" (force) as a surrogate for a Superhero that helps mankind by fighting wrongdoing Humans (as Superman did).  The author/artist, Frank Thomas, uses "The Eye"
as an omnipotent "Conscience of Mankind", which is all-seeing, all-knowing, both physical and "outside (above) The Universe, which can interfere in Earthly events, by sending Worldly forces to physically stop evil, harmdoing Humans from hurting others.  The Eye is not only taking the part of a Superhero, but acting like The "God" of The Bible, or a pagan "god".  This series "set-up" has inherent problems in logic.  Can it see all current wrongdoing at the same time, and act on multiple offences concurrently?  If so, why did it mention to Mr. Mattes that it had to leave him in the middle of his explanation and instruction-giving, to another task?  If it is then, NOT the above-The-Universe omnipotent Creator, who created "The Eye", and why can't its creator (who must be The Creator/Master of The universe", interfere with Earthly events WITHOUT using "The Eye"? - And why does a Creator, who knows all, sees all, and created it, in the first place, need to interfere with its own creation.  Why didn't it create The Universe to be perfect?  Is it "playing a game" for its own amusement, to avoid "boredom"?

In answer to Bowers' question, of what we readers would do IF a detached "Eye" would accost us giving orders, but trying to assure us it is "our friend"........  I would NOT run away, as it is clear that The Eye could simply follow me anywhere, moving much faster than I.  I would ask it why it wants me to follow those particular orders (instructions), and what would result from those actions, and what its overall purpose is.

Thomas' artwork is decent, especially for that early period of comic book production.  The stories are decent.  But, as usual, I feel that they are much too short.  I would rather read an entire 60-68 page story, taking up the entire book.  Or at least 20 page continuing episodes of a single story in a regular, monthly series taking up from 6 months to a few years.  I think "The Eye" is a refreshing idea to come up with something a little different from the standard carbon-copy superhero series.  But I'd like to know more about its essence, from where it came, and what entity operates it.

I think it is interesting that Thomas created a decent amount of published (and well-loved and respected) both semi-realistic Human comic character-based series and cartoony Human and Funny Animal series in comic book publications (unlike Carl Barks, Dan Gordon, Paul Murry, Frank Frazetta, and many others, who were competent in drawing both, but drew and had published mainly one of the two, and only dabbled in the other.  Thomas, in his long career for Western Publishing, did a lot more in the comedy comic book genres than many comic book fans realise, because during the latter portion of his career, he wrote and storyboarded several Dell Comics comedy series, not providing their final penciling and inking, and many times not even getting credit for the story writing.  Perhaps he acted as a "middleman", drawing the storyboards from typed scripts, or handwritten story notes (with the originator of the script, notes, or "story idea", getting the story writing credit).

[The Australian Panther]

Reading through the other posts on the site I spotted 'The Hand', a disembodies hand that comes out of a cloud of smoke. Hard to believe that it's not in reference to 'The Eye' when 'The Hand' offers a card which begins,
"The hand is faster than the eye"!
only seems to have lasted a short time as a feature. 

Speed Comics 12
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=17463

Oh, what fun we have!

[Robb_K]

Reading through the other posts on the site I spotted 'The Hand', a disembodied hand that comes out of a cloud of smoke. Hard to believe that it's not in reference to 'The Eye' when 'The Hand' offers a card which begins,
"The hand is faster than the eye"!
only seems to have lasted a short time as a feature. 

Speed Comics 12
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=17463
Oh, what fun we have!

Yes! "The Hand", coming out of a cloud to help defeat criminals and wrongdoers is basically a carbon copy of "The Eye", in terms of concept and function.  If Western were owned by Disney, there probably would have been a lawsuit.  And maybe the shortness of The Hand's series run was due to a lawsuit threat.  It's similar to  Captain Marvel as a copy of Superman.  If I had tried to do something like that, my editor would have handed it back to me, and advised that it would need several more very obvious differences from "The Eye", to become acceptable to be used.