Holiday Reading Room AMAZING ADULT FANTASY "Beware of the Giants!"

It's not often you see Stan Lee's signature on cover art...

...(behind the giant boot) perhaps because it was probably meant as the title page for the following story (and, to tell the truth, I think the splash page below would've been a better cover)...

Hah!

Bet you thought I had forgotten St Patrick's Day, eh? 

This Stan Lee-scripted/Steve Ditko-illiustrated piece from Atlas' Amazing Adult Fantasy #14 (1962) has one fatal flaw...the clothing and architecture are more mid-European (Germany/Austria/Switzerland) than Celtic (Irish/Scottish)!

BTW, one of the rarely-noted aspects of this series were the kool individualized contents pages for each issue...

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Monday Mecha Madness ADAM LINK!

This Requires a Little Explanation/Background...

Introduced in Ziff-Davis' sci-fi anthology Amazing Stories (1939), Adam Link was the first ongoing series about a sentient robot!

Though credited to "Eando Binder" (a pen-name used by author brothers Earl and Otto Binder when they worked together), the Adam Link stories were entirely Otto's work!
Adam was no soulless automaton!
From his introduction onward (and Binder used the title "I, Robor" before Isaac Asimov) he was on a quest to become as human as possible!
Though created to be totally-logical, he developed emotions!
In fact, after his second story "Trial of Adam Link" where he was accused of killing his creator (scientist Dr Charles Link, not Otto Binder), though found innocent (he was framed)  he decided he couldn't go on living without his "father", and decided to commit suicide.
That's the basis of the third tale, "Adam Link's Vengeance", where another scientist (of the "mad" variety), prevents his untimely death, and plans to use him as a weapon!

That particular story was adapted by writer/editor Bill Spicer and artist D Bruce Berry into a two-part story in Spicer's prozine Fantasy Illustrated in 1965 and reprinted in Spicer's Graphic Story Magazine (under a new Berry cover) in 1971.

You'll be seeing that over the next two Mondays.

The comic story was done shortly after the Adam Link tales were adapted into a fix-up novel combining all the short stories...

Note the Isaac Asimov quote!

BTW, if the name "Otto Binder"sounds familiar to comics fans, that's because he wrote a lot of DC, Quality, Timely, and Fawcett comics in the Golden and Silver Ages, as well co-creating among others, the Legion of Super Heroes, Black Adam, Braniac, Kid Eternity, Krypto, Young Allies, Mary Marvel, Bizarro, and Supergirl!

But, for some, he's best-known as the writer of the first Marvel Comics prose novel...

Bantam's The Avengers vs the Earth-Wrecker!

(Dig the Doc Savage-style logo!)

BTW, We'll be running this long OOP & HTF novel this summer during the annual RetroBlogs Summer Blogathon!

Easter Reading Room EASTER WITH MOTHER GOOSE More Walt Kelly Short Subjects

It's a Quiet Sunday, Several Weeks Before Easter...

,,,so let's continue with Walt (Pogo) Kelly's Easter-themed one pagers!

Some, like this one and the one below, are totally-new, one-shot Kelly creations!

Of course, what would a Walt Kelly Easter post be without at least one guest appearance by a well-known fairy tale/nursery rhyme character or two?

Note: this last page is from the inside cover, which was printed b/w to save money, a standard practice until the mid-1970s.

All features from Dell's Four Color Comics: Easter with Mother Goose #220 (1949)!

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Space Hero Saturdays FANTASTIC COMICS "Space Smith and the Crustaceans of Ganymede"

Space Smith Doesn't Seem to be Quite Himself...

...as another artist fills-in for Fletcher Hanks, bringing a rather Buck Rogers-esque feel to the strip!

While the scripting on this story From Fox's Fantastic Comics #7 (1940) has that Fletcher Hanks "feel", the art, definitely, is not Hanks!

It looks like the artist is trying for the same look as Dick Calkins' original Buck Rogers newspaper strip, which was incredibly-popular at the time!

The next issue would feature a totally-Fletcher Hanks tale....for the last time!

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Friday the 13th Fun TIPPY'S FRIEND GO-GO "Egg-Head in Friday the 13th"

One of the better Archie clones of the 1960s was Tippy Teen, who had both her own book...

...and two spin-off titles featuring a Riverdale-like ensemble of supporting characters who had their own features, including Egg-Head...who was called that only because he wore glasses and looked like a nerd!

If the story doesn't make much sense, the fact it was from Tower's Tippy's Friend Go-Go #15 (1969), which was the last book of the series and the company was already winding down to close the doors a month later, might have loosened the editorial standards a tad...

You'll note the art appears exactly like the Archie Comics "house look"!

That's because the Tippy Teen books were illustrated almost entirely by moonlighting Archie artists, though which particular one did this tale is unknown!

BTW, Egg-Head was not the only Tower Comics character to bear that name!

One of the original members of the T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Squad (a non-superpowered backup team for the T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents) was named...Egghead!

I'm not sure how "well-trained" and "highly-skilled" the "super-brilliant strategist" was since he died in his second appearance...