Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Reading Room: WEIRD THRILLERS "Fisherman of Space"

Weird Thrillers was a 1950s sci-fi comic with painted covers...
Art by Allen Anderson
..which helped set the Ziff-Davis comic series apart from others on the newsstands!
All Ziff-Davis comics, no matter the genre, had painted covers, usually by the same artists who did cover art for their large pulp magazine line.
(Avon Comics also used paintings from time-to-time, but not throughout the line, and not on a consistent basis.)
Z-D was a latecomer to the comics business, publishing their first title in 1950 and canceling most titles by the end of 1952, continuing one book, G.I. Joe, until 1957.
During the comic division's brief existence, Z-D published over fifty titles, mostly one-shots and two-issue runs, covering every genre in fiction...except superheroes!
(The closest they came to superheroes were Lars of Mars and Crusader from Mars, both of whom were Martians operating undercover on Earth, and neither lasted past issue #2.)
Weird Thrillers (and it's one-shot predecessor Weird Adventures) ran a total of six issues.
Here's an example of why they lasted longer than most other Z-D titles...
This time-traversing tale from Weird Thrillers #2 (1951) was penciled by Alex Toth and inked by Sy Barry.
The writer is unknown, which is a shame, since it's a decent story with a clever, scientifically-accurate solution.

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Thanx for posting!