Saturday, September 22, 2012

Customized Halloween Goodies!

Besides an amazing assortment of Halloween goodies using classic horror comic book and movie poster art, including Spectral Signs & Banners, Sinister Stationary, Ghostly Garb, and Creepy Collectibles, Atomic Kommie Comics™ also offers customized outdoor banners & lawn/yard signs and greeting cards/notecards!
PLUS: the personalization is FREE!
NO charge!
NO fee!
Won't cost you a cent extra!
In these trying economic times, the opportunity to both do something FUN and do it for FREE can't be overlooked!

So if you want to have a ghoul-kool Halloween on a tight budget, order NOW! Orders must be placed before October 15th to guarantee delivery in time for Halloween! (If you're ordering customized cards to use as Halloween party invites, the sooner you order, the better!)
Any questions, e-mail us at atomickommiecomics(at)gmail.com and sub "@" for "(at)"

Friday, September 21, 2012

Reading Room: SPACE RANGERS "Operation PLUTO"

We continue the scientifically-silly adventures of the Space Rangers...
...with a tale from Space Adventures #2 (1952) that, even in the 1950s, didn't make sense!
You'll note the Space Rangers are now referred to as "Space Officers".
We're not certain why, since tv's Rocky Jones: Space Ranger didn't debut for another two years, and DC Comics' Space Ranger didn't appear until 1958, so it's not a trademark or copyright problem!
For whatever reason, the "Space Officers" moniker will remain for the duration of the series.
This tale from Charlton's Space Adventures #2 (1952) was illustrated by Art Cappello, who followed Al Fago & Lou Morales' costume and character designs.
The writer is unknown.


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Thursday, September 20, 2012

Reading Room TIME TRAVELERS "Date with Danger"

Sci-fi of the 1950s wasn't limited to space opera...
...as this series from the AGC adventure anthology comic Operation: Peril demonstrates!
Operation: Peril was an interesting multi-genre anthology featuring on-going strips about time travel (as seen above), a hard-boiled private eye (Danny Danger), and high adventure in the Pacific (Typhoon Tyler), as well as a historical short story.
While the other series featured stand-alone stories, Time Travelers presented a couple of on-going plotlines, as you'll see in future posts.
Though Time Travelers didn't appear on the first few covers, by issue #4, they took over the cover spot until their final appearance in #12, after which the book changed focus and became a war comic.
This premiere tale from Operation: Peril #1 (1950) was written by Richard Hughes and illustrated by Ken Bald.
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Wednesday, September 19, 2012

RetroBlogs™ Updates...

A never-reprinted tale of the 1970s biker hero Hell-Rider...
...can be found in three parts; HERE, HERE, and HERE at Hero Histories™!

A retro-kool sci-fi love story is HERE...

A rarely-seen Masked Western Hero returns HERE...

A never-reprinted crossover between two heroes can be found at...
and

And, Gorgo (as rendered by Steve Ditko) cometh...

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Reading Room: SPEED CARTER: SPACEMAN "Slaughter in Space"

We meet a new alien race, the Vegans...
...who, it turns out, are no more trustworthy than most other alien species.
(We humans are scrupulously honest, of course!)
Don't ya just love a happy ending?
What I want to know is why Speed is suddenly wearing shorts!
Thankfully, it's the only story in the series where he does so.
This story from Speed Carter: SpaceMan #5 (1954) was scripted (as were all Speed Carter tales) by Hank Chapman!
Illustrator George Tuska later became the final artist on the original Buck Rogers comic strip (1959-67) and then assumed the art duties for almost a decade on Marvel's Invincible Iron Man!

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Monday, September 17, 2012

Reading Room: LOST WORLDS "City that Escaped from Tomorrow"

In the 1950s, the popularity of sci-fi in tv and in movies carried over to comics...
...with a plethora of sci-fi anthology titles from almost every publisher, most of which ran material equal to the bulk of pulp and paperback science fiction of the era.
This never-reprinted tale from Standard's Lost Worlds #5 (1952) was penciled by Ross Andru and inked by Mike Esposito and Jim Mooney.
The writer is unknown.

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Sunday, September 16, 2012

Ride the Halloween Night with the Classic GHOST RIDER!

He began life in the late 1940s as The Calico Kid, a masked hero whose secret identity was a lawman who felt justice was constrained by legal limitations. (There were a lot of those heroes in comics and pulps of the 40s including our own DareDevil and Blue Beetle!)
But, with masked heroes in every genre doing a slow fade-out after World War II, and both the western and horror genres on the rise, the character was re-imagined in 1949 as comics' first horror / western character!

The Ghost Rider himself was not a supernatural being.
He wore a phosphorescent suit and cape, making him glow in the dark, appearing as a spectral presence to the (mostly) superstitious cowboys and Indians he faced.
Since the inside of the cape was black, he'd reverse it, and appear in the dark as just a floating head, usually scaring a confession or needed information out of owlhoots.
Note: some covers, like the one here, show the inside of the cape to be white! Chalk it up to artistic license (and face it, it looks damned cool).

BTW, the artistically-astute among you can tell that cover above was by the legendary Frank Frazetta!
He did several of them, three of which are included in our collection!

In the series' early days the villains were standard owlhoots or, like the Rider, people pretending to be supernatural beings.
That changed around 1952, when he started facing occasional real mystic menaces including Indian spirits, vampires, and even the Frankenstein Monster (though not the one from Prize Comics.)
Unfortunately, it was about this point in time that Dr. Wertham began his crusade against comics in general and horror comics in particular...
By 1954, the Ghost Rider had lost his series. The next year he disappeared entirely.
But, over 50 years later, Atomic Kommie Comics™ brought him back, digitally-restored and remastered on a host of kool kollectibles to go with our other masked Western heroes including The Lone Rider, The Red Mask, The Black Phantom, and The Masked Ranger.

If you're a fan of horror, masked heroes, Westerns, or all three genres, take a long, lingering look at The Ghost Rider!
You'll not see his like again!