Saturday, October 27, 2012

"Thank You" for your Halloween orders!

We at Atomic Kommie Comics™ wanted to say 'thank you" to all who ordered our ghoulish goodies and creepy customizable collectibles!
It's nice to see so many like-minded ghouls and creatures out there! ;-)

With the second-scariest day, Election Day, only a week later, we'd like to recommend a couple of satellite stores for your consideration...
"Pay My F@#$ing Mortgage!" which shows how only selling the Honus Wagner T-206 card will enable you to keep a roof over your head during the recovery...
and
"Fill My F@#$ing Gas Tank!" which follows the same theme, but with ridiculously-fluctuating gasoline prices!
Now, THOSE are scary!

Happy Halloween
and 
GET OUT AND VOTE!
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Friday, October 26, 2012

Reading Room: STRANGE WORLDS "Invasion from the Abyss"

Since 1938, Halloween and alien invasions go hand-in-hand...
...even when the "aliens" are from inside the Earth, rather than outer space!
This story from Avon's Strange Worlds #3 (1951) was a "Fleagle Gang" production.
The "Fleagles" were a group of artists including Frank Frazetta, Al Williamson, Roy Krenkel, Wally Wood, Angelo Torres, and George Woodbridge who would help each other out on tight deadlines by doing a "jam" with individuals penciling and inking different pages and even different panels on a single page, producing some absolutely amazing visuals!
Trivia: the group was named by EC Comics editor/writer/artist Harvey Kurtzman.

The idea of advanced beings living inside the Earth and invading/reconquering the surface was very popular in the early 1950s.
Richard Shaver and pulp magazine editor Ray A Palmer caused a media firestorm with series of stories presenting a theory that combined the "civilization inside the Earth" concept with another pop culture phenomenon...flying saucers!
Numerous readers wrote in, claiming that they had actually seen creatures and vehicles exactly as described in the stories!
The "Shaver Hoax" (as it came to be known) influenced 1950s sci-fi/fantasy ranging from the pilot episode of the TV's Adventures of Superman to movies like Brain Eaters.
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Thursday, October 25, 2012

Reading Room: "Ghosts from the Underworld"

In the scientific world of the future, there's no place for unexplainable things like ghosts...
...or is there?
So there was a plausible (albeit far-fetched) explanation for the "ghosts"!
This one-shot tale from Youthful's Captain Science #3 (1951) was illustrated by Don Perlin at the beginning of his long (45+ years) comics career.
In fact, it was his first published work!
Don continued working steadily (writing/penciling/inking/editing/art directing) until the mid-1990s, when he went into semi-retirement.
He still does an occasional cover or spot illustration as well as private commissions.
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Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Reading Room: "Monster God of Rogor"

Heroic Archeologists in torn shirts!
Scantly-clad Princesses!
Terrifying Monsters!
And, it's illustrated by Wally Wood!
I really should charge for entertainment this good...
Yeah, I know every blogger and his brother has run this tale.
But it's so damn kool, I just had to get it into the Atomic Kommie Comics™ archives.
The art for this tale from Youthful Publications' Captain Science #1 (1950) is signed by Wally Wood, and the inking is pure Woody.
But, it looks like he had assistance on pencils, perhaps by Joe Kubert.
The writer is unknown.
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Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Reading Room: LOST WORLDS "First Man to Reach the Moon"

In this 1952 tale, Mankind doesn't reach the Moon until 2021!
For the record, most sci-fi stories of the era show a manned Moon landing by 2000!
While we don't know who wrote this never-reprinted story from Standard's sci-fi anthology Lost Worlds #6 (1952), the illustrations are by Art Saaf, a steady contributor to comic books from the beginning of the Golden Age to the end of the Bronze Age (1940-1980).
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Monday, October 22, 2012

Reading Room: SPEED CARTER: SPACEMAN "Famous Explorers: Saturn"

In the future world of Speed Carter, women are not always treated as equals...
...but, when push comes to shove, the're as brave and as any men when facing the dangers of deep space exploration!
This story of a future fighting feminist from Speed Carter: SpaceMan #6 (1953) is written (like all the Speed Carter-related tales) by Hank Chapman, and illustrated by Bill Benulis, an artist who entered the comics field in 1949 and stayed only four years in the business.
He became a postman when the comics industry almost collapsed due to the "Seduction of the Innocent" witchhunt (that claimed comics caused juvenile delinquency) swept the country.
But, because he was so prolific, "new" material by him kept appearing in comics until 1957!
Support Small Business!
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Sunday, October 21, 2012

Reading Room: WEIRD TALES OF THE FUTURE "Escape to Death"

Yeah, you read that correctly.
"To", not "From".
Don't worry, this s-o-b deserves what he gets in the end...
It's a kool story with superb Basil Wolverton story and art.
But, there's one problem...the coloring.
Basil went to the trouble of doing a number of different alien races, but they're all colored the same shade of green!
(There is one panel with the various aliens colored differently, but even there, the coloring is not consistent.
Members of the same species are colored dseveral different ways!)
I hope that, when this tale from Key's Weird Tales of the Future #2 was reprinted in Eclipse's Mr Monster's Super-Duper Special #8 in 1987, it was recolored to play up the various species' differences.

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