Reading Room MYSTERY IN SPACE "Singling"

A well-done graphic story can be understood without captions or word balloons...

...as this never-reprinted tale from DC's Mystery in Space #111 (1980), illustrated by Jim Aparo, demonstrates!

Scripter Gerald J Brown penned only a few stories before disappearing from comics.
He was also a writer/editor of the prozine Night Voyages. which ran for 10 issues between 1977 and 1984.
This particular issue of Mystery in Space was the first issue of a revival of the legendary anthology which was cancelled 14 years earlier, in 1966.
Sadly, the book only lasted for 7 issues before being cancelled again...

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The Best of DC Science Fiction Comics
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Wednesday Worlds of Wonder PLASM "The Sedition Agenda: Prologue 'The Death of Love' " Part 1

There have been numerous comic companies that lasted only a couple of years...

...with Defiant Comics being one of the examples of a company who had all the right ingredients, but failing to achieve long-term success!

Their first, and longest-running title was Warriors of Plasm, which began with a unique #0 issue...

The Story Continues...Next Wednesday!

Conceived by Jim Shooter, fresh off his success at Valiant Comics, the tale sets up the Defiant Universe (actually a "multiverse" since this dimension and Earth's dimension, which it will soon interact with, are separate) and introduces us to the world of Plasm, where technology is organic and must be "fed" with other organic material in order to continue functioning!

You may ask "what makes this #0 issue so unique?"

Look at the page layouts.

Every page adheres to a grid pattern.

There's a good reason for that.

This entire issue was designed to be printed as trading cards!

So the panels, and most importantly, the captions and word balloons, all had to fit on what would be a "page" composed of nine cards!

No cutting-off titles, captions, or word balloons on seperate cards!

Here's Page 5 as a comic page...

...and here's how the cards that make up Page 5 look when placed in the album...

In addition, the cards were printed two-sided so that the cards of Page 1 had Page 2 on their backs, the cards of Page 3 had Page 4 on their backs, and so on!

Even so, the card set ran 150 cards, including four groups of chase cards which were rarer than the story cards!

And, of course, you had no idea what cards you'd get in a given pack!

You can see the complete set of cards HERE.

Be here next week for the rest of the comic story and more background about Defiant!

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Reading Room JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY / WHERE MONSTERS DWELL "Ruler of Earth!"

We had something much different for today's post...

...but after Don the Con's announcement at the United Nations that the US government would now refer to Artificial Intelligence only as "Super Intelligence",  my mind immediately returned to this article we posted last year at fellow RetroBlog Hero Histories!

So, let's travel to the "future" year of 1990...as seen from 1962...

Appearing as the cover-featured story in one of the final pre-Mighty Thor issues of Atlas' Journey into Mystery (#82 in 1962), this story by plotter/editor Stan Lee, writer Larry Leiber, penciler Jack Kirby, and inker Dick Ayers is a clear Cold War/anti-Communist parable!

But, when the tale was reprinted at the end of the Cold War in Marvel's Where Monsters Dwell #25 (1973)...

...editor Roy Thomas had the hammer and sickle and red star insignias removed from the Russkies' hats...

...and replaced with an "H", which was explained with the change in the dialogue balloon above!

HYDRA???

Why not AIM...who were always more tech-oriented?

So, presumably, there are at least two worlds in the Marvel Multiverse where ROE presides, to this day, over a peaceful Earth!

Bonus for putting up with this all this fanboy mishigas...the lovingly-detailed original art for the spash page by Jack Kirby and Dick Ayers!

BTW, did you note how warm, cuddly, and almost teddy-bear-like the cover's RoE is, compared to the version in the story itself?

Monday Mecha Madness SHOGUN WARRIORS "Demonicus Scheme!" Part 1

When Last We Left Our Gleaming Gulliver...

...our narrator will kindly (and conveniently) fill us in on the previous goings-on...

To Be Concluded Next Monday!

You'll note they didn't mention S.H.I.E.L.D. or Godzilla (whom Dr Demonicus previously fought) by name in Marvel's Godzilla #4-5 (1977)!
While I understand them not being able to identify Godzilla by name (due to the expiration of the licence from Toho Studios), S.H.I.E.L.D. (which is owned by Marvel) shouldn't be a problem, especially since (SPOILER) the agency shows up next issue!
Written and illustrated by the classic crew of Doug Moench, Herb Trimpe, and Mike Esposito.

The Robots are Coming! THE ROBOTS ARE COMING!!!

Last Week, We Re-Presented a Warning About the Dangers of AI Run Amok...

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday
Then, on Friday, we relieved your tension with a tale of a benevolent, self-aware robot...

Friday
Tomorrow, we return to a trio of robots who show us the best robots may be ones under direct human control!

Don't Miss It!