Space Force Saturday SEEKER 3000!

Comics Have Tried to Emulate the Success of Star Trek...

...as Marvel did when it took a crack at the genre with this one-shot in 1978 to test audience reaction.

You can read it by clicking on these links...

Part 1

Conclusion

Despite promoting the series in a special science fiction issue of their Prozine FOOM (as shown HERE), the best the project got was a serialized reprint in Marvel UK's sci-fi anthology, Future Tense.
It then disappeared from everybody's radar!
Apparently, two British readers found that reprint enough to inspire their imaginations.
And, two decades later, after they turned professional, the duo pitched a sequel to the original tale!
After a highly-promoted reprint (with a couple of promotional articles detailing the new series) of the decades-old original story...

...a 4-issue limited series appeared in 1998 with an extra-long premiere issue!

"A New Beginning"

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Conclusion

Then three regular-sized issues...

"Medusae"

Part 1

Part 2

"HumanKind"

Part 1

Part 2

"Mind Bomb"

Part 1

Part 2

Personally, we loved the original tale and enjoyed the sequel, which was left open-ended for more adventures with the crew of Seeker.

Sadly, over 25 years later, it's been forgotten yet again, without even a reprint hardcover or trade paperback to inspire yet another generation of creatives to continue their interstellar exploration!

But here's your chance to see "what might have been" by clicking on the links!

Enjoy!

Reading Room WEIRD WONDER TALES / STRANGE TALES "When a Planet Dies!"

The current "deep freeze" covering the USA reminded me of the splash panel from this story...

...from Marvel's Weird Wonder Tales #22 (1973), which was actually a reworking of this (literally) kool splash page from a cool story from Atlas' Strange Tales #97 (1962)!

While the art is credited to Jack Kirby and Dick Ayers, who wrote it is not entirely clear.

A number of people, myself included, think it's scripted by Kirby!

Bonus: Here's the original art for the cover from a previous issue of Weird Wonder Tales that supplied the Dr Druid figure on the reworked splash page above...

Art by pencilers Jack Kirby and John Romita Sr (Dr Druid's face), and inker Joe Sinnott.

Now, here's the original art for the Strange Tales story's splash page...

A Marvel production artist "flipped" a photostat of the Dr Druid figure from the Weird Wonder Tales cover and replaced the bearded aliens with it on a photostat of this splash page!

No original art was harmed in the making of the new splash! page!

Friday Fun MODNIKS "Noel Talent: the Most Unkindest Cut"

By the early 1970s, Jack Davis was an established, successful, and busy, commercial artist...

...so when was this weird filler piece, published in 1970, created?

Written by Gary Poole and illustrated by Davis, this one-off tale appeared in the second (and final) issue of Gold Key's Modniks in 1970.

But here's the weird part...

The previous issue of this title appeared three years earlier...in 1967!

That's a loooonnng time between issues!

Plus, Davis had never done any work for Gold Key, and it had been years since Jack had done any work for Dell (which Gold Key split off from)!

And, Poole didn't start working in comics until the mid-1960s, after GK had split from Dell, so this wasn't inventory from that period!

Did Davis know Poole (who had been a radio/tv writer for years before coming to comics) and illustrated this as a favor for a friend entering the field?

We'll never know...

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Jack Davis

Drawing American Pop Culture: a Career Retrospective

Holiday Reading Room presents MARVEL CLASSIC COMICS' "A Christmas Carol"!

There have been numerous comic adaptations of Charles Dickens' legendary Yuletide ghost story...

...but this never-reprinted one from (believe it or not) Marvel Comics, has the distinction of being illustrated by more artists than any other version!

Credited to "Diverse Hands", the art styles I recognize include Bob Hall, Frank Giacoia, Frank Springer, Dave Cockrum, Marie Severin, Carmine Infantino, Steve Leialoha, John Romita Sr, Al Milgrom, Mike Esposito, and probably anybody who wandered into the Bullpen while this book was in production in 1978!

Trivia: 

This was the final title in the Marvel Classics Comics line which had started out as color reprints of the early '70s b/w Pendulum Press "comic adaptations of classic stories" series.
After a dozen issues, Marvel began doing their own adaptations, continuing for another two dozen issues.

Scripter Doug Moench was no newcomer to adapting prose to comics having worked on comics versions of literary properties including Doc Savage, The Shadow, James Bond, and Fu Manchu!

Colorist Francoise Mouly later became the art editor of The New Yorker, co-creator of the legendary comic anthology Raw, and is currently the publisher/editorial director of Toon Books.

You can read this HTF story by clicking HERE for Stave One, then just clicking the links at the bottom of each post!

Reading Room / Tales Twice Told WEIRD "The Dead Live"

 Usually, in "Tales Twice Told" we present the original story first...

...but this time, we're going with the later, reworked version from the same script first!

Illustrated (or is that re-illustrated by Cirilo Munoz, this tale from Eerie Publications' Weird V8N4 (1974) is a re-working of a story from 20 years earlier that, up until then, had not been reprinted...despite the fact it had been illustrated by a major Silver-Age artist!
Trivia: that original tale remained hidden under the cowbwebs of history until 2008.over a half century later, and only in black and white!
But you'll see that story from 1954, in brilliant color, right here on Thursday!

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The Worst of Eerie Publications

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HALLOWEEN TREAT (No Trick!) DRACULA One-Page Tales

While the English-language reprints of the 1970s Spanish Dracula magazine didn't have any Dracula...

...the original Spanish title had these one-page jokes on the back cover!

Both England's New English Library and America's Warren Magazines (who licensed the NEL translated version) left out these entertaining pieces...despite the fact no translation was needed!

Written and illustrated by Alfonso Figueras, these one-pagers now make their American debut!

Written and illustrated by Alfonso Figueras!

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Dracula

the Trade Paperback

(from 1971, featuring the first six issues of the translated-from-Spanish Dracula magazine...but not these Dracula humor strips...nor any Dracula content!)
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Macabre Monday Madness BLACK MAGIC "Madame Cyanide and Mister Tricks!" & HORROR TALES "Broomstick Witch"

Here's a maddening tale (for several reasons) on the Monday before Halloween...

...a never-reprinted tale, which was redone with new art decades later!

Steve (Dr Strange) Ditko illustrated this story from Prize's Black Magic V4N5 (1954).

The writer is unknown, but could be Joe Simon and/or Jack Kirby, since the book was packaged by their studio.

Was it meant to be the first in an ongoing series about Mister Tricks and his attempts at debunking?

The tale's script (with minor changes) served as the basis of this story from Eerie Publications' Horror Tales V6N4 (1974) twenty years later...

"Romero", the artist who signed the piece is not Enrique Romero, who illustrated Modesty Blaise and Axa, but one of several other Romeros who've worked in American comics over the decades. 

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Simon & Kirby Library: Horror!

(which doesn't include this tale!)