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?

Salute the Troops on Veterans Day SGT FURY AND HIS HOWLING COMMANDOS...in Korea...and VietNam???

Yep!
The guys who (almost) won World War II single-handedly (as a team)...

...fought in Korea (over half a decade later), and, fifteen years after that...

...in VietNam!
Here's how it begins in 1967, when World War II vet Nick Fury is a middle-aged (between 45 and 50 years old) but still fit, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D....

Want to see more?

March over to our "brother" RetroBlog, Hero Histories...
NOW!

Space Force Saturdays ATOM-AGE COMBAT "Third Element"

Is This What Don (da Con) Trump had in Mind...

...when he plagiarized the concept from 1950s sci-fi to create his inane Space Force?

Illustrated by longtime comics veteran Dick Ayers and scripted by an unknown writer, this never-reprinted tale from Fago's Atom-Age Combat #3 (1959) is typical of the sci-fi of the era.

Oddly, it shows us and the (unnamed, but obviously Russkie) enemy dropping everything to unite against extraterrestrials, then agreeing to work together, with no hint of treachery, despite the fact a "Space Race" was on between Americans and Soviets to get men into space and even to the Moon ASAP!

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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!

Space Force Saturdays ATOM-AGE COMBAT "Puzzle"

Since it's Memorial Day weekend...

...we thought we'd run a tale of interplanetary conflict between Earth and Mars!

Note: the last page was the inside back cover of the comic, so it's black-and-white, a standard cost-saving technique back then by printing the front and back inside covers one, or sometimes, two-color.

Illustrated by Dick Ayers, this tale from Fago's Atom-Age Combat #3 (1959) touches on an interesting idea.

Someone's keeping us from leaving Earth...but they're also keeping others from approaching Earth!

Were they protecting us from them...or them from us?

Since this was the final tale in the final issue of the series, we'll never know the answer...

BTW, this was the second series called "Atom-Age Combat"!

The first was published by St John Comics with five issues in 1952-53 and a one-shot in 1958.

Fago Publications bought the title when St John dropped it's comic line, continuing the numbering from the one-shot and producing two issues.

Fago itself only lasted from 1958-59.

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Monday Madness REAGAN'S RAIDERS "...Back to Zero!" Conclusion

When Last We Left the Septuagenarian Super-President...

...he and his revitalized cabinet were about to deliver a can of whup-ass to a group of terrorists!

You'll note a cameo by a certain eyepatch-wearing, cigar-smoking soldier usually seen in ripped shirts.

The never-reprinted Solson's Reagan's Raiders #1 (1986) was written by Monroe Arnold, and illustrated by Dick Ayers, Rich Buckler, and Jason Rodgers.
Monroe Arnold was a character actor with numerous tv/movie appearances in the 60s-80s.

His best-known genre role was in the unsold pilot for Dick Tracy (1967), produced by Batman's William Dozier.
BTW, the film Monroe was listed above as writing/directing, Diary of a Terrorist, was never completed.
He suffered a heart attack after shooting a proof-of-concept reel and was unable to continue the project.

Solson Publishing was run by Gary Brodsky, son of Marvel's first Production Manager and occasional inker Sol Brodsky.
One of the many companies created during the b/w comics craze of the 1980s, it was legendary for producing parody/swipes of more-successful b/w books along with somewhat tasteless books about how to draw women.
Reagan's Raiders was one of the few original titles in the lineup, and it lasted only three issues.

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