Space Hero Saturdays FLICK FALCON IN THE FOURTH DIMENSION "Return to Mars"

We Have Already Seen...

...now that you're caught up, watch as, unarmed and with Adele by his side, Flick prepares for another journey.

Writer-penciler Don Rico's wild imagination goes full-speed, combining science fiction and fantasy elements with equal aplomb in this never-reprinted tale from Fox's Fantastic Comics #2 (1940).

It's interesting to note the three-armed slavers introduced last time aren't native to Mars, as Flick thought...though no mention is made about whether the giants they control are Martians or not. 

Also, rather odd for a kids' story, is the fact that sexual attraction can be used to break the alien slavers' control!

Inker Claire Moe (who usually scripted, penciled and inked her own material for Fox, Centaur, and Novelty), helped out probably due to a tight deadline.

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Science Fiction Comics

Taylor History of Comics

Vol 3

Space Hero Saturdays FLICK FALCON IN THE FOURTH DIMENSION "To Mars and Back"

You know the scientist-hero of this strip is stark-raving bonkers...

...when, after seeing a test item come back through his teleporter inside-out, he leaps into the device!

This premiere tale from Fox's Fantastic Comics #1 (1939) ends right there.

No "To Be Continued" caption or anything else.

The next page begins another strip, Sub Saunders.

But fear not, Flick Falcon will return for 20 more issues of Fantastic Comics!
Unlike Brick Bradford or Doctor Who, both of whom used other people's tech to jaunt around the Universe (and eventually the Multiverse), Flick created his own mode of travel, avoiding tedious (and dangerous) interplanetary travel by ship.
BTW, "Orville Wells" was a pen-name, probably inspired by Orson Welles, who had, only a few months before, panicked America with the legendary War of the Worlds radio show.
The artist (and probably writer) was Don Rico, who would become one of the premier creatives working in 1940s-50s comics before turning to writing novels.
(You can read one of his wildest comic tales HERE!)
Unlike contemporary Fletcher Hanks, whose Stardust and Space Smith strips also premiered in this issue, Rico's never received the attention and acclaim his equally-offbeat work deserves.
(That's not to put-down Hanks in any way.
His wild creations are equally as deserving of critical study by aficionados of sci-fi/fantasy.)
BTW, this never-reprinted tale was Rico's very first published comics work.

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Science Fiction Comics

Taylor History of Comics

Vol 3

Monday Madness CAPTAIN BATTLE COMICS "Doctor Horror"

It's Monday, you're expecting "madness", and I'm gonna deliver it...

...with a character who made only one appearance...but what an appearance!

If this had been produced in the 1960s, I'd say the artist had gotten some bad weed before producing the latest issue of his underground comix.

In fact, it appeared in 1941's Captain Battle Comics #2, illustrated (and probably written) by Don Rico and read by impressionable young kids throughout America!

Publisher Lev Gleason had already introduced comics' first major super-villain, The Claw, in Silver Streak Comics, and it's possible he posed the suggestion to his artists that they come up with something to top The Claw.

Or, it's possible that with a deadline looming and pages to fill, Gleason assigned Rico to come up with a story in a very brief time frame!

We'll never know the answer.

But that shouldn't stop you from enjoying this startling story!

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Reading Room FLIP FALCON IN THE FOURTH DIMENSION "Marriage on Mercury!"

It's been almost eighty years since this never-reprinted story appeared...

...but it's astonishing what we've learned about the planet Mercury in the interim!

Wow!
This Don Rico-written and illustrated tale from Fox's Fantastic Comics #7 (1940) might well be the first example of inter-species...er...relations with the female as the aggressor!
(The hot-to-trot one in such stories is usually the alien male!)
BTW, what happened to the Queen's father, whom she claimed was an Earthman?
How'd he get there in the early 1900s?
What happened to him?
Another example of the multiple concepts the amazing Rico just tossed off the top of his head, then promptly forgot about while working on these maniacally-paced stories!

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Lorelei

by Don Rico

(who turned novelist after leaving comics!)

Reading Room FLIP FALCON IN THE FOURTH DIMENSION "The Devil with Lucifer!"

Is there nothing Flip Falcon can't do?

Even battle Satan himself to a standstill?

Wow!

Much attention has been given recently to fellow Fox Comics creator Fletcher Hanks for his way-out work on strips like StarDust and Fantomah.

But writer/artist Don Rico could come up with equally-astounding stories (and was a better draftsman) as this never-reprinted story from Fox's Fantastic Comics #6 (1940) proves!

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Lorelei

by Don Rico

(who turned novelist after leaving comics!)

Reading Room FLIP FALCON IN THE FOURTH DIMENSION "Doomed World"

We Have Already Seen...

Returning from Earth in the year 1,001,939, Flip looks where no man has looked before...

Wow!

Much attention has been given recently to fellow Fox Comics creator Fletcher Hanks for his way-out work on strips like StarDust and Fantomah.

But writer/artist Don Rico could come up with equally-astounding stories (and was a better draftsman) as this never-reprinted story from Fox's Fantastic Comics #5 (1940) proves.

Reading Room FLIP FALCON IN THE FOURTH DIMENSION "One Million AD (Give or Take a Millennium)"

When Last We Left Flick Falcon...

...hmmm.

Just go with the synopsis above, and we'll fill you in on the name change later...

It's fascinating to see concepts that today's writers would use as the premise for an entire mini-series get tossed aside in only six pages!

But that's exactly what happened in this never-reprinted tale from Fox's Fantastic Comics #4 (1940)!

Writer/artist Don Rico was coming up with such weird ideas that this was, literally, just a distraction from the main plotline!

But on to more important matters...

Why did "Flick Falcon" become "Flip Falcon"?

Remember, comics' lettering for both titles and word balloons/captions was almost always UPPER CASE!

When you look at the word FLICK, if the "L" and "I" are too close together, it looks like...well, you get the idea.

So, more or less, in mid-story, "Flick" became "Flip".

In fact, if you look at the captions and word balloons, there's extra space between "Flip" and the other words because they didn't want to reletter the whole story after altering Falcon's first name!