Space-Hero Saturdays CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT "Race to Pluto!"

If You Read the Last Chapter....

...You Already Know Jagga Isn't Dead, Though Captain Midnight and Ichabod Mudd Don't Know That!

Is this never-reprinted story from Fawcett's Captain Midnight #57 (1947) really and truly, once and for all, conclusively, cross our hearts and hope to die, the End of Jagga???

Maybe...maybe not!

You'll just heave to keep reading!

(Ain't we stinkers?)

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Captain Midnight Archives

Volume 2

Captain Midnight Saves the World!
...which does not include this story!

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Space-Hero Saturdays CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT "Last Rites of Jagga!"

When Last We Left Our Hero (and His Astral Arch-Enemy)...

Jagga the Space Raider has been caught and is now on trial!
Will this truly lead to his execution and "last rites"?

Yeah, you knew he wasn't dead, right?

Writer Otto Binder and illustrator Leonard Frank didn't kill the evil alien in this story from Fawcett's Captain Midnight #56 (1947), but fear not!
His end is closer than you think!

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Monday Mutant Madness MECHANIX ILLUSTRATED "How Nuclear Radiation can Change Our Race"

From Fawcett's Mechanix Illustrated V49N8 (1953)...

...a cautionary tale about mutants produced by exposure to atomic radiation...written by Otto Binder and illustrated by Kurt Schaffenberger!

Did it help inspire Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Werner Roth, and Vince Colletta in creating this sequence in Marvel's X-Men #14 (1965)?

You tell us!

Space Hero Saturdays CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT "Peril on Venus!"

Alien "space raider" Jagga had already encountered (and lost to) Earth's greatest defender, Captain Midnight...

...now the Sovereign of the Spaceways is about to encounter the Scoundrel of Space again!

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Writer Otto Binder and artist Leonard Frank continue the battle with Jagga (who's gone from Caucasian skin-tone to grey in his second appearance) in this tale from Fawcett's Captain Midnight #53 (1947).

He'll turn green (though not with envy) in later appearances!

Note that the then-current science of 1947 theorized Venus might, in fact, be habitable.
The idea that Atlanteans would've migrated there centuries earlier, when their continent sank beneath the waves, was unique.

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Space Hero Saturdays CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT "versus the Space Raider!"

Our intrepid aviator-turned-astronaut faces his first interplanetary foe...

...in this never-reprinted story from Fawcett's Captain Midnight #52 (1947)!

Oh, you can bet on it, Cap!

Scripted by noted pulp and comic author Otto Binder, and illustrated by Leonard Frank, this was the first of several encounters with Jagga, who seemed able to change his skin color in each tale, likely due to colorists not being given reference of the character's previous appearances!

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Captain Midnight Archives

Volume 2

Captain Midnight Saves the World!
(Which doesn't include this story!)

Reading Room UNEARTHLY SPECTACULARS "Saucerer"

The 1960s were a weird period in comics (and pop culture in general)...

...as this camp-fest from the "Swinging Sixties" amply demonstrates!

BTW, could you guess that the creators were both middle-aged guys whose exposure to "rock-n-roll" was through their kids (more likely, their grand-kids)?

Yep!

Written by long-time sci-fi and comics author Otto Binder (born 1911), and illustrated by Golden and Silver Age artist Carl Pfeufer (born 1910), this never-reprinted two-pager appeared in the back of Harvey's Unearthly Spectaculars #3 (1967)!.

In point of fact, most Silver Age creators were 40 (or over)!

In comparison, today's comic creators are mostly in their 20s and early 30s...and judging from their output, I'm wondering if that's such a good thing...

Monday Mars Madness MAN FROM S.R.A.M. "vs the Devil Man from S.U.N.E.V.!"

A couple of weeks ago we presented the Man from S.R.A.M. in his only published adventure!

...but there's one more tale to be told...that wasn't told!

Written by Otto Binder (with re-write by Editor Joe Simon?) and illustrated by George Tuska, this story produced for Harvey's never-published Jigsaw #3 features a different Martian form for the protaganist, as well as a different vehicle from the previous chapter!
At the same time, Tuska also drew all three issues of Harvey's SpyMan, another cross-genre (super hero/spy/sci-fi) series just before moving on to a long run as Marvel's primary Silver Age Iron Man artist after Gene Colan!

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Hero-a-Go-Go

Campy Comic Books, Crimefighters, and Culture of the Swinging Sixties

Reading Room TALES OF THE UNEXPECTED / FROM BEYOND THE UNKNOWN "Cartoon That Came to Life"

Here's an off-beat tale...

Art by Nick Cardy

...that made the cover both times it was published!

Art by Bill Ely

...though I have to admit the original cover (above) is a bit dull compared to the reprint's cover (top)

Written by Otto Binder and illustrated by Bill Ely, it's a nicely-done story with one obvious question?

Why is the Martian called a "dragon-man"?

His wings are feathered and look more like a bird's...or even an angel's!

The new art for the cover of the reprint gives him scales and a beak so it's a little more like a dragon, but still...

Was the original concept much more lizard/dragon-looking, but the Comics Code Authority forced DC to "tone it down" to the rather innocuous-looking alien?

Trivia: This story is one of the few to be the cover feature both for its' original publication (Tales of the Unexpected #1 [1956]) and the reprint (From Beyond the Unknown #24 [1970])

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Mysteries in Space

The Best of DC Science Fiction Comics