Showing posts with label Reading Room. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Reading Room. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 5, 2026

Reading Room 3-D COLOR CLASSICS: TIME MACHINE (Part 1)

Here's a never-reprinted graphic version of the HG Wells tale...
...from over 3 decades ago, illustrated by the late, great, Neal Adams and his Continuity Associates studio!
To Be Continued Tomorrow...in Wednesday Worlds of Wonder!
Adapted by scripter Peter Stone, with layouts by Neal Adams and finishes by Adams, Rodolfo Damaggio, Andres Klasic, and John Nyberg, this adaptation takes considerable liberties with the original novel.
But, to be fair, almost every adaptation, no matter the media, has made changes, usually due to technical (sfx) or space limitations.
The book was part of a series of comics given away as part of Wendy's Kid's Meals in 1995!
The books used a full color 3-D process called "ChromaDepth", that used the color spectrum to create a three-dimensional effect with the enclosed glasses, yet left a perfectly-readable (if oddly-colored) comic if the glasses were lost!
Support Atomic Kommie Comics
Visit Amazon and Buy...

Thursday, April 30, 2026

Reading Room SPACE WARS "Strange World"

A never-reprinted short story that could've been produced as an episode of the original Twilight Zone...
...from Charlton's Space War #22 (1963).
Was this a longer tale edited down to only three pages?
It certainly feels like it, since there are many unanswered questions like...
If these people are Tibetan, why are they dressed like the Flintstones...and why do they speak English?
How would they know anything about the Earth-Uranus War?
And why is it we have no idea how only Heffner survived?
Pencils by Dick Giordano, inks by Vince Colletta.
The writer is unknown, but the Grand Comics Database
 postulates Joe Gill as the most likely candidate.
Support Atomic Kommie Comics!
Visit Amazon and Buy...

Tuesday, April 28, 2026

Reading Room: CAPTAIN SCIENCE COMICS "World War III with the Ants"

I'm Having Serious Problems with Ant Infestation...
...but never anything like this ant-ageddon (or ant-pocalypse) from Youthful's Captain Science #6 (1953)!
As for who was responsible for writing and illustrating this cult comic classic, theories run from Harry Harrison (who became a major sci-fi novelist and editor), to Dick Ayers to Lou Cameron, but nobody knows for certain.
BTW, this story came out over a year before the classic giant-ant film THEM!

Sunday, April 26, 2026

Reading Room CAPTAIN SCIENCE COMICS "Spawn of Saturn"

Welcome to the Cover Featured Tale from Captain Science #1 (1950)...
...except it's not about Captain Science!
In fact, the story's title isn't mentioned on the cover at all!
(You can find the actual Captain Science stories from #1 HERE and HERE.)
It's interesting to see a sci-fi tale where a handsome starship captain doesn't go on a landing party to a potentially-dangerous locale!
The writer is unknown, but the art is by Walter Johnson, who not only penciled and inked his own work, but ran a studio that supplied material to a number of comics companies, so some of his "signed" jobs (like this one) show elements of several artists' styles.
Support Atomic Kommie Comics!
Visit Amazon and Buy..

Thursday, April 23, 2026

Reading Room BLAST-OFF "Little Earth"

This is a classic example of an unheralded gem by two graphic-story masters...
...that has been reprinted only twice...in now OOP limited-run books, so most of you have never seen it!
Oddly, the GCD lists it as penciled by Reed Crandall and inked by Al Williamson, but Teddy I at pencilink.blogspot.com reverses the credits!
Personally, I think both artists, in typical Fleagle Gang-style worked at both tasks in various panels.
The writer is Larry Ivie, who scripted several dozen stories for MarvelDCTowerKing, and Warren in the 1960s, and also published Monsters and Heroes, a competitor to Famous Monsters of Filmland!
According to the Kirby Museum, this story was intended for Harvey's never-published Race for the Moon #5 in 1958, but remained unused until 1965, when it ran in the Harvey one-shot anthology Blast-Off!

Tuesday, April 21, 2026

Reading Room WEIRD THRILLERS "Shadow on the Screen!"

For all those whose parents told them "TV is bad for you"...
...and "comics are bad for you", well, they were right, as this comic tale about TV proves!
This tale from Ziff-DavisWeird Thrillers #3 (1952) was illustrated by Bob Powell.
Powell, besides being a gifted illustrator was also a pioneer in the use of "color holds" in comic books.
The same technique he used on the tv screen was also used in a tale of radio and pulp hero The Shadow HERE, taking artwork that normally would be black-line and making it one of the color plates.
It was a very tricky thing to do back in those days since the interior pages were almost never proofed due to time and cost restraints.
But, Powell does some amazing things with the holds, making them line up exactly almost all the time!
Sadly, the writer of the story is, as in so many cases, unknown...
Support Atomic Kommie Comics
Visit Amazon and Buy...
Terror
Paid Link

Thursday, April 16, 2026

Reading Room RACE FOR THE MOON "Face on Mars"

The most famous story from Harvey's Race for the Moon anthology series...

...is this tale from #2 by writer/peniler Jack Kirby and inker Al Williamson which doesn't take place on the Moon...but on Mars!

Why is it so famous?

Keep in mind that this was the era of the Chariots of the Gods? fad, and to many, this pic was confirmation that aliens had either come thru the Solar System and stopped off not only on Earth, but Mars as well, or were from Mars initially!
And, there were those who remembered this little comic tale from their childhood.
The truth was a bit more mundane.
Click HERE for NASA's explanation.
To this day, there are still those who say it's a cover-up, that there is life on Mars, and that "the face" is a relic of their existence.
Judge for yourself.
Support Atomic Kommie Comics!
Visit Amazon and Buy...
Mars in the Movies
A History
Paid Link

Tuesday, April 14, 2026

Reading Room OUT OF THIS WORLD "The World Awaits"

We know Steve Ditko as the co-creator of The Amazing Spider-Man...
...but he was equally-adept at visualizing insects as well as arachnids!
(Yes, there is a difference!)
This lovely Ditko-rendered story from Charlton's Out of This World #12 (1959) would really have benefited from some Stan Lee-esque scripting rather than Joe Gill's stilted prose, which renders the ending rather...dull.
Support Atomic Kommie Comics
Visit Amazon and Buy...