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

Thursday, July 3, 2025

Patriotic Reading Room 1776: the Movie Conclusion

When Last We Left a Disfunctional Congress...

...no, not the one currently screwing up America!
The one screwing up the founding of America!
Specifically, conservatives, even then, "right-wingers".
Some called them Tories.
Some called them "traitors"!

How Thomas Jefferson was ...persuaded...to write the Declaration was abridged in the comic...but not in the movie!


To keep the horny Jefferson on-task, a little feminine assistance was imported from Virginia...

Sexually-satiated (in a tasteful, Comics Code-approved way), Jefferson pens the Declaration of Independence...

...and then the debating really began...


One matter the comic avoids, but the movie (and the play it's based on) doesn't is slavery and how it was addressed in this situation...

And now, back to the voting...
And thus was the "Great Experiment" Born!

Happy 249th Birthday, America!

I Hope and Pray We Reach the 250th!

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Tuesday, July 1, 2025

Patriotic Reading Room 1776: the Movie Part 1

Before Hamilton, There Was a Broadway Musical About the Creation of the USA!

But, unlike Hamilton, there was a comic book adaptation of it...when it was transformed into a movie!



As you can see, doing a musical as a comic book has a major drawback!
NO MUSICAL NUMBERS!
But we have a solution...Insert the songs back into the narrative!

Now, on with the comic...

Time for another song!

Again, back to the comic...




To Be Continued...Tomorrow...
at Secret Sanctum of Captain Video!
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Sunday, June 29, 2025

Atomic Reading Room TALES TO ASTONISH "Voice of Fate"

...but with some interesting variations!
This story by plotter Stan Lee, writer Larry Lieber, and artist Don Heck is from Atlas' Tales to Astonish #33 (1962) and is a retelling of "Mister Black", which appeared only a couple of months earlier in Atlas' Strange Tales #93 (1962).
You'll note the protaganist is now American...but still a draft dodger.
Of course, the story omits why the Japanese would even take him in (since he had nothing of value to the government), or how he even got to Japan in the middle of World War II...
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Thursday, June 26, 2025

Atomic Reading Room STRANGE TALES "Mister Black"

 Continuing our look at how American comics portrayed the bombing of Hiroshima...

...with a tale featuring a Japanese protagonist!
Was this story from Atlas' Strange Tales #93 (1962) an inventory tale from the 1950s?
Artist Bob Forgione lost his ongoing freelance work at Atlas when the company cut back in late 1956-early 1957 after losing their newsstand distributor.
When this story was finally published, Forgione was working steadily for DellACG, and DC.
It also appears to have been the last original tale by Bob that Atlas/Marvel published.
(All subsequent stories were reprints of earlier material.)
Also, could it have been reworked from an unpublished Witness tale?
Every comic company had a cloaked mystery man narrating stories about "everyday" people (and occasionally influencing them, as well).
Timely/Atlas' entrant in the Mysterious Traveler/Whistler/Phantom Stranger/Man in Black Called Fate competition was The Witness, who had his own one-shot comic and a number of stories scattered in other titles.
At any rate, an extremely-similar tale appeared only a couple of months later...by one of the now-revived and thriving Atlas/Marvel's hottest artists!
Be Here Sunday For the Final Horrific Hiroshima Tale!
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Tuesday, June 24, 2025

Atomic Reading Room STRANGE TALES "Eyes that Never Close"

With the 80th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima coming up...
...we're presenting several tales from the 1950s-60s relating to it.
This never-reprinted story from Atlas' Strange Tales #61 (1958) treats the bombing as just another disaster, but one the criminal won't escape from.
Illustrated effectively by Bernie Krigstein, who tells a story in only four pages that most artists today would need twenty pages for.
BTW, the writer is unknown.

Be Here Thursday For the Next Horrific Hiroshima Tale!
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Thursday, June 5, 2025

Reading Room DO YOU BELIEVE IN NIGHTMARES? "Man Who Crashed into Another Era"

Here's a short story featuring dinosaurs, illustrated by Steve Ditko...
...just before his stint on Charlton's Gorgo!
Ok, so it was the old "It's only a dream" scenario.
You got to admit, it's well-done!
From St John's Do You Believe in Nightmares? #1 (1957), a short-lived anthology produced just before St John went out of business.
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Tuesday, June 3, 2025

Reading Room STRANGE WORLDS "Abduction of Henry Twigg"

Here's a dream come true for all us fanboys and nerds (Yep, I'm one)...
...in this Joe Kubert-illustrated tale from Avon's Strange Worlds #8 (1952)...
Talk about politically-incorrect...from both sexes!
But it's still entertaining, and that's what counts, eh?
Note: we've run stories from two different series named "Strange Worlds".
This tale is from the first one, published by Avon Comics in the early 1950s.
By the late 1950s, Avon Publishing had abandoned comic books and concentrated on "traditional" publishing (hardcovers and paperbacks) in various genres (including sci-fi and horror).
Curiously, when comics became "hot' in the 1960s, Avon did not reprint their comic library in paperback format the way Ballantine Books did with EC ComicsSignet did with DC ComicsLancer did with Marvel. and Belmont did with Archie's super-heroes!
Considering they owned the material and didn't have to pay to reprint it like all the other publishers did, it seems like a lost opportunity for Avon to make some quick cash.
Note: We've re-presented several tales from the other Strange Worlds, published by Atlas Comics in the late 1950s, literally right before they became Marvel in 1961!
It's easy to tell which is which, since the Atlas/Marvel version features work by creatives like Jack Kirby, Don Heck, and Steve Ditko who would be the creative mainstays of the Marvel Age of Comics, while the Avon books have art by illustrators who would make their mark at DC, like Joe Kubert and John Forte!
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