Showing posts with label Steve Ditko. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Steve Ditko. Show all posts

Thursday, September 19, 2024

Reading Room OUTER SPACE "Repair Stop"

Today's comics creators have lost the ability to tell a straightforward story...
...in a short story format!
It wasn't always this way....
Written by Joe Gill and illustrated by Steve Ditko, this efficent, effective tale from Charlton's Outer Space #18 (1958) sets up the minimal plot, conveys multiple points of view, and delivers a satisfying ending...all within four pages!
If it was done today, it'd be a book-length tale!
You'll note Ditko's heavy use of pen, rather than brush for inking, resulting in a less-lush, less organic "feel" and a lot more cross-hatching instead of feathering than his work only a year later, when he was transitioning from Charlton over to Atlas/Marvel.
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Tuesday, September 17, 2024

Reading Room JUNGLE JIM "Wizard of Dark Mountain"

When Jungle Jim returned to comic books in the 1960s in new stories...
...the usually "realistic" high adventure strip jumped head-first into all-out sci-fi/fantasy!
Written and laid-out by Bhob Stewart, pencilled by Steve Ditko, and inked by Wally Wood. this cover-featured story from Charlton's Jungle Jim #22 (1969) was prepared for the character's previous publisher, King Comics, but ended up at Charlton when King Features Syndicate dropped in-house comic book publishing.
You can read Bhob's account of how this story was produced HERE.
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Saturday, July 6, 2024

Space Hero Saturdays STRANGE WORLDS "I Was a Human Satellite!"

You Don't Have to be Square-Jawed and Muscle-Bound to be a Space Hero...

...as our unnamed protagonist discovers in this tale from Atlas' Strange Planets #3 (1959)
Illustrated by Steve Ditko and written by an unknown scribe, the lesson is that courage isn't defined by lack of fear, but being able to control fear and to utilize it!
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Thursday, May 16, 2024

Reading Room / Tales Thrice Told STRANGE TALES "A Thouand Years Later..."

...today we give you the second version, by the legendary team of Stan Lee and Steve Ditko!
Written by Stan Lee and illustrated by Steve Ditko, this story from Marvel's Strange Tales #90 (1961) is the second time in two years that Lee produced a story based on the "Adam and Eve on past/future Earth" cliche, this time adding the plot element of an immortal man who didn't fit in with society.
Lee would reuse the "Adam and Eve" concept one more time two years later...as we shall see Tuesday!
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AMAZING FANTASTIC INCREDIBLE
A MARVELOUS Memoir

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Tuesday, May 7, 2024

Reading Room SPACE WAR "Comeback"

What's cooler than re-presenting an over six decade-old never-reprinted Steve Ditko story?
ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!
I love what I do!
And, as they say, if you love what you do, it ain't work!





Written by Joe Gill and illustrated by Steve Ditko, this story from Charlton's Space War #10 (1961) has some weird "echoes" of the origin of Captain Atom II in Charlton's Space Adventures #33 (1960)...by the same creatives!
(We showed it HERE!)
Could this story have been created before "Introducing Captain Atom" and held in inventory until a slot opened up?
We'll never know...

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Thursday, February 8, 2024

Reading Room OUT OF THIS WORLD "Conquered Earth"

Ever wonder if Steve Ditko could do Jack Kirby-style epic star-spanning storytelling?
Well, wonder no more, True Believer!
Illustrated by Ditko, written, most likely, by Joe Gill, this tale was tucked in the back of Charlton's Out of This World #4 (1957), which featured three Ditko-rendered stories out of four tales!
Ah, those were the days...
When the story was reprinted in Charlton's Space War #31 (1978), it was finally cover-featured, with the cover for a different (and still never-reprinted) Ditko-illustrated tale...
...which we re-presented a couple of days ago, as shown HERE!
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Tuesday, February 6, 2024

Reading Room STRANGE SUSPENSE STORIES "One Last Chance"

A never-reprinted, Ditko-rendered, Silver Age tale...
...is the sort of thing we delight in presenting to our blog's loyal fans!
I rather like the idea that the protaganists will never know if they succeeded in saving the future...or inadvertently destroyed it!
Charlton's Strange Suspense Stories V3#2 (1968) was written entirely by Steve Skeates, though the stories in the anthology were illustrated by different artists.
Apparently editor Dick Giordano had planned to allow a single writer to carry each issue, with Denny O'Neil penning all the stories in the first issue and Skeates scripting the the tales in the second one.
Giordano's departure to DC scuttled the concept, and from the third issue onward, a variety of writers would fill the pages.
BTW, though the tale was never reprinted, the cover was...
...to represent a different Ditko-illustrated story reprint in Charlton's Space War #31 (1978)!
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