Reading Room STRANGE WORLDS "End of His Service!"

Though Isaac Asimov had introduced his Three Laws of Robotics in 1942...

...obviously the unknown scripter of this never-reprinted tale from Avon's Strange Worlds #5 (1951) never read the story,or chose to disregard the concept!

No less than three illustrators contributed to this story.

Norman Nodell did the bulk of the art, and inked the others' pages.
Those others were John Rosenberger on Page 3 and Werner Roth on Page 4.

The reason for the artist round-robin is unknown, though it was likely a tight deadline.

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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!

Cover Gallery SPEED CARTER: SPACEMAN & SPACE SQUADRON

Here's a look at the covers for the complete run of Speed Carter: SpaceMan...

Art by Bill Everett

Oddly, though they're really nice pieces of art, they never relate to the stories inside the book!

Art by Carl Burgos & ?

Art by Bill Everett

Art by Mike Sekowsky & ?

Art by Mort Lawrence

Art by Joe Maneely

Bill Everett (who didn't do any inside art) did two covers, and Joe Maneely (who did all the Speed stories in the first three issues finally got to do a cover with the last issue!

Here are the covers for Space Squadron.

Note the variants in foreign editions with retitled and redrawn covers...

Art by Sol Brodsky & Christopher Rule.

Vignettes at bottom by George Tuska.

Art by Werner Roth

Canadian Edition

Easily one of the worst recompositing jobs I've ever seen!

Art by Werner Roth

British Edition

Why were the aliens' second heads removed?

Art by Werner Roth

Canadian Edition

Now, this is how you recompose a cover!

Art by Sol Brodsky & Joe Maneely

Art by Sol Brodsky

British

Art by Sol Brodsky &?

We've decided to keep Space Force Saturdays at least through Halloween, so watch this space (pun intended) next week!

FCBD Delayed...But Not Space Force Saturday SPACE SQUADRON "Ring of Flame!"

Usually, the first Saturday in May is Free Comic Book Day...

...but this year, due to Covid-19, it's been moved!

So, let's dive into this week's Space Force Saturday...which won't be pre-empted today, but will be on August 14th!

I suspect Atlas was trying out a new colorist on this never-reprinted tale from Space Squadron #4 (1951)!

Otherwise, with all respect to penciler/inker Werner Roth, it's not a particularly-memorable tale.

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Space Force Saturdays SPACE SQUADRON "Menace of the Martians"

What happens when a strip ignores it's own backstory...

...and changes an alien race's entire history...for no reason at all?

This never-reprinted story from Atlas' Space Squadron #4 (1951) contradicted the Space Squadron #1 tale that introduced Max in several ways!

Notably, that Martians, who were as scientifically and intellectually-advanced as Earthers (though with extremely-short tempers), are now simply savage beings who wish to slay anything living that's not them!
There's no reason I can think of, except that it's likely the anonymous writer of this particular tale was new and unfamiliar with the series!

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Space Force Saturdays SPACE SQUADRON "Target Moon"

Once more, we join the all-American heroes (and alien allies) of...

...showing life in the early 21st Century as seen from the mid-20th Century!

1) Why wasn't the creature vaporized?

2) If it isn't dead after a direct hit by an atomic bomb, how do we know it won't reproduce before it dies?

3) What about radiation?

At the very least, the Space Squadron should all be sterile, if not dying of radiation poisoning!

Hope Blast isn't counting on grandchildren in his future!

4) Considering, in this future, we've populated the Solar System (as well as other systems), I can't believe we don't have one (or more) moonbases already in operation!

Are they in danger from radiation?

The author of this amazingly scientifically-illiterate tale from Atlas' Space Squadron #4 (1951) is unknown, but we do know the penciler is Werner Roth!

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