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 Comics, Signet did with DC Comics, Lancer 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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Science Fiction Comics

Taylor History of Comics

Vol 3

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Reading Room HOUSE OF MYSTERY "Human TIme Capsule"

Under this kool Ruben Moreira cover...

...lurks an even kooler, never-reprinted tale of illegal aliens and crime from DC's House of Mystery #64 (1957)!

So the American citizen is the criminal, not the "illegal alien"!

The Mort Meskin-illustrated tale left a possibility for a sequel, which was never realized!

Since even DC doesn't know who wrote it (and the odds are the author is deceased by now), we'll never know...

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Showcase Presents

Strange Adventures

Volume 1
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Reading Room AMAZING ADVENTURES "Amazing Prophecies"

Let's peer into a crystal ball from the 1950s...

...and see they did predict 3-D TV and bigger women (as compared to the females of the 1950s).

But the other prophecies from this never-reprinted feature illustrated by Ross Andru in Ziff-Davis' Amazing Adventures #4 (1951) have yet to occur...

Reading Room LOST WORLDS "Man Who Didn't Know Venus"

Nedor/Better/Standard Comics produced several sci-fi anthologies...

...none of which lasted more than three issues.

But it certainly wasn't due to lack of quality.

With a contributor list that included Alex Toth, Ross Andru, Mike Sekowsky, Nick Cardy, and Jack Katz, you're talking some of the great and soon-to-be-great storytellers of comics history!

But, there was one other sci-fi creator who did a story for Lost Worlds, one of only four tales he did for comic books.

Jerome Bixby, novelist and short-story writer, as well as screenwriter whose credits include...

IT! the Terror from Beyond Space!

Fantastic Voyage

Star Trek "Mirror, Mirror"*, "By Any Other Name", "Requiem for Methuselah" and "Day of the Dove"

and the short story "It's a Good Life" which was adapted on both the original Twilight Zone tv series (by Rod Serling) and the 1983 feature film (by Richard Matheson).

BTW, around the time he wrote this, Bixby had just left his position as editor of the Planet Stories pulp magazine at Fiction House, where he also contributed a couple of text pieces to Planet Comics and Indians (his only non-genre text story)!

*The Mirror Universe created by Bixby in "Mirror, Mirror" has proven to be so popular that it has reappeared in almost all the spin-off series spanning almost all of Federation and StarFleet history!

And let's not get into the numerous (sometimes contradictory) novels and comics about the concept...

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Masters of Science Fiction Volume 2
Jerome Bixby
"One Way Street" and Other Tales
Note: "One Way Street's" concept of being transferred to another universe was the thematic basis for "Mirror, Mirror"!
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Reading Room (and Bonus Video) STAR*REACH "Why Viking Lander/Mars?" by Ray Bradbury

A very kool, never-reprinted adaptation of a Ray Bradbury poem...

...first performed by the legendary author at the 1976 San Diego Comic-Con the week after the Viking probe landed on Mars!
Sadly, there's no extant video or audio recording of the event, but we did find a more recent reading by Robert Picardo ("The Doctor" on Star Trek: Voyager)

AFAIK, the poem's never been reprinted in any of the Bradbury anthologies, or anywhere else, for that matter!

It's only appearance was in Star*Reach #6 (1976), illustrated with absolutely beautiful art by Alex Nino!

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Star*Reach
Greatest Hits

Reading Room STRANGE TALES "Beware of Meeks Bringing Gifts!"

A couple of days ago, we brought you a never-reprinted sci-fi comics tale...

...but, while it has never been reprinted, that doesn't mean the story wasn't reused...this time with an oddly-contemporary aspect...

WTF???

Newspeople have a responsibility to uncover and tell the truth objectively and honestly?

Please don't tell FoxNews that...

We do know that Jack Kirby penciled this (also) never-reprinted story from Atlas' Strange Tales #86 (1961).

However, everything else is pure speculation.

It's thought Sol Brodsky inked the story (though it has aspects of Dick Ayers' style as well).

And, since it's not signed "Stan Lee" (as most confirmed Lee-scripted tales were),  the consensus is that Stan's brother Larry Lieber penned the story.

Reading Room WORLD OF FANTASY "Creatures Who Captured Earth!"

Did you know the two famous sci-fi stories' plots that were combined to create this tale?

Hint: one original involves robots/androids,, and the other is about cannibalism...

This never-reprinted story by Stan Lee/Larry Lieber and Don Heck from Atlas' World of Fantasy #18 (1959) was based on two classic sci-fi tales...

"With Folded Hands" by Jack Williamson, which premiered in Astounding Science Fiction...

...and was expanded into the novel The Humanoids, (and a sequel, The Humanoid Touch, over 30 years later)!

Though never done on film or tv, the story was adapted to radio on Dimension X (which you can hear HERE) and the basic plot was re-used in the classic Star Trek episode "I, Mudd".

The other plot point, involving decoding an alien text to discover a secret agenda, was probably taken from the 1950 Galaxy Magazine short story "To Serve Man" by Damon Knight.

(Note that the classic Twilight Zone episode adapting the tale wouldn't appear until three years later.)

Also note that, while the comic tale was never reprinted, it was redone only two years later by another of Atlas/Marvel's major artistic stars!

We'll have that story Thursday!

Monday Madness ADVENTURE INTO MYSTERY "Conquerors"

As Fascism/Authoritarianism sweeps across the globe, and even infiltrates America...

We have to ask ourselves...is there any way to stop it?

The answer presented in this never-reprinted story from Atlas' Adventure into Mystery #1 (1956) is rather symplistic, and likely wouldn't actually work in the real world!
But it's nice to believe it could work!

BTW, Silver Age comics aficionados might note that the art for this story (and a number of pre-Marvel Atlas tales, was by John Forte, best-remembered today as the first ongoing artist on DC's Legion of Super-Heroes during its run in Adventure Comics!

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Science Fiction Comics

Taylor History of Comics

Vol 3

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Yesterday Was Free Comic Book Day, and I Couldn't Help Wondering...

...What If Comics Were All That Remained of Humanity?

This never-reprinted short from Warren's Heavy Metal knock-off 1984 #1 (1978), written by Bill DuBay and illustrated by Alfredo Alcala, offers a more-than-likely answer!

Reading Room BLACK CAT MYSTIC "MysteryVision!"

Here's a tale that could've inspired the movie They Live! as well as several Twilight Zone eps...

...plus it has a rather unique aspect we'll explain at the conclusion...

"We take our leave of Herman Scudder, who discovered that "reading" people can be as easy as reading an eye-chart...in the Twilight Zone..."

(Sorry, instinctively channeled Rod Serling for a moment...)

Pencils and inks for this never-reprinted story from Harvey's Black Cat Mystic #57 (1956) are by Jack Kirby, who rarely inked his own work since editors felt his time was better-spent penciling at a rate of up to four pages per day!

(Yes, I said per day!)

Probably written by either Kirby himself, or studio co-owner/creative partner Joe Simon.

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Art of the Simon and Kirby Studio

featuring images shot directly from the original art!

Reading Room HOME RUN "Little Leagues"

With the return of fans worshipping at the temples of the National Pastime (aka "baseball stadiums")...

...we thought we'd look at the origin of how many of us (myself included) first experienced organized baseball!

There was a short-lived surge in sports-themed comic books from 1949 to 1952.

This particular one-shot from Magazine Enterprises, produced in 1952 (but published in '53), was the last gasp of that cycle.

Produced/packaged by writer/artist Bob Powell's studio, this non-fiction historical piece was typical of the high-quality material he supplied to numerous publishers including Magazine Enterprises, Street & Smith, Prize Comics, and Harvey Comics, from the mid-1940s to the early 1960s.