Space Heroine Saturday BARBARELLA 2.2

When Last We Left Our Space Heroine...

With Captain Dildano and the rest of his crew dead, and their ship a derelict, Barbarella is stranded on Lython...

There are more plot elements and characters who ended up in the movie, though at the flick's beginning, rather than midway through the story, as they do here.

Some characters like "Klill, the horrid little Martian", didn't appear in the film.
The explanation of why the inhabitants are dressed in mid-19th Century Earth fashions was utilized a year later in the Classic Star Trek episode "Squire of Gothos".
At any rate, the "antique-looking" clothing and technology didn't make it into the movie's version of this sequence!

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Reading Room / Tales Twice Told SUSPENSE DETECTIVE "Short Step to Oblivion"

With the revelation that Fredric Wertham lied about comics' effects on kids...

...it seems appropriate to take a look at how his far-reaching deception altered pop culture as we know it!

BTW, most people (myself included) felt that Wertham exaggerated his claims, but altering/modifying evidence to validate his theories went over the line.

This pre-Comics Code tale appeared in Fawcett's Suspense Detective #1 (1952), illustrated by George Evans, but the writer is uncredited.

It seems to be a straightforward tale of mistaken identity and justice served with some violence mixed in, but nothing over-the-top, right?

Not according to the Comics Code Authority!

Be back Thursday to see how the Code altered this story, which they considered too violent!

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Ten-Cent Plague

The Great Comic Book Scare and How It Changed America

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Wednesday Worlds of Wolverton MARVEL TALES "Gateway to Horror"

For Halloween, we're devoting this feature to the demented delineations of Basil Wolverton...

...such as this sordid story from Marvel Tales #104 (1951)!

Marvel Comics (known as this point as Atlas Comics) embraced horror comics as much as any other publisher during the 1950s, occasionally pushing the borders of "good taste" with work by Basil Wolverton, Russ Heath, Bill Everett, Joe Maneely, Steve Ditko, and others.

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Creeping Death from Neptune

Life and Comics of Basil Woverton

Volume One: 1909-1941

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Reading Room OUT OF THIS WORLD "Man Who Stepped Out of a Cloud"

Let's have a look at a Steve Ditko story...

...that shows both his storytelling and rendering talents at their best.

Written by Joe Gill and illustrated by Steve Ditko, this tale from Charlton's Out of This World #5 (1957) is a superb example of how to tell a complete story in just five pages.

While the script isn't the greatest, Ditko tells the story effectively with both "talking heads" (and very distinctive, individualistic talking heads, at that), and kool graphics showing things impossible to portray convincingly with the SFX technology of the 1950s.

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Unexplored Worlds

Steve Ditko Archives, Vol 2

Space Heroine Saturdays BARBARELLA 2.1

When Last We Left Our Heroine...

All you really need to know is that Captain Dildano's spacecraft was forced down by a gigantic jellyfish...ok, plot logic is not the strip's strong suit.

Just enjoy the kool art...

Dildano also dies in the movie, but under vastly different circumstances.
In fact, this particular sequence is not adapted into the 1960s cult classic flick!

More in the near future!

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Barbarella

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A Safety Tip from The Fighting Yank for the 4th of July...

Here's the word, kids, from The Fighting Yank himself...

Art by Mort Meskin

...from the final issue of his 1940s series, Standard's Fighting Yank #29 (1949)

Art by Alex Schomburg

And here's the patriotic cover from that issue!

Monday Maternity Madness Redux CHOICES "Abortion: What Would Hippocrates Say?"

On the second anniversary of Dobbs V Jackson Women's Health Organization...

...we re-present a tale from Choices, a benefit comic produced in 1989, about the almost-equally-stupid Webster V Reproductive Health Services verdict,when we thought that was the worst that could happen to America's women!

"Those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it!"

Written and illustrated by William Messner-Loebs, a multi-award-winning writer/artist who would do an acclaimed run on DC's Wonder Woman a couple of years after this.

Space Heroine Saturdays BARBARELLA 1.2

When Last We Left Our Space Heroine...

Barbarella crash-landed on the planet Lythion where, after a number of...interesting...situations, she managed to reunite two long-feuding races, ending their centuries-long war.
With her ship destroyed, the amazing woman gets a lift from a conveniently-arriving space freighter and is off to another astounding adventure on other worlds...

We'll return to Barbarella in the near future...after we catch our breath...

It's interesting to see various plot elements and characters that Roger Vadim and Claude Brulé re-composited in the 1960s movie's script!

Speaking of which...

Support Atomic Kommie Comics
Visit Amazon and Buy

Barbarella
2-Disc 4K Blu Ray
with Lots of Kool Extras
Paid Link