Meet the FIRST Black Comic Character with His OWN Book--LOBO!

Celebrate Black History Month (and show off your pop-culture knowledge) with kool kollectibles from Atomic Kommie Comics™ featuring comics' FIRST Black cowboy!

Created the same year (1966) as Marvel's Black Panther (who guest-starred in Fantastic Four, Tales of Suspense, and The Avengers, but didn't get his own series until 1973, or his own comic until 1977), Lobo was the FIRST Black character with HIS OWN BOOK!
(Other Black characters had their own series in anthology books, but Lobo was the first to have his name AS the comic's title!)

Lobo combined several popular concepts...
Man on the Run for a Crime He Did NOT Commit
Exemplified by then-hit tv series The Fugitive, Lobo was framed, but couldn't prove his innocence.
Lone Western Hero
A loner wandering the Old West, righting wrongs was an especially popular genre in tv Westerns.
Variations on the theme included gamblers (Maverick) and martial-arts experts (Kung Fu)
Note: the tv series Branded combined both the Loner and Man Framed themes!
Prominent Black character
Black characters (except for sterotypes like Amos 'n Andy) were few and far between on tv until the mid-1960s, and even then only as supporting characters (usually servants).
1960s urban dramas like Naked City and East Side, West Side, which dealt with current social themes had Black guest stars including James Earl Jones and Diana Sands, but no Black regulars.
Star Trek (1966) had both a Black regular character (Lt. Nyota Uhura) and Black actors in prominent roles as scientists and high-placed officers (admirals, etc,).
But, at that point, there were no tv series with a Black lead or Black title character!
(Diahann Carroll's groundbreaking series Julia didn't debut until 1968!)
So, Lobo was, to say the least, a daring experiment, albeit one with as many popular themes as possible to maximize sales potential!
Unfortunately, it didn't work.
Lobo the comic only ran two issues, but now you can have the collectibles like t-shirts, magnets, mousepads, etc., they never made during his title's too-brief run!
Our Lobo page...
Lobo
Our entire Western line (including Lobo)...
Western Comics Adventures™

Comic Christmas Cover: The Lone Ranger

For the next few days, we'll be showing Christmas-themed Golden Age comic covers.
Today it's The Lone Ranger #79 (1955)
"Hi-Yo---Ho-Ho-Ho!"

Put a Woman Outlaw Under Your Christmas Tree!

The tradition of Old West-themed Christmas presents dates back to the late 1800s, and was immortalized in the modern Xmas film A Christmas Story written (and narrated) by the late, great, Jean Shepherd.
Ralphie's quest for a Red Ryder BB Gun was mirrored by countless little boys (and probably more than a few girls) of the 1930s-1950s!
We at Atomic Kommie Comics™ believe the tradition should be upheld...but with a twist!
As part of our ongoing Christmas List of Pop Culture Stuff, we suggest...Women Outlaws, one of the coolest lines in our Western Comics Adventures™ section!
These AIN'T no ladies!
Think Barbara Stanwyck or Jane Russell in comic book form!
We're talkin' Horses! Leather! High-heeled boots! ShootOuts! Dominant females who don't take no sh!t! And...CatFights! Wah-HOO!
(And it's all rated PG-13 or PG!)
Besides the usual t-shirts, mugs, and other collectibles, these kool retro images also adorn women's duds! Jersey Tees, Spaghetti tanks! Thongs!

If women who can ride and shoot as well as any man ain't yer cup of prairie coffee, we also have Real-Life Westerners, Broncho Bill, The Cisco Kid & Pancho, Kid Cowboy, Masked Heroes, Native Americans, A Wealth of Westerners, and even Western Love!
Think of how they'll look under the Christmas Tree! (And they're safer than a Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle! You won't shoot your eye out!)

Calendars are Coming! Calendars are HERE!

from Basil Rathbone IS Sherlock Holmes!™ 2010 12-Month Calendar

Among our most popular items are 12-month calendars.
(Y'know, the ones with different illustrations for each month.)
Last year we almost doubled the selection of subjects, and you pop culture aficionados responded by gobbling them up like there was no tomorrow (pun intended)!
Plus, there were several subjects that you requested we create calendars for!
No fools we! If the demand is there, supply it we will!

So, for 2010, Atomic Kommie Comics™ is unleashing the following ALL-NEW 12-month calendars...
Basil Rathbone IS Sherlock Holmes!™
(replacing Sherlock Holmes: the Greatest Sleuth of All!™ which will return, revised, in 2011!)
Lost Heroes of the Golden Age of Comics™ Team-Ups
(classic covers featuring two or more characters together who already had their own strips or titles!)
Classic The Owl
Classic Monster of Frankenstein
Classic The Flame
Classic Doc Strange
Classic DareDevil
Classic Captain Future
(featuring all three versions--original pulp hero and both comic incarnations!)
Classic Cat-Man
Classic Blue Beetle
Classic Amazing-Man
Captain MidNight™
Phantom Lady™
Mr District Attorney™
(replacing Crime & Punishment™)
Captains of the Comics!™
(replacing Captains of the Cosmos™)
Jungle Girls™
Masked Western Heroes™
Aviators of the Golden Age of Comics™
(replacing War: Past, Present & Future™)
plus revised versions of some of our previous best-sellers, some of which are already up!
The rest will be loaded as we finish production work, over the next few weeks!
Check back every few days to see what's new!
(note: we link calendars as they become available)

Ghost Rider by Frank Frazetta

He began life in the late 1940s as The Calico Kid, a masked hero whose secret identity was a lawman who felt justice was constrained by legal limitations. (There were a lot of those heroes in comics and pulps of the 40s including our own DareDevil and Blue Beetle!)
But, with masked heroes in every genre doing a slow fade-out, and both westerns and horror on the rise, the character was re-imagined in 1949 as comics' first horror / western character!
The Ghost Rider himself was not a supernatural being.
He wore a phosphorescent suit and cape, making him glow in the dark, appearing as a spectral presence to the (mostly) superstitious cowboys and Indians he faced.
And, since the inside of the cape was black, he'd reverse it, and appear in the dark to people as just a floating head, usually scaring a confession or needed information out of them.
Note: some covers, like the one here, show the inside of the cape to be white! Chalk it up to artistic license (and face it, it looks damned good).
BTW, that cover was by the legendary Frank Frazetta! He did several of them, three of which are included in our collection!
In the series' early days the villains were standard owlhoots or, like the Rider, people pretending to be supernatural beings.
That changed around 1952, when he started facing real mystic menaces including Indian spirits, vampires, and even the Frankenstein Monster (though not the one from Prize Comics.)
Unfortunately, it was about this point in time that Dr. Wertham began his crusade against comics in general and horror comics in particular...
By 1954, the Ghost Rider had lost his series. The next year he disappeared entirely.
But, over 50 years later, Atomic Kommie Comics™ brought him back, digitally-restored and remastered on a host of kool kollectibles to go with our other masked Western heroes including The Lone Rider, The Red Mask, The Black Phantom, and The Masked Ranger.

If you're a fan of Westerns, horror, masked heroes, or all three genres, take a long, lingering look at The Ghost Rider!
You'll not see his like again!

The FIRST Black Hero to have his OWN Comic Book!

Celebrate Black History Month (and show off your pop-culture knowledge) with kool kollectibles from Atomic Kommie Comics™ featuring comics' FIRST Black cowboy!

Created the same year (1966) as Marvel's Black Panther (who guest-starred in Fantastic Four, Tales of Suspense, and The Avengers, but didn't get his own series until 1973, or his own comic until 1977), Lobo was the FIRST Black character with HIS OWN BOOK!
(Other Black characters had their own series in anthology titles, but Lobo was the first to have his name AS the title!)

Lobo the comic only ran two issues, but now you can have the collectibles like t-shirts, magnets, mousepads, etc., they never made during his title's too-brief run!
Dedicated Lobo page...
Lobo
Our entire Western line (including Lobo)...
Western Comics Adventures™

Indians weren't always the "bad guys"!

Atomic Kommie Comics™ continues it's revival of Western comic book pop art as kool kollectibles!
New to Western Comic Adventures™ is Native Americans, featuring heroic Indian/Native American/AmerInd lead characters (not sidekicks like Tonto or Little Beaver, who also had their own comics) battled evil and injustice, no matter who was committing it, cowboy or Indian!
Yes, in these books, the Indian won!
So far, we have two collectible designs each for Red Arrow and Indian Braves (featuring Green Arrowhead), and we'll be adding more as we acquire or borrow books to scan.

"The Cisco Kid was a friend of mine..."

The Cisco Kid was the first Hispanic multi-media superstar, hitting books, movies, radio, comic books, newspaper strips, and eventually, television, predating Zorro in each media (except Zorro never had a radio show)!
As created by legendary writer O Henry, in the short story "The Caballero's Way" in 1907. the Kid was neither Hispanic nor a hero!
A 1914 silent movie of "The Caballero's Way" altered the character to the version that became famous...a wandering hero, called "The Robin Hood of the Old West", who, with his sidekick, righted wrongs without killing, but with lots and LOTS of shooting, just like the Lone Ranger!
We at Atomic Kommie Comics™ are proud to reintroduce the classic Western character to a new audience in our line of products in the Western Comic Adventures™ line.
Just go to The Cisco Kid & Pancho for a look at 6 different designs, including his 1st comic appearance!
They'll have you going "Oh, Cisco!" "Oh, Pancho!" just like Duncan Renaldo & Leo Carrillo did in the classic tv series!
(And they'd make great Cinco De Mayo gifts!)

Retro Wild West designs for the owlhoot in your life!

More vintage fun from Atomic Kommie Comics!
Classic rip-roaring Western images including Women Outlaws (bad grrrls), King of the Bad Men of DeadWood (You thought the HBO series was just fiction?), The Lone Rider (Not RANGER!), Red Mask, and Blazing SixGuns!
A 12-month calendar, shirts, mugs, magnets, mousepads and other stuff !
Just click on Western Comics Adventures to have a look!
Think of how they'll look under the Christmas Tree! (And they're safer than a Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle! You won't shoot your eye out!)