Reading Room: ATOM-AGE COMBAT "Hungry Moss"

Here's a story from the 1950s that might've inspired the cult flick The Green Slime!

This tale from the fifth (and final) issue of the 1952-53 comic book Atom-Age Combat is one of only three stories in the entire series with actual sci-fi or alien elements!
Most of the tales were of the World War III / Atomic War type showing a long-feared "US vs the Russian and/or Chinese Commies" war using advanced technology and limited nuclear weaponry.

While the writer is unknown, the art is by longtime war comics artist Dick Ayers, best-known for Sgt Fury and His Howling Commandos. 

Reading Room: VIC TORRY AND HIS FLYING SAUCER "Catastrophe!"

When Last We Left Our Hero...

Ace test pilot Victor Torry and his aviation-enthusiast girlfriend Laura are bequeathed a flying saucer by a dying alien.

Operating on automatic pilot, the spacecraft returns to it's home on Mercury, where they discover a civil war under way against the tyrant Szzz, who has plans to conquer the entire solar system!

Vic and Laura manage to commandeer another ship, override the controls and leave.

But now, they are returning to Mercury...

Art by Golden Age great Bob Powell.

The tale has been reprinted twice, in Vic Torry & His Flying Saucer (2000) and
Mr Monster's Hi-Voltage Super-Science (1987)

Vic himself appears in a cameo in the SkyWolf back-up story "Bachelor Party" in AirBoy #36 (1986)

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Reading Room: VIC TORRY AND HIS FLYING SAUCER "Evil of Szzz"

When Last We Left Our Hero...

Ace test pilot Victor Torry and his aviation-enthusiast girlfriend Laura are testing a new jet when they encounter a flying saucer!
They pursue it and, when it lands in the desert, they also land, then go aboard the alien ship where they meet an elderly alien.
Unable to return to Mercury (his home world) in time to regenerate, he bequeaths the spacecraft to Vic and Laura, then disintegrates.
Exploring the ship, they accidentally activate the propulsion system and the ship, operating on automatic pilot returns to Mercury, with them aboard.
It lands, and a group of Mercurians greet the ship.
They are not pleased to see Earthlings instead of one of their own exiting the ship...

Script by Roy Ald, who also edited Fawcett's Captain Video!
Art by Golden Age great Bob Powell.
Be here tomorrow for the final chapter of Vic Torry!

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Reading Room: VIC TORRY AND HIS FLYING SAUCER "Captive Planet"

One of the weirdest one-shot comics ever...

...art by Golden Age great Bob Powell!

We'll come back to Vic and Laura tomorrow...

Published in 1950 during the flying saucer craze caused by UFO sightings at Roswell in 1947, Vic Torry and His Flying Saucer was probably going to be an ongoing series, but never got past the first issue.
I have that impression because this issue is primarily an intro, detailing how Vic came into possession of the alien ship, as well as setting up an ongoing antagonistic situation with at least one extraterestrial race.
It's possible that the comic was intended as a lead-in to a toy line which never developed.

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