Harry Harrison (1925-2012)

Noted sci-fi-author Harry Harrison passed away this week...

...and while he's best-known to the average person for the movie Soylent Green, based on his novel Make Room! Make Room!, sci-fi aficionados (myself included) love his Stainless Steel Rat and DeathWorld series.

But many sci-fi fans are not aware of his almost decade-long stint as a comic book professional, doing everything from writing to editing to penciling and inking over 150 stories in almost every genre from horror to war to romance to Western.

(Oddly, he never did a super-hero story!)

In tribute to his passing, our brother blog, Seduction of the Innocent™ is running one of his horror tales "Terror of the Vampires Kiss".

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Reading Room: STRANGE GALAXY "The Moon is Red"

In the late 1960s-early 1970s, numerous b/w comic magazines popped up...

...to publish the risque material the Comics Code Authority banned from color comic books!

This tale from Eerie Publications' Strange Galaxy #V1N8 (1971) has the feel of a 1950s tale, which wouldn't be surprising since the publisher both reprinted stories from defunct publishers when they could find photostats/printing film or re-illustrated stories using old scripts nearly verbatim.
UPDATE: As it turns out, the script is from a tale in Avon's Strange Planets #4 (1951) called "A Nation is Born" as shown HERE.

BTW, this issue, despite being #8, was actually the first issue under that title.
What it was before then is unknown, since the publisher did numerous titles in various categories including astrology, romance, crime, etc.

"Oswal" was the pen-name of Osvaldo Walter Viola, an Argentinean writer/artist who began his career in the early 1960s creating Argentine's first super-hero, Sónoman.

His only American comics work was for Eerie Publications' titles.

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Reading Room: SPEED CARTER: SPACEMAN "Mosquito Men & the Multiple Menace"

When you're summoned to a "secret experimental laboratory"...

...you just know there's gonna be trouble.

But in this case, it'll be triple trouble!

If you have an army of Speed Carters, and they're all captains, then who's in command?

This tale of mosquito men and mathematics from Speed Carter: SpaceMan #4 (1954) was written (as are all Speed Carter stories) by Hank Chapman and illustrated by Mike Sekowsky and Jack Abel.

BTW, though we didn't mention it in the previous Sekowsky-illustrated story, Mike apparently redesigned everything including uniforms, weapons, and equipment.
You'll see this continue in all the remaining issues as each succeeding artist does their own rendition of the universe of 2075 instead of following the previous artist's designs.

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Joe Kubert (1926-2012)

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step...

...and this never-reprinted tale from All-New Comics #7 (1944) was one of the first for a man who would eventually become a graphic storytelling legend...Joe Kubert!

Though he was just 18 when he did this story, Kubert was already displaying a knack for storytelling that many "professional" artists today lack.

You can see a super-hero tale he did during this same period at the beginning of his career HERE.

Plus, we've presented several 3-D tales Joe did with Norman Maurer in the 1950s when the duo pioneered the technology HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE.

Make sure you have red/blue glasses before reading them!

Reading Room: PUSSYCAT "Cool & Carefree Capers of a Curvy, Cuddly Chick!"

We showed you HERE how Phantom Lady handled terrorists at the 1948 Olympics...

...now, as the real Olympic Games wind down, look at how Agent PussyCat dealt with danger in a similar situation 20 years later (and 44 years ago)!

This tale originally appeared in Male Annual #5 (1967), but this is from the one-shot PussyCat (1968) that reprinted her stories from the various "laddy" magazines published by Martin Goodman, who also owned Marvel Comics at the time.

The writer is officially-unknown, but the scripter is probably Stan Lee or Larry Lieber, and the artist is pretty clearly good-girl legend Bill Ward with inking by Bill Everett.

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