The Horror...the Horror (comics, that is)!

Monster Crime!

Now that's a title!
Yeah, they knew what budding juvenile delinquents wanted back in the 1950s!
As you might have guessed, the upcoming Halloween holiday has inspired the Atomic Kommie Comics™ crew to add like mad to our Horror Comics of the 1950s™ section.
And, what titles did we add to our kool kollectibles kollection?
Besides the aforementioned Monster Crime, there's Tales of Horror, Horror from the Tomb (see a trend?), Beware! (with a fantastic Frank Frazetta cover!), and The Clutching Hand!
We already had The Hand of Fate, Horrific!, Weird Adventures, Baffling, Challenge of the Unknown, Terror Tales, Haunted, The Beyond, Weird Terror, Weird Mysteries, Weird, Diary of Horror, WitchCraft, and Eerie!
Plus collectibles with our ghoulishly-graphic, viscerally-vintage Horror Comics of the 1950s™ logo!
BTW: the Tote Bags featuring these designs would make GREAT trick-or-treat bags!
Be the envy of all the kids on your block this All Hallows Eve!

Best of Reading Room: COMMANDER BATTLE AND HIS ATOMIC SUB "Battle Beneath the Earth"

We Have Already Seen...

...now that you've read the built-in synopsis, let's proceed, but with one caveat: this part of the story (despite being Comics Code-approved) is possibly NSFW due to politically-incorrect racial attitudes.

SPOILER: The "new, exciting mystery character" will quickly replace one of the original four Atomic Commandos.

Is he...

• 1) an alien?
• 2) a teen sidekick?
• 3) an alien teen?

You'll find out when Commander Battle and the Atomic Sub return in a previously-unreprinted tale in two weeks!

Two points:

1) You'd think the giants would find blonde and red-headed Belotti just a bit out-of-place.

2) I wonder if Irwin Allen saw this series, years before either the movie or tv versions of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.

Besides the similar plots to several episodes of the tv series, Allen's use of a submarine-berthed aircraft (the Flying Sub) seems more than coincidental.

Just sayin'...

The script for Commander Battle and the Atomic Sub #2 (1954) by Richard Hughes, the Stan Lee of ACG who wrote practically everything at the company during his tenure as editor/writer!

Pencils by Sheldon Moldoff, inks by Al Camy, Odgen Whitney and others.

Best of Reading Room: COMMANDER BATTLE AND THE ATOMIC SUB "Fight for Survival"

When Last We Left Commander Bill Battle and His Crew...

...and with that succinct synopsis, let the mayhem ensue!

Tomorrow:

The Fearsome Finale!

The pseudo 3-D created by Craft-Tint tones used in the first issue was eliminated for #2 of ACG's Commander Battle and the Atomic Sub (1954), although it looks like the pages were initially-conceived to utilize the Craft-Tint effects to create depth.
Script by Richard Hughes, the Stan Lee of ACG who wrote practically everything at the company during his tenure as editor/writer!

Pencils by Sheldon Moldoff, inks by Al Camy, Odgen Whitney and others.

Best of Reading Room: COMMANDER BATTLE AND THE ATOMIC SUB "Giants from the Depths"

Having successfully defeated one world-threatening menace...

...and completed their shake-down cruise, the aptly-named Commander Battle and his Atomic Sub are ready for action!

Tomorrow:

Giant Squid!

Giant Humanoids!

Giant Thrills!

The pseudo 3-D created by Craft-Tint tones used in the first issue was eliminated for #2 of ACG's Commander Battle and the Atomic Sub (1954), although it looks like the pages were initially-conceived to utilize the Craft-Tint effects to create depth.
Without it, the giants aren't quite as imposing as they would have been, and panels like the last one on Page 7 (Battle bailing out of the airplane) just look silly.
Script by Richard Hughes, the Stan Lee of ACG who wrote practically everything at the company during his tenure as editor/writer!

Pencils by Sheldon Moldoff, inks by Al Camy, Odgen Whitney and others.

Arena by Fredric Brown

"Arena" by Fredric Brown was adapted (sort of) twice for TV...

...first, in 1964, on the Outer Limits as "Fun and Games", starring Nick Adams.

You'll note a number of differences between the story and the episode, including a pair of new characters, a mate for the alien, and a woman with a hidden past who works with the hero!

A year later the story was reused, on Classic Star Trek as "Arena"...

...except it wasn't...exactly.

Gene Roddenberry's right hand man, producer Gene Coon, had submitted a story about Capt. Kirk fighting an alien starship commander to see whose ship would survive.

When the story was fact-checked, it was discovered that Coon had inadvertantly used numerous elements from Brown's story, which Gene had probably read years earlier!