Wednesday, February 22, 2023

Wednesday Worlds of Wonder SPACE MAN "Out Into Space" Part 1

Beginning: a long-lost space epic of a federation of alien worlds, cyborgs, a secret Earth defense force, and flying saucers...
...years before Star TrekSix Million Dollar Man, or UFO were broadcast over the airwaves!
What...or who...is at the end of the corridor?
Find out...
Next Wednesday!
With a real-life space program well under way, this book-length tale from Dell's Four Color Comics #1253 (1962) was an attempt to "update" the sort of space opera popular with comic and pulp fans of the 1940s-50s like Speed Carter: SpaceMan and Space Squadron by setting it in the near-future instead of 50 or more years later.
Writen by Ken Fitch and illustrated by Jack Sparling, who used the then-current Mercury astronauts' spacesuit designs, but Chesley Bonestell's already-outdated spacecraft concepts (probably because the finned ships looked cooler than the actual Atlas and Redstone rockets NASA was using) as reference.
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Tuesday, February 21, 2023

Does Imperialist Running Dog Putin Realize World War III Already Happened?

Nuclear Armageddon occurred in 1960...
...not once, but twice!
At least, that was the basis for two different series from the same publisher running simultaneously in 1952; Atomic War! and World War III!
Oddly, the premiere issue of World War III presented a similar series of events to the first issue of Atomic War, but in a slightly-different time-frame, and a different order!
There were no cross-overs and certain events and available technology were very different in the two titles, indicating the two series were alternate universe / multiverse versions of each other!
BTW, Atomic War! came first, in November, 1952, with a second issue following in December, then going bi-monthly in February and April, 1953.
World War III ran in March and May of 1953, the months Atomic War! wasn't published, giving kids of the era a monthly fix of future fun!
Noted comics, pulp, and paperback author Robert Turner wrote both issues of World War III, but the writer(s) of Atomic War! are unknown.
With Russia threatening us with nuclear annihilation (again), we thought we'd call your attention to our re-presentation of these kool examples of Cold War paranoia at our "brother" RetroBlog ™War: Past, Present & Future™.

Monday, February 20, 2023

Monday Madness BASEBALL COMICS "Rube Rooky Climbs Up from the Pit"

Will Eisner's saga of how a baseball superstar is created continues...
...as Rube leaves his family and girlfriend to pursue his dream...
Wow!
Big-screen TV in 1949?
Who knew?
Next Week: the exciting conclusion to Rube Rooky's amazing saga!
BTW, anybody here see a parallel between Rube and a real-life ballplayer who faced similar problems being accepted by his teammates because he was "different" just a year before writer/penciler Will Eisner and inker Tex Blaisdell created this tale?
Be here in two weeks to see whom I'm talking about.
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Baseball Comics #2
(A follow-up published decades later)

Sunday, February 19, 2023

Fill Your Easter Basket with JOY!

Back in the 1940s and 50s, comic book companies produced a prodigious number of holiday annuals and one-shots.

For example, a multitude of Christmas-themed comic books flooded America's magazine racks every November and December!
(In fact, a large part of our popular Cool Christmas collection is based on them.)
But, did you know that several publishers also did Easter-oriented books?
And, that noted comics illustrators including Walt Kelly (Pogo) and Harrison Cady (Peter Rabbit) contributed art to them?
Believing that there's always room for more classic comics collectibles, we at Atomic Kommie Comics™ offer a line of goodies entitled Exciting Easter!
Yes, it's eggs, bunnies, chicks, and other fuzzy animals galore digitally-restored and remastered from Baby Boomer-era classic comics covers on baby bibs, infant creepers / onesies, toddler and kid t-shirts, greeting cards, mugs, nursery clocks (like the one above) and a plethora of kool kollectibles!
They make great Easter basket stuffers! (And they won't rot your kids' teeth like marshmallow chicks or chocolate bunnies!)
So click over and see what's in our basket!

Saturday, February 18, 2023

Space Hero Saturdays FLASH GORDON "Return to Mongo" Part 2: MindLife!

When Last We Left Flash, Dale, and Zarkov...
...Ming the Merciless has been freed from exile and returned to the throne of Mongo!

Our heroes, unaware of this development, have been ambushed and shot down over Mongo's "Lost Continent", where they've been captured by a band of Lizard Men and their queen, the priestess Silith!
Flash Gordon Will Return!
Bonus: the original, uncropped cover art by the prolific George Wilson who illustrated a lot of Gold Key comic covers, as well as numerous paperbacks..including the Flash Gordon novels from Avon Books in the mid-1970s.
Note that, according to the hand-written text at the bottom, it's supposed to be for Flash Gordon #2, not #19!
That's because this was, in fact, the second Gold Key issue of Flash Gordon!
The first was a one-shot in 1965.
But, in 1978, King Features (which owns Flash Gordon) insisted Gold Key continue the series numbering which began in 1965 with a short-lived King Comics series with a new #1, then continued when Charlton Comics took over the book as of #12 and ended with #18 in 1970!
The numbering continued to Gold Key's final issue, #37 in 1982.
Since then, every new Flash Gordon series from Marvel, DC, Dynamite, Ardden, etc, began with #1s!

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(which includes this issue)