It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year...

...the Halloween Season!

...and some of the RetroBlogs are going full-on spooky/scary as part of the multi-participant #CountdownToHalloween2025 Blogathon!

Last year, Hero Histories presented "Commie-Crushing Kaiju"!

This year, we're presenting

Third-Reich Terrors

featuring monsters and creatures both serving and smashing the Nazis!

Werewolves!

Vampires!

Golems!

and the Frankenstein Monster!

Join us HERE on Monday, as we get a head-start on horror!

True Love Comics Tales continues the annual month-long festival tradition of

Halloween HeatBreak

(which we take quite literally), as you'll see by clicking HERE starting this Wednesday

Medical Comics and Stories again presents

Halloween Hospital Horrors

from the Past, Present, AND Future, beginning this Friday!

Click HERE....if you dare!

PLUS: the blog you're presently-reading is going full-on Halloween with...

Monday Monster Madness featuring the wit and wisdom of Stan (the Man) Lee!

Now that's scary!

Frightful Friday Fun will present silly silent scares with a wordless Dracula strip rarely seen in the US!

Wednesday Worlds of Wonder enters the universe of the Elder Gods as we present H P Lovecraft stories adapted by writer/artist Estaban Maroto, and translated by Roy Thomas!

We didn't leave out the rest of the week!

You'll just have to be here to find out for yourself!

Space Hero Saturdays CRUSADER FROM MARS "Mission Through Space"

Lars of Mars wasn't the only Martian Sent to Fight Evil on Earth by Jerry (Superman) Siegel!

This guy, along with a female "friend and companion" was sent to Earth to do similar work...but for a very different reason!

If I follow the "logic" of this concept correctly, the Martians send a proven murderer (along with someone who may be either an accessory to murder or an innocent who had nothing to do with the crime except having a murderer obsessed with her) to fight evil on Earth.
Send a convicted killer with emotional control issues (and advanced weaponry) to a primitive planet and tell him to clean it up?
And then, when he screws up. send a fleet of flying saucers in to straighten out the mess.
(Martians apparently don't have a non-interference Prime Directive.)
Also note that the American military seems to be made up of idiot bureaucrats!
The writer for this premiere tale from Crusader from Mars #1 (1952) is unknown, but probably is the book's editor, Jerry (Superman) Siegel, who co-created another short-lived Martian crime-fighter, Lars of Mars, the year before.

The artist is believed to be Marvin Stein, but the layouts have a strong Jack Kirby feel to them.
Considering Stein was doing a lot of work for the Simon/Kirby studio at the time, and Jack was reputed to be very generous in terms of helping his friends, it seems likely he provided roughs for Stein to render full pencils and inks over.
BTW, you may note that Tarka wears a very Superman-style costume in this tale, but on the cover, and in the next (and last) issue, the colors are reversed.

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Pre-Code Classics

Lars of Mars / Crusader from Mars

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Friday Fairy Tale Fun FAIRY TALE PARADE "Emperor's New Clothes"

Besides Doing Holiday-Themed Variations of Classic Nursery Rhymes and Fairy Tales...

...legendary writer artist Walt (Pogo) Kelly also did straight-up retellings of those children's stories!

This PG (no nudity) retelling of Hans Christian Anderson's satirical fairy tale appeared in Dell's Fairy Tale Parade #2 (1942)!

The series ran for nine 68-page issues, and while Walt Kelly did a considerable amount of the material, he didn't do all of it!
Other contributors included humor/kids' comics veterans Gardner DuBois, Arthur Jameson, Jon Small, L Bing (whose first name is unknown), Bill Brady, Casper Emerson, and George Kerr!

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Walt Kelly's Fairy Tales

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Reading Room COSMIC BOOK "UFO and the Perts vs Experts"

Feeling just a wee bit...paranoid?

Feel like the world just doesn't make any sense at all?

Well, you ain't alone, kiddo!

While it's been reprinted several times, this version from Wandering Star Press' Cosmic Book #1 (1986) is the only time it's been presented in color!

The Cosmic Book was a personal obsession for Pat Boyette who packaged it (as well as doing the covers and a couple of tales inside), then shopped it around to numerous publishers until Ace Comics agreed to co-publish it.

Though there were rumors of a second issue, sadly, it never appeared.

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Cosmic Book
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Best of Wednesday Worlds of Wonder MARVEL CLASSICS COMICS "War of the Worlds"

We Wind Up Our Month-Long Retrospective with a Halloween Season Treat (No Trick)...

...HG Wells' best-known novel, The War of the Worlds...told the Marvel Way!

Adapted by Chris Claremont, penciled by Yong Montano, and inked by Dino Castrillo, this almost half-century-old book-length tale is a pretty straightforward adaptation of the original novel, which was the basis for Marvel's just-cancelled KillRaven: Warrior of the Worlds series, which was a sequel featuring a second Martian invasion in 2001!

Note: this was not meant as a tie-in to that series, so Dave Cockrum, who was aiding Art Director John Romita Sr as his Associate Art Director while also drawing the All-New X-Men, deliberately designed the tripods and Martians to look different from the ones appearing in KillRaven and other Marvel Universe titles!

Part I: the Coming of the Martians!
Part II: the Conquest of Earth!
Part III: the Rout of Civilization!
Part IV: Earth Under the Martians!
Part V: End of the Invaders!