Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 176: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction & Fantasy Comics!

 

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 161

March 1959

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Journey Into Mystery #51

Cover by Russ Heath

"The Ghost Ship of Space" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★★

"The Creatures in the Volcano" 

(a: Jack Kirby & Wally Wood)

(r: Crazy #65) ★★1/2

"The Prison Planet!" (a: Carl Burgos) ★★1/2

"Alien on Earth!" (a: Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule) ★★

"Robot on the Rampage!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★★★

"The Ghost Ship of Space" is wreaking havoc throughout the universe, causing the disappearance of three space vessels in just a month! When the military sends yet another ship (the Saturn 934) out to find what's going on, Daily Cosmos reporter Frank Brandon is sent along to get the skinny for his millions of readers.

It isn't long before Frank's rocket spots the Ghost Ship and gives chase. In a matter of seconds, the craft does a 180 and heads right for the good guys, but the Ghost Ship flies right through them. It really is a ghost ship! The Saturn follows the specter to a nearby planet, where the crew is taken prisoner by an army of BEMs. 

The Saturn crew meets up with the missing men they'd been sent to rescue and they learn that the BEMs are trying to build their own spaceship in order to conquer the galaxy, but they just don't have the brain power. Frank fools the creatures with a fake bomb and the boys are soon heading back to Earth with a crazy story to tell. Standard space opera with a silly twist at the end, but some sharp Sinnott graphics.

Tubuai is the leader of a tribe living on a volcanic island. When the volcano gets set to blow, he urges his people to move to the neighboring island of Ono-I-Lau until it's safe to return home. Time passes, the lava cools, and the people head back. But Tubuai is suspicious; he does not believe the eruption was organic. He climbs the high mountain and descends into the volcano, where he is assaulted by a trio of aliens, who explain that they are a scouting party from the planet Igneous Rex and they plan to wipe out mankind and claim Earth as their own.

Thinking fast, Tubuai contacts the United States Government, which had made him an offer to buy the island years ago, and offers to sell his home dirt cheap. The tribe moves to another island and the US begins its atom bomb testing on the volcanic island. A pretty good story with a great ending, but it's pretty lame that Tubuai claims he can't tell his people the truth about "The Creatures in the Volcano" until he's "won back their respect." We're moving into classic Kirby Atlas-era sci-fi comics, with lots of faces looking into "the camera" and finger pointing. I'm not sure Wally Wood made a good inker on the King's material; Rule was a safer bet. The three aliens could have fit well in a Fantastic Four strip.

Two million years ago, criminals were sent on a rocket ship to colonize "The Prison Planet!" It took centuries, but the pilgrims in the new world managed to make a go of it; now and then, new "inmates" were dropped off and forced to acclimate. Meanwhile, back on the home planet, the population had gone soft since crime had been all but eradicated; this left them weak and open to attack by enemies from other planets. Civilization is wiped out and the planet is left a barren landscape. Back on the prison planet, over the centuries, the marooned have gotten a lot smarter and they've built their rocket ships. They intend to return home--to Mars. Good surprise there in the final panel, but I'm afraid Carl Burgos's art is getting rougher.

"Alien on Earth!" is another take on The Day the Earth Stood Still, wherein an alien exits his parked spaceship and causes panic all around the world. After the US government drops an A-bomb on the creature, it turns and leaves. Mankind is safe once more. In the final panel, we discover the alien was on a mission to see if the human race was still bloodthirsty and he reports back to his C.O. that in no way can Earth people be allowed to roam freely through the galaxy. Yep, the climax is exactly what we expected it would be and there are plenty of stinkin' commie digs to go around, but the art is pretty darn good.

One hundred years in the future, man has perfected the robot and now has very little to do. But then the mechanical servants begin breaking down and a "Supreme Calculator," a robot to watch over all robots, is created to restore order. But then the SC begins thinking on its own and before you can say Terminator 2: Judgment Day, humans are slaving for the gizmos. Thank goodness for the human spirit, though, as one particularly clever worker notices the SC's plug is dirty and disconnects it from the wall. As Earth breathes a sigh of relief, the scientists go back to the drawing board to make the perfect robot. Wonderful little SF classic, a heck of a lot smarter than most of the scripts being passed around the Atlas lunchroom (could it have been written by the artist himself?), and some dazzling work by Steve Ditko.-Peter

Tales of Suspense #2

Cover by Steve Ditko

"Invasion from Space" (a: Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule) ★1/2

"Trapped in Yesterday!" (a: Carl Burgos(?)) ★★1/2

"The Planet That Wasn't There!" (a: Russ Heath) ★★

"The Secret of Planet 'X'!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★

"A Robot in Hiding!" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★

An armada of massive ships appears over the skies of New York; could it be an "Invasion from Outer Space"? The heads of each nation gather and decide the best action to take would be to blow the strangers out of the sky. One man, a really smart and brilliant Einstein look-alike, offers a different strategy: disarm the world's super powers and show the visitors they want peace.

"Nyet!" "Nein!" and "Nuts!" are the leaders' answers and before you can say "Armageddon," a host of the East and West's "mightiest missiles" are fired off at the spaceships. After the smoke clears, a stunned audience realizes this enemy is a whole lot stronger than assumed. In a panic, the leaders agree to Option B and immediately destroy their bombs, missiles, submarines, guns, slingshots, espresso machines, anything that could be construed as a weapon. The ships then leave the airways and the world breathes a sigh of relief. Elsewhere, in the "private observatory" of the peaceful professor who suggested Option B, a sigh and a chuckle are emitted as the scientist admits to his wife he wasn't sure his ruse would work. You see, confident that the Earth was ruled by men who weren't the brightest bulbs in the box, the scholar had projected a really convincing picture of spaceships onto the New York skies to nudge the world into peace. 

You can tell that The Day the Earth Stood Still left its mark on Stan, Jack, and the boys, since every possible variation on the plot would be squeezed out like a lemon from here until the Fantastic Four appeared (even popping up in the superhero comics as well). The reveal, that no one would notice that the vessels were really a projected image, is a hoot. I guess our hero, the scientist, was sure that all the combined firepower wouldn't accidentally start some apocalyptic chain reaction in our atmosphere. The 1950s Atlas world was clearly one that could be swayed by parlor tricks, in stark contrast to the real world we live in now. Hmmm.

While the ingenious and smart Professor Wilkes puts the final touches on his... wait for it... time machine, buck-toothed simpleton Jason Grubb, a mild-mannered mop-pusher, watches from the shadows in envy. Once Wilkes attaches all the little signs to each knob and button (so that he won't forget which lever to pull to go back in time and which one is the brake), Jason's diseased brain concocts a brilliant but evil plan: he will steal the Professor's new invention, go back in time to Camelot, convince King Arthur he's a genius, and live like... well, a king, I guess.

Jason runs home, grabs his TV set, a portable radio, and a camera, and heads back to the lab. Evidently not as dumb as he looks, he sets the way-back machine for August 20, 500 and something, the exact moment when King Arthur is hanging out in his castle, sets a timed explosive device to destroy the time machine so that Professor Wilkes won't find him, and settles back in for the ride. Sure enough, moments later, he is being escorted into the castle with his three forms of magic tucked under his arm (a full-size TV set weighed a lot less in 1959) for an audience with King Arthur. In short order, he's reminded that: there is no electrical outlet for the TV set, radio stations have not been invented yet (No rap music? Camelot, here I come!), and there's no technology to develop pictures. Pissed that his time has been wasted, Arthur orders Jason to be his new royal mop boy. All that our hapless moron can do is hope Professor Wilkes can build a new gizmo and rescue him.

"Trapped in Yesterday!" is about as dopey as they come, but you have to admit it's entertaining as well. Each successive failure on Jason's part is one part cringe-inducing and one part chuckle-worthy, as is the fact that this janitor would form an elaborate plan involving Camelot instead of going back a week or two and making a killing on the stock market or the horse races. 

In 2026, the president of the free world looks on as a rocket ship is launched and falls back to Earth, exploding in a massive fireball. This was the 17th such trial to perfect a rocket ship that can search the galaxy for another inhabitable world, one he is convinced exists. You see, this world is overpopulated and time is running out; there are only so many Swanson Frozen TV dinners to go around. Anyway, after the 17th failure, the president goes home and discusses the future with his daughter, Elizabeth. Surely the launches must stop, laments his gorgeous daughter. "No, we must forge on," the man grimly reminds her, "and don't call me Shirley."

Soon after, the 18th ship is launched, breaks the planet's ozone layer, and then explodes. As he sighs the sigh of a man with the world on his shoulders, the president is approached by one of his aides and informed that Elizabeth snuck aboard the doomed flight. Finally convinced that the project is for naught, the president hangs his head and laments that the world he's been searching for, one he calls "Earth," probably doesn't exist. I've always wondered how it is that far off worlds know that our planet is called "Earth." Could they be listening in to Alan Freed's Saturday night rock 'n' roll show? Is there a giant sign that can be seen only from space that identifies our big rock (and perhaps outer space signposts that notify our weary travelers that there are only 64,000,000 miles left in their journey?)? Alas, "The Planet That Wasn't There!" answers none of those questions but does allow us a rare (for 1959) look at Russ Heath's majesty. 

In the far-flung future, the tyrant Kluge becomes bored of ruling over his tiny world and wishes to expand his power base. He commands his underlings to build a rocket ship and he and the crew set off to find a conquerable world. They land on Planet X and the locals seem very amenable to slavery; Kluge has found his new kingdom. Or so he thinks. There's a very good twist in the tail and some nice Ditko art to slobber over; the number one lesson to learn from "The Secret of Planet 'X'!" is that communism is not the answer to happiness.

After Roderic Zante, the supreme ruler of the entire world, declares that all robots must be rounded up and deactivated, a mild-mannered android leaves his family of humans and becomes "A Robot in Hiding!" Our robotic protagonist sets out on a journey to change Zante's mind and restore "freedom" to his android brethren. Once he gets to the ruler's palace and breaks in, he discovers that Zante is a robot himself, programmed to lust for power rather than serve. Our hero pushes Zante's button and shuts the ruler's power down once and for all. Peace is restored to the galaxy and robots are reactivated, biding their time until they can overthrow their human captors. That last part was just me trying to inject some razzle-dazzle into a very boring and oft-told tale.-Peter

Tales to Astonish #2

Cover by Steve Ditko

"When Aliens Meet!" (a: Don Heck) ★★

"I Fell to the Center of the Earth!" (a: Matt Baker & Vince Colletta) ★

"I Was a Man in Hiding!" (a: John Buscema) ★1/2

"I Spent Eternity in a Deep Freeze!" (a: Carl Burgos) ★

"My Job: Capture a Martian" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★1/2

Dunstan Craig is the most ruthless hunter of alien creatures in the year 2058, traveling from planet to planet and bringing back specimens for zoos on Earth without a shred of pity for those he captures. When the spaceship he's riding on has an emergency, Dunstan hops into an emergency space boat and zips off to the nearest planet, but "When Aliens Meet!" the hunter gets a taste of his own medicine and is put on display in a zoo.

Don Heck's art is muscular and exciting, but any reader who didn't see that ending coming should turn in his comic book badge here and now.

An archaeologist named Henry Burke jumps at the chance to head to Asia and dig deep down into the Earth with the latest atomic-powered equipment. He investigates an obstruction and soon remarks that "I Fell to the Center of the Earth!," where he encounters cavemen and a dinosaur. After he is pulled back to the surface and convinced he imagined it all, one of his crew digs up a rusted, moldy cigarette lighter engraved with Burke's name.

Matt Baker may have done some great work in the Golden Age, and I respect him for being one of the early Black comic book artists, but this story is a dud. There's no rational basis for anything that happens and the concluding twist has been done to death.

In the year 2087, everyone wears a wristband that allows the police to locate people at a moment's notice. This cuts down on crime, but when Harry Grant reads about the discovery of a new planet, he realizes his long held ambition and robs his company's payroll. Harry rents a rocket ship and takes off for the new planet, figuring that he won't be traced, since the wristbands won't work away from Earth. Sadly, Harry's hope that "I Was a Man in Hiding!" would be a successful plan is thwarted when he arrives at the new planet and discovers that he towers over everyone else there.

The GCD suggests that this is a Wessler script, and it reads like one, since the main character's biggest concern is committing robbery. The art by John Buscema is adequate but looks nothing like the work we'd see ten or fifteen years later, when his characters always seemed to have muscles like bowling balls.

"I Spent Eternity in a Deep Freeze!" is another story penned by Wessler, with another character robbing a payroll. This time it's Joe Sykes, who pilfers cash from a self-service refuel center on a satellite. He volunteers to be frozen for a long space voyage, thinking he'll be famous when he gets back. Somehow he awakens in another dimension, where no one on Earth can see or hear him.

This story is truly awful, with sub-par art by Carl Burgos and a script by Carl W. that ends in a fashion that makes absolutely no sense.

Garner is a private eye who is surprised to learn that "My Job: Capture a Martian" is his latest assignment. A professor bursts in with a wild story about seeing a flying saucer land; when he investigated the craft, he found it empty, but soon an explosion left no trace of it. Garner takes the case and begins to search. Eventually, he gives up and tells the professor he's had enough. What the professor doesn't know is that Garner is the Martian and he has just eliminated the last shred of suspicion!

Thank goodness Joe Sinnott turns in a decent job on the artwork here, because this story is just about as bad as the rest in this dreadful issue. If this is the big Atlas revival, we're in trouble.-Jack

Next Week...
More Kirby
Giant Monster Madness

Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 139: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction & Horror Comics!

 

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 124

October 1956 Part IV

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Uncanny Tales #48

Cover by Russ Heath

"Power Mad!" (a: George Roussos) ★1/2

"The Whirlpool" (a: Bob Forgione) ★1/2

"The Night Watcher!" (a: Bill Everett) ★★1/2

"They'll Never Find Me" (a: Doug Wildey) ★1/2

"What Happened to Harry?" (a: Pete Morisi) ★

"The Door I Dare Not Open!" (a: Jim Mooney) ★1/2

With his new "Compound K" formula, scientist Conrad Elton finds he can bend the will of his favorite dog, Otto. So why shouldn't it work on people? Conrad begins to dream of unparalleled power, unending wealth, and a wife like Christina Urbana! Sure enough, when Conrad dumps a vial of "CK" into the punch at a social gathering, everyone in the town of Nordsburg votes him mayor and Christina accepts his proposal of marriage.

But, after just a few months of mayordom, Conrad's magic begins to wear away and, after demanding a new City Hall be built, the villagers light torches and chase Conrad and Christina (and Otto) out of town. Suddenly, while driving, Conrad realizes that it wasn't "CK" that won him the trust of his neighbors, but love. Gosh, how sweet. "Power Mad!" perfectly represents all that was bad about the post-code. Just two years before, Conrad would have been taken to the nearest town square and disemboweled for his grievous errors, but here we see him heading into a new life, completely cleansed of bad intentions. There's literally no suspense or danger in these yarns.

After his girlfriend leaves him for another man while he's fighting in the war, Jeff Dawson gives up, wanting only to die. So, naturally, he accepts a professor's challenge to recreate the raft voyage of a group of South American Indians, who disappeared and were found safe thousands of miles away in the Polynesian Islands. Days into the journey, Dawson's raft is sucked into a whirlpool and he awakens in an undersea cave, surrounded by fishmen in bad spacesuits. They tell him that he will never be released and suddenly Jeff Dawson wants to live! "The Whirlpool" is yet another story about the triumph of the will and all that, with nary a surprise nor a twist in sight (well, except for the fact that Dawson seems to exist for a long period of time on a small box of provisions). 

An alien lands in the middle of a backwoods forest, looking for the dominant species in order to duplicate it and then rule the world. Along comes brain-dead hick (well, at least that's what the other hillbillies in Coonskin Junction call the poor man) Pete, hunting raccoons with his trusty dog, Bob. But Pete ain't so dumb after all and he tricks the alien into transforming into a raccoon before he gives it both barrels. "The Night Watcher!" is a fun little distraction with some decent Bill Everett artwork. If only they gave poor Bill something to draw other than Pete, Bob, and a smoke monster. Definitely a waste of a master's talent.

In the three-page "They'll Never Find Me," escaped convict Jerry Owens hides in a satellite that is about to be launched into space. Weighing the cops outside his small shelter against fifty years in space, what will Jerry do? Well, I can't tell you that even if I wanted to because the story ends with Jerry's contemplation. In "What Happened to Harry?," the E-12 spaceship lands on Earth after five years in space and authorities are alarmed to discover that only one of the crew made it back and that's Harry. The sole survivor confesses that he had to leave the rest of his crew back on planet Zeno when a duplicate crew of explorers made it impossible to tell which batch were friends and which were foes. The climax is oddly muddled; I thought for sure we were going to be handed the old "the other guys are actually these guys from the past or future" cliche but, instead, no explanation is given.

Ben just has to get away from his wife, Julia, after a typically heated argument. When his car breaks down, he finds shelter in a remote house owned by a kindly old man who invites Ben to stay the night. "But," he warns sternly, "whatever you do, don't go through that door right there... no matter what, just don't open it, ya hear... no way no how should you go through that doorway!" Ben agrees but then finds it hard to sleep so, naturally, he opens the door and enters a misty corridor. 

There he witnesses a grim scene... his wife, Julia, standing over his fallen form, admitting she's poisoned him for the insurance money. He turns away and finds another door. Opening that, he sees himself captured by savage natives, the kind with bones in their noses, after the ship he's sailing on shipwrecks on a deserted island. Suddenly, Ben awakens to find himself in a partially constructed house with workers all around him. They inform him that the house is just now being built; Ben smiles and promises himself he'll find a pay phone to call Julia to tell her how much he loves her. Sure, right after he sees a glimpse of a future where the woman has killed him for his dough. Sounds like someone you want to run back to. The Mooney art reminds me that, aside from Bill Everett's work on "The Night Watcher!," this issue is filled with merely competent art.-Peter

World of Mystery #3

Cover by Bill Everett

"The Bugs!" (a: Angelo Torres) ★★

"Who is Raymas?" (a: Jack Davis) ★★★

"The Mystery Man!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★1/2

"I Received Letters from Nowhere!" (a: Ed Winiarski) ★

"The Man Who Failed!" (a: Manny Stallman) ★

"Nobody" (a: Bernard Baily) ★

A metal thingie resembling the wing of an airplane crashes into the barn belonging to a hick farmer and his young son. The boy insists that the object is a spaceship, but the older man is having none of that. He cuts open a section and inside spots some bugs. The boy once again insists the craft is from outer space and that, with his younger eyes, he can see the "bugs" are actually space travelers. Having had enough of his son's poppycock, the hillbilly tosses the metal into the garbage and orders the boy back into the house. The last panel of "The Bugs!" proves the kid was right. The art of Angelo Torres is so radically different than that of some of the hacks working on the Atlas genre titles that anything sporting its sheen is, like those stories blessed with Everett, Ditko, Heath, and Maneely, eminently more readable despite cliched scripts.

A troop of entertainers, including Raymas the Magician, are forced to work in the factories owned by the stinkin' commies. Unfortunately for the Reds, Raymas begins a reign of mischief, shutting the plant down and forcing the State's leader, Baruta, to sign a peace treaty with a neighboring country. The politics are hazy, as is the meandering script, but the Jack Davis work is solid and the whole thing has an EC vibe to it. In my book, that makes this a standout this month.

Government agent Peter Dennis is tasked with finding an answer to why so many people across the world are sending large sums of money to a Professor Moros, who preaches a belief known as "cosmic harmony." When Dennis finally finds Moros, he tells the professor to denounce his own beliefs and tell the sheep who are sending him dough to put a halt to it. Dennis believes the old man is a crackpot, but an incident at a rally changes his mind. After Dennis is accidentally shot, Moros heals his wounds and begins to fade away, explaining that he will return when mankind is ready to hear his message of peace. The reveal for "The Mystery Man!" is very Klaatu barada nikto, but the graphics by young Steve Ditko are eye candy. Agent Dennis is a dead ringer for Ditko's Norman Osborn.

In "I Received Letters from Nowhere!," Eugene Page buys a ratty old mailbox from an antique store and, when it's installed, the relic spits out recipes for riches. Page's interest is piqued after he makes thousands on the tips received, but when he enlists the aid of postal inspectors, he discovers that the antique dealer has been running a scam. So how did his tips pay off?  In the inane "The Man Who Failed!," an inventor attempting to create a time travel machine accidentally whips up a space travel gizmo, sending him to Pluto. 

A strange being (let's call him "Nobody" for now), oddly dressed in what appears to be a superhero outfit is discovered in the desert and brought to a bevy of scientists for study. The creature cannot talk but, with the magic of word balloons, we discover that his name is Holdar and he's from another dimension. Some of his buddies from Dimension X arrive (they're invisible) and tell Holdar that the pressure from arriving on Earth has caused him to lose his memory. Now that the earthlings have found him and will no doubt yearn to trace his origins, Holdar must make the supreme sacrifice and remain on Earth.

After reading three more crappy Atlas comics,
Peter makes a startling confession

Holdar transforms into human form and regains the power of speech, explaining to the scientists that his name is John Billings and he was exposed to an atomic explosion, which explains his amnesia. The world's most brilliant men all nod in agreement that such a cataclysmic event would cause memory loss and no blisters. They accept Holdar's story, thus adding weight to P. T. Barnum's theory. The good will generated by the art for the first three stories in this issue is erased by the sheer ugliness found in the last three.-Peter

World of Suspense #4

Cover by Carl Burgos

"Something Is In This House" (a: Paul Reinman) ★1/2

"Bait!" (a: Manny Stallman) ★★

(r: Strange Tales #173)

"He's Hiding on Earth!" (a: Robert Q. Sale) ★★

"They Were Reborn!" (a: George Roussos) ★★

"Volcano!"(a: Hy Fleishman) ★1/2

"Brainwash" (a: Bob Forgione) ★★

Phil Evans has a recurring nightmare in which he visits a big house where a maid and a dog both run in fright when they see something that Phil can't see. He wakes up and his wife Julie suggests a vacation, but as they drive, they suddenly see the house in Phil's dream. Phil approaches it alone (because there are some things a man must do alone) and the maid is terrified. Phil confronts her and she tells him that he is a ghost!

When we worked our way through the DC horror comics, we frequently encountered Jack Oleck. I don't recall if his stories were as bad as "Something Is In This House," but this one demonstrates that he must have learned at the feet of the master of confusion and dopey twist endings himself, Carl Wessler. Why does the maid call Phil a ghost? Who knows? It's page four, so it has to be over. Paul Reinman's art is mediocre.

Three scientists take a fishing trip and one hooks a bizarre fish from the depths that appears to have lungs. The boat captain is disappointed in the catch, especially when the trio want to cut the trip short and head back to land with their fish. The creature thinks back to its origin in the time of dinosaurs; when they became extinct, it shrank and hid in the depths of the ocean. Now it will grow again and go on the attack! Well, it would have if the captain hadn't cut it up to use for "Bait!" the next morning.

I'm getting used to Manny Stallman's art, which has an EC vibe in spots. The story isn't much and depends on the reader accepting that the captain is a simpleton.

Professor Duncan lectures his students, suggesting that even though there is no water on Mars, the Red Planet may still sustain intelligent life. A student named Bellows upsets the prof by arguing that any life form that could exist without water must be very simple. At home, Duncan muses about his true identity as a Martian, gathering data for the coming invasion; he catches Bellows snooping outside and follows him to the lake, where the professor confronts the student in a boat and admits that, as a Martian, "He's Hiding on Earth!" The boat tips over and Duncan disappears--Bellows realizes that he must have drowned because Martians would not need to know how to swim on a waterless planet.

Another alien invasion foiled by a simple thing! H.G. Wells must have been rolling over in his grave. Just once I'd like to see an Atlas Martian succeed! Sales's art is average and creates no reader interest or excitement.

Rex Mott and his mob held up an armored truck and stole a half-million bucks, but when a policeman makes a TV announcement that they know who did it and have blocked all exits from the city, Rex is concerned. He sees a TV interview with a scientist who can put people in suspended animation for 200 years, so Rex and the gang seek him out and take a very long nap. Upon awakening, they are greeted by bald men of the future and boast of their crime. One of the future men hands Rex a contract to appear on stage and Rex blithely signs it, only to discover that the whole thing was a fix; they never traveled into the future and his boastful confession was recorded.

I was so convinced that "They Were Reborn!" was a prototype for "The Rip Van Winkle Caper," an episode of The Twilight Zone, that the ending caught me off guard. It's not as clever or effective as Serling's twist, but the premise of this story is so similar to the later TV episode that I wonder, and not for the first time, if the great TV writer secretly read and mined Atlas comics for some of his plots (also see "The Bugs!," above).

Gerald Hawkes is a rich jerk who buys up the leases to the land in a Mexican village and then orders the residents to pay up or get out by tomorrow morning. Gerald has his eye on minerals under the ground, but that night, a nearby "Volcano!" erupts and pours gold nuggets into the village. The next morning, the villagers pay off their leases in gold and Gerald is forced to leave the area.

Simple, silly, and forgetful, the story matches Hy Fleishman's art.

A new American fighter jet being tested over Russia encounters problems and the pilot is forced to land in enemy territory. The plane explodes and the Russkies grill the pilot for details of the new plane, but he refuses to divulge any information. Starvation doesn't work. Depriving him of water doesn't work. He even resists the charms of a sexy agent named Marla. Diplomats order his release and the pilot returns home, where it is revealed that he is a robot and he, not the plane, was what was being tested! He resisted the enemy's attempt to "Brainwash" him!

Not a bad little story, with solid art by Forgione and Abel, this wraps up an underwhelming issue with a minor surprise and some good old anti-Communist themes.-Jack

Next Week...
The 200th Issue of Batman
Has to be Something Special, Right?

Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 133: Atlas/Marvel Horror and Science Fiction Comics!

 

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 118

September 1956 Part I

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Adventure into Mystery #3

Cover by Bill Everett

"Next Stop Eternity!" (a: George Roussos) ★

(r: Giant-Size Chillers #1)

"Good-Bye Forever!" (a: Joe Maneely) ★1/2

(r: Chamber of Chills #17)

"Bedlam" (a: Paul Reinman) ★★

"A World Gone Mad!" (r: Jim Mooney) ★

(r: Fear #26)

"When the Time Comes!" (a: Bill Ely) ★1/2

"Behind The Locked Door..." (a: Howard O'Donnell) ★

"Next Stop Eternity!" opens Adventure Into Mystery #3 with a heaping helping of schmaltz. Bus driver Bill Walsh is in love with Jennie but she has eyes only for "the stranger," a handsome bloke who seems to have appeared out of nowhere. Bill wishes the guy would disappear.

One night, while the stranger is riding Bill's bus, the vehicle breaks down in the middle of a driving rainstorm. The stranger exits the vehicle and heads for a nearby station... a station Bill knows should not be there! When the stranger never shows his face in town again, the authorities question Bill, since everyone knew Bill had a thing for Jennie before love found other options. Cleared of all wrongdoing, Bill drives his route again and is amazed when Jennie boards his bus. 

Jennie rides that route for decades, looking for any sign of her vanished lover, and finally hits pay dirt when the station appears one stormy night. Bill watches, downtrodden, as the now old and wrinkled Jennie is reunited with the stranger. The years melt from her face and a smile forms. Bill harrumphs and rides on. Eye-rollingly bland, "Next Stop Eternity!" offers no solutions to the mystery (to be fair, the title of the comic book is Adventure Into... not Answers to...) nor rational behavior. How would the police begin an investigation into a guy who has no name? Does Jennie know his name or does she coo "Oh, stranger... you send me!" in his ear?

Inventor Hugo Valgon deliberately destroys his Valgon Ray Activator™ at the risk of death at the hands of his Commie bosses. Why? Good question. One day, while monkeying around with his VRA™, Valgon accidentally plugs a tube in the wrong slot and... presto!... he's transported to a world of splendor and peace. There he meets the gorgeous and scantily-clad Risa Skara and falls madly in love with the girl. When he asks her father for Risa's hand, Pop turns him down due to Hugo's small bank account.

Determined to prove to Pop Skara that he can provide for Risa, Hugo makes a return trip to Earth and returns to Barsoom with a fleet of Air Force jets and militia arms. Dad goes mad and begins bombing runs, alarming Hugo and convincing him that the arms must be destroyed. Task accomplished, Hugo bids Risa a fond fare thee well and heads back to Earth to destroy his VRA™. When his colonel hears Hugo's sad story, he vows to cover up the destruction of the big gizmo and fight for peace in a Communist world. 

What a load of crap. Though this is hackmeister Wessler at the helm, you can smell Stan's brand of "America--Love Her or Leave Her" politics all over "Good-Bye Forever!" The watering-down of the CCA doesn't help either. The transformation of Colonel Yubek from Red, child-eating monster to olive branch extending Ghandi in a handful of panels is one for the ages. I love how Valgon whines about his future dad-in-law using the materials he brought to impress him to wage war. If he's so concerned about peace in paradise, why pack grenades?! Maneely's a name I always welcome on a strip but this isn't Joe's best work. It looks rushed and lacks the usual Maneely dynamics.

Explorer Eric Lamont stumbles upon a handful of aliens while doing what he does in a South American jungle and begs the little guys to come back with him and bask in the glow of adulation sure to come to outer space visitors. The strangers politely decline, citing the color (yellow) and texture (smooth and silky) of their skin. They believe Earthlings would not take kindly to the intrusion and, to prove their point, they transform Eric into a mirror image of themselves and give him a week to prove them wrong. As expected, the ensuing "Bedlam" causes the aliens to cut their trip short and head back to Pluto. Eric sighs and wishes he'd gone to Colonel Yubek instead.

Returning home from a hard day at the office, Ed Wilson bemoans the fact that nothing ever happens on Maple Street. Then, much to his surprise, a vicious dog approaches Ed on his porch. But Ed doesn't own a dog! When he knocks on the front door, Ed is amazed to find a big, burly man answering and he's sure that he's fallen into "A World Gone Mad!" Well, actually, it's the local kids playing pranks on Halloween night, changing the street signs and all. Obviously, Ed's not the brightest bulb in the box since he can't tell his own house from a neighbor's!

In the three-page "When the Time Comes," astronaut cadet Baker takes his first trip into space and has a hard time quelling his panic. The real panic comes when Baker exits the rocket ship and discovers the whole thing was a training exercise... he never left Earth! Not bad for a short-short but we've seen the twist a time or two. In the closer, "Behind the Locked Door...", pretty but shy Lana Cummings can't find romance but at least she's got her hobby: telepathy. Then one day, her sixth sense leads her into danger when she identifies a "Most Wanted" criminal. But happy endings are aplenty in 1956 Atlas funny books as Lana finds herself a man as a result. More romance comic fodder with banal graphics. One of the worst single issues of the post-code Atlas era... and that's saying something!-Peter

Astonishing #53

Cover by Bill Everett

"The Hidden Valley!" (a: Lou Morales) ★★

"There Were 3 Victims!" (a: Sid Greene) ★★

(r: Weird Wonder Tales #14)

"Trapped in the Tunnel!"  (a: John Forte) ★★

"The Hunter's Prey!" (a: Dave Berg) ★★

"Down in the Cellar!" (a: Ted Galindo) ★

"Build Me a Machine!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★★

Magazine photographer/journalist Todd Scott is obsessed with learning the secret behind the Manaos, a tribe that disappeared 1000 years ago. Heading high into the mountains of Tibet with his faithful manservant, Arnark, Scott stumbles upon a beautiful valley hidden between the tallest peaks.

When Scott and Aardvark head into the village, they are startled to find that every person there is frozen in time. "They've been stopped in time for 1000 years!" surmises the brilliant cameraman. Heading into a temple, Scott discovers a huge, powerful telescope aimed at the stars. When he looks through the lens, he finds the contraption is aimed at... Mars! Turns out that every 1000 years, Mars is close enough to Earth that we can contact its residents. Scott immediately realizes that it's been 1000 years and... holy cow!... he can contact Martians! He does so but the communication does not go as planned. Never fear, though, since this is a post-code Atlas story we know Scott will be just fine. "The Hidden Valley!" is not too bad a read; it's fanciful and Lou Morales's graphics are above-average for the post-codes.

In 1994, four escaped convicts hide out on the Galaxy, a space shuttle whose main route is between Earth and a new colony on Mars. The cons want to go to Mars and they threaten Captain Sutton with death if he does not comply. Sutton cites Rule #345/3902.4893 of the Spaceway Rules and Regulations: "No escaped felons allowed on Mars!" To show they mean business, the thugs start tossing Sutton's co-pilots out one-by-one until he's the only one left of the crew.

Sutton sighs and agrees with the cons' demand. Later, they land, but not on Mars. They're back on Earth! At the trial for the four murderers, Sutton testifies that his friends and colleagues were heartlessly tossed out the hatch but the defense lawyer claims that, since the Captain has no witnesses, he can't prove a thing. Sutton tells the judge he has witnesses and he'll bring them to court if he's given a few days. Time passes, the court adjourns, and Sutton's three co-pilots appear to testify. 

How did these guys survive their space ordeal? And how did the Galaxy make it back to Earth? Easy! The three men grabbed onto the ship's wings and turned her around! I can't make this stuff up, boys and girls! The craziest thing about "There Were 3 Victims!" is that writer Carl "Do You Want It Good Or Do You Want It For Your Funny Book?" Wessler doesn't even attempt to explain how these three astronauts avoided the pressures of space without spacesuits and made it back to Earth without food. Carl didn't even fall back on the "they were robots the whole time" chestnut. And that makes this nonsense supremely enjoyable. Sometimes it's alright to listen to the Bay City Rollers instead of Cream. Sid Greene's art makes it look like this was a strip that sat around since the early 1940s.

"Trapped in the Tunnel!" continues this issue's theme of "If you can't dazzle them with brilliance..." A crew of tunnel diggers constantly belittle their biggest grunt, Biff, because the guy can't get a girl. Biff heads home one night, cuts a picture out of a Hollywood magazine, and presents the clip as proof he's got a girlfriend. The others are wise to the charade and tease Biff even more. Just then, the ceiling of the tunnel begins to leak and the boys head for the elevator. 

The damned thing's stuck and they say their prayers. Suddenly, the elevator car appears, manned by Biff's "girl!" The boys are rescued and explain to a reporter about their savior. The paperman laughs and points at the empty elevator. When they produce the pic of Biff's girl, the journalist explains that the blonde is Janet Marlowe who died five years ago!!! This one just loads inanity atop ludicrosity and hopes no one will question its logic. I sure won't.

In "The Hunter's Prey!" two big game hunters are looking for water buffalo when they happen upon a mammoth! But those mammals are extinct, I hear you say. Well, the exposition comes in the final panels when an alien arrives just as the two gunmen are about to be trampled. Seems as though he accidentally let the big guy out of his interplanetary zoo cage. 

The Mercers have been trying to get rid of their rundown house for months but no one will buy it. Now there's a torrential downpour and the ceiling is leaking. The basement is flooded. Mary can't even run her hairdryer for fear she'll be electrocuted. Then their realtor calls to tell them a young couple wants to have a look. "What the hell?" exclaims Bob, "This place is a dump!" But the shack must hold some kind of charm, since the couple make an immediate cash offer and ask the Mercers to be out by end of day. Mercers gone, the new occupants take their clothes off and jump in the flooded basement. They're merpeople! Most of these three-pagers are inane and "Down in the Cellar!" is no exception.

A failing commie dictator (well, we're never told he's Russian, but this is a Stan Lee-edited strip written by Carl Wessler, so...) demands that his top scientist build him a time machine so he can travel back fifty years (armed with blueprints for deadly weapons such as H-bombs, jet fighters, and rap music) and be BMOC. Though the egghead warns the czar that there are flaws in the time travel theories, the despot demands success. Time machine built, the egotistical, warmongering madman heads back half a century into the past and comes out the other side as... a baby! The extraordinary work of Steve Ditko would be enough to make "Build Me a Machine!" one of the best yarns of 1956, but the script by Wessler is also a clever winner.-Peter

Journey Into Mystery #38

Cover by Sol Brodsky & Carl Burgos

"Stone Face!" (a: John Giunta) ★1/2

"Those Who Vanish!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★1/2

"The Mystery of the Missing Man" (a: Bill Walton) ★

"The Box That Wouldn't Open!" (a: Ed Winiarski) ★

"The Secret of the Sargasso Sea!" (a: Bill Benulis) ★★

"The Sea Serpent!" (a: Ross Andru & Mike Esposito) ★1/2

Richard Dell, who runs a sideshow, buys a stone statute from a farmer whose plow uncovered it in a field. Dell displays "Stone Face!" but everyone thinks it's a fake. When Richard announces that he believes the stone man is real, it comes to life and turns everyone but Dell to stone. Distraught at what he has done, Richard announces that he no longer believes the creature is real, and it turns back to harmless stone.

The stone creature explains, in a long caption, that it's a dealer in black magic from a distant planet who was turned to stone and banished to Earth as punishment. How can we punish the writer and artist of this story for wasting the five minutes it took me to read it? I was certain that Dell would use a mirror to turn stony solid again, but no such luck.

After spending 20 years in the clink, Pete Arlen is free but without prospects. Near a pool called Chi-Ha-Nichi in Wyoming, he meets Chief Red Dust, an old Indian who claims that the water makes anyone who bathes in it 20 years younger. Since the chief says he's 104 but looks about 80, Pete buys the title to the pool for 25 bucks. In a nearby cafe, he meets Linda and Eddie and makes a nice profit by selling the title to the pool to Eddie for $3000. A few days later, Pete learns that not only are folks paying $500 each to bathe in the pool, it works! After a quick dip, "Those Who Vanish!" are sent back 20 years through a time warp and return looking younger. Pete decides to hop into the pool after everyone is gone, only to discover himself back in jail, twenty years before, once again starting his two-decade stint behind bars.

The GCD credits this story to Carl Wessler and I can believe it, since it makes twists and turns that don't make a whole lot of sense, and because the end is a flop. More impressive is the art by Ditko, who draws an impressive 80+-year-old Indian chief. Pete's face is a bit weird but Linda and Eddie look like they could have stepped out of a Spider-Man comic less than 10 years later.

Harvey Wilson wants to marry Gina and return to the States from the Middle East, but Gordon Dunbar holds an IOU from Harvey's gambling debts and threatens to show it to Gina if Harvey won't go along with his scheme to rob an old curio shop. That night, Harvey steals a small box from the shop and gives it to Gordon, warning him that he should throw it away due to scary noises Harvey heard in the shop. Instead, Harvey and Gordon visit Gina and, when Gordon enters a back room to open the box, a cry for help is heard. Harvey investigates and finds only the box, which the native shop owner quickly retrieves. Harvey and Gina agree to head for the U.S., while in the shop, the native proprietor adds a small figure to his shelf that looks just like Gordon.

The dreadful story in "The Mystery of the Missing Man" is matched by the dreadful art. Bill Walton should have stuck to basketball.

"The Box That Wouldn't Open!" is no better. Three hoods read in the paper that Dr. Neil Farr has made a discovery worth millions of dollars, so they break into his house, find him studying a metal box, and conclude that it must be valuable. They then do all they can to open it while he keeps popping pills. At Police HQ, Sgt. Dan Boyd has a hunch that the doc is in trouble, so he rushes to the house, then to a machine shop where the thugs have taken Farr and his box to try to pry it open. Boyd arrives and corners the thugs; Farr reveals that the box is empty and the pills are his great discovery, since they allow for thought communication.

Why is Captain Pearly Marston insistent on piloting his ship, which carries vital rocket fuel, into the whirlpool near the Sargasso Sea? Even he doesn't know. Once the ship reaches that sea, the crew find other ships that have ended up there. On one of them, the captain explains how he and his ship endured a similar fate. That night, Marston's crew report that the rocket fuel has suddenly vanished and, next thing they know, their ship is being towed to safety by... a rocket ship! It seems that the other ship on the Sargasso Sea was a rocket ship; it took the fuel from Marston's ship, headed out to space, and towed Pearly's vessel to safety. The art by Bill Benulis makes "The Secret of the Sargasso Sea!" worth reading; it doesn't hurt that it only lasts three pages.

It's funny how some of these stories can be elevated by quality art. Benulis, Ditko, Reinman (sometimes) and a few others were toiling for little money and no recognition, yet they turned out pages that still impress seven decades later.

Finally, in the "only at Atlas in the post-code years" comes "The Sea Serpent," which turns out to be a friend to humans and ships rather than a big, scaly monster. At this point in their career, Andru and Esposito draw art that is recognizably theirs but doesn't yet hit the excesses they would reach in the '60s and early '70s with bug-eyed characters. The best panels in this story are the ones with the sea serpent, which is actually pretty cool, at least until it turns into a Disney creature that uses its head to nudge ships out of trouble.-Jack

Journey Into Unknown Worlds #49

Cover by Russ Heath

"Invasion of the Metal Men!" (a: Joe Maneely) ★1/2

"I Am Nobody!" (a: John Forte) ★★

"The Moon for Sale!" (a: Robert Q. Sale) ★★

"Forever and Ever" (a: Kurt Schaffenberger) ★1/2

"The Man Who Never Was!" (a: Harry Lazarus) ★1/2

"Address Unknown!" (a: Vic Carrabotta) ★

After the "Invasion of the Metal Men!" gets underway in 1983, the robots attack the capital city and take over the government. Senate President Milford speaks to the gallery, announcing that the metal men come from another planet and have brain power equal to that of humans, as well as impenetrable bodies. "'No! That's wrong!'" yells Ned Webb, a young ham radio operator who is thereafter mocked by everyone for daring to disagree with the brilliant Milford. A week later, the onslaught of the metal men is suddenly stopped by Ned, who leads them into a lake, where they vanish (and rust?). Ned tells the senators that he figured out that the robots were being controlled by radio waves from outer space, so he got on their wavelength and took over. The senators take credit for Ned's success and he laments that "'I'm still a nothing.'"

It's not just Ned. Wessler's script is terrible and Maneely's art isn't much better. The story never really gets going and ends on one of those typical Wesslerian letdowns.

John Mason is an actor who hosts the popular TV true crime show called Booked. He is so worn out from all of his celebrity appearances that he is happy to accept an offer from a mysterious fat man who will send him to a parallel world where he is unknown. It only costs $10,000! John agrees and forks over the money. He walks into the parallel world, where he is happy to realize that "I Am Nobody!" Happy, that is, until he overhears a couple of spies plotting and karate chops the gun from one of their hands. The F.B.I. rush in and want to arrest John, thinking he's a spy too and not believing him when he says he's a famous actor. He runs off and returns to his original world, relieved to be famous.

John Forte's art always seems a bit wooden to me, but it is decent enough to match this silly story. I've reproduced a panel where the word balloon is supposed to point to the man in the hat but looks like it points to the screaming teenaged girl.

Despite having been swindled before, Herman Doakes can't resist responding to an ad offering to sell lots on the moon for a dollar. He borrows a buck from his skeptical friend John, mails it off to P.O. Box X, and waits, his faith unshaken. Soon, a moon man knocks at his door to tell Herman that he now owns the whole moon because he was the only person who responded to the ad. As a result of his faith, he will run the moon men's business when Earthlings conquer space travel.

"The Moon for Sale!" contains no surprises, since anyone who has read more than a handful of Atlas comic book stories knows from page one that the ad will turn out to be legit by page four. The moon man is yellow with black spots all over his head and he wears a red turtleneck. I guess it was hard to keep coming up with interesting designs for alien creatures.

After his spaceship suddenly explodes on a trip to Venus, an astronaut is cast into the vast reaches of space, where he is lucky to be picked up by the space version of the Flying Dutchman. Kurt Schaffenberger's cartoony visuals are the only thing that makes this three-pager worth a look.

Two years ago, while on a picnic with Bess, his fiance, Vic Marshall was sucked up into a tornado and deposited in the year 1654 after passing through a time warp! He met and married Angela and they had a son. All was well until another tornado tossed Vic back into 1956, where he discovers that he is his own descendant. Fortunately, another tornado is on the way to return him to 1654.

If the GCD didn't credit this story to Carl Wessler, we wouldn't have much trouble identifying the author, since (as usual) the twists and turns never quite make sense. It's like a plot developed by Yogi Berra. The art by Harry Lazarus is serviceable.

When a young couple from Venus and their baby son mysteriously appear in Alex Gordon's barn, the farmer must fend off an angry mob. The GCD editor suggests that Ross Andru may have done some work on this story, which is signed by Vic Carrabotta; I've reproduced a panel here that could be the work of Ross the boss.-Jack

Next Week...
Nope, that's not Peter griping
about mediocre Bat-comics, it's
the latest Penguin epic!