The Adventures Of The Spirit!

The Adventures of the Spirit is not a Republic serial, nor even a Columbia one. It fell to amateur filmmaker Don Glut to at long last bring Central City's protector to the screen, albeit not necessarily the big one. The movie is shot in five chapters and of course in the climax of each chapter the Spirit is seemingly killed or about to be killed. He faces a villain Glut names the "Black Avenger" who wears a hood and sends out his minions. 

The first of these is a robot played by an impressive toy, the second is a Wolfman using a Don Post mask, the third is a Mummy using props from actual films owned by superfan Bob Burns who plays many of the parts. The fourth and final menace in this silent film is Frankenstein's Monster played by Glenn Strange using a mask made especially for him to promote Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein. The Spirit (played by Glut of course) is pretty hapless in most of these chapters and needs saving by such classic stalwarts as the Green Hornet, Captain America, the Shadow and Superman. Even Rocketman makes an appearance. 

(Art from this cover used in title cards.)

I Was a Teenage Movie Maker - Don Glut's Amateur Films is an exceedingly strange movie package. Don Glut is well known to my generation of comic book fans as a prodigious writer of comics for most of the major publishers such as DC, Marvel and especially Gold Key. But when he was a youngster, he was apparently a relentless moviemaker. The movies he made were the stuff you'd expect from kids at first but later they became much more refined.  

The Adventures of the Spirit is only a tiny part of the overall collection of handmade films produced by Glut. There are hours and hours of homemade movies about dinosaurs, classic monsters, and even more superheroes. Glut's films even got mentions in Famous Monsters of Filmland.  The DVD also has a pretty lengthy documentary hosted by Don Glut himself explaining how his various films came to be over the course of his life. Audio commentaries accompany the films as well. 

To get a look at the documentary check out this link. 

It was when Glut finally headed off to film school in California, that he continued to make weird but fascinating films, often with the help of other film fans such as Bob Burns, notorious for his own roles as Tracy the ape in Ghost Busters. Glut also made movie serials in the tradition of the classic Republic films and even was able to attract pros like Roy Barcroft, Kenne Duncan and Glenn Strange to play roles for him. Some of those films, made on locations such as the famous Bronson Canyon (my favorite place on Earth) were even shown on local Chicago television. 

If you're a "Monster Kid" or sympathetic to the cause you might find this interesting. Watching the all the movies can be a chore, but there are many charms to be discovered. 

There is also a paperback book which enhances the documentary and the films themselves. I should also note that it has just been announced that Don Glut has won The Bill Finger Award. 

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The Savage Comics Of Solomon Kane!

Aside from the two Kane appearances in Marvel Premiere, the six-issue run of The Saga of Solomon Kane is apparently the only color comic run featuring the Puritan from Mighty Marvel. I've never owned nor read them before getting them along with the aforementioned Marvel Premiere issues in the color trade collection from Dark Horse.

This is an odd set of stories because there's precious few of Howard's Kane stories to adapt and Marvel adapted some of them two separate times. One story is adapted twice in this very volume, a most strange happening, but interesting in that it allows a pretty close comparison of the interpretations.

 

"Red Shadows" is the first Kane story by REH and it was adapted first by Roy Thomas and Howie Chaykin and it's a great rousing version of the story. Chaykin's style is perfect for Kane and he's at his best in this tale. I'd love to see him adapt all of the Solomon Kane canon using his modern style. It would be a masterpiece I suspect. The story is adapted again by Ralph Macchio and Steve Carr and Bret Blevins. This one is more briskly paced, but a pretty good rendering. Macchio really has a solid handle on the Puritan.

There are several other stories here that are originals and I have to say they are quite smashing, especially one titled "The Prophet" which pits the Puritan zealot Kane against a Muslin zealot, both of them men of good intent but blinded by their faiths to some degree. It's got art by Mike Mignola and it's a darn fine story with a very effective ending.

Two other REH stories get adapted, "Hills of the Dead" and "Wings of the Night", both of which had been adapted previously by Marvel in black and white. These are decently done, but I prefer the black and white versions, especially the one by Alan Weiss for "Hills".

There's a neat little subplot that runs through the Macchio stories about Kane and his conflict of faith regarding a fetish staff he carries that clearly seems to contradict his Christian faith. At times he rejects it, but is drawn back to Africa and comes to embrace a larger worldview apparently. This storyline running quietly through the stories gives a neat texture to works.

These color Kanes aren't great, but they are darn good. And they look good in this Dark Horse reprint. 

Next up is the Dark Horse B&W reprint of Solomon Kane's adventures from Savage Sword of Conan and elsewhere. Aside from a few of these very early stories, I'd read almost none of this, so it was all new-old Marvel for me.

The earliest Kane stories with artwork by Alan Weiss are superb. Weiss gave Kane a distinctive flavor, similar but not at all aping what Smith did with Conan. Kane's stories under Weiss's hand were lush and had a crisp modern feel to them, even today. There's another great story by Howie Chaykin. The storytelling is by Roy Thomas and Don Glut. In fact, much to my surprise I learned here that Glut was the primary scribe for Kane's adventures, writing the majority of these stories.

The artwork in the later stuff is by journeymen. David Wenzel still many years from his Hobbit stuff is on board for several stories, but in nearly every case the storytelling seemed to suffer by insufficient page count. I'm not one who usually bickers about this kind of thing, but there was a distinct cramped quality to many of the middle stories, even those which got serialized. Following the action was hard at times, but perhaps that has to do with the reduction of the page for this format.

The latter part of the book reprints stuff from the 90's. At one point there's a jump from the mid-80's to the 90's and the change in styles is remarkable. Many of the later stories are well told with some artwork that grew on me as I read the stories. There's even a crossover with Conan to close out the volume. The pin-ups throughout are nice, especially from solid pros like the late Berni Wrightson. 

I'd give this volume a solid B. It's a decent read, it adapts most of the key Kane stories, but the artwork is suspect at times. The high romance that should permeate a Kane story is often missing in these. The first few stories with Kane encountering Dracula are fantastic, and there's a sequel to this classic clash that I'd never read. All in all, not that bad, it opens and closes very strongly.

More Kane later today. 

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I Was A Teenage Movie Maker!

I Was a Teenage Movie Maker - Don Glut's Amateur Films is an exceedingly strange movie package. (It was my Halloween treat for myself.) Don Glut is well known to my generation of comic book fans as a prodigious writer of comics for most of the major publishers such as DC, Marvel and especially Gold Key. But when he was a youngster, he was apparently a relentless moviemaker. The movies he made were the stuff you'd expect from kids at first but later they became much more refined.  

There are hours and and hours of homemade movies about dinosaurs, classic monsters, and later superheroes. Glut's films even got mentions in Famous Monsters of Filmland.  The DVD also has a pretty lengthy documentary hosted by Don Glut himself explaining how his various films came to be over the course of his life. To get a look at the documentary check out this link. 

When Glut finally became an adult and headed off to film school in California, he continued to make weird but fascinating films, often with the help of other film fans such as Bob Burns, notorious for his own roles as Tracy the ape in Ghost Busters. Glut also made movie serials in the tradition of the classic Republic films and even was able to attract pros like Roy Barcroft and Glenn Strange to play roles for him. Some of those films, made on locations such as the famous Bronson Canyon were even show on local television. 

If you're a "Monster Kid" or sympathetic to the cause you might find this interesting. Watching the all the movies can be a chore, but there are many charms to be discovered. 

There is a companion book for this collection, but I was unable to acquire a copy alas. 

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Dagar The Invincible!

Now technically this series was titled Tales of Sword and Sorcery - Dagar the Invincible, but as the creator and writer Don Glut points out, almost no one calls it that. For most of us it's just Dagar the Invincible, one of the many comic imitators of the highly successful Conan the Barbarian from the House of Ideas. That this version comes from Gold Key is somewhat remarkable as generally sword and sorcery might be deemed a bit too bloody for the family-friendly line which still had some Disney comics on the stands at the time. But also it should be noted that some of the more successful Gold Key books were Twilight Zone and Boris Karloff Tales of Mystery. 

The first issue comes after much planning and revision. Glut and artist Jesse Santos had already created a barbarian hero named "Durok" who had appearance in Mystery Comics Digest. (To read those stories check out this link.) But for whatever reason he was deemed not worthy of his own series and so Dagar came about after many name adjustments. He's supposed to look somewhat like Kirk Douglas in Spartacus and that sure seems to be the case. Dagar is the last of his kind, a member of the "Tulgonian" society. If you happen to the name "Glut" in that word it's no accident as the writer pulled this trick several times in his Gold Key work which didn't necessarily have credits. Dagar's eventual love interest is named after one of Glut's girlfriends for instance. 

The sorcerer who destroyed Dagar's society was named "Scorpio" and the first four issues of the serires concern Dagar's search for this villain. 

After killing the fiend who killed his pa and ma the series is left with a conundrum. Dagar purports to be a "mercenary" who fights only for gold and says such more than once. But that hardcase attitude gives way more often than not and he is a proper hero who reluctantly does the right thing because as it often turns out he's the one who can. 

Dagar battles werewolves, vampires, zombies and such classic monsters, though these critters are often given a fantasy world gloss. Dagar even travels through time to battle dinosaurs alongside primitive cavemen. Glut had apparently wanted to co-star Tragg, his own caveman creation, but the editor Del Connell nixed that idea. 

Generally Dagar and his squeeze Graylin wander the landscape falling in and out of trouble and battling a host of magicians and monsters. This collection has the first nine issues and of that lot the ninth offers up the best story since the debut with a new black hero joining forces with Dagar. But most of the stories are a bit by-the-numbers sword and sorcery gags with Dagar trying to come across as a tough guy when really he's a sweetheart, albeit a sweetheart who might stab you in the chest if you cross him. 

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Getting The Creeps!

I pretty much noticed Warrant Publishing's The Creeps right away when it hit the stands, but for whatever reason I have just this week picked up my first issue. The magazine fills a nifty space as I am still casting around for proper entertainment to complete the gap left by cancellations of all my current favorite comics. The premise of Warrant's magazine is dead simple -- imitate Warren publishing as much as possible. What we have here is a weird zombie-like imitation of Creepy and Eerie from the halcyon days of Jim Warren's maverick magazine line which gave us top-flight characters like Uncle Creepy, Cousin Eerie, Vampirella, Hunter, and The Rook among many others. Now we can add "The Old Creep". It's a weirdly charming idea.

The talent has been pretty darn good with reliable names like Roger McKenzie, Nicola Cuti, T. Casey Brennan and Don Glut as writers and Frank Frazetta, Ken Kelly, Sanjulian, and Rich Corben on covers. Inside has been handled by a bevy of talented young pros who do a grand job evoking recognizable styles. Even Groovy Friends of the Dojo have had a hand in the production of the magazine. In fact with the fourteenth issue Nick Cuti joins the editorial staff headed by Rich Sala, so it does rather feel even more like old times. So add The Creeps to the list. Now I have some back issues to chase -- sounds like fun.

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