Solar Reflections - Nuclear Nightmares!

In the third volume of Doctor Solar Man of the Atom from Dark Horse, we are treated to a fully-realized superhero. Gold Key had been reluctant to dive into the superhero pool, clearly showing a disdain for the underwear crowd which commanded so much attention in the field. But eventually they follow the patterns and give us a Doctor Solar who functions in many ways like a hero in the classic modes.

Paul S. Newman, the ubiquitous writer for Gold Key continued to handle the chores on that end and Frank Bolle had successfully taken over the art, if his style was somewhat less dynamic than what had come before. With this team we continue to get stories which are rock solid science fiction such as when Doctor Solar is forced to travel back in time to stop a deadly doomsday device by going to before it began, and later he confronts a sun spun out of control and threatening to destroy the Earth itself.

Then the stories begin to focus more on the machinations of Solar's arch enemy Nuro, an obscure behind-the-scenes villain akin to many masterminds from the Bond films and other such tales. Nuro employs a robot dubbed "Orun", one who'd battled Solar before and makes of him a steady henchman and persistent threat to Doctor Solar. We get a glimpse of Nuro's face after many years of shadows and see that he has a rather porcine countenance. Nothing much is made of this, but it suggests a slight change in the tone of the series.

Those changes continue when Dick Wood takes on the writing and veteran Al McWilliams steps into do some art on the series and we meet Hamilton Mansfield Lamont, who is Gale's nephew. This brilliant young man joins the cast which had long been comprised of love interest Gale and Dr. Solar's longtime boss and confidant Doctor Clarkson and soon becomes a nerdish Snapper Carr/Rick Jones like figure. You can for sure say that the Man of the Atom becomes a bona fide superhero when he gets a teen sidekick.

We also get a new villain, sort of when King Cybernoid is birthed as Nuro's intellect becomes entrapped in the robotic form of his henchman. This new more physical opponent again creates a more pure superhero dynamic for the book and draws it away from its sci-fi roots, though of course those notions still function to supply threats.

Here are the covers of the issues included in this volume.

Next time Doctor Solar really goes through some changes, and we chase the character through the decades of the 70's and the 80's.

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Solar Reflections - Doctor In Red!

With the second volume of Doctor Solar Man of the Atom we are getting a full-fledged superhero, a bright and shiny man in red who saves the day when it's needed. The adventures though in this volume also explore the unique nature of Doctor Solar, putting him through a wide range of transformations, not for Solar are the machinations of sundry super-villains but rather it is often Solar battling against the peculiar side effects of his own awesome power.

Frank Bolle

All the stories here were drawn by Frank Bolle, an artist with a flair for the real but lacking the oomph often associated with superheroes. The writing on this series transitioned in the tenth issue with the ubiquitous Paul S. Newman giving way to Dick Wood.

In these stories Doctor Solar is pitted against Nuro time and again who fights most often by proxy and very often using machines. The first of these is a device which challenges the reality people see, but Solar is able to fend off these threats and save Blue Valley. Then it's a computerized robot named Transvac which is able to absorb energy including the energy which comprises Solar himself, but that energy is possessed of a min which uses strategy to escape. Then for a couple of issues Solar has to contend with an overabundance of energy which swells him to gigantic proportions. It is through the steady and reliable help of his best girl Gail he often found his way to return to some semblance of humanity, whether in scale or temporally.

For Gold Key, a company that clearly didn't get the whole superhero zeitgeist, Doctor Solar Man of the Atom is an anomaly. Other superheroes from the company were either parodies of the form (Frankenstein, Dracula, The Owl) or firmly rooted in science fiction like Solar (Magnus, Robot Fighter). It's Solar's magnificently resplendent red costume which has made him an iconic hero worthy of revival over the decades. Sure the nature of the hero, a many torn asunder by the power of the atom and reshaped into something akin to a god is fascinating, but without that costume it's all for naught.

Here are the covers in this collection, all by the great George Wilson.

More Doctor Solar next week. 

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Solar Reflections - Man Of The Atom!

Dated October 1962 the debut issue of Doctor Solar hit the stands as the fledgling Gold Key brand was first trying to establish itself after the split from Dell. The talents at Western Publications were eager to try out their own stuff and adding a "superhero" seemed necessary for  a comics company. Under a lush and mysterious Richard Powers cover, this comic seemed to be what it was -- a strange blend of science fiction and superheroics, with less attention on the latter.

In the debut story "Doctor Solar's Secret", we meet Doctor Philip Solar, a nuclear physicist who works at Atomic Valley. There he is trapped inside a sabotaged nuclear pile and the radiation, which kills his colleague does not kill him, instead he finds himself changed and weirdly quickened by the radioactivity. His skin becomes a vivid green and he seems to be dead save that he isn't. The only person who knows his secret is Dr.Clarkson, his boss, who works with Solar to keep him alive by giving him access to radiation he needs. Ignorant of his true nature is Gail Sanders, a newly arrived and quite attractive scientist who is smitten with Solar. The man behind the sabotage is the mysterious Nuro, who will be the villain throughout the series.In the second story "An Atomic Inferno" the agent of Nuro runs afoul of Gail and stops her and destroy Atom Valley before she can reveal his secrets, but not before Solar can save the day. The agent pays for his failures.

Esteemed science fiction artist Richard Powers does the first two covers for the series run before George Wilson takes over. The artwork on the early issues is by Bob Fujitani and it is stellar, offering up the a nicely dramatic but still exceedingly real world for Solar to operate in. Frank Bolle became the regular artist with the sixth issue and his style is certainly in the spirit of Fujitani's but alas to my eye lacks some of the power. The ubiquitous Paul Newman writes the scripts for all the Solar comics, and Matt Murphy is given credit as co-writer.

In subsequent issues we get stories like "Remote-Controlled Traitor" which has Gail Sanders kidnapped by Nuro's agents and she becomes a saboteur before she is confronted and saved by Solar, and  "The Night of the Volcano" has Solar leaving the confines of his laboratory and rushing to save the region from a tremendous volcanic eruption which had been unwittingly triggered by experiments from Atom Valley itself. Eventually he visits undersea cities and confronts aliens other scientists with odd and sometimes villainous goals. Always the mysterious and malevolent Nuro is lurking behind the scenes,even sending a robot to infiltrate Blue Valley in one issue. 

These early stories have a specific science fiction feel to them, as the always staid and conservative Gold Key folks were really reluctant to tap the superhero vein, but rather wanted to market a character who was just a scientist with an unusual condition. They seemed to be designing for television shows rather than superhero comics. Of course they eventually relented and gave Doctor Solar a costume in the fourth issue, but the nature of the stories really didn't change all that much in these early issues. All the stories were written by the phenomenal Paul S. Newman save for the seventh which was written by Otto Binder.

Here are the covers for the first seven issues. 

More "Solar Reflections" to come next week.

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Sunday Of Stone - Turok Volume Ten!

With its tenth volume Dark Horse ceased its reprinting of Turok Son of Stone. It's a shame they didn't complete the run but truth told the quality of the reprints in the final three volumes is somewhat suspect with bindings that are not all that reliable. Not something one wants to find in an "archive" item. The stories in this collection take Turok and Andar nearly into the 70's and as the series closes out the 60's it is a mature comic with a settled format. Underneath solid George Wilson painted covers we get stories by Paul S. Newman that offer clever alterations of the vintage scenario. Turok and Andar are not full characters but are not just stereotypes either. Both demonstrate degrees of wisdom and bravery which benefits the other and while it falls most often to the younger Andar to play the naive partner it is not always the case. The art buy Giovanni Ticci and Alberto Giolitti is rock solid if and for me a major lure in the days when I collected the comic off the stands. 

 

Issue sixty offers up "Scourge of the Sea Serpents" in which Turok and Andar attempt a deadly water crossing amongst a multitude of water-going Honkers. "The Lost Key" is a text item discussing a strange, wooden tablets which give clues to ancient lost languages. The "Young Earth" story "The Giant Conquerors" describes how ancient man battled against even more bestial tribes for dominance in the world. "Guardian of the Pit" finds Turok forced to explore a deadly cavern to save Andar from a murderous tribe. 

"Survive --Alone" is a powerful story in which Andar thinks that Turok has actually been killed and he spends much of the tale relying on himself and the things Turok taught him. Eventually of course he learns that Turok is still alive, but that's not a great surprise. "Eskimo City" is the text item discussing a settlement of Eskimos who lived in a larger village contrary to the norm. "Young Earth" features the "The Reindeer Hunters" who have to develop spear throwing technology to succeed in the hunt. "Dinosauria: Styracosaurus" initiates this vintage series showcasing various dinosaurs. "Prisoner" is a tale in which both Turok and Andar are captured by a tribe of Vine Men who want the pair to burn down a grove next to their enemies the Hill Men. But the rub is the poison berry patch which the duo rely on to slay the deadly Honkers is in that very grove. 

Issue sixty-two dated July 1968 gives the reader a strange two-part tale in which Turok and Andar encounter a strange drug which might show them the way out of Lost Valley. The tale told in two parts is titled "Terrors of the Dream". The first half titled "The Dangerous Temptation" has the pair encounter a tribe in which a medicine man claims his drug gives him the ability to see into the future among other things. Andar is anxious to try this drug. He does in "Andar's Nightmare World" and he is at the mercy of his altered state when he encounters many deadly Honkers who are changed into even more deadly beasts in his vision. "Prehistoric Voyagers" is a text item about how Japanese islanders might have been the first to find the New World. "Young Earth" tells the story of the Elasmosuar, a dominant aquatic dinosaur. "Dinosauria: Iquanodon" continues this feature. 

A rare treat is found in the sixty-third issue, a non-painted cover by the Giolitti studio. That's the good news, the bad is that the price per issue jumps to fifteen cents, at the time a twenty-five percent increase. In "Honker Alive--Or Andar Dead" Turok is forced by yet another hostile tribe to find a strange dinosaur to help guard their swampy territory after he and Andar kill the original. Andar is held hostage by these Swamp Men. "The Desert Conquerors" is a text item about Indians who likely migrated from Mexico and brought great skills with them. "Young Earth" describes "The Coming of the Reptiles" when the Earth became too dry for amphibians. "Dinosauria: Proteceratops" describes this ancient creature. "The Peak of Peril" is the second Turok and Andar adventure and has the pair in search of water. They follow an old man they rescue who claims to know where some can be found but it's a dangerous journey up steep cliffs and Andar disagrees with Turok about the reliability of their guide. 

"The Lost City" is a different kind of Turok adventure which finds our two heroes discovering a strange, abandoned city which is well beyond the capacities of any of the primitive tribes they've  so far encountered in Lost Valley. In part one title "The Silent Menace" they come across a strange Honker statue and then the city itself. Andar sees a place they can stay a while to recuperate but Turok remains steadfast that they should keep looking for an escape from the valley. Later while they explore Andar becomes locked in a room. "The Maze of Death" is part two of this different adventure and finds Andar in a strange thorny maze confronted by Honkers. Turok does find him eventually but the mystery of the city remains. "Prehistoric Sports" examines long-lost games sometimes deadly one in a text item. "Young Earth" presents "The Natural Trap" and shows how Neanderthals might've learned to trap the elusive Ibex. "Dinosauria: Ankylosaurus" closes out the issue. 

The sixty-fifth issue gives us "The Burial Ground". In part one titled "Turn Back or Die!" Turok and Andar strike upon the notion that they've seen relatively few dinosaur bones in Lost Valley and speculate that there might be a dinosaur burial ground. They follow a wounded dinosaur for a time but are attacked by a cave tribe which worships the area. "The Secret of the Sacred Place" is part two of this adventure and Turok and Andar find the misty region they are seeking but alas it is not what they expected which turns out to be a good thing for Turok. The text item is "The Neanderthal Funeral" which speculates how these ancient peoples might've had regard for their dead. "Young Earth" tells the long story of glaciers and how multiple Ice Ages impacted life on the planet. 

In "The Trap of Flames" Turok and Andar must confront not only the menace of two battling tribes but the arrival of a volcano which threatens the lives of everyone. In the first part titled "The Trap Closes" the duo find themselves caught between two battling clans, but the eruption of a volcano changes the scenario and everyone looks to Turok for salvation. "Death by Spear or by Fire" the second part sees Turok and Andar helping both tribes to save themselves from lava but then the untrustworthy primitives try to bend the pair by making them leaders so as to use their technology. The text item "Prehistoric Americans" examines some of the different ways ancient peoples lived in the New World. The "Young Earth" features "The Vanished Ones" and focuses on strange mammals which thrived then disappeared before the advent of man. "Prehistoria: Neanderthal Man" closes out the issue. 

The sixty-seventh issue of Turok Son of Stone dated October of 1969 is the final issue in this final archive edition and ironically it's also the very first issue of this venerable series that I bought off the stands for myself. It's a standout installment which presents our Native American duo a unique challenge. "Two Kinds of Terror" tells the story of what happens when Turok and Andar are made small in Lost Valley. The first part of the tale titled "Andar the Hostage" sees our duo after they've entered a remote canyon by crawling through a small opening. They soon encounter pint-size Honkers and later pint-size people. After drinking from tubs from the tribe both Turok and Andar shrink to fit this strange new canyon. In the second part title "The Magic Weapon" Turok uses his wits to make use of his bow to bring down a threatening Honker. Soon after the pair escape the canyon but run into more trouble when their small size makes them vulnerable to other cave men. It takes some clever thinking for the two to get back their weapons. Eventually of course they regain their normal size. "Prehistoric Americans" is the text piece that talks about various early peoples of the land. And the "Young Earth" revealed that animals in prehistoric times often found greater safety in herds. 

And that's a wrap my fellow Turok fans -- almost.

Turok Son of Stone rumbled along throughout the 1970's and last into the 1980's until its one hundred and thirtieth issue dated April, 1982. Turok even outlasted Gold Key itself  when Western Publishing dropped the noble brand and went with Whitman for its final comics. 

Then in the 90's along came Jim Shooter who got the licenses to the then defunct Gold Key heroes and used them as the core of the launch of Valiant Comics. I was great admirer of what Shooter and his team tried to do with Valiant, seeing it at the time as a smarter version of the disruptive Image Comics. Marvel and DC were on their heels and the direct sales market was ripe for the taking and Valiant was a heavy hitter in the incursion. After the revival of Magnus Robot Fighter and Solar Man of the Atom it eventually was Turok Son of Stone's turn for a revival in the pages of Magnus Robot Fighter number twelve. The lost Valley was reimagined as another dimension and became the hub for the Valiant "Unity" event. Turok and Andar showed up to take part. 

Later Turok Dinosaur Hunter became a "hot" number one issue and featured Turok in our modern world, a savage warrior who was more than capable of dealing with strange smart Honkers which had invaded our dimension. The series lasted around fifty issues or so with a bunch of special editions as well under both the Valiant and the later Acclaim brands. Turok captured the imagination of a new generation and had success as a video game and even popped up as animated movie. 

Now the "Turok" in some of these venues is not the Turok I know, but the name still has power. It did for me when I first stumbled across it on the newsstands and saw two small Native American braves trying to launch a giant arrow at a threatening dinosaur. Great stuff indeed. 

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Sunday Of Stone - Turok Volume Nine!

Turok Son of Stone Volume Nine from Dark Horse reprinting those fascinating Gold Key comics from the 1960's is perhaps the strangest collection of Turok stories yet. The concept of two Amerindians lost in a vast Lost Valley filled with cavemen primitives and dinosaurs is one that has proven to have legs, but Paul S. Newman seems to be straining at this point, a little over a decade after the debut of the comic, to find fresh ways to present this fundamentally strong dilemma without simple repetition. The key is to make the threats to Turok and Andar increasingly offbeat and at times downright weird. The previous volume saw Monkey Men, Spider Men, and an especially enormous "Honker" lost in time. The weirdness only picks up from there and delivers what I think is the strangest Turok tale that Gold Key ever told. 

 

The fifty-first issue begins with "Captives of the Beaver Men" in which we see artist Rex Maxon step in to fill in for the regular art team of Giovanni Ticci and Alberto Giolitti. Turok and Andar try to cross a river only to be snatched by the Beaver Men who live in strange homes in the river. The two try many things to escape but are only able to do so when in the second part titled "The Red Scourge" Turok and Andar find a way to stem a deadly tide of ravenous fish. The text piece discusses "Stone-Age Music" and the "Young Earth" feature tells the tell of early flightless birds and how eventually they came to lift off into the sky. 

The regular team of Newman, Ticci, and Giolitti are back in the next issue which sees our two heroes trying a desperate gambit by climbing a sheer cliff to enter the nests of deadly flying honkers that shred the flesh from the bones of any creature they chance upon. They hope to find a cave through to the world they left behind so long ago. They are lucky to escape with their lives in a two-part tale titled "The Savage Shadow". The text item is about "The Mystery Men of Hudson Bay" a tribe of strange primitives. The "Young Earth" relates the discovery of the ancient ancestors on the island of Java and how those prehistoric folks might have lived. 

The search for water is paramount in the story "Drought". Turok and Andar cannot find water and fear the worst when suddenly they are waylaid by desperate primitives who think they can find water when no one else can. Even the Honkers are desperate for drink, making them even more deadly. Two one- page stories tell of "A Living Link" about the Coelocanth, and "Australopithecinae" about an early variation of man. The text tale is about "Prehistoric Ancestors" who turn out to be possible Japanese sailors who might've been the first to discover South America. The comic closes with "The Secret of the Black Water" in which Turok and Andar have to face a weird tribe who smear themselves with an odd oily water and live among pools of oil. They do not yet know its flammable nature. 

The fifty-fourth issue of Turok Son of Stone is a reprint of issue twenty-five from 1961. It features one of George Wilson's most dramatic cover scenes. You can find my review here. 

In issue fifty-five Turok and Andar confront many bizarre "Monsters of Legend". In the first part titled "Into the Cavern of Danger" they follow a possibly deranged caveman into a deep cave inhabited by many strange threats, but which might lead to a way out of Lost Valley. While they do find danger they also find the caveman has exaggerated the monsters. In the second half of th story titled "Journey Without End" they have to fight their way out of a the dangerous cavern which seems filled with different kinds of Honkers. There is a one-pager on the dinosaur the "Hesperonis" and a text piece titled "The Stone Age Museum" about a particularly rich discovery. The "Young Earth" piece is "The River Crossing" and shows how primitive man might have learned to ford great rivers to find good hunting. 

"The Monster Master" begins with Turok and Andar low on poison arrows when they encounter seemingly tame Honkers commanded by a caveman who uses a strangle flute to keep control. How he is able to do this is never explained but eventually the duo escape his clutches through trickery. "Prehistoric Apartment Dwellers" is a text item about a bizarre discovery of an area in which many ancient people lived together in relative harmony for many ages. "Young Earth" is about how early man learned to hunt the mighty Mammoth in "The Easy Prey". 

Issue fifty-seven is a reprint of issue seventeen from 1959 when the title was a Dell production. You can read my review of that issue here. 

The fifty-eighth issue of Turok Son of Stone might well be the most bizarre single yarn in the comic book's long history. Turok and Andar encounter aliens.  "Things from the Sky: Strange Visitors" finds Turok and Andar asleep when their camp is attacked by a deadly Honker, a Honker who quickly ends up as a pile of ash due to a strange beam from the sky. Later they encounter primitives who talk of sky people and then they see it, a flying saucer. It lands and they meet some incredibly friendly aliens who are returning to Earth after a long absence to check up on its progress. There are two one-pagers about the "Iquanadon" and the "Heidelberg Man", a text item about some bizarre balls found by archeologists titled "The Secret of the Spheres" and a "Young Earth" story about a small but highly successful dinosaur called Coeleopterous.  "Things from the Sky: The Incredible Sight" has the friendly aliens see their spaceship damaged but still workable enough to fly Andar out of Lost Valley where he sees his people. But they go back for Turok and things go very badly for our heroes and for the friendly aliens. 

Issue fifty-nine has Turok and Andar snagged by a particularly deadly predator which seems equal parts dinosaur and spider in "The Web of Danger". The text piece is "The Kanapol Hominid" about one of our early ancestors and the "Young Earth" story "The Loner" describes what life might have been like for a Neanderthal who breaks away from his tribe. "The Monster's Lair" sees Turok and Andar battling glowing water Honker when they try to find out why modern fish turn up in a stream. Sadly as we already know the trail is a frustrating one. As 1967 nears its end our two Indian heroes are still trapped in a world they never made. More next time when we take a gander at the tenth and final Dark Horse collection. 

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