selegue

Aside from the reprint I posted above I have the May 1941 issue. The Black Bat is only seen hovering in the cover (as he does on most covers) but I also scanned a full page interior illo - Y'know, I'm glad that Batman didn't borrow Black Bat's clown collar. Jack

Issue 46, sorry I don't have a good scan but the swipe is obvious. bb HAW! The Grabby Zombie is an equal opportunity grabber. Jack

Y'know, there's no necrophilia here, unless South Sea Girl is enjoying the attention more than she's letting on. Strictly speaking, I guess we could call the grabby zombie an animaphiliac. Jack or "Zombie with good taste"

A freebie from the skypinkblu pedigree! Added into box 1 of my latest massive order -- thanks, Sharon! Jack the Giant Killer 12-374-301 Jan-63 Dell Movie Classic GCD says that the painted cover is from movie poster art, crediting the story to Ken Fitch (-script), Ed Ashe (Lee Ames?) (Pencils and inks). Fairly crude story artwork, but fun. Now I can't decide whether she thinks I'm a guy that kills giants, or a giant that kills. Pesky punctuation! Jack

The fact that the jailed guy exhales helium is quite a bonus. Jack

I don't know about you guys but if I were Ted, I would have thought longer and harder before settling on this plan I guess Ted has a lot of voyeur in him HAW! No kidding! “And—and you didn’t mind impersonating a silly thing like the Moon-God?” “No. It was—” What do you suppose he was about to say? "... just another Saturday night with the Trockaderos." "... freakin' hot in there." "... a hoot when you repeatedly pressed your bared breasts upon my rough surface, bruisingly." Jack

Still have to read it but I did mention that the stories were un-memorable, right? I guess The Black_Hand will love it though ... breasts and all It was repetitive, but I've read worse. He had kind of a poor man's Lovecraft thing going for a little while (I think he even used the verb "gibbering"once). But that all kind of came apart with the Scooby Doo it-was-just-a-guy-in-a-costume ending. ...but he would have gotten away with it if it weren't for those meddling kids! Jack

We should try this. Let's both (and everyone with the inclination) read the following Bellem story for Spicy Mystery (Dec. 1936) and report here! Here's the link to the PDF of that story: Bellem's The Moon-God Takes [Note: Clicking on the link will open an Explorer window and then start downloading a PDF file] I just printed it and plan on reading later tonight. Cool, I'll read it tonight too. (thumbs u So stretched out and repetitive in places that I could hardly slug through. "...Insistently the questions hammered within his brain. Where had the girl come from? Why was she nude? Why did she dance? How had the great grey stone been brought here? And why did the girl worship it, make obeisance to it, bruise her lovely breasts upon its grey, rough surface. . . ?" "...And am I up to 1000 words yet? Can I make it to 2000 if I mention the part about the rock scraping her breasts a few more times?" Still, I've read stories with less developed plots. In comic books, come to think of it. Jack

Much better! I got the same overall gist from my hacked-together (60 characters at a time) translation. What's PAM? Presumably nothing to do with cooking spray. I had never heard of Fethry before -- had to look him up. Jack

Not until 2006 and not in the US yet. There's a 36 page story starring Donald and the Gremlins. I can't tell you exactly what the story line is, seeing my finnish is quite rusty ... but here's the plot summary: "PAM-agentit Aku ja Touho suuntaavat Brittiläiseen lentotukikohtaan huippusalaisen järjestönsä operaation myötä, mutta äkillinen sokaiseva leimahdus heittää kaksikon ajassa vuosikymmeniä taaksepäin, kaksitasokoneiden aikaan - se on kuitenkin huolista pienin, sillä tukikohtaa riivaa yliluonnollinen ongelma, kun pikkuiset menninkäiset sabotoivat lentokoneita ja aiheuttavat muita onnettomuuksia." Aku and Touho the PAM agents direct to Brittiläinen to air base its top secret organisation with operation, but sudden blinding the flash will throw the pair at the time for decades backwards, time kaksitasokone -however, it is the smallest of the worries because the base possesses supernatural problem, when little menninkäinen they sabotage aeroplanes and cause others onnettomuuksia. [i ran out of attempts on that last word] Almost less clear than in Finnish! Aku is Donald, right? Brittiläinen is England?? kaksitasokone?? menninkäinen must be Gremlins onnettomuuksia must be problems or such Jack

The Gremlin covers could be considered a war time theme. I think they were part of the home front propaganda campaign to encourage better quality, greater productivity and less errors. I don't think they were really looking for spies or thought that they were wrecking planes. Below is my beat up copy of the cover which has some repair work. bb WHOOOOOOO -- I didn't know this issue was on my want list until just now! What a great Kelly cover! I see that there's a 2-page Gremlin Gus and the Widgets story by Kelly in the issue. Donald's not in it, is he? Were there any actual crossovers between the Gremlins and Donald or any other Disney character? Is this cover the only example? Jack

With an entire race of small naked men, naturally. Jack Did I win another quiz?

STUNNING Copy! I have never owned this one, but always wanted it. How are the insides? Metamorpho and Sapphire Stagg prototype cover? Jack

Don't you have a business to run? Solving puzzles is my business. And business is good! You hiring? Unfortunately his company health insurance plan only covers employees with full spleen function. Jack Oh! Henry!

And the ghost was printed in blue -- 1951, Bill Ely. Maybe the technique was much more common (esp 1950s DC) than I realized but I'm just noticing it recently. Jack

Swiped for the cover of House of Mystery #1, and again later a Jimmy Olsen cover. Maybe it wasn't Jimmy, I know they used it again though. Superboy! That's it! Lois too, sorta -- unfortunately she remembered her modest one-piece swim suit. Probably the best Swan/Kaye cover of the whole series. Quite a leopard pack, eh? One leopard and one chimp. Jack

Jack, I also found that I have issue 24 and below is posted a scan as requested. bb Thanks! Very fun page -- the odd glassware scattered around, the goofy aliens, the wave of hate. Jack also getting a familiar tingle. 'scuse me

OK, I'm just mumbling to myself in the corner, but here's another cover with the same technique from Oct 1953 by Murphy Anderson. Phantom Stranger 4 is Feb-Mar 1953 by Carmine Infantino. Maybe the technique was more common than I think but I'm just noticing it here. Jack Jack, I notice that the original art for Mars has a note that the engraver suplied the blue ink job. Mars was supposed to be invisible in the story and usually apeared as that ghostly image. I have noticed that Powell used that technique a lot. I think he probably asked for blue or green for some or his horror/ghost stories. bb Thanks! GCD: Planet Comics #24 1940 Series - Fiction House, May 1943 ["Mars, the outlaw god, forever schemes to plunge..."] (Sequence 1 - Story , 10 pages ) Feature Story: Mars, God of War Credits: ? [as Ross Gallun] (-script), Joe Doolin (Pencils), Joe Doolin (Inks), ? (Colors), ? (Letters). A full decade before the covers I was asking about. Did you mean Doolin, is the GCD credit wrong, or were you just comparing to Powell's work? Does anyone have a scan of the published page? Do you own the original page or just scavenged it from Heritage? Jack Do I ask too many questions?

Then what are we paying you for? Oh... we're not? Jack pointy-haired boss

OK, I'm just mumbling to myself in the corner, but here's another cover with the same technique from Oct 1953 by Murphy Anderson. Phantom Stranger 4 is Feb-Mar 1953 by Carmine Infantino. Maybe the technique was more common than I think but I'm just noticing it here. Jack Those non black images would have been drawn regularly, but stripped into the Magenta plate instead of black. In the 80's it was done by velox overlay (High quality photocopy), but am unsure about the 50's technique, may have been the same. Just sort of pasted onto that color separation. Thanks for the info. Why do you think it was uncommon? Too much work? Too high a failure rate? Not many production people were willing or able to do it? Artists, editors or buyers just didn't like the effect much? I do think it was overdone in the 70s. *google* "Award-winning colorist JACK ADLER worked for DC comics from 1951 to 1981, rising to the office of Vice-President of Production." These covers would have been done not long after Adler joined DC. Again, I wonder if he was involved. Jack

Is this one of the earliest cover examples of an image inked in a color besides black? Can someone clue me in on technically what was done here? Was the witch (?) inked in black as usual then passed off to the colorist, who included it on the red plate -- or something like that? I'm not used to seeing this technique used (and abused) frequently until the 70s. Great eyes on the woman!... I wonder whether Adler was involved in all these experiments. OK, I'm just mumbling to myself in the corner, but here's another cover with the same technique from Oct 1953 by Murphy Anderson. Phantom Stranger 4 is Feb-Mar 1953 by Carmine Infantino. Maybe the technique was more common than I think but I'm just noticing it here. Jack

Strange inking! With the limited color palette, it gives the cover a very pixillated look. *check* Art Saaf pencils and inks! I still don't have a feeling for his style. Jack

HAW! An unnecessary exposition CLASSIC! One of the funniest things about 50s DC covers. Gorgeous copy, of course. Jack Look! He's typing on his keyboard!

Here's another image from the cover. This will probably be the last clue for the evening. I'll post more images tomorrow if no one guesses the comic tonight. That is Mystery Men 5 Scrooge and Jack must be on vacation.. bb Good catch! I only wish I was on vacation. Busy with post-semester catch-up. (Sometimes it's hard to distinguish from pre-semester catch-up, mid-semester catch-up, and end-of-semester catch-up, but that's why we have years of training.) I didn't recognize any of the fragments and didn't have time for a random hunt. Jack

What a great book! I had never seen the origin of Hydroman's odd, diaphanous "snappy outfit". Sort of a cross between the stylings of Firebrand's shirt, Red Bee's sleeves and Phantasmo's "let it all hang out". Glad to see the understatement, "That's bad!" make a return from the origin story. This page always cracks me up. Jack "Huh?"