Boy Comics 3 3

[vaillant]

If you can, thank you, I will try to contact him.

I have doubts whether it was correct or not, but it appeared as a Biro story for sure, so it might be cool to contact the gentleman anyway.

[rjpb]

Excellent post Crimebuster! It's exactly the kind of review of the title I was looking for. While I love some of the early WW2/Iron Jaw covers, I'll keep a lookout for some cheap 28-44 issues. I've long been a fan of CDNP, but frankly the stories are usually just so-so. It sounds like Biro put a lot more heart into Boy Comics.

[Crimebuster]

I am in the process of documenting my collection for insurance purposes, and one suggestion I was given was to film my collection and post the footage on YouTube, so if something happened to my computer or whatever - like a fire - I would have the information.

 

So I am doing just that and am in the process of filming my Boy Comics collection. I'm not sure if anybody is interested in watching clips of me talking about my comics, but since I am posting them to the internet anyway, I figured I might as well share them.

 

Anyway, as soon as I can figure out how to embed the video here, I'll do that. In the meantime, here's the link. Warning: the HD and weird lighting end up giving me some weird mutant wookie arm hair, so be warned:

 

 

And here's the second installment:

 

Edited March 27, 2013 by Crimebuster

[Scrooge]

Did the second cut-off in the middle of the Hockey cover commentary?

 

Anyway, been enjoying both parts. Fantastic viewing & very much enjoyed the running commentary. Pimping out the daughter to lure thugs into a death pit

[Crimebuster]

Did the second cut-off in the middle of the Hockey cover commentary?

 

Anyway, been enjoying both parts. Fantastic viewing & very much enjoyed the running commentary. Pimping out the daughter to lure thugs into a death pit

 

Thanks for the kind words. I just double checked the video and it seems to all be there, it goes up through issue #59. It sounds like there might have been some upload interruption for you, as it cut out at #50 for you, but if you try again the rest is there are far as I can tell.

 

 

Here's the final video, for #60-119:

 

[BB-Gun]

Boy had good stories...

and interesting backup features.

[Crimebuster]

So, I've been thinking for awhile about commissioning artists to do new covers for Boy Comics. Sort of my own personal Next Issue project.

 

Well, one of our boardies, Erik Mullins aka Team Zoth, happens to be doing a half price sale on commissions right now, so I decided to bite the bullet and give it a go.

 

Here's the result, the new cover for Boy Comics #120:

 

 

 

 

As you can see, it's an homage to one of my favorite covers, Boy Comics #16:

 

 

 

 

I described to Erik what I had in mind and did a little thumbnail and he did the rest. He was even nice enough to add the logo for me, which I'm sure would have taken me forever since I suck with photoshop.

 

Anyway, I'm not sure when I will be getting #121 done or who will be doing it, but I'm very happy with Erik's work and I'm sure I will be getting more new covers for Boy Comics done. Who knows, maybe someday I'll have enough free money to rescue Crimebuster from the public domain scrapheap and publish my own full issue of Boy Comics. But for now, this will suffice just fine. (thumbs u

[Twistty1]

That's amazing.. He did a really good job...

[Crimebuster]

 

a) Does anyone know if Allen Bellman ever worked on Boy Comics or the Crimebuster strip specifically? The new Alter Ego has an interview with him where he mentions working for Biro and Gleason, but it doesn't mention what titles he was on. I've looked around the internet and apparently he worked on Boy Meets Girl and a couple others, but I haven't found any mention of Boy Comics; it's not listed on Bellman's official website. But he also says he doesn't remember everything and some of the listings on his site were provided by readers and collectors who are filling in the gaps, so I thought there might be a chance. If he did work on the Crimebuster strip, I am thinking about commissioning something but I'm not sure he worked on it.

 

I met Allan Bellman at a con a few weeks ago and asked him whether or not he worked on Boy Comics. And the answer is: He can't remember. He didn't think so, though.

 

He did say he thought he worked on Girl Comics, which I wish I had known, as I am also putting together a run of Girl Comics to accompany my Boy Comics run. But I got him to sign a couple issues of Man Comics, which again, I am collection as a supplement to my Boy Comics collection. He didn't actually remember working on those either. When I brought them out, he said "did I work on those?" And I replied, "I have no idea! Your website says you did."

 

But, anyway, he appears to have not worked on Boy Comics, alas.

 

For what it's worth, I asked him about working for Lev Gleason and he talked about how great a guy Bob Wood was. Right up until Bob Wood murdered a woman in a drunken rage. They were, as Bellman put it to me, "in a hotel room screwing."

 

 

[Crimebuster]

That's amazing.. He did a really good job...

 

He did, yeah. (thumbs u

 

 

I tried to photoshop in a background. I did my best to make it look like it was drawn, though I think it's still pretty obvious it's a photo. But it was the best I could do for now.

 

I wanted to do an interior, haunted house scene, like the original in #16. But I couldn't find any images that worked for me, so I went with this outdoor scene instead:

 

 

 

 

Still hoping to eventually commission a cover for #121 from someone, but I don't have the money at the moment.

[sacentaur]

For what it's worth, I asked him about working for Lev Gleason and he talked about how great a guy Bob Wood was. Right up until Bob Wood murdered a woman in a drunken rage. They were, as Bellman put it to me, "in a hotel room screwing."

 

Another sad chapter for one of the hobby's notable talents.

[Crimebuster]

Wow! Any chance of seeing the whole story?

 

 

As long as you don't mind photos instead of scans, sure.

 

Better late than never!

 

It's too bad the covers of most issues of Boy Comics are so boring, because many of them hide some great stuff. This isn't the best story Biro and Maurer did, but it's certainly a vivid example of their work. This is right when they were really starting to put it together. This story, as you will see, is 12 pages, but once they started doing 15, 17 or even 20 page stories, they really hit gold. The next 2-3 years following this were top notch.

 

Perhaps atypical for stories of this period, but very typical for Crimebuster stories, is the fact that Crimebuster doesn't actually show up in his own strip until page 7, halfway through the story.

 

 

Anyway, here's the so-so cover to Boy Comics #28:

 

 

 

 

And here's the lurid tale of murder hiding inside:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Twistty1]

 

In fact, I have no collecting goals with Boy Comics, except for specific issues which interest me for various reasons, and/or are related to the climate of the war.

I am mostly looking for a copy of issue #13 right now, although I would need a #4 as well, but even a coverless copy could be fine. I am mostly interested in the "On to Berlin" game page and the Crimebuster story.

 

Here's one that I picked up this past summer...

 

[Straw-Man]

realized i have picked up a couple of these since posting my one-and-only last year.

 

[Straw-Man]

[BB-Gun]

 

In fact, I have no collecting goals with Boy Comics, except for specific issues which interest me for various reasons, and/or are related to the climate of the war.

I am mostly looking for a copy of issue #13 right now, although I would need a #4 as well, but even a coverless copy could be fine. I am mostly interested in the "On to Berlin" game page and the Crimebuster story.

 

Here's one that I picked up this past summer...

 

 

The game looks interesting and so does the cover for #5.

Thanks to Comics Plus for the scans, I think.

[BB-Gun]

[Sqeggs]

 

That is so great!

[Crimebuster]

Just got this in today. It's from a mail order set of trading cards Lev Gleason put out in 1951. If you collected the whole set you could clip off coupons from them all and mail the set of coupons in for a year's subscription, which apparently the original owner of this one did:

 

 

 

[sacentaur]

Neat item - looks in great shape for its age.