Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 138: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction & Horror Comics

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 123

October 1956 Part III

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Strange Stories of Suspense #11

Cover by Bill Everett

"The Professor's Prisoner" (a: Herb Familton) ★

"The Decoy" (a: Bernard Bailey) ★★

"When the Vault Opens" (a: Pete Morisi) ★★

"He Can't Stop Looking" (a: Robert Q. Sale) ★★

"The Mouse that Saved the World!" (a: Hy Fleishman) ★

"Someone is Listening!" (a: Bill Draut) ★1/2

A brilliant but egotistical scientist uses his ultra-powerful microscope to trap a miniature man from another world. But the little guy has an ace up his sleeve. Dismal SF yarn, with the only break from yawning being the professor's daughter constantly exclaiming "No, Dad, not more power! You've used too much power already!" You have to search for miniature gems in a giant pile of coal sometimes.

During World War II, a PT boat becomes lost in a fog and stranded on an uncharted island. Whatever each man wishes for is granted (one man wishes for bacon and eggs and a horde of pigs and chickens materialize!); the island lulls the men into a sense of satisfaction while it plots its real course of action. Only one man sees what's really happening and saves his crewmen from a life of luxury. "The Decoy" never explains exactly what's going on, be it an alien experiment or another dimension, and that may help just a bit.

Three explorer parties, each from a different country on Earth, land on Mars to find it desolate, a wasteland thanks to a long-ago nuclear war. The three quibble over who landed first and a fistfight breaks out. An item thought to be a "time capsule" is discovered and the squabble escalates. Just then, an emissary from the international tribunal arrives to break up the fisticuffs. With the man's help, the three nations come together and discover that love is all you need. "When the Vault Opens" is preachy, with (no surprise) the explorers from the communist countries being the most physically aggressive. That said, it's amenable enough and the Morisi art ain't half bad. 

In the three-page "He Can't Stop Looking," Henry Taylor stumbles across an ancient scroll that claims Aladdin's genie moved into different digs, inhabiting a bottle rather than a lamp. Henry turns away from the girl he loves and spends his life looking for that bottle, never knowing that the scroll was wrong!

Brilliant Dr. Morley needs more sleep as it's then, during dreamtime, that he comes up with his best inventions. Accused of being "lazy" by his colleagues, Morley invents an "Earth-Controller" that halts the planet's spin. Now Morley can get as much sleep as he wants thanks to 24-hour darkness. But the rest of the world isn't as happy... "The Mouse That Saved the World!" is a perfect example of the space-filler. It makes very little sense and the four pages did not allow for a proper climax, so the narrative dies midstream when the titular rodent shows up.

Amateur inventor Ted Slade creates a gizmo that transmits the thoughts of nearby pedestrians. Thinking this is a good way to promote peace (... would not be my thinking...), Ted hops a train to demonstrate his "Thoughtcaster" to his mayor but, while onboard, the thoughts of a terrorist are broadcast to Ted! Our exhausted hero arrives at Mayor Macey's office in time to hear the official's thoughts on embezzling a "few hundred grand" from the town's pockets. In a fit, he races home and hears wife Nell's brain admit it might be time to "kill him myself!" Has the whole world gone mad? Well, not exactly. "Someone is Listening!" teaches us all that there are several ways to interpret words (Nell's working up enough nerve to "kill the turkey in the backyard!") and mind-reading devices should be used only in Commie countries, not in the land of the free.-Peter

Strange Tales #51

Cover by Bill Everett

"The Insects!" (a: Paul Reinman) ★★1/2

"Inside the Black Box" (a: Herb Familton) ★

"No Place on Earth!" (a: Harry Lazarus) ★

"He Stalks By Night!" (a: Bob Powell) ★1/2

(r: Giant-Size Man-Thing #2)

"Blackout!" (a: Hy Fleishman) ★

"The Thing in the Jungle!" (a: Bernard Bailey) ★

(r: Journey Into Mystery #16)

A Coast Guard boat runs across what seems to be a derelict freighter and the men board the ship. Immediately, they are attacked by a horde of giant ants! A door in the ship opens and they are beckoned to take shelter; their savior introduces himself as Professor Rollins. He explains that the ants were a by-product of a scientific study on the effects of radiation. "The Insects!" will continue to grow, hypothesizes the egghead, until they rule the world! The guardsmen decide to delay the apocalypse by sinking the ship. As they sail away, Professor Rollins confesses that the ants weren't really victims of radiation but robots he invented in order to steal the gold that was on board the freighter. But for the really dumb switcheroo at the climax, this was a fun little romp and a harbinger of things to come in Atlas sci-fi comics.

Skin diver Don Lowry finds an undersea cave that can take him back into the past, so he offers his services for a price to a group of treasure hunters who are looking for the bounty hidden two centuries before by Captain Kidd. Lowry heads back to 1697 and befriends Kidd, but then he falls in love with the pirate's girl, Cora. He vows to stay in the past until Cora marries Kidd and Don heads back to the present day with all the info his employers need. 

When he opens the black box containing Kidd's treasure, he finds a note from Cora explaining that she really loved him but was forced into marriage by the black-hearted Kidd. "Inside the Black Box" is a dipsy soap opera that makes no sense whatsoever. There's no reasoning given for the multi-chambered time tunnel cave, nor how Don could know exactly which door to choose to arrive in 1697. That final panel, of Don tearfully reading the centuries-old love letter from Cora, is fine cheese.

In the year 1993, Dave Warwick hates his step-brother Phil with a passion. Nothing but good seems to come Phil's way, including gorgeous Gloria, and Dave is left in the shadows. Looking to dig up some dirt on his bro, Dave does some reading and stumbles across a little-known fact that Phil might just be from the planet Mercury! To wipe Phil from the earth, Dave travels back in time to when the spaceship dumped his step-brother, in hopes of changing history. Unfortunately for Dave, he succeeds. Another goofy time travel yarn, this time with a character who'll stop at nothing to achieve... nothing. Both "No Place on Earth!" and "Inside the Black Box" were spawned from the incredibly prolific Carl Wessler, who was adept at latching on to a plot device and running it into the ground.

A hunter defies local superstition and shoots the mate of a were-tiger. He then becomes the prey of the beast itself. It all ends with a Scooby-Doo explanation and disappointment. Only Bob Powell can save "He Stalks By Night!" from being a complete waste of paper. In the three-page "Blackout!," an American baseball player and a Spanish matador both suffer disgrace and turn to a life of crime but are given a second chance. They blow that one, too.

Soldier of fortune Cliff Morgan will be paid a hefty sum by a museum if he's the first man to reach a lost temple hidden deep in the jungles of Africa. Morgan finds the temple at the same time as three other explorers and the quartet engage in fisticuffs of rage and greed. Suddenly, a robot appears and explains that all four men are actually aliens from another world and it's time to go home. "Get your asses on the ship," coos the metal monster. What is Cliff Morgan's next move? Well, forget finding out, because "The Thing in the Jungle!" ends on a cliffhanger, with our narrator asking the reader what they'd do if they were in Cliff's boots. Both the script and Bernard Bailey's graphics are amateurish. In fact, only the Bob Powell art seems inspired this issue.-Peter

Strange Tales of the Unusual #6

Cover by Bill Everett and Carl Burgos

"City in the Sky!" (a: Jay Scott Pike) ★★

"Bring Me Back a Human!" (a: Dick Ayers) ★★

"I Can't Be Harmed" (a: Hy Fleishman) ★1/2

"The Tree that Walked Like a Man" (a: Bill Walton) ★

"The Sound of Doom" (a: Bernard Bailey) ★1/2

"Beware! Radio-Active Man!" (a: Sid Greene) ★★

While flying his plane, Jeb Ogden sees a "City in the Sky!" suspended nearly 10,000 feet above the Earth. He lands in the city, named Burchfield, and meets a cute blonde named Jane Rawles, who explains that, 200 years ago, her great-grandfather invented an anti-gravity machine and up Burchfield went. Jeb falls in love with Jane and stops the machine so that the townsfolk can descend and experience the wonders of 1956. They soon begin hawking souvenirs and, before you know it, Jane has dumped Jeb for a city slicker in a fast car. Jeb restarts the anti-gravity machine and Burchfield disappears back above the clouds.

Jeb has a lot of nerve, doesn't he? The good citizens of Burchfield voted to descend and were perfectly happy with the capitalism of the mid-'50s. All it takes is Jane calling him a "dull bore" and Jeb decides on behalf of the whole town to send them back into isolation. Pike's art is average, which is looking better and better as the Atlas months pass by.

Garth and Tor are a pair of aliens whose mission is to "Bring Me Back a Human!" to their planet for study in preparation for an invasion. They separate and promise to meet back at their rocket ship, each with a human specimen. Garth disguises himself as a human and uses his mental powers to draw a man with a strong mind back to the ship. Since there's no sign of Tor, Garth takes off alone, but an accidental fall by the human causes a lever to jam; it will cause the ship to explode. The human reveals that he's Tor and both await destruction.

Dick Ayers's aliens are pretty good, so this story isn't as bad as many we've been reading lately. I knew the human with the strong mind had to be Tor. It's puzzling that neither Garth nor Tor could manage to convey that with their big brains.

Old Ben is dying, but his friend Cornelius is a philosopher who tells him that if he believes with heart and mind that "I Can't Be Harmed," then he'll be just fine. Cornelius goes on a trip and Ben hops out of bed, jet-setting from tragedy to tragedy around the world telling people that if they believe they can't be harmed, then they'll be fine. It works, over and over. Cornelius returns to find that Ben has died and the nurse says he never left the hospital.

Is this Carl Wessler's take on Peter Pan? The speed with which Ben races from disaster to disaster has to be seen to be believed, and the simplistic message falls as flat as Hy Fleishman's art.

A tree spends years wishing it could uproot itself and become "The Tree That Walked Like a Man." When it is struck by lightning during a storm, the tree is able to perambulate on its roots. As its strength ebbs, it longs to take revenge on one of the humans who it perceived was gloating about its inability to move, and in the dark it comes crashing down on a lone figure. Next morning, passersby wonder how a tree ended up on top of a statue in the town square.

It's a crowded field when trying to select the dumbest Atlas story, but this one has to be in the running--at three pages, it seemed too long.

Ben is a glue salesman whose car gets a flat tire one night. He wanders off, looking for a house where he can use the phone and finding a cave where an ancient wizard resides. In the cave hangs a big bell and the wizard explains that, every time he rings it, "The Sound of Doom" causes the world to explode in violence and war. He ties Ben up and dozes off; Ben awakens, makes a crack in the bell, and repairs it with glue, knowing that it will never ring with the same tone. That's the end of war and violence!

What a bizarre story. Bernard Baily does his best with it, but there's only so much an artist can do with a mess like this. I'm glad Ben ended war in 1956. Whew! Imagine what the last 69 years would've been like otherwise.

The cry goes out to "Beware! Radio-Active Man!" after a miner escapes from the Mikan Corp. Medical Center, where young men who go below the Earth's surface to mine dangerous minerals are held for treatment. The escaped patient is very dangerous due to high levels of radiation. The people who are on the young man's trail lament the fact that Carl Mikan got rich while his workers got sick; when they corner the young man in an alley, a man in a suit runs ahead of them and confronts the escaped patient. A shot is heard and both men stagger out of the alley. It turns out that the young man on the run was William Mikan and he was saved by his father, Carl Mikan.

I gave this story two stars in part because Sid Greene always turns in a decent job on the art and in part because I did not see the final twist coming. I knew the man in the suit was Mikan, but I did not guess that the escaped, radioactive patient was his son.-Jack

Next Week...
Is Batgirl a Victim
of Male Chauvinism?