Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 146: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction and Horror Comics!

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 131

December 1956 Part IV

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Uncanny Tales #50

Cover by Bill Everett

"Look Behind You!" (a: Joe Orlando) ★★1/2

"Inside the Room of Shadows" (a: Ed Winiarski) ★

"A Man Destroyed!" (a: Angelo Torres) ★★★

"The Escape of Johnny York" (a: Herb Familton) ★

"Valley of No Return!" (a: Bob Powell) ★

"It Happened to Henry" (a: Robert Q. Sale) ★

Brilliant scientist Louis Stark has invented a television screen that allows him to drop in on important events and people of the past. Unlike the usual brilliant scientist, Louis doesn't use his new toy as a tool to rob banks or rule third world countries; Louis just wants to make the world a more peaceful place to live.

To that end, the egghead drops in on well-known 18th-Century dictator, Vincent di Varni, just before he reaches power. With the aid of his gizmo, Louis is able to sway di Varni from making the decisions he made that set him down a wrong path in life. Unfortunately, Louis discovers that di Varni is his ancestor and slowly, but surely, the changes he's made affect the man's lineage. In a panic, the professor attempts to manipulate the machine in order to erase his changes but fate intervenes. "Look Behind You!" is not a bad little science fiction tale; sure, it's very predictable, but it's a nice change of pace to see someone with a big brain who doesn't want to use his assets to rule mankind.

Penny-pinching miser Mr. Bascombe just can't seem to get happy; he's miserable about everything, convinced the world is out to cheat him. The maid spends too much money on butter; the butler stole his cigars; Dish Network raised their rates 35.6%. The list goes on and on. Then one day, while on a walk, Bascombe is compelled to enter a dark doorway. "Inside the Room of Shadows," he is greeted by an old, bearded man who claims that Bascombe's true happiness is attainable if he simply enters a doorway within the house. The old codger quickly talks himself out of it, for fear the stranger is trying to take advantage of him. Convinced he has been hypnotized by his thieving butler (!), Bascombe races home to fire the man, only to learn he gave the dedicated servant the axe the night before. Atlas strips where cold-hearted bastards have a complete 180-degree turn within two panels never cease to cause eye-rolling in this funny book veteran.

In the year 2056, crime has essentially been eliminated, thanks to the "Criminal Selector" machine, which predicts a crime is about to be committed and gives law enforcement the right to arrest the guilty parties before the act takes place. But mob boss Victor Sharkey discovers a way to manipulate the gizmo to his advantage. In the end, we discover that the entire drama is a television show being telecast in 1956. A worried housewife asks her husband if he thinks such a "mechanization age" will come to be and her husband laughs and assures her machines will never become that widespread, all while the couple are surrounded by a plethora of modern electric kitchen devices. 

Yep, the concept of a government-supported initiative to arrest criminals before they break the law sounds verrrrry familiar. PK Dick's "Minority Report" had popped up in Fantastic Universe at the beginning of 1956, which certainly gave Carl Wessler more than enough time to "borrow" some elements from the SF short story. But thievery aside, "A Man Destroyed!" is a decent read with some great Torres work. I swear at times I would not be able to tell Angelo's pencils from those of Al Williamson.

Carl Wessler returns with his script for the nonsensical "The Escape of Johnny York," in which the titular POW drinks some herbal tea provided by a cellmate and escapes prison to visit his dying wife. Predictably, the tea not only transports Johnny to his wife's bedside, but also magically cures her ills. Maudlin hogwash. In the three-page "Valley of No Return!," Burt almost shoots a white eagle but is convinced to leave the bird alone by fellow hunter, Greg. Later, when they become lost, the eagle leads them out of the lost valley safe and sound. The last-panel reveal is immensely predictable.

Perhaps the worst was saved for last. Henry is a bully and his latest target is fellow accountant, Porter. After a particularly vicious prank, Porter tells Henry the world would be better off without him. Sure enough, from then on no one sees or hears Henry. What's going on? Who knows? The last panel of "It Happened to Henry" literally reveals that the writer had no idea either. So let's just ignore this one.-Peter

World of Mystery #4

Cover by Carl Burgos

"The Things in the Window" (a: Werner Roth) ★★

"The Forbidden Land" (a: Paul Reinman) ★1/2

"Let the Creature Beware!" (a" Bob Powell) ★★

"The Dreadful Dream" (a: Manny Stallman) ★

"The Man with Yellow Eyes" (a: Dick Ayers) ★★

"What Happened in the Basement?" (a: Mac L. Pakula) ★1/2

Cal buys a deserted house on the edge of town, a well-tended home that has a bad reputation and a hint of... evil! This would normally send Cal running the other way because everyone in the Atlas Universe knows... Cal is a coward! He knows it, has become used to the sensation, almost revels in it. When the real estate salesman lets Cal know that a woman who lived in the house vanished off the face of the earth, the knees of our timid hero shake a bit because, you know... Cal is a coward!

Seeing the new residence as something of a challenge, Cal moves in and, in a cowardly fashion, continuously looks out the front window to make sure no one will bother him. Then, later that night, Cal notices that one of the windows has been blacked out. Cal shivers! Cal quakes! But soon he feels he can't take the mystery anymore and climbs through the darkened sill to find himself in another dimension. There, in the distance, is a beautiful woman held captive by weird shapes. Can Cal dispose of his cowardice and save the woman from a fate worse than death? This being the 1956 Atlas Universe, you can bet on it. About as harmless as a Saturday morning cartoon, "The Things in the Window" just shambles and stumbles to its inevitable, happy ending, saved only by some tasty art by Werner Roth. The other-dimensional voyage is very Ditko-esque and a few panels of cowardly Cal look like Roth was assisted by Johnny Craig. The speed bump is the reminder, in every other panel, that Cal has a problem being brave.

A trio of reporters from World View Magazine arrive in Peru to sniff out the legend of "The Forbidden Land." The three men push their way through, ignoring Incan pleas, and find themselves inside the ancient temple, ready to witness rites never seen by white men. Unfortunately for the three stooges, they soon find out that they are to be the human sacrifices at the ritual. They manage to escape and return to New York but, once their pictures are developed, they discover the secret Incan ritual will remain secret. Back in the early 1950s, at least one of the men would have gunned down a score of Incans and the trio would have been skinned alive.

In the heavy-handed preachy, "Let the Creature Beware!," Judd Kerr stirs up hate in small towns, pointing out residents who may be a bit "different" than their neighbors and dropping hints these "creatures" might be from another world. Once the town is in a stir, Kerr asks for donations so that he can pursue the situation in a "legal" way by hiring a lawyer. Cash in hand, Kerr races out of town. Then he gets to Abbyville and turns the town's attention to an odd old man who lives on the edge of town. Too late, Judd discovers this is the last stop on his hate tour. Some good Bob Powell work can't transform "Creature" into anything other than a mild distraction with a very unsubtle message. Powell seems to hint in his last panel that Kerr might be Hitler.

Frank Beech is involved in a terrible, serious, life-threatening, and really scary train wreck. He dies but then wakes up and relives everything he'd seen in his dream--the damn toys left on the staircase by his rotten little brat, his wife's attempts to make him breakfast despite the fact that she has no cooking skills to speak of, and the innocuous dialogue he engages in with people at the train station. Sure enough, his train crashes and he awakens to the same thing over again. When his wife hands him his mushy pancakes and tells him to hurry up, he'll be late for work, he informs her he's taking the day off. No, I mean it, that's really the end of "The Dreadful Dream"! I had roughly the same feeling as Frank since this plot has been on a loop since 1948.

"The Man with Yellow Eyes" is G.I. Lee Forrest, who fights with the American Tank Corps in Africa. "Yellow Eyes," as he's affectionately known to his comrades, fights with a bestiality akin to a jungle cat. A fellow G.I. saves the life of "Yellow Eyes" and the two men become friends, with the giant brute claiming that no matter how, no matter where, he'll return the favor. "Yellow Eyes" confides in his new friend that he was an orphan, found in a zoo near the wild cat cages, and Africa seems like home to him. A few months later, Forrest is given a discharge, but he stays in Africa and his savior loses track. 

Once the war ends, our narrator also decides to stay in Africa and attempt a search for "Yellow Eyes." One day, while out in the jungle, a lion leaps but is stopped (mid-air!) from chowing down on our hero by a mysterious whistle. The lion runs off with a man and we come to learn exactly where "Yellow Eyes" has made his home. Right off the bat, I gotta admit that a Tarzan rip-off with Dick Ayers art would usually get a one-star rating from me sight unseen, but "Yellow Eyes" has a real kooky atmosphere that must be experienced to be believed. A couple chuckles translate to a couple stars any day!

John Winters is a would-be inventor who actually doesn't work on anything in his basement. He simply goes down there to see if his family cares enough about him to head down the stairs now and then to check up on him despite his warnings to never ever ever bother him. Confused yet? Keep up. John gets zapped by lightning in his basement and is transported into the future, where he's tried and convicted as a spy. The judge listens to John's fantastic story and then tells the convicted man that his only hope is that his family will come to his rescue. Magically, John is zapped back into the present, where wife Ethel and forty-something, useless, sycophantic son, Melvin, grill him as to where he went. After he tells his utterly ludicrous tale, his wife reminds him that she couldn't check up on him because she was making him his birthday cake like any loving wife would. Holy crap, what connived rubbish this be! So, the answer to the question, "What Happened in the Basement?" is a very resounding, "Nothing!"-Peter

World of Suspense #5

Cover by Carl Burgos

"While Simon Slept...!" (a: Bill Everett) ★★1/2

"By the Dark of the Moon" (a: John Giunta) ★1/2

"Menace Below!" (a: John Romita) ★★

"The Men in Glass!" (a: Don Heck) ★★1/2

"The Lead-Lined Box!" (a: Chuck Miller) ★★

"The Brain Trap!" (a: George Roussos) ★

Simon Miller is an inventor who shows up at the police station with a wild story. He claims to have invented a matter duplicator in his basement. He mistakenly left the machine on and dozed off on the floor under its ray. "While Simon Slept...!" an exact duplicate of him was created, and he met his mirror image upstairs! Simon brings a policeman home to show him the man, but the duplicate claims to be Simon's twin brother. The cop chases the duplicate into the cellar and, when the machine is switched on, a duplicate policeman is created. Now the cop believes Simon's story!

It's not often that I wish an Atlas story were longer, but this one, nicely drawn by Bill Everett, would have benefited from more pages. The story is interesting but ends abruptly. Is there a way to get rid of the duplicates, or would that be murder? Are they good or evil? More pages drawn by Everett would be welcome.

A strange creature haunts the outskirts of Grenhorst! Local farmers believe that it's one of the town's residents who doesn't realize that "By the Dark of the Moon," he changes into the green-skinned descendant of space creatures who landed nearby 200 years ago. Over time, they took on human characteristics that only disappeared under the full moon. One of the townsfolk, Luther Krohler, decides to take revenge on Charles Reuse, a town father, for marrying the woman Luther loved. Luther creates fake movies that show the green-skinned creatures landing and eventually demonstrates that Freda Reuse was one of them. But just as the townspeople are about to grab Charles, the full moon rises, and it's revealed that the real descendent of the creatures is Luther. The next day, he apologizes to everyone for his behavior.

I do not want to read more pages of this story! It's too complicated and not worth the effort it takes to unravel. The art, by John Giunta, reminds me of the type of art I used to see in children's books or issues of Classics Illustrated.

Two men from a foreign country (Russia?) are given a tour of a U.S. Naval station, but they are not allowed to inspect the dock. Karlin, one of the foreigners, deduces that there must be some important secret under the water by the dock, so he waits for a dark, calm night, dons scuba gear, and dives down to inspect. He sees a large metal ball that has studs all around it and he swims toward it. Unfortunately for Karlin, he has discovered a new anti-frogman device that will explode at the slightest touch!

I've always liked John Romita's art, and he does a nice job with what are essentially four pages of people talking to each other. Fortunately, there are some underwater panels that allow him to draw some shadowy scenes. The story ends on a note of suspense, with Karlin about to whack the ball with a wrench and a Naval officer explaining what will happen if he connects, unaware that there's about to be a big boom right off the dock.

Joe is a recent immigrant to the U.S. who is working as a waiter at a banquet where the president is going to speak. Suddenly the lights go out! When they come back on, an alien named Zarki and several of his cohorts have appeared in the room. Zarki announces that they have been sent to colonize Earth and resistance is futile! The aliens have glass helmets around their heads and Zarki demands that the people in the room cooperate and give him information. Everyone refuses but Joe, who volunteers to cooperate, drawing jeers from the patriots around him. Joe asks if he can display his skills as an opera singer and, when Zarki agrees, Joe breaks into a loud version of "The Star-Spangled Banner." The Americans in the room are horrified until Joe hits a high note that shatters the aliens' glass helmets! Now everyone realizes that the immigrant waiter saved the day.

"The Men in Glass" is corny as heck, but artist Don Heck knocks it out of the park and his dynamic depictions not only make it bearable but also prefigure the work he would do in a few years on The Avengers and other Marvel comics of the '60s.

Professor Hugo Steiner believes that babies are born with the memories of mankind's collective history already implanted on their brains and he plans to prove it with his new Memory Visualizer! His assistant Hans brings him a newborn in "The Lead-Lined Box!" and Hugo zaps the box with a ray from his gizmo, but what he sees as the newborn's memories show that its immediate ancestors were mute slaves, dependent on others and thrown scraps and bones for food. Hugo is so upset by what he sees that he destroys the machine, unaware that his kindly assistant couldn't bear to put a human baby in the box, so he put a puppy dog in there instead!

I like Chuck Miller's art on this three-pager, and I did not see the twist ending coming in advance, so it was worth a read. I had a feeling that there was something going on with the newborn in the box, but the uncredited writer did a decent job of  suggesting that it was a human baby until we were told otherwise.

Harry Hoyt is a chemist who accidentally invents a cure for baldness and decides that he needs a partner to develop his new product into one that he can sell worldwide. His wife warns him that his partner might take advantage of Harry's good nature. Harry puts an ad in the paper and Earle Bolton responds. Earle is impressed by the invention and signs on as partner, but Harry suddenly finds himself able to read Earle's thoughts and discovers that Earle plans to kill him and take all the money for himself. Harry avoids Earle's clumsy attempt to brain him with a wooden stool, calls the police, and burns his formula.

An unexpectedly enjoyable issue of World of Suspense ends with a dud in "The Brain Trap!;" George Roussos's illustrations are as pedestrian as the script. Both Peter and I are working on a time machine to return to 1956 and question Harry about his miracle cure for baldness.-Jack

Next Week...
With-it, Hip, New Writer Mike Friedrich
Decides That What the World Needs Now Is a Hip, With-It
Reboot of the Very First Batman Adventure For the
Dark Knight's 30th Anniversary. Do the Boys Agree?