Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 176: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction & Fantasy Comics!

 

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 161

March 1959

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Journey Into Mystery #51

Cover by Russ Heath

"The Ghost Ship of Space" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★★

"The Creatures in the Volcano" 

(a: Jack Kirby & Wally Wood)

(r: Crazy #65) ★★1/2

"The Prison Planet!" (a: Carl Burgos) ★★1/2

"Alien on Earth!" (a: Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule) ★★

"Robot on the Rampage!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★★★

"The Ghost Ship of Space" is wreaking havoc throughout the universe, causing the disappearance of three space vessels in just a month! When the military sends yet another ship (the Saturn 934) out to find what's going on, Daily Cosmos reporter Frank Brandon is sent along to get the skinny for his millions of readers.

It isn't long before Frank's rocket spots the Ghost Ship and gives chase. In a matter of seconds, the craft does a 180 and heads right for the good guys, but the Ghost Ship flies right through them. It really is a ghost ship! The Saturn follows the specter to a nearby planet, where the crew is taken prisoner by an army of BEMs. 

The Saturn crew meets up with the missing men they'd been sent to rescue and they learn that the BEMs are trying to build their own spaceship in order to conquer the galaxy, but they just don't have the brain power. Frank fools the creatures with a fake bomb and the boys are soon heading back to Earth with a crazy story to tell. Standard space opera with a silly twist at the end, but some sharp Sinnott graphics.

Tubuai is the leader of a tribe living on a volcanic island. When the volcano gets set to blow, he urges his people to move to the neighboring island of Ono-I-Lau until it's safe to return home. Time passes, the lava cools, and the people head back. But Tubuai is suspicious; he does not believe the eruption was organic. He climbs the high mountain and descends into the volcano, where he is assaulted by a trio of aliens, who explain that they are a scouting party from the planet Igneous Rex and they plan to wipe out mankind and claim Earth as their own.

Thinking fast, Tubuai contacts the United States Government, which had made him an offer to buy the island years ago, and offers to sell his home dirt cheap. The tribe moves to another island and the US begins its atom bomb testing on the volcanic island. A pretty good story with a great ending, but it's pretty lame that Tubuai claims he can't tell his people the truth about "The Creatures in the Volcano" until he's "won back their respect." We're moving into classic Kirby Atlas-era sci-fi comics, with lots of faces looking into "the camera" and finger pointing. I'm not sure Wally Wood made a good inker on the King's material; Rule was a safer bet. The three aliens could have fit well in a Fantastic Four strip.

Two million years ago, criminals were sent on a rocket ship to colonize "The Prison Planet!" It took centuries, but the pilgrims in the new world managed to make a go of it; now and then, new "inmates" were dropped off and forced to acclimate. Meanwhile, back on the home planet, the population had gone soft since crime had been all but eradicated; this left them weak and open to attack by enemies from other planets. Civilization is wiped out and the planet is left a barren landscape. Back on the prison planet, over the centuries, the marooned have gotten a lot smarter and they've built their rocket ships. They intend to return home--to Mars. Good surprise there in the final panel, but I'm afraid Carl Burgos's art is getting rougher.

"Alien on Earth!" is another take on The Day the Earth Stood Still, wherein an alien exits his parked spaceship and causes panic all around the world. After the US government drops an A-bomb on the creature, it turns and leaves. Mankind is safe once more. In the final panel, we discover the alien was on a mission to see if the human race was still bloodthirsty and he reports back to his C.O. that in no way can Earth people be allowed to roam freely through the galaxy. Yep, the climax is exactly what we expected it would be and there are plenty of stinkin' commie digs to go around, but the art is pretty darn good.

One hundred years in the future, man has perfected the robot and now has very little to do. But then the mechanical servants begin breaking down and a "Supreme Calculator," a robot to watch over all robots, is created to restore order. But then the SC begins thinking on its own and before you can say Terminator 2: Judgment Day, humans are slaving for the gizmos. Thank goodness for the human spirit, though, as one particularly clever worker notices the SC's plug is dirty and disconnects it from the wall. As Earth breathes a sigh of relief, the scientists go back to the drawing board to make the perfect robot. Wonderful little SF classic, a heck of a lot smarter than most of the scripts being passed around the Atlas lunchroom (could it have been written by the artist himself?), and some dazzling work by Steve Ditko.-Peter

Tales of Suspense #2

Cover by Steve Ditko

"Invasion from Space" (a: Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule) ★1/2

"Trapped in Yesterday!" (a: Carl Burgos(?)) ★★1/2

"The Planet That Wasn't There!" (a: Russ Heath) ★★

"The Secret of Planet 'X'!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★

"A Robot in Hiding!" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★

An armada of massive ships appears over the skies of New York; could it be an "Invasion from Outer Space"? The heads of each nation gather and decide the best action to take would be to blow the strangers out of the sky. One man, a really smart and brilliant Einstein look-alike, offers a different strategy: disarm the world's super powers and show the visitors they want peace.

"Nyet!" "Nein!" and "Nuts!" are the leaders' answers and before you can say "Armageddon," a host of the East and West's "mightiest missiles" are fired off at the spaceships. After the smoke clears, a stunned audience realizes this enemy is a whole lot stronger than assumed. In a panic, the leaders agree to Option B and immediately destroy their bombs, missiles, submarines, guns, slingshots, espresso machines, anything that could be construed as a weapon. The ships then leave the airways and the world breathes a sigh of relief. Elsewhere, in the "private observatory" of the peaceful professor who suggested Option B, a sigh and a chuckle are emitted as the scientist admits to his wife he wasn't sure his ruse would work. You see, confident that the Earth was ruled by men who weren't the brightest bulbs in the box, the scholar had projected a really convincing picture of spaceships onto the New York skies to nudge the world into peace. 

You can tell that The Day the Earth Stood Still left its mark on Stan, Jack, and the boys, since every possible variation on the plot would be squeezed out like a lemon from here until the Fantastic Four appeared (even popping up in the superhero comics as well). The reveal, that no one would notice that the vessels were really a projected image, is a hoot. I guess our hero, the scientist, was sure that all the combined firepower wouldn't accidentally start some apocalyptic chain reaction in our atmosphere. The 1950s Atlas world was clearly one that could be swayed by parlor tricks, in stark contrast to the real world we live in now. Hmmm.

While the ingenious and smart Professor Wilkes puts the final touches on his... wait for it... time machine, buck-toothed simpleton Jason Grubb, a mild-mannered mop-pusher, watches from the shadows in envy. Once Wilkes attaches all the little signs to each knob and button (so that he won't forget which lever to pull to go back in time and which one is the brake), Jason's diseased brain concocts a brilliant but evil plan: he will steal the Professor's new invention, go back in time to Camelot, convince King Arthur he's a genius, and live like... well, a king, I guess.

Jason runs home, grabs his TV set, a portable radio, and a camera, and heads back to the lab. Evidently not as dumb as he looks, he sets the way-back machine for August 20, 500 and something, the exact moment when King Arthur is hanging out in his castle, sets a timed explosive device to destroy the time machine so that Professor Wilkes won't find him, and settles back in for the ride. Sure enough, moments later, he is being escorted into the castle with his three forms of magic tucked under his arm (a full-size TV set weighed a lot less in 1959) for an audience with King Arthur. In short order, he's reminded that: there is no electrical outlet for the TV set, radio stations have not been invented yet (No rap music? Camelot, here I come!), and there's no technology to develop pictures. Pissed that his time has been wasted, Arthur orders Jason to be his new royal mop boy. All that our hapless moron can do is hope Professor Wilkes can build a new gizmo and rescue him.

"Trapped in Yesterday!" is about as dopey as they come, but you have to admit it's entertaining as well. Each successive failure on Jason's part is one part cringe-inducing and one part chuckle-worthy, as is the fact that this janitor would form an elaborate plan involving Camelot instead of going back a week or two and making a killing on the stock market or the horse races. 

In 2026, the president of the free world looks on as a rocket ship is launched and falls back to Earth, exploding in a massive fireball. This was the 17th such trial to perfect a rocket ship that can search the galaxy for another inhabitable world, one he is convinced exists. You see, this world is overpopulated and time is running out; there are only so many Swanson Frozen TV dinners to go around. Anyway, after the 17th failure, the president goes home and discusses the future with his daughter, Elizabeth. Surely the launches must stop, laments his gorgeous daughter. "No, we must forge on," the man grimly reminds her, "and don't call me Shirley."

Soon after, the 18th ship is launched, breaks the planet's ozone layer, and then explodes. As he sighs the sigh of a man with the world on his shoulders, the president is approached by one of his aides and informed that Elizabeth snuck aboard the doomed flight. Finally convinced that the project is for naught, the president hangs his head and laments that the world he's been searching for, one he calls "Earth," probably doesn't exist. I've always wondered how it is that far off worlds know that our planet is called "Earth." Could they be listening in to Alan Freed's Saturday night rock 'n' roll show? Is there a giant sign that can be seen only from space that identifies our big rock (and perhaps outer space signposts that notify our weary travelers that there are only 64,000,000 miles left in their journey?)? Alas, "The Planet That Wasn't There!" answers none of those questions but does allow us a rare (for 1959) look at Russ Heath's majesty. 

In the far-flung future, the tyrant Kluge becomes bored of ruling over his tiny world and wishes to expand his power base. He commands his underlings to build a rocket ship and he and the crew set off to find a conquerable world. They land on Planet X and the locals seem very amenable to slavery; Kluge has found his new kingdom. Or so he thinks. There's a very good twist in the tail and some nice Ditko art to slobber over; the number one lesson to learn from "The Secret of Planet 'X'!" is that communism is not the answer to happiness.

After Roderic Zante, the supreme ruler of the entire world, declares that all robots must be rounded up and deactivated, a mild-mannered android leaves his family of humans and becomes "A Robot in Hiding!" Our robotic protagonist sets out on a journey to change Zante's mind and restore "freedom" to his android brethren. Once he gets to the ruler's palace and breaks in, he discovers that Zante is a robot himself, programmed to lust for power rather than serve. Our hero pushes Zante's button and shuts the ruler's power down once and for all. Peace is restored to the galaxy and robots are reactivated, biding their time until they can overthrow their human captors. That last part was just me trying to inject some razzle-dazzle into a very boring and oft-told tale.-Peter

Tales to Astonish #2

Cover by Steve Ditko

"When Aliens Meet!" (a: Don Heck) ★★

"I Fell to the Center of the Earth!" (a: Matt Baker & Vince Colletta) ★

"I Was a Man in Hiding!" (a: John Buscema) ★1/2

"I Spent Eternity in a Deep Freeze!" (a: Carl Burgos) ★

"My Job: Capture a Martian" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★1/2

Dunstan Craig is the most ruthless hunter of alien creatures in the year 2058, traveling from planet to planet and bringing back specimens for zoos on Earth without a shred of pity for those he captures. When the spaceship he's riding on has an emergency, Dunstan hops into an emergency space boat and zips off to the nearest planet, but "When Aliens Meet!" the hunter gets a taste of his own medicine and is put on display in a zoo.

Don Heck's art is muscular and exciting, but any reader who didn't see that ending coming should turn in his comic book badge here and now.

An archaeologist named Henry Burke jumps at the chance to head to Asia and dig deep down into the Earth with the latest atomic-powered equipment. He investigates an obstruction and soon remarks that "I Fell to the Center of the Earth!," where he encounters cavemen and a dinosaur. After he is pulled back to the surface and convinced he imagined it all, one of his crew digs up a rusted, moldy cigarette lighter engraved with Burke's name.

Matt Baker may have done some great work in the Golden Age, and I respect him for being one of the early Black comic book artists, but this story is a dud. There's no rational basis for anything that happens and the concluding twist has been done to death.

In the year 2087, everyone wears a wristband that allows the police to locate people at a moment's notice. This cuts down on crime, but when Harry Grant reads about the discovery of a new planet, he realizes his long held ambition and robs his company's payroll. Harry rents a rocket ship and takes off for the new planet, figuring that he won't be traced, since the wristbands won't work away from Earth. Sadly, Harry's hope that "I Was a Man in Hiding!" would be a successful plan is thwarted when he arrives at the new planet and discovers that he towers over everyone else there.

The GCD suggests that this is a Wessler script, and it reads like one, since the main character's biggest concern is committing robbery. The art by John Buscema is adequate but looks nothing like the work we'd see ten or fifteen years later, when his characters always seemed to have muscles like bowling balls.

"I Spent Eternity in a Deep Freeze!" is another story penned by Wessler, with another character robbing a payroll. This time it's Joe Sykes, who pilfers cash from a self-service refuel center on a satellite. He volunteers to be frozen for a long space voyage, thinking he'll be famous when he gets back. Somehow he awakens in another dimension, where no one on Earth can see or hear him.

This story is truly awful, with sub-par art by Carl Burgos and a script by Carl W. that ends in a fashion that makes absolutely no sense.

Garner is a private eye who is surprised to learn that "My Job: Capture a Martian" is his latest assignment. A professor bursts in with a wild story about seeing a flying saucer land; when he investigated the craft, he found it empty, but soon an explosion left no trace of it. Garner takes the case and begins to search. Eventually, he gives up and tells the professor he's had enough. What the professor doesn't know is that Garner is the Martian and he has just eliminated the last shred of suspicion!

Thank goodness Joe Sinnott turns in a decent job on the artwork here, because this story is just about as bad as the rest in this dreadful issue. If this is the big Atlas revival, we're in trouble.-Jack

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Giant Monster Madness