Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 181: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction & Fantasy Comics!

 

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 166

August 1959

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Strange Tales #70

Cover by Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule

"A Giant Walks the Earth!" 

(a: Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule) ★1/2

(r: Uncanny Tales #7)

"Earth in Chains!" (a: Paul Reinman) ★

"Ghost Ship!" (a: Carl Burgos) ★

"Escape to Tomorrow!" (a: Paul Reinman) ★

"When Walks the Sphinx!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★1/2

(r: Journey into Mystery #14)

Biochemist Wilbur Fiske never gets the promotions he deserves and he just knows it's because he's a runt, much shorter than any of the other scientists in his lab. Well, Wilbur is gonna show them a thing or two! The half-pint just happens to be working on a growth serum in his lab at home. That night, he has the breakthrough he's been waiting for and, without even testing the goop on a rat or a chicken or his mother-in-law, Wilbur downs the whole beaker.

The formula works immediately. In fact, it works too well--Wilbur keeps on growing and growing until he's as tall as a skyscraper. Itching to be rich, he grabs hold of the nearest bank and rips it from its foundation. But our hero finally grows so tall that he's running out of oxygen. Just before he hits the pavement, the serum begins to wear off and he becomes his old, small self again. That's okay, though, Wilbur muses after he's done ninety days in the pokey for major street and building damage: mankind should be happy with what its given and not look for easy answers in drugs and potions. 

Wilbur smiles and returns to his latest invention: a liquid that can make rocks into gold. Well, that last bit is of my own making. The real story ends with the maudlin "man should not mess with Mother Nature" message.  "A Giant Walks the Earth!" would probably be just as dull at double the length but perfectly illustrates why Kirby was later given 10+ pages to tell his giant monster stories.

Stop me if you've heard the plot of "Earth in Chains!" before. Aliens invade Earth and level a major city to create their new home and we have no defense against them!  Our salvation arrives in the form of "the smallest of creatures"--basic germs! That's right, the aliens can't handle the bacteria we all take for granted. What an original concept!

A coast guard boat stumbles across a "Ghost Ship!" floating in US waters. Turns out it's a stinkin' commie sub and, once the officers board it, they discover it's been abandoned. Dan finds a ship's log with lots of "commie writing" in it and, luck of the draw, he aced Communist Language in high school. He translates the startling story for his comrades: the sub was sneaking around in US waters, looking for any of our latest technology, when it came across an alien spaceship. Wanting to know more about the ship, they did what any stinkin' Bolshevik would do: they put the pedal to the metal and tried to ram it.

Just before making contact, the hatch to the spaceship opened and out popped a bevy of BEMs. The journal entry ends with a startled captain screaming in fear. The good guys continue their search of the Russkie ship and find a map of outer space left there by the BEMs for some reason. Surmising the aliens had nothing but good intentions, our coast guard officers head back to port. "Ghost Ship!" is another of those Atlas strips (written by Stan?) where the action keeps coming fast so that no questions will be asked. Like how did the Red ship captain write down all the details if he's constantly in the midst of the chaos? Did he wait until there was a break in the action and then run to his desk and put quill to paper? How could our heroes come to the conclusion that these aliens were only "lost while on a journey" and not actually casing our world for invasion? I have more questions but I'm out of space. I will say that I like the Burgos art; looks like the kind of penciling he pumped out for the 1940s titles.

Bank robber Joe Palmer forces Professor Whitehead to let him use his time machine and "Escape to Tomorrow!" Joe obviously didn't study economics in high school or he'd know that, with the rate of inflation being what it is, the dollar won't buy what it used to when he gets to 2010. Worse, as he soon discovers, paper money is obsolete. Stuck fifty years in the future with no way back, his haul is worthless, so Joe has to get a hard labor job. "Well," the dope sighs, "at least I've learned a mighty good lesson and now I'll be a decent human being!" You have to laugh at the fact that the newspaper headlines scream the news about Whitehead's time machine and yet the government hasn't swooped down on the egghead and hauled his tinker toy away.

When the first wave of an invasion from space arrives in Egypt, the Sphinx rises from its base to defend its people. There's really not much to the script, I'll grant you, but Ditko's art is dazzling and that saves the day (and the issue as well). At first glance, a strip containing a giant walking sphinx seems like a slam-dunk for Kirby, but the mystic elements push the tale into Ditko territory.-Peter

Strange Worlds #5

Cover by Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule

"We Are the 3 Who Vanished!" (a: Don Heck) ★★1/2

" I Couldn't Stop the Runaway Comet!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★1/2

"I Am... Gorilla!" (a: Paul Reinman) ★★1/2

"Don't Send Me... Out There!!!" (a: Carl Burgos) ★

"They Call Me... Space Pirate" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★★

The final issue of Strange Worlds begins in very familiar territory with the time machine fantasy, "We Are the 3 Who Vanished!" The police break down the door to Roger Hastings's lab after receiving reports of suspicious activity, but when they enter they can find no Roger. What the police inspector finds is Roger's lab journal, which tells the story of just what's been going on in the lab the last few days.

Roger Hastings forces two of his scientist buddies to help him finish his time machine. With work completed, Roger states that man will finally be able to travel back in time, while his two colleagues roll their eyes and make whistling noises. Roger sets the way-back machine to the 17th century (that's about as specific as Roger gets) and flips the switch. That's where the journal ends and the police are baffled. Did the three eggheads travel through time or did they vaporize themselves with the dangerous machinery they were working with? No one will ever know.

Aha, that's where Inspector Clouseau is wrong. If he had only turned the page of his copy of Strange Worlds #5, he'd have seen bonus coverage revealing the fate of the travelers in a very clever epilogue. I've had about enough of time machine yarns as they usually end up telling the same story over and over, but "We Are 3..." gives us another angle on the dangers of science. 

The most popular man in the world of 2060 is scientist Victor Sage, a man of the people. Just before he's a shoo-in for president of the new world, it's discovered that a destructive comet is heading for Earth in a matter of weeks. Sage calms his constituents and reminds them he's got the biggest brain in the galaxy. He'll figure it out. But Sage's rocket missiles are destroyed by the comet's intense heat before they can even get near. He tells the people of the world to ready themselves for annihilation.

With little help from science, the world begins praying as one and, miraculously, the comet is turned away as if "a giant unseen hand had brushed it aside." Promising himself not to ever become lost in his own ego again, Victor Sage looks to the sky and thanks... whatever... for the helping hand. I don't mind a little religion peppering my sci-fi/fantasy funny books now and then as long as the story being told is a good one; "I Couldn't Stop the Runaway Comet!" introduces an interesting character in Victor Sage, almost a superhero-type, and then knocks him off his pedestal a little at a time. More great experimental work by Ditko.

Bongo, the carnival gorilla, looks out at the world through his bars and wonders where his next banana will come from while his audience remarks about how dumb he looks. The crowds have grown considerably since the atomic testing facility opened up right next door (wink, wink) and the carnival owner has a lot on his mind lately. That's how Bongo's cage door is accidentally left open. Bongo goes on a bit of a tour of the area and wanders into one of the test areas, exposed to high radiation.

Suddenly, Bongo is the most intelligent gorilla in the world, but what to do with that extra brain power? After briefly considering sticking up a few local banks, our simian hero decides he's going to help mankind fulfill its potential to become a more peaceful and loving species. Why, maybe Bongo can even talk the Atlas scientists out of building any more time machines. But, just as he's about to call the President, the radiation wears off and Bongo becomes... Bongo again. Back to his cage he goes, once again on the receiving end of endless banana jokes.

I enjoyed "I Am... Gorilla!" a lot. It's very simple, very quick, and doesn't go overboard in the preaching department. It does have some very clunky exposition in the first few panels but effectively points out the pros and cons of having an atomic testing ground within walking distance of a populated area. Did you know that exposure to high radiation can cause mutation in a matter of seconds? I didn't. I was hoping we'd see a few panels of carnival attendees with three eyes or stretchable limbs.

"Don't Send Me... Out There!!!" is the hilarious tale of a spaceship pilot who's lost his nerve. The dope spends the first three pages pinballing between family members, trying to elicit sympathy to no effect, all while detailing the dangers of flying in space. When the final panel arrives and we discover the pilot is actually a robot (He's got a metal cranium! So that's why he's running around the house with his helmet on!), the laughs dry up and the eyes roll. This guy running around the house like a madman, shrieking about meteor showers while wearing what looks like a motorcycle helmet, reminded me of Ethel Merman's scene in Airplane! Comedy gold.

The 24th and final story to appear in Strange Worlds, "They Call Me... Space Pirate" is the humorous tale of Sandor, rapscallion and pirate, who leads his merry men on a scourge of the galaxy. Seeing what looks to be a very attractive and vulnerable planet in their view screen, the boys set down and immediately discover they've made a mistake. The world (which looks a lot like Earth) is populated by mutants who can control objects with their minds. Before long, Sandor and Co. are behind bars and bitching about prison food. Some nice Sinnott work and a few giggles. Looking back over our notes and ratings for Strange Worlds, it's easy to see why the title is virtually forgotten these days. Not one of the stories garnered over a 2.5 rating and most fell in the 1.5-2.0 range.-Peter

World of Fantasy #19

Cover by Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule

"The Gargoyle from the Fifth Galaxy!" (a: Don Heck) ★1/2

(r: Vault of Evil #15)

"Deluge!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★1/2

(r: Dead of Night #7)

"The Iron Hulk!" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★1/2

"The Brain Destroyer!" (a: Carl Burgos) ★1/2

"I Was Stranded in Space" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★1/2

When an alien rocket ship approaches the Earth, no one knows quite what to do, and when "The Gargoyle from the Fifth Galaxy!" emerges, spouting fire from his mouth and talking in gibberish, soldiers open fire. The creature turns around, gets back into his ship, and takes off, leaving a book behind on the ground. After months of work the volume is translated and--surprise!--the gargoyle came to Earth to share all the wonders of his advanced civilization with us. As usual, we chased him off and now hope he'll return some day.

What was the point of rehashing the same stories over and over? They could have just reprinted the first one ad nauseum. Would anyone have noticed? This time we don't even see much of the alien, who looks nothing like the version on the cover that Kirby drew. Inside the comic, he's green and much slimmer.

A scientist named Jason Trump is convinced that magnetism is the force that holds the universe together. After being fired from his job, he builds a big machine to control magnetism and aims it at the moon, thinking it will cause the moon to develop an atmosphere that can sustain life. His plan works, but an unintended consequence is that Earth is covered by a "Deluge!" of rain that threatens humanity. Army Major Tek figures out that the cause is in the vicinity of Jason's lab, so he journeys there and destroys the machine. The sun comes out and all is well again. All except Jason, whose corpse is found next to the machine.

Good lord, whoever wrote this (Stan the Man?) sure liked to pile word upon word! There are so many words in this five-page story that there's hardly room for Ditko to do much with the art. What puzzled me was that Major Tek managed to grab a crowbar and smash the machine with little effort, yet Jason Trump died trying to switch off the machine without wrecking it. At what point in a worldwide flood do you just give up and whack the thing?

In the year 3000, young Tim Jones's dad takes him to the store to buy Tim his very own robot. Dad is sure that the machine will be nothing more than "The Iron Hulk!," but Roby quickly becomes Tim's best pal. Tim is sure that Roby has feelings, but when Dad says they have to move to a small apartment in the city and sells Roby to the junk man for twenty-five bucks, Tim runs off to save his pal. On the way, his foot gets caught in a railroad track and it's Roby to the rescue! The heroic robot is damaged but Dad's mind changes when he observes a tear in Roby's eye. He has Roby repaired and robot and boy live happily ever after.

What nonsense! Joe Sinnott gets a gold star for holding his nose and turning in four nice pages of artwork to illustrate this heap of refuse. Even a kid reading this comic in 1959 would think this was dopey.

Did a meteorite just crash land in Central Park? Renowned astrophysicist Philip Latimer is summoned to examine the object, so he brings his wife and son along for the ride. The object seems to have been made by an intelligent creature and it starts to emit electronic waves that hypnotize the scientists in the area. Phil's wife and son run for it and New Yorkers panic. Soon, people across the world are convinced that the object must be "The Brain Destroyer!" Young Bobby won't give up on Phil and runs into the park, causing the machine to short circuit, since it didn't know what to do when it encountered a child's brain waves.

At least the machine wasn't sent to Earth to spread peace and love! This is not a great story, but I prefer a menacing machine from an unknown planet to the alien in the first story who just wanted to make the world a better place.

While being brought back to Earth to serve his time in jail, escaped convict Joe Burke manages to jump in a small space cruiser and get away. He crash lands on an unknown planet, where he laments the lack of civilization. He uses his wits to survive but complains that "I Was Stranded in Space." Joe combats loneliness in the years that follow by making pets of small, alien animals. Eventually he discovers other people and a civilization, and Joe decides that he's done his time and now will spend the rest of his life making up for his crimes. He does not know that the people knew all along that he was there and let him serve out his sentence alone.

Joe Sinnott deserves a medal for giving it the old college try twice in one issue. The story isn't any better than the others, but at least it looks good. And so ends the run of World of Fantasy, a comic that never distinguished itself from the other mags on the spinner rack. I doubt anyone noticed when it stopped coming out.-Jack

Next Week...
Jack and Peter Are Trapped
By the Secret of the Mystery
of the Things on Easter Island!!!

Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 180: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction & Fantasy Comics!

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 165

July 1959

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Journey Into Mystery #53

Cover by Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule

"Only Twelve of Us May Live!" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★★

"Beware of Tomorrow!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★1/2

"The Stranger in Space!" (a: John Forte) ★1/2

(r: Strange Tales Annual #1)(r: Vault of Evil #20)

"Shadows in the Night!" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★

"He Made the Machines Go Mad!" (a: Don Heck) ★

A runaway planet heads right for Canopus Minor, a world located in a galaxy far, far away. The world leaders are in a panic since there is only one space ship available and its occupancy is a mere twelve. How will the leaders pick the lucky dozen who will survive the cataclysmic collision? The twelve youngest? Twelve most intelligent? Twelve with the best hair? Luckily, miles from the capital toils brilliant but exhausted Sfeen, who's trying to come up with a way to save the entire population. Sfeen isn't tired from his research but from the nagging of his ball-and-chain, Urbaam, who seemingly does nothing but cook dinner and complain.

In the eleventh hour, his work complete, Sfeen contacts the leaders and tells him to gather the entire population of Cannibus Sativa around the rocket ship. He then has his friends and neighbors walk through a line of electricity. That quick and painless zap reduces each person to about one inch tall, easily fitting the fourteen million souls aboard the Rocketship X-250. Relieved about saving all their constituents, the leaders ask Sfeen to whip up a gizmo to shrink 140,000,000 ham sandwiches to micro-size. Happy ending, nothing new to "Only Twelve of Us May Live!" Let's see the lost panel that shows the sleeping arrangements and the tiny toilets for all these little people.

A strange old man, supported by a cane and sporting a trench coat, shows up at a police precinct and warns that the train carrying the ultra-fancy telescope lens will be destroyed. Of course, the cops laugh and tell the old man to grab a hunk of highway. Believe it or not, the lens is destroyed when a rock slide derails the train. The next day, the stranger shows up at "Project Mole," a top secret digging experiment in the Arizona desert and warns of a disaster to come. Again the seer is rebuffed, and again disaster strikes. 

Mike Wells, World News correspondent, hears of the predictions and begs his editor to let him write up a story on the phenom. Sensing that the old man might show up, Mike heads for the launching of Rocketship X-2500 in Florida and is not disappointed when he witnesses firsthand the dismal treatment of the prognosticator. Even when Mike warns the base colonel about the stranger's track record, the launch goes on. Seconds after lift-off, the rocket explodes and the old man walks away, swearing he'll never help these morons again!

If you're here for Ditko's art, that's fine, I understand, but the script for "Beware of Tomorrow!" is like a cheese grater, filled with holes (in logic). Why does Mike seem to be in the right place at all the right times? Why is this mystery man showing up at what seem to be minor disasters? The final panels have Mike asking the stranger how he knew so much about the future, with the man's reply being, "To me, this isn't the future. But the past!" Yep, another visitor from our future trying to undo some event which will trigger something even bigger down the line. Our "savior" lets it be known that now he realizes that the past can't change because then there would be no future. Well then, does that mean in the future any dunderhead can jump in a time machine and attempt a do-over and we just got lucky this time? I'm so confused.

In the 29th Century, astronaut Frank Mason stops at one of those newfangled self-serve gas stations in space to put petrol in his X-671 (definitely an upgrade from X-2000) when he notices another X-671 landing at the next pump. Well, that's interesting, thinks Frank, since there aren't many of these models flying around the galaxy right now. Curious about the coincidence, Frank gets on his telecaster and contacts "The Stranger in Space!" who answers his question with alarming replies. Frank thinks this might be a holdup, so he grabs his blaster and heads over to the other ship. When the hatch is opened, Frank meets... Frank! You see, one Frank was coming from Earth and the other was heading to Earth and one of them got duplicated in the space/time continuum or some such nonsense. Let's just leave it there. Hilariously enough, the final panel basically says, "Who knows how these things happen and who knows how this will right itself?" as though our uncredited writer threw up his hands and gave up. Kinda like I did.

Dumbest story of the month award goes to "Shadows in the Night!" (another head-scratching title), wherein soap scientist (no, I'm serious) Elias Burbank can't concentrate on new soap formulae when he's convinced there's an invisible world that exists right next to our own. It's never explained how Elias came to this startling conclusion (and, in a hilariously heated discussion between our kooky egghead and his two lab compadres, one of the other scientists wonders if there's really an invisible world, "then why can't we see it?!") and we get the standard twist that the world he's trying to find is Earth. Next!

Do I have to? Okay then, let's be quick. "He Made the Machines Go Mad!" is the 700th Atlas story of 1959 to document the perils of building the perfect humanoid. Stop me if you've heard this one before: Android XTT-4 slips a gear and becomes the most powerful android in the world, able to control every machine ever invented. The only thing that stands between XTT-4 and complete domination of the human race is the man who invented him. In the end, the moral is: don't invent anything ever again.-Peter

Tales of Suspense #4

Cover by Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule

"The Invisible Army" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★

"One of Our Spacemen is Missing!" (a: Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule) ★★

"The Voice of Doom!" (a: Carl Burgos) ★★

"Beware of the... Robots!" (a: Al Williamson) ★★

"One of Us is a Martian!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★

Hendrik Muir has finally perfected his groundbreaking gizmo that can make two hundred men at a time invisible. But, of course, Muir lives in Commieland, so when dictator Igor Zetaxas gets wind of the contraption, he has Muir dragged to the palace, pronto. When Hendrik hears the leader's plan, he informs Igor that his machine will not be used for evil means. Quicker than you can say "Siberia!," Hendrik is tossed into a small cell and told he will rot there until he consents to "loaning" the Reds his machine.

Weeks pass and Hendrik's resolve does not weaken, so Zetaxas visits the man in prison and tells him that, if the machine is not turned on immediately, Hendrik's wife and child will join him in solitude. The brilliant but weak scientist gives in and Zetaxas arranges to have his top two hundred military men brought to a small field. There, Hendrik zaps the soldiers and, sure enough, they disappear. Igor Zetaxas roars his approval and approaches "The Invisible Army." He realizes finally that not only are they invisible but they've vanished. Hendrik laughs and tells the crooked despot that the machine has sent the men to another dimension. Hendrik Muir is actually the leader of a resistance movement and his army is closing in on the capital as they speak. Glory be to freedom. 

Lester Wells and his space crew are orbiting in Star Cluster System 472 when they come across a planet that is startlingly similar to Earth in its oxygen levels and plant life. Lester's co-pilot Jim Stack wants to voyage down immediately to the planet's surface and take samples, but Les warns that they do not know enough about the lifeforms below. Jim poo-poos that, tells Les he's a wussy, and teleports down in a party of four explorers. The plant life indeed is excellent and Jim has brief thoughts of murdering his crewmen and bringing the flowers back to Earth and opening up a florist shop (sorry, that was the pre-code first draft), but good manners win out and they continue their expedition.

One by one, the men begin to disappear suspiciously and Jim radios Les to let him know something strange is going on. By the time Les gets the exploro-pod unhooked from the ship and arrives at the spot where Jim was supposed to be standing, the entire party has vanished into thin air. Well, not quite, since Jim is a brilliant (if slightly unmasculine) technician who tracks his comrades to a nearby field, where he discovers that the plant life is mobile and very hostile; trees have tied up the four explorers in their vines and seem to have bad intentions. Les lets the hyper-afterburners rip in full view of the tree-people; the walking elms exit stage left and the prisoners are freed to join their comrades back in the X-2500. They all have a laugh and head back to Earth to have a salad and reclaim their superiority over foliage. "One of Our Spacemen is Missing!" (a misleading title to be sure, since four spacemen are missing) is a fairly enjoyable and wholly laughable bit of nonsense, the highlight of which is a panel where the giant trees run like hell away from the flames.

An amateur ham radio operator somehow intercepts transmissions from what he believes is outer space, detailing an all-out war between two armies. Turns out "The Voice of Doom!" is being sent from a nearby ant hill! Clever twist and some dynamite Burgos art.

Al Williamson's art is the only saving grace of the ridiculous "Beware of the... Robots!" In the 23rd century, assembly line worker Joe Hughes loses his job to an android and is so outraged that he writes an article for the local paper about the dangers of robots. The piece is so popular that it leads to more exposure, including best-selling books, TV, and nationwide fame. Once Joe has all the dough, he does a 180 and decides that mechanical men are actually good for mankind because they push humans out of jobs and force them to focus on other vocations. Oh, okay, that's some new way of thinking, I guess. 

Atlas's Number Three Most Favorite Plot Device of 1959, the Martian (right behind the time machine and the android), gets a Ditko coat of paint on "One of Us is a Martian!" (another nonsensical title), wherein Earth preps the first rocket to Mars and the Red Planet reacts. Martians head to Earth to blow the spaceship to smithereens, but (since they're only one inch tall) they accidentally set their suicide mission on a little boy's toy rocket. If these Martians had only read Atlas funny books of the 1950s, they would have seen that this kind of silly mistake happens frequently.-Peter

Tales to Astonish #4

Cover by Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule

"I Was a Prisoner of the Martians!" (a: Joe Sinnott)  ★★

(r: Creatures on the Loose #21) 

"My Forbidden Paintings!" (a: Don Heck) ★1/2

"I Made Time Stand Still" (a: Tom Gill) ★

(r: Monsters on the Prowl #20) 

"I Love a Mermaid!" (a: Carl Burgos) ★1/2

(r: Giant-Size Chillers #2) 

"The Man Who Floats in Space!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★

Darius Wolfe is the biggest director in Hollywood and he makes sure everyone knows it. He takes his crew into the desert to film a new sci fi picture, unaware that real Martians are on their way to invade and capture an Earthling to take back to their planet. They land right near where the movie is being filmed and, coincidentally, they look just like the Martians in the flick! The real Martians grab Wolfe and take him aboard their ship; the cast and crew think it's all part of the movie. After taking off, the Martians discover that the added weight of Wolfe causes their ship to shake, so they return to Earth to fix it. Will the cast and crew come to Wolfe's aid or will they let the Martians take off again with him in tow?

In addition to the incredible coincidence that real Martians are dead ringers for movie Martians, I find myself wondering why Atlas comic book aliens often seem to have one big eye. Don't you need two eyes to see in 3-D? Wouldn't these advanced races be more likely to have extra eyes? Joe Sinnott's art is good, as usual, and "I Was a Prisoner of the Martians!" is reasonably fun until the dopey last panel, in which Wolfe realizes that his poor treatment of the cast and crew makes it unlikely that they'll rescue him. These moralizing conclusions are no fun.

Crane is a painter who is down on his luck. He meets a bum on a park bench and the man sells him a magic paint brush for a buck. The artist paints himself as handsome, and he suddenly looks great! He paints a picture called "Freedom" and is hailed as the world's greatest painter. Finally, he paints himself as a dictator and soon finds himself in charge of the country of Mythavia. Too bad Crane ignored the bum's warning that he'll live to regret using the magic paint brush! His painting of "Freedom" inspires the Mythavians to rebel and soon Crane is in prison.

Don Heck's art is fair to middling on "My Forbidden Paintings!" This is another story about being careful what you wish for, and it ends with an unfortunate panel (just like the story that precedes it) where the main character sits and swears to change his ways, having learned his lesson.

Sydney Burr was trying to invent a time machine, but instead his machine makes everything and everyone but him stand stock still. Like every single other Atlas character, he decides to use this as a way to get rich quick. He runs around town, robbing people, stores, the bank, and so on. He returns to his lab and pulls the lever on his machine, certain he'll be able to enjoy his newfound wealth. Oops! The cops arrive and tell him that, although everyone was standing still, they saw everything he did.

"I Made Time Stand Still" has a bad script and worse art. Tom Gill drew The Lone Ranger for Dell for more than a decade--remind me not to pick up any issues at the next comic convention.

For years, a man has been drawn to the sea, always searching for something. In the Caribbean, he encounters a beautiful mermaid named Alethea and it's love at first sight! She heads below the surface of the water at sunset and the man heads back to port, where he is roundly jeered. Next day, the man heads out to sea again and sees Alethea once more. "I Love a Mermaid!" he declares and dives into the sea to follow her. He discovers that he can breathe underwater and has a tail, so they live happily ever after.

I was a bit confused by this dud. Are we supposed to take away that the man had a tail all along? Carl Burgos never shows us the man below the waist until the last panel, where his merman parts are revealed, but you'd think the guy would have wondered why his legs were replaced by a giant fin. Maybe that's why he was always drawn to the sea. I don't understand why the mermaid wears a skintight yellow shirt with a yellow bra outside the shirt. I guess I just don't follow mermaid fashion.

"The Man Who Floats in Space!" is a decoy set out by Bogane, the Martian space pirate, to catch every ship that comes close enough to investigate. Three spacemen hide inside an asteroid and get inside Bogane's lair. Soon, the Space Patrol uses a real floating man to capture Bogane and get rid of the menacing decoy.

Ditko's art is wasted on this wretched tale. How much more godawful science fiction will we have to endure before things get more interesting around here? We're just two tears and four months away from Fantastic Four #1.-Jack

Next Week...
Don Heck Helps Us
Blow Bye-Bye Kisses
To Two More Titles

Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 179: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction & Fantasy Comics!

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 164

June 1959

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Strange Tales #69

Cover by Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule

"The Man in the Iron Box!" (a: Carl Burgos) ★

"Rocket Ship X-200" (a: Don Heck) ★1/2

(r: Fear #5)

"Journey Into Nowhere!" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★

(r: Fear #3)

"The World That Was Lost!" 

(a: Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule) ★1/2 

(r: Tower of Shadows #9) 

"The Threat from the 5th Dimension!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★

(r: Tower of Shadows #9) 

Brilliant but selfish scientist Phineas Stokes perfects a suspended animation coffin that will keep him alive and in a deep sleep for one million years. Phineas ain't digging the current affairs in the world and wants to wake up when war is over. Presumably, one million years will do the trick. Government officials come to Stokes's door and beg him to help them with defensive weapons, but Phineas sends them away, telling them he couldn't care less about America. 

The day arrives and Phineas Stokes takes his place in the Suspendo-Anima™ chamber to take his big sleep way below his home in a secret cavern. Meanwhile, far above his new bed, government leaders seem to get their acts together and join for world peace. War ends and, as the centuries roll away, earthlings spread their wings and depart for other planets in the galaxy. Earth becomes barren. "The Man in the Iron Box!" awakens (freshly shaved and his hair exactly the same length as when he laid his head down on his fluffy pillow) and roams the empty landscape until he's approached by a handful of commie-lookin' goons who explain that they're from a distant planet that loves war. Phineas is cuffed and taken prisoner, soon to be one of their "warriors."

Ironic, huh? We're reminded in the final panel (probably by Stan) that this is the fate of anyone who doesn't come to the aid of their government (presumably this means the Soviet government as well, but that's not stated), so if a Fed knocks on your door and asks you to build a better H-bomb, you should do it. I would have liked to know how this iron box stayed powered for one million years. Couldn't be solar and I would imagine the electric company shut Phineas's power off after three months of non-payment.

Charlie Brewster still hangs onto his old-fashioned "Rocket-Ship X-200," which can only do the Kessel Run in 25 parsecs, unlike the new speedboats the young whippersnappers fly, which zip through space so fast they would miss an incoming armada of warships from another planet. Whoops, I got ahead of myself, but then there's not much here to blab away about. Charlie saves Earth and the other space jockeys decide there's room for old-timers in the space lanes. I never saw that ending coming... well, okay, I did. Nice Heck work, though.

Two brilliant but naive scientists perfect a time machine, but not just any time machine. You see, in the Atlas present day, everyone is building a time machine (and we've certainly read each and every one of their stories, haven't we?), but this gizmo will be different in that it will be the first time machine that can travel into the future. So, Walt and Tom hop into their multi-million-dollar machine and hit the way forward for one thousand years. When they step out, they're disheartened to see a tribe of cavemen wandering around with clubs.

 "Damn, it's the Republican National Convention of 2024"  "We seem to have made a miscalculation in our time/space continuum figures and arrived one million years in the past!," utters Walt, and the two zoom back to present day. One of the cavemen spots the two visitors and hoofs it back to the tribe to explain to them (and us) that the first wave of time travelers has arrived and they have to be ready when the next bunch lands so they can explain to them that it's not really the past but the future cuz damn us all to hell we did it we finally did it and after the 8th world war the planet will be ruled by... men in loincloths. Love that final panel that explains everything to the eight-year-olds that didn't get it. We've yet to see a really good time machine story here in the Atlas zines, so I'm thinking Bill and Al used them all up years before. Once you finish "Journey Into Nowhere!" you'll discover that at least the title is perfect.

Eccentric millionaire Linus Vermeer hires Captain Jordan and his crew to take him out to a part of the sea he's sure holds the lost city of Atlantis. The crew all think the bald, wheelchair-bound Linus is batty, especially when he orders the captain to drop anchor and says, "This is it!" However, the look on their faces turns from amused to astonished when Linus whips away his lap blanket and jumps into the sea, his huge flipper wagging in excitement. Holy cow, this guy's a mermaid! The climax, of course, is supremely predictable, there's no other way to end this thing, but I do find it cool that Linus is the spitting image of a certain wheelchair-riding mutant leader who'll pop up about four years in the future.

The finale, "The Threat from the Fifth Dimension!," does not chronicle the popular music group of the late 1960s but rather the horrifying story of a man who is attacked by demons in his sleep. Are these really creatures hoping to enter our world through our hapless hero's sleeping body or the hallucinations of a diseased brain? Either way, this is one sloppy read. The script meanders and Ditko's art looks like a mess of colorforms and empty backgrounds. Not what we've come to expect from the mystic dazzler. And that puts a bow on what could be the worst ever issue of Strange Tales.-Peter

Strange Worlds #4

Cover by Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule

"Journey to Jupiter!" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★★

"A Magician Walks Among Us!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★

"The Man Without a Past!" (a: Paul Reinman) ★

"I Was the Changing Man!" 

(a: Al Williamson & Roy Krenkel) ★★

"Manhunt on Mars!" (a: John Buscema) ★★1/2

Far in the future, Earth has set up trade with every other planet... except Jupiter. We've done everything we could to convince the biggest planet that we only want peace and brotherly love. We've hurled rockets, H-bombs, VHS tapes of the Star Wars Christmas Special, everything we could at their force field, but nothing will allow us to "Journey to Jupiter!" and present our case to them that we are simply a peaceful race with only good will in mind.

Only ace astronaut Glenn Scott figures out a way to persuade the Jupiterians to let down their guard; he floats a giant black box just outside Jupiter's force field and the gullible dopes can't help themselves. They examine the box and find it completely empty. For some reason, this equates with peace in their minds and they turn off their defenses. Glenn lands and negotiates a fair-trade deal and the worlds co-exist in peace from then on.

There's so much stupid but entertaining nonsense here to unpack. Why would Earth decide that the best way to show we want to be friends is by destroying Jupiter's force field? One of my biggest chuckles came when Glenn returns from a business trip on Mercury. I wanted to see what kind of suit he'd wear to avoid going up up up in a puff of smoke. The Jupiterians turn out to be a friendly but gullible bunch, don't they? What if Glenn had planted a 40-trillion megaton Z-bomb in that box? I really wanted to see the climax we would have gotten in the pre-code days where Jupiter's leaders are putting pen to paper while Earth's armada arrives to invade and strip mine the planet of its minerals. Now that would have been a cool twist. 

In "A Magician Walks Among Us!," brilliant but goofy Professor Dolen builds a time machine and travels back to the days of King Arthur, convinced that Merlin the Magician was, in fact, a scientist who had traveled back in time. Dolen's machine blows up once he arrives in Camelot and he's stuck in the past. His search for Merlin is fruitless; no one recognizes the name. It's not long after that the prof realizes to his (but no one else's) shock that.... Holy Cow!... he's Merlin! Predictable but fun fantasy with Ditko back on his game. 

A man working on a rocket assembly line suddenly questions who he is and how he came down with amnesia. The bosses tell him to get back to work, but the man's anguish is too much and he breaks out of the building. After a full-scale manhunt, our hero is found and sent back to the android factory for reprogramming. The problem with "The Man Without a Past!" and most of these Atlas SF/F tales is that the writer (Carl Wessler?) sticks to a formula that's been done umpteen times already, so the reader can guess from the third or fourth panel where the veer in the road will take us. It doesn't help that the Reinman art is so awful that the characters all look alike; this from an artist whose pre-code art was in the top tier.

Brilliant but self-serving Duncan Sloan has invented a gizmo that allows him to "dematerialize" and enter the brain of another human being. Rather than use this machine for the betterment of mankind and maybe win the war against those stinkin' commies, Sloan decides to invade the body of Emerich Fabius, the richest man on the planet, in order to hang out on the bestest beaches of France and attract the hot chicks. 

When Fabius's tin mines are seized by the government and he goes bankrupt, Sloan decides it's a good time to exit, stage left... and lands in the brain of Hollywood idol Vincent Stalwart, he of vast riches and hot chicks galore. Unfortunately, with Stalwart's sex appeal come jealous jilted lovers and one of them puts a bullet in the screen star. Sloan once again has to make a quick exit without being sexually fulfilled and nary a trip to the bank.

After a third attempt at transferal goes belly up (this time with a South American dictator--what could go wrong there?), Sloan decides he's good enough being in the body of a seventy-something brilliant scientist and dumps his machine in the waste basket, never to be used again. "I Was the Changing Man!" has a few good laughs (for once, these are intentional) and some dazzling graphics from Al and Roy but has me once again asking the question, "Why do these eggheads turn to criminal acts rather than marketing their inventions for profitable gain?"

In 1993 Russia, political prisoner Anton Volocheck escapes a visit to the firing squad and hops aboard a rocket ship to Mars. Once on the red planet, he discovers its people are just as bloodthirsty as his communist compadres back home. He escapes death a second time and flies back to Earth to tell his government officials what he's found. He then escapes yet again and finds his way to America, where he finds an audience with our president. He informs the chief that he has told the Russkies that Mars is a friendly planet and will welcome the Reds with open arms. A clever twist is hard to find by 1959, let me tell you, so the dark and twisted reveal at the climax of "Manhunt on Mars!" had me smiling from ear to ear. This was the last Atlas art Buscema did before he quit comics and took up commercial art at a New York advertising firm. He would not return to Marvel until 1966. Who knows what Buscema could have done for Marvel superheroes from '61-'66 had he stuck around.-Peter

World of Fantasy #18

Cover by Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule

"The Creatures Who Captured Earth!" (a: Don Heck) ★1/2

"The Clock Strikes Never!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★1/2

"To Build a Robot!" (a: Jack Kirby & Christopher Rule)

(r: Tomb of Darkness #11) ★1/2

"The Man Who Talks to the Stars!" (a: John Forte) ★★

"Xom! The Menace from Outer Space!" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★1/2

One day in 1980, the sky is filled with flying saucers! Aliens land and announce that they're from the planet Cygnus and they're here to show Earthlings how to have everything they want without having to work. Soon, people across the planet are living blissfully, but an astronomer named John Warren is having none of it. He concludes that the aliens plan to conquer our planet after we become lazy. At first, no one believes Warren, but he sneaks aboard a flying saucer and finds a book that lays out the aliens' plan, just as he suspected. He convinces everyone to fight the invaders and the aliens are quickly defeated. They leave and Warren tells us to remain ever vigilant.

The twist ending to "The Creatures who Captured Earth!" is that there is no twist. This boring tale is utterly straightforward. I was hoping it would turn out to be a pre-Twilight Zone adaptation of "To Serve Man," but no such luck. Heck's art is nothing to get excited about.

Frank Hanes steals the time machine he's invented and travels to the year 2059, only to find futuristic police waiting for him. He sets the wayback machine for the past and escapes, recalling how he felt unappreciated at his job at World Electronics, even when he invented a time machine for them. Unfortunately, Frank gets caught in a loop and finds himself a younger man, applying for his job and starting all over again.

Ditko's art is fun, but "The Clock Strikes Never!" makes about as much sense as any other Atlas time travel tale. By the end, the hooded personification of Fate is narrating, speaking directly to the reader and informing us that Frank's future will be based on the choices he makes. I have to hand it to Ditko for taking a mundane idea and making it visually exciting. The young Frank looks an awful lot like Peter Parker.

An inventor named Dexter Scott visits Luther Worthington, a titan of the automobile industry, and proposes a stunning plan--for a million-dollar investment, he'll build a thinking robot! Tut tut, says Luther, it can't be done, and he shows Dexter the door. Alone in his office, Luther admits that he has always discouraged experimentation because he, a thinking robot, doesn't want competition!

Yawn. More clunky art from Kirby and Rule, more simpleminded stories. "To Build a Robot!" barely qualifies as having a plot.

A reported named Hank Johnson gets a hot tip and rushes to the park to meet "The Man who Talks to the Stars!" The man in question is sitting on a park bench, calmly feeding the squirrels and the pigeons. He whips out his communication device and places a call to the star named Ursa Volans, but Hank isn't buying. The man explains all about the distant star and takes out his tourist map, which leads him to the realization that he's on the wrong planet. Oops! He's off in a puff of smoke, disappearing into the sky. Now Hank is a believer!

I got a kick out of the end of this one, when the man laments that "I landed on a restricted primitive planet by mistake! I'd better leave before I'm penalized and lose my passport!" I also am predisposed to liking a story with a newspaper reporter who calls another character "Mac." John Forte's style can seem wooden at times, but here it's just wry enough to work.

Philip Lindsay is a cosmic archaeologist in the year 2744, exploring a remote star system when he happens on an uncharted planet. He and his crew land their ship and are met by aliens who ask for help defeating "Xom! The Menace from Outer Space!" Xom is a great big, hairy creature who moves very slowly and is surrounded by a circular wall. Phil zaps Xom with this ray gun and that ray gun, but nothing has any effect. Phil then spies a plaque on the wall around Xom and confronts the aliens with the truth--Xom is a sweet teddy bear and they're the bad guys. They admit that they wanted the ivory from his giant teeth and, found out, they head off.

Once again, the aliens have one big eye. Xom doesn't do anything other than look big and menacing. I would have expected Kirby to draw a story with a creature like this, but perhaps the lack of a scene of Xom rampaging through the city streets meant it was assigned to Joe Sinnott.-Jack

Next Week...
Some Dazzling
Al Williamson!