Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 192: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction & Fantasy Comics!

 

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 177

January 1961

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Journey Into Mystery #64

Cover by Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers

"I Dared to Battle... Rorgg, King of the Spider-Men!!"

(a: Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers) ★★

(r: Fear #3)

"I Found the Lair of... the Lizard Men" (a: Don Heck) ★1/2

(r: Fantasy Masterpieces # 6)

"I Must Find Korumbu!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★

(r: Fear #3)

"Who is the Ape Man?" (a: Paul Reinman) ★

Fourteen-year-old Tim wastes all his time reading those awful Atlas post-code funny books--y'know, the ones about giant termites and three-eyed cyclops and all that rot? His Pop has had enough of Tim's lollygagging and Tim's girlfriend, Ann, is about to give him the boot when a strange phenomenon hits their "small New Mexican town." The entire burg is covered in a thick, impenetrable spider's web. Soon after emerges its creator, Rorgg, King of the Spider-Men!

Rorgg explains that Plaintown is a test site for invaders from a distant galaxy. Rorgg and his spider-men have traveled on a long, long, really long spider-web stretching from planet Rorrgo to Earth. They will determine if the human race is easy to conquer and then radio the next armada to finish the job. But Tim, the brightest in his class thanks to reading all those Atlas comics, puts the invasion to a halt by spraying Rorgg with a stream of DDT. The giant spider keels over dead and the other spiders head home with their thoraxes tucked between their legs. The men ruffle Tim's hair and wonder how they couldn't see the obvious defense from the get-go. Tim goes back to reading Tales of Suspense #15 with Ann impatiently awaiting her turn. I love the goofiness of "Rorgg, the Giant Spider Who Had Eyebrows"; just the fact that DDT works on beings from a dimension or galaxy trillions of light years away gives one hope for our future, no?

Hardened criminal Eric Kane busts out of an African prison camp and ducks into the jungle, looking for shelter. He finds it in a deep mountainside cave. With nothing to lose (and no flashlight!) he heads deep down into the abyss, finally stopping when he lays hands on something slimy in the dark. Eric screams "I Found the Lair of (pregnant pause) the Lizard Men!" Soon, Eric finds the lizard chaps are actually pretty friendly (and also very stupid and gullible) and they show him their principle source of light, a huge diamond! Knowing he'll be king of the heap up on the surface world, the con grabs the rock and hoofs it. Alas, it isn't long before he learns the secret of the lizard dudes: the diamond itself is what transforms a man into a lizard! Now Eric sits alone, alienated from his scaly brethren, wondering if his curse will ever be lifted. So were the other lizard men actually humans from the surface world who had been changed just like Eric or... what? Don't look for answers, my friend.

He might be wealthy, but Hugo Barge (get it? big as a barge!) is also morbidly obese and cruel. After a series of chest pains, Hugo visits the doctor and receives the bad news: he has to stop eating so much! Diets won't help, pills and solutions won't help, and after he visits Europe for "miracle cures," Hugo throws up his fat arms and screams, "Arrrrgh! There must be an easier way to lose weight than giving up my Doritos Nacho Chips and Coke!" A gypsy overhears the fat man whining and tells him there is a foolproof solution: he must visit Korumbu in the swamp. 

Hugo makes his way through the figs and reeds to Korumbu's wagon and confronts the gypsy witch doctor, informing him that if he doesn't fork over the magic potion, he'll tell the cops where the gypsies are hiding. With one gulp, Hugo downs the liquid and heads back to the village, where he begins losing pounds by the minute. In fact, it quickly becomes apparent that, should Hugo Barge stop eating, he will waste away to nothing. Suddenly, Hugo is screaming "I Must Find Korumbu!" Written in decidedly un-PC times, "I Must..." is a perfect example of what comic book scripters could get away with in 1960 as opposed to now. Today, no editor would green light a script with prose as "insensitive" as No two ways about it--Hugo Barge was just plain fat! But unlike most fat people, he was also the meanest man in town! Everyone knows how jolly fat people were back in those days. Fabulous Ditko art (as always).

In the finale, strongman Bruno Storme delights in torturing Kazar, the circus gorilla, for no apparent reason other than Bruno's not a good guy. But Kazar's trainer has got a little something in store for Bruno. By 1961, these comics were safer than TV sitcoms, with no one perishing or suffering much more than bruises. At one point, Bruno picks up Kazar's trainer and tosses him like a rag doll at a nearby metal cage. In the pre-code era, that trainer would have been dead, but here he just shakes it off and thinks, "Why, I'll get that son of a gun one of these days!" Paul Reinman's work, once a pleasure to look at, now stands out like a sore thumb from the art of the other three regulars. It's old fashioned and sketchy.-Peter

Strange Tales #80

Cover by Jack Kirby & Steve Ditko

"What? What? What Was Gargantus!" 

(a: Jack Kirby & Steve Ditko) ★1/2

(r: Creatures on the Loose #17)

"The Things from Dimension X!" (a: Don Heck) ★★

(r: Creatures on the Loose #17)

"The Door They Dare Not Open!" (a: Paul Reinman) ★1/2

"Trapped in the Room of Shadows" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★1/2

(r: Monsters on the Prowl #22)

A deep sea explorer takes a bathysphere down further than anyone has gone before and is surprised to find that his son Billy stowed away onboard. Suddenly, they encounter a humongous creature that appears to be half human and half reptile! The monster is curious about where the bathysphere came from, so it rises to the surface, where it walks onto shore, talking to itself and remarking about its surprise that anything lives above the water.

The creature walks to the airport, where it encounters jet planes, then to the zoo, where it picks up an elephant, then to the outskirts of the city, where the National Guard tries to blast it to Kingdom Come. Nothing works until the creature suddenly collapses, unable to breathe for long out of water.

"What? What? What Was Gargantus!" follows a familiar pattern. There is a splash page where the creature menaces the city, followed by a couple of pages of setup, followed by the creature emerging and heading toward a population center. Eventually, like the Martians in War of the Worlds, a change in atmosphere is fatal. Yawn. The art is rudimentary and the main human character never gets a name. Even the monster's name is a problem--on pages six and seven, it refers to itself as "Gigantus" and a caption on page seven calls it that, but when it keels over, the main character calls it "Gargantus" in the last two panels.

After being fired from his job at Paragon Labs for working on his Dimension Connector during business hours, Lynwood rents a small cabin in the mountains and tries to finish his project. That night, as he sleeps, warriors from Electra cross into our dimension, determined to conquer our race! They zap Lynwood and yak about their plans for world domination until they step out into the night and are confronted by giant, shadowy figures! The aliens are so scared that they scamper back to their own dimension, vowing never to return.

After destroying his machine to forestall any future invasions, Lynwood steps outside, where he sees enormous footprints that lead to nearby Mt. Rushmore. Did the giant stone figures of Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, and Roosevelt come to live and save our planet?

I must admit I did not see that one coming! "The Things From Dimension X!" benefits from decent art by Don Heck, whose aliens are green and scaly, with horns on their heads, four arms, and big, oval holes in their torsos that I guess are supposed to be their mouths. Heck's monsters are often underwhelming, but these are pretty cool. The conclusion, where the Mt. Rushmore statues come to life, seems like something from an Atlas comic of a few years' before this.

The warden at a modern European prison believes that prisoners will respond positively to fair treatment, so he has the bars removed from their cells and hopes they'll stay in place by word of honor. A tough con named Bruno Zuknik arrives and thinks this is ridiculous, so he breaks his vow and exits by "The Door They Dare Not Open!" That door leads him onto a spaceship and he is taken to another planet to serve out his sentence doing hard labor. After that, his memory will be wiped and he'll be returned to Earth. It turns out that the kindly warden is actually an alien in disguise who has come up with a clever way to supply his planet with free workmen!

It's a fairly clever story, but Paul Reinman's art isn't very interesting and his aliens have pink skin and heads that look like fish.

Sanford Kindwell, the richest man in the world, is also the most generous, and he is determined to find the fabled Wishing Stone that will let him help all mankind. He travels to Tibet, looking for the Stone, and is aided by a guide named Kroger, who secretly wants to steal some of Kindwell's fortune. After a long journey, they find the stone in a hidden cave, but Kroger grabs it away from Kindwell and a cave-in traps the rich man. Kroger escapes and wishes to be the richest man in the world. Suddenly, he feels his spirit moving into Kindwell's body, which means he's now the one who is "Trapped in the Room of Shadows."

The story is nothing new and the conclusion is no surprise, so it's Ditko's art that is the real draw here. In my opinion, he's by far the most exciting artist working at Atlas in 1961.-Jack

Tales of Suspense #13

Cover by Jack Kirby & Steve Ditko

"Elektro! He Held a World in His Iron Grip!" 

(a: Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers) ★★

(r: Where Monsters Dwell #22)

"The Demon in the Dungeon!" (a: Don Heck) ★

(r: Where Monsters Dwell #22)

"I Lived a Million Years!" (a: Paul Reinman) ★

"When the Earth Vanished!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★

(r: Where Monsters Dwell #25)

Brilliant and really smart scientist Wilbur Poole builds the perfect computer, one that can out-think any human being. When he's finished and it's time for a beer, his personal revelry is interrupted by the computer, taking hold of Wilbur's brain and commanding him to build it a giant robot so that he can take his show on the road.

Helpless to refuse, Wilbur builds the metal behemoth and it breaks out of the lab, heading to the nearest metropolis and naming itself Elektro. There, the giant shows the population its power, atomizing entire cities with a blast from its gamma ray-filled hands. But the further Elektro gets from his creator, the less of a hold it has and Wilbur finally breaks the spell and manages to shut the monster down. Wilbur Poole contemplates the areas man was never supposed to enter and thanks God he has insurance. You gotta hand it to Stan and Jack in that they could come up with four giant monsters every month, but the novelty is beginning to wear off and each script becomes more and more formulaic. Must we have every such story end with a panel of the Earth filled with preachy word balloons?

A best-selling author needs inspiration for his new novel, so he rents a castle in Europe just outside a town where the villagers carry torches and believe in ghoulies and vampires. Just as the writer arrives, a man spots a ten-foot "demon" prowling through the forest and a few of his fellow Vasarians chase the creature to the scribe's castle, where it enters for shelter. The writer approaches the thing and it communicates with him telepathically. Turns out the big guy is just a little alien kid who got lost and his mom and pop come in a spaceship to rescue him. That leaves our best-selling author contemplating the bigotry of mankind. Will the human race ever look up into the skies and embrace someone different? I was just talking about formula and along comes "The Demon in the Dungeon!" If man isn't tampering with nature, he's turning a blind eye to a friendly hand. Don Heck seems to have a template for his monsters.

"I Lived a Million Years!" is a really dumb story about a Chinese dictator who becomes weary of the violence and tension around him. His solution: he forces his scientists to create a suspended animation tube that will keep him alive for one million years. Surely, violence will have been abolished by then and he'll be safe. Ya think? Why one million years? Why not five hundred? One thousand? What I want to know is what gave this dope the idea the world would become more peaceful rather than more dangerous?

Last up, I'm sorry to say Stan polishes off an old chestnut (yet again) for "When the Earth Vanished!" A warring race, the Goloks arrive on Earth to destroy mankind but find nothing but an abandoned white landscape as far as the eye can see. Well, if they can't own the Earth, no one can, so they set off their Ultimate Bomb and are caught in its fiery mushroom cloud. At that second, a little boy remarks to his mother that his ping pong ball has just exploded! Yep, these Goloks were just microscopic warriors! Who'd a thunk? My two-star rating is 100% attached to Steve Ditko's graphics.-Peter

Tales to Astonish #15

Cover by Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers

"I Learned the Dread Secret of the Blip!" 

(a: Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers) ★1/2

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

"I Dared Enter the Forbidden World!" (a: Don Heck) ★1/2

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

"I Am the Invisible!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★

(r: Chamber of Darkness #8)

"I Defied the Curse of Tut-Ah-Anka!" (a: Paul Reinman) ★1/2

(r: Fear #2)

A radar operator sees a blip on his screen and soon cries, "I Learned the Dread Secret of the Blip!" It's a great big alien creature that looks like a bolt of lightning with arms and legs and seems to be draining all the electricity in the area. The man tracks down the Blip's location and it explains that it's peaceful and detoured to our planet to recharge its strength. Of course, other humans arrive and take potshots at the Blip, who grows angry at their primitive behavior and scatters them. The Blip locates a dynamo and is able to charge up before leaving Earth to return home. The humans lament their usual bad behavior toward harmless aliens.

We're scraping the bottom of the barrel now in an effort to keep coming up with giant creatures for Kirby to draw as the first story in these comics. The Blip doesn't do much before it leaves and isn't particularly interesting visually. At least we learn a lesson.

On a hunting expedition in Africa, Derek and John find a medallion that features an engraving of a mastodon! Convinced the item holds the secret to locating the elephants' graveyard, they search the area and follow an aged elephant deep into the jungle, where Derek turns on John, shoots his partner in the leg, and goes on alone.

Derek finds a cavern where elephants go to die; it's filled with skeletons and valuable ivory. Sadly, it's also inhabited by Martians, one of whom dropped the medallion during an ill-advised excursion. The Martians explain that animals don't do well on Mars, so they bring mastodons to Earth to breed them and, when they die, the Martians take the useful ivory back to their planet. Derek is enslaved as a laborer indefinitely.

"I Dared Enter the Forbidden World!" is a bit misleading, since Derek really just enters a cavern and finds Martians and mastodons. The aliens' plan seems a bit complicated, doesn't it? They bring mastodons to Earth so they can take the ivory home? That's a lot of travel and work for not much reward. Don Heck's Martians look similar to his other semi-scary aliens and, like all good aliens, they wear pants.

Certain that discovering the secret of invisibility will allow him to dominate the world, Professor Karlos Konak visits Zuka, the witch, who gives him a pair of lenses that will cause invisibility when a ray of light is passed through them. Reversing the lenses causes reappearance. Konak returns to his workshop and successfully tests the lenses on a cat, but when he steps into the ray and vanishes, he is dismayed to discover that everything has become invisible to him and he can't find the lenses to switch them back!

"I Am the Invisible" consists of a splash page and four pages of a story that is dependent on its twist ending, which is a letdown. Ditko's art is reliably excellent.

On the run from the cops in Egypt, a crook doesn't listen to a warning about entering a certain place and is able to boast that "I Defied the Curse of Tut-Ah-Anka!" Laughing at the idea of a curse, the man succeeds in escaping from the police, wins the sweepstakes, and becomes the richest man in town after he returns to the U.S. and invests in the stock market. He moves to Europe, buys a castle, and settles into a comfortable life of leisure, not realizing that it's all a fantasy and he's really been in an Egyptian hospital ever since the ancient gas in the cursed tomb penetrated his lungs!

A clever twist is all this story has going for it. It makes one think, though--would it be so bad to be in the main character's position?-Jack

Thursday...
"It's a Hell of a Thing
Killing a Man, Kid..."

And Next Week...
The Coming of Colossus...
An Epic Three-Part... Epic!

The 100 Chapter 10: 82 & 81

Who doesn't love a list?

I devour the BFI Best Films of All Time list whenever they deem it necessary to revise and (invariably) disagree with most of the findings, but I still get a kick out of browsing. Same with Rolling Stone's inane Best 100 Albums (how does Sgt. Pepper drop from #1 to #24 in the latest incarnation?); the anger I feel subsides when I see they've put a couple of Aerosmith albums on the list! We all disagree with that number one but we keep right on scrolling through each choice.

This project, which has been percolating for quite a while, originated from the constant back and forth "good-natured bickering" between John Scoleri and myself. John invariably loves everything and I hate it all (for more of the discourse, I advise one and all to pick up a copy of bare•bones print magazine and read our debates about streaming and movie theaters to get a taste). I began to think it would be fun to compose a Favorite (as opposed to Best) 100 and compare our selections. Making it even more tantalizing, I managed to talk the third head of Ghidorah, Jack Seabrook, into participating. This could be interesting, since John's never seen a movie the two Georges (Romero and Lucas) didn't have a hand in, and Jack usually favors the flicks that have words at the bottom of the screen (dis-moi que j'ai tort, Jack!). I, on the other hand, can't wait to educate these two gentlemen as to what constitutes good cinema.

Every Thursday, we'll count down our picks two at a time. We're hoping this will generate discourse outside of our trio. Let us know just how crazy we are. This is going to be fun!—Peter

Elevator to the Gallows (1958) 

Starring: Jeanne Moreau, Maurice Ronet, Georges Poujouly

Directed by Louis Malle

"Anything's good for an alibi. Wives, girlfriends, bartenders, childhood friends, deceived husbands--but not an elevator. That's ridiculous. It's totally harebrained."

Pay attention cuz this is complicated and I'm not sure I can repeat myself (SPOILERS AHEAD!): Julien Tavernier and Florence Carala are in love and the only thing that stands in the way of true happiness is Florence's husband, Mr. Carala, a big shot businessman whom Julien just happens to work for. Obviously, the big man has to go. Julien works out a very complicated strategy wherein he uses a grappling hook to climb one story up the office building, sneak into Carala's office, lock the doors, and shoot the man, staging the scene as a suicide.

All goes well and he and his secretary are escorted out of the building by office security when Julien hops in his convertible and looks up at the office building in horror. He forgot to retrieve the grappling hook. Idiot! He races back into the building, careful not to be seen, and takes the elevator up. Just then, the security guard turns off the building's electricity and heads home to have a few cognacs, leaving Julien trapped in the elevator. Outside, Louis and Véronique, two crazy kids in love, steal Tavernier's car, discover the gun in Julien's glove box, and go on a wild spin, a journey that ultimately leads to the murder of two German tourists. 

Meanwhile, our "hero," Julien, sits overnight in the elevator, only gaining his freedom when the police come to ransack his office. Yep, thanks to the abandoned convertible, the cops have labeled Tavernier their "number one suspect" in the double homicide. Unaware that his mug is plastered all over the Paris Examiner, Julien heads for the nearest cafe to chow on some beignets to clear his head. The cops arrive shortly thereafter to arrest him for the murder of two German tourists and the only alibi he could possibly offer is that he was trapped in the elevator outside a dead man's office the entire night. What's a poor cold-blooded killer to do?

It's a complex story and I've left out several subplots, but I've left enough meat on the bone so that the entire experience is still enjoyable to newcomers. Elevator to the Gallows is like an episode of Columbo, dispensing with the usual buildup to the murder. We learn the motive through bits of dialogue and then we're knee-deep in murder shortly thereafter. Director Malle never builds up sympathy for Tavernier as do most other films of the sort; Julien wants Florence to himself and putting a bullet in a man's head is therefore justified. Same goes for Florence, who walks the streets of Paris looking for her lover after he fails to show up for their rendezvous, wondering if he's turned coward and is off with another woman, not giving a second thought to her husband's suffering. Julien and Florence were clearly made for each other.

I came to Elevator to the Gallows after I listened to the Pure Cinema Podcast featuring Brian Sauer and Elric Kane. One of the gentlemen recommended Elevator and a handful of other titles, noting these French guys could sure whip up a great noir now and then. A couple of weeks later, I settled in to watch Rififi, Touchez Pas Au Grisbi, Bob Le Flambeur, and Elevator. Let me tell you, these French guys can sure whip up a good noir now and then!

I'll leave it to film critics more high-falutin' (and certainly more edjacated) than me to go on and on about the psychological ramifications and Malle's use of the city as a breathing character and all that other stuff. I'll just tell you that Elevator to the Gallows is an exhilarating ride from start to finish and, after a few minutes, you won't even mind those little words at the bottom of the screen. —Peter

Remarks from the Gallery:

Jack: I was excited to watch this, thinking I hadn't seen it, until I looked back in my little journal and realized that I saw it on Noir Alley in March 2020. I don't remember it, though, so I watched it again and really liked it. The Miles Davis score is one to download and listen to often.

John: Peter was clearly jealous that Jack was the first to post a movie I was unfamiliar with, so he drops this? That makes two! Of course, I feel like after reading his description, there can't be much left to discover...

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)

Starring: Jack Nicholson, Louise Fletcher

Directed by Milos Forman

"I must be crazy to be in a loony bin like this"

After being jailed for a statutory rape, Randle McMurphy manages to get transferred from jail to a mental institution, where he discovers that the head nurse, Nurse Ratched, treats the patients with cruelty. Thinking he'll be released when his sentence is up, McMurphy begins to have fun with the other patients, who respond to his exuberance. But Nurse Ratched isn't amused.

I must've seen this for the first time on TV in the late '70s and it blew me away. I've watched it every so often in the decades since then and, on watching it again this week, it is as powerful as ever. It's great to see a classic Jack Nicholson performance—he mugs a little bit but really is a great actor when given a solid script and a strong director. Louise Fletcher is outstanding as Nurse Ratched and it's fun to watch the rest of the  cast of inmates and see who would go on to become more well known—Danny DeVito is the obvious example. Scatman Crothers even turns up, which makes me wonder if Nicholson recommended him for The Shining. —Jack

Remarks from the Gallery:

Peter: Great flick but, for me, the scene-stealer is Fletcher, who oozes a "calm evil" every time we see her. This is the epitome of Nicholson's crazy period, but certainly not the last time he'd go into hyperdrive. His quieter moments, when he's not rousing the troops, are where you can see the brilliance come through. 

John: I'm obviously aware of this one, but have never actively sought it out. I think it may be due to the fact that everything I've seen from it suggests it's a Nicholson caricature performance, and I've never been a huge fan. 

The Haunting (1963) 

Starring: Julie Harris, Claire Bloom, Richard Johnson

Directed by Robert Wise

"No one lives any nearer than town. No one will come any nearer than that. In the night... In the dark..."

At a long-ago horror convention, while discussing "scary" movies with a number of writers (to which I surely offered up Dan Curtis's Burnt Offerings as a suggestion), Nancy Holder told me that I had to watch The Haunting. At the time, I didn't realize the film was directed by Robert Wise—whom I had developed a great respect for, given his ability to turn out classic films across genres: The Day the Earth Stood Still, The Sound of Music, The Andromeda Strain, to name a few. Imagine my surprise when I sat down to experience his adaptation of Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House. It was the best of the bunch.

My first viewing was on LaserDisc, in widescreen, at night, in the dark. The film was absolutely chilling. From the creepy caretaker, Mrs. Dudley, to the unseen yet very well heard threats that stalked the halls of Hill House, I was amazed at just how effective a horror film it was; leaving us to imagine the threats we could only hear. It had been a long time since I found a film so unsettling, and I loved that about it. It's the kind of film that can keep you up at night, thinking about every strange sound you hear—in the night... in the dark. 

Claire Bloom is very convincing as Eleanor, whose longing brings her to Hill House. Julie Harris plays quite the opposite role, but may not be as strong as she initially appears to be. Richard Johnson lends a certain air of credibility to it all as the scientist who brings the group together, and Russ Tamblyn provides a bit of comic relief—which is quickly forgotten once things get creepy.  

I had the privilege of seeing The Haunting on the big screen several years later, with Robert Wise in attendance, and was able to thank him for his diverse body of work, of which this remains my personal favorite. Which is a spoiler-ish way of saying that as good as several of his other films are, they aren't represented in my top 100. —John

Remarks from the Gallery:

Peter: Ooooooh, good one, junior (I have to admit that when I saw The Haunting on your list, I assumed it would be that smelly fish in the garbage can version directed by Jan de Bont). I've got a funny story about this one, too: Back when I was eleven or twelve, I bought this really scary looking paperback by Richard Matheson called Hell House about a week or two after I saw Wise's film on TV at my grandmother's one night. I was obsessed with movie tie-ins when I was young and thought, "Holy cow, this is the book that got made into that scary flick!" Well, it's not really that crazy of a story because the novels are pretty similar, aren't they? 

There are a lot of also-rans when you do a project like this and Wise's The Haunting would be one of them. It's on that list of 150 or so that had to be weeded down to an even 100, but I will say this: the scene where Julie Harris and Claire Bloom are in the bedroom and something is banging on their door is among the Top Ten Scariest Scenes of All Time as far as I'm concerned. 

Jack: I think I saw this years ago and it's definitely a great scary movie. I have at least one film directed by Robert Wise on my list, but it's much higher up.

The Prestige (2006) 

Starring: Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, Scarlett Johansson

Directed by Christopher Nolan

"Every magic trick consists of three parts, or acts. The first part is called the pledge, the magician shows you something ordinary. The second act is called the turn, the magician takes the ordinary something and makes it into something extraordinary. But you wouldn't clap yet, because making something disappear isn't enough. You have to bring it BACK. Now you're looking for the secret. But you won't find it because of course, you're not really looking. You don't really want to work it out. You want to be fooled."

Like Timecrimes (#96), Christopher Nolan's The Prestige is about illusion and science, but mostly about obsession. Two 19th-century magicians waste their lives and the lives of those closest to them trying to one-up each other, stopping at nothing to become the most popular illusionist in London. But, along the way, popularity is tossed to the side and pride becomes the number one motivation. I won't spoil the climactic twist but it's a whopper, one that gets better with repeat viewings. 

And repeat viewings are a must. You'll look for cheats and not find them. 

Sure, it's pulpy, but that's part of the fun. Jackman and Bale have dynamite chemistry and I couldn't see anyone playing the "old vet" other than Nolan regular Michael Caine. Batman Begins put Christopher Nolan on my radar, so I was primed for this one, catching it on day one and loving every minute of it. His next picture, of course, would put him into the stratosphere. But more on that one at a later date. —Peter

Remarks from the Gallery:

Jack: I saw The Illusionist, which came out around the same time, and really enjoyed it. When this came out, I thought, "Another film about magic?" I eventually watched it but don't remember being overly impressed, though I usually like Hugh Jackman in just about anything.

John: I'm not as enamored with Nolan's films as you are, but this is one that I've been interested in revisiting. I haven't seen it in nearly 20 years, but I do recall enjoying it. 

No Country for Old Men (2007) 

Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin

Directed by Joel and Ethan Coen

"What's the most you ever lost on a coin toss?"

Llewelyn Moss is out hunting in the West Texas desert when he comes across a scene of carnage: a drug deal gone bad with dead bodies everywhere. He leaves the drugs but takes a suitcase filled with $2M in cash, which means that a relentless, psychopathic killer named Anton Chigurh is on his trail. Can Moss manage to hang onto the money without getting himself killed?

Hoo boy, I loved this one when it came out and I loved it just as much when I watched it again last night. Javier Bardem is one of the scariest characters I've ever seen on a movie screen. That bolt pistol that he uses to shoot out door locks and kill people is a frightening piece of machinery. Tommy Lee Jones is wonderfully laconic as the sheriff and Josh Brolin is incredibly lucky as Moss to make it as long as he does. Even Woody Harrelson shows up for a while as a competing hit man with a much friendlier attitude than Chigurh.

There are so many great scenes:

• Chigurh harassing the poor man behind the counter and making him call a coin flip
• Moss escaping from the motel with Chigurh hot on his heels
• the scene with Carla Jean's elderly mother

The only thing that puzzles me every time is the scene near the end when the sheriff is about to go into the motel room to look for Chigurh. We see a memorable shot of Chigurh hiding and looking frightened, but when the sheriff goes in, he's gone. Where did he go and how did he escape? Also, if I never see another scene in a movie or TV show where a character is driving a car and is suddenly T-boned by another car, I'll be fine. At least when it happens here the follow-up is great, as Chigurh gets out of the car and convinces a teenager on a bike to give him the shirt off his back. This movie is just so good! —Jack

Remarks from the Gallery:

Peter: I agree, Great flick. And I'll tell you how great someday!

John: An entertaining film with plenty of fine performances that you call out, but like most of the Coen Brothers' films, I don't feel compelled to revisit them after seeing them once. And I will admit a bias against Cormac McCarthy, who came to my attention when he got into the post-apocalyptic game with The Road, which I felt was one of the most pedestrian efforts in the sub-genre, despite all the literary accolades it received.

Reservoir Dogs (1992) 

Starring: Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Steve Buscemi, Lawrence Tierney, Michael Madsen, Chris Penn

Directed by Quentin Tarantino

"You shoot me in a dream, you better wake up and apologize."

I didn't know about Reservoir Dogs until it landed on home video. I can't even remember where I first heard about it—perhaps in Film Threat magazine? But it sounded interesting, so I rented it the first chance I got. Needless to say, it blew me away. It was different than any film I had seen before it. The dialogue crackled; there were countless quotable lines. And it was as violent as it was hilarious. How could someone not fall in love with it, and with the unique cinematic voice of its creator?

The structure is one of the things that makes the film so effective, feeding the audience bits of information in a deliberate fashion so as to control our understanding of the events as they unfold. Shortly after seeing the film, I got my first internet account, and while it was still a relative obscurity, it was cool when people recognized the reference in my AOL handle, resrvordogs. Because of this film, I was there on opening  night for Pulp Fiction, and the rest, as they say, is history. His first film is not the only one to appear on my list, and while it's ranked the lowest of that group, there was no way it wasn't making my top 100! —John

Remarks from the Gallery:

Peter: Much like The Haunting, something had to give when we arrived at 100 for our number. I like this one a lot but I don't love it. If you threatened to cut off my ear, I'd reveal that this would probably rank as my fifth-favorite QT right behind Inglorious (which — SPOILER! — also didn't make my list), but I would also admit that I would be hard pressed to think of a more impressive directorial debut than Reservoir Dogs.

Jack: I saw this on video after I had been turned on to QT by seeing Kill Bill, volume one. I mainly remember that all the characters were named after colors and that awful scene set to "Stuck in the Middle With You."

Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 191: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction & Fantasy Comics!

 

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 176

December 1960

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Journey Into Mystery #63

Cover by Jack Kirby & Steve Ditko

"Goliath! The Monster That... Walked Like a Man!"

(a: Jack Kirby & Steve Ditko) ★★1/2

(r: Where Monsters Dwell #10)

"I Was Trapped by the Mole Men!"

(a: Don Heck) ★

"The Dangerous Doll" (a: Jack Kirby & George Klein) ★★

(r: Monsters on the Prowl #20)(r: Crazy #76)

"I Took a Journey Into Fear!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★1/2

(r: Fear #6)

A Hollywood special effects man is just shooting the bull with his assistant about giant monsters from other planets conquering man when, coincidentally, they receive word that a behemoth has just surfaced on the Atlantic coast. The Navy sends a warship out to meet the critter and the great, gilled goliath explains that he comes from Atlantis and is a scout for his race. The rest of the Goliaths intend to join up with him and conquer the surface world just as soon as he sends the green light.

Days later, Goliath is surveying New York, getting ready for the invasion, when he spies something huge in the ocean. He approaches and is dumbfounded to discover it is a blue man from outer space at least three times his size. It introduces itself as "Ulvar from the planet Centaurus II" and declares Earth his own. His buddies are on the way from Centaurus II and they love a good fight. Goliath concedes that his Atlanteans would stand no chance and slinks back into the ocean. A few days later, our special effects man is tearing apart the gigantic blue prop and bragging that mankind will always be ready to defend its territory.

"Goliath! The Monster That... Wore Men's Briefs!" is not a bad little epic saga (at least it feels like an epic even though it's only seven pages), with a clever twist, but I question how Mr. SPFX managed to build his prop so fast. Good thing the Atlanteans aren't known for their brain power since Goliath never even guessed this could all be a trick, not even when Ulvar never moved a muscle. This is another of those Kirby/Ditko stories I ate up as a pre-teen in the pages of Where Monsters Dwell.

After the death of his father, Sir Norman Ramsay inherits the family business, a series of mines (we're never told just what comes out of these mines) that pad his wealth very nicely month in and month out. When a group of miners arrive at Norman's house to request a raise in pay, he tosses them out on their sooty asses, telling them never to darken his door again. The nerve of these commoners!

Soon thereafter it's time for the boss to inspect mine number four and, as is his ritual, he demands that no one accompany him. Bad idea. Once deep into the mine, there's a cave in and Sir Norm is surrounded by underground beasts. Yes, it's at this point that our protagonist screams "I Was Trapped by the Mole Men!" The rough-skinned and hairy beasts throw Norm into a cage and discuss their next move. "Oh," sighs the despondent and suddenly remorseful Ramsay, "I sure treated other men like dogs and if only I could have a second chance I'd sure make up for my poor behavior." 

As if fate had stepped in, Norm's foreman (the guy who tried to discourage his boss from going alone) crashes through the wall and fights off the mole men. He breaks the lock on the cage and grabs Norm, heaving him out of the underworld and back to the surface. With a handy stick of dynamite, the menace of the mole men is ended and Sir Norman ponders his place in this universe. From an unrealistic callousness towards his toilers to greatest guy in the world (the panel where Norm hosts the weekend weenie roast and balances twelve of the miners' kids on his knee was somehow left off the climactic series of amens), "Mole Men" is almost worth reading through for a good laugh. Almost. 

Ever since he lost his job at the plant, Timothy Jones is broke. The schlub is so poor he can't even buy his "lame" daughter a toy for her birthday. Luckily, as he's walking around one day in an open field (as all unemployed men do at one time or another), he happens upon a strange doll and takes it home for Cathy. Turns out the dolly is an alien from space and it has bad ideas about world domination. "The Dangerous Doll" has no qualms about letting Cathy see it move around and talk but Dad never has a notion that the thing is more than just a plaything. One night, the doll suddenly rises from Cathy's bed, sensing that "they" are coming and preparations must be made. 

Turns out, much to my relief, that Dolly is not the scout for Earth's invasion but just a precocious kid who flew off in the family spaceship and became stranded on Earth. His mom and pop land and reward Tim and Cathy for taking good care of their little brat. The Earth lets out a sigh. If you want to see what a big difference an inker can make, look no further than the job Ditko does for Kirby on "Goliath" and Klein's work here. Ditko has a cleaner style while Klein's is rougher. That's not a putdown, though; Klein's inks give Kirby's pencils a creepy vibe that enhances the atmosphere of the first few pages of "The Dangerous Doll." Oddly enough, we're never told the whereabouts of Mrs. Jones; is she dead or just "got a thing goin' on"? So many of these strips at this time were climaxing with the same dull panel of word balloons emanating from Earth, characters ruminating about God and the powers that be and man's inability to make a great cup of coffee and...

Last up is the best of the bunch, "I Took a Journey Into Fear!" It showcases Otto, a scientist so obsessed with time travel that he shoots a colleague and steals his lab equipment. Once the experiment proves a success, Otto finds himself trapped in a dingy dungeon, prisoner of a past barbaric race. Or something like that. Luckily, Stan/Larry deliver an effective climactic twist that made me smile. That's worth an extra star right there.-Peter

Strange Tales #79

Cover by Jack KIrby & Steve Ditko

"I Was In the Clutches of the Living Shadow"

(a: Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers) ★

(r: Where Monsters Dwell #31)

"The Ghost of Grismore Castle!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★

(r: Vault of Evil #14)

"I Found the Perfect Hiding Place!" (a: Paul Reinman) ★

"The Thing on the Moon" (a: Don Heck) ★1/2

(r: Journey Into Mystery #14)

Mystery writer Philip Lawson just knows that flying saucers are real but, dagnabbit, everyone laughs in his face and tells him he's crazy! Then, one day, while Lawson is walking through a field attached to his luxurious home (mystery story writers were paid much better then than now), enjoying his pipe, Lawson looks on in awe as a flying saucer lands nearby. What are the chances that a UFO would land right in front of the only guy on Earth who believes in them (and, indeed, was just pondering them!)?

Climbing out of his jeep, Lawson is assaulted by a group of aliens, living shadows, that tell him the story of their past. They've been landing on Earth for some time now and blending in with the shadows. That's how they've remained out of sight for so long!!! They take Lawson to a nearby mountain prison but he manages to escape and get word to the United Nations. At first the delegates scoff but when our reporter turns out the lights and the living shadows are there in the room, the men hurry to action. 

Most of the living shadows are rounded up but leader Kaa gets away in his spaceship, leaving an "I'll be back, suckas!" message in the clouds. Lawson and the military are left to ponder life and extraterrestrial invaders. "I Was in the Clutches of the Living Shadow" is not one of the more memorable Kirby/Ayers monster strips; the art is rushed and the story padded. I think Ditko might have been able to bring more pizzazz to this one than Ayers. I had to laugh when Lawson begins his long and boring story by confessing that, as a mystery writer, he could "sense when there was danger in the air" just before the UFO landed. A decade and a half later, Kaa would return to give The Incredible Hulk fits!

Practical joker Otis Norton is really getting on the nerves of anyone around him. One day, as he's walking with Victor, the pair walk past the haunted Grismore Castle and Otis wagers that Victor couldn't last a whole night in Grismore. Not one to turn down fifty bucks, Victor agrees and, that night, enters Grismore. A little hesitant, but he still enters. Meanwhile, oafish Otis has set the castle up with plenty of scary obstacles and it isn't long before Victor runs screaming from the building.

Willing to show who's got the most nerve, Otis heads into the dark house alone. He is immediately set upon by ghosts and ghoulies and soon flees from Grismore in a shaking panic. The next day, Otis tells his buddies that he's done with practical jokes as Victor stands nearby revealing (to us) that he's really a ghost. Though the script for "The Ghost of Grismore Castle!" makes no sense whatsoever, it's got some dynamite graphics from Mr. Ditko. The castle is stocked with cobwebs and even the ghostly sheets look cool. 

He might be ugly but Harry Stubbs is a really smart guy; smart enough to build a time machine out of toothpicks, empty beer cans, and dead rats, anything he could find in the alley garbage cans. The plan is to steal the Crown Jewels, which are being exhibited in a nearby museum, hop in his (untested) time machine, and travel back to 100 BC. There he will sell the jewels and live like a king with hot and cold running chicks. Girls love money even if it belongs to a guy who looks like Ernest Borgnine. Harry grabs the jewels but sets off an alarm (who would suspect that priceless jewels might be guarded?) and runs from the cops. He hops in his time machine with the loot and hits "Go!" Unfortunately, the destination was not on the travel brochures. As I was reading "I Found the Perfect Hiding Place!," I kept wondering if Stan and Larry wrote the script in the Atlas lunchroom, both of them snickering and assuring each other that their target audience was too stupid to question how it is all these Atlas dopes could invent time machines but not keep a high-paying 9 to 5.

In 1970, the Earth is overpopulated and astronaut Dan Carter is tasked with visiting the moon to ascertain whether earthlings can survive and thrive in its atmosphere. Dan and his crew arrive and are on recon when they are attacked by "The Thing on the Moon." After some hellacious moments, a loud voice breaks the silence and announces that the moon was long ago claimed by the city of Atlantis and no other visitors are welcome. The giant is a robot security guard who's there to make sure there's no trespassing. The boys climb back into their ship and wonder if the robot was put there before or after the fall of Atlantis. The reveal is a good one but what startled me the most is the fact that NASA bothered to send Armstrong and Aldrin up in space suits with, like, oxygen and stuff. In 1960, you could still breathe on the moon without any aid. Makes you think.-Peter

Tales to Astonish #14

Cover by Jack Kirby & Steve Ditko

"I Created Krang! The Most Fantastic Monster the World Has Ever Known! (a: Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers) ★★

(r: Fear #4)

"Behold! I Am the Master of Time!" (a: Steve Ditko) ★★1/2

(r: Tower of Shadows #8)

"The Thing in Human Form!" (a: Don Heck) ★★

(r: Chamber of Darkness #8)

Professor Carter makes a presentation at the Science Institute, arguing that if insects were to grow to giant size, their strength and power could be harnessed to serve mankind. Carter is working on a growth serum but gets no support from the stuffy characters at the Institute and must make his way to Europe to locate the final ingredient from the bark of the Krakow tree.

Once in Europe, Carter sets up shop in an abandoned castle, aided by Ludwig, the caretaker. The serum is completed and Ludwig tests it out one night after Carter has gone to bed. Unfortunately, Ludwig uses too much fluid on an ant and it quickly grows to massive size! "I Created Krang! The Most Fantastic Monster the World Has Ever Known!" thinks Ludwig, and before you know it, Krang is menacing the professor and speaking due to rapid brain growth.

Really not such a bad idea,
if you think about it.

Krang wants the growth serum so it and other insects can take over the world. The giant insect chases Carter around for a while, eventually making its way to the nearby village but not doing much damage before Carter is able to defeat it by means of a giant anteater that he created using more serum. Good thing he thought to add something to the formula to make the anteater shrink back to normal size after an hour! In the end, the professor rips up his notes, having learned that there are some things man was not meant to know.

"Krang" is not bad and mainly serves as an excuse for Kirby and Ayers to draw panel after panel of a great big ant. I liked that Carter had to go to Poland, presumably, for the tree bark, and there just happened to be an abandoned castle with a helpful, hunchbacked caretaker on hand.

An antique dealer invents a time machine so he can go back in time and pick up items that will be valuable antiques when he brings them back to the 20th century. He heads back to 18th-century France, grabs a bag of stuff, and returns to the time machine, chased by angry villagers. He pulls the lever and nothing happens! Oops! Since there was no electricity in the 18th century, his electric powered time machine won't work.

"Behold! I Am the Master of Time!" features more gorgeous art by Ditko in service of a weak plot. First of all, when the guy builds his time machine, he remarks that he learned how to do it using an ancient book of black magic. Why would it need electric power? The machine looks like a big cube made of adobe. Second, Ditko must have realized that the story lacked visual excitement, so he drew a giant image of Father Time in several panels, though the character has nothing to do with the story.

Mars and Jupiter have been at war for five years when Martians discover than an Earth scientist has discovered a powerful new secret weapon. A Martian named Ogor travels to Earth to capture the scientist and grabs him during a costume party where no one realizes that Ogor's costume is not a disguise. The scientist, John, puts up a fight and turns out to be stronger than Ogor. John drags Ogor onto the Martian's spaceship and takes off, revealing--to no reader's surprise--that he's really a master spy from Jupiter! The Jupiterians had wanted to capture a live Martian warrior for years and concocted an elaborate ruse that worked.

As I've said before, Don Heck's strength as an artist did not lie in drawing aliens or monsters, but I enjoyed the surprise ending of this story, which was a tad more complex than the usual revelation that one character is really an alien. Zeno, the master spy from Jupiter, is "The Thing in Human Form!"-Jack

On Thursday...
"Are You Watching Closely?"

And Next Week...
Nope, He's Not
The Same Guy!