The Marvel/Atlas
Horror Comics
Horror Comics
Part 129
December 1956 Part II
by Peter Enfantino
and Jack Seabrook
Cover by Bill Everett
"Inside the Silent Box!" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★1/2
"They Took Me Away!" (a: Al Williamson & Roy Krenkel) ★★
"The Hidden Man" (a: Tony DiPreta) ★
"Harmless!" (a: Ed Winiarski) ★
"When They Appear!" (a: Bob Powell) ★1/2
"The Man Who Was Erased!" (a: John Forte) ★
Greedy old miser Ebediah Riggs suddenly walks through his hometown as if he's got an invisible load upon his back. What gives? Well, Eb sponsored a trip to the island rumored to be Sinbad the Sailor's last stop. The caves should be filled with treasures, right? Eb does find a chest in a dark cave and takes a look "Inside the Silent Box!" Out pops a specter, introducing itself as "the old man of the sea" and informing Eb that he once sat atop the strong shoulders of Sinbad. Now, the ghost needs new transportation. And that's why the old-timer walks the streets of Anytown with a stoop. The facts are presented plainly, with no excitement nor straying from cliche. The Sinnott art is nice but Joe gets nothing to inspire him.
"The Hidden Man" is a thief who steals from hardware stores and leaves the proprietors frozen. When the police track the robber to a nearby cave, they discover that the man is from Saturn and he was short on Earth cash so he was stealing equipment to repair his rocket ship. As the cops look on in amazement, the alien blasts off back to his own world. Dreadful stuff, with one-time fave Tony DiPreta delivering lifeless artwork.
The hits just keep on coming with "The Man Who Was Erased!," about a scientist who creates a gizmo that can whip up "multiple celled life!" All his research means that he's neglected his family for years and he convinces himself that now that he's stumbled on the greatest achievement known to mankind, he'll play catch with little Timmy and dry the dishes with Hazel. He drives home that night to discover his house gone and his neighbors unaware of his identity. "I've got it!," screams the looney egghead, "I must destroy all my notes and gizmos and my life will reappear just as it was before I had my fabulous breakthrough!" He does so and his home reappears, wife and son intact. I mean, he's no scientist now since whenever he works on a project he's essentially screwed but hey, we all make sacrifices for our art, no?-Peter
Cover by Bill Everett
"Who Steals My Brain" (a: Joe Sinnott) ★★★
"Tyrant!" (a: Bob Powell) ★1/2
"The Four Sam Smiths!" (a: Vic Carrabotta) ★
"The Face in the Air!" (a: Mac L. Pakula) ★
"The Thing!" (a: Manny Stallman) ★★1/2
"Out of the Swamp" (a: Bob Forgione) ★1/2
Mr. Octi has arrived on Earth from a faraway planet, an emissary sent to pave the way for a full-blown invasion. He takes over the brain of brilliant scientist Brad Forest and forces him to take him to Forest's home so that he can study our species up close. Octi is startled to find that our race just digs violence, with children mimicking shootouts at the OK Corral and wrestling and boxing on television. In the end, Octi releases Brad from his cerebral cortex prison and explains that his own species would never make it against such a violent society. As Octi's ship blasts off and heads back to outer space, Brad chuckles and praises God that Octi misinterpreted a little fun and games for violent behavior.
Dishonorable Sam Smith pulls a job and is chased into a University lab by the cops. There he falls into an atom-smasher and is split into four parts: himself, now the "good" Sam Smith, Sam the thief, Sam the liar, and Evil Sam, the one that "does evil just for the sake of evil!" With his newfound honesty, the good Sam Smith swears he'll return the money and make his wife proud. In the end, it turns out, the other three Sam Smiths were actors, hired by Sam's best friend to bring Sam to his senses and make him a good guy. The final panel of "The Four Sam Smiths!," where the twist is revealed, is hilarious, reaching new heights of inanity only previously hinted at.
A soldier is wounded on the battleground and sees a hovering face topped with a mane of silver. But why? Turns out he saved the man from drowning years before and now the stranger has saved his life... he's an army surgeon! "The Face in the Air!" is a three-pager with some really sub-par work by Mac Pakula.
Millionaire Lem Hass is sick and tired of his fellow man, so he wanders into a nearby swamp to find a life of peace and quiet. Lem stumbles across an old man who leads him through the swamp, where he arrives at a wonderful little town on the edge of the murk called Gladestown. Hass deposits his million dollars in cash in the town's bank and begins a life of excess and respect. Only one thing eludes him: the gorgeous Eleanor. But the pretty blonde is already engaged and wants no part of him, so the vengeful Lem destroys his competition's successful business and waits for Eleanor to come crawling to him. That doesn't happen. What does happen is that the town begins disappearing right before Lem's eyes. Eventually, he's back to standing in a "filthy" swamp when the old man returns and explains that Gladestown is nothing more than a mirage. "Out of the Swamp" makes little to no sense; if it's a mirage, how could the old codger see exactly what Lem saw? The only original aspect of this one is that Lem is not a criminal; he's not a great guy, that's a given, but his wealth was not achieved through robbing banks or offing rich wives. Bob Forgione dukes it out with Mac Pakula for the issue's most primitive art.-Peter
Cover by Bill Everett & Carl Burgos
"The Condemned Man!" (a: Reed Crandall) ★1/2
"When the Phantoms Speak!" (a: Bob Forgione & Jack Abel) ★★
"He's Still Following!" (a: Vic Carrabotta) ★
"Fade-Out!" (a: Dick Ayers) ★
"Invaders of Earth!" (a: Manny Stallman) ★
"The Other Me!" (a: Bob Powell) ★★1/2
A tyrant orders a man to be shot but, when the man runs off, the tyrant dismisses him, remarking that "'it no longer matters.'" The tyrant heads outside and gets into a waiting car that takes him to a secret location. Knowing that the war is nearly lost, the tyrant has arranged to be put into suspended animation for 300 years, at which time he'll awaken and retake power.
Something goes wrong and he sleeps for an eon! When he awakens, he finds the world changed and not at all as he expected. Finally, after days of wandering, he comes upon his palace, where he is arrested and another tyrant orders that he be shot. The first tyrant escapes and the second tyrant is unconcerned because he, too, is heading off to be put into suspended animation for three centuries until he can reassert his power. The first tyrant watches from the bushes, understanding that the new tyrant is as much a fool as he was.
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| A very EC-like panel from "When the Phantoms Speak!" |
It's interesting to compare Forgione's art on "Out of the Swamp" in this month's Mystic with his art as inked by Abel in this story. It looks to me like Abel helps quite a bit, since Forgione's solo work is pretty bad. In fact, the art on this story is quite strong--too bad the writing is so weak.
In 1780, greedy Bruce Carmody enlists the aid of a sorcerer named Hollowell to find the gold left by his father to his brother Joe. One potion later, Bruce sets off on a long series of adventures in far-flung places, only to end up back at home, where the treasure was hidden all along. "He's Still Following!" is four pages that seem like four hundred, with sub-par art by Carrabotta and a narrative that jams way too many events into a small space before ending with a head-scratching climax.
Bored with his job as an astronomer, Grover Hawkins suddenly finds himself transported from the New York City subway to a mountainside, where he is butted by a large ram. He is suddenly back in the subway! The next day, he is transported to the Black Sea, where his sailboat capsizes! Each day, another adventure occurs before Grover is catapulted back to ordinary life, until one day it all stops. Little does he know that it was part of a test by aliens to see if he could survive on their planet, since he signed up on a list at the planetarium for the first trip to outer space.
So many of these Atlas stories follow a pattern where a character undergoes one or more unexplained events and it turns out to have something to do with creatures from outer space testing man's ability to withstand space travel or to survive on another planet. Unfortunately, all of them are equally awful and the harebrained explanations fall as flat as the art by Dick Ayers.
Another tired Atlas trope involves the discovery by one group that they are tiny in comparison to another group. "Invaders of Earth!" adds nothing original to the plot device and the art by Stallman is particularly wretched.
A young man named Carl Hanson saves an older man named Lucius Farrar from drowning. The thankful Lucius carves a miniature doll that looks just like Carl as a gift for his savior and tells him never to part with it or abuse it. Six months later, Carl needs money and agrees to sell the doll to a man named Kashmir but, in the months that follow, Carl experiences painful visions and discovers that Kashmir is a smuggler who has escaped the authorities and carries the doll with him. Carl tracks the man down and recovers the doll just as Kashmir's hideout is on fire! He vows never to part with it again.
Bob Powell saves the day, and not for the first time in an Atlas comic. The story is predictable but Powell gives something extra to his pages and his art continues to look like it did in some very fine work he did in the '40s.-Jack
Cover by Joe Maneely
"The Betrayer!" (a: George Roussos) ★★
"Oh, Perfect Crime!" (a: Howard O'Donnell) ★1/2
"He Won't Open the Door" (a: William Wellman (?) and Jack Abel) ★
"The Man Who Didn't Belong!" (a: Robert Q. Sale) ★
"They Dare Not Come" (a: Bill Everett) ★1/2
"Man in a Trance" (a: John Forte) ★1/2
A spaceship is headed for Earth, but is its mission to bring peace or war? Wealthy Philip Clark is one of the only people who knows and he spends lavishly to build an underground bunker for himself on the remote island of Bimur in the South Pacific. If the aliens turn out to be friendly, no worries, but if not, he'll be protected in his isolation. Clark is "The Betrayer!," having lied that his goal was to save his fellow man when all he really cared about was his own safety.
As the rocket approaches, it's determined to be on a mission of peace. Clark thinks he's safe, unaware that when the huge rocket touches down, it will destroy all life for miles around. Not knowing Clark's location, generals direct the aliens to land on the isolated island of Bimur!
Not a bad start to an issue, "The Betrayer!" doesn't try to do too much and ends with a twist that I did not see coming. For once, the story is better than the bland art.
Ever since an accident, the Great Gambo has had the power to teleport objects from one place to another. He signs with an agent named Mac Connors, hoping for work on stage, but Connors insists that the Great Gambo steal for him. Gambo reluctantly agrees and, when Connors tells him to teleport a million dollars from an armored truck to his office, Gambo makes it happen. Unfortunately, the magician is a bit too anxious to please and teleports the entire truck into the office, causing the floor to collapse and the police to show up and arrest Connors.
Not much to see here, folks--the Great Gambo is not developed as a character and the twist ending to "Oh, Perfect Crime!" is silly. O'Donnell's art is pleasant enough in a cartoony sort of way.
When professors show him a map leading to the lost gold of Pizarro in the Amazon jungle, a tycoon named Preston agrees on the condition that he lead the expedition. In the jungle, he alienates everyone by pushing them too hard, but his increasingly high offers of payment keep things moving along. Alone one night, he sees a hut by a river that's not on the map. Preston is convinced that crossing the river is the key to vast riches, so he begs the man in the hut to take him across. Inside, Charon wonders if he should accept Preston's offer and ferry him across the River Styx!
"He Won't Open the Door" is a poorly written, badly illustrated story that seems to have been created backwards from the surprise ending. Preston is an unlikeable character and I didn't care what happened to him. The art is so bad that the last few panels hold little weight.
When Steve Donner bravely pulls men out of a cyclotron after an accident, one of the men is unfamiliar to everyone. "The Man Who Didn't Belong!" only knows that his name is Rex and his mother's name is Denise, but otherwise he has amnesia. Steve lets Rex share his pad and gets him a job at the plant, but over time Rex becomes an irritant, getting promoted over Steve and stealing his gal. One day another accident occurs at the cyclotron and Rex disappears. Among the cadre of reporters interviewing Steve is a blonde named Denise, and he intuits that they'll marry one day and have a son named Rex.
Robert Q. Sale's art is always a little off to me and in this story it veers into just plain ugly. Of course Rex was Steve's future son. How did he end up in the cyclotron as an adult? Ask Carl Wessler, master of the confusing plot and disappointing twist.
Things are looking bleak at the weather station on Mars. Supplies are running low and men are collapsing left and right, but when a supply ship approaches and sees the terrible storm, well, "They Dare Not Come." The station commander won't tell the ships to land and eventually he's the only one left standing. Finally, the weather clears and the ship lands. All of the men who collapsed receive medical attention and the commander gets a new fuel pellet. After all, he's a weather robot!
What a difference a competent artist makes! Not much happens in this three-pager, but Bill Everett manages to make it look exciting. I was wondering if the men were dropping dead or just passing out; thank goodness it turned out to be the latter.
The four Flynn brothers have been searching all over England for the long-lost Drake diamond. Brother Ronnie invents a formula that allows a person to pass through the dimension of time and enter the past, but no one wants to take a chance, so they follow a rumor to the shore of Newcastle, where the diamond is said to be buried. After two weeks of digging, Ronnie decides to try the elixir and travels back through the centuries, where he soon falls in love with Drake's pretty daughter, Nancy. Drake doesn't want her to marry a pauper, so they decide to steal Drake's diamond and elope. They are chased to (where else) the shore of Newcastle, where they bury the diamond. Ronnie refuses to divulge its location and, before he is imprisoned, he returns to the present and tells his brothers that he knows where the diamond is buried. He digs it up, but his love for Nancy makes him rebury it so it will be there when she tells her father where it is. The brothers give up looking in disgust and Ronnie thinks happily that Nancy did not get put in a dungeon.
Partway through the four pages of this convoluted story, I felt like a "Man in a Trance" due to the unlikely twists and turns of events and the uninspired art by John Forte. I guess that the diamond was not there when Ronnie and his bros first dug, but after he went back in time and buried it, it was there. But if he leaves it there for Nancy to find, won't it not be there? My brain can't handle this kind of complexity.-Jack
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| Next Week... Batgirl Gets Her Back-Up Let's Hope That's a Good Thing! |
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