Number 1502: “So Captain Marvel zapped him right between the eyes...” — John Lennon

In reading and cleaning up the scans of this UK version of Captain Marvel Adventures #69 (US issue #124), John Lennon crossed my mind. In “The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill”* on the 1968 album, The Beatles, there is this lyric:

“Deep in the jungle where the mighty tiger lies
Bill and his elephants were taken by surprise
So Captain Marvel zapped him right between the eyes...”

One Beatles' song website believes the reference to Captain Marvel means John Lennon was spoofing Americans on superheroes. I think it is more likely that because Lennon was a kid when the British Captain Marvel comics were published (he was 11-years-old when this comic was published in 1951, for instance), he may well have seen or read comics featuring Captain Marvel. Captain Marvel was popular enough that in 1953 when his American adventures ended the British publisher, L. Miller, had Mick Anglo do a close version called Marvelman. Captain Marvel was known in England, so John Lennon using the name wouldn’t seem surprising.

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*You can read the story of the song’s origin in this Wikipedia page on “The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill”.

At the end of 2012 I scanned and posted the UK version of Fawcett's adaptation of the science fiction movie, The Man From Planet X, and last July I posted a UK edition of The Marvel Family Go to them by clicking on the thumbnails:

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#655 - Some more Hi-Res Phantom Daily strips from Emile.

Emile has been sending Hi-Res versions of some of the Phantom and Mandrake strips already available in lower resolution.

I was indisposed for a while and so am a bit late in sharing these with you. Here are 5 of the strips. By mistake I had deleted the previous links for 194 & 195. So I am giving new links. 193 seems to be incomplete, missing a strip.


http://www.mediafire.com/download/rbd64tqsqz2ma25/D193_-_The_Dakk_Pirates_-_1998-09-28_-_1999-01-09_-_15_weeks-Incomplete.cbr

http://www.mediafire.com/download/zr7y7bvpno7yw4a/D194_-_The_Albee_-_1999-01-11_to_1999-03-13_-_9_weeks.cbr

http://www.mediafire.com/download/wgexqurj1kk336e/D195_Terror_at_the_Opera_1999-03-15_to_1999-07-10_-_17_weeks.cbr

http://www.mediafire.com/download/gfjfcyq6ohj6jep/D196_-_The_Ghost_Wall-1999-07-12_to_1999-10-20_-_14.5_Weeks.cbr

http://www.mediafire.com/download/7aq9jt5kc5m747w/D197_-_The_Halloween_Kidnappers_-_1999-10-21_to_2000-01-15_-_12.5_weeks.cbr

Start downloading and keep rechecking the blog for more. And it goes without mention that all credits and praises be showered upon Emile.

Venkit

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Mark of the Tomb / The Unholy Quest

Kickin' off 2014 with a couple of truly terrible tales from the June 1951 issue of Mysterious Adventures #2, a wild Story Comics series that started off a lot weaker than it ended out (two dozen issues later in 1955.) This doesn't mean these stories aren't entertaining though, because they are, in that lo-fi, ultra Z-grade way that bottom barrel B-films entertain. Ed Goldfarb and Bob Baer are responsible for not only the cover art, but also the art in "The Unholy Quest", a tale that would later get reworked by Cirilo Munoz for Eerie Publication's Weird V4#6, and Tales of Voodoo V4#5 --retitled "Black Magic." Another double header from this issue in our next post as well, stay tombed!

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Number 1501: Lou Cameron travels through time

These two stories with time travel themes are drawn by Lou Cameron, a favorite fifties comic book artist. The first story, “Mission Into Time” (which begins with a date of 2014) is from Ace Comics’ Space Action #3 (1952, last issue), and the second, “I Was the First Future Man” is from DC’s My Greatest Adventure #24 (1958). You can see how Cameron developed as an artist in six years. (The stories are not very good, a problem with science fiction stories packed into six or seven pages.)

Cameron didn’t stay much longer in the comic book field. According to the Wikipedia entry on Lou Cameron, he wrote an estimated 300 novels, mostly in the Western genre, many of them under pen names. He created the popular Longarm series as well as the Renegade and Stringer series. Cameron died in November, 2010.

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Number 1500: New year, same old comics

For those of you joining us on New Year’s morning, how are you feeling? Tongue feel like someone stuffed a towel in your mouth? Head throbbing, joints aching, memory-loss from New Year’s Eve festivities? Well, go take a nap and come back when you feel better.

For the rest of you who did not over-indulge (including me), welcome to the first posting of 2014.

The Black Terror was a 1940’s character who had many artists over the years, and many adventures I consider silly. The Black Terror story I’m posting today, while silly, is one of my favorites. The art is credited by the GCD to Ralph Mayo and it has a gorilla. That’s good enough for me. I consider the panel I have excerpted from the story (above) to be some sort of oddball classic. The story is from Black Terror #20, 1947:

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I showed another Black Terror story last May. Click on the thumbnail.

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