Captain Crossbones!

 

cover art by Ogden Whitney

Soldiers of Fortune (published by the American Comics Group) began its twelve-issue run with the March-April 1951 issue. For most of its run, it featured two modern-day adventurers (Ace Carter and Lance Larsen), as well as a pirate known as Captain Crossbones. By the time it ended its run, the comic had morphed into a war comic--probably in response to the beginning of the Korean War. 

It's the first Captain Crossbones story that we'll be looking at today, because... well, because pirates are nearly as cool as dinosaurs and original Star Trek. Not quite--but close.

We don't know who wrote this story, though we do know the art was by Sheldon Moldoff. The tale recounts the origins of Captain Crossbones. He begins life as a young apprentice named Tom Rutherford, who runs away from his cruel master and stows away on a boat.

But his romantic notions of life on sea are soon squashed. Once he's found, the captain puts him to work scrubbing the decks. The other sailors haze him and when he fights back, one of them burns the image of the royal seal onto his arm. The sadistic sailor had no reason for using the royal seal other than it was handy and it was a way to cause Tom pain.

The captain punishes the sailor, but further feuding is put on hold when the ship is attacked by the notorious pirate Red Rover. Tom's ship is captured, but he's spared from walking the plank when the captain runs a bold bluff, telling Red Rover that Tom was a member of the royal family and had a mark on his arm to prove it. Tom, in other words, is worth a fortune in ransom.

The bluff works and Red Rover holds Tom prisoner rather than kill him. 

The story is a  little weak here. Tom spends several years on the pirate ship, learning the trade and growing an Errol Flynn mustache to remind us that swashbuckling is in his future.

Why Red Rover never sought to ransom him and how Tom was able to avoid committing atrocities along with the rest of the crew is never explained. He's just suddenly an adult with some wicked fencing skills.

Things finally come to a head when the beautiful Lady Nancy is captured by the pirates. Tom kills a pirate to defend her. Tom is tied to the mainmast as punishment, with the intent of eventually whipping him to death.

But a sympathetic pirate named Duke lets Tom free. What follows is a duel to the death with the Red Rover, then Duke using a cannon full of grape shot to subdue the rest of the crew. Tom, taking the name of Captain Crossbones, is now in charge.

Lady Nancy and Tom have, of course, fallen in love. But he's a pirate now whether he wants to be or not, so he sends her away in a boat. 

It's a fun story despite some weakness in the middle act. It moves along briskly, gives us heroes to like and villains to hate, and Moldoff's art is strong. We may visit again with Captain Crossbones at some point.

You can read it online HERE.

Next week, we'll visit with Superman's Pal.

Sir Spot the Lion-Hearted Leopard

 

cover artist unknown

I love discovering obscure characters that have since vanished into Comic Book Limbo. And, by golly, I've found another who is worthy of standing side-by-side with Tommy the Time Traveling Cat or Travelin' Toughy. 

Today, we examine the origin of Sir Spot, the Lion-Hearted Leopard, who first appeared in Animal Fair #1 (March 1946). The artist is Bill Bailey and the writer is unidentified.

A leopard named Freckles, who loves poetry, is picked on by bullies. In response, he's found a hidden location in the woods where he dons a cape and mask, then practices swashbuckling moves with a sword.

But, alas, Freckles knows he's too scared to ever really become a brave knight.

Until the opportunity is thrust upon him. A messenger from the queen stumbles up to Freckles, needing help. With no other choice, Freckles fights the soldiers pursuing the messenger. To his surprise, he wins! All that practice pays off.

Information in the scroll being carried by the messenger leads newly-confident Freckles (though we can now call him Sir Spot) to a castle, where the queen is being held by an evil duke. Sir Spot jumps the wall, takes out some guards, rescues a maid, encounters the duke, defeats him and then discovers the maid is really the queen in disguise.

The graceful queen knights Sir Spot, but Freckles decides that he should keep his knightly identity a secret. He'll be around for more adventueres.

His origin story is pretty cool, with Bailey's artwork endowing the story with energy and a sense of adventure. Sir Spot would go on to have stories in all 11 issues of Animal Fair, which you can read online HERE. He also later appeared in two issues of Fawcett's Funny Animals (#63 & #67). I haven't found these issues online, so I can't confirm whether they are new stories or reprints from Animal Fair, though both have different titles than any of the Animal Fair tales. 

Next week, we'll return to the early days of Timely (later Marvel) Comics and visit with the original Human Torch.

Where the Heck is the Stag?

 

Cover artist unknown

The unidentified writer and artist who brought us the story "The Enchanted Stag," which appeared in Let's Pretend #1 (May/June 1950), have left me a little confused. Charming art and a script that effectively generates a proper fairy tale ambiance leave us with an entertaining little tale. But where the heck is the stag? Despite the story's title, there isn't a stag to be found.

We also seem to start in the middle of an ongoing story. Perhaps the publisher used the second part of a longer tale, knowing we'd be given enough information to follow along. Perhaps the stag was involved earlier in the story. That's just a theory. It really doesn't matter, because what we have is fun.

Anyway, we start with the girl Daray and her younger brother on the run in the woods. Helpful expository dialogue tells us they are running away, because a witch had put a spell on their father and turned him against them.

 They stop to get a drink from a brook. This brook, though, talks, warning them that anyone who drinks from it will turn into a faun. The young brother discards this warning, drinks, and promptly turns into a faun.

They eventually find an abandoned house and move in. Daray cleans the place up, while her brother openly regrets that he can't help much because he's now a faun. Hey, kid! Can you still walk? Got two hands? THEN YOU CAN PUSH A BROOM, CAN'T YOU?

Eventually, the faun is spotted by a hunting party led by the king. They trail the kid back to the house. The king, fortunately, turns out to be a good guy. He takes in both the kids to care for them.

Seven years later, Daray is grown up and marries the king. But remember the witch who originally drove her into the woods? She's still around, with a plan to dispose of Daray and get her daughter to marry the king. (How this ties into her driving the kids away from their dad years later isn't explained.)

The witch's daughter, in disguise, enters the castle and gets into everyone's good graces. Then, while Daray is resting after giving birth to a child, the witch and her daughter drug her and toss her out of the castle to her death.

But NEVER MATCH WITS WITH A DRUGGED QUEEN WHEN DEATH IS ON THE LINE! Daray returns as a ghost. The king figures out what's going on and brings Daray back to life with Love's True Kiss. The witch and her daughter are arrested, which also breaks the spell on Daray's brother, who returns to being human.

Which is the first indication that his original transformation was because of the witch and not some random enchanted stream. The point of the transformation isn't addressed.

It sounds like I'm making fun of the story and it IS flawed in terms of story construction. Even a fairy tale should proceed from Point A to Point B in an internally logical manner. But, as I said, the art is charming. Heck, even when it's creepy (when Daray is tossed from the castle), it's still charming. And the story is a nice one despite the sloppy plot. Heck, maybe the story problems do result from shortening a longer tale. 

Decide for yourself. You can read this one HERE. 

Eva the Imp

 

cover artist unknown

I love stumbling across obscure and forgotten comic book characters. Little Eva ran for 31 issues during the early and mid-1950s. Two issues of reprints by another publisher appeared in 1957, titled Eva the Imp. I kind of like the latter title better. 

Little Eva #7 (April 1953) includes the story "Watch Dog"--writer and artist both unknown. Eva has done what she sees as a favor for the boys of the neighborhood, but they are busy playing war and won't listen to her.

Well, the boys soon find out what she's done. She's fixed up their playhouse with curtains and flowers! She's even cleaned the floor!  And, well... THIS ABOMINATION WILL NOT STAND! 

Boys will be boys and they've soon declared the curtains to be bandages for their "war wounds" and the flowers become medals. Then a really big stray dog wanders in and they make him a watch dog to keep Eva out while they go back on patrol.

Eva brings some more flowers into the clubhouse while they are gone. When she sees the curtains and flowers she brought earlier are gone, she assumes the big dog ate them and, therefore, must be hungry. So she gets some bones from the local butcher. When the boys come back, she sneaks out a window, but leaves the bones behind.

The boys think the bones belong to Eva. Obviously, the girl has been eaten by the dog!

They begin to cry, but Eva soon appears at the window. Their grief turns to anger and they chase the poor girl. But it turns out that the big dog LIKES girls:

The story is sincerely funny--especially the gag about the dog having supposedly eaten Little Eva. The art is clean, effective in both telling the story well and adding to the humor. Little Eva's superpower may have been nothing more than being adorable,but, by golly, that's not a bad superpower at all.

You can read this one online HERE.

Next week, we return to the Lonely War of Willy Schultz.

A Time Traveling Cat, Part 2

 

cover artist unknown

Artist Thurston Harper and an unknown writer brought Tommy the Time Traveller back for another (and final) adventure in America's Funniest Comics #2 (December 1944)

Judging from his two appearances, Tommy doesn't put a lot of thought into where he travels. He's struck by a thought--in this case, a thought about Ancient Egypt--and decides to go there. Dr. Goatee, who would be in prison on multiple charges of child endangerment if he didn't live in a Comic Book Universe--then lets Tommy borrow his time machine.

In the previous story, Tommy visited King Arthur, where all the knights were anthropomorphised dogs. In Ancient Egypt, though, the inhabitants are human. Comic book readers were still mostly kids in 1944, but it would have been known by then that a lot of guys in the military were reading comics. I wonder this was an attempt to toss our boys overseas a little eye candy.

Anyway, Tommy meets Cleopatra, who mistakes the cat for Julius Ceasar. Tommy doesn't know this and is just confused that a girl is hitting him with "mush" when he just wants to have adventures.

Cleo takes him to the arena, where some captured Phoenicians are about to get fed to the lions. Tommy jumps into the arena to help and gets a lucky break when the lions try to attack his shadow and knock themselves out against the arena wall. He then convinces Cleo to give football a try. It's violent, but nobody is likely to get killed.

The football game, complete with cheerleaders and modern equipment, continues apeace until the real Julius Caesar arrives. Condemned as an imposter (though Tommy didn't know Cleo thought he was Caesar), Tommy runs for it. Caesar follows, but gets knocked out in another slapstick accident.

By now, Ancient Egypt is definitely unsafe for Tommy. The time machine roars by to save him just befor Caesar's soldiers get him.

Once home, Tommy wants to see what cavemen were like. Sadly, Tommy and Dr. Goatee move into comic book limbo at this point, so the prehistoric adventure is one we'll never see.

Like the first Tommy adventure, this one is funny, drawn with charm, and contains a dollop of real adventure. It really is too bad Tommy didn't stick around. He was fun.

You can read this story online HERE. 

Next week, we'll visit with Batman.

A Time Traveling Cat, part 1

 

cover art by Victor Pazmino

SPECIAL NOTE: Last week, I said I would talk about a story in which a squirrel attempts to skip school. It's a story I found online in a comic book that has fallen into the public domain. But, after reading it, I failed to make a note of the comic book's title. Now I can't find the darn story! Too many funny animal comics were being published at the time and that naughty squirrel is thus able to hide from me. So I'm moving on to a time-traveling cat. 

America's Funniest Comics #1 (Sept. 1944) was the first in that title's two issue run. Both issues include a story about Tommy the Time Traveler, a young cat who has access to a time machine. Well, it's not every day you stumble across a time traveling cat. So we'll cover his premiere adventure this week and his final adventure next week. The artist who chronicled Tommy's adventures is Thurston Harper. The writer is unknown.

Tommy has an interest in history. At the museum one day, he sees a suit of armor that had belonged to a knight named Watts Cookin. This night is said to have one day disappeared from King Arthur's court and was never seen again. Anxious to find out what happened to the knight, Tommy asks to borrow Dr. Goatee's time machine. 

What's interesting is that Dr. Goatee implies that Tommy has borrowed the time machine in the past and already had some adventures. This comic was put out by one of the many small publishers who came and went during the 1940s. It's possible that Tommy had showed up in another, largely forgotten book before this. But if so, I can find no record of it.

Of course, if this is Tommy's first recorded adventure, then the "he's done this before" vibe allows the writer to get the backstory out of the way in just one panel, leaving plenty of room for the actual adventure. If I had to guess, I'd go with this being Tommy's first appearance.

Anyways, Tommy is soon dressed in Watts Cookin's armor and winging his way into the past on the uniquely designed time machine. He reaches Camelot in 592 AD and greets the knights of the Round Table (who were busy playing jacks) with the phrase "What's cookin'?"

Tommy's odd speech patterns confince the knights he's a witch and they drag him outside to burn him. We learn here that the time machine is sentient, has it clobbers the knights and saves Tommy.

Tommy manages to convince the knights that he's friendly. He rides out with them on a quest to defeat a giant and the giant's pet dragon.

When they see the dragon, Tommy assumes it's a fake, because dragons exist only in fairy tales. Well, it turns out they also exist in stories starring anthropomorphic animals. The dragon is real, but Tommy's sword blows tickle it enough to make it run off.

Tommy gets rid of the giant by hanging a large mirror in front of its cave, frightening the big guy into running off. I have no idea where Tommy got the mirror.

The two monsters soon return, though, convincing Tommy its time to jump into his time machine and fly home. It's only when he gets back that he realizes that the knights of the Round Table thought Tommy's name was "Watts Cookin" based on how he initially greeted them. The knight was Tommy all along.

The story is fast-paced and fun, effectively blending silly humor with adventure. Tommy, in his eagerness to time travel and learn more about history, is an appealing protagonist. We'll join him next week for his second (and sadly last) adventure.

Click HERE to read the story online.

There's No Nice Way to Say It--Dullwit the Fox IS Dumb!

 

cover art by Bill Walton

Adventures in Wonderland #1 (April 1955) includes the story "Dullwit, the Dumb Fox," with art by Dick Rockwell. And, by golly, there really ISN'T a nice way to say it. Dullwit is an idiot.

We meet him on the way to school, dressed in a new coat and carrying his lunch. But a crow tricks Dullwit, stealing the lunch. Then a couple of hedgehogs trick him, stealing his coat. When he comes home from school that night, he has a note from the teacher saying he's too dumb for school. Mom briefly tries to console and encourage him, but then resignedly tells him "I guess you are dumb!"

Not exactly in the running for "Mom of the Year," is she?

Actually, the standard of intelligence among the foxes isn't that high. A fox named Dapper Dan is luring foxes into traps, so that their pelts can later be sold. We see him trick one fox into a trap by promising him he'll find a money tree in that spot.

Dapper Dan lures Dullwit into a trap by promising him some "smart juice." But Dullwit is too small for the trap, gets loose and stumbles across the cage holding the captured foxes. He's too dumb to figure out how to unlatch the cage. Because he's cold without his coat, he starts a fire. In a panic that the surrounding woods will catch fire, Dapper Dan and his bear partner run into the trap that had been meant for Dullwit. 

Later, fox police officers, searching for the kidnap victims, find everyone. The foxes are freed, while the bad guys are taken off to jail. Dullwit, however unintentionally, is responsible for capturing Dan and the bear, so all the kids who had been picking on him now try to make him smarter.  They start with trying to teach him 2 + 2, which he'd been struggling with earlier. And maybe--just maybe--he starts to learn.

It's a silly story, but silly in a good way. Rockwell's art is charming--the story does succeed in getting us to sympathize with Dullwit when everyone (even his Mom) is picking on him. And it's nice to see all the other fox children joining together to help him learn in the end. This is a story that could only have been told years ago, since nowadays we automatically wonder if Dullwit has a learning disability. But such things weren't understood in 1955. And besides, the other foxes don't come out looking that bright either. Falling for the old "You'll find a money tree" trick? Come on! I myself haven't fallen for that one in months!

Click HERE to read this story online. 

Next week, we go from a dumb fox to a smart squirrel--who is trying to come up with a plan to skip school.

Travelin' Toughy--the Final Chapter

 

After two adventures in the desert, Ding Dong #5 (1947) finds Toughy flying his carpet over the Swiss Alps.

And, yes, he finds someone in trouble. This time, the cry for help comes from a pretty Swiss girl named Heidi. Toughy is able to find out that her boyfriend Leif is in immediate danger, so he doesn't stop to get the full story before bringing Heidi aboard his carpet and zipping to the rescue. They find Leif being worked over by some thugs. But never bring just your fists to a fight with a tough kid on a flying carpet. You won't stand a chance.

Leif's leg has been injured. And Toughy learns that, in an ill-adviced attempt to make Leif jealous, Heidi had agreed to marry whomever wins the upcoming ski jump. So Leif's rival Alf has sent the thugs to make rig the contest.

But it's really Leif that Heidi loves. So Toughy tries to sabotage Alf's jump, but this only launches Alf on an even longer jump than he would have otherwise made.

Toughy then tells Leif to go for altitude. Leif jumps into a low-lying cloud, where he's then able to hitch a ride on the flying carpet before coming back down. He wins Heidi's hand in marriage. Happily ever after.

Toughy flies off, planning on visiting France. I wonder how the heck that little kid navigates? 

As far as I know, there were no further issues of Ding Dong published and Travelin' Toughy disappears into Comic Book Limbo. Since his character development was complete--going from "I hate everyone" in the first issue to "I like helping people" by the end of the fourth issue--perhaps his saga was indeed complete. But, on the other hand, the stories are clever, full of good slapstick humor and enhanced by Ted Miller's wonderful artwork. Travelin' Toughy deserves to be remembered and it would have been nice if he'd stuck around longer.

Click HERE to read this issue online.

Next week, I think we'll visit the Planet of the Apes.

The Origin of the Shadow--Well, Sort Of.

 

cover art by Paul Reinman

I'm doing this post on a Thursday rather than a Wednesday (when I normally do comic book reviews) because this actually isn't a review of a comic book story.

For years, comic books often included a short text story to take advantage of different postal rates. Two pages of text were required to qualify a comic as a magazine and thus get lower rates.

So today we are going to look at the Shadow text stories that appeared in the eight issues of Archie Comics Shadow comic book, published for eight issues in 1964 and 1965. The comic book stories themselves are considered an abomination by most Shadow fans. Despite a fairly accurate depiction of him on the cover of the 1st issue, the stories within were essentially about a completely different character. 

But the eight-part text story--one part per issue--that was published during the comics' run was actually pretty good. It's an Alternate Universe Shadow, taking elements from both the pulp and the radio version of the character, resulting in a unique but viable take on the character.

In this version, Lamont Cranston is filthy rich, but bored with his life running the Cranston Corporation. So he leaves that life behind and randomly chooses Cairo as a destination at which he'll try to find adventure.

Well, he finds it. First, he runs into a hypnotist that performs a street act. Then he out-hypnotises the hypnotist, discovering a natural ability that allows him to control the minds of others. 

He sails for Greece. Aboard ship, he sees a trio of thugs attempting to murder someone. On a whim, he cuts a poncho-like costume out of the canvas covering a lifeboat. Using this to blend in with the dark, he then uses boxing skills to surprise and take out the thugs. Of course, they weren't the most efficient thugs, what with their murder attempt (trying to shove their victim overboard) taking long enough for Cranston to make a costume.

In Greece, Cranston continues to run into trouble. One night, someone comes diving through the glass window of a bistro, pursued by three armed men. Here's where the story gets pretty cool. Using his hypnotic powers, he get the armed men to drop their guns by convincing them the weapons are red-hot. Then he tells them to fight each other. While they are busy pummelling each other, Cranston questions their intended victim. I love this image--Cranston and the guy he saved calmly talking to one another while three criminals beat the snot out of each other right next to them.

That guy turns out to be Weston, but in this universe he's the head of the American Secret Service, not the New York police commissioner (as he was in both the radio and pulp universes). He's currently working with an organization called C.H.I.E.F., an U.N.C.L.E.-like group that uses agents from various countries to take on extraordinary threats to the world. 

Because of the timing of these stories (coming out the same year as the TV series premiered), I think the simularity to U.N.C.L.E is just a coincidence, but I'm not sure.

Anyway, Cranston discovers the thugs have been programmed NOT to give away the name of their boss or what the upcoming plot against the world might be. He does manage to flatter them into giving away their boss's name anyways by convincing them he's the Devil and telling them what a great job they've done being evil.

The name of their boss? Shiwan Khan--the pulp Shadow's arch enemy!

All this takes up seven chapters over the first seven issues of the comic book. Sadly, the eighth chapter presents us with a cliffhanger that will be forever unresolved when Shiwan Khan captures Weston and Cranston. After issue #8, the comic book was cancelled. 

So if anyone ever invents interdimensional travel and visits this particular Shadow universe, please find out what happened to that particular Shadow. His story wasn't Walter Gibson-quality, but it was still fun and was the only good thing to come out of that particular comic book. It is sad we never got to finish his story.