Monday, December 24, 2012

Reading Room: Golden Age CAPTAIN MARVEL "Plot Against Christmas"

He's not a captain in the Kree starfleet (or his son)...
This is the original guy, the one who yelled "SHAZAM!", starring in a Christmas tale about a miser who...well read it for yourself...
This Yultide tale from Fawcett's Captain Marvel Adventures #42 (1945) was illustrated by Pete Costanza with touchups by C C Beck.
The writer, who owed a great deal to Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol", is unknown.
Merry Christmas
&
Happy New Year

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Reading Room: ZORRO "Mark of Zorro" Part 2

Art for inside front cover by Bill Ely
Don Diego Vega, secretly the masked man known as Zorro, battles oppression of the middle and working-class citizens of Los Angeles while romancing (as the dashing Zorro), Lolita, the beautiful daughter of caballero Don Carlos!
Art for inside back cover by Bill Ely
Meanwhile, Sgt Gonzales is in search of the man known as El Zorro (The Fox)...
To be concluded, tomorrow, at Western Comics Adventures™, where the previous chapter also appeared!
This book-length tale in Dell's Four Color #228 (1949) was adapted from the novella "Curse of Capistrano" by Johnston McCulley.
(The title "Mark of Zorro" was first used for the 1920 silent film adapting "Curse" and starring Douglas Fairbanks as Zorro/Don Diego.
Since then, when the story is reprinted, the story tends to use the "Mark of Zorro" title instead of "Curse".)
The writer of the comic adaptation is unknown, but the artist is Bill Ely, who has several hundred comic stories covering every genre from 1937 to 1967 to his credit.

This entry is part of our Retroblogs™ Masks Marathon, celebrating the new Dynamite comic series Masks which combines, for the first time, the major masked mystery men of pulps and comics including The Green Hornet, The Shadow, The Spider, Zorro, The Black Terror, The Green Lama, and Miss Fury (ok, a masked mystery woman), among others.
We'll be presenting more never-reprinted stories featuring these characters throughout the month of December.

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Reading Room: GREEN HORNET FIGHTS CRIME "Flirt with Death"

While breaking up a racket, The Green Hornet inadvertently reveals his secret identity to Linda Travers, a Daily Sentinel reporter secretly working for Britt's father, Dan Reid...
(Don't worry, you didn't miss a Hero Histories™ blog entry!
The previous entry was at our brother blog, Secret Sanctum of Captain Video™.)
The secret identity exposure storyline took place over four episodes of the radio show...
"Exposed" 10/28/47 (which we covered HERE.)
"Graft Crosses a Bridge" 11/4/47
"Too Hot to Handle" 11/11/47
"The Man on the Top" 11/18/47
...which were condensed into two eight-page stories in Green Hornet Fights Crime #43.
You can hear the Green Hornet radio episode, "Too Hot to Handle", that contributed primary story elements to the comic tale, HERE.
The art on this final (and never-reprinted) tale from Green Hornet Fights Crime #43 (1949) is presumed to be by Al Avison, but I believe he only did the pencils.
The inking looks a lot like Lee Elias, who was doing, among other things, The Black Cat for Harvey.
The writer of the comic adaptation is unknown.

This entry is part of our Retroblogs™ Masks Marathon, celebrating the new Dynamite comic series Masks which combines, for the first time, the major masked mystery men of pulps and comics including The Green Hornet, The Shadow, The Spider, Zorro, The Black Terror, The Green Lama, and Miss Fury (ok, a masked mystery woman), among others.
We'll be presenting more never-reprinted stories featuring these characters throughout the month of December.

And don't forget to visit...