Showing posts with label 1950s. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1950s. Show all posts

Monday, January 8, 2024

Russkie-Smashers SUB-MARINER (and Namora) "Unseen Invaders"

Let's celebrate the New Year enthusiastically with even MORE Russkie-Smashing...

...featuring Marvel's (retroactively) first mutant, Prince Namor and his cousin, Namora!
Written and illustrated by Subby's creator, Bill Everett, this tale from Atlas' Sub-Mariner V1N37 (1954) shows that, while Namor is as anti-Russkie as he was anti-Axis in World War II, Americans still don't trust him!
Marvel Multiverse note: the aliens resemble the Badoon, officially-introduced in Marvel's Silver Surfer #2 (1968)...who also used invisibility and flying saucers!
Bill Everett brought the Badoon into his final run on Subby in the 1970s...as allies of Namor's evil cousin Prince Byrrah!
Coincidence?
I think not!

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Monday, December 18, 2023

Russkie-Smashers MARVEL BOY II "Phantom Pen"

...and we're going to close out the year with one more action-packed tale starring him!
Illustrated (and likely written) by Bill Everett, this tale fom Atlas' Astounding #6 (1951) was the next-to-last appearance (and final Russkie-smashing story) starring the character in any form until his revival as The Crusader in the pages of Marvel's Fantastic Four #164 (1975).
Note: due to constant reboots of Marvel Universe continuity since the late 1990s, this is now in dispute.

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which includes all of Marvel Boy's 1950-51 appearances as well as the 1953 re-intro of Captain America, Human Torch and Sub-Mariner

Monday, December 11, 2023

Russkie-Smashers WONDER BOY "Midnight Showdown"

Like a certain Man of Steel, this character was also a survivor of a doomed planet...
...now a castaway on Earth, battling evil (including Russkies, of course) during his 1940s-50s career!
The teenage Last Son of the Planet Viro, possessing super-strength, speed, and limited invulnerability, arrived on Earth inside a meteor in Quality's National Comics #1 (1940).
Though he came to Earth in his teens, he never referred to his family or life on Viro.
He wore civilian attire from time to time, but he didn't have a secret identity, and everybody called him "Wonder Boy" no matter how he was garbed!
Since he was created and owned by the Eisner/Iger Studio, which "packaged" stories and art for publishers, he and other Eisner/Iger characters (like studio mate Phantom Lady) would be leased to other publishers when contracts weren't renewed, or if the characters' rights were purchased by the client and continued by in-house staff, as was the case with Blackhawk, Uncle Sam, among others at Quality.
In Wonder Boy's case, he bounced from Quality to Elliot, then to Ajax-Farrell, who published this particular tale in Terrific Comics #16 (1955).
BTW, this tale may be a re-working of a previously-published comic story, which Eisner/Iger was notorious for, as shown HERE, where a story written and drawn for one character was modified/updated for a totally-different character!
Or, it may be a totally-new tale.
We're not yet certain.

Monday, November 27, 2023

Russkie-Smashers BLACKHAWK "Hitler's Daughter"

You read the title and muttered "What the f@#c does this have to do with Russkies???
Well, it does have a lot to do with Russkies, as you'll see as you read this never-reprinted tale!
World War II had ended only a decade earlier when this tale appeared in Quality's Blackhawk #97 (1956), and, if anybody did the math, Hitla (who appears to be in her mid-20s) would have been born around 1930-32...when Hitler wasn't married, but he was involved with Eva Braun...who was never pregnant!
Curiously, at that time in real life, Adolf's half-sister, Angela Raubal, and her 21 year-old daughter Geli, moved into Hitler's home.
Hitler's relationship towards Geli, while initially kindly, eventually bordered on the obsessive, fueling rumors that they were romantically linked...which Hitler denied.
In late 1931, Geli was found dead at Hitler's flat in Munich.
Verdict: suicide.
Did writer Joe Millard know about this, and could he have used it as a cover story for the imposter daughter in this Dick Dillin-penciled and Chuck Cuidera-inked story?
We'll never know!

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Monday, November 20, 2023

Russkie-Smashers BLACKHAWK "Doom in the Deep"

When you fail at killing just one Blackhawk (as seen last week)...
...try to kill all of them in one fell swoop!
Like last week's tale, this never-reprinted story by writer Joe Millard, penciler Dick Dillin, and inker Chuck Cuidera is from Quality's Blackhawk #96 (1956) features Russkies getting their butts kicked again by the Dark Knights!

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Monday, November 13, 2023

Russkie-Smashers BLACKHAWK "Case of the Missing Blackhawk"

Easily the busiest Russkie-Smashers of the 1950s were the "Dark Knights"...
...who were using that phrase long before The Batman co-opted it in the 1970s!
They would fill entire issues, like the never-reprinted Blackhawk #96 (1956) from Quality with nothing but Commie-crushing comics tales like this!
You didn't think Andre was really dead, did you?
And why was he wearing that leather Blackhawk uniform under a business suit?
Written by Joe Millard, penciled by Dick Dillin, and inked by Chuck Cuidera...as were all the Russkie-smashing stories in this issue...as you'll see over the next two weeks!

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Monday, May 22, 2023

Russkie-Smashers BLUE BEETLE "Rookie Trouble!"

We presented a Russkie-Smashing story featuring this character HERE...
...and, oddly, though Dan Garret had been a cop since 1940, he's still considered a "rookie"....in 1955!
This never-reprinted tale from Charlton's Blue Beetle #20 (1955) was part of the first batch of new stories about the character after several issues of reprints from the original Fox Comics run.
Penciler Ted Galindo, inker Ray Osrin, and an unknown writer treated the character as a less-powerful Superman, with most of the Man of Steel's powers and relationships transposed to Dan Garret/Blue Beetle and his supporting cast!
There are some changes in his abilities from his just-reprinted Fox Comics tales, so this may actually be a reboot, and not merely a continuation of the earlier series, though it's never clearly-defined!
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