Lurking under the Christmas Tree: G-Men, T-Men & Spies!

In our continuing quest for cool Christmas presents for the pop culture aficionado in your life, we at Atomic Kommie Comics™ wish to offer you yet another exciting possibility for gift-giving...
Secret agents have been a part of pop culture for centuries, but spying didn't really become a glamorous profession until World War I.
Since then, the image of the spy has been of a heroic figure fighting off foreign evildoers while holding a girl in one arm and a martini (shaken not stirred) in the other...
In that stylish vein, we offer a line of collectibles that present our government's heroic G-Men, T-Men & Spies on classic comic covers in our Crime & Punishment™ collection.
Note: "G-Men" is slang for "Government Men" or F.B.I. agents. "T-Men" were Treasury agents.
Protecting us from threats both internal and external, these brave fictional American men (and women) fought enemies ranging from Communists, to the Mafia, to Iranians (perceived as a threat even in 1955!), and looked good doing it! (The most famous spy in fiction, James Bond, isn't American! He's a member of MI-6, the British Secret Service!)
Choose from 9 different designs including Cloak & Dagger, Date with Danger, Atomic Spy Cases, Al of the F.B.I. (later Al of the Secret Service), T-Man, and GangBusters! Then combine it with one of the kool books or dvds below for the ultimate spy gift set!
Make it a Merry Christmas for your loved one...and the entire Free World!

It's good to be BAD at Christmastime!

It is...really!
Not truly evil, just sorta naughty!
And to that end, here's a kool, retro, 1950s comic cover image from our Seduction of the Innocent™ section.
Quick side note: Seduction of the Innocent was a book written in the 1950s by Dr. Fredric Wertham, a psychiatrist who postulated that, because juvenile delinquents read comic books, comics caused juvenile delinquency! (Psychiatrists today claim the same thing about video games, in the '80s & '90s about horror movies, in the '60s & '70s about tv shows, etc.) So our collection's title is tongue-in-cheek and somewhat snarky, not prurient! As we put it..."Proudly show the stuff your grandparents didn't want your parents to see!"
This particular image is a cutting commentary on the belief that New York City is a den of sin, a modern Sodom (if not Gomorrah), and that only MidWestern small-town values are the RIGHT values!
It's available on a variety of items including mugs, messenger bags, t-shirts, tops, and other goodies along with other comics covers and almost TWO DOZEN naughty movie posters!
So, let's put the "X" back in Xmas!
But in a PG-13 way! ;-)

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (in a nice, kid-safe way!)

He's the Jolly Old Elf in a red suit!
They are BIG Green Men from Mars with an even BIGGER robot!
Before Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas, they were the ingredients for the weirdest Christmas movie ever!

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians was filmed in 1964 in that bastion of the cinema, Long Island (in an unused aircraft hangar).
Starring a host of tv and b-movie actors including handsome-but-stiff Leonard Hicks as the Martian Leader (and kids' father) Kimar, villain/voiceover artist Vincent Beck (who did lots of work for Irwin Allen's 1960s sci-fi shows) as the film's mustache-twirling villain, Voldar, and John Call as a pretty damn convincing Santa Claus.
The flick is touted as the debut of future talentless chantuse Pia Zadora as Martian kid Girmar.  (Thankfully, she has rather limited screen time.)

As an example of low-budget filmmaking, it's actually pretty effective.
Every penny (what few of them they had) is up on the screen.
There's lots of stock footage (from Dr. Strangelove, no less).
And the use of the then-popular Wham-O Air Blaster toy guns as Martian weapons was either a stroke of marketing genius or clever use of limited funds.  Either way, sales of the guns shot thru the roof after the film hit the kiddie matinee circuit!

If you're between 3-9 years old, the flick's a lot of fun.
If you're between 10 and whatever the local drinking age is, it'll drive you nuts, especially the theme song!
If you're over the local drinking age, do so before watching! The flick is available on a host of public domain dvds as well as one of the Mystery Science Theatre 3000 snarkfests (see below).

And you just knew we at Atomic Kommie Comics™ were going to include Santa Claus Conquers the Martians in our Cool Christmas collection on stuff including kid and adult sweatshirts and hoodies, mugs and coasters, tree ornaments, stockings, and greeting cards!
BTW: The image is from the comic book tie-in. There was also a 45 single of the theme, a spoken-word LP album of the movie's dialogue, and a novelization!
Now I can't get that frackin' theme out of my head..."Hoo-ray for Santy Claus..." AARRRGGGHHH!

If they sing that damn theme song...AGAIN, you're dead!

FREE early Christmas gift from us to you: a link to a download of the film in various formats!
EXTRA free early Christmas gift from us to you: a link to an on-line reprint of the comic book adaptation of the film!
EXTRA, EXTRA free early Christmas gift from us to you: the long-lost trailer for the film (at least they don't sing the theme song)...

"The Gifts are Afoot, Watson!"

OK, it's a silly paraphrase of a classic line, but we at Atomic Kommie Comics™ take our Sherlockania VERY seriously...
As part of our Crime & Punishment™ collection, we've given The Greatest Sleuth of All™ his very own section!
12 different designs, including several with Basil Rathbone, the man who is to Sherlock Holmes as Sean Connery is to James Bond, not the first, but to many (including myself), the definitive portrayer!
Add to that, several classic comic book covers, a variety of other movie posters (including the campy A Study in Terror with Holmes as "The ORIGINAL Caped Crusader"!), the coolest cigar box art I've ever seen (based on William Gillette), and 1st Edition covers from A Study in Scarlet & His Last Bow!
If you're looking for a cool Christmas gift for the Holmesian, Sherlockian, or Baker Street Irregular in your life, you can't go wrong with one of these mugs, bags, shirts, 12-month calendars, or other goodies, perhaps with one of the books or dvds below in a dazzlingly-deductive gift set!

It's Crime Time at Christmas Time!

Ah, Christmas.
What do we at Atomic Kommie Comics™ think of?
Peace on Earth!
Good Will towards Men!
25-to-Life at Sing-Sing!
What...?
Yep, you heard right!
For a subject-specific gift for the lawyer, or other legal professional in your life, the crew at Atomic Kommie Comics™ suggests you have a look at the Daring District Attorneys and other Legal Eagles section of our Crime & Punishment™ collection, featuring the long-running radio/tv character Mr. District Attorney!
Inspired by the racket-busting exploits of New York City DA Thomas E. Dewey (who later became New York's Governor), law student-turned radio writer Ed Byron created a nameless "everyman" DA who maintained law and order in an unnamed Big City (implied to be NYC).
The stories, while rarely based on actual cases (like rival show GangBusters) followed actual legal procedures to the letter, even introducing CSI-style "lab boys" to analyze evidence and present testimony during courtroom sequences!
A couple of kool trivia items:
The narrator was known as "The Voice of the Law" who defined both the DA's case at the beginning of the episode and pronounced the criminal's sentence at the end of the show. (A conceit picked up by rival radio / tv show Dragnet!)
Though several actors played Mr. District Attorney, the DA's secretary, Edith Miller, was played by the same actress, Vicki Vola, for the entire run of the show both on radio and tv (1939-1953)!
There were also several b-movies, which took the name, but little else, from the radio series.
The comic book series, from which we draw our imagery, was packaged by the Bob Kane comic book studio. Bob Kane was the co-creator (with Bill Finger) of the most famous fictional detective of the 20th and 21st Century--The Batman!
We offer five different classic comic book crime-busting covers as well as his distinctive logo on items ranging from mugs to mousepads to t-shirts, as well as a kool 2011 12-Month Calendar!
And, if attorneys aren't your thing, the Crime & Punishment™ collection also has Movie Spies & Secret Agents, Newspapermen (& Women) Against Crime, Real Life Criminals, Police--the REAL Heroes!, Sherlock Holmes, Top Secret--Images without Words, All-True Detective Cases, Crimes by Women, Gangsters, Private Dicks, and G-Men T-Men & Spies!
Use them responsibly this Yuletide season, citizens!

BONUS: A FREE Christmas present, to you, our faithful readers: mp3s of the Mr District Attorney radio show!

Santa's Elves on Strike!

Well, the Christmas shopping season is more-or-less underway, so we are going to offer you an almost-daily guide to reasonably-priced pop culture collectibles that would make great gifts for the hard-to-please person in your life from now thru Christmas Eve!*

First off...
You think the economic situation is bad now?
Go back 72 years ago, to November 1938 and see...elves were picketing Santa's WorkShop for better pay!
(The cover is dated January, 1939. But it was actually on sale in November, 1938! Publishers used to cover-date comics and pulps two to three months ahead of the actual on-sale date to keep the books on the stands for as long as possible!)
In this case, we proudly present one of our Christmas in the Comics line from our Cool Christmas collection: nine different digitally-remastered comic covers featuring classic characters celebrating Christmas, including The Green Lama, two different SuperSnipe covers, Edison Bell: Boy Inventor, and The Lone Ranger, as well as two long-out-of-print versions of Santa Claus, and a 3-D comic!
Available on a multitude of memorabilia including greeting cards, mugs, hoodies, and other goodies, these pop-art collectibles are NOT available in any brick-and-mortar stores, only on-line thru us!
And don't forget our Santa Claus--the Man Himself, A Christmas Carol starring Scrooge, the Hardly-Abominable SnowMan, and Santa Claus Conquers the Martians lines!
There's something for everyone under the tree at Atomic Kommie Comics™!

* Note: We will have the occasional interruption for Video Fridays or other such entry.
Old habits die hard...

Either naughty OR nice at Christmastime? We have a grrrl for you!

One of the most notorious Golden Age characters, Phantom Lady was also one of the first costumed superheroines, beating out Wonder Woman (who debuted in All-Star Comics #8) in 1941 by several months!

Like a number of 1940s comics characters, she was created by an independent comic book studio for an established publisher, in this case, Quality Comics, debuting in Police Comics #1 which also featured the first appearances of Plastic Man, FireBrand, and The Human Bomb.
After a year, her strip was canceled by Quality, and the character was offered to Fox Comics, where she was promoted to her own comic, which started with #13, since it took over the numbering of an already existing title.
Her costume was recolored and modified by legendary "good girl" artist Matt Baker to expose more of her (ahem) assets and a number of covers featured her being captured and tied up by evildoers.
It is this version which became notorious by becoming one of the primary examples in Dr. Fredric Wertham's crusade against comics detailed in his book Seduction of the Innocent.

Believing that both the "naughty" and "nice' versions of the character have a place in pop culture history, Atomic Kommie Comics™ has included the classic superheroine in not one, but two different sections of our store!

In the Heroines!™ collection, we have the G-rated "empowered" version, kicking evil butts right and left!

And, in Lost Heroes of the Golden Age of Comics™, we have the PG-13, more risque version, including the famous cover (above) included in Dr. Wertham's book!
She's also featured in her own 12-Month calendar as well as on both our Heroines and Good Girl / Bad Grrrl Calendars!

If you're looking for classy, yet kitchy, holiday presents, you can't go wrong with our selection of Phantom Lady goodies for the pop culture / comics aficionado in your life, especially combined with one of the items below as a gift set!
Let him (or her) unwrap Phantom Lady this Christmas!
They'll thank you for it! ;-)