Reading Room: PHANTOM LADY "Substitute Cinderella"

The Phantom Lady gives new meaning to the phrase...

..."If the shoe fits, wear it!", as seen in this tale from All Top Comics #15 (1949).

Of course, the old "evil twin nobody knows about" trick!

Story, such as it is, probably by Ruth Roche.

The art is a mixed bag, there's some inking by Matt Baker, but the penciling and most of the inking is unusually-stiff and awkward.

Perhaps it was Jack Kamen's first art job, but it didn't see print until after several of his later assignments had been published!

Support Small Business!

Visit the

"Naughty" 

Phantom Lady

Collectibles Shop

featuring goodies emblazoned with cover art that Fredric Wertham railed against in Seduction of the Innocent.

Reading Room: NOT WHO YOU THINK Atlas "Man of Might" Conclusion

The Challenge that Made a Man Out of Jim Randall...

Cover art by Ross Andru and Mike Esposito

When he fails to stop his girlfriend's little brother from being beaten by a gang of juvenile delinquents, Jim Randall is visited by the spirit of the Greek deity Atlas, who gives him The Secret of Strength, a list of exercises to build his body.
(Why Atlas didn't just zap Jim the way the Golden Age Thor did, is never explained!)
After the prerequisite montage, a newly-bulked up Jim visits his girlfriend Linda and discovers her brother is now a member of the juvie gang!
The Greek Titan reappears before Jim, gives him a costume, and tells him to  "Use your powers in my name and go forth and war on evil!"

Though the art appears to have been done sometime in the late 1940s-early 1950s, the tale wasn't published until 1964 by IW/Super Comics, a company noted for buying up defunct companies' printing plates, doing new covers, and reprinting the inside stories exactly as they originally appeared.
The resultant comics were bagged randomly in sets of three and sold in drugstores, toy stores, and five-and-dime shops, thereby bypassing the Comics Code.
IW published over three hundred issues of various titles ranging from Algie to Ziggy Pig, including The Spirit, Plastic Man, The Avenger, Doll Man, and Space Detective.
This story's pedigree is near-impossible to verify.
It's obviously intended for a book called Atlas Comics (though for which publisher is unknown), and the character's origin was (equally-obviously) based on the Charles Atlas method of using isometric exercises to improve the body.
Perhaps it was done as a potential licensed property which wasn't approved?
And, should we classify it as a Golden Age (when it was created) or Silver Age (when it was finally published) tale?
I'm listing it as both until new information is unearthed...

Since this was the only issue published, we, unlike Atlas, will never learn all the Secrets  of Super-Strength.
Bummer.

Support Small Business

Visit the

Lost Heroes of the Silver Age of Comics

Collectibles Shop

Reading Room: NOT WHO YOU THINK Atlas "Man of Might" Part 1

What if mail-order bodybuilder Charles Atlas created a superhero?

Well, he might have been someone like this guy from 1964's Daring Adventures #18!

(Though the artwork was apparently done in the late 1940s-early 1950s.)

And you, dear reader, shouldn't be late tomorrow, for the astounding conclusion!

We'll also be presenting what little info we have on this unique tale!

Oh, and a page on how YOU can become an Atlas through intensive exercise!

Support Small Business!

Visit the

Collectibles Store!

Reading Room: PHANTOM LADY "Case of the Criminal Chessman"

Some people compare the War on Crime to a chess game...

...but the pulchritudinous Phantom Lady is nobody's pawn!

Lipstick?

Don runs into Sandra's bedroom, finds the Phantom Lady trussed up to a bedpost, and the only thing he notices on the unmasked woman's face is her lipstick?

Believe me, Sandra, you don't have to change lipstick!

Hell, you could wear a nametag saying "Sandra Knight" while in your Phantom Lady garb, and Don wouldn't put 1+1 together!

BTW, if the villain's name is familiar, that's because "Algernon Blackwood" was one of the premier ghost story writers of the late 19th/early 20th Centuries!

He was not short, so I presume Ruth Roche's use of his name here was just a "tip of the hat" to the spooky story author.

The art for this never-reprinted story from Phantom Lady #21 (1948) is unusual.

Pages 1 and 2 are totally Matt Baker.

The remainder of the story appears to be Jack Kamen, retouched by Baker.

Support Small Business!

Visit the

"Naughty" 

Phantom Lady

Collectibles Shop

featuring goodies emblazoned with cover art that Fredric Wertham railed against in Seduction of the Innocent.

Reading Room: NOT WHO YOU THINK: Captain Comet "Vicious Space Pirates”

A space-going hero named "Captain Comet" who saves the Earth?

Plus, he's drawn by Al Williamson and Frank Frazetta?

Sign me up!

But, he's not DC Comics' mutant mental marvel...

 ...but a character who only appeared once, in 1953, two years after DC's space hero debuted in Strange Adventures #9, and would continue as an ongoing strip through 1955 (usually getting the cover slot)!

The Captain Comet we've just shown you was more a Flash Gordon / Buck Rogers-type hero, set in the future, battling interplanetary threats with fists and ray guns.

Appearing in the first issue of Toby Press' anthology title Danger is Our Business, he obviously was meant to be an ongoing character, but there was never another appearance, except for a reprint in 1958.

Did DC issue a "cease and desist" due to trademark infringement?

We'll never know...

Support Small Business

Visit the

Future WAS Fantastic!

Collectibles Shop