Movie Monsters #2 - Atlas

This is the other issue of Atlas' Movie Monsters magazine, having already discussed the one other I own back in July.

Since I was never that big a fan of Famous Monsters of Filmland, I never saw the point of getting Atlas' knockoff version. I bought #4 because it was famous for being thrown together as the Atlas offices crumbled around the staff(metaphorically). I bought this issue because it concerns the only other notable moment in this series run, one that was indictative of the company's problem as a whole.

Apparently, this nice cover of Dr.Zaius was commissioned from Greg Theakston, and the cover text was done in a cool blue by Jeff Rovin(Atlas' EIC) and Steve Mitchell. They thought(correctly) that it would contrast nicely with warm browns and oranges Theakston had used for the painting.

Well, apparently son-of-the-editor Chip Goodman stopped looking at Swank nudie photos long enough to stick his nose in the production of this issue, and demanded the blue text be changed to an almost neon-y magenta. Rovin and Mitchell argued you wouldn't be able to read the text that way, and it would hurt potential sales. But Chip insisted and the issue went out like this. When the color proofs or whatever came back, everyone could see it was a bad choice. But it was too late to change it, and to make things worse, Chip tried to deflect the blame to the staff! Sheesh, what a dick.

Anyway, there are articles on some fun stuff, like 2001, Ray Harryhausen, Superman movie serials, "Giant Bug" films, Frankenstein, Planet of the Apes, Rodan, Bela Lugosi(including a plug for Atlas' Planet of the Vampires comic so shameless it would've made Stan Lee wince), and Doc Savage. But there was only so many of these types of magazines the market could support, so after four issues Movie Monsters went belly-up(making it one of Atlas' longest-lasting titles!).

There clearly wasn't quite enough text, since there are some giant empty spaces in this issue. At least when DC had an empty half-page you'd get a "Henry's Household Hints" strip or something.

Devilina #1 - Atlas

The 1970s obsession with All Things Satanic was in full swing here, with one of the briefly-exisiting line of Atlas comics, Devilina. I guess we can thank Jerry Falwell and the Moral Majority for all this kind of material pretty much completely disappearing from mainstream comics. Gee, thanks, Jerry.

Devilina was Atlas' version of Vampirella(pretty much all their characters were "Atlas' version of..."), a scantily-dressed vampire woman who starred in stories as well as playing hostess to other horror tales.

The cover, very striking, I will admit, is by Pulojar, whose work I'm not too familiar with. But it does have everything you need for a good satanic cover--weird voodoo guy, implied violence, barely-dressed sexy babe. Done and done.

The first story stars Devilina, "Satan's Domain", story and art by Ric Estrada, whose nice but slightly-cartoony work was an unusual style for this kind of story, but it actually works. All the sordid goings-on(avenging angels, Satan kidnapping people(!), floors filled with writhing naked succubusses) don't seem quite as sordid via Estrada's style, like the way Ernie Colon could draw tremendously violent stories and it make it seem almost funny. This first tale ends with Devilina swearing eternal vengeance against Satan himself! Quite a task she's set out for herself.

Next is "The Lost Tomb of Nefertiri" by Gabe Levy(who seemed to only do work for Atlas before completely disappearing from comics) and Pablo Marcos, a classic tale of treasure hunting and murderous ambition. Plus a sort of sexy mummy!

Third is "Lay of the Sea" by Levy and Leo Duranona, about a mermaid who runs afoul of some wretched, violent seamen, and the one man who tries to rescue her from them. A grim, brutal tale, with a really fine art job by Duranona--more cartoony than I normally associate him with, and very effective.

Fourth is "Midnight Muse" by Michael Cahlin and Ralph Reese, a two-page(!) tale of alien visitors watching two paranoid humans...or are they? Next is "Merchants of Evil!" by John Albano and Jack Sparling, a goofy tale of murder set in the horrifying confines of a pet store.

After that is a text feature, "Filmdom's Vampire Lovers", which covers some fairly obscure films and I think was just an excuse to run this still:

Last is Shakespeare's "The Tempest" via Martin Pasko and Leo Summers, a definitely more horrorific take on the classic story. Maybe Atlas thougt sticking in an adapation of Shakespeare, for Pete's sake, would help mitigate all the violence, sex, and devil-worship in the rest of the issue. It doesn't.

Movie Monsters #4 - Atlas

Atlas, in its attempt to copy every successful idea from other comics companies, left no stone unturned. One fine example of that is Movie Monsters, Atlas' lookalike to the groundbreaking Famous Monsters of Filmland.

These magazines never did much for me as a kid--even FMOF--so I don't have that sense of wonderful nostalgia for these like a lot of others have, but I wanted to see for myself what Atlas' version looked like. I went after this issue, #4, because, among the Atlas staffers themselves, this is an infamous issue.

I say infamous because it was one of the last publications prepared in the offices before Atlas was closed down, and that whole one-foot-out-the-door feeling of people looking for other work pervades this issue.

Amid the articles on Star Trek, Disney films, The Loch Ness Monster, Lon Chaney jr., The Thing, Flash Gordon, and Ray Harryhausen films, there are spelling mistakes, factual errors, and odd sentences. Most egregiously is a page in the Loch Ness Monster article, where two boxes where graphics were supposed to be are blank. I can picture the proofs for this issue, sitting on someone's desk, collecting dust.

To be fair, from what I've read about the inner workings of Atlas(mostly the superb history done in Comic Book Artist #16), the staffers like Jeff Rovin and Steve Mitchell were trying their best, but owners/publishers Martin Goodman and his, uh, less interested son Chip kept undercutting them, slashing budgets and micromanaging at random times. It must have made working at Atlas a harrowing experience(indeed, Mitchell tells a story in CBA about being so stressed one day he went into the bathroom and cut off all his hair--and this was the seventies!), so the fact that some cheesy monster mag went out with some mistakes is hardly a Crime Against Humanity.

This issue stands as more of an example of what can be produced when not all of a company's oars are going in the same direction.

Thrilling Adventure Stories #1 - Atlas

I wanted to post something a little off-brand from the b/w monoliths of Warren and Marvel, and you can't get more off-brand than Atlas Comics, that shooting star of comics publishers from 1975.

Atlas jumped into the pool hip-deep, and even published some black and white titles like this and Weird Tales of the Macabre. Ironically, while most of the their color comics were obvious knock-offs of Marvel books, it was with the b/w line that they really formed(or at least tried to) their own identity.

The second--and last--issue of this title was so good that it one of the first titles I reviewed, and in fact I agree with Comic Book Artist's assessment that its one of the finest b/w single issues of the seventies, so I thought it was long past time to talk about the first issue!

Past the nice cover by Ernie Colon(whose work for Atlas was uniformily top-notch) we open with a story of Tiger-Man, one of their color comic stars, called "Flesh Peddlers", written by John Albano with art by Colon. Tiger-Man takes on pornographers who prey on young girls, complete with a bad-guy-who-falls-into-a-pool-of-piranhas ending. As derivative as Atlas' superheroes might have been, you never saw Batman take on bad guys like this.

Next is "The Sting of Death" by Albano and Leo Summers, about survivors of a plane crash who now have to deal with the locals...cannibals! Yeeesh!

Third is "Kromag the Killer" by Gabe Levy and Jack Sparling. Kromag was Atlas' Conan-as-caveman character, so we get him taking on dinosaurs, a sabretooth tiger, and making sweet love to nekkid cavewomen. 'Nuff said. (oops, wrong company)

Then we get a text piece on the Films of Alistair Maclean, whose books like The Guns of Navarone, The Satan Bug, and Where Eagles Dare were all turned into films in the last few years. Not sure what this has to do with comics, but I guess Atlas was going for whole stories-of-adventure thing.

The next story is a wonderful tale of "Lawrence of Arabia" by Jeff Rovin and superb art by Frank Thorne, which uses the character from the legendary film for its own purposes. Lots of good, high-adventure fun!

After two pages of pin-ups of the stars of Atlas Comics, "The New House of Ideas!"(cough) by Colon, we have another text piece on the Doc Savage movie(yeah, cause nobody's done that before!). Then we wrap up the issue with "Escape from Nine By 1" by Russ Heath, a great, hard-bitten Great Escape-esque tale.

All in all, a solid issue and a good start to the magazine. They would really hit the mark with the second issue, and then that would be it(*sniff*), so Thrilling Adventure Stories' batting average was around 1000%!

Weird Tales of the Macabre #1 - Atlas

This is another odd little publication, courtesy of the short-lived Atlas Comics in 1975. Atlas tried to take on the world of comics--and Marvel specifically--and one of the prongs of their attack was a line of black and white mags.

All in all, they weren't that bad at it--better, in fact, than they were at the color line, IMO. Not only did they put out Thrilling Adventure Stories (the second issue of which, already profiled here, was one of the finest single-issue comics of the seventies), but they did this, Weird Tales of the Macabre, which features some fine talent.

The nice spooky cover is by Jeff Jones (if only those logo colors had been a bit less garish), and the first story "The Demon is Dying!" is written and drawn by Pat Boyette. Set in a faraway land of Skaaland, this is a gruesome, violent tale of an evil man that many wish dead--and they get it.

"Time Lapse", drawn by Leo Duranona, is a contemporary tale with a twist ending; very reminiscient of the kind of stories you'd find in Warren mags at the time. The very next piece finds Atlas aping the Marvel b/w mags, with a text piece on Dan Curtis, the man behind Dark Shadows.

"A Second Life", drawn by Leo Summers (I think--the individual stories aren't credited, so I'm attempting to match the group credits at the front of the magazine with the art styles for each story), is a EC-esque tale of a guy who bumps off a beautiful woman and thinks he can get away with it. Next is "The Cheese is for the Rats", a gruesomely-funny story exquisitely rendered by the master, Ernie Colon. Ernie did a lot of work for Atlas, and it was all uniformily superb.

The next story, "Tour De Force", is a sort-of werewolf tale drawn by Ramon Torrents, about some people making a horror movie on location, far from the backlots of Hollywood. Ernie Colon is back drawing the final tale, "Speed Demon", a tale of a cocky race-car driver, which has got to be the first--and maybe only--horror tale set in the world of Car Racing.

All in all, not a bad start for a company's fledgling line of b/w magazines. They did do a second issue, which I have yet to get, but it's on my list (along with a million other ones!)...