Number 517


Graveyard of the Rocketeers!


Captain Rocket #1 from 1951 may be the only comic book published by P.L. Publishing of Canada. I don't know of any other, and if you do let me know.

At one time I heard that Harry Harrison had something to do with it. Harrison was Wally Wood's collaborator for a time, and went from comics into being a world famous science fiction writer. But whether he had anything to do with Captain Rocket I don't know. I'm not an expert on Harry Harrison’s comics work.

Captain Rocket is space opera, pure and simple; Planet Comics stuff...rocket ships that look right out of Buck Rogers, ridiculous costumes, and girls who wear bikinis as everyday clothing. It's so simple-minded that Captain Rocket can disguise himself as a bearded rocket ship navigator in a crooked gambling joint, and you know he's a navigator because it says so right on his tunic.

I love this sort of thing. In spite of its built-in dumbness the strip is great fun. Captain Rocket may have been doomed by low sales or poor distribution. I'll be posting the other three stories from the comic at some future time.