Number 1402: Don’t let me kill again!

This story from the Standard Comics 1953 issue of Who Is Next #5 (actually #1 — and only issue) is inspired by a real-life case. In 1946 Chicago a message was left behind at a crime scene:

Click on the picture for a short article on Heirens, which includes a two-page Life magazine article from 1946 about the case.

The so-called Lipstick Killer was caught and identified as William Heirens. Heirens died in prison at age 83, after serving the longest term of any inmate in the U.S.

In this story, drawn by Mike Sekowsky and an unknown inker, ugliness is the motive. A poor homely schmuck from a dysfunctional home kills beautiful girls because they are repelled by his looks. I’ve always found plots like that kind of cheap. If that was a motive for murder there wouldn’t be anyone left.

Falling In Love #13

From September, 1957. Bonus points for that cover for showing both a boy and a girl about to cry. The opener is about Celia, a young woman stuck in a dreary job (apparently as a typist). She fantasizes that she's a Cinderella, and when the clock strikes midnight one evening, she decides to use her savings to buy a trip to Italy. While on a tour through the countryside, she takes her lunch in an orchard and falls asleep, missing her bus. She tries to explain to the handsome Italian farmer:

Surprise, he turns out to be an American living in Italy. They have lunch together and he suggests that she stay for awhile (at a local inn, this was 1957 after all). She agrees and they spend the summer together:

But she's saddened by the knowledge that eventually she will have to leave. Rolf doesn't seem to be serious about her:

The Cinderella thing comes up again, and she senses that the clock is nearing midnight on her summer romance. Without telling Rolf, she gets a ride in a donkey cart to the airport, and prepares to depart, her heart breaking. Then:

And so she becomes a farmer's wife in Italy.

Comments: Art by Mike Sekowsky.  The Cinderella theme is well-handled and despite the simplicity of the plot, I found the story pretty effective.

The second tale is about a young florist who worships Ted Brennan even though he simply looks at her as the gal who sells him a dozen roses to send to his latest flame:

Then she meets Dale, another old schoolmate, who's become an artist:

And although she's a little torn at leaving the florist shop, where she catches her few precious moments waiting on Ted Brennan, she agrees.  And soon:

Well, you can probably guess who his friend is.  But when he makes it clear that he doesn't remember her at all, and is just interested in her beauty, she treats him coldly:

She even begins seeing Dale in an effort to forget about Ted.  But one night:

I'm kind of amused at the fact that she never seems to realize that the only reason she "loves" Ted is because he's so handsome.  They strike me as well-suited for each other.

There is an advice column called "To You... From Carol Andrews".  Most of the letters are pretty standard dating advice but I did blink a bit at this one:

 The third story is about a blind date that goes quite well:

But she's annoyed when it takes him a couple of days to call, and later she finds out that he's dating another gal too.  The friend that set them up originally has a pretty sensible observation:

And when she calls him up to invite him to a party that Saturday, he quite honestly admits that he already has a date.  Well, why not bring her to my party?  The more the merrier!  And of course, to hide her misery when he does show up with the blonde in tow:

Nothing says, "I'm going crazy now," like a handful of mambo records.  She dances with everybody in sight but Lowell and at the end of the night, the other girlfriend bares her claws:

But it turns out that's just what it took to get him to make up his mind.  He's not going to play the field any longer if it means that she can as well.

 The cover story winds up the book.  Vinnie (a girl) and Don have known each other since childhood.  But Vinnie meets a handsome stranger at the fair one day and they win a prize for dancing.  Second night of the fair and they win again.  And Don's in trouble:

But on the third night, she meets him again, and this time:

Ouch!  And to make matters worse, she seems to be losing Don as well:

So she assures Don that she loves only him by throwing away the prizes she had won dancing with the other guy.

Comments: Meh.  At least she ends up with the right guy.

Happy Valentine's Day everybody!

Face Off

As I have noted in the past, one of DC's major trends of the late 1950s and early 1960s was to add continuing characters to the magazines that did not already feature them. The war books picked up Sgt Rock, Jeb Stuart, Gunner and Sarge, etc., while Mystery in Space added Adam Strange, Tales of the Unexpected featured Space Ranger, and House of Secrets highlighted Mark Merlin.

Strange Adventures, edited by Julius Schwartz, tried something different. Instead of adding one feature which appeared every issue, Schwartz rotated several recurring features: Star Hawkins, the Atomic Knights and the Space Museum appeared regularly over the course of several years. In addition, particularly successful one-shot characters were often brought back. The Faceless Creature was probably the most notable as he appeared on the covers of three* issues over the course of as many years. Those of you who are fans of the Brave and the Bold show on Cartoon Network may recognize him as the Hunter who served as Starro's herald in a two-part episode of that series.

As the first story (Strange Adventures #124, January 1961) begins, two Highway Patrolmen in South Dakota, Jim Boone and Bob Colby, are investigating the disappearance of the heads from Mount Rushmore. The heads disappear along with some other famous giant faces around the world, but then are returned. An alien spacecraft lands and:

After preventing them from firing their weapons as shown on the cover, the alien introduces himself as Klee-Pan from the planet Klaramar, which is a sub-atomic world revolving within a single atom of the Planet Jupiter. He explains that he is looking for a giant head which will unlock a vault where a bomb was hidden by a villain named Chen Yull (sometimes referred to as Chan Yull and also as Chun Yull). If the head is not located, the bomb will destroy the entire solar system in one second.

Well, one second on Klaramar, which is quite a bit longer on Earth:

The mathematician in me couldn't resist calculating that out. If one Klaramar day equals 1,000,000 Earth years, then one Klaramar second equals about 11-1/2 Earth years.

Klee-Pan has tried all the famous giant faces on Earth, but none of them work. Fortunately, Jim realizes the secret:

So he suggests the Woman in the Moon. Of course, most of us have heard of it as the Man in the Moon, but apparently the Chinese and South Dakotans have the gender reversed.

While the trio head to the Moon, Klee-Pan explains how his people became faceless:

That sequence would appear in each subsequent Faceless Creature story. They take the Woman in the Moon to Saturn, but Chen Yull has planned for this and destroys the face with ray guns. But Jim has another bright idea:

And by repairing the face, they are able to open the lock, defuse the bomb, and save the solar system. Klee-Pan offers them a reward, but all they want is for the face on the Moon to be restored.

The Faceless Creature returned in Strange Adventures #142 (July 1962). Chan Yull has learned that his prior plot to destroy the Solar System failed, partially because of the efforts of the two South Dakota Highway Patrolmen. So he creates a new bomb and uses them as the triggers:

But when they arrive the bomb does not explode. It turns out that Jim and Bob were given the power of telepathy by Klee-Pan, and so they had ordered each other not to explode the bomb. Klee-Pan sends them back to Earth with weapons that subdue Chen Yull and send him back to Klaramar.

Jim and Bob find themselves compelled to construct an odd, scientific device. When they turn it on:

Chen Yull heads to the UN Building, where he has a strange demand:

But when they do as he asks:

That seems a very strange quirk indeed. How useful an adaptation is it for a people to only be willing to destroy their own planet? Chen Yull reveals his fiendish plan:

Jim and Bob use the weapons they defeated Chen Yull with in the previous story on each other, shrinking themselves down while sending themselves to Klaramar. Once they are able to communicate with Klee Pan, he defeats Chen Yull and restores the two planets (and the Highway Patrolmen) to their normal sizes.
One other oddity about the series; according to the GCD, the pencils on the three stories were done by three different artists: Mike Sekowsky, Carmine Infantino and Gil Kane. I was able to identify the latter two, but the first one really doesn't look much like Sekowsky at all to me except for a few panels. Then again, I noticed how heavy the inks were on that story (by Murphy Anderson), so maybe it's just a case of the pencils being overwhelmed.

*Technically two different faceless creatures appeared on the three covers; Klee-Pan on the first issue and Chan Yull on the other two.

Captain Flash #3

Most casual comics fans know that almost all superhero comics began to die out in the late 1940s. Then the movie skips forward to 1956, when Julius Schwartz, Bob Kanigher, John Broome and Carmine Infantino collaborated on Showcase #4, bringing back a Golden Age hero with a new name, and a new uniform.

But in fact, there were several attempts to launch (or relaunch) superheroes in the mid-1950s. Marvel (then known as Atlas) had three tryout issues of Young Men Comics featuring the Human Torch, the Sub-Mariner and Captain America in 1953-1954. Charlton dusted off the Blue Beetle in 1950 and 1955. And Sterling Comics, a short-lived publisher, attempted a new hero called Captain Flash in 1954-1955.

Captain Flash was actually Professor Keith Spencer. When he clapped his hands together, he would set off a small atomic explosion in his body, giving him super-speed, strength and invulnerability.

As others have noted, the series has a Silver Age feel about it, perhaps because it was drawn by Mike Sekowsky, who went on to illustrate the Justice League of America among other features. Captain Flash had the inevitable youthful sidekick, named Ricky, who does not appear to have superpowers himself, and who (of course) is not his own son.

The opening story concerns "Muscles" a strong-man type who appears to have superpowers of his own:

Captain Flash interferes with the robbery of a train, but is kayoed by Muscles (apparently his powers weaken over time and he needed an "atomic charge". Worried that the public will lose confidence in him, Captain Flash offers to box Muscles for a $1,000,000 purse. Here's the action:

Comments: A pretty dull story, and the climactic fight sequence (shown in its entirety above) is too quick and lacks drama.

The second story is the cover one. Professor Spencer goes to Africa to find out why the uranium being sent back to Atom City is substandard. While there, Ricky is poisoned when he drinks something intended for the local chieftain. There's only one cure and it's located beyond the ice mountains (in tropical Africa?). Using the sonic force of his hand clap, he destroys the ice mountains. Unfortunately a couple of dinosaurs were located behind it. We learn that Captain Flash's moral code is a little more flexible than Superman's:

He gets the cure and defeats the bad guy who was trying to poison the local chieftain, who was also responsible for the lower grade uranium.

Next up is the real highlight of the issue: Tomboy!

Terry, a local girl is disappointed that Bill Jackson doesn't seem interested in her any longer. Tomboy has supplanted her in his heart as we see here:

To add a little "ick" factor, Tomboy is actually Bill's sister (although he doesn't know that). Terry, observing how taken Bill is with Tomboy, decides to dress up as her the next day when the police (including their father, who's a lieutenant) are planning to honor the crimebuster. Of course, how she knows the real Tomboy won't show up is never explained, but as it happens Janie Jackson is dragged along by her father to the ceremony, and can't get away to change into her secret identity, so it works out for the best. But after the award is given out, a limo comes to take Tomboy away, but it's filled with gangsters looking to get revenge on her:

Fortunately Janie's managed to get away in the confusion and takes after the crooks on her motorcycle. She shows she's pretty good with her fists here:

She makes short work of the mob, and frees Terry. Now Terry and Bill both have something in common: Their admiration for Tomboy.

Comments: Although it's way too short a story, I certainly enjoyed the concept of a teenaged girl fighting crime. The only earlier example I can think of offhand is Merry, the Girl of a Thousand Gimmicks.

The final story is another Captain Flash tale. It's a convoluted plot involving an attempt to steal an atomic submarine that involves men in shark suits. Somebody forgot to tell Sekowsky that people can't speak underwater:


Comments: Dull and predictable. Overall I can see why Captain Flash did not become a big hit; the stories lack any real suspense. I did enjoy the Tomboy tale, however, mostly because of the novelty of the feature and the interesting art by Edvard Moritz (according to the GCD).

Because this issue is out of copyright, it can be downloaded from the Golden Age Comics UK site. I should mention too that the spark for this post came from a poll over at the Silver Age Gold blog about whether Captain Flash was the first Silver Age hero. Amusingly, the options were Yes, No, and Who's Captain Flash, which garnered all the votes.