Frightful Frankenstein Friday Preview

Boy Commandos-Land From Out Of Space-1949

Appearing in WORLD'S FINEST and DETECTIVE as well as their own title, BOY COMMANDOS, one would have to admit that Rip Carter, Brooklyn and the gang were Simon & Kirby's most successful creation for National Comics. By this final Golden Age issue, however, S&K were long gone and editor Jack Schiff was already into his sci-fi phase that would eventually touch all his strips, most controversially the early sixties BATMAN. Tex and Percy were the only other Commandos still left by this point and even Brooklyn had ceased looking or behaving like Brooklyn. GCD credits Arthur Peddy and George Klein on this story that's a long way from the series' wartime best.

Two-Gun Percy-Bernard Baily-1943

Probably best known for co-creating the Spectre (with Jerry Siegel) and Hourman for DC, artist Bernard Baily was actually quite prolific, working for a number of companies up through 1980. He even established his own publishing company and his one art studio at one point. This amusing trifle is from National's ALL-FUNNY COMICS of 1943 and shows off Baily's humor style, later put to use in CRACKED.

The Dunce-Joe Orlando-1965

Here we have some lovely Joe Orlando art (particularly that first panel) from a 1965 issue of Gold Key's licensed BORIS KARLOFF comic. In the early seventies, Gold Key pioneered the digest format for comics and this scan comes from an issue of MYSTERY COMICS DIGEST.

The Martin and Lewis Story-1952

DC's ADVENTURES OF DEAN MARTIN AND JERRY LEWIS debuted in 1952 arguably at the peak of the team's popularity. With art by Howie Post, Bob Oksner and others and uncredited scripting, the title did a surprisingly good job of capturing the style of the pair's act--the relationship, the humor--everything but the music. The title would run as long as the pairing did, with Jerry inheriting it in 1957 for an almost unbelievable run of another 15 years! Here we have the rare exception to the standard silliness--a serious (if somewhat questionable) three page biographical piece on Martin & Lewis from issue 2 of the title.

Fearless Fellers-Joe Donohoe-1947

This is a fairly standard kid gang story--somewhere between the creative play of OUR GANG and the adventures of, say, the Newsboy Legion. What is very atypical, however, about this Ray Gill script, is that the young and obviously African-American boy is drawn realistically, acts realistically is treated as a total equal and speaks without the exaggerated Southern accent that all black characters in comics seemed to have. Remember, this was 1947...not that far from Ebony White and Whitewash Jones. Impressive.

The Hidden Doom-Steve Ditko-1958

Here's a brief and atypical boy and his dog story by the one and only Steve Ditko...with a World War II setting! One doesn't see a lot of war stories from the man who brought you Spider-Man, the Creeper and Mr. A but his easy depictions of tensions and action play well here. No writing credits but could well be by one or the other of the Lieber brothers.