The Marvel 52, Part One: Marvel Pulp

I've kept pretty quiet about DC's whole New 52 deal up to now. For better or worse, I don't form opinions quickly, so I gave DC some time to get all their announcements out and respond to the first couple of waves of concerns. I will say that my initial reaction was positive though. I haven't followed DC comics for a couple of years now, so it doesn't affect me personally that they're cancelling everything and starting over. If anything, some of their new series sound really interesting. Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang on Wonder Woman, for instance. Barbara Gordon as Batgirl again, as another example.

My main criticism is that DC seems to be hoping to eat its cake and have it too in regards to balancing current fans with potential, new readers. The New 52's been promoted as an "all-in" approach to reinvigorating the line, while at the same time refusing to call itself a reboot and insisting that fan-favorite stories (an extremely loosely defined category) still count. That's not very "all-in" at all and I suspect that their wishy-washiness will cost them some of those potential, new readers they're wanting.

I don't expect that they'll lose many readers though. As much complaining as fans have been doing, they're still fans. They've stuck with DC through Countdown to Final Crisis; I expect that they'll stick around through this. And it's not like Marvel's got anything especially exciting going on to compete. Yeah, yeah, Marvel still routinely beats DC in sales; all I'm saying is that I don't expect current DC readers to suddenly start switching to Marvel as a result of the "non"-reboot. Whatever you think of DCnU, it's certainly interesting. Marvel, on the other hand, continues to publish the same kind of crossover stuff they've been doing for the last five years. I'm not saying that none of it's good, 'cause some of it really is, but seriously...their section of Previews the last couple of months hasn't been nearly as exciting and expectant as DC's.

I wish I'd thought of this myself, but it was Comics Should Be Good (Robot 6's sister blog at CBR) that came up with the idea of developing your own Marvel 52. I like DC's idea of creating smaller imprints within the DCU (JLA, Batman, Superman, Dark, Edge, etc.). so I used that for my Marvel list too. Not that DC came up with it. Marvel's done the same thing before with Marvel Knights, Tsunami, Marvel MAX, and whatnot. I even used some of those in my list.

Because this could get long, I'm going to divide this up into a series of five posts going into September when DC launches their stuff. That'll give me some room to talk about why I picked the concepts I did as well as the creators I'd love to see work on them. We'll start with a category I call...

Marvel Pulp



The idea behind this "imprint" is to focus on some of the great, not-quite-superhero concepts that Marvel's had over the years: Westerns, jungle adventures, period heroes, spies, and space opera. We'll do this in countdown format, so:

52. Gamora by Kelly Sue DeConnick and Sam Hiti

Gamora's got a lot of history in Marvel's cosmic comics, but the focus on this would be her traveling the universe as an intergalactic bounty hunter. Gamora's extremely hard to kill and has a wicked sense of humor. Kelly Sue DeConnick (Osborn, Supergirl) can deliver the goods on funny (and excitement) while Sam Hiti (Tiempos Finales, Death-Day) knows everything about drawing beautiful women and exotic, alien landscapes.

51. Guardians of the Galaxy by Roger Langridge and Shaun Tan

As fun as a Gamora solo-title would be, we also need a book that can capture the rest of Marvel's cosmic characters like Silver Surfer, Thanos, and Rocket Raccoon. Roger Langridge (Thor: The Mighty Avenger, Snarked!) has the imagination to make that incredible, while Shaun Tan (The Arrival, Tales from Outer Suburbia) has the ability to mix the real and the odd in a unique, believable way. He's not known for action sequences, so I'd be interested to see how he tackled that, but I can already imagine his depiction of the arrival of Galactus and it's mind-blowing.

50. Sabra by Carla Jablonsky and Laurenn McCubbin

Sabra isn't a well-known character, but I've been fascinated by her since I first saw her in The Incredible Hulk #256. Maybe because she took her Israeli heritage so seriously, yet didn't seem to have been created specifically to fill a slot as Israel's Superhero for Contest of Champions or something. She eventually became just another of the many, international mutants running around the X-Men's corner of the Marvel Universe, but I've always thought she was better than that. I'd love to see her in a series that focused on the issues of the Middle East in a thoughtful, objective way. Not that Sabra herself should be objective about them, but that the series could explore the region and its history in a way that educates as well as entertains. Carla Jablonsky's done something similar with Nazi-occupied France in her Resistance series, so I picked her to write.  Laurenn McCubbin has a great, realistic style that would complement that kind of story beautifully.

49. Black Widow by Kelly Sue DeConnick and Amanda Conner



I don't know if this was the right thing to do, but though I picked 52 visual artists for my list, I only picked 26 writers and gave them each two books. That was partly because most writers can handle multiple books in a month, but it was also partly to make list-making easier on myself. I'm sure I'll regret it later when I realize I've forgotten one of my favorite writers.

At any rate, this is the second book I'd give Kelly Sue. I promise that I didn't purposely match up women creators with women characters, but it worked out that way in Kelly Sue's case. I'd love to see her write Black Widow. As for Amanda Conner: I love seeing anything she draws, but one look at her variant cover from Secret Avengers #6 above and you'll get why I want her on a Black Widow comic so badly.

48. Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD by James Turner and Luc Jacamon

If you've read James Turner's Rex Libris or Warlord of IO, you know how insanely, awesomely inventive he is. Just the guy to put the "super" back into super spy. And Luc Jacamon (The Killer) knows all about drawing deadly people in diverse settings, both urban and exotic.

47. Mystery Men by Susan Kim and Guy Davis

I really hate not to have David Liss and Patrick Zircher continue the concept they started, but one of the criteria I wanted for my list was to have as many women as possible on it. So I'm giving this '30s-set heroic pulp series to Susan Kim, who did such a great job with her adventurous City of Spies set in a similar time period. And I'm aching to see Guy Davis do some more stuff like he did on Sandman Mystery Theatre.

46. Tigra by Greg Pak, Fred Van Lente, and Kerry Callen



The inspiration for this book is two-fold. First, I wanted a jungle comic and Tigra would work great in that setting. She wouldn't have to stay only in that setting, but it would be a great homebase for her.The second inspiration was this description by Kerry Callen of what he wanted in a Tigra series: "a fun-loving character whose cat-like curiosity gets her into interesting predicaments." Pak and Van Lente would be perfect for that and one look at Callen's blog and you know he's the only guy for the visual part of the job.

45. The Savage Land by Joshua Fialkov and Jeremy Bastian

It's another jungle comic, but this one's different from Tigra. Her comic would be much more versatile with lots of guest-stars from other Marvel characters. The Savage Land of course would be set exclusively in the prehistoric world beneath Antarctica. At first I thought I'd call it Ka-Zar and Shanna (the first of several two-character comics you'll see in my Marvel 52), but then I remembered the temptation to take those two out of the Savage Land to interact with the rest of the Marvel Universe. Renaming it The Savage Land (which is a much cooler title anyway) removes that temptation.There's a whole world to explore there and as long as I'm fantasizing about my dream comics (as opposed to worrying about sales), I want to keep these characters out of the rest of the Marvel Universe. I don't care if other Marvel characters stop by for a visit, but I want the setting to stay consistent.

Josh Fialkov (Elk's Run, Tumor) does really well with setting and small casts of characters, so I pick him to write. Jeremy Bastian (Cursed Pirate Girl) draws lavishly and I'd love to see the creatures and landscapes he could fill the Savage Land with.

44. The Rangers by Alan Moore and J Bone

Based on another group of characters I once read about in The Incredible Hulk (#265 this time). The Rangers were a goofy team created by Bill Mantlo, but I liked their modern-Western concept and the sheer zaniness of it would be a great playground for Alan Moore. The team included Firebird (probably the most famous character to come out of the team) as well as modern versions of Red Wolf and the original Ghost Rider (renamed Phantom Rider to avoid confusion) and a couple of very Mantlo characters: Shooting Star (her gun shoots stars!) and Texas Twister (tornado powers). In keeping with making the series fun and versatile, J Bone can draw absolutely anything and make it look wonderful.

43. Gunslingers by John Ostrander and Leonardo Manco



Counterpoint to The Rangers, this would be a real Western set in the late 1800s. Really it's just a continuation of Ostrander and Manco's two mini-series, Blaze of Glory and Apache Skies in which they updated Marvel's classic, Western heroes for modern fans of Westerns.

Coming Monday: Midnight Sons!

Mysta vs. Cargo X25

In Planet Comics #61, the Safety Council quarantines suspicious cargo and learns that its concerns are justified. When their scans accidentally activate the regrowth of miniaturized demon-birds and uncover a faux terrorist plot, Mysta leaps into action.

There are a few interesting things in this story. First of all, Mysta's secret identity finally gets a name, sort of. It's Technician 106. That's all the identification that Garro seems to know her by, which makes me wonder if he's really just that disinterested (or pretending to be) or if that's all the identification that the Safety Council allows. Also interesting is Garro's attitude toward her at the end. Though Mysta/Technician 106 has proved herself over and over again on missions she's undertaken with Garro, he dismisses her contributions to this one and says, "Leave such things to men, who can handle them."

Here's my theory: Garro's falling for her and is trying to cover it by refusing to use her real name (I bet he knows it; whatever her cover name is, I mean). He's started worrying about her on these missions, which explains - though doesn't excuse - his sexist remark.

Meanwhile, Bron's still holding things together solo on the Moon. He seems to have gotten over his resentment of that situation though and appears to be resigned to his new role. However, he's obviously in love with Mysta and wishes she reciprocated his feelings.

I'll come out and admit to being a Brysta 'shipper. Though Garro and Mysta are clearly interested in each other and we've got kind of a Moonlighting/Castle dynamic going on with them, they'd make a horrible, dysfunctional couple. I'm crossing my fingers that Mysta realizes what a faithful friend she has in Bron. (Sleestak has an equally valid take on Bron's isolation on the Moon that recalls his previous career as a criminal, but I'm hoping it's romance, not force, that's keeping him there.)

Another interesting thing is that Mysta calls her machine-man Robot II in this adventure. The robot's changed a lot since his first appearance in the series, but I think this is the first time Mysta's acknowledged that it's actually a completely new model.

Space People Hate Cephalopods

[Calvin's Canadian Cave of Cool]

Mysta vs. the Borers of Andros

In Planet Comics #60, Mysta and Safety Council Director Garro head to the planet Andros to oversee the investigation of some energy "impulses" on the supposedly dead world. It's a strange mission for an organization devoted to planetary safety, but probably they're foresighted enough to know that where there are mysterious energy readings there could also be a threat. Turns out of course that they're right.

It's a cool, if straightforward adventure filled with giant, subterranean, metal worms and battle armor and cool flying cars. There's not a lot to comment on other than general awesomeness, but Mysta does continue to mellow in her attitude compared to the hard line she took in her early adventures. Where Garro sees the antagonists of the adventure as "devils," Mysta believes that they can be educated and invited to join the civilized galaxy. Personally, I don't see whatever good she's seeing in the race of what are essentially slavers. Is her struggle with her romantic feelings for Bron and Garro taking away some of her edge?

I wonder if he leniency is related to her memory lapse earlier in the story. While preparing to descend to Andros' surface, Mysta realizes that she used to know something about the planet, but has forgotten what it was. She remembers once she gets a visual cue, but I don't know what caused the lapse. We don't know how old Mysta is or what effect internalizing all of Earth's scientific knowledge had on her brain. Is she just slowing down mentally from natural causes or is this a more serious problem? Is it possibly the result of her being away from her Moon lab for too long? Is there equipment there that helps her organize and retain data?

Mysta faces the Revolt on Planet Xanthia

In this story from Planet Comics #59, an exile of the planet Xanthia returns to take over his homeworld and the Safety Council sends military support to the planet's government. Director Garro again decides to lead the intervention himself, perhaps as a result of his success putting down last issue's prison escape. Is he getting a taste for adventuring?

Naturally he takes along his top aide, Mysta, in her "disguise" as a Safety Technician. This is the first time I noticed the full title of Safety Technician and it can be read a couple of different ways. Without the modifier (and recalling that the Safety Council used to be called the Science Council), I've always read the Technician title as referring to some kind of low-level scientific specialist. So a Safety Technician would be someone like that who just so happens to work for the Safety Council.

On the other hand, maybe Safety describes the type of technical expertise she has. In other words, she's skilled and trained in the technicalities of keeping people safe. If this is the case, it goes a long way towards explaining why she's asked to advise and gets brought along on so many missions. It's a much cooler job.

It would also mean that changing the name of the Science Council to Safety Council was more than just propaganda, but actually indicates a change in function, settling a question I had a while ago.

We also get to see Bron again in this issue as well as the Saturn-shaped UFO from a few issues ago. Bron's apparently having an okay day, because he's not all resentful of Mysta's extended undercover mission like he's recently been. But he is getting a little jumpy at being all alone on the Moon with no one but Mysta's cold and impersonal robot for company.

Mysta vs. the Changeling Mutants

In Planet Comics #57, Mysta faces a plot to destroy the Earth using shape-changing mutants. Actually, the mutants are just used to steal the device that's going to be used to blow up the planet and they're not very good at it. They steal the device all right, but they're barely serviceable as morphs and Mysta's on to them before you can say, "Arrgh! Aaaa!" In fact, even incompetent old Science Council Director Garro knows the mutants are coming and has taken action to prevent it. (The action fails, but still...)

There's an interesting bit at the beginning where Garro announces that he'll be supervising the inspection of all ships from Outer Void Z, the area of space that produces the changeling mutants. You'd think he has better things to do as head of Earth's governing body, but perhaps "supervision" doesn't mean he's personally supervising each and every inspection. Hopefully he's not that much of a mico-manager and is just overseeing the entire process. Maybe the inspection we see him conduct is just a random audit.

Nah. He's a dork.

Be sure to read Sleestak's take on the story in the link above. Where I automatically read nefarious motives into the mutants' leader and saw Earth as merely defending itself against invasion, there's an alternate reading in which Earth is an economic aggressor and Outer Void Z is simply retaliating. As Sleestak explains so well, that interpretation casts a dark shadow over Mysta's resolution to the conflict.

Mysta vs. the Thought-Mites of Andros

In Planet Comics #56, Mysta unpacks her old "thought image" power from the mothballs and uses it against  insect-controlled robots, Saturn-shaped UFOs, and hideous, moving sacks of flesh. But as usual, there's a lot more going on in the story than just that. Mysta's still undercover at the Science Council and a couple of things are happening as a result.

Bron's getting jealous on the Moon, but is that about continually being stuck in the lab while Mysta's off on missions? Or does he somehow sense that she's interested in Garro, the Science Council's director? Mysta doesn't come right out and admit any attraction, but she does muse for a second about her reputation for being cold. Her tone could be regretful, but her train of thought is cut off before she can finish it.

Meanwhile Garro's certainly taking an interest in her. He dismissively calls her "just one technician in thousands," but he obviously can't stop thinking about her, partly because he thinks he recognizes her from somewhere. She's not going out of her way to disguise herself, so he can't have met Mysta before, but you'd think he'd have seen pictures or something. Garro appears to be as dense as his ego is fragile.

Mysta vs. the Safety Council

In Planet Comics #55 (helpfully shared by Sleestak, naturally), Mysta doesn't so much fight giant crickets as watch other people do it while she gets to the threat behind the giant crickets. What's really interesting about this story though is the subplot in which Earth's governing Safety Council (formerly called the Science Council) has selected a new leader who doesn't see the value in Mysta's ubiquitous assistance.

There are a number of reasons worth speculating about why the Science Council changed its name, but Safety Council sounds overly assuring; like they've got something to hide. Science Council was simply descriptive of the organization's mandate to control the dissemination of knowledge. Safety Council implies an external threat that the people of Earth need to be protected from. That's not an invalid concern - as anyone who's been keeping up with Mysta's adventures knows - but actually changing the organization's name indicates an overt change in focus from the management of scientific learning to police action. Troublesome. (Sleestak has a different, equally valid theory that this is an entirely new organization that has possibly taken over the Science Council's role in Earth's leadership. Even if that's true, it's no more reassuring.)

Mysta acts strangely in this adventure too. Not so much at first. Her disguising herself as a technician in order to spy on the Council's new leader is very much like her. As is her willingness to let him fail without her in order to teach him a lesson (of course she stays close enough that she can step in and clean up when needed, but that doesn't go entirely according to her plan). What's weird is that even though the new leader fails and she saves the day, she stays undercover at the end of the story and lets him think that he succeeded. Sleestak speculates that Mysta thinks she can best manipulate the new leader if he isn't threatened by her. That makes perfect sense to me.

Mysta and the Black Bubbles of Zettra

Thanks to my slowness and his industriousness, Sleestak's long past finished posting the entire Mysta series at Lady, That's My Skull even though I'm only about three-quarters done commenting on it. Where I left off was with Planet Comics #53, in which Matt Baker began drawing the series. He's still drawing it in #54 where Mysta investigates some shady goings on at a processing plant.

At first glance it seems like a typical adventure for Mysta: stopping an evil industrialist who would abuse science and knowledge for his own selfish gain. She does use the invisibility cloak she got last issue, but that was the only new thing I noticed until Sleestak pointed out that Mysta's unusually horrified by the villain's fate at the end of the story. Though I haven't always agreed with Sleestak about the extent of Mysta's coldness to others, he's been absolutely right in observing that she's usually extremely generous with the "oh well, that bastard got what he deserved." I totally dig his theory that it's Bron who's having an affect on her. Bron's enough of a tool that I doubt he's intentionally changing her, but her feelings for him seem to be making her more empathetic. Curious to see if that continues.

Space Girls Hate Cephalopods

By Alex Schomburg. [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

Guest Post: GW Thomas on John Hanson of The Space Patrol Service

Dark Worlds Magazine's GW Thomas is back with the next in his series of articles looking at the great space pulp characters. If you're not familiar with Dark Worlds you should check it out. It's full of great, fascinating, and educational stuff like this. Thanks again, GW! --Michael

Buck Rogers may have been the first recognizable hero in Science Fiction, so much so that his name became synonymous with the genre, but his fictional adventures were quite earthbound. Only once in the comic strips did he take off for the stars, quite often with little or no scientific basis. (For example, the classic Frank Frazetta cover from Famous Funnies #212 shows Buck and his beautiful damsel as well as some troll-like aliens, all flying about space without oxygen. Buster Crabbe did similar things in his serial appearances too.)

The next series hero after Buck is not a household name but anyone reading his adventures will immediately associate them with Science Fiction TV shows like Star Trek. The space patrol recollections of Captain John Hanson read today like the adventures of Captain Kirk. Appearing over thirty years earlier, the ten stories about Hanson and his crew of dependable spacemen, helped to establish the nautical feel of space opera. The stories contain the military ranks, submarine-style stations and the all-too-familiar military man who is not understood by civilians motifs.

The series creator was Sewell Peaslee Wright (1897-1970) a journalist, advertising writer, radio operator and Pulp writer who penned westerns, horror, mystery as well as Science Fiction. Wright published the entire series in Clayton’s Astounding Stories under editor Harry Bates, who would in turn create the next great hero (but more about that later). Bates’ attitude as editor was quite different from Hugo Gernsback’s, who believed Science Fiction and inventions could save the world. Bates offered his tales as entertainment and nothing more. Because of this, the John Hanson stories are not mired in lengthy description of gadgets but have a speed of pace similar to other Pulps.

Wright begins with an ancient device in adventure writing, the old man recounting his memoirs, in this case to young punk spacers who don’t know how hard it used to be out there. “It must be remembered that I am an old, old man, writing of things that happened before most of the present population of the Universe was born— that I am writing of men who, for the larger part, have long since embarked upon the Greatest Adventure.”

His recollections of his old ships, first the Tamon and later the Ertak, feature a familiar crew as well known as McCoy, Spock and Scotty. These are the impetuous and scrappy First Officer Correy who “loved a fight more than any man I ever knew”, the staid and trustworthy Kincaide “a cool-headed, quick-witted fighting man, and as fine an officer as ever wore the blue-and-silver uniform of the Service” and the third officer Hendricks “while young and rather too impulsive, was a good rough-and-ready scientist, as well as a courageous and dependable officer.” The great screw-shaped door on its gimbals and the television disc which allows the men to see out of their ship are familiar devices while the menore was a clever invention of the author’s.

Unlike the aliens on Star Trek, Space 1999 or Doctor Who who all speak English, Wright, back in 1930, addresses the inability of Earthmen to speak alien languages. The Menore allows them to do this using telepathy. This kind of logical working out of such problems is one of the reasons Wright was a good SF writer and not just a run-of-the-mill hack.

Some of the Star Trek parallels, which are unavoidable for a ST fan reading today, include: getting stranded on an asteroid and having to fix the ship, killer trees, a world with a hidden dark culture working against the other, time travel, a scene in which an officer tells the captain he is too valuable to go on an away mission, nostalgia for Earth, a piece of Earth technology being confused for a god, laser weapons, and giant space amoebas.

The ten stories were:

“The Forgotten Planet” (Astounding, July 1930)
“The Terrible Tentacles of L-472” (Astounding, September 1930)
“The Dark Side of Antri” (Astounding, January 1931)
“The Ghost World” (Astounding, April 1931)
“The Man from 2071” (Astounding, June 1931)
“The God in the Box” (Astounding, September 1931)
“The Terror from the Depths” (Astounding, November 1931)
“Vampires of Space” (Astounding, March 1932)
“Priestess of the Flame” (Astounding, June 1932)
“The Death-Traps of FX-31” (Astounding, March 1933)

John Hanson and his tales are not well-remembered after eighty years. The Golden Age of Science Fiction would eclipse much of what came before it but Hanson did go before the Space Opera heroes to come from Hawk Carse to Captain Future and beyond into television with Captain Video, Tom Corbett to Star Trek, and beyond. Sewell Peaslee Wright went ahead of many of them, and his work still stands as enjoyable entertainment.

Mysta, Agent of M.O.O.N.

Continuing to catch up with Sleestak's Mysta Mondays.

This is one of my favorites so far, mostly because Matt Baker drew it, but also because it has a strong secret agent vibe. Mysta's "vacationing" undercover at a resort when she gets word that a scientist acquaintance of hers (who's been experimenting with some weird stuff called Electro-Ions that Mysta's loaned him) sends word that he's in trouble. I put "vacationing" in quotes because - as Sleestak points out - it's suspicious that she just happens to have chosen a resort very close to where Dr. Svord is conducting his tests.

There's a pretty assistant, tragic murders, secret call signs, a sinister villain, and a brutal henchman, all of which remind me of Bond films. There's even the "gadget" of the Invisibility Cloak (predating Harry Potter by almost 50 years), which Mysta seems more interested in than the Electro-Ions that created it. Curious to see if she uses it in future adventures. It sure sounds like she wants to.

Mysta of the Moon vs the Plant-Monsters of Vitan

I've gotten way behind on Sleestak's Mysta series, so I'm going to spend some time catching up. I've moved most of the comics linking to the Annex, but Mysta's different because - like Sleestak - I enjoy reading between the panels and trying to figure out the subtext. Since I want to keep on doing that, I'm keeping Mysta here.

One of the coolest things about deciphering the story-behind-the-story is that Sleestak and I have come up with different takes on Mysta's tactics. We agree that she's benevolent in her intentions, but passionately protective of what she considers to be dangerous knowledge. Where we differ though is in how far her influence extends and to what lengths she goes to control power. I see Mysta as a mostly benign gatekeeper of knowledge who - with the support of Earth's government - sometimes has to act violently to protect the galaxy at large. I hope I'm not misrepresenting Sleestak, but his Mysta is harsher and controls the government.

In Part 18a, Mysta travels through time and fights killer plants. From which we learn a couple of things: 1) that future bio-chemists wear awesome helmets, orange-scaled Speedos, and little else, and 2) that history seems to remember Mysta kindly. When she goes to the future and visits a school, she overhears a lecture about her in which the professor calls her, "our beloved idol."

That seems to support my view of Mysta, but I can't ignore the possibility that she had a really excellent PR firm spinning her legacy in a positive direction. Even if I'm right though, I can't argue with Sleestak's interpretation of that last panel. Mysta's clearly been kissed. Hard.

Guest Post: GW Thomas on Buck Rogers: The First Space Hero

I've never had a guest post before, but GW Thomas runs the very excellent Adventure! blog and not only are our blog's names similar, but our interests are so close that I was thrilled when he agreed to write a series of articles about classic Space Pulp heroes for me. And even more thrilled when he decided to cover them in chronological order, because my particular brand of OCD is all about chronological order. Thanks again, GW, and I can't wait to read the rest of the series.



People often forget where things begin. Take Buck Rogers for instance. If you asked anyone about Buck you’d probably hear about the new comic book or the old TV show with Gil Gerard or if you were lucky the old newspaper comic strip. But these and other incarnations of Buck were not the first. Buck Rogers began in the Pulps and is really the first true Space Hero. He was the first and because of that, for many years Science Fiction was known as “That Buck Rogers stuff.” (Said with a sneer usually.)

Buck started out in the world as Anthony Rogers. He was featured in two connected stories, “Armageddon 2419” (Amazing Stories, August 1928) and its sequel “Airlords of Han” (Amazing Stories, March 1929) by Philip Francis Nowlan. The magazine these stories ran in was the first all-Science Fiction Pulp, created by Hugo Gernsback in 1926. It shouldn’t really be surprising that the first Space Hero appeared in the first Space magazine. Gernsback was a crusader for Science, believing technology would change the world into a paradise. His background was radio and electronics and his magazines appealed to these kinds of readers, with lots of gadgets and pseudo-scientific speeches about them.



The plot of “Armageddon 2419” concerns the evil Han (yes, this was the era of Yellow Peril and racism is found in these stories) who take over the World. Anthony Rogers is a man from our time who is put to sleep by a mysterious gas in a mine and wakes to find his beloved America under the Han’s cruel thumbs. He joins a group of resistance fighters, who armed with their flying belts, take on the Han and begin to win back their homeland. Wilma Deering is one of these plucky rebels and the two eventually fall in love. In the sequel the rebels win the world back from their oppressors and all is well. Sounds clunky and just a little silly, doesn’t it? But Nowlan’s style was straight forward and the action scenes with flying men fighting the nasty Han ships are exciting and colorful. We all like to cheer for the underdogs.



At this point, Anthony Rogers is not yet Buck. On January 7, 1929, the National Newspaper Syndicate began a comic based on Nowlan’s story and Anthony became Buck, named after the 1920’s cowboy actor, Buck Jones. The strip was written by Nowlan and drawn by Dick Calkins. Beginning as an adaptation of the stories, the comic changed into tales of space and other fantastic adventures. It was in the comics that characters such as Black Barney, Killer Kane and Dr. Huer were added. The sign that Buck was influential far beyond those two original stories was that he was imitated. Flash Gordon began as a comic strip on January 7, 1934. Ironically, the man who played Flash in 1936, Buster Crabbe, would don the silver underwear to play Buck in 1939.



“That Buck Rogers Stuff” was here to stay. Radio, television, comic books, movie serials. All popular signs that Buck Rogers had gone from fighting the Han to becoming an SF icon, a fate some SF writers lamented. Adventure Science Fiction had begun and the pages of the Pulps, from Amazing Stories to Astounding Science Fiction to Thrilling Wonder Stories, would feature brash heroes who fight against fantastic enemies and win. Space adventurers would appeal to fans for generations to come. George Lucas, when he created his Star Wars franchise in the 1970s was thinking back to those Buster Crabbe serials and longing for the color and excitement they had. And all thanks to “That Buck Rogers stuff” and the first hero of space.

Pass the Comics: To Venus from the Moon

First Men in the Moon



Gold Key Comics! has the comics adaptation of the '60s Ray Harryhausen version of the HG Wells classic.

Mysta of the Moon and the Damp Light



Speaking of the Moon, we need to catch up with Sleestak's presentation of Mysta's adventures. In Part 12, Mysta's still trying to suppress the pursuit of knowledge that can be used for evil purposes. Up to now, I've been giving Mysta the benefit of the doubt concerning her ruthlessness in protecting forbidden areas of exploration, but this story makes me wonder. Rather than stop someone's splitting the atom - something that leads to a consequence I'm very familiar with as a child of the Cold War - this time Mysta's preventing a scientists' exploration of something called Damp Light.

Using a fictional science in the story instead of an actual one has a weird effect. My curiosity gets the better of me and I suddenly want to know more about what Damp Light does. In other words, I'm on the rogue scientist's side on this one. Or would be if he weren't so obviously evil. That he's also a murderer who's raised an equally vile daughter makes the story more exciting, but it's also sort of a moral cop out. It lets Mysta stay the good guy when in other circumstances, she might not be.

No one ever explains why Damp Light is forbidden. It has a nasty effect on a particular kind of insect egg, but my first thought was that that's more the eggs' fault than the light's. Sleestak has a much cooler explanation that also makes more sense of Mysta's objections to Damp Light. He suspects that it mutates insects into giant monsters and postulates that "someone somewhere has a use for giant rampaging bugs...probably the military-industrial complex or a group poised to take over human space."

Sleestak also makes a couple of other fascinating observations in relation to Mysta's sidekick Bron. One I'll leave for my commentary of Part 13, but the other is that - even though Mysta learned he's not the real Bron in Part 11 - "she still refers to her assistant as Bron and not by his true name." Sleestak offers that she maintains the deception in order to protect her positive image in the public eye. I'm not so sure, because she also calls him Bron in private. There's something else going on here, though I'm still trying to figure out what it is. More on this in a minute.

We also learn in this story that Mysta can use her Thought Image form to take control of another person.I don't recall her doing that before, which makes me wonder if it's a recently developed use of her ability or something she's always been able to do, but we just haven't seen yet.

After the break: More Mysta and Adventures on Venus!


Mysta and the Swamp-Men of Venus



In Part 13, we learn that Mysta's not just the gatekeeper of humanity's existing knowledge. She's also conducting her own research, which has something to do with a rare element called platine. The adventure involves Mysta's fighting a vicious space pirate in a battle to acquire the valuable material from the cool-looking, Venusian swamp-men who hold the only supply.

It's a tense story in which Bron nearly dies. In fact, Mysta thinks he is dead and reveals something about her feelings for him. In her relief at his recovery, she calls him "Bron, dear," which raises a couple of questions. Obviously she likes him more than she's let on. When she learned that he was in fact a spy sent to betray her, her response was kind, but cold: "You are forgiven. We are friends now." I wondered then at her quick willingness to forgive him and even more at the strange way she expressed it. Could it be that she was struggling with her emotions because she was torn between her anger at his betrayal and her romantic attraction to him? She had to forgive him, but didn't want to betray too much in doing so.

The romantic angle seems to come flooding out in this story and that makes me wonder even more about her calling him Bron. Could it be that she fell in love with him as Bron and so wants to maintain the illusion even to herself? I don't completely like that explanation because it suggests disturbing things about her mental stability, but I feel like there's some connection between Mysta's feelings for her partner and her continuing to call him by his alias.

I mentioned above that Sleestak made another cool observation about Bron, this time concerning Mysta's robot: "It is interesting to note that the body form of the robot has become less humanoid the more Bron has involved himself in Mysta's affairs." I don't have an in-story explanation for that, but it is indeed interesting. Bron is steadily replacing the robot as the man in Mysta's life, though I hope not completely. Not until Bron can survive explosions and follow Mysta's telepathic commands.

Mysta and the Election



Unfortunately, we don't learn anything new about Mysta and Bron's relationship in Part 14. She leaves him on the Moon as she goes to Earth to investigate allegations of vote-tampering in an important election. The specific offices being voted on aren't specified, but it's mentioned a couple of times that it's the world's leaders who are being chosen. More than just political intrigue, the story's also got giant, mist monsters and yet another use of Mysta's Thought Image power as she actually takes control of a body and uses it like a puppet.

The names of the two political parties in the story are interesting: the Scientists and the Humanists. It's easy to see what the Scientist Party stands for and why Mysta is allied with them, but what are the Humanists about? Are they human-supremacists or simply heirs to the philosophy of secular humanism? I've got my guess, but I'd have to give away the story to reveal it.

About Bron, I wonder if she left him behind because she's uncomfortable now that she's let her true feelings slip. There doesn't seem to be any tension between them though. Looking forward to seeing if/how that plays out in future stories.

Winged Death on Venus



Mysta's not the only one having adventures on the Planet of Love. No swamp-men in this one; just ant-people and bird-men in an outer space safari. And fantastic Wally Wood art. [The Comic Book Catacombs]

Art Show: Stinking Paws

Re-Imagined Raiders



By Ed Binkley. [Illustrateurs]

Planet of the Apes




By Zee Risek. [Art Jumble]

The Hunt



By Jeremy Vanhoozer.

O'Ryann's Odyssey




By Jim Steranko. [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

The Valkyrie from the Void



By Steve Epting.

Vanguard



By Dave Stevens. [Golden Age Comic Book Stories]

Pass the Comics: The Lord of Jupiter, Captain Venture, and More Mysta

Captain Venture and the Land Beneath the Sea



US Space Probe pilots struggle to survive while stranded in the depths of a strange planet! Says so right on the cover. [Gold Key Comics!]

Mysta of the Moon vs the Pirates of Jupiter



This one turns particularly gruesome when the space pirates Mysta's fighting take out a space ship full of school kids to prove how serious they are. And we actually get to see the kids being sucked into space. Mysta takes it personally.

She also fights an enormous, one-eyed snake. I know. [Lady, That's My Skull]

Mysta vs. The Face



In addition to Mysta and her (newly redesigned) killer robot's fighting some Circus Animals from Space, there's some interesting world-building in this one. Part of Earth's efforts to rebuild its library of knowledge include an organization called Youth for Science and an incentive Mysta's set up called - appropriately - the Mysta Fellowship. There are a couple of ways of interpreting Mysta's motivations for this.

Sleestak from Lady, That's My Skull sees it in light of the severe, even cruel way that Mysta has treated scientists who try to rediscover knowledge she deems dangerous. Is Mysta's fellowship nothing more than a PR move to divert suspicion and keep people in line? It's an interesting question and a valid interpretation.

Personally, I'd like to believe that Mysta's truly altruistic. Yes, she deals harshly with those who purposely ignore her restrictions about forbidden areas of research. But I'm not sure that conflicts with her genuinely wanting to reward those who search for knowledge in "acceptable" fields.

Something else we learn in this story is that Earth has an important metropolitan area called Terra City. We're not told for sure, but it sounds like it could be the capitol of the entire planet.

There's more to be learned about Mysta's universe, but I'll send you to Sleestak for it. As usual, his commentary on the story is every bit as interesting as the comic itself.

Mysta VS. the Moon!



This is a sequel to the last story in which the evil Face replaces the winner of the Mysta Fellowship with his own man. And as the Face slips past Mysta's security thanks to his mole, Mysta's busy fighting flame-men, headless bats, and other indigenous moonlife. [Lady, That's My Skull]

Auro, Lord of Jupiter vs. the Life-Drinkers



Because it can't just be space pirates on our solar system's largest world. [The Comic Book Catacombs]