Friday, January 31, 2014

CAPTAIN KIDD "Sorceress of the Briney Deep"

She's not exactly a "heroine"...
...but she certainly knew how to deal with cutthroats and brigands as this never-reprinted tale from Fox's Captain Kidd #25(1949) proves!
When pirates briefly became a "hot" genre in comics after superheroes and heroines died out at the end of the Golden Age, she made several appearances in both historical retellings like this or one of the few romance comics to feature a pirate-themed story, seen HERE!
Both writer and artist are unknown, but the pencils/layouts look like Sheldon Moldoff, the artist of Moon Girl!
(The inking looks like one of the several Matt Baker imitators who worked for the Iger Studios who supplied Fox's stories.)
BTW, this post was part of the RetroBlogs' tribute to the new pirate series, Black Sails, now airing on Starz!

Friday, January 24, 2014

CAVE GIRL "Spears of the Snow-Men"

How do heroines in skimpy animal skins deal with snowy locales?
Have a look at this gorgeous story and find out!
Now that warmed my chilly bones!
In the 1940s-50s, one of the most popular genres in comics was the "jungle hero", the most famous one of all being Tarzan.
A horde of imitators followed, with some interesting variations, including an entire sub-genre--the "jungle heroine"!
While many had weird names like "Sheena", "Rulah", or "Zoot", one of the best-illustrated was known only as "Cave Girl"!

Beginning as a backup in the first issue of Frank Frazetta's Thun'da comic, Cave Girl was a little girl named Carol, whose explorer parents were killed by natives in the jungle they were mapping.
Before Carol could also be put to death, an eagle swooped down and took the child to it's nest.
There, the eagle and a wolf raised the girl to young adulthood, teaching her how to survive and communicate with other animals.
Though in the first couple of stories, the jungle was shown to be home to timelost creatures like sabretooth tigers and Neanderthals, by the time she got her own title, it was pretty much a generic jungle heroine strip...with one notable exception!
Legendary "good girl" and romance artist Bob Powell handled the art as Cave Girl cut a svelte path thru Africa's villains from backup feature in every issue of Thun'da to four exciting issues of her own title as well as a one-shot entitled Africa: Thrilling Land of Mystery!

This story from Magazine Enterprises' Cave Girl #11 (1953), her premiere issue, was produced by her co-creators, writer Gardner Fox and illustrator Bob Powell.

Friday, January 17, 2014

DOLLY O'DARE "Castle of the Talking Corpse"

Though arch-nemesis Baron Blue managed to eleude capture...
Art by Ross Andru and Mike Esposito
...policewoman Dolly O'Dare is hot on his trail!
Written and illustrated by Jim Wilcox in Chesler's Scoop Comics #8 (1944)!
Baron Blue did return, and O'Dare dealt with him.
We'll be bringing you that story soon!

Friday, January 10, 2014

NELVANA OF THE NORTHERN LIGHTS "Attack from Etheria"

Here's a heroine who lives in the Polar Vortex all year long...
...in her never-reprinted final (and only full-color) adventure from F E Howard Publications' Super Duper Comics #3 (1947)!
Considering Nelvana's previous appearance was a couple of years earlier in a book from another publisher, creator/writer/artist Adrian Dingle thoughtfully brought us up-to-date with a synopsis before continuing...
Helluva way to end the series, eh?
As to why this was her only color appearance...
Originally, Canada imported American comic books and pulp magazines, filling their newstands with Superman, The Shadow, and loads of other American characters.
But, when World War II broke out, Canada banned all "non-essential" imports, including comics and pulps!
This opened up a whole new industry for Canadian writers and artists to finally do their own characters!
One major difference between the American and Canadian comic books was that the World War II Canadian books were black and white inside, not four-color like American comics!
(British comics were also b/w inside until the 1950s, when they started using a second color on some books.)
Some American companies licensed Canadian publishers to reprint US comics, but the interiors for those were b/w as well.
In addition, there was a limit to how much "non-Canadian content" could be included in Canadian magazine print runs, so there were relatively-few American reprints during the war.
After the war ended American comics were again imported, so most Canadian publishers began doing color insides to compete with the imports.
BTW, despite being #3, this was the only issue of Super Duper Comics!
And, it was the first appearance of the Golden Age Mr Monster in costume as seen HERE!