COMICS SUCK! - Strange Suspense Stories #75 (June 1965)

50 YEARS AGO - June 1965

STRANGE SUSPENSE STORIES #75 (Charlton Comics)

"Introducing Captain Atom"

By Joe Gill (w); Steve Ditko (a) & William Anderson & Pat J. Masulli (e)

It's unusual to profile a reprint here, but this issue announced the return of Steve Ditko to Charlton Comics, a getaway vehicle of sorts for the troubled genius artist.

After a dozen years of slaving in the thankless comics industry, Steve Ditko knew who he was. After the success of Spider-Man and discovering the ideas of Ayn Rand he became acutely aware of his own value within his industry, even if his full-time employer Marvel Comics refused to acknowledge it. While working for the burgeoning publishing titan he went back to competitor Charlton looking to scrounge up a little extra work. They didn't pay as much as Marvel, but they allowed him more creative control and would credit his full contributions. A dispute about who got the writing credit on the Spider-Man comic (ultimately it would be Stan Lee) became a sticking point that would eventually end in a sudden split with the company. But Steve Ditko already had his exit strategy in place.

Charlton ran out the clock on the sci-fi anthology Strange Suspense Stories and built up a little buzz for the artist's return to the character Captain Atom by reprinting his old Ditko-drawn adventures while Ditko worked on new tales behind the scenes. The title would be re-branded Captain Atom and feature new Ditko-created adventures by the end of the year. The title ran concurrently with Marvel's Spider-Man for half a year after Ditko had already left Marvel because he'd been so far ahead on the title, a testament to the man's work ethic.

Aside from Captain Atom, Ditko also re-vamped Blue Beetle and created The Question for Charlton. He would later create The Creeper, Hawk & Dove and Shade the Changing Man for DC Comics before returning to Marvel at the tail end of the 1970's. Though Ditko's post-Marvel creations would never enjoy the same level of success as Spider-Man, his Charlton creations helped inspire Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons hugely successful The Watchmen series for DC. Captain Atom is the basis for the character of Dr. Manhattan.

***

MUSIC SUCKS!

THE YARDBIRDS

"For Your Love"

This is one of the most important songs in the history of rock music. If it weren't for this song there might never have been a Led Zeppelin. Pissy, heroin-addled, mega-diva Eric Clapton left the group after the release of this song because he saw the slight departure in sound as a "betrayal" of the band's blues roots. Ironically, the change in sound was far less pronounced here than it was on the first single from Clapton's next (and more successful) band Cream, called "Wrapping Paper". Nobody, but nobody expected the brand new British blues supergroup to sound like that! (listen to it here)

But with a pinch of hindsight it isn't too far fetched to see "For Your Love" as a doom metal prototype. The song was relatively dirge-like and though it fit neatly into a pop single structure, it was atypical of radio fare due its dark tone. Ultimately, The Yardbirds had begun to take the same approach to songwriting that Black Sabbath would 5 years later, namely: darkening and messing around with traditional blues structures.

The experimentation wouldn't end there. The very next month the Yardbirds would issue their other signature tune (and first with guitarist Jeff Beck), "Heart Full of Soul". The story goes that Clapton left when the group recorded the original version of "Heart" with a sitar. After the "betrayal" of "For Your Love", there was no redeeming the group in Clapton's eyes after the sitar incident. But if Clapton had never left, they might never have drafted in the talents of Jimmy Page, who might never have cobbled together the New Yardbirds in the wake of the original band's implosion and the New Yardbirds might never have become Led Zeppelin.

***

MOVIES SUCK!

REPULSION 
(Review by Tony Maim)
Directed by Roman Polanski
Cast - Catherine Deneuve, Ian Hendry, John Fraser, Patrick Wymark and Yvonne Furneaux.

From the opening shot of the credits being projected onto an extreme close up of an eyeball to the stark ending devoid of any real hope, this film delivers a gripping study of obsession and paranoia. Catherine Deneuve plays the lead as a manicurist sleepwalking through life, sharing a London flat with her overpowering sister.

With her radiant beauty stealing scenes throughout, the mystery is why she has such an aversion to any type of male contact. When the sister goes on holiday, Deneuve spends more time numbly going through the motions, spending more and more time locked in the flat. While being pursed by various interested suitors, the flat starts to mirror the state of Deneuves’s fragile mind. Cracks appear in the walls, paint is flaking off surfaces, noises are amplified and OCD seems to be taking over her personality.

All through this, the camera shots linger on her face in long, close-up takes which shows the blank wild stare becoming ever more vacant, yet more desperate at the same time.

A casual visit by an interested admirer brings the paranoia to an all time high, ending with a murderous attack leading to a bloody corpse in the hallway. Deneuve spends more time slowly becoming more zombie-like, sleeping on the floor, staring at plates of rotting food,
only moving when her delusions bring arms punching through walls or clever camera angles make hallways stretch into the horizon.

Her lecherous landlord forces his way into the fetid flat only to be stabbed in a frenzied attack when our heroine/villainess is roused into action. The police are called and as she is lead away, the last shot is of an old family snapshot, showing the two sisters being stared at by a father/uncle/relative in a way that does not bring images of a happy childhood.

Hey stop reading this and watch the whole thing here:

COMICS SUCK! - Blue Beetle #5 (April 1965)

50 YEARS AGO - April 1965

BLUE BEETLE #5 (Charlton Comics)

"The Red Knight"

By Joe Gill (w); Bill Fracchio(p); Tony Tallarico (i) & Pat J. Masulli (e)

This was the final appearance of the original Blue Beetle, Dan Garrett. The character had been around since 1939 when he first appeared in Fox Feature Syndicate's Mystery Men Comics #1. Like all other costumed heroes aside from Superman, Batman and to a lesser degree Wonder Woman, the character eventually fell out of popularity with the rise of the fright rags which began to dominate comics newsstands in the 1950's. Blue Beetle was revived only months prior to this issue by Charlton Comics in Blue Beetle #2, with new powers and a new origin (also a new spelling of his last name, adding a second 't' to Garrett). Arguably, it's a different character altogether, but at the pace with which comics companies and now even film studios revamp, revise, re-tool and retcon established characters, which is the "real" version of any character?

The stories and art on this Blue Beetle series (4 issues) are of relatively poor quality. 50 years ago, Marvel and DC Comics had very little competition in the superhero game. There was Archie Comics "Red Circle" line of heroes led by The Fly and The Jaguar who were later joined by The Mighty Crusaders and there was Charlton (Tower Comics had yet to join the fray with Wally Wood's THUNDER Agents). Charlton's Captain Atom and Peter Cannon, Thunderbolt were minor draws, but Charlton's version of the Dan Garrett Blue Beetle never truly found his audience.

The main story in this issue, "The Red Knight" moves at a brisk pace, arguably too brisk a pace as in the space of two pages we're introduced to Garrett's chess buddy, physicist Lew Coll and his experimental rocket, then he takes off in that rocket and heads to Saturn even as he's just showing Garrett the rocket. From panel to panel it's "hey, check out my new rocket" and then "so long, bitches, I'm going to Saturn!" By the time he comes back he's a changed man. He tells his fiancee to go away and she does so without argument. This is the mark of the rushed story, things just sort of happen and are taken for granted by the writer. The characters are not living, breathing, feeling, thinking individuals, each of their actions serves a story purpose and nothing else. There isn't much for the reader to latch onto with a set-up like that and thus, the short four issue run.

When the villain of the piece finally emerges, he does so fully realized. He goes from a normal man with no powers to riding a flying horse that travels at 600 knots from page to page. His only special attribute, as it's explained is his access to the impenetrable Siliconium, which he finds on Saturn to make a suit out of. Why and how is his horse flying though? It's a question that the creators didn't care enough to answer.

Ultimately, Blue Beetle is interrupted and upstaged in his own book by a Frank McLaughlin short called "Nightmare", which appeared between parts II and III of the main story. It's a three-page sci-fi piece about a man falling into the clutches of demonic-looking aliens, but are they really what they seem? It's not a great short, but the storytelling is a step up.

This issue also had a fan letter from future comics artist Alan Weiss with the added bonus of his re-designed costume / Blue Beetle pin-up. A decade later Weiss would become on of the best cover artists in the comics business. He's one of the finest artists all around, but was mostly a fill-in artist, never lasting on a book for more than two or three issues at a stretch. But in 1965, he was a Blue Beetle fan, one of the few.

Blue Beetle would be revived again by Charlton, this time with some serious gusto by comics legend Steve Ditko, fresh off his storm-out from Marvel. In Ditko's iteration of the character, Garrett has died between issues and Ted Kord has taken up the mantle, with a new, improved costume. This would be the character that was brought over to DC when the publishing titan bought the rights to the Charlton heroes back in 1983. He was also the inspiration for Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons's Nite Owl character from their critical darling Watchmen (Did you know that all of the costumed heroes in Watchmen were based on DC's recently purchased line of Charlton heroes? DC wouldn't let the creators use the Charlton characters so they invented their own interpretations).

DC has since re-vamped the character one final time, in what is arguably the most popular version of the character as young Jaime Reyes. His resemblance to Spider-Man, both in attitude and costume is probably neither accidental nor incidental considering Reyes's mentor Ted Kord was created by Spider-Man co-creator Ditko, but that's some pure speculation right there.

WHAT ELSE WERE THE KIDS UP TO BACK THEN?
After putting the final issue of Blue Beetle aside and either forgetting about it for all time or simply burning it, it was time for a complete artistic reversal. It was time to check out the latest album from one of the most challenging, but finest artists of theirs or any era:


Bob Dylan - Subterranean Homesick Blues - HQ from Noisefield on Vimeo.

BOB DYLAN - BRINGING IT ALL BACK HOME
Bob Dylan is one of the most successful recording artists of the 20th century, in terms of sales, artistic quality and influence. The man is a legend. He became that way by challenging his audience in a seemingly impulsive fashion. His artist growth was rapid, he left many in his dust. 50 years ago, he broke all his own rules.

He started out in high school as a Little Richard / Jerry Lee Lewis type piano-rocker but eschewed all rock & roll adornment upon his discovery of folk-singer Woody Guthrie. He drove to New York where he was "discovered" and signed by John Hammond who earlier re-discovered Robert Johnson and would later "discover" Bruce Springsteen. Dylan's first four records were mostly acoustic folk, but a limited band was introduced on a couple tunes on the 'Another Side' album released in '64. The change from protest songs to rockers shocked and stung the folk community, many turned their backs on Dylan for good, swearing off the artist forever. But Dylan always had his roots in rock & roll. His first single "Mixed Up Confusion" is a high energy honky-tonker and there's even a version of Dylan's "House of the Rising Sun" with drums long before The Animals recorded their version. The idea of bringing in a band had always been floating around for Dylan.

He let it all come out on 'Bringing It All Back Home'. No matter how virulent the negative reaction to it was by the hardcore folk contingent, the influence of this album was sweeping. Not only did it inspire a generation of garage rockers, the impact was felt by successful, mainstream bands like The Beatles and The Byrds.

The above video for "Subterranean Homesick Blues" is also, arguably, the first true promo video, for good or ill. And yes, that rabbinical, bearded figure in the background is legendary beat poet Allen Ginsberg.

Another rule breaking artist with a new project out and about at that time was filmmaker Herschell Gordon Lewis with his bold Color Me Blood Red, circulating in theaters.

As is to be expected from Lewis, this movie is pure sleaze and that's why I love it. It's about a temperamental artist who finds a new material to paint with. I think that says it all. Color Me Blood Red was written and directed by Lewis and stars Don Joseph, Candi Conder, Elyn Warner, Patricia Lee and Jerome Eden. Watch it here:

Color Me Blood Red (1965) - Feature by FilmGorillas