Where Monsters Dwell #28: "Tough Guy"

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The Devil Made Me Do It! Here is a short funny which I first read at my cousin Jimmy "Skeeter" Beavers' home, whom used to astound me by seemingly purchasing every single horror anthology comic-book that was available on the newsstands at the time. Needless to say, "Little" Jimmy was my favorite cousin to hang out with when we were mere slip of boys. In stark contrast to the previous post, I thought that this comic story was absolutely hilarious at the time and, perhaps, might even be deemed "politically incorrect" using today's rod of measurement vis-à-vis the political arena. The story's lowdown is that Bart Nelson is too tough for the demons of hell—nothing they do to him has any effect until they come up with a rather unique idea.

While I do not know who wrote "Tough Guy" as the author is not credited, the Grand Comics Database lists John Rosenberger as the illustrator of this very imaginative story.

Reprinted:

• from Journey Into Unknown Worlds (Marvel, 1950 Series) #17 (April 1953).

• in Where Monsters Dwell (Marvel, 1970 series) #28 (May 1974).

Plop! #10: "The Secret Origin of Grooble Man!"

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A man who has turned doodling into fine art, and a very profitable art as well, Sergio Aragonés first came to prominence in the early 1960s through the pages of Mad. Or rather in the margins of those pages, where his tiny doodled figures were to be seen circumnavigating the page in such a lively way that they often seemed much funnier than the material they were framing. Aragonés soon moved up from the marginal notes and in the early 1980s created Groo.

Born in Spain and raised in Mexico, he migrated to America in 1962. "When I found out how much cartoonists made in the United States," he has explained, "that was that." He was soon gainfully employed employed at Mad. By 1967 Aragonés had added DC to his client list. Besides being a frequent contributor to Plop, he had a hand in scripting Angel and the Ape and Bat Lash.

An outgoing and amusing fellow, one who studied mime as well as architecture in school, he's also had a show-biz career, having appeared, for example, on television in the final season of Laugh-In.

In addition to the long-lasting barbarian spoof, Groo, which is scripted by his friend Mark Evanier, Aragonés has in recent years turned out a variety of other projects. One such, put forth in 1999, was Fan Boy. Written by Evanier, the miniseries kidded a typical obsessive comics fan and had Aragonés working in tandem with such serious artists as Gil Kane, Dick Sprang, and Mike Grell. Mad editor Nick Meglin has said of Aragonés, "He never loses sight of the fact that he is a humorist, an attitude that, perhaps more than any other single fact, is responsible for his great success."








Special surprise bonus : a rarely seen Groo the Wanderer story by Sergio Aragonés:






A spoof of Conan and all similarly inclined comic-book barbarians, Groo the Wanderer, who looked as though he might have stepped out of the pages of Mad, began his sword-wielding career late in 1982 in a twelve-issue run from Pacific Comics. The pudgy barbarian stayed longest with Marvel. From 1985 to 1995 there were 120 Marvel issues of Groo the Wanderer. Since then both Image and Dark Horse have published miniseries. Artwork by the highly productive doodler Sergio Aragonés, scripts by Mark Evanier.


Credits

Script: Sergio Aragones (co-plot) and Mark Evanier (co-plot & dialogue)
Pencils: Sergio Aragones
Inks: Sergio Aragones
Colors: Tom Luth
Letters: Stan Sakai

Reprinted:

• in Groo Chronicles, The (Marvel, 1989 series) #2
  

Doc Stearn...Mr. Monster #3: "Case of the Recalcitrant Refuse"

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Mr. Monster chronicles the adventures of Doc Stearn, a man who tangles with any and every type of occult menace. Michael T. Gilbert is responsible for the art and usually the story, too, but Alan Moore guest writes this issue and a Steve Bissette cover rounds out the entire magazine.

"Now... let's get out there and blast those subhuman vermin to bloody gobbets!"

Case of the Recalcitrant Refuse
Script: Alan Moore
Pencils: Michael T Gilbert
Inks: Michael T Gilbert and William F Loebs



















Basil Wolverton is one of the few comic book artists whose work can legitimately be called unique. Although he created such serious adventure features as Spacehawk, he's best remembered for such non-serious and nonsensical inventions as Powerhouse Pepper, Mystic Moot and his Magic Snoot, and the grotesqueries he later drew for Mad and Plop!

One of the major appeals of Wolverton's space opera was the artwork. He was very good at gadgets, especially the kind that require lots of nuts and bolts. His spaceships had the bulk and feel of ocean liners, the control rooms were as cluttered with pipes and dials as an apartment-house basement.


Swamp Monster
Script: Basil Wolverton
Pencils and inks: Basil Wolverton

Reprinted:

• from Weird Mysteries (Key Publications, 1952 series) #5.

• in Doc Stearn...Mr. Monster (Eclipse, 1985 series) #3.
• in Tales Too Terrible to Tell (New England Comic Press Inc, 1989 series) #9.
• in Four Color Fear (Fantagraphics, 2010 series) #[nn].

Arrgh! #5: The Some-THING" (Parody of "The Thing from Another World")

Things that make you go ARRGH! Here's a really nifty story from 1975, which I thought was absolutely hilarious when I read it as a kid, called "The Some-Thing." Featuring an alien monstrosity spouting lines like, "Arghhh! Meaning-what's cookin'?," how could it fail to entertain a twelve-year-old? This is an obvious parody of John W. Campbell's "Who Goes There?", which has been adapted twice as a motion picture: rather loosely in 1951 as The Thing from Another World (with James Arness as the Thing for you trivia buffs) and more closely in 1982 by director John Carpenter as "The Thing," which more famously starred Kurt Russell. This parody was produced by notorious team of Ross Andru and Mike Esposito.

A leading exponent of the DC house style of the sixties (as exemplified by Mike Sekowsky, etc.), Ross Andru pencilled Wonder Woman from 1958 to 1967 and Metal Men from 1962 to 968. In the seventies he worked for Marvel on such heroes as Spider-Man. His partner at DC was Mike Esposito, who inked all of his work for that publisher.

Andru had studied at the Cartoonists and Illustrators School in Manhattan, which was co-founded by Burne Hogarth. His first professional cartooning job was penciling, without credit, Hogarth's Sunday Tarzan page. He teamed up with Mike Esposito in the early fifties to turn out Mr. Universe, a nicely done adventure comic book about a world-traveling wrestler. It lasted only five issues. The two also produced an unsuccessful newspaper soap-opera strip titled Martha Hart. By the late fifties they were employed by DC. Andru and Esposito became the first artists to draw Wonder Woman after co-creator H. G. Peter was put out to pasture in 1958. In addition to Wonder Woman and Metal Men, the team also drew Sea Devils, Rip Hunter, and Suicide Squad.

Andru, without Esposito, moved over to Marvel in 1972. While his main assignment was penciling Spider-Man, he also turned out pages for Dr. Strange, The Fantastic Four, and X-Men. Comics historian Michael Vance has said of Andru that "[his] pencils were clean, bold and technically beyond criticism." Will Jacobs and Gerard Jones, in Comic Book Heroes, said "Andru generally produced forceful and dramatic work."

Andru returned to DC in the eighties. Early in the next decade, shortly before his death, he teamed again with Esposito on a Zen Intergalactic Ninja mini-series published by Archie Comics.

I know that I still have some catching up to do with my blogs, but until then I hope you get as much enjoyment from this short story as I did!


Credits

Script: Mike Esposito
Pencils: Mike Esposito
Inks: Ross Andru