#150.The first Diamond Comics; Tribute to Lee Falk (Frew) and The Phantom Project Kit (Frew)

Do you read the first ever Diamond comics?



Diamond Comics #1 - Lambu Mottu - Murdon Ki Basti Main (Hindi) (29.3 MB)

It's has been posted at Anupam Agrwal's blog too.

Tribute to Lee Falk (1911-1999) - (52.57 MB)

It's has been posted at Bala's blog too.




The supplementary issue with Frew's Special Edition #1094 -Jan 1995

The Phantom Project Kit (14.04 MB)

These are contributed by Ajay Misra. All thanks & credits to him.

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Differently Abled

It is no secret that the comics of the Silver Age ignored lots of human beings in the real world. The characters were almost always Caucasians and invariably perfect specimens of humanity. It was a Lake Woebegone world, where all the children were above average. Oh, there were a few times that "different" people slipped in, but it was mostly in the public service announcements.

In Flash #133, we got a hint that was about to change:



(Note: Yes, there is a huge, glaring error in there, which I'll note at the end of the post.)

Kid Flash is supposed to appear at a camp for handicapped kids, who have dreamed up various tests of his abilities. Some of them seem a little odd, such as this one:



Maybe the kids were inspired by the race because they sensed that Kid Flash could have beaten them even if they were world-class athletes? And it turns out that the inspiration is going both ways:



Excuse me for a sec, I seem to have gotten something in my eye. But it gets even better, as it turns out that three of the boys have independently figured out that Kid Flash is actually Wally West (whom they all know from living in Blue Valley, his home town).



What will happen now? It was an almost ironclad law at DC that nobody could know any superhero's secret identity. In fact, if somebody discovered it, there were three different possible endings to the story:

1. They die
2. They get amnesia
3. They become convinced that they were wrong

Well, this time there was a fourth option:



Wow. Terrific story by John Broome and kudos to Julius Schwartz for allowing an unconventional ending to a secret identity tale. And this response a few issues later must have been very gratifying:



Error: See the splash page for the story, with the third kid saying "I can't speak..."? Obviously that was supposed to be a thought balloon.

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The Legion Rejects: Part II

In Part I of the Legion Rejects, I noted the four basic reasons that the Legion rejected applicants:

1. Fake powers.
2. Undependable powers.
3. Useless powers.
4. Limitation on powers.

Bizarro Superboy was rejected in Adventure #329 for reason #2. Of course, it wasn't so much that his powers were undependable as that he himself was undependable.

The next group Legion tryout after Adventure #325 came in #330.



Ethel was an eyeful, alright! And the Mess seems obviously a rip-off of the old Charlie Brown character, Pig-pen. Both were clearly rejected for reason #3. Update: Norman points out in the comments that the Mess probably took his rejection with a "What, me worry?" attitude. ;)

In Adventure #331, Dynamo Boy (a villain) has successfully gotten rid of all the members of the Legion, and conducts his own tryouts. He adds a reason #5 for rejection:



5. Incorruptibility.

Obviously, this is not normally a disqualifier for the Legion. I'm not sure if Animal Lad (whose powers were changing humans into animals, and taming animals) ever came back for a tryout after Dynamo Boy was captured and expelled.

However, Dynamo Boy does use the normal criteria for some of the other applicants:



Golden Boy is a reason #3 reject, as is the Polecat:



The Tusker:



Rejected for reason #2 after he found himself unable to withdraw his tusks from the tree.

The next Legion tryouts came in Adventure #337. Four Legion members had gotten married (Lightning Lad/Saturn Girl and Ultra Boy/Phantom Girl), and replacements were needed. This was all a plot to get three evil aliens to join the Legion, and so the rejects were just Night Girl and Chlorophyll Kid again being rejected for reason #4 and #3 respectively:



In Adventure #342, Calamity King got gonged for reason #2:



While Color Kid was a #3 reject:



He later proved that his power had some value. In Adventure #351, a green Krytponite cloud surrounded earth during the Legion era and Superboy and Supergirl were forced to resign temporarily. However, he came up with a solution in #352 by turning the cloud to blue Kryptonite, which only affects Bizarro.

Adventure #346 introduced a new wrinkle.



Qualifying tests presumably meant that there would be fewer rejects, and indeed the four applicants show above (Princess Projectra, Ferro Lad, Karate Kid and Nemesis Kid) were all accepted into the Legion, although Nemesis Kid could arguably have been rejected for reason #4:



Indeed, I remember one occasion where he was captured by Duo Damsel, precisely because while he could defeat any one opponent, he was a wimp when facing multiple foes.

That takes us through Adventure #350, another good breaking point.

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#146.J.R.R. Tolkien

I had zeal to read in childhood. I was lucky to read many classics in school as well as almost all works by Munshi Premchand (Hindi).

In Hindi literature, Munshi Premchand's Mansarover (8-volume short stories collection series) are my favorites. First time I read in class 7th. The librarian of my school was reluctant to give me books as I everyday took a book & return next day. He thought that I was not reading. That day I was returning Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's travels. He put a condition, if I could write summary, he would not only allow to take new book (as rule of our school library), but up to 3 books per day. I won the bet.

I just know there are many friends like me, that's why I'm posting many books & comics in one post.

Still I love to read contemporary & classical books in English & Russian starting from old Greek literature to contemporary best sellers. But 4 books are First among equals.

1. Kane and Abel (1979) by Jeffrey Archer. The book tells the stories of two men born worlds apart. They have nothing in common except the same date of birth (April 18, 1906) and a zeal to succeed in life.
2. Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less (1976) by Jeffrey Archer. It was said to have been inspired by Archer's real-life experience of near-bankruptcy.
3. The Godfather (1969) by Mario Puzo. Most impressive character for me "Vito Corleone".
4. The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. The story began as a sequel to Tolkien's earlier, less complex children's fantasy novel The Hobbit (1937), but eventually developed into a much larger work. It was written in stages between 1937 and 1949, much of it during World War II. For many it's the father of fantasy. But for me, it's more than the grand father of fantasy.
   

One of my favorite author

Brief Biography of
John Ronald Reul Tolkien
(From www.biographyonline.net)

Early Life J.R.R. Tolkien

J.R.R. Tolkien was born in 1892, Bloomfontein, South Africa. After 3 years in South Africa, he returned to England with his Mother Mabel; unfortunately his father died 1 year later, leaving him with little memory of his father. His early childhood was, by all accounts, a happy one; he was brought up in the Warwickshire countryside (many regard this idealised upbringing as the basis for the Shire in Lord of the Rings). In 1904, when John was just 12, his mother Mabel died from diabetes leaving a profound mark on him and his brother. After his mother’s passing, he was brought up by the family’s Catholic priest, Father Xavier Morgan. From an early age, J.R.R. Tolkien was an excellent scholar, with an unusually specialised interest in languages. He enjoyed studying languages especially Greek, Anglo Saxon, and later at Oxford, Finnish.

Although a scholar at King Edward VI school, he failed to win a scholarship to Oxford. His guardian, Father Xavier, put this down to his burgeoning romance with his childhood sweetheart, Edith. Father Xavier, thus, made John promise not to see Edith until he was 21. John agreed to his request, and faithfully waited until his 21st birthday. On this date he renewed his contact with Edith, and successfully persuaded her to marry him. It is a testament to his belief in faithfulness and honesty, that he was willing to wait several years to meet his wife; such sentiments of nobility appear frequently in his writings; for example, the magnificent love story of Beren and Luthien.

J.R.R.Tolkien in Oxford

From an academic point of view, his separation from Edith seemed to do the trick, and a year later he won an exhibition to Exeter College, Oxford where he would study classics. John did not particularly shine in this subject, and decided to switch to English literature. He was a competent scholar, but a lot of his time was spent researching other languages in the Bodleian library. It was here in Oxford that he became fascinated with Finnish, a language which would form the basis for Quenya; a language he would later give to his Elves. His love of languages remained with Tolkien throughout his life; in particular, he began developing his own languages, a remarkable undertaking. In fact, in later commented that languages lied at the heart of his writings; the Silmarillion and Lord of the Rings. He actually said, the stories existed to provide an opportunity to use the languages. Devotees of the book may not agree, but it does illustrate the profound importance he attached to the use of languages.

J.R.R.Tolkien First World War

At the outbreak of the First World War, J.R.R. Tolkien decided to finish off his degree before enlisting in 1916. Joining the Lancashire fusiliers, he made it to the Western Front just before the great Somme offensive. At first hand, J.R.R. Tolkien witnessed the horrors and carnage of the “Great War”; he lost many close friends, tellingly he remarked “By 1918 all but one of my close friends were dead”. J.R.R. Tolkien survived, mainly due to the persistent reoccurrence of trench fever, which saw him invalided back to England. He rarely talked about his experiences directly, but the large-scale horrors of war, will undoubtedly have influenced his writings in some way. Perhaps the imagery for the wastelands of Mordor may have had birth in the muddy horrors of the Western Front.

It was back in England, in 1917, that J.R.R Tolkien began working on his epic - "The Silmarillion". The Silmarillion, lies at the heart of all Tolkien’s mythology, it is a work he continually revised, until his death in 1973. The Silmarillion makes hard reading, in that, it is not plot driven but depicts the history of a universe, through an almost biblical overview. It moves from the Creation of the Universe, to the introduction of evil and the rebellion of the Noldor. It is in the Silmarillion that many roots from the Lord of the Rings stem. It gives the Lord of the Rings the impression of a real epic. It becomes not just a story, but also the history of an entire world and peoples.

Writing the Hobbit

Initially J.R.R Tolkien’s writings on the Silmarillion were known by very few. He found his time absorbed in teaching and other duties of being a professor. He also found time to write important papers on medieval literature. These included seminal works on, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and Beowulf. In 1945, he was given the Merton professorship, and gained additional duties of teaching and lecturing.

It was sometime after 1930 that Tolkien gained an unexpected inspiration to start writing the Hobbit. It was whilst marking an examination paper, that he jotted in the margins of a paper the immortal words “In a hole in the ground lived a hobbit.” Unlike the Silmarillion, the Hobbit was a simple fairy tale and adventure for children. Hinting at evil things, it still ends in a happy ending for all and is primarily concerned with a triumph of good over evil. In the course of the next few years, friends including C.S. Lewis, read his manuscript and gave good reviews.. In the course of time the publisher, Allen and Unwin, got to read it; with a glowing reference from, Rayner Unwin, the 10 year old son of Mr Unwin; the book was published to commercial success.

Lord of the Rings

Due to the success of the hobbit, Allen and Unwin, encouraged J.R.R. Tolkien to write a sequel. Thus over a period of many years, J.R.R. Tolkien began writing the Lord of the Rings. This soon became quite different to the hobbit, both in scope and dimension. Putting its roots into the Silmarillion, it became an epic of unprecedented depth. No longer was Tolkien writing a simplistic adventure story; the triumph of good over evil is no longer so complete. Even in the mission’s success there is no obvious happy ending. There is a feeling of permanent change; nothing can remain as it is. As well as being a fascinating story line, the book deals with many issues of how people respond to certain choices and the influence of power and ego. It can be read in many ways, but it does offer an underlying moral and spiritual dimension, which is inherent in the development of the story.

Due to the sheer scope and length of the book, the publishers Allen and Unwin, were wary of publication. They worried about whether it would be a commercial success. Eventually they decided to publish the book, but split it up into 6 sections; they also offered no payment to J.R.R Tolkien, until the book moved into profit. The first edition was published in 1954, and soon became a good seller. However, it was in 1965 when the book was published in America, that it really took off becaming an international bestseller. Somehow the book managed to capture the mood of the 60s counter culture, and it became immensely popular on American campuses. Tolkien, became a household name, and Lord of the Rings would soon become renowned as the most popular book of all time.

Although the book has received the most powerful popular acclaim, it has not always received the same commendation from the literary world. In 1972, Oxford University conferred on Tolkien the honorary degree of, Doctor of Letters. This was not for his writing, but his researches on linguistic studies. Tolkien, however, would have taken no offence at this award. For him his linguistic studies were as important if not more so than his fictional literary endeavours.

He did not particularly enjoy the fame that came from his literary success, and in 1968 he moved to Poole to gain a little more privacy. His beloved wife, Edith, died in 1971, and J.R.R.Tolkien died a couple of years later in 1973. After his death his creations gained increased popularity and sales. Even before the release of the Lord of the Rings films, the book, "Lord of the Rings" was often voted as best loved book of all time. His son, Christopher Tolkien, carefully went through all his manuscripts, and published posthumously several histories of middle earth, encompassing various early drafts of stories and histories.

By: Tejvan R. Pettinger 12/01/07

See also: Why Lord of the Rings is so Popular

Related Pages

• J.R.R.Tolkien Quotes
• J.R.R.Tolkien short biography
• Illustrated Biography of Tolkien
• Tolkien Biography

References

• The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Edited by Humphrey Carpenter. Glasgow, 1995, Harper Collins.
• “Biography: John Ronald Reuel Tolkien” 26 Jun 02
  Carpenter, Humphrey. J R R Tolkien: A biography. Glasgow, 2002, Harper Collins.

Read more details at www.tolkiensociety.org, Wikipedia, www.daimi.au.dk

Check HERE for comics based on his books & books.

Note: Comics "The Lord of the Rings" is 'scanlations' of the German comics by loopyjoe , i.e. scans where the text has been changed into English. These comics were apparently published in Germany, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, Finland, Denmark and Sweden, in various languages but unfortunately not in English.

He says:

".......Unfortunately I DIDN'T KNOW ANY GERMAN! Nevertheless, with the help of a German-English dictionary, a transcript of the animated movie adaptation and of course a copy of Tolkien's novel, I was reasonably pleased with the results."

Big thanks to him for such a wonderful job.

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The Other Woman

I had a fairly good collection of the Flash in either original or reprint, but I confess I had never read the first two stories about Daphne Dean earlier, so I thought I would discuss them here. We learn in Flash #126 that Barry is on his way back to his hometown of Fallville to visit his parents, which means that Mr Allen is one of the very few heroes of the Silver Age with a living mom and dad.

By plan, a young Hollywood starlet who grew up in Barry's hometown and who was his childhood sweetheart is also on the train. Her publicity agent thinks it would make a great story for her to fall in love with her former beau. So they are thrown together and revisit some places they used to frequent in the past:



But when they see a tree behind the schoolyard where Barry had carved their initials, they become lost in a weird sort of daydream:



What the heck? But actually this turns out to be a night-time dream that Barry's having in his parents home. The next day, a masquerade ball is planned at which there will be a reenactment of a key scene from Daphne's latest movie (which sounds like a mixture of Gone with the Wind and Mata Hari). A band of union soldiers captures her at the ball and takes her away with them.

But it turns out the reenactment has gone awry, as crooks have taken the place of the actors playing the soldiers, kidnapping Daphne to steal the fabulous jewels she's wearing. Fortunately the Flash comes to her rescue. In the end, Barry tells Daphne about his engagement to Iris and she accepts it, but:



Comments: Barry's parents only appear as shadowy figures as Barry is having his dream about Daphne in the pasture with the bull.

Daphne returned in Flash #132's The Farewell Appearance of Daphne Dean. Iris is initially worried to see that Barry's former girlfriend is in town, but learns that she is not longer in love with Barry, but with the Flash. This may relieve Iris, but it still leaves her fiance in hot water, as we know he's really the Flash.

Reasoning that Daphne's probably in love with his powers, Flash decides to convince her that he's not really all that fast:



But trouble arises as the Flash spots some crooks about to rob a bank. He distracts Daphne:



And takes care of the crooks, but Daphne suddenly decides to leave Central City. It turns out that she saw Flash dashing off in the reflection of the store window, and realized he was fibbing about his speed in order to let her down easily.



She did pop up one final time in the Silver Age:

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Single Issue Review: World's Finest #135

Cover Art by Dillin/Moldoff.

World's Finest #135 features the last appearance during the Silver Age of a new Dick Sprang story. There is some indication that this story may have been inventoried for awhile; if you look at the number of stories Sprang had published by year in the late 1950s/early 1960s, it sure looks like it:

1956: 16
1957: 15
1958: 13
1959: 14
1960: 11
1961: 1
1962: 2
1963: 2

The irony is amusing. Early in his career, Sprang's work had reportedly been inventoried by DC as a hedge against the potential that DC's regular Batman artists, including Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson, might be drafted into the military for World War II. Now late in his (comics) career it was released in dribbles, apparently to keep the hope alive that he was still working for DC.

The story opens with Batman and Robin investigating a report of a strange-looking man digging in a farmer's field. They arrive as he excavates a small chunk of Green Kryptonite. When they confront him, he shoots them with a repulsing weapon and escapes on a flying platform.

Batman chases after him in his Whirly-Bat, instructing Robin to contact Superman.



Interesting; I had always known that Batman and Superman knew each other's identities, but not that Robin knew about Clark Kent.

Batman follows the Future Man's trail back to a cave where he discovers a time machine with a then-current date (June 8, 1963) and a notebook which mentions New Gotham City in 2084 and ancient Norseland in 522. Robin relays the message that Superman and he have found the Future Man at the local "Boy Ranger Museum". He has created Kryptonite bullets with which to stop the Man of Steel. Seeing Batman approaching on his Whirly-Bat, he forces the Caped Crusader to execute a daring maneuver:



Is this the finest moment ever in Whirly-Bat history? I'll leave that one to the experts, but it's surely high on the list.

The Future Man escapes and when Superman, Batman and Robin chase him to the cave, they discover the time machine vanishing. Has he gone into the future, or into the past? Superman will cover the former, while Batman and Robin go back to Norseland.

This of course means another appearance for Dr. Carter Nichols, a longtime Batman family member who was about to disappear as well. I don't think this was his final appearance but the clock was definitely ticking. He sends Batman and Robin back through time. Unfortunately, the Future Man has gotten there first and convinces the villagers that Batman and Robin are here to assassinate the local chieftain.

They are knocked unconscious and transported to learn their fate from the chieftain who turns out to be a surprise:



This is one of several "Thor" appearances in DC comics, and I would guess one of the last. It turns out that the Future Man's objective was to steal Thor's hammer, which he does and vanishes back to the present, with Batman and Robin in pursuit.

Meanwhile, Superman has gone into the future, where he initially faces charges for imitating the great hero of the past, but he quickly proves he's indeed the Man of Steel:



He recognizes the Science Minister as the Future Man, but later discovers it's actually his twin brother. The Future Man's minions capture Superman with the Kryptonite and tie it to him with ropes. We learn that the Hammer of Thor interacts with Kryptonite to cause amazing effects, hence the cover image, which scene appears next in the story.

We shift to the future, where the Future Man's henchmen greet his arrival from the present. Rak disintegrates the Kryptonite holding Superman down, apparently in preparation for destroying the Man of Steel himself. But it's a ruse, as Batman and Robin have defeated Rak already (using robots for the cover sequence), and with Superman free they quickly make short work of Rak's henchmen.

If we look at this story for keys as to when it could have been created, it immediately becomes obvious that it is after Detective #257 (July 1958) as this story features extensive use of the Whirly-Bats, which first appeared in that issue. There are plenty of other clues, however.

Superman is show as using his heat vision, not the heat of his x-ray vision. I am not sure of the exact date and issue that switchover was made, but I'm pretty sure it was around 1960.

The Thor appearance is a surprise. Marvel's Thor made his first appearance in August 1962 and he appeared on every cover of Journey into Mystery thereafter. That strikes me as a strong indication that this story must have been written before that. DC did have another Batman/Thor story before that in Batman #127 (1959), but with the heat vision aspect we're already after that.

I don't buy the date shown in the time machine of June 8, 1963. That's about when the comic went on sale (actually June 13, according to the DC Indexes).

There is one more aspect of the story that I have to comment on, and that is the tributes. This does certainly seem to be a swan song for Sprang, and Alfred/Rex and Commissioner Gordon are shoehorned into the story via a silly subplot about Batman's secret identity:



Alfred gets a line, the commissioner just gets to hold his head:



I tend to think that's intentional; if the Future Man really had Bruce's secret identity (and he did), then why would he contact Batman at police headquarters? Why not send him a message at Wayne Manor? The only answer is to give Sprang a chance to draw Gordon one last time. Bill Finger is credited with the script; did he know this was Sprang's last issue?

Comments: Nice story, excellent art as usual (but never again in the Silver Age) by Sprang.

There is a text story; World's Finest was one of the last superhero titles at DC to get a letters column. This one starts talking about frogmen of history, then switches to a discussion of the aquatic spider, then segues into modern skin (scuba) diving.

The second story is The Creatures that Conquered Aquaman. This one requires a small amount of intro. Jack Schiff had inherited the Aquaman strip from Adventure Comics. Initially he put Aquaman into Detective comics, but that only lasted for seven issues before he shipped it over to World's Finest. Initially both Aquaman and Green Arrow shared duties as backup features but effective with #134 they began alternating issues with slightly longer stories. This only lasted until #140; with the next issue Weisinger took over editorship of the mag and put a reprint story in the backup role. I have previously expressed bafflement at these decisions, especially since Aquaman had already gotten his own magazine by then. But in retrospect it seems obvious that although Aquaman had landed a new home, there was no room for the old Aquaman creative team of Jack Miller and Ramona Fradon over there.

This story is a rather pedestrian "Aliens from another dimension come to loot ours." They have these headbands that give them super-powers (mostly beams from their hands and eyes). Aquaman's finny friends help him out:



Comments: A mediocre story that feels padded even though it's only ten pages long. I've always like Fradon's art.

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Lois Lane, Dominatrix?

I try to keep it pretty much G-rated around here, but that has always struck me as a weird cover. "Why is Lois Lane lashing a wooden puppet of Superman?" The answer, pretty obviously, is "Because the CCA wouldn't let her lash Superman himself!"

Craig Yoe has a more interesting take on the matter, which is already making headlines. Caution: R-Rated, but amazing material. I'm completely flabbergasted.

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