The Resurrection of Atlas Comics

So, apparently it was announced at NYCC back in October that Atlas Comics is coming back. They've got an exclusive partnership with Walmart to distribute merchandise, including a line of collectible action figures with Mego...

There's also the obligatory (these days) movie deal with Paramount.

While I have some nostalgia for Atlas and Jim and I used to bandy around ideas for how Atlas could be relaunched, I think that maybe a third of the characters need to be forgotten, a third could be cool with some revamping, and a third are good "as-is" but unfortunately might not standout in a crowded marketplace. Spawn seems to have nabbed Grim Ghost's schtick, for instance. 

Anyway, there's a good chance they'll get me to pick up a few issues.

Old Time Radio Horrors

Typically, on/around Halloween, the Radio Classics channel on satellite radio runs a series of horror episodes from the Golden Age of radio. Traveling for work back in 2021, I happened to catch a lot of them. I think these were the best I heard:

"Three Skeleton Key": A lighthouse off French Guyana is overrun by thousands of rats from a wrecked derelict. Stars Vincent Price.

"House in Cypress Canyon": A strange tale of something bestial lurking in a new, post-war subdivision.

"Poltergeist": No relation to the film of the same name, other than being a tale of a malign spirit moved to horrible vengeance by a desecration of a graveyard.

"Behind the Locked Door": A sort of Lovecraftian horror story about some discovered in a cave near Lake Mead.

"The Shadow People": They can't be seen in the light, but a young woman finds out their deadly reality. 

The Energon Universe

When Skybound/Image started the Energon Universe back in 2023, I was only mildly interested. And that interest was more curiosity at why they chose to start this shared universe of Hasbro toy properties, named after a substance from the Transformers with a completely original comic, Void Rivals. It was a title whose whole point of existence seemed to be to provide the surprise reveal of a Transformers link--which for marketing purposes had to be spoiled pre-release so it couldn't be a surprise.

Well, I still don't understand the point of that as I haven't read Void Rivals, but when I read a review of Duke #1 written by Joshua Williamson with art by Tom Reilly, I got onboard to the universe in general. 

Cobra Commander #1 followed a month later by Williamson and Milana. 

Both Duke and Cobra Commander have been collected in trade. 

What they're doing is sort of Ultimate G.I. Joe (in the sense of Marvel's original Ultimate Marvel Universe), but the more realistic/modernized version of the cartoon G.I. Joe universe than Hama's original comics. Duke #1 opens at a point before there's a G.I. Joe, where Duke is a traumatized soldier (he saw a bud crushed in the hand of a giant transforming robot who the reader might recognize as Starscream) and his command structure (personified by Hawk) tells him he's mentally ill and dismisses what he saw.

Duke hooks up with a group of conspiracy theorists and discovers a link between the robot alien technology and M.A.R.S., who seem to be building a private army with advanced tech. The conspiracy group is killed, and Duke has to go on the run. Hawk is forced to send other elite troopers to bring him in--a group which the informed reader will recognize as including Rock-n-Roll and Stalker. Duke is renditioned to some sort of secret prison where he meets...

At this point, you are either the sort that this will appeal to, and you are already sold or it doesn't interest you at all, in which case these series probably aren't for you. I will say I think Williamson's stories for both series are a nice balance of fan service and inventiveness. The world is made more "real" in the sense of implications of alien technologies and human motivations, while retaining all the fantasticness (perhaps goofiness) of the source material. I wouldn't have thought he could make Cobra-La work, but he pretty much does.

These series were soon joined by a Scarlett and a Destro limited. Admittedly, I didn't find either of these as engaging as the first two, but I have also circled back at read the first volume of Daniel Warren Johnson's Transformers. All in all, the Energon Universe has me looking forward to what they are going to do next.

The Spider: Corpse Cargo (1933)

Volume 3, Issue 2 of The Spider magazine (July 1934) is as clear an indication as any that Norvell Page (writing as Grant Stockbridge) is not going to pull any punches with his Spider yarns. His first Spider outing saw kids dying from the bubonic plague unleashed by the villain. In this one, we're only a few pages in when a young member of a club of wannabe Baker Street Irregulars, "The Spider Fan Club," is tortured to death by a gang of modern-day pirates using a knife charged with electricity.

This is part of a larger plot where the gang, led by the beautiful villainess who calls herself Captain Kidd, is using a pulpy invention to electrify rails so that that glow with almost magical "green fire" and electrocute all the passengers of trains so their corpses can be robbed without any witnesses. The trains are sent rolling on to their destinations with no one living on board.

It's a hell of a lurid set-up, and Page is up to the challenge of delivering on it. The pirates set some pretty good death traps for the Spider to have to escape from. There's also a bit of a mystery regarding a kidnapped inventors missing granddaughter that isn't a big point but has a nice little payoff. 

The only thing missing, maybe, is any hint of femme fatale regarding Captain Kidd. The righteous and driven Spider finds her utterly loathsome (and with her disregard for human life, who can blame him!), and though Page says she is attractive, he doesn't give her the sort of loving description a Robert Howard would have.

Get The Spider: The Corpse Cargo here. Tim Truman did a loose adaptation of this story in comics format in the 1990s.

Xum's Who in Print

Xum's Who is a fan expansion of the DC Who's Who by Xum Yukinori, artist, podcaster, and comics fan, who unfortunately passed away in 2019. His son Isamu completed some of Xum's unfinished entries and got them all together for a limited print run. They are gorgeous dives into forgotten corners of the Pre-Crisis DCU.

For instance, Volume I gives entries to the Earth-One Superman and Wonder Woman, characters left out previously because of the erasure of their universe.

Characters deemed too minor for the official run like the Mikaal Tomas Starman, the Teen Titan character Golden Eagle, Lady Cop, and the Batgirl villain Lady Viper get their due. There are also characters whose exclusion from the original run seems odd (Giganta) and some whose exclusion points to the agenda behind the original run's compilation (Sugar & Spike).

I'm still waiting for someone to do an entry for the Black Eagle and his squadron of Tuskegee airmen but despite that lack, Xum's Who is a great thing to have in print. 

Wandering The Wild Wild West

For a long time, the only book on The Wild Wild West was Susan Kesler's book which is out of print. McFarland Books and author Don Presnell do their part to fill that gap with Wandering The Wild Wild West: A Critical Analysis of the CBS Television Series.

Presnell's book lacks the first-hand production detail and photos which made Kesler's book so great, but he does offer a solid review of all the episodes and does highlight the historical context of some episodes. He also offers up some fun trivia in infographic format.

I think it's a good addition to the library of any Wild Wild West fan, and for a fan without a copy of Kesler's book, it's essential.

Micronauts Chronology Conundrum

Anticipating receiving the copy of the Micronauts: The Original Marvel Years Omnibus Vol. 2 I preordered soon, I finally got back around to revisiting the contents of the first Micronauts omnibus--stories I haven't re-read in twenty years or more.

I noticed something in those first few issues that I either didn't notice before or had forgotten:  the timeline of Baron Karza's rise to power is confusing.

Micronauts #1 (January 1979) by Mantlo and Golden and Rubenstein, opens with the scions of Homeworld's royal family, Prince Argon and Princess Mari being pursued and captured by the forces of the despotic Baron Karza. We are told that the king and queen have been killed, but given their kids are still on the run, every suggestion is that this is a recent event. Karza's coup/revolt appears to be a relatively new thing, though certainly it has been going on long enough he has significant forces at his command and alien allies (the Acroyear) from elsewhere in the Microverse.

Next, we see Arcturus Rann return to Homeworld has his 1000 years long voyage of exploration--and quickly get captured himself. We soon find out that after Rann left on his trip, warp drive was discovered, and the species of the Microverse were connect while he was in flight. "Within six months" of the advent of warp drive (whenever that was) the Microverse was at war thanks to Karza. Rann has heard of Karza. He was his tutor 1000 years ago! 

While the information here is unclear, it would suggest at least that Karza's revolt isn't brand new. Perhaps it was centuries after Rann left that warp drive was invented, but whenever it was Karza was in position to launch a war of conquest against other worlds.

Finally, the protagonists of our series are all united in the arena, where Karza and his ally, the Acroyear ruler Shaitan are going to watch their struggles from a position of honor.  Shaitan says to Karza:

"It's been almost 24 xats since your insurrection, Karza, and still you enjoy the unswerving loyalty of the rabble!"

We're given no idea how long a xat is, but clearly 24 of them is sufficient time that Shaitan seems surprised the people still support Karza, so I don't think "hours" or "days' would be a good translation.

We also find out Dallah and Sepsis who we've heard people swear by before were Rann's parents. They were deified by the resistance after they were martyred for defying Karza "almost 1000 years ago."

Where does all this leave us?

1. Almost 1000 years ago, Karza killed the rulers (presumably) of Homeworld Dallah and Sepsis in the Body Banks.
2. Either that or some other event marks the beginning of his insurrection "24 xats" before the present.
3. In the present, he has only recently killed the King and Queen of Homeworld (who aren't Dallah and Sepsis), and only at the start of this story manages to capture their children and their entourage.

We're given contradictory clues that Karza somehow both began his coup a long time ago, yet only recently completely it, and we have two royal families with an unclear relationship.

Perhaps there is further information in later stories that would clear this up. Certainly, I can think of a backstory that would make sense of it all, but I do wonder what Mantlo intended?