Norman Bates The Original Psycho Slasher

Posted on October 15, 2014 by bloodlinematt

I write a blog on here, and you’d be more than welcome to read it if you want f.o.c. of course..free of charge! This update before our big Halloween day update is all about the one and only Norman Bates and Innovation Comics’ three issue adaptation of the film that came out in 1992. If you remember last year I had a tough time choosing what to review between Leatherface: Texas Chainsaw Massacre III and Psycho, and Leatherface ended up winning. Well this year I decided that it’s for sure Psycho’s time in the jack-o-lantern candle spotlight. So while we wait for our room at the Bates Motel, we should talk about the 1959 novel Psycho written by Robert Bloch that was adapted into the 1960 Alfred Hitchcock film of the same name. The novel was about a son and mother that run a motel called the Bates Motel that’s off a stretch of highway. When a young lady goes missing and we know she has been murdered, a plot of why and who killed her comes into play as her sister and a private detective come looking for answers. The novel was a hit and was loosely based off the killer Ed Gein who just two years before had been arrested for murder and grave robbing. It’s said that Bloch didn’t do any research into Gein’s crimes and was shocked to see just how much the Norman Bates character and the real life killer Gein had in common. The novel proved to be such a hit that it was licensed to become a film directed by the master of thrills Alfred Hitchcock, and it also sparked two novel sequels called Psycho II in 1982 and Psycho House in 1990. For those wondering, Robert Bloch wrote 30 novels and hundreds of short stories. Some of his novels include Night of The Ripper, The Dead Beat, The Jekyll Legacy and Twilight Zone: The Movie to name a few. In the 60’s Bloch also worked on Hollywood scripts that included 10 episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents as well as William Castle directed films Straight Jacket and The Night Walker as well as British made horror film The Skull that starred Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee. Bloch was a protege and friend of writer H.P. Lovecraft the latter who even dedicated a story to marking the first and only time the writer dedicated one of his stories to someone else. Sadly Robert Bloch is no longer with us as he passed away in 1994 at the age of 77 from cancer. But if you enjoy a good horror chiller novel then check out some of Bloch’s work. I’m sure you will get a shiver or two from them.

Now at this point I should get onto breaking down the films in the Psycho movie series as well as talk briefly about the TV inspired programs, and I guess about the awful and unwanted remake. So as always I am going to take the films descriptions from IMDB so that you can get a little taste of what these films are about. Warning: I am sure these write ups will have spoilers I will also at the end of each give them a 1-4 star rating just for the fun of it! So with that let’s sit down have some peanut butter sandwiches and milk and learn all about Norman Bates and his Mother Norma. I should also say that Anthony Perkins will always be Norman Bates. The way the actor brought the character to life will never be matched. Perkins played the character in the first 4 films and sadly passed away in 1992 at the age of 60 from AIDS-related pneumonia. But let’s get to those film write ups, shall we?

Psycho – Phoenix officeworker Marion Crane is fed up with the way life has treated her. She has to meet her lover Sam in lunch breaks and they cannot get married because Sam has to give most of his money away in alimony. One Friday Marion is trusted to bank $40,000 by her employer. Seeing the opportunity to take the money and start a new life, Marion leaves town and heads towards Sam’s California store. Tired after the long drive and caught in a storm, she gets off the main highway and pulls into The Bates Motel. The motel is managed by a quiet young man called Norman who seems to be dominated by his mother. 4 stars for sure, a true classic in cinema as well as truly one of the first slasher films.

Psycho II – Now declared legally sane, Norman Bates is released from a mental institution after spending 22 years in confinement over the protests of Marion Crane’s sister Lila Loomis, who insists that he’s still a killer and that the court’s indifference to his victims by releasing him is a gross miscarriage of justice. Norman returns to his motel and the old Victorian mansion where his troubles started, and history predictably begins to repeat itself. A solid 3 1/2 stars and a film I can remember watching a lot when I was younger!

Psycho III – Norman Bates is still running his little motel, and he has kept the dressed skeleton he calls mother. One of his guests is a young girl who has left the convent where she lived. To get some help he employs a young man. One day a nosy journalist comes to see him to ask questions about his past. I really like this third film and while it’s more of a slasher film than a suspense one, I still would give this 3 stars!

Psycho IV: The Beginning – Norman Bates returns for this “prequel”, once more having mommy trouble. This time around he is invited to share memories of mom with a radio talk show host, but the PYSCHO fears that he may kill again for his beloved is impregnated with his child and Norman cannot let another PYSCHO loose in the civilized world. This made for Showtime movie is pretty good and sadly marked the last time Anthony Perkins played Norman Bates. I would give this one as well 3 Stars.

Bates Motel (1987) – This film is based on, but not in sequence with, the Psycho films. After the death of Norman Bates, a man who befriended him in the institution inherits the motel. In keeping with Norman’s wishes, he tries to fix up the place and make it a respectable motel. Made for TV film that was made to try and kick start a TV series.

Psycho (1998) – Marion Crane steals a lot of cash from a man whom her boss is in business with. On the way to see her boyfriend, she stops off by an old motel, run by the odd Norman Bates. She is murdered in the shower. Her sister, boyfriend, and a private investigator try to find out where she is, while we learn more about Norman Bates. This film is a waste and has Vince Vaughn as Norman Bates. Zero stars.

Bates Motel (2013) – “Bates Motel” is a contemporary prequel to the genre-defining film “Psycho,” and gives a portrayal of how Norman Bates’ (Freddie Highmore) psyche unravels through his teenage years. Fans discover the dark, twisted backstory of Norman Bates and how deeply intricate his relationship with his mother, Norma (Vera Farmiga), truly is. Airs on A&E and is on it’s second season.

The Bates Haunting (2012) – One year ago, Agnes Rickover attended opening night at the Bates Motel and Haunted Hayride to see her best friend Lily’s dramatic debut. A horrific accident resulted in Agnes witnessing Lily’s fiery death in a spectacle gone wrong. After a year of obsessing over a murder investigation everyone else thinks is open and shut, Agnes goes to work at the Haunt in an attempt confront her trauma. Horrific events begin to claim the lives of her coworkers and Agnes must figure out what is behind all of the “accidents” before more people die. Generic cash in on the Bates Motel name, has nothing to do with Norman Bates or hell even the Bates Motel!

While Psycho started as a book, it was the films that made it a household name and allowed it to be marketed and even the original motel and house set to become a mainstay tourist attraction for all those who go to Universal Studios Hollywood. Psycho as well as Norman Bates and Mother have been turned into all types of products from t-shirts, dolls, night lights, posters, comics, toys, shower curtains, video games and Halloween costumes. One of my favorite piece of merchandise is the McFarlane Toys Movie Maniac Norman Bates action figure that is Norman in dress with removable wig…classic! I should also note that I would love for a 3 3/4” ReAction Figure line based on Psycho to come out complete with Norman and Mother. So if you’re a Psycho fan, there is plenty of great stuff out there for you to collect.

In 1988, Box Office Games made a game for the Commodore 64 based on Psycho that was a cheesy 8-bit horror themed game. The game is about a curator with a bad heart and some priceless jewels that have been stolen from a museum. All clues point that they are both at the infamous Bates Motel! No one will take the case besides you, a detective that decides to enter the famed house and Motel late at night. In the house is Norman Bates dressed up as his mother as well as skeletons, ghosts and bats all wanting to stop you from saving the day. It’s a race against time as you must find them before daybreak and must also fight off sleep! Find the clues, keys, gun, ammo, the curator and jewels before Norman Bates finds you! Do you have the nerves of steel to search the Bates House and Motel? Can you stand up to Norman Bates? The game is okay but the lack of Norman and Mother make it feel like an updated version of the Atari 2600 game Haunted House.The graphics are your standard Commodore style so while not ground breaking, they are very charming. But over all if you’re a fan of the film and still own a Commodore 64, then this is one you might want to check out.

One thing that makes the Psycho films work is the score music that accompanies so many of the films’ iconic scenes. The first film’s score is done by Bernard Herrmann and is a very powerful and each bit of music fits the scene it accompanies. Who can forget the the the shower scene music cue? The second film’s music is done by Jerry Goldsmith and once more is a very solid piece of work, filled with just enough touches of Herrmann’s score style but truly Godlsmith’s own. The third film has Carter Burwell doing the score, and the fourth film is Graeme Revell and both do outstanding jobs and like the composers before them, capture the mood and feel of the Psycho world. Each of these soundtracks are worth a listen with part four’s being the hardest to get your hands on. One thing that I love to do on Alpha Rhythms on WYSO is play some of the score done by Herrmann from time to time, and it’s always a must-play on the Halloween show.

Janet Leigh was born Jeanette Helen Morrison on July 6^th 1927, and by 1945 thanks to actress Norma Shearer, she became a signed on actress to MGM even though she had no acting experience. She got the contract just simply by her smile. By 1947 she made her major big budget film debut in The Romance Of Rosy Ridge, and after this many roles would come her way like If Winter Comes, The Stratton Story, Hills Of Home, Little Women and Touch Of Evil to name a few. Her most popular role came in 1960 when she was casted as Marion Crane in Psycho. With the success of Psycho, she landed more major roles in such films as The Manchurian Candidate and Bye Bye Birdie. During this time she also took some roles on TV shows like Tales Of The Unexpected, Columbo, The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and even an episode of the 1989 Twilight Zone. She also took roles alongside her actress daughter Jamie Lee Curtis in the films The Fog and Halloween H20. Leigh has been married a total of 4 times with her third husband being Tony Curtis with whom she had Jamie Lee. Leigh sadly died in 2004 at the age of 77 from vasculitis leaving behind a husband and two daughters. To me Janet Leigh could be one of the original Scream Queens of horror and only could be matched for the “original” title by Carolyn Jones of 1959’s House on Haunted Hill and of course Fay Wray from 1933’s King Kong. But what is for sure is Janet Leigh was a fantastic actress who starred in some great films and made her mark on the world of horror.

Growing up I watched Psycho and its sequels a lot, and one fun past time I can remember doing in my teens was talking to my mom as if she was Mother. She hated when I did this but I always got a good laugh acting as if she was crazy and such about girls I was dating or even dinner she had cooked for us. Fun times indeed and still to this day from time to time I still bust out the “Yes Mother” just to keep the joke alive. But I just got word that our room is ready and just our luck we got room # 1, the room right next door to the office so we are really lucky! But before we enter, I just want to remind you all that I grade these issues on a star scale of 1 to 4 and am looking for how well the comic stays to the source material, its entertainment value and its art and story. I also want to thank Bell Book and Comic and Lone Star Comics for having these issues in stock. So let’s go ahead and get comfy and enjoy our stay at the Bates Motel!

Psycho # 1 ***1/2
Released in 1992 Cover Price $2.50 Innovation #1 of 3

At a hotel room Sam and Marion have just finished up a lunch break filled with making love, and the two talk of a “future” that they might have together once Sam can get back on his feet. Marion returns to work where she is a secretary for a real estate agent, and when a load mouth cowboy comes in with forty thousand dollar cash and she is asked to put it in the companies safety deposit box at the bank, she makes the decision to steal the money and go on the run. On her way out of town she catches the eye of a cop who follows her as she trades in her car and buys a new one. She then makes her way to a motel called The Bates Motel during a rain storm and meets the owner Norman Bates, who invites her to dinner and while he goes to his home on the hill near the motel Marion can hear him arguing with his mother before returning with some sandwiches and milk. Marion eats in the office parlor as she and Norman talk about his Mother and running away from mistakes. The talk makes her want to return home and return the money before things get way out of hand, and as she returns to her room Norman removes a picture in his office to show a peephole into her cabin next door!

Marion is a lovely woman who is just down and out in her love life as well are in her professional life. She decides to try and change her luck and commits a terrible crime to secure that new life, and while now she is on the path to make everything better she still feels rotten about what she has done. This sad and desperate situation she finds herself in is what draws you as a reader into really liking her character and hoping that she can make things right and find happiness another way. Norman Bates is an odd and awkward yet likeable man who really seems to care for his Mother even though she treats him poorly and rules every aspect of his life, plus his hobby is taxidermy, he likes to drink milk, he runs a motel with no guests and he’s a peeping tom…so he has to be a good guy right? Mother Bates, while we have not seen her, sounds very strong willed and not very friendly at all. It’s clear that Mother hates other women and thinks that they are all whores who want to corrupt Norman. The mood of the comic captures the mood of the film really well and for those of us who have seen the classic film, we know what awaits us but still the build up here is really well done. The art inside the comic is that painted style and is done by Felipe Echevarria who does a fantastic job with making Marion look like actress Janet Lee, but I will say his Norman Bates, while good, looks nothing like Anthony Perkins and that’s kind of a let down. The cover is fantastic and captures that noir and horror feel of the film perfect. Over all this is a perfect comic film adaptation and really sparks the mood of this Halloween season! So let’s get onto issue # 2 and see what Norman is up to.

Psycho # 2 ***
Released in 1992 Cover Price $2.50 Innovation #2 of 3

Norman spies on Marion as she gets undressed and writes a letter she rips up and flushes. As she gets into the shower Norman, walks back up to his house. As Marion’s in the shower, a shadowy figure with a dress on and white hair slings open the shower curtain and stabs the young woman to death. We cut back to the house as Norman yells at mother about all the blood and rushes to the room and cleans up the blood, and dumps Marion’s body in her car into a near by lake. Meanwhile the murdered woman’s sister Lila is visiting Sam to try and find her missing sister and the money, and they become aware that a private investigator named Arbogast has been hired to find her and get the money back. Arbogast travels the highways and stops at all the motels to see if anyone has seen Marion and when entering The Bates Motel, he and Norman exchange some words when he finds that Norman has lied about the woman being at his Motel after he finds her name on the guest registry. After questioning Norman and being refused to speak to Mother, Arbogast calls Lila and Sam to tell them that Marion was at The Bates Motel and that he plans on sneaking into the house to speak to Mother, and he will call them back in an hour. Arbogast sneaks into the house and becomes another victim to Mother and her knife, and when three hours pass Sam leaves Lila to go to Bates Motel and check on what’s going on.

The second issue is still very solid, but I will say it slips a little as many of the pages are filled with overly large art with no dialogue, and then other parts are filled with overly long dialogue! Marion in this issue is killed off and her character comes to an end, sad ’cause much like in the film you find yourself hoping she does the right thing for her own life. Norman Bates is shown to be spineless when it comes to standing up to mother as well as others who are come looking for those that mother’s actions affected. Arbogast tries his best to be Dick Tracy but falls short when he becomes too nosey and pays the price of entering another person’s house uninvited with his life. Sam and Lila are gearing up to be more of the focus of the final issue as they really want to know where their loved one is! The story in this issue is more noir than horror but this works for the middle issue and is really the set up for the big surprise and blow out of the end of the story. The cover is great and captures the horror of Marion’s shower death, and the art in this issue while good seems a slight more sloppy than issue # 1 and is done by Felipe Echevarria once more in the paint style. I must also say that while in the film the shower scene is the most iconic part, in the comic it don’t hold up as well and comes off solid but not great. The murder that does work is that of Arbogast, due to the dark shadows used and the perfect way the darkness hides Mother. Very good issue that once more holds the feel and mood of the film it’s based on showing that adaptations can be done right. So with no more wait let’s move onto the conclusion of Psycho!

Psycho # 3 ***1/2
Released in 1992 Cover Price $2.50 Innovation #3 of 3

Sam and Lila regroup after he went to the Bates Motel and never saw Norman, only Mother via her bedroom window. The pair visit the town sheriff and tell them about Marion, the money and Arbogast and that all these things tie into The Bates Motel! They tell him of the phone call from the now missing private detective about speaking with Mother as well as Sam’s eye witness of the old woman sitting in the window and watching him. The Sheriff informs them that Norman’s mother has been dead for over 10 years and that he thinks that Arbogast has left town on a lead of Marion so that he himself could steal the money from her. Norman in fear that they will be coming for Mother makes her hide in the fruit cellar and the next morning is able to pass that everything is okay when the Sheriff came to the motel looking for answers. Sam and Lila still don’t think things are right at Bates Motel and head there to stay under the fake guise that they are husband and wife looking for a good night’s rest. They are taken to cabin # 6, and when Norman goes back to his hous,e they sneak into cabin # 1 and find evidence that Marion was there at some point for sure. Sam distracts Norman while Lila sneaks inside and this leads to Norman knocking out Sam when he finds that his questions are about Mother and rushes to the house as Lila hides in the fruit cellar and finds Mother who is in fact a corpse as Norman busts in wearing a wig and dress! Norman is stopped by Sam and is arrested for the murders. In the end it’s shown that Norman Bates has been crazy his whole life and killed his own mother and her lover 10 years back and has took on a split personality that has him switch from Norman Bates to Mother Bates!

Norman Bates is mentally unstable, and this makes him a great bad guy in the comic world as he has layers to his craziness, making him super dangerous as he has this way about him that while you are creeped out you see him as no danger…the key thing to most serial killers is to make everyone believe they are normal. In this final issue we get to see multiple sides of Norman from worried and loyal son to cross dressing mama’s boy with murder on his mind. Norman Bates, while defeated by the end of the comic, lives to fight another day as it’s clear he will spend his days in an asylum. Lila and Sam are good characters who won’t give up on their missing loved one and put themselves into danger to try and find the truth, and are the ones who crack these missing person cases wide open by solving the mystery of the Bates Motel. The Sheriff is just a numbskull who half asses his look into what Norman knows and offers really no help to Lila and Sam for their quest for the truth. Mother….poor decomposed Mother. While her body is a rotting shell, her spirit is alive and well in Norman. The Mother side of his personality is the domineering and evil side that makes him lash out at pretty women and any man who gets in the way. This final issue holds the shock of Mother being dead and Norman being crazy really well, and both these aspects work really well in this comic mini series. Felipe Echevarria does the art again, and the paint style looks great still but his Norman Bates is still a little off. I wish it would have looked more like Anthony Perkins! The cover is well done but is by far the weaker of the three issues. Over all I really enjoyed this comic series, and this was a perfect way to get into the Halloween spirit even more. If you’re a fan of the film, the novel and comics then check this one out for sure.

Well it’s time to check out of the Bates Motel and wrap this update up. This was a very well done comic series that helped capture the thrills of suspense of the film it was based on, and makes me wish Innovation would have made a full comic series based on Norman Bates and the Motel he runs. So I am sure you’re wondering what is the next update, the one that will be going up on October 31^st 2014 Halloween Day. Well I am proud to say that it will be based on Universal’s Frankenstein Monster and special comics made on the films! So until then share some ghost stories with friends, watch a horror movie and read a horror comic and what ever you do, don’t stay at the Bates Motel!

The Incredible Werewolf

Posted on September 20, 2014 by bloodlinematt

Fall’s in the air, and the Halloween season is quickly approaching. That means we are all entitled to a good scare so let me take a look at an old creepy house me and my friends use to go exploring inside and we also filmed many no budget horror films around; it’s one we all dubbed “Murder House”! This house sat in Beavercreek off Indian Ripple Road and was just down the street from a cemetery. The yard was always overgrown with weeds, and all around it was trees and unkept bushes. Every window on the ground floor was boarded up as the second floor windows were all clear but busted. In what was once the driveway to the house, an old dresser sat tipped over and was on top of a body of a deer that was just a skeleton. On the left side of the house was a cage used for dogs and around it bones and skulls of cats and dogs were thrown about. The right side had a covered porch that was covered with vines and rotten leaves, and also around this part in the yard were old metal toy trucks that were rusting from years of neglect and weather. The backyard had an old cellar that had caved in and was blocked by all types of debris and a little further back pens used for sheep as well as a little stream could be seen. The backdoor to the house was busted open and this would allow you access to the inside, that we would all enter when wanting to get a good scare. For years I was obsessed with this house and would drive past it with friends on late night ghost hunts or just cruising around blaring music. Keep in mind I was in my early 20’s and loved making my own shot on video horror flicks so this house was my go to spooky place to freak out dates and get a shiver up my spine as well. When around the house at night I would always get a weird vibe that someone was watching me. The first time I ever entered the house was with my pal Josh Weinberg. Armed with flashlights and pocket knives, we creeped into the backdoor that lead us to the kitchen. The first thing we noticed was that a freezer had been tipped over and was laying on its side but the rest of the kitchen, while dirty, was not vandalized. The odd part was that dishes still sat in the sink and the cabinets were filled with dishes and caned goods. The grossest part was the fact the refrigerator still had lots of food in it that had turned into a molded mass of goo! A door off the kitchen lead to the garage that was packed with normal stuff like a lawnmower, but it was also packed with lots and lots of trash bags filled with junk and clothes. Another door in the kitchen lead to the basement..that at first we did not go down due to time and I am sure as well nerves. Off the kitchen was a small dining room area and this is were the house got its name among us friends because on the carpeted floor was a giant blood stain, a stain so big that whatever lost the blood clearly passed away..

Josh and I looked at the blood stain for awhile and chatted about what we thought had happened in that spot. We went a little further into the house, and the next room was a very large living room that still had the furniture around. While it was clear that someone had tipped it all over, it was still intact. I should also say that the house was pitch black and not even the flashlights seemed to help all that much as the darkness always seemed to be all around you. Off the living room was some stairs that lead to the second floor, but we didn’t go up them as we wanted to go tell the others about the blood stain. Later that night Josh and I returned to Murder House with Matt Hoffman, Dave Wean and Brandon Womeldorff to show them the stain and just how odd the house was. It was at this time we noticed that 1994 was the date on the calendar and all the left behind bills we could find. At that time we never did go into the basement nor go upstairs, but we did get a scare from a raccoon who came out of nowhere hissing and acting like a wild nut. A few months later Brandon and I went back to the house and found that the carpet in the room with the blood stain had been removed exposing the hardwood floor. Who would remove carpet with a giant blood stain on it from an abandoned house? Years would pass and Murder House became the set for my films like “Cocktober Blood” and the unfinished “Frankenstein Meets The Werewolf,” and I would also still take girls to it to give em a scare as well as people I didn’t like to freak em out and tell them that I saw people watching us from the windows upstairs and laugh as they would freak out. One night many years later when I was in my very late 20’s, I went back inside Murder House with my friends Max Ervin, Chris “Doogie” Mollohan and Lauryn Campanell and finally went into the basement and upstairs! The basement was very plain and while the washer and dryer and some tools was around and the atmosphere was spooky, it was nothing to special. The upstairs however was pretty creepy as all three bedrooms still had the beds and furniture intact. One bedroom was also filled with toys I can remember Max and I finding a Muppet Babies See and Say as well as the video game cart of Indiana Jones for Atari 2600. That was a fun night with great friends one that I will always remember sharing with Max and Chris who sadly have both passed away. Murder House was torn down shortly after that night and now all that stands in its place is an empty lot that is for sale. After trying to find information on the house and its history, we never could figure out just what happened there.

The year was 1987, and the Fox Network was trying to become a major player for prime time television viewership. One of the shows they made was called Werewolf that followed a young man named Eric Cord, played by John J. York, who was bitten by a werewolf and must try and find a way to kill the lead werewolf who started his bloodline in order to rid himself of the curse. The “lead” werewolf was a one eyed ship boat captain named Janos Skorzeny, who was played by TV acting veteran Chuck Connors. To add more stress to Eric’s quest, he was also being hunted by a bounty hunter named Alamo Joe Rogan played by Lance LeGault. The series premiere was a 2 hour event, and Fox put a lot of hype into it’s airing. I can remember the buzz going around it, and my parents even planned on watching it. That seemed like a big deal to me at the time as my mom never really liked horror themed things, so the fact she was going to watch the premiere peaked our interest. My brother and I wanted to watch it so bad but due to what time it aired and our mom thinking that the show was going to be too bloody for our young eyes to see, we didn’t get to watch it when it first aired. We did however get to watch it on tape as they recorded it on beta. When we finally were able to watch it, I can remember loving every cheesy and scary moment of it. The werewolf costume was perfect and pretty great stuff for the time. After watching the episode my brother and I became fans, and our parents worked it in on the family TV viewing lineup. We tried to not miss an episode although we did miss many. One of the reasons I loved the show so much was the fact it reminded me of the 1978 Incredible Hulk show with the fact Eric, much like David Banner, had to travel from town to town and when their monster side came out, the beast always did the right thing, but it became unsafe for their human side to stay around. Werewolf was canceled in 1988, and only lasted 1 long season that had 29 episodes and sadly the series never had a full fledged ending leaving us loyal viewers hanging. The series had solid ratings but the rumor going round was that the budget for episodes was too high and this was the reason for the cancelation.

A short time after Fox pulled Werewolf from their lineup, USA Network stepped in and started airing the reruns and even showed the two hour premiere episode on Saturday Nightmares! My brother and I watched the episodes on USA and was able to catch the ones we missed on Fox. I can remember sitting in our living room on Royston Drive in Waynesville Ohio watching Werewolf and cheering for Eric to turn into a werewolf and find a way to end his curse. I can also remember seeing in Cracked Magazine parodies of the show and always for some reason nerding out. In fact, in some of my lame home made comics I had the Eric Cord werewolf as a character! At some point in the coming year here at Rotten Ink, I will cover a comic series I made called Robo-Raccoon that followed a Raccoon man and his friends who were trying to collect bounties in space. Wow, I was way off track with Robo-Raccoon, but really just wanted to write this little part to say thanks to both Fox and USA for airing a show that made my childhood even cooler!

Chuck Connors was a very popular actor in our household as my parents loved shows like The Rifleman and Branded and us the kids had Werewolf and the film Tourist Trap. Chuck Connors was born Kevin Joeseph Connors in 1921. Growing up, Chuck was a great athlete in high school and after spending two years in South Orange College in New Jersey, he decided to join the Army during World War II and become a Tank Combat Instructor. During this time as well he played for the NBA team Rochester Royals and helped lead them to the 1946 championship! Also in 1946 he was discharged from the military and joined the basketball team the Boston Celtics, but left the team to join the MLB team the Brooklyn Dodgers whom he had been a fan of since youth. But before he left the Celtics, he became the first player to break the backboard! Sadly the Dodgers had him mostly play for the minor teams before letting him play only one game with them in 1949. By 1951 he started to play for the Chicago Cubs as a first baseman for a total of 66 games. Connors floated around the sports world for awhile even getting drafted by NFL team the Chicago Bears, but he never once suited up and left sports altogether to become an actor in Hollywood. Connors, early in his acting career, was in such films as Pat and Mike, South Sea Woman, Trouble Along The Way and Old Yeller. Connors even began taking small roles on TV shows like Adventures of Superman and Dear Phoebe, but in 1958 he landed the role of Lucas McCain on the ABC western show The Rifleman! The show was a huge success and lasted 5 seasons for a total of 168 episodes. After The Rifleman went off the air in 1963, Connors found work again in TV and movies landing roles in such projects as Arrest And Trial, Branded, Flipper (film) and even had a part of a slave owner in the 1977 mini series Roots which he won a Emmy for. In 1979 Connors played Mr. Slausen in Tourist Trap, a horror film that also starred Tanya Roberts that was about a rundown tourist attraction were a group of friends come face to face with a crazed killer. In 1987 he took the role of the one eyed werewolf in the horror series Werewolf. His last major role came in the 1991made for TV movie The Gambler Returns: The Luck Of The Draw were he plays once more Lucas McCain. Connors over the years had been married three times and had four children and had smoked since 1940 and for many years he smoked three packs a day. Sadly in 1992 at the age of 71 Chuck Connors passed away from pneumonia and was battling lung cancer. Chuck Connors was able to do many great things during his lifetime and is a true icon of western TV programs and even is in the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Mueseum’s Hall of Fame. So this update is dedicated to you Chuck Connors for entertaining the Brassfield family for generations.

Werewolf the Complete Series has never found it’s way to VHS, DVD or Blu-Ray here in the United States by a main stream company but can be found on the Grey Market. Some years back I can remember that Shout Factory was going to put out the series and this made many fans happy cause they could toss away the old DVD-R’s and get a legit with better picture quality and extras! But as the release date drew near, the boxset was pushed back not once but twice and then it quietly was canceled, and fans of the show once more were left out in the cold with no official release. The story I heard of why this series has never made it out on home media is that some of the music that was used in the series is costing any company wanting to put it out too much in royalties. The big rumor on the band that’s caused much of the drama of this series not coming out is Mike + The Mechanics whose song Silent Running is used during a key part for the first episode, and they want way too much money for the rights to the song for home video. But again I must stress that all this is just rumors I have heard, but whatever the reason this series has not made it to DVD needs to be figured out so us fans can re-live the hunt for the werewolf curse cure.

So the full moon is in the night sky, and I can hear the children of the night howling with delight as we are about to take a look at the six issue comic series done by Blackthorne Comics based on this short lived horror TV series. So make sure you have your silver bullets ready and always keep in mind that I grade these comics on a standard 1-4 star scale and look for entertainment value, art, story and how true the comic is to its source material. So let’s go on a wild ride of full moon fever and roam in a pack with Eric Cord. Also thanks to Bell Book And Comic, Ebay and Lone Star Comics for having these issues in stock

Werewolf 3-D #1 ***
Released in 1988 Cover Price $2.50 Blackthorne #1 of 1

A couple is attacked and killed in the parking lot of the local disco by some kind of werewolf. The next morning Eric and his girlfriend Kelly are by the pool when her father comes out and is shocked and fearful of the attacks going on in their hometown. You see Eric has been raised by them and his relationship with Kelly is a secret as they both don’t know how her dad would take the news as he looks at Eric as a son, and Eric’s best friend Ted is also Kelly’s brother. When Ted comes back into town he has Eric come over and tells him that he is the one killing all the people around town and that he is in fact a Werewolf! Ted begs Eric to kill him but after some time it’s too late as Ted becomes a werewolf and bites Eric who is forced to shoot and kill his friend, as the neighbors come rushing over they see Eric holding the dead body of Ted and he is blamed for murder. Out on bail Eric is picked up by Kelly who tells him that she knows her brother was a werewolf because he sent her a cassette tape message telling her the whole story the morning of his death. So together Kelly and Eric deal with his full moon change that leaves him a crazed beast and together they find that a ship captain named Janos Skorzeny is the start of the curse, and when Eric meets him things go south real quick! That evening Skorzeny kidnaps Kelly as Eric is picked up by bounty hunter Alamo Joe Rogan on a full moon night for skipping out on bail. When Eric turns into the beast, he escapes and saves Kelly from Skorzeny as a werewolf battle rages on in a burning cabin in the woods. In the end the sun comes up and the werewolves stop fighting. Eric, while human, tells Kelly he must kill Skorzeny and set himself free, as Alamo Joe understands now he is no longer hunting just a man but now a monster.

This 3-D issue is a lot of fun and is really just an adaptation of the first episode of the series. The artwork and story are really well done but once more I found that the 3-D effect didn’t work all that great, much like it didn’t with The Noid comic and when wearing the glasses I could almost feel a headache creeping in. Eric Cord is our hero, a normal guy who just so happens to have really bad luck as he kills his best friend and at the same time is infected with a curse that turns him into a werewolf, and to make it all worse his girlfriend knows of his condition and he has a bounty hunter after him…so let’s just say our hero needs a lot of support from the reader. Plus I think the best thing about Eric is that he seems like an average guy, no different from you or me. Kelly is Eric’s girlfriend and is a huge help to him once he decides that he must track down the werewolf who started the bloodline that affects him. While she is confused, she is a great help and a likable character. Alamo Joe Rogan is a great character who has been a bounty hunter for 21 years and has never lost one of his targets, and when he comes face to face with Eric as a werewolf he doesn’t blink an eye and just goes out and gets blessed silver bullets…now he’s what I would call a badass. The lead bad werewolf Janos Skorzeny is an evil man who takes joy in killing when the moon is full, and he is hard for the cops to find because being a sailor takes him from place to place. He doesn’t get to flex his evil muscle much in this issue, but I am sure he will be a thorn in Eric’s side a lot during this comic series. The werewolf fight at the end of the issue was thing comic books are made of as the two beasts duked it out all the while the cabin around them is on fire and a lovely woman is caught between them….amazing! The artwork is really well done by Donnie Jupiter who captures the feel of the TV Show and the mood of a late 80’s horror comic, and the story from Frank Lupo and adapted by Lance Hampton is also top notch. Over all if you like the TV show or like werewolves then check out this cool little 3-D gimmick comic. So let’s travel deeper into the woods of this full moon and see what more mayhem we can read about.

Werewolf # 1 ***
Released in 1988 Cover Price $2.00 Blackthorne #1 of 5

Eric Cord is hanging out at the dock where Skorzeny’s boat is and with a stolen gun and some silver bullets he plans on killing the old ship captain and lifting his curse. While waiting around the docks, Eric also finds out that Alamo Joe is on his tail and is also packing a gun with silver bullets but he is aiming for him and not Skorzeny. To make it all worse, Alamo Joe has places a bounty on Eric’s head and now some of the shady dock workers want the money. Skorzeny gets mad at another ship captain and turns into a werewolf and kills him very brutally as Eric as well turns into a werewolf and has to kill some dock workers who were attacking him to collect the reward on his head. In the end Werewolf Eric comes face to face with Alamo Joe, who fires a silver bullet into his ear, causing the beast to leap into the water and disappear into the night sky. In the morning Skorzeny shows up and is upset about the bullet holes in his ship, as Alamo Joe finds out that brutal murders have been happening around the dock for months now and he also finds Eric’s journal that tells the story of Skorzeny being the werewolf king! As for Eric, he wakes back up as a human on shore and knows that he must try and kill his tormentor again and again until he succeeds.

What a great first issue, and while it is just based on a script from an episode of the TV Show, it still translates to comics really well. The downbeat mood of the issue is well described by the setting of the dirty and scummy docks where not only Skorzeny roams but also some real dirt bags. Placing yourself into Eric’s shoes as he searches the area for his target helps add to the over all chill of the issue. Eric Cord in the issue is more of a man on a mission and with Kelly safe at home and his mind on the cure, he comes off way manlier and way more ready for action. As the Werewolf, Eric is a killing machine and if the 3-D issue taught me anything, it’s that as the werewolf he can even stand toe to toe with Skorzeny who is older and tougher than him. Skorzeny is a cruel evil man and when the werewolf he don’t care who he kills and how brutal it may be, in fact in this issue when he kills the fellow sea captain, he doesn’t just claw and bite him, he also impales him on a metal rod! Alamo Joe in this issue don’t get into the action too much as he only gets one good shot off from his gun and that only clips Werewolf Eric’s ear. He mostly is around to be a pain in Eric’s side as he puts pressure on the dock workers to turn him in. The issue, while in black and white, does have the use of blood during the werewolf attacks and while I would not say it’s a bloodbath it is nice to see in this TV Adaptation comic series. The issue’s artwork is once more top notch late 80’s independent horror comic work and is done by a great artist whom I could not find his or her’s name in the credits. The issue’s cover is pretty cool and has all the main characters shown so it does its job. I used to have this issue when I was younger as well, and it held up really well as I liked it back then as well as today. So let’s see what happens in issue two and see if Eric can fulfill his destiny.

Werewolf # 2 **
Released in 1988 Cover Price $2.00 Blackthorne #2 of 5

Davey is a 10 year old boy who loves monsters who lives with his mom and her abusive boyfriend Bobby. Late one night Davey hears a gunshot as well as a howl, and he gets hyped that a real life monster must be out and near his house. He sneaks out and finds a werewolf who has a bullet wound and takes him to his tree house to hide. The next morning Davey is caught entering the house by his mother and he tells her about his monster friend, she thinks he just telling stories and allows him to eat his breakfast in his tree house as Bobby bullies the Mom and always trashes and picks on Davey leaves for work but not before meeting a man who comes to the house looking for a wounded man he has shot and who he tells them is a murderer. Davey finds that the werewolf is now a man who needs help to remove the bullet from his shoulder and the young boy helps him. Later in the day Bobby returns home and starts beating on Davey and his Mother, and the wounded man comes to their aid and turns into a werewolf and kills Bobby and escapes into the night as Davey warns it of the law coming to kill it.

This issue is a major disappointment as I am sure that this issue has zero to do with Eric Cord or any other character from the TV show and was just a generic werewolf story they had sitting around the Blackthorne office and decided to slap the Werewolf logo on it and pass it off as one. Not once is the man shot referred to as Eric Cord, and in fact he is nameless as is the hunter who is hot on his trail, plus not once is Skorzeny brought up. While this issue’s story is not bad, it would have been a better fit for a comic series like Howl, Creepy or even Vault of Horror as I feel the story line would have been better suited for that style of horror comics. The plot is really simple, and it’s about a boy with a big imagination who meets a real life werewolf who is injured and the youngster takes care of him and in return he kills the evil and mean boyfriend of his mother who has beaten them and made their lives miserable. The artwork in this issue is really weak, and The Werewolf looks terrible and NOTHING like the werewolf from the show and past issues and was done by Abel Laxamana. Don’t want to spend to much time on this issue and hope that # 3 gets better and goes back on track on what the series should be about and that’s Eric Cord and his hunt for his cure.

Werewolf # 3 *
Released in 1988 Cover Price $2.00 Blackthorne #3 of 5

Yep, as you can see issue # 3 is just part of the 3-D special done in none 3-D and this is one CHEAP move by BlackThorne who did not even state this anywhere on the cover as they try and pass it off as a third in a series. What makes this more annoying is all this stuff told in this one is supposed to take place before # 1. As you all know I enjoyed the 3-D issue and liked the artwork and the story, but for this cheap move I have to give this issue, aka cheap reprint, a 1 star.

Werewolf # 4 *
Released in 1988 Cover Price $2.00 Blackthorne #4 of 5

Out on bail Eric is picked up by Kelly who tells him that she knows her brother was a werewolf because he sent her a cassette tape message telling her the whole story the morning of his death. So together Kelly and Eric deal with his full moon change that leaves him a crazed beast and together they find that a ship captain named Janos Skorzeny is the start of the curse, and when Eric meets him things go south real quick! That evening Skorzeny kidnaps Kelly as Eric is picked up by bounty hunter Alamo Joe Rogan on a full moon night for skipping out on bail. When Eric turns into the beast he escapes and saves Kelly from Skorzeny as a werewolf battle rages on in a burning cabin in the woods. In the end the sun comes up and the werewolves stop fighting, and Eric, while human, tells Kelly he must kill Skorzeny and set himself free, as Alamo Joe understands now he is no longer hunting just a man but now a monster.

The second part of the reprint of the 3-D issue and once more a major let down that they would take such a cheap route on a series that thus far only had two good issue in its pretty short run. It’s no wonder why this series was on the chopping block and sales must have been really bad after three issue coming out being this bad and poorly thought out. This is very disheartening that Blackthorne treated this series with this little of respect and delivered these two issues to fans of the show and comic series. Let’s not harp on these two issue reprints and move on to the 5^th and final issue in the series. But I do want to state again, I loved the story of this issue and #3, I just hate the fact they are just reprints of the 3-D issue that came out the same years as these.

Werewolf # 5 ***
Released in 1989 Cover Price $2.00 Blackthorne #5 of 5

Some young lovers are camping at a lake in the woods, and they are attacked and killed by a werewolf. The next morning Eric wakes up in the woods and meets Deidra, a good witch who invites him back to her home for some fresh cloths and a good meal. While home Tracy, a young woman, shows up and gets a love potion from Deidra and rushes off to give it to the boy she is crushing on. Deidra talks to Eric and tells him that she knows what he is and can 100% say that he was not the werewolf who killed the campers and that she can try and help him control the curse. Eric don’t believe in witchcraft but feels a bond to Deidra so he agrees to the help, just as Tracy comes running to them with he would be boyfriend chasing her in a rage and hyped up on PCP and dies from the overdose. The father of the boy blames Deidra even after the police tell him his son died from the PCP and he along with some fellow towns people set fire to Deidra’s house killing her and forcing Eric to turn into the werewolf and teach them some manners. In the end Eric once more must move on to find a way to end his curse and still a little heartbroken over the loss of his could-be lover Deidra.

What a breath of fresh air that this series ended on a good note and had another solid and well-done issue for its final! This time around Eric Cord finds himself befriending a white witch who tries to cure him but gets targeted by local hillbillies who ruin his chance at a cure of his curse. Eric in this issue comes off as a man worried about the deeds his werewolf side commits and also in an odd turn a disbeliever of the unknown. I mean you would think he would consider the fact that witches are real given the fact he’s a werewolf! Deidra is an okay character and is a good witch and for some reason while reading this I kept flashbacking to the Dark Horse Comic Pumpkinhead mini series that had the good witch Mariah who also meet an early death due to backwoods thinking rednecks. While the series ended on a good issue the series still very much was lacking with two issues being a reprint and one issue feeling as if it shouldn’t even be in the series due to the poor werewolf drawing. Below is some of the artwork used in this series so give them a look and enjoy.

So the moon is going away and the sun is coming up, and our werewolf hunt has come to an end, well for now. I must say over all I enjoyed the comic series based on one of my childhood favorite shows. The major letdowns that really bogged the series down have to be the reprints for issues 3 and 4. If you’re a fan of the show or of werewolves, this is one series you might want to check out, and while it was no bloodbath, the series did have some cool kills and the black and white art will remind you of classic horror magazines like Creepy and Eerie. But our next update will move away from Eric Cord the Werewolf and will focus on Pinhead the Cenobite as I take a look at Epic Comics’ movie adaptation of Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth. So until then read, a horror comic or two, watch a horror themed TV show and support you local horror host and beware of the full moon!

The 8th Wonder Of Giant Classic Comics King Kong

Posted on September 1, 2014 by bloodlinematt

My mother was 7 or 8 when she attempted to watch the 1933 film King Kong with her mom when it aired on TV. She watched as a group set out to sea to make a movie and landed on an island, and when King Kong showed up just the sight and sound of the beast scared her enough to make her hide behind her mom’s chair! She would peek around the corner and shiver in fright of the sight of the giant ape. Way before the gross out films of the 60’s made by the likes of Hershel Gordon Lewis became the norm in what’s “scary” about horror films, the likes of a giant ape with a love for blondes paved the way and terrified the young and old. While many not consider it a horror film, I have always viewed it as one as King Kong is a giant ape creature that caused panic not only on his home island but also New York, and he does kill and eat humans so yeah, it spells horror film to me. I saw the film when I was about 7 or 8, the same age she first saw it, and I can remember my Mom telling me about her first viewing and this set the bar very high as I sat down on the couch ready to watch it alongside my parents and my brother on a VHS that we rented from Waynesville’s library. From the moment the film started, I was hooked on every word and when Kong showed up I became a fan, and to me every gorilla toy became King Kong. The watch with my family was a great one and was one of many fun family night of watching a flick on the old VCR while eating popcorn and being entertained. I don’t want to give too much of the plot away of the film as that will happen as we review the Gold Key comic adaptation a little later on so I will give you the cliff notes version. The film is about a filmmaker and some sailors who take a fresh faced new actress to an island were the natives take her to appease King Kong, a giant gorilla who rules the land. They save her and also take Kong to New York as a stage attraction, and he escapes running wild in the city until he is killed in the end. It’s an amazing classic film with special effects that were way ahead of their time. If you have not seen this film, do yourself a favor and watch it!

In the 1980’s Ted Turner owned Turner Classic Movies wanted to do something fresh and new to King Kong so they did the unthinkable…. they colorized it! To be honest it seemed like an odd kick Turner was on, taking old classic black and white films and turning them into color films to air on his classic movie station, and on the top of the list that sparked the most debate was what they did to King Kong. I can remember that my mom and dad were not pleased that they messed with a classic film this way, but being so young I was a little curious to see what the classic Kong would look like in color. I seen the color version after the black and white and still preferred the original to the tampered with version. King Kong was the first movie on VHS that I owned two versions of as I had to own them both, and I would say I watched the black and white more than I did the colorized one that I got dirt cheap brand new at Blockbuster Video.

Now if you look at King Kong as a horror film like I do, then you would have to look at Fay Wray as the original scream queen, and she proves she has a set of lungs as she screams her head off at the first site of Kong. She began her acting career making short films and making westerns for Universal but left once she became a WAMPAS Baby Stars meaning she was listed as an actress to watch. As a teenager Wray was signed to a contract with Paramount Pictures where she made over a dozen films like the failure 1928 silent film The Wedding March. Wray was able to make the transition from silent to talkie films and left Paramount to make other films for other companies, the most notable being RKO that hired her for her first horror films like Doctor X, The Most Dangerous Game and her most famous film King Kong. She was proud of her work in Kong and that film saved RKO from going bankrupt! During that time as well she was in a few other horror films like The Vampire Bat and Mystery In The Wax Museum. By the 1940’s, Wray retired briefly from acting but came back to make more films and take TV parts being on such shows as Perry Masson and Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Wray continued to act for many years and even turned down a part in James Cameron’s 1997 smash hit film Titanic. Sadly at the age of 96 Fay Wray passed away of natural causes in 2004 while she slept. After her passing, the Empire State Building shut off all its lights for 15 minutes to honor her legacy. Wray was a true beauty, a talented actress and could possibly be the first scream queen of cinema.

Because King Kong was such a huge hit at the box office, a sequel was made in 1933, coming out only 9 months after the original. The film follows the film director from the first film who is now in hot water for King Kong running wild in New York and travels to find that the giant ape might have had an offspring. That film was called Son of Kong! In Japan in 1962, they made a film called King Kong vs. Godzilla where they pit the world’s top giant monsters against each other, and in 1967 they made another King Kong film called King Kong Escapes that has our lovable Kong fighting a robot version of himself called Mecha Kong. Paramount Pictures in 1976 decided to make a remake of King Kong and added in more modern touches to the film and even trades in the Empire State Building for the Twin Towers as well as the stop motion Kong for a stuntman in a suit done by FX God Rick Baker. In 1986 the remake got a forgettable follow up called King Kong Lives that had the giant ape getting a pacemaker put in to replace his damaged heart and finding a mate who has also been brought to the USA. In 2005 a longwinded Peter Jackson remake of King Kong was made and besides more minutes added to the runtime, it was a good but unnecessary film. With all these spin off films, sequels and remakes this just shows you how much impact this film had on classic cinema, and I agree with James Rolfe who said that film students should watch the original in film school right alongside Citizen Kane. While none of them are as good as the original film, they are all still fun watches that help add to the legacy of Kong and prove that this primate of fright, this ape of terror, is truly a legend of cinema.

In 1966 America and Japanese animation studios teamed up to make The King Kong Show, an animated adventure kid show that had King Kong befriending the Bond Family and stopping the likes of Dr. Who (and no, not the BBC version) from capturing Kong for his own evil gain. This animated cartoon was teamed with another show about a tiny special agent called Tom of T.H.U.M.B. and the show would last till 1969 with a total of 3 seasons and 25 episodes. This cartoon also helped Toho make the film King Kong Escapes and also was to be inspiration to the film that became Godzilla vs. The Sea Monster, which Kong was suppose to star in, not Zilla. The cartoon over the years did not hold up well and was mostly forgotten until it got released on DVD as volumes a few years back. I never remember seeing the show when I was a kid, and I think it would have fit perfect on early morning Saturday’s back in the 80’s and could have also found a place on the USA Cartoon Express. I saw the show when I was older and in my 20’s found it to be pretty cool but only from a retro standpoint.

So as we all know Toho studios made two films with King Kong in them in the 1960’s, but did you know that there are also two others made in Japan way before this that are now lost films? The first was a short silent film called “Wasei Kingu Kongu” made in 1933 the same year King Kong was released and was a team up from RKO and Shochiku Studios. Not much is known about the film besides RKO asked them to make it and that instead of a stop motion Kong, it was a man in a suit. It was directed by Torajiro Saito with Isamu Yamaguchi playing King Kong and all that is left of the film is one single picture that was printed. Next was a 1938 film called “King Kong Appears In Edo” that made by Zensho Cinema with permission from RKO and was directed by Soya Kumagai and had a size changing King Kong attacking Edo (Tokyo) during Medieval times! Fuminori Ohashi who some 16 years later would make the original Godzilla costume made the Kong costume in this film. Just think about that, King Kong was really Japan’s first giant movie monster and not Godzilla like we all thought! Both films are believed to have been destroyed during the bombings of World War II and neither ever showed outside of Japan making all master prints being only stored there. I learned about these missing films thanks once more to James Rolfe (Angry Video Game Nerd) when he did a top 10 list of lost Horror Films and the Japan Kong films were his # 1, and I agree with him when he said he hopes all the films he picked won’t always be lost films. Below are some pictures of Japan’s King Kongs, the first being Toho’s with the second being the 1933 version and last being the 1938 one.

Tiger Electronics who are best known for making handheld games in the late 80’s and 90’s also made some console games in the age of Atari 2600 under the brand name TigerVision. And would you know it that in 1982 they made a game based on King Kong that was a follow up to their handheld games made about the big ape the year before. The game was a total rip off of Donkey Kong and had you playing as a guy who was trying to get to the top were King Kong was. The graphics were bad and Kong was a stiff looking pixel mess. I have played the game several times and even own it and I must say that it really is a bad game. Though I do find it funny that Donkey Kong was a clone of King Kong who in turn had a game made about him that was just a bad clone of Donkey Kong. The game on release only sold moderately well and was by no means looked at as a classic.

Ideal made a board game in 1976 based on the remake movie that had 2-4 players trying to get to the top of the Twin Towers before King Kong so that they can capture him, or you can win the game by saving the woman from his right hand via a special mission. But Kong won’t make your trip easy as he is flipping all around trying to knock your player back to the start. I own this game and played it with the fellow members of The Dayton Board Game Society who are Stephen Alexander II, Josh Weinberg, Jeremy Hoyt and Garrison Kane on one of our past meetings ,and I can remember that while the game was not all that ground breaking we all had fun trying to knock each other off the building using Kong as our puppet and it was a blast seeing just how competitive it got. If you get a chance and like classic board games based on movies then I would say check this one out, play time to complete is about 20 minutes give or take a few. I should also share we played this game on February 6^th 2013 in Josh Weinberg’s basement and we also played the LJN A Nightmare on Elm Street video game for the NES and we ate Wing Zone.

King Kong not only has been made into many video games and board games but he has also had pinball machines based around him, many comic books, novels, magazines, t-shirts, toys, Halloween costumes, soundtracks, stickers, dolls, drinking glasses and so much more. If you’re a King Kong fan, then there is something for you out there in the world of merchandise. Some of my favorite King Kong merchandise that I owned was my Imperial King Kong action figure that I use to make fight my Godzilla figure and even Kong was wrapped up in my epic Toy Wars, also would be my Crestwood Monster Series Book based on King Kong that gave the history of the film as well as some sweet photos. I also really liked my adaptation novel by Delos W. Lovelace and can remember reading it before bedtime many nights. It’s odd looking back at my youth now being 35 years old and seeing just how much of an impact King Kong has had on my life. It’s a neat feeling knowing that a giant ape with a love for blondes truly means something to me. And for those of you who listen to Alpha Rhythms on WYSO (91.3 FM) on Sunday nights, I have played soundtrack pieces from the original score by Max Steiner as well as tracks from King Kong Lives by John Scott.

Before we move onto The Gold Key Comic Review I of course have to talk about a ride I have wanted to go on since I first heard about it; that’s the one and only KongFrontation ride at Universal Studios Orlando that opened on June 7^th 1990 and became a major attraction at the park. The ride was based on the 1976 remake as well as a ride Universal Studios had at their Hollywood park called King Kong Encounter that opened in 1986. The 5 minute ride would place you and others inside a tramcar but not before you walked down a mock New York street complete with newscasts playing on TVs to build up that King Kong is roaming the streets. Once inside the car you are treated to explosions as well as giant animatronic King Kong’s that would roar and knock your little car around given the effect that he was attacking. In the end he would attack while you’re on the bridge but your driver would get you out safe and unharmed. This ride seemed amazing to me and just the thought of being close to a life size version of Kong was enough to make me want to go, but being a kid and having parents that didn’t like to travel out of state put a damper on getting to go. The attraction closed in 2002, and two years later a lame ride based on the terrible Mummy Remake took its place, marking the sad fact that I never got to ride the one roller coaster/attraction that I always wanted to. As far as King Kong Encounter, it had guests on a tramcar as King Kong would knock a helicopter from the sky and would end with you being eye level with the great ape on the Brooklyn Bridge as he tries to break it apart. Of course you would make it off the bridge and would be safe thanks to your driver. The Kong animatronic was at the time the world’s largest and was so detailed that it’s “breath” smelled of bananas! This ride as well lasted a total of 5 minutes and was one of the main attractions to the park. Sadly it as well came to an end when in 2008 a massive fire broke out and burnt the attraction up, but in Universal Hollywood they didn’t give up on King Kong and replaced it with an attraction called King Kong 360 3-D. I really would have loved to have ridden these attractions and sadly with both of them gone for good I will never get the chance to do so. But I can watch videos of them on YouTube and hear stories from my friends who did get to experience it…sigh.

So I think our voyage through the sea of King Kong is over and we looked at the movies, video game, cartoon, missing films, merchandise as well as a theme park attraction but now it’s time for us to take a walk on Skull Island alongside Gold Key comics and see what this 1968 adaptation has to offer to the Kong legacy. I want to think Bell Book And Comic for having this comic in stock, and I would like to remind that I graded on a star scale of 1 to 4 and am looking for how well the comic stays to the source material, it’s entertainment value and it’s art and story. So let’s man up and walk through the giant gates into King Kong’s lsland and hope he doesn’t stomp us into the mud!

King Kong # 1 ***1/2
Released in 1968 Cover Price .25 Gold Key # 1 of 1

Carl Denham is a filmmaker who can’t find a lead actress for his top secret next project. He even has rented a boat called the “Wonderer” along with all its crew and after an agent tells him that he will not supple him with an actress, the director walks down the streets of New York and finds a pretty thief woman named Ann Darrow who was stealing an apple due to hunger. Denham buys it for her and hires her to be in his new film. While on board the first mate Jack Driscoll falls in love with Ann, and the two start up a relationship. They find out that they are to port at an unknown island called Kong Island. But while at the island they find that the natives are worshiping and sacrificing women to an unknown “God” and they have set their sights on Ann who they kidnap off the boat and take to the altar where a giant gorilla named King Kong falls for her and takes her deep into his jungle home! Driscoll and Denham lead some crew members on a rescue mission and while in the jungle they find that Kong is not the only giant monster as dinosaurs and sea serpents all blocking their trail to save Ann from Kong’s grip. Kong finds that he is being followed after he beats up a pair of Triceratops and knocks all the crew members off a log killing them leaving only Driscoll and Denham left. As Driscoll follows Kong, Denham goes back to the ship for more men and gas bombs. King Kong while trying to grab Driscoll from a cave is attacked by a T-Rex and a major battle breaks out between the giant beasts! As Kong climbs to his cave home he must fight off all types of attackers and during this Driscoll saves Ann, and the two escape via the river below. As they reach the gates Kong is in hot pursuit and it’s here that Denham uses his gas bombs to knock Kong out and then takes him to New York to use the giant ape as a sideshow, but when Kong see’s Ann again he breaks his chains and escapes his cage and takes Ann to the top of the Empire State Building where he is attacked by fighter planes that lead to his death as they use machine guns on him while he is distracted by Ann being saved by Driscoll again and he falls to his death. In the end Ann and Driscoll are safe in each other’s arms, Kong is dead in the middle of the street and Denham learns that it was beauty that killed the beast.

This is another amazingly done comic film adaptation of a classic horror film much like Comic Library International’s Edison’s Frankenstein 1910 that holds just so true enough to the source material but still adds its own flare to spice it up. The plot is your simple Beauty and The Beast and follows a young actress who gains the affection of a tough sailor as well as a giant ape and when the big primate is taken away from his home and placed in the big city, his only comfort when he escapes is his blonde bombshell but even love can’t save him from being slain. Ann Darrow is a sweet woman who turns her misfortune of being poor into fame when she takes the part in a movie that leads her to charming King Kong to be put on display. Even though Ann fears Kong she also still feels some affection for him and wishes him no ill will and even tries to save the beast as the planes shoot him down. King Kong is neither good nor bad and it’s clear he is very territorial of his land and very protective of Ann who he has fallen in love with. I love the fact that he keeps not only the natives in check but also all the other giant beasts that live on the island proving he really is the King. Carl Denham, while a money grubbing rich film making geek, still really shows he cares about his friends as Ann’s safety when being taken is a big priority to him, though he does mistreat King Kong by keeping him in chained up and taking him away from his home to be looked at by New York’s rich snobs and press. Jack Driscoll is your very classic tough guy who only cares about the woman he loves and will risk it all for her. The major changes I noticed between the comic and the film is that in the comic the ship is called The Wonderer, while in the film it’s The Venture; in the comic the island is called Kong Island, while in the film it’s Skull Island. I also noticed in the film Jack is annoyed that Ann is on the ship and it takes awhile before he falls for her, in the comic it happens fast. This was the second time I have read this comic and I found that I enjoy it more and more after each read and find something very magical about the whole reading experience. The copy I have is a classic example of Rotten Ink as the smell of the decomposing ink fills your nose when you flip through the pages, while not a beat up copy, it’s still very yellowed on the pages. The artwork is done by ummm….an unknown artist as no credit is given, but I must say the art is perfect for this comic and while Kong doesn’t capture the full look of his movie appearance it still looks the part enough to draw this comic reader in. The cover as well is very eye catching and I am sure drew kids attention to it by using lots of orange and putting a giant ape crushing planes on the cover. If you like the film or like classic horror comics, than this is for sure one you should check out. I am glad I got it and I am sure a few years from now I will read it again. Below is a piece of art from the comic just so you can see the style Gold Key went for in this comic.

Really this is a great comic with great classic artwork and really is going to help us kick off our two month long horror comic countdown to Halloween 2014! So on this update we traveled to Skull Island and got to know King Kong and see what that massive beast was about, but how about next time we travel to a black lagoon and celebrate the 60th birthday of the Universal Monster Gill-Man. So until then read a comic or two, watch a horror film and support your local Horror Host.

How I Spent My Summer At Camp Candy

Posted on July 22, 2014 by bloodlinematt

Summertime is upon us. That means lots of sun, swimming pools and vacations for many of us Americans and fine people from around the world, and after the snow filled winter we had this year I am sure many of you like me are ready for some sun time. When I was in school, summer break was also the thing that got me from grade to grade, knowing that at some point I would have a few months off to do what I wanted to do and not be stuck in a classroom. So in this blog update we are going to take a look at some of the fun stuff I used to do in the summer as well as places I have been including camp during school! The comic series we will be looking at is based on the Saturday morning cartoon called Camp Candy that featured the comedian John Candy as the lead counselor and owner of the camp. But first I would like to talk about my first time going to Kings Island with my Uncle Johnnie and Aunt Debbie when I was just a young lad. Most summers my family would not go on a vacation and a lot of time was spent at our house running the streets with friends or just visiting our grandparents. Sometimes my Dad would shock us and take us to Fantasy Farm or Americana Amusement Park in Middletown and those were always fun times, but mostly it was stay at home kind of time. I will admit it was pretty embarrassing when I would return to school and the teacher would have us stand up and tell the others what we did over the summer and I would hear others talk about trips to Florida, Disney World and Kings Island and all I got to do is play Nintendo and toys at my house…pretty sad indeed. One summer however my Dad got some tickets to Kings Island from his work at Cub Foods and gave them to my brother Bryan and I, and instead of him and my mom taking us they gave the other two pairs to my Uncle Johnny and my Aunt Debbie who acted as our guide to the theme park. Before we went to the top amusement park in Ohio, we talked to our cousins Dino and Norman and they filled us in on the must experience rides that included The Vortex, King Cobra, The Racer, The Beast and one of the newest coasters at the time The Adventure Express. I can remember the night before going to the amusement park sitting in my bed restless with my mind racing with all the excitement of what was to come the next day, images of ridding a roller coaster with Yogi Bear and stories of all the large hills and fast speed told to me by Norman echoed in my brain, for this summer of 1992 I was going to Kings Island!

The next morning my brother Bryan and I were up early and ate up our cereal super fast and waited for our Aunt and Uncle to come pick us up, they arrived right on time and I can remember rushing to get into the car with them so that my adventure of the summer could start happening. On the ride to the park I can remember my Uncle playing Ozzy Osborne’s Dairy Of A Madman from a cassette tape and he and my aunt asking us what we were looking forward to the most. For me I really was looking forward to The Adventure Express and Hanna-Barbera Land because I was a fan of Scooby-Doo and Yogi and looked forward to the rides based around them. I can remember my brother looking forward to The Beast and The Racer as the idea of the backward coaster peaked his interest. As we pulled into the huge parking lot my excitement sky rocketed as I could see the entrance to the park and knew that so much fun rides awaited me inside. As we gave the attendant our tickets and walked in I was amazed as I seen the Eiffel Tower and fountains and knew that I had finally made it to Kings Island! That day was a blast we started the day off by riding The Racer and while I rode the one that went forward by brother rode the one that went backwards, we also rode The Beast and for the first time I became breathless as the speed and the excitement literally took my breath away! The Adventure Express was epic and fun and while not a fast coaster it still was a great gimmick of riding inside of caves with talking stone statues and parts that sprayed you with mist. We rode The Smurf Enchanted Voyage Boat ride that our Mom had ridden before and hyped up and it was a pretty fun experience as was White Water Canyon a boat ride that makes you feel as if your traveling on what its named after. We rode many rides that day and I even got to see the likes of Scooby-Doo, Yogi Bear and Huckleberry Hound wondering around and taking pictures with kids and adults. I did not get to ride The Vortex as the line was to long that day and we skipped the King Cobra cause we heard it racked ya if you were a male, I know now that it was false but as a kid you believe those type of rumors. We stayed until the park closed and watched fireworks and then headed back home, I must say my Aunt and Uncle were a blast and allowed us to be kids and have the fun we wanted…and while we went to the park a number of times after mostly with Dino and Norman and for me as I grew older with my girlfriend at the time Jennifer this first time will forever remain the most special. I have to admit that the next day after going my legs felt like rubber from all the walking and running we did that day but boy was it worth it! Oh I guess I should pick my favorite ride that first time going and it would have to be hands down The Beast as it was the one that not only took my breath away but also is the one that always stuck in my mind.

While during the summer I did get to go to Amusement Parks the one thing I never did get to do was go to Summer Camp and for some reason I always kind of wanted to thanks to the Friday The 13^th films. But I did get to go to camp during school when I was in the 6^th grade to a place called Camp Joy and let me tell ya all about the wonders of this place. Before I was set to go to Camp one of my pet mice named White Man was sick with a giant tumor that had grown on the side of her tiny body, I hated to leave her in such bad shape but I knew she was in great hands as my Brother, Mom and Dad were all going to look after her. The day of camp I had my bags packed and was ready for some fun in the woods as I was dropped off at the school and got onto the bus that was driving us there. When getting to the camp I was pretty hyped as I loved the idea of having fun in the woods with fellow classmates and boy did we do just that! We did all types of fun stuff and even pulled small animals from the near by stream to be studied and thats when the full outdoor fun ended for me as while carrying a bucket of water I tripped going down some stairs and spilled the water and sprang my ankle bad! By hurting my ankle not only did I hurt my pride but it also kept me from doing the wire walk an activity that had you rope walking high above the ground as well as a few other activities. By our last day I was limping around enough to do an activity that had us acting as slaves and escaping via the underground railroad. For me being hurt the main fun came in the cabin were at night we told horror stories, made up what ifs using Jason Voorhees, talked about girls from our grade we liked and we even went into the bathroom and played Bloody Mary in the mirror…you know the legend of Bloody Mary right? Well if not its a legend about a witch who is trapped in the mirror world or in some cases Hell that when you say her name 5 times in a mirror in a dark room she will appear in the mirror infront of you with blood pouring down her face and in some cases is said to pull you into the mirror. I can remember doing this and all us guys trying to spook the others. While I was hurt at camp I still had a blast, but sadly when I returned home White Man lost her battle to the tumor…But I would say if you have kids I would say send them to camp at least once cause I am sure they will have a fun time.

On Halloween 1950 comedian John Candy was born in NewMarket, Ontario Canada and with this a comedy legend was delivered to the world. Candy began is acting career in 1973 by starring in a tiny uncredited role in the film“Class Of ’44” and throughout the 70’s took roles in film and TV like “The Silent Partner”, “90 Minutes Live” and his most popular role on TV “SCTV” (Second City Television) Canada’s version of Saturday Night Live. But it was not till the 80’s when Candy became the big star with roles in “1941”,“National Lampoons Vacation”, “Stripes”,“Splash”, “Little Shop Of Horrors”, “Plans Trains and Automobiles”, “Great Outdoors”, “Space Balls” and “Uncle Buck”to name a few all these films made Candy a top name in comedies and an A-List actor. Even in 1989 Candy became a cartoon star with the Saturday morning toon “Camp Candy”. But sadly the 90’s were not as nice to him and while roles in “Home Alone” and “Cool Runnings”kept his star shining he also had a string of flops at the box office like “Nothing But Trouble” and “Once Upon A Crime”making the actors roles coming fewer inbetween he changed it up and took more dramatic roles in films like “Only The Lonely”and “JFK”. His big comeback to comedy film was called “Wagons East!”were he co-starred with Richard Lewis that was released in 1994, but sadly while doing this picture Candy died of a heart attack at the age of 43. Some cool things you might not have known about the comedian are the following Candy won Emmy’s for his writing on SCTV in 1981 &1982, Candy hosted SNL on a 1983 episode, Candy was asked to play Louis in the film Ghostbusters but could not meet eye to eye on how the character should be played so the role went to Rick Moranis, he did however make a cameo in Ray Parker Jr’s Music Video for the hit song from the film. Candy alongside Hockey Legend Wayne Gretzky and racehorse owner Bruce McNall owned a Canadian Football team called the Argonauts, his crypt is bellow fellow actor Fred MacMurray best know for his role in the TV Show My Three Sons in California. I can remember growing up and loving John Candy in movies and I cant tell you how many times I have watched The Great Outdoors and Uncle Buck! While he may be gone his body of work lives on thanks to DVD, VHS and TV.

Back in the 1980’s Saturday Morning Cartoons was a huge deal and almost every major station tried to out due the others to get kids to watch their station over the others. NBC in 1989 started to air a cartoon called Camp Candy that followed comedian John Candy as he was the head councilor and owner of a Summer Camp that was always in danger of being closed down by a rich business man named Rex DeForest III who wanted to use the land to develop condos and malls. Candy was joined my Nurse Molly and a handful of boys and girls and they would get into all types of silly adventures. The series ran for a year on NBC and lasted a total of Twenty Seven episodes before going into syndication were thirteen more episodes were made. The series last major TV airings was with reruns on Fox Family in 1998, and with the syndication episodes sometimes live action John Candy skits were attached. I watched Camp Candy when it aired originally and in fact I never missed an episode if I could help it and was a pretty bug fan of it’s simple and fun storyline. Even when Marvel Comics released the short 6 issue run based on this cartoon I got myself a copy of issue # 1 at Big Bear! The series never did get a DVD release and only a few episodes ever came out on VHS making this cartoon series one that you would have to find on the Grey Market in order to enjoy again, it’s a shame that this series never did get the fandom it deserves and even in school I remember very few kids talking about it, but the ones that did were big fans like myself I can remember my friend Jeremy Patton really liked it allot. And I can’t stress enough to the big broadcast stations when I say bring back Saturday Morning Cartoons to the glory it once was and stop just showing terrible Disney Network reruns and terrible Pokemon clone cartoons and bring back the verity and life to that magical time of the week when kids should be putting down their Iphones and Tablets and watching quality cartoons and shows.

So before we move on to the comic series brought to us by Marvel, I should introduce the characters to those of you readers who never got to watch this fun cartoon when it aired. The adults at the camp are John Candy, the lead counselor and owner of the camp. John has a good soul and will do whatever he can to entertain and protect the kids even if he is a coward and not that bright. Nurse Molly is the camp’s nurse and mother figure to the kids; one could even get the slight hint that while she is annoyed with John at times, she also seems to almost have a crush on him. These two are the only adults shown in the cartoon and makes one wonder just how the two of them run the whole camp!

The boys of the camp are as follows: Rick is the blonde haired cool kid who is the popular one, Iggy is the tall nerdy type with glasses and is super smart but is also a hypochondriac and last but not least is his little brother Binky who, while short in size, is always ready for adventure. Those are the boys who are attending Camp Candy.

As for the girls attending Camp Candy, it goes as follows: Vanessa is the rich spoiled brat who is into fashion and looking good. Alex is the tomboy who has red hair and loves sports, and last is Robin who is all into nature and saving the animals of the forest. The girls and the boys get along well besides Vanessa, who is the one who gives everyone grief.

The bad guy of this cartoon was Rex DeForest III, a short man with lots of money and ideas that always have Camp Candy out of business and the land his to develop into condos. His assistant is Chester, a dim witted goofball who goes along with whatever his boss tells him to do. While they always have plans, they of course never win.

Camp Candy inspired very little merchandise and had no toys or video games made based on it. Besides the Marvel/Star Comics series, the only other stuff I can think of is a plastic lunch box, VHS tapes of selected episodes and later t-shirts made by fans. It makes you wonder why some company didn’t turn out some cool things for fans of the show. I mean it would have made a perfect NES game where you played as John and had to rescue the kids from Rex. This poor underrated show has gotten no DVD release and had very little push for other merchandise even in its prime! So if you’re looking for Camp Candy goodies, they are few and hard to find.

So are you readers ready for Camp? I have my backpack packed with all the stuff I need including some comics and Tiger Electronic Handheld Games, and I have my Incredible Hulk sleeping bag rolled and tied so I think we are ready to enter the cabin and see what Camp Candy has to offer! I want to remind everyone that I grade these comics on a standard 1-4 star scale and look for entertainment value, art, story and how true the comic is to its source material. I should thank Lone Star Comics and Bell Book And Comic for having these issues in stock, and I really look forward to reading issue one again as I can remember buying it when it first came out at Hearts and really liked it! So no further delay, let’s dive in shall we..

Camp Candy # 1 **1/2
Released in 1990 Cover Price $1.00 Marvel Comics #1 of 6

John Candy is tricked by that no good Rex DeForrest III into believing that he owes 5 thousand dollars to keep the camp safe, and Candy who had proof the camp was paid up lost the papers…well his campers did. Candy doesn’t have the money to pay for the “balance” owed and is bummed out as the camp is set to close the following day, but during the last night around the campfire, Candy tells a spooky story about Headless Harry, a man who found a giant gold nugget in a cave and then left it behind to play basketball with some Native Americans. When the basketball rolled out of the cave, a witness thought it was his head. Rick gets the idea that in the morning they should go and check the cave for the gold to use to save the camp. Rex and Chester decide to follow Candy and the Campers to make sure they don’t find money to pay for the fake bill, and Chester hides in the cave and scares them away once they find the giant gold nugget, but Candy catches on and uses his own trick to spook Chester away and he calls in an expert to look at his gold. Sadly the gold nugget is fools gold, and just when it looks like the camp is doomed, a tabloid news reporter pays Candy that amount for his story of Headless Harry and his “meeting” with the legend!

This issue throws in the spooky camp legend around a plot that is very similar to the film “Ernest Goes To Camp,” about a rich butthead wanting to build on the land of the camp. John Candy is a total goof in this issue and seems not to be bothered that his own campers are the ones who lost the papers when they came into his cabin to find paper to use to make a fake skunk and to draw on, but to be honest the fact that he does not mind is what makes me really connect with this cartoon. Candy is very likeable, and I have a feeling he will be done right through out the series. The campers don’t fully get to shine in this issue and while bits of their personalities do, I have a feeling that as we go along each camper might get spotlight. Rex and Chester are those kind of bad guys with one smart one and one goofy one who play off each other and come up with schemes to try to get what they want. The issue is broke into two stories with the first being the longer main story and the second is a quick story thrown in to fill pages. The art in this issue is done by Howard Post, and his style is great for this type of comic based on a cartoon. The cover is also well done and eye catching. Over all, while this is not ground breaking, it’s still and average fun comic. Plus it was nice re-reading this issue after all these years! So let’s move on to issue 2 and have more fun at Camp Candy.

Camp Candy # 2 **1/2
Released in 1990 Cover Price $1.00 Marvel Comics #2 of 6

John Candy is preparing Camp Candy for the safety inspector who is on her way the next day. Rex and Chester hear this and know that if the camp gets so many marks for being unsafe, it will be closed down and leave the land open for him to buy. Rex and Chester dress up and join the camp as a father counselor and his daughter and cause issues so the camp will fail, and fail it does when the flag poll falls on the inspector, the tree house falls apart with her inside and a grizzly bear in one of the cabins chases her from the camp. Before she closes the camp, she allows Camp Candy to join in on the big canoe race among all the surrounding camps and during this Rex and Chester, who are forced as their fake characters, take the wrong path and are about to drown but Candy comes to their aid and this impresses the inspector who allows the camp to stay open.

Yet another issue that holds the charm of the cartoon and still holds some of that “Ernest Goes To Camp” spirit making this a fun read and perfect for these warm summer nights. Candy in this issue is still a loveable goon who takes pride in his camp and really seems to care that his campers are having a good time. The one thing that you have to question about the safety of the camp is the fact Candy allowed two fake people who were really his arch enemies to work for him without even checking backgrounds, makes you wonder if Jason Voorhees wearing hockey mask and all wanted a job, would he hire him on the spot? The campers once more take a back seat to the comic comedy and are very much background players. Rex and Chester have the same chemistry they had the last issue with greed being their driving force. The second story in this one deals with a moose and is pretty standard filler stuff. Howard Post once more did the art and once more it looks good. I should also say Post is doing the main story art and not the back up story. Pretty good standard issue that makes me want to read the third in the series.

Camp Candy # 3 **1/2
Released in 1990 Cover Price $1.00 Marvel Comics #3 of 6

Rick’s cousin Trooper is at a nearby camp called Camp Kickboot, and he is feeling like Campy Candy is for nerds as they don’t do half the militant stuff the other camp does. John Candy takes all his campers to visit the camp and finds that its run like a boot camp and its counselor Nayles is like a drill sergeant. During the visit it’s set up that the two camps the next day will play a game of capture the flag to show which team is better. The Kickboot Campers are hyped as Candy Campers want nothing to do with it! If any camper or counselor gets hit with whipped cream that means they are taken prisoner and must sit out. The next day Binky runs off with the Camp Candy flag to try and win the game as Kickboot makes short work of John, Iggy and Vanessa, and just as they are about to put their flag on Camp Candy’s poll, Rick has climbed the poll and whip creams the whole Kickboot team! Binky makes it to Camp Kickboot and wins the game for his team. Oh yeah, Rex and Chester try to get involved with a real tank shooting fireworks at Camp Kickbutt. This ends badly as always.

This is a fun issue that reminds me of the show “Hey Dude” when they played capture the flag against each other. Rick takes a front seat in this issue, and while a prankster at heart, he still tries to live up to the macho image of his cousin who he thinks is having more fun at his camp. Of course in the end Rick shows that his camp is the best and kids should be kids and have fun. John Candy is as goofy as ever and once more has pride in his camp and campers and even gets them involved in a “war game”, still a very likable character. Rex and Chester in this issue are a waste and to be honest should not have even been in this issue as they really added nothing to the story. Nayles and his campers are kind of mean and take pleasure in breaking stuff and have an almost bully aspect to them. So it’s nice to see them lose by being outsmarted at their own game. Plus this is the first issue that had only one story, and to me that’s a good thing as this story was more fleshed out, well minus Rex’s part. The pencil art was done once more by Howard Post, and to me this guy is great at doing kids comics of this style! The cover is cheesy fun and also with this issue we mark the half way mark of this Marvel/Star series. So far I will say it’s a solid and entertaining kids comic series so let’s get into issue # 4!

Camp Candy # 4 **1/2
Released in 1990 Cover Price $1.00 Marvel Comics #4 of 6

It’s open house day at Camp Candy and all the campers’ parents are on their way to visit their kids, but this year instead of showing them boring stuff they made or collected they decide to build an amusement park for them to enjoy. Binky builds a toy horse ride, Iggy builds the worlds lowest roller coaster, Vanessa’s is a house of mirrors, Rick’s is a surfboard on wheels ride that spins around fast, Alex built a fitness ride were the kids are carried in wooden boxes by her dad and Robin has a ride a grizzly bear ride! While preparing for the parents, Binky wants his ride more scary and Rex and Chester dress as workers claiming that John hired them to help. The plan is to make the ride so scary and unsafe the parents won’t trust John and the park will close so Rex can buy it. When the parents arrive all is going well and as Binky is taking his mom to his ride, Chester jumps on it before his mom can ride it and Binky jumps on to stop him, but Chester being a moron, he forgot the track was not complete and that they are headed straight for a cliff! John sees they are in danger and jumps on the wheeled surfboard to try and stop them, and when Rex hears the tracks are incomplete, he rushes to try and help as well. In the end Binky checked his ride early in the morning and placed safety rafts at the end so Chester, John (who jumped on to try and stop it) and himself are all safe and to payback the damage they did. Rex and Chester have to also carry kids in the wood boxes at Alex’s ride.

It’s cheesy rides and danger all around in this issue as families take turns riding grizzly bears and a toy horse roller coaster almost leads to deaths! Binky gets to shine in this issue, and he is your typical 5 year old kid who wants his ride scary, but who also in the hero by knowing safety comes first and places the rubber rafts down. John is also brave in this issue as he risks his life and safety to save Binky’s and Chester’s all while riding a surfboard with skateboard wheels. The rest of the campers are given little to do as are the parents but yet they all fit in like a glove, adding to the overall. Rex in this issue does not think out his plan very well, and his worse mistake is that he trusted Chester to be in charge on this project. Like the prior issue, this is one long story with the filler story cut out of the issue, and again I must stress I like one story better than two in this series. The best part about this series so far is that it’s stayed steady and has not lost any steam, tho it could also be said that by this point it should also be gaining steam so it’s kind of a catch-22. Howard Post once more does the art and once more does a fine job. So with that let’s get to issue # 5.

Camp Candy # 5 **1/2
Released in 1990 Cover Price $1.00 Marvel Comics #5 of 6

John Candy is taking his campers on a field trip to the camp he grew up going to and speaks highly of the head counselor named Hercules who was so strong and brave. Well when they get to the camp, it’s a ghost town and the cabins are run down and Hercules now is an old man with no campers to look after and worse he has Rex DeForrest II, the father to the III, coming to take his camp away and turn it into a land fill! Rex the II and Hercules make a bet that if he can get to the top of a nearby mountain and set camp that Hercules can have the camp site for as long as he lives. John and the Campers help Hercules who proves in the end all he needed was some joy as he makes it to the top and wins the honor of the camp.

This issue is a fun one. While not as good as the past 4 issues, it still was entertaining and held the Camp Candy charm. Taking John and the Campers away from Camp Candy was a smart move and allows them to be shown out of their environment and in a new camp trying to help an old man. Hercules is a fun crazy old coot character who still has it even after all these years, and while he is strong willed and physically strong, it’s clear as day where John got a lot of his counseling skills. Adding the dad of the Rex we have all grown to dislike is cool, but really also just made me wish they would have added some sort of new butthead who wants to run a camp out of business. The issue goes back to having two stories, and the second one is about them camping and Binky being the man, more filler stuff really. Howard Post is still doing the art and it still looks good for this kind of comic book. I will also say that this is the first issue not to say “Star Comics Presents,” and I should also point out when the little box that says that was places in an issues it looked like a bad cut and paste job, think glue stick on paper kind of stuff. So let’s get to the final issue here at Camp Candy.

Camp Candy # 6 **1/2
Released in 1990 Cover Price $1.00 Marvel Comics #6 of 6

A gorilla has escaped from the circus and is on a path to Camp Candy. John does not know this and takes his campers on a nature walk as Rex and Chester come up with a plan for Chester to dress like a gorilla and scare off the campers so you guessed it, he can buy Camp Candy to turn the land into condos. But of course the real gorilla shows up, and the high jinks kicks into high gear. In the end the Gorilla finds his way back the circus while driving a car with Rex who thinks it’s Chester in the outfit! There are three other smaller filler stories in this issue as well, and they are just your typical short subjects.

The final issue loses a little steam as the first of four…yes four stories is the best one and for some reason the whole time I was reading it I kept thinking about Yogi Bear and how this story would have been perfect in a Yogi Bear comic or cartoon. The gorilla on the loose who knows tricks and can drive a car is pure cartoon stuff and adds to the fun theme of the Nature Walk. Neither John nor the kids are the main focus of the issue as they all share about the same importance to the story. One thing I must say is that Rex and Chester being in every issue blabbing about owning the land Camp Candy sits on was wearing thin and new characters should have been added to make more challenges for them all to have to get past. I mean the only other bad guy in the series was Rex’s dad who has the same motives for another camp’s land. The other three stories once more are just filler and that’s a shame when the main story of the escaped Gorilla should have been more fleshed out and given more panels. Howard Post did the art and wrote the main story and did a fine job on both. It’s also a shame that Marvel being who they were back then didn’t even give this series a final issue as this one just simply ends the series. This issue was alright and was a fun adventure with John and the Campers.

It was nice to see that in 1990 a “Star” comic series was released with this 6 issue series based on the cartoon Camp Candy. While I would like to think they were just shutting down Star for a re-launch that would have seen more originals and more IPs and this comic was just caught in the middle of that transition, when to be honest I am sure it all came down to when the license for this cartoon was signed over to Marvel it was under the Star branch so they just cut and pasted the logo on the first page of each issue to hold true to that original contract. I found this comic series to be silly and good solid reads that held very true to the source material making it a true treat for a person like me who grew up watching the cartoon. But while this update we had fun at camp, the next update we will be visiting Dracula’s Castle as we take a look at Eternity’s mini series “The Ghosts Of Dracula”! So make sure to join me then and bring some garlic just in case. So until next time enjoy the great outdoors, go to camp and read a comic or two.

Avoid The Noid In 3-D With Extra Cheese

Posted on June 8, 2014 by bloodlinematt

Welcome back to Rotten Ink. Today’s update we will be taking a look at that pizza hating mascot of the 80’s, The Noid, and Blackthrone’s two issue series based on the little booger. Growing up my family didn’t order out for pizza very often, and when we did, it was from places like Dagwood’s in Waynesville or we would pick up a pie from Pizza Hut or Marion’s. But most of the time we would make our own. I can remember my mom and dad letting me and my brother pick what ingredients went on our pizza and than watching it go into the oven and waiting for it to bake as the smell of cooking cheese and crust filled the air. I enjoyed eating homemade pizza, and when I was younger I always drank Mountain Dew, Kool-Aid or chocolate milk with my slices…I know the milk sounds kind of gross, but it was good! To be honest though, I have never liked pizza all that much and always found that it hurt my stomach after eating it. Oddly enough, the only pizza that doesn’t hurt my stomach is homemade or Pizza Hut! Before we really dive into Dominos and The Noid, I should say that I am a fan of just cheese pizza, sausage and only some places deluxe like Marion’s.

Dominos Pizza started in 1960 when brothers Tom and James Monaghan went in together and bought DomiNick’s, a small pizza joint in Michigan, for $975.00! James gave up his half of the business in trade for a car giving Tom full control only eight months into them owning it, and by 1965 the name changed to Dominos. By 1967 the first franchise opened sparking it to becomes a major player in the pizza restaurant war. A cool little fact is that the famous logo that has the three white dots on the blue/red domino was supposed to have more dots as they were going to add a dot for each store that opened! By 1978 they had 200 locations and more planned, so in loose terms of the rock band Megadeth: Pizza was their business and business was good! Starting in the 1980’s, they got so big that they were able to open pizza joints all over the world in such places as England and India making them grow even bigger as a Pizza Empire! In 1998 Tom wanted to retire and sold 93 percent of the company to Bain Capital for a billon dollars, and by 1999, they made David A. Brandon the new CEO of Dominos. Over the years Dominos slipped and became one of the lower pizza places. When it came to the taste tests via customers, it tied for last place with Chuck E Cheeses. So in 2009 they revamped their menu and used better ingredients to make their pizza better, even taking shots at themselves for making poor tasting pizzas over the years. This marketing has helped them bounce back and become a fighter once more to try and compete to be the # 1 pizza place in town. Dominos doesn’t only serve pizza though, they have added chicken wings, subs and even salads over the years. The only major media issue the company has had was with there “30 Minutes or It’s Free” promise that told customers if you order a pizza from them and it comes after 30 minutes of placing said order, then you got your food free. This pressure on delivery people was high, and many of them were involved in serious accidents as they would run red light to make it on time. The company was sued for millions by those the drivers hurt making the promise disappear from their marketing. So after reading all this about Domino’s, are you thinking about ordering a pizza?

1986 was the year a strange imp claymation man wearing a red body suit with bunny ears and a chest piece with a giant N creeped his way onto TV screens across America trying his hardest to ruin the pizzas made by Dominos that were out for delivery with the 30 Minutes Or It’s Free promise. The Noid became such a popular mascot with kids and adults that a computer video game was made based on him as was other merchandise. The actor who did the voice of The Noid was Pans Maar who later went on to have roles in films like Return To Oz, The Golden Child, The Blob, Theodore Rex and even played Saurod in the live action Masters Of The Universe film. His TV credits include the popular show Dinosaurs where he played multiple smaller characters. But like all good things, The Noid was put into the mascot retirement home and only gets dusted off once in a while when Dominos sees fit to try and squeeze a dime out of the little guy. I can remember watching the commercials on TV and always being so hyped to see The Noid try his darnedest to ruin the pizza. I kind of always wanted to see him be able to do so at least once just to help his self esteem. In fact he reminds me a lot of Looney Tunes character Wile E. Coyote who tries so hard to catch Roadrunner but just can’t. In the late 80’s, The Noid was everywhere including a Michael Jackson video/movie showing he was truly an icon and always was a hit when seen by the young Brassfield brothers. It’s a shame that Dominos didn’t bring him back when they redid their menu as it would have been amazing to see The Noid try and make not only the Pizzas cold and trashed but also chicken wings, subs and cheesy bread! While The Noid has been off TV for many years and not a mascot of the pizza place any more. His impact on pulp culture is still felt thanks to things like Family Guy, The Simpsons and The Irate Gamer all who have had the little Imp in episodes. While not as iconic as Ronald McDonald or as beloved as Billy Bob, The Noid remains a favorite to all those who remember his fun and zany antics.

In the 1980’s Nintendo was the top video game system a kid could have. Sure Atari had the 7800, and Sega had The Master System but the classic NES put them all to shame. In 1990 Capcom, the company that makes games like Street Fighter, Resident Evil and Ducktales, released a video game called Yo!Noid that was a side scrolling action game that had you playing as the red suited imp going from town to town in New York to stop the evil Mr. Green (a green suited imp) who is using slime people to ruin the city. The promise to The Noid if he can save the day..is pizza..yep. The game in Japan is called Kamen No Ninja Hanamaru and has another hero and villain instead of The Noid and Mr. Green. It was only in the United States that the pizza mascot was used. The game was by no means a classic but was a fun playing experience. I can remember renting the game from K&L Video years and years after it came out and enjoying it as did my brother at the time. Over the years the game has become a punching bag by many because it’s a tie in to a massive company that sells pizza, but put all that internet B.S. and wannabe Angry Video Game reviewers reviews out of your mind and enjoy a fun silly side scrolling adventure game.

Besides Yo! Noid for the NES and the BlackThorne comics, some other merchandise that came out included a game that came out for the Commodore 64 called Avoid The Noid, PVC figures of The Noid in all types of outfits like boxing gloves and wizards hat, stuffed dolls, bendable figures, halloween masks, t-shirts and key chains among many other small things that had his goofy face on it. The only thing I had growing up was the bendable figure that I got from a garage sale as a kid, and I can remember eating home made pizza at the kitchen table while acting as if The Noid was trying to ruin my dinner…that damn Noid. So if you’re a collector of mascot merchandise or just a fan of the claymation character you can find some really cool stuff based on the little nut job.

All my friends can tell you I love old mascot costumes that were used at restaurants and amusement parks and try my best to buy them when ever I can find them. So I wanted to take this brief moment to share some pictures I have found that are amazing and creepy all at the same time. Two are people wearing mascot costumes being silly and the other is a odd Halloween mask that looks as if its melting before our eyes. So sit back and enjoy the wonders of these pictures!

Husband and wife Steve Schanes and Ann Fera opened BlackThorn Comics in 1985 after they left the defunct Pacific Comics that closed in 1984. The company started small and was built from the ground up thanks to credit cards. The first comic to come out from them was based on the classic character Sheena Queen Of The Jungle that was reprints of her old adventures. The company grew over the years and gained attention for putting out comic books taken from old newspaper comic strips from such characters as Dick Tracy and also for breaking the mold and not just selling their comics at normal comic stores as they got their titles into Hallmarks, Spencer Gifts and 7-Elevens making them more distributed than other smaller comic companies. The company also was able to nab some important IP’s for comic series like Battle Beasts, Battle Tech, Rambo, Waxworks and Werewolf based on the FOX TV Show. They also were the masters of making 3-D comics and cornered the market with such titles as Bozo The Clown, G.I. Joe, Transformers, Bravestarr, Gumby to name a few but it was the 3-D series based on the Californian Raisins that proved to be the big hit and money maker for them. By 1987 the cost and low sales of their normal comic lines caused them to cancel those titles and focus only on the black and white reprints of classic characters and the 3-D comics. Sadly they made a very poor choice in 1989 when they over paid to get the license to the film Michael Jackson’s Moonwalker that they turned into a 3-D comic that didn’t sell well causing them to have a huge financial loss for the year. By the start of 1990, the company was on its last legs even though they were the 5^th largest comic publisher in America. That major blow they took at the hands of Moonwalker was too much, and they closed the doors for good. This really bums me out as I respected this company. Even at a young age as I could recognized they took chances and were not so cookie cutter like many other companies at the time. I for one would have loved to see what they would have made if they would have made it through the 90’s and were still making comics to this day. Some projects have leaked on what they were working on before they closed up that included A Nightmare On Elm Street as well as a WWF comic that would have focused on The Ultimate Warrior…Now I am even more pissed off about them closing and have to say thanks Moonwalker for ruining everything! Below is some of the original art for those two never published comic series that were taken off EBAY that were up for sale. Over all to this long time comic reader, Blackthorn is truly missed.

So now that you have the history of Dominos Pizza, The Noid and even Blackthorn Comics I feel we are at the point now that we are ready to dive into the comic reviews and enjoy a slice of pizza and a part of mascot history. And I must really say I would have loved to have read Blackthorn’s A Nightmare On Elm Street 3-D adaptation as well as see what the WWF 3-D comic would have been about..dang that Moonwalker, it’s a curse on comics I tell you! I need to remind everyone I grade these comics on a standard 1-4 star rating and am looking at how well the comic keeps to the source material, its entertainment value, and its art and story. So with that let’s NOT avoid The Noid but instead see what kind of adventures he is having!

The Noid In 3-D! # 1 **
Released in 1989 Cover Price $2.50 Blackthorne #1 of 2

The first story is Mondo Rotundo who is the overseer of mischief and mayhem, and he is very upset over the failure of The Noid who has yet to make Domino’s Pizza cold and gross for customers, so Mondo has his little electric ball side kick Fister to bring The Noid to him. Mondo takes The Noid into a room and shows him the past Noid’s and how they succeeded in their quests to be food pranksters and that The Noid himself is the reason he fails as when he was “born” to be a food ruining imp, he lost the one and only Noid handbook. He then tells The Noid that he will give him one last chance to prove himself, so as The Noid leaves he decided to ruin Mondo’s dinner! The second story has The Noid thinking he is a super hero after he reads his own 3-D comic and wants to join the Super Hero club but is laughed at by all the other heroes. This hurts his feelings and he decides to play some pranks on them and as well as keep them prisoner and by doing this he is asked to join the super villain club!

The first thing I would like to point out is that the 3-D aspect of the comic doesn’t really work well and for the most point while reading the comic I had my left eye closed and only read with the right. Why, you ask, cause that’s the only way the comic even looked like it should have! I must also point out that pages in the comic were in the wrong order, showing that this title was not on the top of Blackthrones list of A-List comics. The first story was kind of lame and while very cool seeing Noids of the past, the pay out of The Noid ruining the fat Mondo’s dinner was very ho-hum. The second story as well was lame and had The Noid tricking super heroes in dumb ways. For instance, he gave one hero who is like Wolverine a glass of milk and that fact it’s healthy knocks him out….yep. I didn’t expect much from a comic series based on a fast food mascot from a small comic company that used a terrible gimmick like 3-D to try and sell it to the masses. I did however think that it would hold a little more entertainment value than it did. The Noid in the comic is very likable and really comes off as a goof down on his luck that was born to be a prankster who just can’t get it right. The art in the comic (via 3-D) looks a little bland with very little backgrounds and lots of use of white empty spaces. The Noid himself looks good and is how I would picture him in comic book art. I went back and fourth on what star rating I should give this issue, and I decided to go two stars only because while idea and presentation of the comic made me very nostalgic for 80’s gimmick comics and the fact it was all about that loveable goof The Noid, if your removed The Noid from the picture and inserted some Blackthorne made up character I would have given this issue a one star…so with that let’s hope issue two is better!

The Noid In 3-D! # 2 **
Released in 1989 Cover Price $2.50 Blackthorne #2 of 2

The Noid is sick of being yelled at by Mondo over losing the Noid Handbook and decides to go back to school in order to learn what he couldn’t from the missing book. While at college he pulls some pranks like acting as a professor and tricking students. He also joins the football team and comes up with new plays that make no sense and he also ruins Homecoming for the elected Queen by ripping her dress off. In the end The Noid is booted from the school once some frat boys learn he never even went to high school. The second story has The Noid and Fister traveling to the jungle to find a Temple of Noids that may hold secrets of the missing handbook, but while in the temple The Noid keeps making the wrong choices and Fister has to keep saving him. In the end they both find that there is no secret as a note has been left behind that blames The Noid for the missing book!

Issue two is just as lame as the first and only really changes that were made are that the backgrounds are better and the stories are slightly more entertaining than those is issue 1. The 3-D still is bad and really is distracting when trying to read the comic, and I really wish the series would have come out not using this terrible gimmick. The Noid is still likable in both of these stories and is as goofy as ever, When reading these two issues and seeing that he is the verbal whipping boy for a fat slob and that he seems not never make the right decisions, you almost wish he would at least be able to make one of those dang Domino Pizzas cold to boost his self esteem. Mondo Rotundo who is his boss is kind of bland and just seems like a filler character as does Fister who to me seems like he should be in the Kool-Aid Man comics. The better of the two stories in this issue is the more Indiana Jones inspired Noid Temple as we get to see him out of his element and not pulling pranks but just really trying to survive! The art once more is good on characters and better for backgrounds than the past issue. I should also note that Andy Ice does the art for both issues and I do like his cartoon looking style. To sum it up not much change from issue 1 to 2, and I found it an ok read that I wouldn’t recommend to fellow comic readers. Also below is some 2-D artwork done by Ice from his original storyboards so check em out!

Blackthrone gave this two issues before the plug was pulled, but I am not sure how many of you readers knew that an issue three was planned and the cover was made! Below is the mock up cover that was planned and it appears as if in the unfinished issue The Noid must have visited Mount Rushmore or had some sort of interaction with the President. Andy Ice did the cover art once more and it looks pretty dang great as did all of his Noid 3-D covers. Even though I was not a fan of this series I would have liked to have read issue 3 and see what kind of odd adventures the little Imp would have gotten into, but I still would have much rather seen the A Nightmare on Elm Street film adaptation and WWF 3-D comic over Noid issue 3. But enjoy a look at what could have been the 3^rd issue in the mascot’s comic run.

On Monday April 14^th 2014 while at work me and friend and co-worker Todd The Fox tried the New Dominos for the first time we placed our order online and was treated to Pete the Pizza Maker, a cartoon little guy who acts as the way to track your pizza as its being made placed in the oven and when it goes out to be delivered. On this day we ordered a large bacon cheeseburger pizza, spicy jalapeno pineapple chicken bites as well as an order of stuffed cheesy bread, and I was really wanting to try this new and improved food so that I could talk about it on this blog. The delivery was fast and the driver was a nice guy who even brought us extra plates and silverware just in case we didn’t have any in the store, and I should note he made it under 30 minutes. The pizza was pretty good and was a big improvement over the flat cardboard style they had in the past; the only thing I will say is that it was a little dry. The chicken bites were fantastic and had a rich flavor to them, but the best thing was the stuffed cheese bread that was mouth watering good and even more fantastic when dipped in the garlic sauce. Over all Todd and I both really enjoyed the pizza and we even had to fight off The Noid who showed up to try and ruin lunch…below is photo evidence of that little creeper being around.

While I loved watching the Noid on TV on the classic Domino commercials and even liked my old bendie toy, I am kind of glad that I did not read this series in my youth as I think I would have hated it while the older me just thinks it is ok at best. I also find it very odd that I never even remember Domino’s ever pushing this comic. In my mind it would have been very smart of them to give the comic out when someone would have bought a large pizza and a 2 liter of pop on carry out or delivery. Another very odd thing is that in both issues pizza is only briefly showed once…why the heck did Domino’s not have Blackthorne make the comic into one giant ad for their product! Major company marketing, who can’t figure it out? Well for my next update we will be leaving the pizza place and heading down DC Boulevard as we take a look at a relatively unknown super hero called Steel…and no I ain’t talking about the metal man one time NBA Star Shaq played in a crappy Superman tie in film. So come back next time and learn all ’bout Commander STEEL, The Indestructible Man!

The Red Devil Of Dinosaur Valley…

Posted on May 2, 2014 by bloodlinematt

Welcome back to my own little slice of the internet, a place that I can sit back and be one with the memories of the past as well as those of present day and even the future. So the day I am writing this is March 16^th 2014, the day before St. Patrick’s Day. While out and about with my gal pal Juliet, we stopped at an antique mall called Peddler’s Mall in Lebanon. You see, we love looking at old stuff from vintage toys, character glasses, metal lunch boxes, classic board games, comics and all types of other random stuff. This place had it all, but this place was also something more to me as it’s located on the site of the old Big Bear & Hearts that I grew up going to, the same place that I got many of my toys, comics, magazines and music from as a kid. Big Bear is now split into two sides with the side that was Hearts being the Antique Mall, and the Big Bear side sitting empty with paper covering the windows and doors. When walking back into it that building, a surge of nostalgia hit me like a train as I took in the memories of Hearts and a younger me and my brother rushing to the toy aisles. I also was swept up with the vintage Charlie’s Angels trading cards, a Happy Days lunch box and Elvis Presley figures. This Antique Mall was pretty cool as many vendors inside had classic toys, even some really cool Universal Monster dolls of Son of Dracula and Invisible Man that were cheaply priced at $15.00 a piece, not to mention a basket of Kenner Super Powers with such heroes as Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and Green Arrow all priced at $10.00! They also had many great vintage character drinking glasses from Looney Tunes all the way to E.T. They had them all priced pretty well! They even had a Pepsi “Moon” DC Glass of Robin The Boy Wonder for $14.00, and it’s amazing because the glass looked brand new! They had many great lunch boxes as well. Besides Happy Days, they had Lone Ranger, Super Friends, Chip & Dale Rescue Rangers, Six Million Dollar Man and Buck Rogers, all priced pretty well with a few being slightly over priced for the condition they were in. The place was also packed with not only customers but also books, cloths, vinyl and baseball collectibles making the trip there a very fun one. I will admit the moment I stepped in the location that was the toy department of Hearts, I felt a sense of missing them and wishing they were still around so some day when/if I ever have kids, I could have taken them there and got them whatever they liked from the toys. But sadly we can’t live in the past or even in the world of Marvel’s What If? And I just need to be glad something moved into the building that was empty for way too long. I will also say that the customers were all polite, and the staff of Peddler’s Mall were all nice, making the trip a good one. So I am sure you’re wondering what we bought, right? Well let me tell: you we got an Officer Big Mac glass for $3.00 and a metal Muppet Movie lunch box minus the thermos for $15.00. So not too bad of a haul….kind of wished I would have bought the Son of Dracula Doll though.

But while speaking of the past, I want to say that when I was a kid, like many kids of my time and before and after me, I really liked dinosaurs. They just seemed like real life monsters that roamed our world that were all killed off by something unknown. I mean scientist have many theories on why they all died, but let’s be honest, they have no clue. While science is cool and very helpful, some things they come up with seem as if they are pulled out of thin air. Growing up I played with rubber dinosaurs and even small plastic ones and always enjoyed going to museums and seeing their bones and watching any TV program about them. In fact some of the more fun times in school were spent learning about dinosaurs that sadly seemed to be taught way too fast. It’s really not shocking that the youth of the 80’s and 90’s grew up loving dinosaurs as we were treated to Godzilla films on TV, movies like Land Before Time, Baby and Jurassic Park as well as cartoons like Denver The Last Dinosaur and Dino Riders and a hell of a lot of toys! So with this update we are going to take a look at a dinosaur that was created by comic legend Jack Kirby for Marvel Comics, and we are talking the one and only DEVIL DINOSAUR!

When someone mentions an icon of comic books names like Stan Lee, Steve Ditko, Bob Kane, many others come to mind but one that is always at the top of the list is artist and creator Jack Kirby who is known around the world for being the creator/co-creator of such characters like Captain America, Fantastic Four, Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Silver Surfer, Thor, Doctor Doom, Magneto, The Demon, Darkseid and so many more for Marvel, DC and even other comic companies. Jack Kirby, who’s real name is Jacob Kurtzberg, was born on August 28^th 1917 in New York to a poor family where he grew up drawing and tracing comic characters from newspapers and books. In the 1930’s and under many different pen names he worked in the comics industry, but in 1940 alongside friend and co-worker Joe Simon for Timely Comics, they created Captain America! Captain America was a huge hit and was a very popular character for kids to read. In the 40’s Kirby and Simon teamed up to make many different characters, but they had to take time off when Kirby went to fight in World War II. When returning from war, he went on to work for DC, Harvey and a few others before working for Marvel Comics in 1960’s and with Stan Lee they created some of the company’s top heroes like Hulk, X-Men and Fantastic Four. While he was considered one of the company’s top artists, he felt they mistreated him, and he decided to quit and work for rival DC in 1971 where he created many iconic characters such as Darkseid, Mister Miracle, Omac and The New Gods. But while there he felt that he and DC had different ideas and after being put on comics he did not care for and finding out that they were redrawing Superman’s face in issues of “Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen,” he felt it was time for him to leave in 1975. Kirby returned to Marvel in 1976 and during this time he worked on Captain America and created such characters as Devil Dinosaur, Machine Man and The Eternals. But his time back at Marvel was cut short as in 1978 he quit again, this time over employee benefits or should I say the lack thereof. For about a year Kirby worked on animation designs for cartoons like Thundarr The Barbarian, Turbo Teen and Fantastic Four. During this time he also worked on a comic strip for Disney based on their film The Black Hole. In 1980 he returned to comics working for smaller companies like Pacific and Topps and never really making the impact he had back in his prime. While characters like Captain Victory and Bombast were cool, they lacked the punch his creations for Marvel and DC packed. Sadly in 1994 Jack Kirby passed away from heart failure at the age of 76, and this was a major loss for the world of comics as Kirby is one of the best in the biz and has influenced so many artist around the world including my friend Jason Young who runs Buyer Beware Comics. This update is dedicated to Jack Kirby, a true legend in comics! Oh and in the first picture of a young Jack, doesn’t he look like a mafia hitman?!

I felt the need to share some of the great art of Jack Kirby so that you readers who may not be familiar with his style can get a good look at what he brought to the comic table. Kirby’s style was that of his alone and over the years many artists have tried to copy it and none look as good as his. I am sure most modern comic readers who were born in the late 90’s or after would find his style dated and blocky (yes I have heard younger comic fans use these terms to describe his artwork), but to me nothing can beat the art used in comics from the 60’s-80’s. To me that was when comics truly were comics.

Dinosaur World is a place were time has been forgotten and dinosaurs still roam the lands and even early man is around to provide a source of food for the great beasts. This world is not of our Earth’s past but more of an alternate planet that coexists with ours. In the world is also a volcano that acts as a symbol of power and fear as man and dino know that its red lava means death for those it touches. Devil Dinosaur a red t-rex with not only power but a mind is the ruler of this planet and his own will to keep order is what makes him stay at the top of the food chain. What really sets Devil apart for his fellow Dinosaurs is that fact he seems to have a brain that allows him to strategize and feel emotions. Devil Dinosaur was born from the fire of a tribes mans torch and as a baby watched as his mother and siblings were murdered in cruel ways, and with out the help of a young man named Moon-Boy he would have died as well. The fire from the torch that burnt him left his skin bright red and this giving him the name Devil Dinosaur. As Devil grew older be became respected and feared and along with his “brother” Moon-Boy they run Dinosaur World with a tiny iron fist. So really I just wanted to write real quick a little bio on Devil Dinosaur so you the reader could maybe have a slight connection to the character as you read my reviews of his issues.

As young kids my brother and I always loved to read and collect comic books, we were lucky to have parents who didn’t mind buying us issues off the News Stand and Garage Sales as well as getting us subscriptions sent to our house. While my parents would buy us both comics for some reason my Grandma would go out and buy tons of comics and give them to my brother and my younger cousin and none for me….I can remember being really upset about this and even asked once why I didn’t get any and she said I was to young and wouldn’t take care of them, but what even boggled my young mind was the fact she would give them to my cousin who is like three years younger than me! In one of the stacks of comics given to my brother from my Grandmother was a copy of Devil Dinosaur and I can remember reading it and being very bored and not impressed with it back then and over time while I was still young I read a few more issues and was very lukewarm on how I felt about the characters and the story. So now being older and more mature (yeah I know) I really cant wait to read this series and see how it holds up now, so are you readers ready to travel to Dinosaur World and hang out with Devil and Moon-Boy as they travel around and get into all kinds of adventures? Well I know I am, but before we do I need to remind everyone I grade these comics on a standard 1-4 star rating and am looking at how well the comic keeps to the source material, its entertainment value, and its art and story. Also want to think my friend Geoff Burkman and Bell, Book And Comic for getting me these issues for this review.

Devil Dinosaur # 1 ***
Released in 1978 Cover Price .35 Marvel Comics #1 of 9

Devil Dinosaur is in a battle with Thunder Horn, they are fighting to the death over ruling the Valley Of Flame. As the two massive dinosaurs are doing battle Moon-Boy sits and watches and cheers on his big red friend, as victory comes his way and the two head off into the on coming night. As Moon-Boy sits on top of Devil Dinosaur he remembers back on how they became “brothers”. Some years back when Devil was a baby his mother and siblings were killed by a race called The Killer-Folk, Moon-Boy came to his rescue and the two have been best friend sense. But as they sleep this night The Killer-Folk also still remember the Red Devil and set a trap for him that will have him fall off a cliff onto spikes and equal his death! Will Moon-Boy and Devil Dinosaur fall to their sharp pointed end? Or will they figure out the trap and ride the land of the Killer-Folk for good? We will have to see what happens in Issue 2.

Devil Dinosaur in 1978 was that odd cross between very old school Cavemen themed books as well as the Horror Comic boom that Marvel was having at the time. This first issue acts as a quick way to show why a young cave boy is best friends with a very large and red skinned T-Rex and repairs us for the world that is known as Valley of Flame that all centers around a volcano. Moon-Boy in the first issue seems to really have pride in his friend and almost also seems to enjoy the power that comes with it’s friendship. Odd thing also is that is seems Devil understands what Moon-Boy is telling him making one wonder which is the smarter one of the two. Devil Dinosaur is all business and seems to really understand right from wrong and rules the land with an iron fist, and seems not to mind to kill to keep said peace. The artwork is great Kirby stuff and helps add a touch of comic class to the issue. While in my youth I would say that I would have found this issue boring like I did the ones we did own, over the years and rereading this one I find it to be a solid comic with a great potential of a storyline, so lets see how the other issues hold up and lets see if this will remain a good short run comic series.

Devil Dinosaur # 2 ***
Released in 1978 Cover Price .35 Marvel Comics #2 of 9

Moon-Boy and Devil Dinosaur have out smarted the Killer-Folk and have gotten past their pit of spikes, but what they don’t get past is the giant rocks that fall from the sky onto them. Devil is buried under tons of rocks as Moon-Boy is taken from the rubble and is to be sacrificed to Long Legs a giant spider that lives in the mountain. Devil who is thought to be crushed to death is indeed alive and after escaping from the rocks he has to make a quick fight of another dinosaur who was looking to eat him while he was pinned down. Moon-Boy is tied up and as Long Legs comes to eat him Devil Appears and sets fire to all the grass around The Killer-Folk and Long Legs, he then saves his friend and together the squash the leader of the Killer-Folk and flee the flames. In the end Long Legs kills the remaining Killer-Folk who had to hide in his cave from the smoke and flames and some one big watches as Devil and Moon-Boy walk the path to find a place to rest.

One thing that people have learned from this issue I am sure is not to mess with Devil Dinosaur, cause he will squash you like a bug, set the ground around you on fire and pay no attention to your screams of pain. The issue also really shows the bound that is between it and Moon-Boy as he force himself into the heart of a fight even though he is injured to save his only true friend from being eaten by a spider. Moon-Boy is not given much to do in this issue as he knocked out and tied up for most the issue, though the part he is playing is very important to the over all scheme of the issue. The Killer-Folk look as if they have been wiped out and this makes me wonder if they are all truly dead or if they will return for revenge soon. As for Long Legs he reminds me of the Godzilla Kaiju Kumonga who as well is a giant spider. Over all issue two offers lots of suspense and action and with the element of Moon-Boys possible death it was a page turner and I am sure had comic readers of 78 on the edge of their seats. Kriby’s art and story telling as he also wrote many of these issues shows you that this comic legend really knew is craft and made people care about a hairy cave boy and his red dino friend. With the tease of someone called Giant aiming for Devil at the end of this issue we should not waste any more time and we should see just who Giant is and what’s his plan to bring down the King of Valley of Flames.

Devil Dinosaur # 3 ***
Released in 1978 Cover Price .35 Marvel Comics #3 of 9

While Devil and Moon-Boy are resting something is scaring and killing other dinosaurs in the jungle and for this Devil cant let what ever it is get away with it so he sets out to find what’s causing all this destruction and while tracking he his hit with a rock and taken off his feet! The next morning Moon-Boy who thinks he seen something the night before returns to the spot and finds that a Giant of a man wearing a triceratops head as a helmet is the one causing all the issue and he wants what’s his and that’s a missing youngster of his race of giants, and to make it worse the another captures Moon-Boy and tries to make him his pet as Devil who is really mad does battle with the other that leaves the giant sinking into a tar bog. Moon-Boy escapes the younger giant and puts two and two together and asks Devil to save the Giant and a respect is built between the Giant and Devil.

This issue has Devil Dinosaur meeting his match and at first it looks as if he could loose the fight, if not for his smarts and using the bog around him is it he is able to beat Giant. Giant is a rampaging brute who kills a ton of Dinosaurs before he is stopped. All his rage and destruction is all over finding a younger Giant who is kind of a brat who likes to torment things smaller than him like Moon-Boy. Speaking of Moon-Boy he as well uses his brain and out smarts his Giant showing that much like Devil he is quick minded when faced with over the top odds. I like the fact that Devil Dinosaur also seems to look after his fellow kind when they are being bullied by some wicked foe, it almost reminds me of Godzilla ruling Monster Island and King Kong ruling over Skull Island. Fun plot that’s well written and well drawn once more by Kirby wraps up this fun third issue, with this staying at a solid three star pace I am pretty hyped to move onto issue 4.

Devil Dinosaur # 4 ***
Released in 1978 Cover Price .35 Marvel Comics #4 of 9

Moon-Boy is being plagued by nightmares of terrors falling from the sky and eating up everything living in The Valley Of Flames. When he awakens from his nightmare something does fall from the sky and when he and Devil go to investigate they are attacked by Giant Robot Aliens who are there to study the planets creatures and destroy anything and everything. The fight leaves Devil knocked out and Moon-Boy once more a captive of the aliens, but when Devil comes to he makes friends with a pair of Hill-Folk lead by White-Hair and his young friend Stone-Hand and together they save Thunder Horn and kill one of the alien robots. The new team goes to the robots base and see that they not only have Moon-Boy captive but also tons of Dinosaurs and Hill-Folk! In the end Devil has a plan to use The Tower of Death as a way to fight them! What is this plan well we have to read the next issue to find out!

This issue has a prehistoric mixed with cheesy sci-fi feel and touch to it, making it really enjoyable and a really cool read. Devil Dinosaur like in last issue has come face to face again with enemies that can hurt him and possibly kill him in the Robot Aliens. And much like in the last issue Devil uses his brain to find ways to survive the attack after he gets a beat down for being to cocky and thinking his strength can always get him out of trouble. With Devil it always seems to take him getting smacked once or twice before he decides to not charm in to a battle with ego alone. Moon-Boy while the voice of reason to Devil as of late seems to always find himself being held captive by the enemy, making one wonder if Devil at this point is getting a little annoyed with his friend. I am really starting to wonder also if the Hill-Folk are also the Killer-Folk as they speak of Devil at first as if he is an enemy, but none the less I like the fact they must team up with him in order to survive this invasion. The Robot Aliens take no crap and stomp dinosaurs and blast cave people left and right. Kirby’s Story and Art are well done and the only real down side to the issue is that it kind of has the same formula as issue 3 with Moon-Boy being captured and Devil facing a strong foe, but even that little flaw don’t keep the issue form being a good fun read. So I am not sure about you, but I know I am ready for issue 5 and to find out how Devil and White-Hair are going to stop the Alien take over, so lets not wait any longer!

Devil Dinosaur # 5 ***
Released in 1978 Cover Price .35 Marvel Comics #5 of 9

Devil Dinosaur along with his new allies White-Hair and Stone-Hand watch the Alien Robots and try to figure out a plan of attack, and while they watch they are attacked by two of them who were sent out to kill them! Devil tricks both and by doing so he leads them both to their deaths, but he also leads himself and his friends into a very bad place as giant ants want to eat them alive! While fleeing from the ants more Robot Aliens come into the fight and are eaten by the ants as Devil and the Hill-Folk hide in the ants home (Tower of Death) and only escape after the Aliens blow up the tower causing the ants to attack them! All the while Moon-Boy and the rest of the prisoners are on the ship and Moon-Boy is selected to be studied for his intelligence, and this will also lead to his death.

This issue has Devil Dinosaur thinking that Moon-Boy is in fact dead and that’s why he kills as many Alien Robots he can shake his tail at! This adds another layer to Devil who now is shown can feel anger and has a need for revenge and vengeance when he thinks his friend/brother from another mother has been killed. But once again it shows he makes bad mistakes as he almost gets himself and his new friends killed by messing with flesh eating ants. White-Hair follows Devil blindly and does not question his new friends path of war, while Stone-Hand is kind of a pain in the butt as all he does is question why they follow Devil and it’s clear as the day is bright he hates the red skinned dinosaur. The Alien Robots are as soulless as ever, but they do show more anger when many of them are killed by Devil. The Giant Ants are the real bad guys in this issue as they really want eat and kill what ever they can grab ahold of, pretty scary stuff if they were real. The end of the issue also has Devil down and out and thinking his friend is dead, making you now have to think that Moon-Boy is going to have to try and get himself off the ship and back home on his own, and I kind of like the fact he is going to have to help himself as I feel he relies on Devil way to much! Kirby Art and Story is well done as is the cover, in fact this far into the series I must say all the covers look great. So another solid good issue lets see if # 6 can keep up the good work.

Devil Dinosaur # 6 ***
Released in 1978 Cover Price .35 Marvel Comics #6 of 9

Devil Dinosaur is drained and must take a rest as White-Hair stays with him, Stone-Hand rushes to save a woman named Eev who is being attacked by two of the giant ants. The odds looks against the cave people but they fight on as Devil gets back to his feet and makes short work of the ants. Eev joins the group and together they watch as the Giant Ants destroy the space shit causing it to explode and for all inside to die along with it…or so they think. Devil Dinosaur sad about his loss of Moon-Boy walks off into the woods as Stone-Hand shows his true side by trying to attack Evee and knock the snot out of White-Hair and claims he is now in charge! While in the rubble of the ship many Hill-Folk escape as well as Dinosaurs and even Thunder Horn, and than Moon-Boy comes out he is shaken and scared and finds that escaping dinosaurs all around him want to eat him! Moon-Boy finds shelter in a small cave as a thunderstorm moves in, meanwhile a giant computer sits were the alien ship once sat and gets the attention of Stone-Hand, Eev and White-Hair.

This issue is pretty shocking and I am not 100% sure but I think in this issue you see an attempted rape as Stone-Hand gets wayyyyyy to forceful with Eev and forces her to he his woman…cause he likes her…yep it’s a little creepy. Poor Devil fights with all his might in this issue and crushes a few ants and even lets a few live, but sadly in the end his soul is crushed as he thinks his best friend is pushing up daisies. This shows an odd side of Devil as well cause it comes off not only as a saddened friend but also that of a pet whose master has died. Moon-Boy who at first I thought was shapping up to be his own man in this series quickly turns back into a character who just really wants his must stronger friend to fight his battles for him. Stone-Hand is just a total ass and I really cant wait for Devil to stomp him to death! White-Hair and Eev are ok and are kind of forced to follow the new rules set in place by Stone-Hand who acts as if they are his people and slaves now. The Giant Ants kick the crap out of the Alien Robots who don’t last long once they become under attack. And now I wonder what this Giant Super Computer Tree like thing is up to and how while it help or destroy Stone-Hand and his “people”. Once more Kirby does a great job on story and art and I will say that being 34 years old now and reading this series some for the first time and some for the multiple times I find this to be a great series this far and I am sure readers of 78 also thought so. So lets move onto issue # 7 and find out if Moon-Boy and Devil will finally reunite.

Devil Dinosaur # 7 ***
Released in 1978 Cover Price .35 Marvel Comics #7 of 9

Stone-Hand and his followers soon find that the Demon Tree as they call it really just wants to keep them as slaves, yet if they stay with him they can have it all fresh water, fresh fruit and green grass under their feet. The only catch this paradise is coasting them their freedom as Demon Tree places them all into a force field to keep them safe and his for as long as they live. Moon-Boy leaves his cave hideout and by luck just as he is to become a snack to a hungry dinosaur Devil appears and saves him and together they wonder towards the Devil Tree, meanwhile Stone-Hand don’t want to be a slave and finds that he can not escape the force field nor can he get close enough to attack the Devil Computer Tree as it uses gas to knock him out. Eev and White-Hair want to stay in this new paradise and tell so to a now pissed off Stone-Hand who sleeps on it. In the morning Stone-Hand awakens to find White-Hair dead of radiation poisoning and this is the final straw as Stone-Hand attacks the Devil Tree and hits it with a mighty blow causing it to go into a countdown to explosion! Stone-Hand and Eev try to escape the force field and it looks as if they may die from the exploding doom, but just in time Devil shows up and flings his body against the force field several times breaking into it and freeing his two new friends just in time. In the end Stone-Hand finds respect for Devil and says he shall speak of how great he is as Devil and Moon-Boy set out find a place to relax.

So Devil and Moon-Boy are reunited and together they save the day and help save the lives of two people that now will help spread the legend of Devil Dinosaur. Moon-Boy once more shows that really he can’t function of live with out his big red buddy, and Devil shows that he has feelings and really gets down in the dumps when he is not around his little hairy buddy. I really do like the fact that Devil Dinosaur is a true noble giant and when seeing Stone-Hand and Eev in trouble he flings his own body into danger to save them from the force field and the big boom of the computer blowing up. Plus by the end of this issue Stone-Hand who has been a butthole for the last few issues seems to have a turn around and finds respect for Devil who saved him and his woman from deaths door. White-Hair who was for staying in the bubble wonderland of slavedom at least dies of radiation poison and don’t get to truly see how evil the trees intensions are. This is a great ending to The Robot-Alien Invasion storyline and keeps the quality and entertainment level high showing why we comic readers love us some Jack Kirby. So with no more wait lets get to the next issue in the series.

Devil Dinosaur # 8 ***
Released in 1978 Cover Price .35 Marvel Comics #8 of 9

Moon-Boy wishes to return to his tribe called the Small-Folk and travels to a cave with Devil in order to talk to them, while inside a pack of cavemen called the Dino-Riders attack Devil and try to make them their master Grey-Tooth’s new ride! Moon-Boy tries to rescue his friend but is quickly ran off into the near by forest. The Dino-Riders take Devil to their camp tied up with vines and try to break his spirit by placing mud in his eyes and a foul smelling mask over his face. Moon-Boy wants to help Devil so bad he returns to his people the Small-Folk and gets them to help him save Devil from their evil plans. In the end the Small-Folk trick and defeat all the Dino-Riders as Devil gets free and stomps out the life of Grey-Tooth.

This issue takes a switch as most the time Devil is the one in danger and Moon-Boy is the one who must come to his aid and risk his own life. I like this change and it helped spice up the issue as Devil’s life is the one at risk and he can’t do anything really to free himself. That’s the really cool part of this issue is how Moon-Boy is able to get his tribe together to fight to save Devil, and he then puts his own life on the line when he runs into Grey-Tooth who sprung to action once Moon-Boy got close to Devil. Grey-Tooth who is the leader of his tribe called the Dino-Riders (Not to be confused with the toys of the same name) is really just a loud mouth bully who gets stomped to death by Devil in the near by jungle. The issue also brings back the Small-Folk who have been missing from many issues and it’s nice to see that they put their fears aside to help the one thing they fear and that’s Devil. Good story and while a little weak on plot it was still well worth the read and is another solid adventure for Devil. The art is your classic Kirby style and I must say I felt so bad for Devil in the parts were he gets mud placed in his eyes and a bag of rotten tree sap placed over his nose. This issue is the weakest in the series this far and even with that it’s still very entertaining, so lets move onto the 9^th and final issue of Devil Dinosaur.

Devil Dinosaur # 9 ***
Released in 1978 Cover Price .35 Marvel Comics #9 of 9

Moon-Boy and Devil watch as an old Witch makes nice with the spirits and asks for more power, Devil looks at the old woman as a threat to his rule and attacks even against the wishes of Moon-Boy. The old witch gets away and warns them to get out of her land before it’s two late and that their fate is in their own hands. Devil and Moon-Boy decide to not follow the witch, but take her advice and leave. As they leave the ground gives way and they both fall into the earth below as Moon-Boy is able to hold onto some of the stones in the hole, Devil falls all the way down into a light pit that travels him to the future the year being 1978 and while there he is scaring people and being attacked by modern man. Moon-Boy is pulled up from the hole by the Witch and her Son who he begs for them to help Devil, and while at first they don’t want to the Son thinks that saving him might be for the best and together they pull him from the future and bring him back to the past. The series ends with Devil and Moon-Boy walking into the Valley to rule some more.

This is it the final issue of Devil Dinosaur and in this one we get to see him not only in Dinosaur Valley but also in modern 1978 Earth were he torments modern man as well as gets attacked by modern weapons. This issue reminded me of Jurassic Park a little were a T-Rex is the fish out of the water in a big modern city and while confused he still knows that he must fight to stay alive. Moon-Boy as always is the brains of the group but is also the one who is weak link and must get the help of others to save the day. The Witch and her Son who everyone thinks are evil really are good people who just want to be left alone and live in a dangerous part of the valley hoping to keep the spirits in check and the strangers out of their homeland. While this final story is pretty fun, I do feel that it was not the right one to end a series on and lacks the impact I as the reader was looking for to end the characters comic run. The last panel ever for the 78 run of Devil Dinosaur only reads “And Thus Endeth The Chronicle” and has Devil and Moon-Boy walking into the light nice gesture but would have liked a little more. This issue also packs a message and that’s don’t judge people before you know them, as every one judges the Witch who really turns out to be a pretty good person willing to help Devil out even after he tried to kill her. This issue is also the one I remember me and my brother having that our Grandma Brassfield found at a garage sale and got for him, I can remember us always for some reason laughing about Devil Dinosaur but for some reason we both always looked at and read this issue. The artwork in it has that amazing Kirby look and the story while good does have a normal issue feel and not a final issue one. Over all this is a good issue just not what I would have wanted to end it all with.

Devil Dinosaur is one of those characters that I think many Marvel fans forget about or even treat as a joke. While nowadays the character would not fit in with the “Ultimate” or “Modern” style of comics, I do find him to be one that holds a lot of charm and captures the true spirit of comics of the 70’s. Jack Kirby, I think, took pride in the character and delivered a short lived series that was aiming to please horror comic fans as well as sci-fi comic fans and readers of such comics as Turok and for the most part delivered. As I stated before in this update I grew up thinking the series was boring when in fact if I would have just chilled out and read the whole 9 issues I am sure I would have been a fan of it. So next update I have been going back and fourth on what I want to do, and I have decided to do a smaller one before I tackle another big one so I will be looking at the comic sequel to the Lucio Fulci film “Gates Of Hell”!! So until then shop at a local antique store, watch your local horror host and read a comic or two.

Jason Voorhees’s Bogus Journey To Hell

Posted on March 7, 2014 by bloodlinematt

As you long time readers remember when New Line Cinema told the world that Freddy Kruger was going to die in their film “Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare” and that it was the final film in the Nightmare on Elm Street series, it sent shockwaves through the youth at the time who believed their marketing tool. But could they trick us all again when they did the same thing with the newly acquired Friday The 13^th film series? Paramount Pictures had been making and putting out Friday The 13^th films since 1980 when they released the original film. To their surprise, it was a huge hit and sparked 7 sequels for them, but this whole time while they made money on them, it almost seemed they were embarrassed to be the company making these slasher films. The final film for them came in 1989 with “Friday The 13^th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan,” and while it made money, its profits were less than before. Paramount had enough of the hockey mask killer, and they sold the film rights for future sequels to New Line Cinema who made the A Nightmare on Elm Street series as well as films like Leatherface: Texas Chainsaw Massacre III and Man’s Best Friend. This was shocking for fans of the series as now New Line had the rights, and no one knew what was going to happen. Would they do a remake of the series or would they continue on? We got our answer as they announced Jason Goes To Hell: The Final Friday, and they once more let it out that this was it. If you like Jason Voorhees, you better come see this film and say your goodbyes because this was the “Final” one. Of course time would prove that they were full of crap as sequels like Jason X, Freddy vs. Jason and even a reboot was made by a coproduction between New Line and Paramount in 2009. In 2013, Paramount has gotten the rights back to Friday the 13^th for 5 years and plan on making the 13^th film in the series soon for a 2015 release date. The actor best known for playing the part of Jason Voorhees is Kane Hodder, a stuntman who has been in many great horror films over the years such as the Hatchet Series, Project: Metal Beast, Pumpkinhead II: Blood Wings, Wishmaster and 2001 Maniacs. He is also the actor who played Jason in the film this blog update is about.

For those who don’t know who Jason Voorhees is, here is a quick bio for the famed hockey mask killer. Jason Voorhees was born a mongaloid, and when he was young and at camp he drowned in the lake at Camp Crystal Lake while the councilors were making love and partying. Over the years, his mother, Pamela Voorhees, did all she could to have the camp closed. She murdered people and even poisoned the water to try and keep people away. Pamela’s reign of terror came to an end when a young woman named Alice chopped her head off after she had already killed all of Alice’s friends and co-workers. Alice had a vision of a boy in the lake who pulled her under, but no such boy was found. Years pass, and the boy who was really Jason Voorhees killed Alice and spent all his time getting revenge on those who entered his camp. At first Jason wore an old sack as a mask, but later he was able to get a hockey mask from one of his victims. While at first Jason was just a deformed human, it was after he died at the hands of Tommy Jarvis (a young boy whose family he attacked) that he later became an undead killing machine who could not be stopped. Jason was brought back from the dead thanks to Jarvis, who over they years brooded over the killer and believing he was not truly dead dug up his body and like Frankenstein’s Monster a bolt of lightning brought back the killer who spent many years hacking up teens and even battling one with psychic powers. The hockey face killer even caught a cruise at one point and traveled to New York and later was set up and blown to bits only to be shown that he has a demon inside him that can body jump. Le also later went to space in the future and turned metal and even fought dream killer Freddy Kruger in a bloody battle. Jason over the years has been hacked up, blown up, set on fire, drowned, hung and shot and nothing ever seems to stop him. Actors who have played Jason over the years in 12 films include Kane Hodder, Steve Dash, Richard Brooker, C.J. Graham, Ken Kirzinger and Derek Mears to name a few. Jason Voorhees remains one of the most popular horror characters of the 1980’s, and while this bio was rushed, you should do yourself a favor and watch all the films and enjoy the blood splatter goodness.

1993 marked the first film of the Friday the 13^th series done by New Line Cinema called Jason Goes To Hell: The Final Friday, and like before they acted as if this film was the last to be made for the Jason Voorhees character like they did before with Freddy Kruger and Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare. This time around while I was hyped for the idea of a new Friday the 13^th film, I was not as sold on it being the final one, all that kept going through my young mind was “Why would they buy the rights only to end it with one film?” Still the hype of final did fill my mind and made me wonder just how they would kill him off, and when Fangoria Magazine started to show pictures on the set and showed a more bloated looking Jason who looked battle tested and his mask seemed fused to his face, my hype built slightly even more. I can remember talking to my brother about how they were going to kill Jason off this time and ever so slightly the rumor of Freddy Kruger being in the film echoed in my brain. The kids at school, while some horror film fans, they were few and far but the ones that did, I can remember talking of ideas of this final film and what we thought was going to happen. I can even remember Entertainment Tonight doing a big segment of the film, adding more hype to its release. The film came out and grossed $15,935,068.00 during its run at the box office, and being younger my mom and dad would not allow me to watch the film in theaters. I can remember hearing negative reviews from older friends who saw it, and even my brother got to see it and disliked it. While I heard positive stuff about the gore, the fact that in this film Jason had a little demon that lived in his heart and would body jump kept being compared to films like The Hidden. It took it coming to VHS before I was able to see it, and after watching it I found myself liking it, while I would say next to part 5 it’s the weakest in the series, it still has a charm that I find entertaining.

The film’s gore effects are great and perfect for the 90’s slasher film, and while the Jason body jumping demon was dumb, when the hockey mask wearing Jason is on screen, it’s good stuff. The end of the film when Freddy’s glove shows up and pulls Jason’s mask into Hell was so awesome and built up the fact that you knew that the Friday The 13^th film series was not over and that the two horror icons would meet each other in a film. So while it did not hold the questions and mystery of Freddy’s Dead, this film still held some great memories of talking to my brother and friends of the Final Friday.

Jason Goes To Hell is filled with a few other horror film relics and characters. The most known is Freddy Kruger’s glove that pops from the ground at the end and pulls Jason’s mask down to Hell while giving his evil laugh. The second is the Book of The Dead from the famed Evil Dead series that sits in the Voorhees house, making one wonder is Jason a deadite? And last is the crate from Creepshow that houses the razor teethed monster that eats Adrienne Barbeau, that is now being stored in the Voorhees basement. Very cool little surprises for fans of horror in this flick and are worth trying to spot on your next watch.

Like all good popular horror films, Jason Goes To Hell had its share of merchandise like t-shirts, trading cards, cardboard cut out, Halloween masks, model kits, toys and magazines. Some of the best are the Mezco Jason Goes To Hell figures from their Cinema of Fear line. McFarlene Toys had a Jason Goes to Hell figure in their Movie Maniac line, and Fangoria had a magazine dedicated strictly to the film.

One other cool piece of merch that came out was the soundtrack to the film done by Harry Mantredini on both cassette tape and CD. The film’s score, while updated, still holds the classic Friday the 13^th feel and even has brief moments that echo the classic score. This is a score that at some point I want to get and start playing a few tracks of it on WYSO’s Sunday night radio show Alpha Rhythms. So listeners of that, keep your ears open.

When I moved back to Kettering I hated it. I felt like I did not connect with the other kids, and I felt like the schools themselves were nothing but one big joke more concerned with test scores than actually teaching kids. While I had some great friends in Kettering like Josh Weinberg and Patrick Neeley, it was when I was placed in the media class that I found friends who were just like me. They were into horror films, music and being creative. Guys like Dave Wean, Rion Neeley, Linda Webb, Dan Salter, Brandon Womeldorff and Matt Hoffman were all amazing and fun people. With these guys I also helped build a small shot on video film company called Independent B Movie. One of the first people I bonded with in that class was Matt Hoffman over a T-shirt I was wearing that lead to us talking about music and then of course horror films. Hoffman was a fan of Friday the 13^th and A Nightmare on Elm Street, and I can remember him even printing out rumors of what the Freddy vs. Jason film would have been about. One of the coolest things Matt did was he gave me a double sided official movie theater poster of Jason Goes To Hell that I still have to this day. So once more thank you, Hoffman, for being a great friend, and this update is for you and all the other horror fans in the world who stick together.

So here we are at the point of the comic reviews, and I want to let all you readers know that the issues I am about to re-read are the same ones I bought off the news stands when they first were released. I got these comics from Mavericks Cards and Comics as well as The Bookie Parlor and have kept them all these years. At one point in time when I sold off my comics to pay rent for me and my girlfriend’s place, I kept these as well as a handful of others so these comics hold a lot of memories. Remember I grade these comics on a standard 1-4 star rating and am looking at how well the comic keeps to the source material, its entertainment value, and its art and story. So if you’re ready, let’s get into the Final Friday.

Jason Goes To Hell # 1 **1/2
Released in 1993 Cover Price $2.95 Topps Comics #1 of 3

A young woman goes to Crystal Lake and lures Jason Voorhees out of hiding and tricks him into following her into an ambush set up by a SWAT team who use a bomb and blow Jason up “killing” him once and for all. But when Jason’s body is taken to the corner’s office, something goes wrong as one of the men working on his body takes a bite out of Jason’s over sized heart and has the spirit of Jason inside him and goes on a killing rampage. Meanwhile Robert Campbell, a TV host for a tabloid show called American Case File, has put up $100,000 to bounty hunter Creighton Duke who travels to Jason’s old stomping ground and talks to waitress Diana who he thinks can help him kill Jason. Diana’s boyfriend is the town’s sheriff, and after some heated words Duke is kicked out of the diner and arrested. Diana wants to talk to her daughter Jessica’s ex-boyfriend Steven about the family’s secret and makes him promise to come visit her at 11pm that night. Meanwhile one of the town’s cops is attacked by the coroner who has Jason’s spirit inside him and via a strange worm demon that comes from his mouth, the curse is passed onto the cop who goes to Diana’s house and attacks her while she is on the phone with the sheriff. Steven goes in and tries to save her but during the attack Diana is killed. Jason Cop is knocked out the window and the sheriff blames Steven for the death of his girlfriend.

The Jason Voorhees kills are kept to a minimum in this first issue as is all the cussing and naked boobs of the film. In fact one whole scene that has a couple of collage kids getting naked and dying is missing from the issue all together. The scene should have taken place before Steven goes to Diana’s house as he is the one that picks them up hitchhiking and drops them off in the woods. Jason in this issue is seen in the traditional hockey mask very little and spends most of the issue in other bodies like the monster from “The Hidden.” This takes away the Friday the 13^th feel to the killer. Steven, who is being prepped to be the comic’s hero in this issue, does very little besides get thrown around by Jason Cop and does ram a fire poker through the killer’s body. Diana seems like a sweet woman who wanted to be happy with a husband and a perfect life. Too bad she was the main target of Jason who wants to have his little demon thing inside her…yeah, I know how that sounds. The Sheriff and the cops seem like closed minded small town good old boys, and if they are the main protection for the town when the blood hits the fan then I feel sorry for them all. First impression of Robert Campbell is jerk, and he has that Bill O’ Reilly sleaze factor to him. Creighton Duke is badass, and I can’t wait to see him more in action. Out of everyone shown thus far, he is the only one who stands a chance of killing the hockey mask killer. The small dinner where Diana works is also a great small town attraction as they even make Jason Voorhees burgers and are milking all they can out of the killer’s “death”. The artwork in this series is done by Cynthia Martin and has the 90’s comic charm to it. While I am not a super fan of this style, I still enjoy it for this comic. The cover is great and has Jason’s hockey mask on blac,k and best of all it glows in the dark…classic 90’s comic gimmick stuff…oh yeah, it also came with three Topps trading cards based on the film. So with issue one down, let’s move onto issue two as we continue our comic adaptation of “Jason Goes To Hell: The Final Friday”.

Jason Goes To Hell # 2 **1/2
Released in 1993 Cover Price $2.95 Topps Comics #2 of 3

Jessica along with her baby daughter Stephanie and her new boyfriend Robert Campbell have all come to town after her mothers murder, while Steven is locked up next to Creighton Duke who is now being held because they think he stole Diana’s body that is now missing form the morgue. Duke shares some info with Steven that explains Diana and Jessica are related to Jason, and he needs one of them to make himself reborn so he can be the strong killing machine once again. Steven escapes the jail and starts his quest to get to Jessica who has allowed her friend and her mom’s co-worker Vicki to watch her daughter who takes the baby to work with her at the diner. Steven goes to the old Voorhees house and watches as Robert Campbell talking to his producer admits to stealing Diana’s body and using Jessica just to get this big news story for his show, but his dreams of having high ratings is cut short as Jason Cop enters and now inserts the worm demon in Robert! Steven rushes to Jessica and kidnaps her and runs over Robert right in front of her. The two argue, and Jessica breaks away and leaves Steven at the side of the road who is then in turn arrested again. As Jessica is also at the police station, Jason Robert shows up kills the cops and tries to kill Jessica as Steven comes in and tries to stop her attack.

It’s a Voorhees family reunion as it’s revealed that Jessica and her child are relatives to Jason who wants nothing more than to put his worm demon inside Jessica’s mouth…yep, again I know how it sounds. While Jessica is a major part to this comic series plot, I really don’t feel that she is fleshed out and that’s a shame because in the film you find yourself liking her more so than here in this comic adaptation. Once more Robert Campbell shows that he is a total scumbag as he steals a dead body and uses a woman just because she can get him ratings on his trash TV show. What a turd that you find yourself happy about when he dies and the Jason worm demon takes him over. Steven turns into a macho man as he breaks free from jail and tangles once more with Jason who was in the body of Robert this time around. It’s a shame that in the story it’s explained that he walked away from Jessica because he found out she was going to have his baby…not cool, Steven, not cool. Creighton Duke takes a backseat in this issue and is used only as a source of information to give our hero Steven all the knowledge he needs to know. Most of the cops in the issue are useless and are taken out pretty fast by Jason Robert. One character in the comic that is not in the film is Vicki’s boyfriend who gets killed getting out of the shower after Jason Cop shows up to steal the baby that is no longer there and is at the dinner safe and sound in a cardboard box…yep. This issue has more kills, more blood, more cussing and more Worm Demon Jason than issue one and keeps the pace building. So over all, this is not a bad issue. The art this time around is done by Bobby Rubio, and in my opinion is terrible and looks more like a sketchbook than a finished comic. The cover is pretty cool and has a woman just out of the shower looking into a mirror and seeing Jason behind her…classic slasher film stuff. Well we have one issue to go, so let’s dive into it and see if Jason really does go to hell!

Jason Goes To Hell # 3 **1/2
Released in 1993 Cover Price $2.95 Topps Comics #3 of 3

Steven and Jessica flee the police station. As Jason Robert makes short work of the remaining cops, they make their way to the dinner to pick up baby Stephanie only to find that the owner of the diner is not having it because Steven being wanted for the death of Diana. Things get worse as Jason Robert shows up and kills everyone in the diner including Vicki, and baby Stephanie is missing! Jessica leaves Steven behind and rushes to the Voorhees house were Creighton Duke has the baby and explains to Jessica that she must kill Jason and send him to Hell once and for all. While talking to Duke, an accident happens and Duke falls through the floor and crashes to the basement as the sheriff and another cop show up and each are suspected of having the Jason demon inside them. After a scuffle the sheriff dies and the other Cop picks up Stephanie and is clearly the Jason Demon! Steven shows up just in time and cuts off the cop’s head, freeing the worm demon who in turn gets into the dead body of Diana and poof the Hockey Mask killer Jason Voorhees is back! Jason kills Duke by snapping his back and then goes after Steven and Jessica, but as the legend goes Jessica is able to take Jason down with a dagger to the heart and with a final blow from Steven, Jason is taken to Hell by giant demon hands and just as they think its safe he pops back up and tries to drag Steven down with him! Jessica saves Steven and as they walk off together with baby in hand. They are about to start their new family as Jason’s Hockey mask is pulled to hell by the razor gloved hand of Freddy Kruger.

Jason Voorhees is back by the last few pages of this comic, but sadly after throwing Steven around briefly he is taken down by the dagger of Jessica really quick and we never do get the full Jason effect! Though I will say that while better done in the film, the massacre at the diner is the brutal killing style that we all know and love coming from Jason even though he looks like a TV reporter. That is the only downside to this comic and even the film is that in our Friday the 13^th media, we want Jason in all his glory not a body snatching worm demon. Steven, while very noble in wanting to save his love Jessica and his daughter, is just not a badass hero as much as he is a punching bag! In fact at the end when he is the one that hits the final blow to the dagger that sends Jason to Hell, I felt like he did not deserve it as that glory should have been given to Jessica. Speak of Jessica by this third and final issue its clear that she is more of the hero and is the only one who can kill Jason once and for all. Her character comes around and you find yourself liking her more so than in the past issue. The cops once more are just filler and human sacks of meat for Jason to get his body count higher as are the workers at the diner. Creighton Duke, while the information giver, is dogged out in the comic pretty bad as he goes down for the count really easy and Jason makes quick work of the bounty hunter. One thing that has always bothered me in both the film and the comic is when Jason Demon jumps into the final Cop’s body, why in the holy hell can he talk and sound just like the cop…now that’s some dumb bull stuff. The art is once more done by Cynthia Martin and look very 90’s, while the cover once more is well done and has Jason being pulled down to Hell by the demons. This is a pretty cool horror film comic adaptation and holds the cheese of the film really well. The series had okay artwork and the story was a mix of the final film print, the script and the comic writers’ own take making for a good read. While it does not hold 100% true to the film it was based on, it still holds up as an average 90’s horror comic read and is worth checking out if you’re a fan of the Friday series.

I should also note that all three comics came with trading cards and truly show that it is a comic product of the 90’s where gimmicks ran wild. Oh yeah, I am sure you are wondering yes, it was cool to see Freddy’s Glove in comic form pull down the mask of Jason to Hell..and made you wish Topps would have pulled the trigger and made their own version of Freddy vs. Jason in a comic book.

Topps Comics had a lot of guts bringing Jason Goes To Hell to comics and putting them out at your local comic shop next to Batman and X-Men. While horror comics were being made, none of the big companies at the time were touching IP’s based on horror films so I give them a lot of respect for that. It’s a shame that Topps pulled the plug on their comic branch because I would have loved to seen what they would be working on now in 2014. While Jason Goes To Hell is not a great movie nor would I even say is it a cult classic, it is a fun cheesy film that tried to do something new with a horror icon that was running thin on ideas to keep itself fresh. While no one I knew bought into the gimmick of this being the last film in the series, it was still a fun event to think about. These past few updates have been filled with many spooky horrors from Frankenstein’s Monster to the hockey mask killer Jason, so our next one will be something a little less frightening as we take a look at Star Comics series based on the dolls The Hugga Bunch…oh wait, this might be more terrifying!! See you next update!

Stays Crunchy Even In Ink!

Posted on February 2, 2014 by bloodlinematt

1985 was a good year for many things. In movies, such classics as Back To The Future, Rambo First Blood Part 2, The Breakfast Club, Commando, Rocky IV, Clue, Return of the Living Dead, Pee Wee’s Big Adventure, View to a Kill, Fright Night, Re-Animator and Day of the Dead all filled the cinemas with entertainment. Vinyl and cassettes of such albums as David Lee Roth’s “Crazy From The Heat”, Megadeth’s “Killing is My Business…And Business Is Good”, Motley Crue “Theatre of Pain” and W.A.S.P. Put out “The Last Command”. TV shows like Cheers, Cosby Show, Golden Girls, Night Court, Amazing Stories, Saturday Night Live and Growing Pains were great home entertainment for couch potatoes. Not to mention horror hosts like Commander USA just started his Groovie Movies and Dr. Creep of Shock Theater had ended his long run on Dayton television. But while stuff like this was going on, the kids of that time also knew one thing that troubled them and that was Cap’n Crunch was missing!!

Cap’n Crunch, whose full name is Horatio Magellan Crunch, is the mascot for the surgery cereal of the same name (that stays crunchy even in milk) put out by Quaker Oats since 1963. The good Captain of the S.S. Guppy, along with Seadog and a young crew, sailed the seas and delivered breakfast to all the hungry girls and boys around the world and became beloved by all who ate his fun and good tasting cereal. As the years went by Cap’n Crunch would bring in more great tasting cereals like Crunch Berries, Peanut Butter Crunch, Choco Crunch and Vanilly Crunch and became friends with CrunchBerry Beast, a wild creature with red hair, yellow skin and red spots, Mr. Choco a creature made out of cookie dough who could shape shift, a crunch berry bush and Smedley, a peanut butter loving elephant. But while his friends, fans and crew all loved him, Cap’n Crunch did make some enemies along the way that wanted nothing more than to bring him down and ruin breakfast for everyone.

Being a Cap’n of cereal is hard work, and you don’t get to the top of the table choice with out making some folks mad. The poor Cap’n has his share of jealous haters. Jean Lafoote is a barefooted pirate who wants to steal the secrets of the cereal. He has kidnapped and stolen and would stop at nothing to get what he wants! Lafoote was the prime suspect for people like me to when Cap’n Crunch was missing even though by 1985 he was a second thought and not a mascot in use! While he was the prime suspect for me, many other ideas and such were given, and many people tried to figure it out to win money that was being offered to lucky winners who could figure out where the Cap’n was..but the shock of where he had been was about to hit us all.

Kids around the US were worried and spent time trying to figure out where the Cap’n was and hoping he was okay. They had their parents buy boxes of Cap’n Crunch cereals to try and get the clues that were inside the boxes to figure it out, to help their breakfast friend and to win some money to buy toys and video games for helping find him. But then they found him…and the place he was lost in was The Milky Way…you get it? So after all the worry and stress, Cap’n Crunch was found safe and sound and was once more on our TV commercials and cereal boxes. But this peace of mind would only last for a year when more trauma would be placed on all the youth as once more something would happen to Cap’n and we would all have to team up again this time to Free The Cap’n from his worst enemy, and no it’s not Jean Lafoote!

The Sogmaster, along side his henchmen The Soggies, are Cap’n Crunch’s worst nightmare. They want to not only steal his famed cereal, but they also want to ruin it and make it get gross and soggy in milk taking away the crunch! The Sogmaster is a robot who is all grey, has a hoses for fingers that shoot out soggy gross stuff and is very mean spirited. Amazingly enough he left me with the impression of being one of the meanest mascots in my history of watching TV. The Soggies themselves are white gloppy masses who are not very smart and are easily out smarted. The way to tell them apart is one wears a red hat and the other does not. In 1986 Sogmaster and The Soggies did something that would shock the nation; they kidnapped Cap’n Crunch, and once more the hunt was on to find him and save him from his captors. Once more money was given out to those who found the clues and called a 1-800 that held the answers. This is the one case that my brother Bryan and I got into and tried to find Cap’n without calling the phone number and with just small clues and our own ideas.

One thing I would like to very briefly talk about are the cool PVC figures that use to come free in cereal boxes based on popular mascots or even Disney Cartoons. Some of my favorite ones were the Cap’n Crunch ones that had not only Cap’n but also both Soggies and The Sogmaster! My brother and I collected these and during the whole time of them coming out, we only got one Sogmaster, a few Soggies and an army of Cap’n Crunch’s who seemed to be the one they over produced. To this day I have a Cap’n Crunch that sits on a shelf near the TV. So for those who remember these, this blog update is for you!

The kidnapping of Cap’n Crunch not only caught the attention of all the kids but it also got the attention of super hero Spider-Man who had all ready also joined the hunt last year to find where he was lost and was now going after The Sogmaster to get his friend back! Now when Spider-Man is worried and wants to save Cap’n, you know he was in deep trouble. Marvel Comics placed a one page ad in many of their comics that had Spider-Man finding the track of the Soggies and coming face to face with them and leaving us on a cliffhanger as to what happened. This was a fun way to add to the gimmick of the missing mascot and again made you worry about your breakfast and its champion.

But like before, Cap’n Crunch was saved. The Sogmaster was sent packing, and the cereal Icon was free to spread his sugar coated cereal to all! But that’s the thing, while Cap’n Crunch was able to beat The Sogmaster, outstep Jean Lafoote and even find his way home after being lost, it seems that one thing he can’t shake are those pesky people who think they should tell parents what their kids should be eating. That’s one thing that annoys me about society today, everyone wants to say that these cereals are giving kids diabetes, McDonald’s is making their kids fat, etc. While these things don’t help, it’s the job of the parents to watch how much of this type of food their kids eat, and it’s a shame companies are becoming so wimpy that they are backing down and using mascots less and allowing nut jobs to make rules for the world on what’s good for whom. But enough, let me get down from my soap box, and let’s take a look at a comic based on Cap’n Crunch that was given away to people who bought the cereal. I want to remind everyone that I grade these comics on a standard 1-4 star scale and look for entertainment value, art, story and how true the comic is to its source material. So let’s set sail over the Milk Sea, and see if we can have an adventure with the one and only Cap’n Crunch.

Cap’n Crunch: In The Center of The Earth **
Released in 1986 Cover Price FREE Quaker Oats Comics #1 of 1

The Sogmaster is about to sog the Earth when Cap’n Crunch along with his giant robot and kid sidekicks Peter & Judy stop him and cause him to be so angry that he wants revenge. Sogmaster along with his Soggie Army go to the center of the Earth and use a giant cannon to turn the Earth’s crust in mush as well as almost everything on the planet! The government knows something’s wrong and send Cap’n along with Peter & Judy to the center of the world to stop the worlds soggy situation. While down below, Cap’n meets a race of underworld monsters who join his fight and together they all bring down The Sogmaster and his canon with one simple box of Cap’n Crunch Cereal.

This is a quick comic filled with a silly story that pits Cap’n Crunch and The Sogmaster against each other, and the end battle is pretty un-epic and not exciting but yet so fitting for a cheesy give away comic of this nature. The story is simple; Sogmaster is mad and wants to take revenge not just on Cap’n but the whole world and uses a Sog cannon on the Earth’s core making everything up above soggy and gross. He’s stopped by Cap’n Crunch and a box of his cereal. The art in the comic is good for this free comic but would not hold up for a comic that one had to pay for and would be considered very poor in Star Comics standards. In fact, I could not find a credit in the issue of who did the art, making one wonder: was he ashamed of it or was he told not to give himself credit? Cap’n Crunch is a silly hero but is very noble to the world and wants everyone to enjoy his crunchy cereal at any cost, even traveling to the center of the Earth to protect it and its eaters. Sogmaster in the issue just comes off as a bad guy who was born to loose and surrounds himself with brain dead henchmen who only slow him down. While he loses a lot, he never rethinks his attacks making him easy to predict and easy to defeat. Not much more can be said about this comic besides the cover is well done and makes it seem way more epic than it actually. Also, the issue should have been longer..yeah, so to sum it up, I would say it’s okay.

Breakfast mascots were a lot of fun for kids of the 60’s through the early 90’s before parent groups stepped in and took the fun out of everything. I have many fun memories of Cap’n Crunch, the Trix Rabbit and Lucky and wish kids of today could also find a bond with their cereal and its spokesperson. This was a fun quick look back at a simple time when one fake junk food Cap’n worried the youth of the time by going missing and being kidnaped. Our next update however goes back to a series subject as we look at Frankenstein, and not just any Frankenstein but that of the 1910 version done by Thomas Edison’s film company and the amazing comic book done based on this one time “lost” film. So until next time, sit back, relax, eat a bowl of cereal and read a comic or two! And oh yeah Happy Super Bowl Day!

Horror Host Icon : Commander USA

Posted on January 21, 2014 by bloodlinematt

Growing up a strange kid was a very fun way to live life. I was able to be me and not worry about what others thought of me, and I must say all my fellow classmates in Waynesville were all very cool kids and no one thought it was weird that I drew pictures of Satan, demons and monsters all the time. In fact, I can only remember one teacher ever really being an ass, and his name didn’t even stick with me because he was a piss poor teacher who was younger than the rest and walked around like he was the man when really he was a dud. He was a computer teacher and he gave me crap for writing about Jason Voorhees (Friday The 13th) and The Toxic Avenger.

Waynesville was a good time and was way better than the second time I had to go to Kettering Schools who had many teachers who targeted me for being “satanic” in their eyes. Many things helped make me the person I am today and have lead to all the cool creative things I do from no budget films with companies like Independent B Movie and Bloodline Video, to the TV show Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre, to music concerts at local venue Gilly’s to even my early made comics of Benny The Squirrel and Robo-Racoon that were drawn with colored pencils. Of course my Mom and Dad played a big part in it, as they never discouraged me from being myself and even my brother Bryan played a big part of just helping my mind work with all his fake wrestling leagues and such. But of course entertainment also played a big part in warping me. Things like pro wrestling with all the amazing characters like Ultimate Warrior, Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair, video games on the NES with all the high adventure, Universal Monster movies with all the classic scares and horror hosts that brought me doses of comedy mixed in with my horror. The hometown Dayton area host was Dr. Creep, a lovable character who hosted Shock Theatre and later Saturday Night Dead. While he played a part in my life at the time but more so later on, it was one horror host that aired on cable TV on USA Network that truly was an icon to me and a guy me and my brother tried never to miss. You long time readers know who I am talking about..that’s right, the one and only Commander USA who hosted his Groovie Movies Saturdays and later on Sundays.

Commander USA’s Groovie Movies started airing in 1985 and would show two horror or cult type films on the USA Network. Commander USA is a retired super hero whose secret headquarters (The Video Vault) is located in the basement of a shopping mall in New Jersey and with his Heat And Radiation Screen That Protected Tel-Psychotronic Screen he would watch the film alongside us as well as his best friend and sidekick Lefty (his hand with cigar ash on it) or some other guest. Commander was part of the Legion of Decency and is a fan of all the cheesy goodness he shows and took pride in presenting the movie along side showing us how to make a mid-movie snack that was some gross mix of food that should not go together.

Groovie Movies would come on Saturday at noon and was the perfect follow up to the major networks’ cartoon blocks. This was the perfect thing for Monster Kids of the 80’s like myself as later that night USA Network would have Saturday Nightmares that consisted of a horror film and shows like The Hitchhiker and Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Then after that, USA Up All Night would come on with host Gilbert Gottfried, making this the perfect station to watch on Saturdays. Commander USA would switch to showing one film and later even moved to Sundays before sadly going off the air in 1989. Commander USA was the first host that drew me 100% in and really helped spark my interest in slasher films and low budget horror flicks. His style of hosting is what I would consider the best as he would have a storyline that would run through out the episode, and you would feel as if he was watching the film with you, the sign of a good solid host. Commander USA made the odd little kid me feel as if I was normal and that many of people out in the world liked the same things as I did. I know my brother and I have a lot in common, and I would almost guarantee that he would also say that Commander USA had an impact of his young life. Something about sitting down and eating lunch or a snack and watching Commander USA host films like Frankenstein And The Monster From Hell, Friday The 13^th Part III and Aztec Mummy are magical moments that some day I hope future kids of mine will share with their favorite horror host.

Jim Hendricks was the actor who played Commander USA, and he was a former radio DJ and theater performer. His other acting gigs include bit parts in Law And Order: Special Victims Unit, Brutal Fury and a cameos as Commander USA in the Christmas film classic Scrooged and pool shark film The Color Of Money. While not a household name, Jim Hendricks will always be one of my favorite actors of all time for his role of being the Commander. I should also note that Jim Hendricks is talked to in the horror host documentary American Scary, a film every fan of hosting should watch.

Commander USA is a character who has a very blue collar super hero look. Commander wears a tight red body suit with USA logo on his chest, star suspenders, blue baggy shorts and a polka dotted cape. He also always has a cigar, and his mask is blue grease paint painted around his eyes. As I stated back in my “Top 10 Should Have Been Star Comics,” Commander USA should have been made into a comic book series because I would have been a buyer of every issue. In fact I would love to see a comic series made even now about the adventures of Commander, and I know of a few comic artist that would be perfect for that job! Below is some artwork done by two of my friends, Eric Shonborn and Bruce O’Hughes, as well as an art piece I found online. All are different in style, and all are amazing in their own way. So make sure to take a look at these amazing drawings.

Commander USA was joined by all types of guests from vampires to mall shoppers, but only really had two co-hosts/sidekicks that appeared in almost every episode. The most popular was Lefty, his right hand with a smiley face drawn on with cigar ash. Lefty was a strong willed hand puppet who had a mind of his own. Lefty was his righthand man and was always around to help out the Commander in whatever silly thing that was going on. The second sidekick was Monroe, a mounted stuffed deer head who made weird noises and would always hold the Commanders coat, and sometimes he would have some ideas for The Commander to try. So I had to give both of these great sidekicks a shout out, and I can remember loving Monroe when I was a young lad. So this update is not only for Commander USA, the fans but it’s for Lefty and Monroe as well!

1989 was a dark year as it marked the end of the Groovie Movies and was a sad time to be had by all. While we still had USA Up All Night and USA Saturday Nightmares, the Video Vault was closed for good and and reruns were not in the cards. For the following years, I was able to get my cheesy horror flicks fix via other horror host shows, cable TV like HBO and renting VHS tapes from the library and video stores. While they were all fun ways to discover and relive the horrors of the movies, they were all still lacking Commander USA. I kicked myself for never recording the episodes on Beta or VHS, but the younger me was to busy taping Godzilla films and cartoons. Over the years my brother was able to track down some copies of Groovie Movies on VHS and burned them onto DVD-R’s, and we were both able to relive our youth and be reunited with Commanders wisecracks and silly jokes. We both spent time tracking down episodes and trading them to each other, and now I own a large amount of these episodes and even still to this day am inspired by Commander USA who is my favorite horror host of all time. One episode that I have been looking for is the one where he hosted the 1973 Hammer Horror film “Frankenstein And The Monster From Hell.” This was the only episode that for the first few times he showed it, my Mom would not allow us to watch cause it had the word “hell” in it! So if you have a copy of this episode or any episode of the Commander, please get in contact with me because I would love to get a copy!

So on this update I am going to take a look at some of the episodes I own of Commander USA, and I am going to tell you what the film is and what he does in each of these episodes. So be ready to go back to the past when the USA Network was the top cable station to me and my brother.

Before I get into these episodes I should explain a few things, like first what is a Groovie Movie? After growing up watching this show, I can give you a run down: it’s the following type of films, classic horror, cheesy horror, Mexican horror, fantasy, low budget action, slashers, goofy comedy, low budget horror, sci-fi and kung fu films. Now on each episode that I review, I will break down the host segments as well as give a brief write up for each film he is hosting. The film write ups I will get off IMDB, and the hosts ones I will write myself. I will also give the names of two actors in the film as well as its rating and year of release. I will not be doing my comic 1-4 star ratings for these episodes because I have such a soft spot for all these episodes that the ratings would all be high! I will also review them in alphabetical order to make it easier. I want to also credit Stumpy Disk for the cover design idea. But now that I gave you a little more info, let’s get ready to enter the Video Vault.

Groovie Movies: Abominable Snowman
Starring – Peter Cushing & Forrest Tucker Not Rated 1957

Host: It’s a heat wave in New Jersey, and Commander is happy to be in the Video Vault and wants to do summer activities indoors! He makes boats out of snack food and sails them in a bowl of water. He butchers “fresh” fish and plays a game of fish ball where you play bad mitten with fish heads, makes a slime zoo, opens his own cloths fashions and just enjoys the cool air in the Vault.

Movie: A kindly English botanist and a gruff American scientist lead an expedition to the Himalayas in search of the legendary Yeti.

Groovie Movies: The Alligator People
Starring – Beverly Garland & Lon Chaney Jr. Not Rated 1959

Host: It’s Halloween time, and the Video Vault is set up for the first ever Groovie Movie Halloween Party and guests include Lefty and Angela The Alligator. He also gets a visit from a zombie who brings him a voodoo doll that looks just like Commander. He helps Dorothy escape a evil witch, makes some snacks, gets a visit from a vampire and just has a blast at his party as other ghouls and goblins come to party.

Movie: A newlywed couple sit in a train. The husband receives a frantic telegram. He gets off at a station to make a phone call, the train pulls away without him on it, and that’s the last his wife sees of him. Years later after a long search she finally tracks him down on his family’s southern estate where she discovers that a failed medical treatment has turned him into an alligator mutant.

Groovie Movies: An American Werewolf In London
Starring – David Naughton & Jenny Agutter Rated R 1981

Host: It’s New Years Eve, and Commander USA is going to have a pub party in The Video Vault and has some guest to help that come all the way from England in honor of the days film. In the end of course, he spends the party just with the help as no one else comes, but he has a blast with his new friends.

Movie: Two American college students are on a walking tour of Britain and are attacked by a werewolf. One is killed, the other is mauled. The werewolf is killed but reverts to its human form, and the local townspeople are unwilling to acknowledge its existence. The surviving student begins to have nightmares of hunting on four feet at first but then finds that his friend and other recent victims appear to him, demanding that he commit suicide to release them from their curse, being trapped between worlds because of their unnatural deaths.

Groovie Movies: Beast From 20,000 Fathoms
Starring – Lee Van Cleef & Paul Hubschmid Not Rated 1953

Host: The nights film is one of Lefty’s favorite films and for the showing Lefty makes a reptile dude ranch play set! Tourists pour in to see the ranch and Commander orders and receives his very own Dinosaur who just so happens to be way to large for the miniature ranch as Monroe opens up a souvenir shop to help out at the attraction. Commander gets a little hungry and makes his own weird ice cream thats made with cheese in a can, cake frosting, avocado and ketchup, and when that don’t work he makes yet another gross snack. The Dinosaur escapes into the mall and Commander and Lefty must travel above to stop it’s rampage.

Movie: As a result of an arctic nuclear test, a carnivorous dinosaur thaws out and starts making its way down the east coast of North America. Professor Tom Nesbitt, only witness to the beast’s existence, is not believed, even when he identifies it as a “rhedosaurus” to paleontologist Thurgood Elson. All doubts disappear, however, when Elson is swallowed whole during an oceanic bathysphere excursion to search for the creature. Soon thereafter the rhedosaurus emerges from the sea and lays waste to Manhattan Island until Nesbitt comes up with a plan to try to stop the seemingly indestructible beast.

Groovie Movies: Beginning Of The End
Starring – Peter Graves & Peggie Castle Not Rated 1957

Host: Some one has entered the Video Vault has has stolen Commander USA’s Headcheese Tarts, and now Commander and Lefty break out a Sherlock Holmes dress up kit and are on the case to find his missing snacks. His prime suspect is Rose Rosewood whom has teamed with one of his rouges gallery before, but is she the snack thief and will ge get his tarts back in time to enter the malls headcheese bake off?

Movie: Audrey Ames, an enterprising journalist, tries to get the scoop on giant grasshoppers accidentally created at the Illinois State experimental farm. She endeavors to save Chicago, despite a military cover-up.

Groovie Movies: The Blade Master
Starring – Miles O’Keeffe & Lisa Foster Rated PG 1984

Host: Commander USA brings his two prehistoric friends Fred and Wilma Fieldstone to the Video Vault to watch the days film. During this time Fred and Wilma dance around, eat a meal made of hearts, give buckets of blood to the blood drive and Wilma tries to help Commander sale a book based on the wise words given by one of the films characters. Commander also gets his mail delivered by a Wizard who he thinks looks like the wizard from the movie!

Movie: In this sequel, the Fighting Eagle returns. This time he must save a former mentor from the evil Zor. Ator battles cavemen, invisible swordsmen, and barbarians with his new sidekick Thong to finally have the ultimate showdown with Zor.

Groovie Movies: The Blood Beast Terror
Starring – Peter Cushing & Robert Flemyng Rated G 1968

Host: In this episode Commander USA tells of a monster concert in Japan and the crazy shopping sales going on in the mall above as he is joined by a strange man who is a entomologist (studies bugs) who is trying to capture a very large butterfly, the man is annoying and keeps walking around with his net and being an over all pain and even with the help of Lefty he seems to not be able to run this unwanted guest off. The Commander is also visited by weird bug girls who flap around the video vault and once the entomologist uses his net on one of them, he pushes the Commander to far who frees the bug girl and drops a net on the entomologist!

Movie: A scientist, working with genetics, creates a creature that is capable of transforming back and forth between a giant Death Head moth and a beautiful woman. The creature masquerades as his daughter when she is in her human incarnation and feeds on the blood of her victims when she is in the moth form.

Groovie Movies: Blood Song
Starring – Frankie Avalon & Donna Wilkes Not Rated 1982

Host: Commander USA is gearing up for St. Patricks Day and is making all kinds of green colored food from roast beef to mashed potatoes as well as costumes like the Map of Ireland hockey mask. Commander also changes up his look with a green mask and shamrock suspenders in honor of the holiday. He also cleans up around the Video Vault and Monroe is also dressed up all in green gearing up for the Holiday. Commander shows us a Irish Game called Potato Toss where he throws a potato into the air and shoots it with a machine gun as well gives us silly none true facts about Saint Patrick!

Movie: A psychopath escapes from a mental institution and starts a murder spree, which ends in the pursuing of a young handicapped girl, who once got a blood transfusion from him.

Groovie Movies: The Brood
Starring – Oliver Reed & Samantha Eggar Rated R 1979

Host: Commander USA in honor the the movie brings a crazy psychiatrist to the Video Vault named Fraud who comes complete with a straight jacket. The man is a quack and gets a crush on Monroe and speaks gibberish to Commander who seems to be in on the joke that this man is nuts. And in the end the Nut House comes looking for him.

Movie:A man tries to uncover an unconventional psychologist’s therapy techniques on his institutionalized wife, while a series of brutal attacks committed by a brood of mutant children coincides with the husband’s investigation.

Groovie Movies: C.H.U.D.
Starring – John Heard & Daniel Stern Rated R 1984

Host: Monroe has won the lottery, and Lefty is writing a bunch of short stories with Commander helping with the proof reading and typing of the stories. Lefty then decides to become an investigative reporter!

Movie: A rash of bizarre murders in New York City seems to point to a group of grotesquely deformed vagrants living in the sewers. A courageous policeman, a photo journalist and his girlfriend, and a nutty bum, who seems to know a lot about the creatures, band together to try and determine what the creatures are and how to stop them.

Groovie Movies: Death Of Bruce Lee
Starring – Ron Van Clief & Phillip Ko Rated R 1975

Host: Ralph Headwards shows up to the Video Vault and is doing a “This Is Your Life” for Commander USA! But the big issue is that the Commander does know some of the people from his “past” or they are stand ins for people he knows and some he just doesn’t want to remember!

Movie: Three rival gangs embark on a search for Bruce Lee’s handwritten “finger gifting” manual.

Groovie Movies: Deathquake
Starring – Hiroshi Katsuno & Eiji Okada Not Rated 1980

Host: The Commander is pretty excited to be showing Deathquake and due to all the fright and sub plots of the film, he invites a woman named Sheare Fryte who is an expert in these things and wrote a book called The Fryte Report. However while he was thinking she was a sweet woman, he soon finds out the she is a very mean diva who hates men!

Movie: Seismologist Hoichi loses touch with his family when he predicts that there will be an earthquake in Tokyo of greater magnitude than the one in 1923, which his father predicted. Because of this, he starts seeing another woman, who already has a boyfriend. Hoichi’s wife wants to meet her before she will grant a divorce. Eventually, the earthquake he predicted does come, which changes all relationships and exemplifies the character of the Japanese.

Groovie Movies: Def-Con 4
Starring – John Walsch & Lenore Zann Rated R 1985

Host: In honor of the day’s film and its scenes of space, Commander USA signs up to go to Space Camp that also acts as a Trailer Park! The camp sends a spaced out female councilor to help him get ready by the name of Astral Plane. Can she help prepare Commander and will Space Camp even happen after a meteor shower?

Movie: Two men and a woman circle the globe in a satellite armed with a nuclear device. The third world war breaks out, and a few months later the satellite crashes. They survive the crash but one man gets killed by survivors and the other man gets caught. The woman stays by the remains of the the satellite but is soon caught by evil punks who have taken power.

Groovie Movies: The Devil’s Nightmare
Starring – Erika Blanc & Daniel Emilfork Rated R 1971

Host: Commander USA decides that in this episode he is going to analyze dreams and nightmares and spends time watching the movie along with you, giving his thoughts during his breaks.

Movie: Six of seven tourists in a east European castle overnight are victims of a helper of the devil. Is Satan willing to spare their souls?

Groovie Movies: Duel Of Ultimate Weapons
Starring – So-Jeon Yu & Hwang Jang Lee Not Rated 1983

Host: Commander USA hangs around the Video Vault with his friend Debbie who is dressed as if she is from Japan, and together they watch the movie and eat and make a lot of snacks!

Movie: The evil Dong Won has unbeatable kicking legs and proudly travels the land proving his expertise. But when a young man loses his foster parent to Won’s deadly kick, he seeks out an old drunken master to learn a way to defeat the Master of the Leg.

Groovie Movies: The Final Terror
Starring – Daryl Hannah & Adrian Zmed Rated R 1983

Host: As part of a super hero group he has joined, Commander USA is allowing one lucky camper to spend the day camping inside inside the Video Vault! That lucky camper is a rich fun loving woman named Pearl who seems to be hyped to be camping in the Video Vault.

Movie: A group of forest rangers go camping in the woods, and trespass into an area where a backwoods mama likes to kill people who come onto her turf.

Groovie Movies: Friday The 13^th Part 2
Starring – Amy Steel & John Furey Rated R 1981

Host: In the Video Vault, Commander USA gives some camp safety tips like the buddy system and plans a trip to Washington D.C.! He also practices his acting skills that has him dancing with a fake bird and gives a silly daily joke.

Movie: After killing Mrs. Voorhees, who was avenging her son Jason’s death, Alice Hardy can finally sigh with relief. But there is just one problem; Jason never drowned at Camp Crystal Lake and lived in the nearby woods as a hermit all this time. The day that Alice beheaded his mother, Jason saw everything, and his heart filled with thirst for revenge. Two months later, Alice gets stabbed by an ice pick in the temple and disappears. Is Jason behind this? Five years later, a camp next do to Camp Crystal Lake is built and the counselors start snooping around the old, abandoned camp ruins. This makes Jason very upset, since his shack is next to the remains of Camp Crystal Lake and what is inside the shack shall be kept secret forever, even if it means killing nine people!

Groovie Movies: Friday The 13^th Part 3
Starring – Tracie Savage & Dana Kimmell Rated R 1982

Host: Commander USA is hyped to be showing Friday The 13^th Part 3 and shows the viewers his new barber chair as well as the Merry Go-Around Wall and even does a recap of parts 1 and 2. This is an epic showing for him as Friday The 13^th Part 3 was new to cable and aired only once before on USA Saturday Nightmares. The Commander has thrown out his back and is waiting for his friend who can fix it by having him lay on a bed of snails, and Commander just sits around the Video Vault reading mail and eating a snack and gets a visit from vampire Count Phantom.

Movie: Jason Voorhees, having barely survived a wound to his shoulder from his own machete, is back to revenge on all that visit “his” woods. A new group of friends come over to party at an area close to the campsite. This time, Jason will be stronger than ever, and gets a hockey mask from one of those friends.

Groovie Movies: Gamera vs. Barugon
Starring – Kojiro Hongo & Yuka Konno Not Rated 1966

Host: Commander USA comes face to face with his second planet doppelganger, The Evil Commander, who does bad things and they decide to watch, the film together. The two fight over the film with Commander being on the side of Gamera and the film and Evil Commander just trashing it all and more siding with Barugon. In the end Commander USA uses a spray and rids himself of the Evil Doppelganger.

Movie: After a treacherous expedition to retrieve a giant opal, disaster strikes as the opal reveals itself to be an egg which spawns Barugon, demon dog from Hell! Armed with a deadly tongue and cold beams, Barugon wreaks havoc on Japan. Gamera comes to save the day.

Groovie Movies: The Hand
Starring – Michael Cain & Charles Fleische Rated R 1981

Host: Lefty feels like Commander USA is holding him back from movies and we learn that Lefty went to school with Michael Cain’s hand who is the star of this movie. So to make him feel better, Commander lets Lefty show his talents. From stunts to music he does it all to catch an eye of a movie producer so that he can go work in Hollywood.

Movie: Jon Lansdale is a comic book artist who loses his right hand in a car accident. The hand was not found at the scene of the accident, but it soon returns by itself to follow Jon around, and murder those who anger him.

Groovie Movies: The Hearse
Starring – Trish Van Devere & Joseph Cotten Rated PG 1980

Host: Commander USA has built a casket box car for the annual Dirt Box Derby and has asked for the help of a lazy mechanic named Backwrench to make sure it looks good and is built to win. In between naps, Backwrench places all types of stuff the Commander doesn’t need on the coffin car and in the end his high bill might just keep the Commander from entering the race.

Movie: Jane Hardy decides to stay the summer in the house her aunt left her when she died, to try and recoup from a bad divorce. Little does she know, her aunt practiced witchcraft and is still thought of very badly by the town’s citizens. As soon as she moves in, she is haunted by a old black hearse and it’s creepy driver. Is she going insane or is she truly being menaced? She meets a friendly young man and becomes involved with him, but is he and the creepy driver one and the same?

Groovie Movies: Hercules II
Starring – Lou Ferrigno & Milly Carlucci Rated PG 1985

Host: Commander USA is at Mel’s Mount Olympus Diner for this episode in honor of the day’s film. The worker Feta is a goofy joke telling girl and takes a break to watch the Groovie Movie along side the Commander. The diner sits on top of the mountain, and the clouds are all around as The Commander gets some of the worse service from the greek workers, but he still is having a blast! And then at some point during the episode Commander is working at the diner and helping out. In the end the diner is closed down by the Health Inspector.

Movie: Hercules searches for the Seven Thunderbolts of Zeus, which have been stolen by renegade gods.

Groovie Movies: The Hills Have Eyes 2
Starring – Michael Berryman & John Bloom Rated R 1984

Host: Commander USA has won a collage degree from Publishers Clearing House but must pass a test given to him by some very bored board of education members. Can Commander’s super quick wit and charm get him his degree? Of course it can, but the important question is what is he going to do with it when he gets it?

Movie: A group of bikers, which includes some of the survivors from the original film, embark on a journey by bus to a biker race near the desert of the infamous incidents. However, because of a mistake they are late and decide to take a shortcut through the desert. Halfway through the desert the bus breaks down. While trying to repair the bus, some of the group wander off, and wind up in the traps of the survivors of the mutant family of the first. Then the mutants go after the rest.

Groovie Movies: Horror Of The Werewolf
Starring – Paul Naschy & Mercedes Molina Rated R 1975

Host: When entering the Video Vault, Commander USA gets a “pentagram” message that asks if he would watch over his friend Lon’s pet named Chuck, but when the pet arrives he finds out that Chuck isn’t a dog or cat but a werewolf who is as rude as rude can be. Commander puts up with his friends rude guest for as long as the day’s movie and just as he is about to send word that Lon needs to pick up his annoying pet, Chuck turns back into human and is a pretty woman who ends up getting dinner with the Commander!

Movie: Waldemar, the renowned adventurer, joins an expedition to find the Yeti in the Himalayas. While hiking the mountains, he’s captured by two cannibalistic demon nymphets guarding a remote Buddhist temple and becomes their sex-slave. They transform him into a werewolf setting him loose to roam the mountain where he encounters a sadistic bandit.

Groovie Movies: Horror Of The Zombies
Starring – Maria Perschy & Jack Taylor Rated R 1974

Host: Commander USA decides to have a zombie super model named Savannah Bright visit the Video Vault in the spirit of the day’s film, and she is able to give him modeling tips and show that zombies aren’t very bright!

Movie: The model Noemi questions her employer Lillian about her roommate Kathy that is missing after receiving a call from Lillian, and she tells that she will go to the police. Lilian explains that Kathy is in an afloat boat in the Atlantic with another model participating of a publicity stunt, and she brings Noemi to meet Howard Tucker and his henchman Sergio that have idealized the advertising campaign. Kathy uses the radio to report that a ghost galleon without crew has arrived and Tucker sends a helicopter to bring the models back; however the pilot does not find them at the location. Tucker contacts Professor Grüber that studies the Sixteen Century galleon and they use a boat to reach the ghost vessel with Sergio, Lillian and Noemi. Soon Professor Gruber learns that the damned galleon is stranded in another dimension and the crew is composed of excommunicated Templar zombies. Now they try to leave the galleon and return to their own dimension. Will they succeed in their intent?

Note from Matt: This film that is also known as “The Ghost Galleon” and is the third film in the Blind Dead series. When shown on Groovie Movies it goes under the title “Ship of Zombies”.

Groovie Movies: I Married A Monster From Outer Space
Starring – Tom Tryon & Gloria Talbott Not Rated 1958

Host: A wedding consultant named Sally McBride shows up to the Video Vault and thinks that Commander USA is getting married because of the day’s Groovie Movie! Sally, like most of his guests tries to sell the viewers her books she wrote, and Commander makes some gross snack and has some random guests pop in! Sally then starts doing home improvements around the Vault and while she is annoying, the Commander lets her go crazy with repairs!

Movie: Aliens from outer space are slowly switching places with real humans — one of the first being a young man about to get married. Slowly, his new wife realizes something is wrong, and her suspicions are confirmed when her husband’s odd behavior begins to show up in other townspeople.

Groovie Movies: I Walked With A Zombie
Starring – James Ellison & Frances Dee Not Rated 1943

Host: Monroe turns the Video Vault into a video watching night club, and as the guests pour in they are treated to the film of the day as well as other entertainment like a singing mermaid and a terrible stand up comic. The club is a hit, and all have fun in the Video Vault making Monroe’s idea a great one.

Movie: A young Canadian nurse named Betsy comes to the West Indies to care for Jessica, the wife of a plantation manager named Paul. Jessica seems to be suffering from a kind of mental paralysis as a result of fever. When she falls in love with Paul, Betsy determines to cure Jessica even if she needs to use a voodoo ceremony, to give Paul what she thinks he wants.

Groovie Movies: Infra-Man
Starring – Danny Lee & Terry Liu Rated PG 1975

Host: Commander USA has just gotten back from a Super Hero Convention and has gotten himself a SHERA Machine (Sanitary Household Experimental Robot Assistant) to help him do all types of stuff including make more great headcheese snacks! The Video Vault also gets attacked by a Couch Potato who blows himself up turning into potato chips, and Lefty gets a girlfriend who only has one eye. In the end Commander puts $10.00 into the SHERA Machine, and poof! a woman appears who doesn’t wanna go on a date with him.

Movie: The ten million year-old Princess Dragon Mom attempts to conquer the earth with her legion of mutant monsters. In response, Professor Chang creates Infra-man, turning a young volunteer into a bionic superhero to save the world. However, the Princess kidnaps Chang’s daughter. Can Infra-man save her and the planet before it’s too late?

Groovie Movies: It’s Alive
Starring – John P. Ryan & Sharon Farrell Rated PG 1974

Host: Commander USA gets a good idea after walking through the mall. It’s inspired by the day’s movie as he turns the Video Vault into “It’s Alive Nursery” where busy Mall shoppers can drop of their kids and have Commander USA watch them as they continue to shop. He gets a client who drops off her two monster kids who during the movie eat the Milk Man and rip the arm off of a baby expert! In the end, he must wait for his payment of $14.95 via check.

Movie: Heavily pregnant Lenore Davis tells her husband, Frank, that she is in labor. They leave their eleven year-old son Chris with their friend Charley and they head to the Community Hospital. Lenore feels that something is wrong and delivers a monster that kills the team in the delivery room and escapes through a skylight. Lieutenant Perkins comes to the hospital to investigate the murder and the press divulges the identity of the parents. Frank discovers a dark secret about Lenore and the baby.

Groovie Movies: Jaws Of Satan
Starring – Fritz Weaver & Christina Applegate Rated R 1981

Host: Commander USA and Lefty get a make-your-own-radio-drama kit and decide to break into broadcasting and make their own old time radio show. Lefty writes a western drama called “Pa and Son” that is just plain bad, but Commander and him keep trying with many of attempts to make the show good.

Movie: A preacher whose ancestors were cursed by Druids battles Satan, who has taken the form of a huge snake.

Groovie Movies: Kingdom Of The Spiders
Starring – William Shatner & Tiffany Bolling Rated PG 1977

Host: Commander USA’s plant has a fungus so he calls on Dr. Root for help, and decides to have her stay in the Video Vault and watch the film of the day. Dr. Root gives plant advice as well as tries to sell the viewers things that she made like books and even a board game, making her whole appearance nothing more than a way for her to sell her goods at the Commander’s expense.

Movie: Investigating the mysterious deaths of a number of farm animals, vet Rack Hansen discovers that his town lies in the path of hoards of migrating tarantulas. Before he can take action, the streets are overrun by killer spiders, trapping a small group of towns folk in a remote hotel.

Groovie Movies: Land Of The Minotaur
Starring – Donald Pleasence & Peter Cushing Rated PG 1976

Host: Outside the Video Vault is a raging blizzard, and Commander USA decides to turn the Video Vault into an inn for shoppers who are stuck in the mall and gets the help of Tiffany, a crazy woman who has worked for many inns in the past! He also hires a dim witted handy man, George, and finds that during this time of extreme snow people just don’t wanna stay in The Video Vault!

Movie: A satanic cult that worships a stone Minotaur kidnaps 3 young people and Priest Father Corofax and Milo Kaye must save them from the hands of this evil!

Groovie Movies: Mako The Jaws Of Death
Starring – Richard Jaeckel & Jennifer Bishop Rated PG 1976

Host: Commander USA is having a tribute to Richard Jaeckel the star of the day’s film. He even sets up a camera in the mall and has shoppers give their opinions of Jaeckel and his work. He also has Dr. Moist Brothers come in, and she talks about Jaeckel and the relationship with fish, and of course tries to promote her new book on the subject. Everything in the episode is in honor of Jaeckel!

Movie: A man accidentally learns that he has a mystical connection with sharks, and is given a strange medallion by a shaman. Becoming more and more alienated from normal society, he develops an ability to communicate with sharks telepathically, setting out to destroy anybody who harms sharks. People enter into his strange world to exploit his weird passion, and he uses the animals to gain revenge on anybody who double crosses him.

Groovie Movies: Mausoleum
Starring – Bobbie Bresee & Marjoe Gortner Rated R 1983

Host: A worker at the mall’s morgue comes down and asks to store some dead bodies at the Video Vault, and the Commander allows it. Some of the morgue workers and other odd balls come down to work on the bodies or try and sell something as Commander is creeped out by the day’s movie. But once the bodies begin to stink, it’s time for Commander to want them out of the Vault.

Movie: Traumatized by her mother’s death, young Susan is becoming possessed by the same demon that possessed her mother before she died. More and more her husband and psychiatrist are noticing the strange changes.

Groovie Movies: Motel Hell
Starring – Rory Calhoun & Paul Linke Rated R 1980

Host: The Video Vault is now being used as a set for a Hollywood film called “Attack of the 50 Foot Cheesecake Girl,” and Commander USA will be the star and Mr. Grill is the director! During the movie Commander is reading his lines and meeting the crew, and he gets a shock when he finds out his co-star is Elizabeth Trailer famous z-movie star! In the end, Commander finds out he is not the star of the film likes he thinks and his big kiss scene with Trailer is scrapped, making the Commander see that he should not trust Hollywood.

Movie: Farmer Vincent kidnaps unsuspecting travelers and is burying them in his garden. Unfortunately for his victims, they are not dead. He feeds his victims to prepare them for his roadside stand. His motto is: It takes all kinds of critters…to make Farmer Vincent’s fritters. The movie is gory, but is also a parody of slasher movies like Last House on the Left.

Groovie Movies: Night Of The Creeps
Starring – Jason Lively & Tom Atkins Rated R 1986

Host: Commander USA has allowed a sorority house on a tight budget to hold their prom in the Video Vault for only $14.95 for the night. Commander USA watches the film with the decorating crew and helps decorate along the way. In the end only one of the girls’ dates show up to prom, and he is just a brain in a glass bowl so Commander takes all the ladies out for an all you can eat dinner.

Movie: In 1959, an alien experiment crashes to earth and infects a fraternity member. They freeze the body, but in the modern day, two geeks pledging a fraternity accidentally thaw the corpse, which proceeds to infect the campus with parasites that transform their hosts into killer zombies.

Groovie Movies: Pandemonium
Starring – Tom Smothers & Judge Reinhold Rated PG 1982

Host: Commander USA is being visited by Leo and Cleo, a pair of paparazzi junkies who take pictures of celebrities and Lefty! The pair is also on the run from someone in the mall and use the Video Vault to hideout in.

Movie: Tom Smothers stars as the brave mountie, who along with his trusty horse and bitter deputy Paul Reubens must track down a killer who is stalking coeds at a nearby cheerleader camp.

Note from Matt: This episode is missing the opening skit.

Groovie Movies: A Polish Vampire in Burbank
Starring – Mark Pirro & Eddie Deezen Not Rated 1985

Host: Commander USA is hyped to see the day’s film because it’s his first time watching it and he wants all the viewers at home to join him on the watch. But he also gets a guest to come watch it as he finds a 13 year old vampire kid who says this film is a must see for vampires his age!

Movie: A somewhat reluctant vampire is taken out by his sexpot sister for his first “night out on the town.”

Note from Matt : The version of this episode I own is sadly a very poor put together fan reproduction that cuts out many of the Commander’s skits and replaces them with segments from other episodes that deal with contests and poems.

Groovie Movies: Princess Of The Nile
Starring – Debra Paget & Jeffrey Hunter Not Rated 1954

Host: Commander USA is getting bored with the look of The Video Vault and invites a team of decorating sisters over called the Little Designing Woman to spice up the look of the place. But the sisters can’t get along and argue the whole time and even during the free Christmas play that comes with their services. In the end, the Video Vault gets a minor change but pretty much stays the same, and Commander USA feels better about it.

Movie: Time: A.D. 1249. Shalimar, an Egyptian princess, striving to rid her country of its Bedouin conquerors, forms an alliance with Prince Haidi, son of the Caliph of Bagdad. She practices her intrigues both at the court and, disguised as a dancing girl, in the market place.

Groovie Movies: The Psycho-Tronic Man
Starring – Peter Spelson & Chris Carbis Rated PG 1979

Host: Commander USA turns the Video Vault into a place to help people with their fears and acts as a doctor to “save” them from what spooks them. He has some clients come in and tries to help them with fears of things like white paint and furniture and even gets accused by the news for taken bribes to show the day’s film from the director! In the end Commander gets a fear of other people’s fears and has to close up shop.

Movie: Just as Rocky thinks the world is proceeding along quite well, he dashes out of his barber shop in a kind of trance, as though possessed. Once outside he is driven to hunt for a victim and after he has found someone, he kills them with whatever forces are latent in his subconscious.

Groovie Movies: Swamp Of The Lost Monsters
Starring – Gaston Santos & Sara Cabrera Not Rated 1957

Host: Commander USA gets a visit from a visit from a “Cowboy” who owns a store in the mall above that offers tacos, facials and boots! Commander does a lot of other things that all have a western feel to them, and he has fun with his Cowboy friend.

Movie: A disappearing body leads a detective and his sidekick into an encounter with a gill man.

Note from Matt: This episode is missing its opening skit.

Groovie Movies: They Still Call Me Bruce
Starring – Johnny Yune & Victor Brook Rated PG 1987

Host: Commander USA invites his friend Sue who knows secrets of the oriental massage and more to come to the Video Vault and watch the day’s movie with him. Commander is trained in the art of pressure points and even Kung Fu and is really trying to learn all he can from his guests who also includes Sue’s sushi chef and student.

Movie: Bruce Won arrives in America in search of an American G.I. who saved his life in the Korean War. He meets an orphan boy and together they land themselves in a string of outrageous situations. This high-strung farce culminates when a case of mistaken identity leads a gang of thugs to think Bruce is a karate master. They arrange a nationally-televised match which pits our hero against a monstrous brute, and Bruce is beaten to a bloody pulp.

Groovie Movies: Toxic Zombies
Starring – Charles McCrann & Beverly Shapiro Rated R 1980

Host: Commander USA and Lefty are all set in the Video Vault and are ready to watch the day’s film when all through it random people show up and do random things. Even the Commander starts doing odd and random things, well more odd than usual. Over all the Commander just seems to be having fun watching the day’s zombie movie.

Movie: After drug crops are sprayed with a chemical by a passing airplane, the growers of the crop are poisoned by the chemical and turn into zombie-like mutants.

Groovie Movies: Trick Or Treats
Starring – David Carradine & Steve Railsback Rated R 1982

Host: It’s a week before Christmas, and the mall above is filled with shoppers and Commander USA decides to show a movie more suitable for Halloween and has a guest named Nurse Nancy who has showed up to tell him his new gift idea (The Home Autopsy Kit) was foul. While Nancy seems negative she is also very flirty with the Commander who as always makes some snacks and even tries to sell the viewer paper plates with Lefty and his image on them.

Movie: A baby sitter is stuck watching over a young brat on Halloween night who keeps playing vicious pranks on her. To add to her trouble the boy’s deranged father has escaped from an asylum and is planning on making a visit.

Groovie Movies: The Vampire’s Coffin
Starring – Abel Salazar & Aradna Welter Not Rated 1958

Host: Rent is going up at The Video Vault so Commander USA and Monroe decide to open up a fast food restaurant mixed with a sock emporium to help pay the rent. Commander even hires a young woman named Wendy to help wait on the customers. Commander becomes the place’s chef and makes all kinds of gross dishes for his customers. Of course by the end of the show the restaurant goes belly up and Commander has bankrupt yet another one of his odd business ideas.

Movie: Graverobbers stumble upon the tomb of a vampire, who turns them into zombies to do his bidding, which is to stalk and capture beautiful women.

Groovie Movies: The Witchmaker
Starring – Anthony Eisley & Thordis Brandt Not Rated 1969

Host: Commander USA has built his own Frankenstein Monster named FrankenSchtick and it’s a terrible stand up comic! At one point Commander summons the spirit of Jesse James with a can of tomato juice and spends a lot of the episode hearing the terrible comedy of his created monster and talking about the film they are watching.

Movie: A psychic researcher and his assistants investigate a series of murders of beautiful young women.

And with that this marks all the single feature episodes I own, and be warned at some point we will get into the double features!!

As you can see I have been collecting and trying to get as many old Commander USA episodes as I can get. It’s been great reliving those days of watching Commander on my TV screen though nothing can take away those Saturday afternoons of eating lunch or some sort of junk food and spending two hours (four when he showed the double features) hanging out with my brother and watching Commander USA during his time of broadcast. I can remember the excitement of waiting for him to come on, and Groovie Movies became the true highlight of my weekends. Commander USA’s Groovie Movies was the first place I saw horror films like Friday The 13^th 1-3, Final Terror and Motel Hell. It’s the place where I became a super fan of films like Frankenstein And The Monster From Hell and Horror of the Zombies. Plus Commander USA is one of the main people that made me the creative person I am today, and for that I want to truly say THANK YOU. If not for the Commander, I would have not seen half the horror films I saw at a young age because of where I lived, and seeing these films on his show as well as USA Saturday Nightmares and Super Scary Saturday helped spark the interest in wanting to make my own shot on video horror films. One regret I have is never writing to the Commander and becoming a member of his fan club. In fact I am not really sure why my brother or I never did do this. I should also take this time to thank some people that over the years have helped me on my quest of collecting and re-living the Groovie Movies experience: Bryan Brassfield, Stumpy Disks and my pal Darren Young.

In 2013 at Horrorhound Weekend in Cincinnati, Ohio Commander USA got one of the highest honors a host can receive as he was inducted as one of the thirteen hosts of that year into the Horror Host Hall Of Fame. When I heard that he was going in, I asked if Baron Von Porkchop, the host I direct could induct him as I would feel that it would be the highest honor I could give back to him for being such a major influence in my life, but it was not to be as New Jersey Horror Host and all around great guy Halloween Jack was asked to do so. While I would have loved to have had the Baron do it, Jack was a great pick and did the speech with lots of class and respect. Baron Von Porkchop did get to induct Florida’s own Shock Armstrong, the 1964 host of Shock Theatre, and that as well was an honor as he meant a lot to many kids of the 60’s and was a great host who looked like Frankenstein’s Monster in a football jersey.

Commander USA was the logical pick for me when doing the first Horror Host Icon update as he was the host that was the first to mean something to me as does the next host on my list, but you all will have to wait and see who it is! This update is in honor of Jim Hendricks, the man who played Commander USA, and it’s also for all the fans of Groovie Movies who were glued to their TV’s and watched a spooky cheesy film and laughed alongside the Commander and his sidekicks. I have had a lot of fun doing this update, and while I could say a lot more, I think this will do for now as I can not express in words the wonderful impact this host and his show have had on my life. If and when I get more episodes at some point, I would love to do an update blog and tell you a little more about the episodes I own…but that will be a while aways because we have lots of comics to read and other hosts to celebrate! Our next update takes us from a Commander to a Capn’ as we take a look at a free comic give away from Quaker Oats that allows us to set sail with the one and only Capn’ Crunch! So till next time, support and watch you local horror host and make sure to read a comic or two!

Thundercats Are Ho..Ho..Ho!!!

Posted on January 11, 2014 by bloodlinematt

Rotten…Rotten….Rotten Ink Ho! Yeah, I know that one was lame but welcome back to my little flashback place on the web, and with it being Christmas Eve, I decided to take a look at one of the heavy hitters that Star Comics has to offer, something that I watched the cartoon of and even collected the figures when they came out. Of course I am talking about Thundercats! The cartoon hit airwaves back in 1985 and was a solid hit with the youth at the time. The animation was done better than Masters of The Universe and had a Japanese flair to it that made us believe we were watching something more than a cartoon. I was about six years old when the cartoon was out and was in first grade and can remember kids talking about the cartoon and how epic it was on the playground at Beavertown Elementary. This led to every boy I knew wanting to collect the action figures that were being made by LJN. I even remember one kid saying that Thundercats was better than Masters Of The Universe and many of the kids agreeing with him. I for one was on He-Man’s side, but I could not doubt the power and impact this cartoon was having on all our young minds. The odd thing though is when I moved to Waynesville in the 1^st grade, I only remember a handful of kids being totally into the cartoon and toys, and they had other top toys to worry about. The cartoon, as I said, aired in 1985 and had a total of 130 episodes and ran for 4 seasons ending in 1989. I can remember being so hyped to watch the first episode of Thundercats and after seeing it, I was not let down. It was adventure and fantasy wrapped into a nice package and had elements of Masters of The Universe, Voltron and The Beastmaster, and this made it a must see toon for me. I stuck with watching Thundercats till the end but will admit that midway through season 3 my watching habits had changed, my interest in them lessened and I watched it sporadically at best. My favorite characters in the cartoon were Lion-O, Mum-Ra, Jackalman and Monkian. For some reason when I was younger I always liked the bad guys more, like in He-Man I liked Skeletor, Star Wars was Dark Vader and in G.I. Joe I liked Cobra Commander! The cartoon has been released on VHS and DVD and for those looking to capture the magic of watching again or want to share with their children, you have the chance to thanks to Warner Brothers. Well I guess it would be smart of me to tell you readers what the plot of Thundercats is about now wouldn’t it? It’s about a race of feline humanoids who have to flee their planet of Thundera and find a new place to live. They are attacked by their enemies, the Mutants of the planet Plun-Darr, and one ship is left that holds the Sword of Omens that houses the Eye of Thundera, the source of the race’s power. They crash on Third Earth and Lion-O who was a boy at the time of his escape from his doomed planet has now has a grown up body but still the mind of a young child! Mumm-Ra is an evil powerful wizard who wants the Eye of Thundera for himselfm and this begins the long battle of The Thundercats! I could explain a whole lot more, but if I did we would be here a long time.

The first episode of the cartoon also helped spark the playground talk of Cheetara being the sexiest cartoon character, and that’s because in this episode she is shown nude!! Cheetara has her boobs out, and while she had no nipples, we kids thought we were seeing something naughty. I can remember one of my friends drawing pictures of her and always talking about how much hotter she was than other cartoon girls. Isn’t it great that when I was younger in the 80’s, we spent time talking about who was hotter in cartoons and comics instead of truly looking at real life girls…but the interest in girls was close at hand for many of us. Nowadays the naked female cartoon character would not pass the censors who would be in an uproar way before it hit the airwaves, and thats why I am happy to say I grew up in the 80’s and 90’s where cartoon cat girls could be naked and we kids had the freedom to think she was hot stuff! Below is a pic of Cheetara that amazed us all!

Long before all kids wanted were ipods, tablets, cell phones and ipads, actions figures, board games and video games were on all our minds. When LJN put out the action figures for Thundercats, kids went crazy and the toy shelves of Children’s Palace, Hearts, K-Mart and Hills were left with empty spots or characters no one wanted. These toys were so popular. I was also very much taken in by the hype and the cool designs of these figures, and for my 6^th or 7^th birthday my mom and dad took me to K-Mart and said for me to pick out three Thundercat figures that I wanted. This was on a good day, and the shelves were filled with all the main figures. The only one missing was Cheetara, but this didn’t matter to me as I was not looking for any of the members of the Thundercats. I was looking for the bad guys, and I was so happy when I found Jackalman, Monkian and Slithe! I already had Mum-Ra as I was able to gain him in a trade, and this made my legion of bad guys complete. At this point Mum-Ra and his crew in my toy playing world joined the side of Skeletor and were all trying to stop He-Man! I was so happy to get these figures, and my favorite was Monkian who I would carry around the house and even bring on a long trips to visit my grandparents who lived on a farm. Later on for another birthday I got the super cool Vultureman, and he became one of my favorite figures of the time. The kids on the playground with the most cool and modern toys always seemed to be the most popular and for a short time, and these figures made me a king….well a toy king. The figures were all well done and come with weapons and some even had light up eyes like Lion-O and Mum-Ra. The Thundercats figure lasted for many lines but as all things lost steam, and they were phased off toy shelves and replaced with the next popular toy. I should note that my cousins Dino and Norman had the biggest Thundercats collection of any kids I knew and even had the Cats Lair base playset!

I can remember one Christmasm I think it was 1986, that it was a very Thundercats and Masters of The Universe Brassfield Family Christmas. Back in the 80’s and most of the 90’s, we would always have Christmas Eve at my Brassfield Grandparents’ house, and all the cousins would gather in the living room that held the tree as well as a fireplace that would be cranking out super hot heat. Well this year I can remember that my aunts and uncles got me and my brother some really sweet action figures! I can remember that on this Eve I got a Lion-O figure as well as Mantenna from Masters of The Universe. I can remember my cousion Nathan getting Beastman, Norman getting Battlecat, Dino getting a walking robot with a dinosaur head and my brother getting Panthro from the Thundercats….those were the days when the family would all be together and all us young Brassfield kids would spend the night playing with toys and having a blast. Below is a picture of that Christmas Eve of 1986 and all of us having a blast. Yeah, that’s me with my Lion-O.

In 1985 Burger King also had kid meals that came with Thundercat prizes like plastic cups featuring your favorite character, a light switch sticker cover, a ring and even a Snarf pencil topper! Of course when the news broke of Thundercats at Burger King, my brother and I had to go and my Mom and Dad gave in a few times and we were able to get the light switch cover both times that made our Dad get mad at us when we used it on our rooms light switch. He got over it. The crown jewel of these prizes was the Snarf topper figure who kids wanted so they could use when they played with the LJN figures. We never got one from the kids meal but one day at school on the playground at Beavertown Elementary I found one and took it home. Yeah, it was the old finders keepers rule.

As I said Thundercats had a video game for the Commodore 64 made by Elite, and it played like a standard 8-Bit action side scrolling game, making one wonder why it never made it to the Nintendo Entertainment System. The game’s plot is about Mumm-Ra stealing the Eye of Thundera, the source of the Thundercats’ power and its up to Lion-O to battle through 14 levels of action to get it back. It’ a very cool and challenging game and is well worth tracking down if you like The Thundercats and retro gaming.

In 2011 Thundercats was brought back to the airwaves in a new series thanks to Warner Brothers and Cartoon Network, the series only lasted one season but for a total of 26 episodes. The style and look was changed and was not the same. I only seen some brief moments of this series and lost interest quickly. I would rather have just popped in the classic series than watch this new one. Sometimes you just don’t need to remake things because while it could be good, it’s also just not the same. Below is the new looks for the new Thundercats.

Before we dive into Star Comics 24 issue run based on the classic Thundercats, we should take a drink of eggnog or whatever other holiday drink you like, and take a look at some cosplay girls dressed as Cheetara. If your a kid of the 80’s you know this is kind of hot in a weird way. My favorite is the woman in the middle but sit back and enjoy.

When Star Comics was going strong in 1985, they were looking for kid popular IPs and were nabbing up such things as Star Wars: Droids, Care Bears, Fraggle Rock and of course Thundercats! Star kept the series going until 1988 for a total of 24 issues, and it was one of the longest running series for them next to Heathcliff and Muppet Babies. Growing up I watched the cartoon, collected the toys and even read a few of these comics so with that on this very cold night, I am going to sit back with a blanket and some hot chocolate and I am going to travel to Third Earth and review these comics. Oh yes Santa Claus wanted me to remind all you readers that I grade these on a standard 1-4 star rating and am looking at how well the comic keeps to the source material, its entertainment value, its art and story. So with that while not a creature is stirring besides a Streets J. Cat (my cat I rescued from the streets of Dayton), I am ready to read Thundercats!

Thundercats # 1 ****
Released in 1985 Cover Price .65 Star Comics #1 of 24

The Planet of Thundera is doomed and from space Jaga, along with fellow passengers Panthro, Cheetara, Tygra, Snarf, WilyKat, WilyKit and Lion-O, watch as their beloved planet explodes and is no more. Jaga takes the young Lion-O to an important part of the ship and shows him The Eye of Thundara, a stone that holds the power of their planet, as well as the Sword of Omen, a powerful sword that will house the eye and become the most powerful weapon in the world. While they all wait and learn of the things to come, they are attacked by Mutants lead by Slithe who wants The Eye of Thundara, and all their fellow ships are shot down leaving them the last survivors of their race. As the Mutants enter the ship, the Thundercats spring into action, and young Lion-O swinging the Sword of Omen scares them off. The ship is damaged and the nearest planet they can land on is light years away so Jaga places them all into sleep pods and mans the ship and for this he dies in time for his friends to make it safely to their new home. As the ship crash-lands, the remaining Thundercats wake up from their sleep pods and Lion-O who went in as a young boy now has a grown up body yet still the mind of a young man! The Mutants followed them to the planet and after a quick fight they find an old castle crypt and make a pack with the evil old wizard inside named Mumm-Ra.

This is a perfect first issue based on a cartoon/toy line and is nothing more than a condensed version of the first episode of the cartoon. This issue is the origin story of the Thundercats and follows them from the death of their home planet to their landing on Third Earth. It also explains The Eye of Thundara and the importance of Lion-O who is to become the leader of what’s left of their race. It’s also great to see Lion-O as a young adult at the start and by the end of the issue, while still young in the mind, his body grows and he comes the hero we all know him to be. Jaga is the wise one who knows the history of their doomed planet and is the Obi Wan Kenobi to Lion-O’s Luke Skywalker as he can speak to him in spirit forum. The rest of the Thundercats in this issue are played up as more background characters. and you know that they will be more major players as the series goes on. This issue’s main bad guy is Slithe who leads the Reptilians as well as makes an alliance with Jackalman (leader of the Jackalmen) and Monkian (leader of the Simians) in order to steal the Eye of Thundera. He is a strict leader who means business and will kill to get what he wants. Mumm-Ra in his old wizard look makes a brief cameo in the end to make an alliance with Slithe in order to rid the planet of the Thundercats. Now let’s get to Snarf who is the small cat like babysitter of Lion-O who whines and complains a lot and is that annoying sidekick character that plagued the cartoons of the 80’s. While he is not terrible in this issue, the groundwork is being built that he will be very annoying in future issues. This issue is filled with action, drama and even a little comedy and this makes for one fun comic that is a great start to the series. The art is great and well done by Jim Mooney who is clearly Star Comics’ best artist of the time, and the cover is really bad ass and should have been made into a poster! So let’s see how issue 2 does as we go now to the follow up to this great A+ issue.

Thundercats # 2 ***1/2
Released in 1986 Cover Price .65 Star Comics #2 of 24

A race of robot bears named The Berbils live on Third Earth and are the allies of The Thundercats and have helped them with food as well as building a giant base called The Cats Lair. While out “practicing” with the sword of omen, Lion-O disobeys Snarf and eats a wild berry that is poisonous and leaves Lion-O with a very high fever and at death’s door! Snarf goes to the old wreckage site to find Lion-O’s old stuffed animal and is kidnapped by Slithe and the other mutants who use him as bait to lure out the rest of the Thundercats into a trap! Lion-O pushes himself forward to come to the aid of his friends and by doing so helps break his fever and not only saves himself but his friends.

This second issue packs just as much of a punch as issue one and is filled with action, drama and a message, all the things one would want from a comic based on an 80’s cartoon. Lion-O almost dying helps add the feel of doom as the mutants are attacking his friends and you find yourself cheering for him to push himself to save them, but yet you are worried that the strain and stress could also lead to his death. Snarf comes off as a caring friend for Lion-O, and it’s clear that he is not just the young leaders guardian but also his dear friend. The Berbils are pretty cool and to make the connection to Star Wars again, they are just robot versions of the Ewoks. Mumm-Ra makes a small apperance once more and this time transformers into the warrior version of himself to punk out Slithe and company who are questioning him on his part of the alliance. I feel like the rest of the Thundercats again play background parts but yet they all seem important to the story arch. The cover is pretty well done and is very eye catching for fans of the cartoon and toys, and the artwork inside done by Jim Mooney is top notch stuff and looks like the work of an A list Marvel artist. So with a solid issue # 2 let’s see how issue # 3 holds up, shall we?

Thundercats # 3 ***
Released in 1986 Cover Price .75 Star Comics #3 of 24

Lion-O is working on the roof of the Cat’s Lair and uses the Sword of Omen to call all the Thundercats to help. When they get there and find that no danger is around and it’s just that Lion-O wanted help moving shingles, they all get mad about the misuse of the sword and leave him and Snarf to finish the job. Panthro takes the Thundertank to get more fuel for it as well as the base and comes across a human girl named Tessa who is being attacked by a horde of Rockmen who wish to do her harm. Panthro springs into action and saves her for the time being. As the two rush off in the Thundertank, it runs out of gas just as he is able to use it to trap them in a cave and away from the swords and spears of the Rockmen. While in the cave Tessa tells him that she is from a race of warrior women and that she left her home due to uncontrollable powers she got from a spell in order to save her village from a magical giant bird that was sent by Mumm-Ra and how the power has not left her so for the safety of her people she left and was attacked by the Rockmen who, while story time is going on, are trying to still get inside the cave. Lion-O with the Eye of Thundara sees that Panthro needs help and rushes to his aid, not calling upon his fellow Thundercats and in his rush is trapped in living vines! Panthro has the woman use her powers to charge the Thundertank, and they escape and her powers are depleted letting her return home. Lion-O escapes the vines and is shown by Jaga that its ok to call for help when it needed but something goes wrong the Jaga’s spirit is ripped away!

This is a showcase of Panthro, and it works well to highlight another member of the Thundercats besides Lion-O. Panthro comes off as a catman who has honor and risks his own life to save that of a woman he does not know. Plus it shows that he has a sharp mind as he is able to save them both with ideas. Tessa is a good character who when unleashing her power against the magical bird shows how powerful she was. It’s a shame she lost the power cause she could have been a major help to the Thundercats in their war against Mumm-Ra and the Mutants. Lion-O shows that he still does have the attitude of a child but is learning to be more adult like with his powers and responsibilities. The Rockmen seem like mindless brutes who want nothing more than to destroy things, and I think I see them teaming with Mumm-Ra in a later issue. The cover is pretty good but not as eye catching as the first two, but fans of Panthro I am sure love it. The art inside is once again done by Jim Mooney and is fantastic! The issue also had a ten cent price increase for those of you readers you pay attention to those details. With this issue ending with a cliffhanger of the Ghost Spirit of Jaga being ripped from the sky, I am pretty hyped to get on to issue 4 to find out why. So let’s get to it.

Thundercats # 4 ***
Released in 1986 Cover Price .75 Star Comics #4 of 24

The Thundercats are all out looking for clues to why Jaga’s spirit is missing and all are worried about the reason why. Even though Lion-O is the only one who can see him, they all still believe in his visions. They all go out to look for clues and each are captured by an unknown attacker who seems to know the ways of the Thundercats. Lion-O finds the spirit of Jaga who tells him that what had happened to him was just a change in the planets atmoshere and that he is well and with them once again, but when Lion-O leaves to tell the others the good news it’s clear this spirit is not of their friend! Upon returning to The Cats Lair, Lion-O finds that his friends are missing and goes to try and find them only to come face to face with female one time Thundercat Lynxana The Hunter who has captured his friends for the mutants and was banished from Thundara by Lion-O’s own father some years back! The two clash only for them to be on the same page when the Spirit of Jaga shows himself to really be the mighty Mumm-Ra! After Mumm-Ra leaves them the pair of Thundercats decide to team up and rescue rest in order to ride the planet of the evil grip of Mumm-Ra.

This issue is filled with drama and action as Lion-O must face the fact that his guiding spirit Jaga is missing still and he was duped into making bad decisions and worse that his actions of having his friends look for clues leads to them all being captured and in the hands of The Mutants! Lion-O is clearly the star of the issue, and he is the brave one that goes toe to toe with whatever stands in his way to help his friends. Mumm-Ra is a tricky one as he uses his powers to trick Lion-O into trusting him and even makes him second guess the Eye of Thundara who tries and warns him of the trap that awaits ahead of him. Lynxana The Hunter is one butt kicking woman who is part Kraven The Hunter (Amazing Spider-Man) and part Boba Fett (Star Wars) in the way she handles herself. Shes a very nice addition to the story line this far and helps add to the building aspect of the rescue that is about to happen in the next issue, because it makes you wonder can Lion-O trust her? Very good storyline that helps build the excitement of the next issue and this is truly this far what a kid comic based on a toy/cartoon line should be! The art is once more done by Jim Mooney and is top notch and the cover is a nice homage of The Uncanny X-Men #141 cover for Days of the Future Past. Well I for one can’t wait to see what happens in issue 5, so let’s get to it.

Thundercats # 5 ***
Released in 1986 Cover Price .75 Star Comics #5 of 24

Lynxana The Hunter has seen how evil Mumm-Ra is and makes a plan with Lion-O to rescue the rest of The Thundercats from the Mutants who plan on torturing and killing them all by Slithe orders. Lynxana takes Lion-O prisoner and marches him to the gates of the Mutant base. She knocks out our hero and takes the Sword of Omens and delivers both of them to Slithe who now feels as if the war with the Thundercats is over. Later in the night Lynxana free’s Lion-O and steals back the Sword of Omen, and together they fight off the mutants and rescue all the Thundercats! As they all escape the Mutants’ hideout, Mumm-Ra appears and blows up the Mutant base and now wants a battle with the Thundercats!

A very cool issue that builds upon whether you can trust Lynxana or not. When she knocks out Lion-O and delivers the Sword of Omen/Eye of Thundara to Slithe, you start to wonder if she can be trusted and if she has just played Lion-O like a fiddle. Of course it turns out that you can trust her and she becomes a great ally in the rescue of the Thundercats. Lion-O is growing as a hero and leader and this issue shows how brave and loyal he is to his people and his friendships. Mumm-Ra takes a back seat as the main bad guy in this issue though he is such a mean ass as he blows up his allies base and wants to show off how powerful he is to anyone who can see his actions. Slithe is one dumb leader of the Mutants as he could have ended it all by killing Lion-O and not leaving the Sword of Omen in plan sight. I guess cheesy cartoon kid show bad guys will never learn. The odds are against the Thundercats as they all band together to escape and this adds some fun action moments that have you cheering as they make their way out of danger’s way. Jim Mooney’s artwork once again is great, and the cover this time around is okay with the Lizard man Panthro is punching face being very weird looking. Well let’s see if Lynxana stays with them to help fight Mumm-Ra and how this battle will end in issue 6!

Thundercats # 6 ***
Released in 1986 Cover Price .75 Star Comics #6 of 24

The Thundercats are shocked as it looks as if Slithe and all his mutants are all dead at the hands of Mumm-Ra who had blown up their base. Lion-O figures out that the destroying of the hideout was just an illusion done by Mumm-Ra and the Mutants come out and are ready for another battle. But as the fight is taking place, the Giant Mumm-Ra shows up once more and attacks both sides declaring war with both sides who now must team up to stop the evil wizard from taken over Third Earth. Slithe and Lion-O make a treaty and join forces and head to Mumm-Ra’s pyramid and start attacking the Giant Mumm-Ra who seems unstoppable! During the attack Lion-O along with Lynxana and Cheetara use the Thunder Tank to drill into the pyramid and find that the source of Mumm-Ra’s new power lies in versions of himself from the other Earths and Jaga’s spirit that is trapped in a crystal. After a fight with some stone soldiers, Loin-O busts the crystal and undoes the spells of Mumm-Ra leaving him weak. Slithe, who is about to attack the Thundercats now that the battle is over, is scared away by harsh words from Mumm-Ra. The Thundercats are saddened when Lynxana turns down joining them for she needs to think about her life.

A team up that none of us readers saw coming, The Thundercats and The Mutants joining forces to save Third Earth from the mighty and more powerful Mumm-Ra who has gone even more mad with power. Lion-O once more plays the hero and with the help of Jaga, he brings the final blow that ends the battle and leaves Mumm-Ra weak from the battle. Slithe, while teaming with the Thundercats, did have it in his mind to turn on them once the fight is over, but when he hears that he and his band of goons are now on Mumm-Ra’s hit list, he and his men flee back to their hideout to make it stronger. Lynxana once more proves she was a great ally and sadly after they win, she leaves The Thindercats to get her head on straight and rethink her life. I like this character and hope she comes back in future issues. I love the fact that Mumm-Ra’s new power was coming from not only the captured Jaga but as well as the Mumm-Ra’s of Earth 1 and Earth 2 who he held in his tomb! Very fun issue filled with lots of battles and some cool and interesting ideas and has the Multi Universe feel to it that DC Comics is in love with. The art is done by Mooney again but this time it seems a little rushed and not as detailed as the other issues, while good it’s just not as pretty. The cover is well done and eye catching and the Giant Mumm-Ra helps add to the “epic” feel of this issue. I am 6 issues in and this series has yet to lose steam, so here is to hoping this stays that way as we head into issue 7.

Thundercats # 7 **1/2
Released in 1986 Cover Price .75 Star Comics #7 of 24

Third Earth is having a terrible storm heavy rain and red lightning is striking all around causing damage to the small village of the Berbils when Lion-O uses the Sword of Omen to knock the lightning away and causes it to hit the near by mountain. Lion-O is missing his home world and his spirits are down. He feels like he does not belong on Third Earth. But when a glowing light is seen on top of the mountain where the red lightning hit, the Thundercats go to investigate. Lion-O and Cheetara get separated after a land slide, and they find a portal that leads them to the past on back on Thundara as the rest are being attacked by Insect people lead by their queen Sectra. While Lion-O and Cheetara play the role of heroes to the primitive cave Thundercat people, the rest are in deep trouble as the insect army horde just keeps coming! In the end Lion-O and Cheetara return to Third Earth to save their friends, and Lion-O learns that home is with his friends…oh yeah and the red lightning and the insect people’s attack was all set up by Mumm-Ra!

This issue only slips a little and by no means is it a bad one. It just is very average and seems almost like a throw away issue used to fill space in the series. Lion-O is a sad sack at the start of this issue and misses his home planet, and when he gets the chance to go to the past of his home world his spirits are lifted and he even finds love in a cave girl Thundercat. But even in his happiness, he learns that home is where you’re loved and with your friends and family. Cheetara is also homesick but she also acts as the guardian of the young leader and even tries to smooth over his disruption with one of the Cave Thundercats who seems to not like the young heros fame among his people. Mumm-Ra is the pain in the butt who had set all this up from the insect people attacking to the portal to the past all in an attempt to once again rid Third Earth of Thundercats. Sectra The Queen of the Insect people and her army are the major threat of the issue, and they are very mean as at one point they want to pour lava on the Thundercats below. But while mean and a threat, they were played like fools by Mumm-Ra who used them to battle his enemies. The art this time is done by Jose Delbo, and while good, it’s no Mooney and lacks the charm of his artwork. The cover on this one is also a little cheesy yet fun. Let’s see if issue 8 can lift it back into three and four stars or drop it lower than two and a half.

Thundercats # 8 **1/2
Released in 1987 Cover Price .75 Star Comics #8 of 24

The Thundercats have built a reservoir to get fresh water to flow to the Cats Lair and decide to have a field day to enjoy themselves with sports events. But the day of fun turns into a huge argument amongst them all when WilyKat and WilyKit start fighting over tying during a race and sharing the prize. The fight leaves them all not speaking to each other, and this leads to both WilyKat and WilyKit being kidnapped by Slithe and the mutant, the reservoir being blown up and the Cats Lair being flooded and taken over by the Mutants. It takes the team work of the youngsters WilyKat and WilyKit to force the mutants out and allow the Thundercats back in.

This issue has a message that its best to work together and work out problems instead of brooding on them. WilyKat and WilyKit are the focus of the issue and their fighting and rivalry gets out of hand, but when it comes down to it they both step up to bat and help each other as well as their fellow team mates. Slithe is the main bad guy and sets up the attack on Cats Lair that actually works, once again though he and his band of mutants are out smarted and out classed. Mumm-Ra is MIA and doesn’t even have a small cameo. Over all this issue is 100% average, and there is not much to talk about for it. Art work is done by Jose Delbo and with the inks added I think it all looked a little odd and off. The cover reminds me of that issue of Amazing Spider-Man (#33) were Spider-Man was holding back water from a cracked wall…here is to hoping issue 9 is better than 8.

Thundercats # 9 ***
Released in 1987 Cover Price .75 Star Comics #9 of 24

The Thundercats are building a wall to help protect the Cat Lair, and Lion-O and Panthro have been working at it all day in the heat. Little do they know that they are being spied on by the Rockmen, and an accident leaves their Prince injured and to them Lion-O was to blame. The King of the Rockmen with a little mental push from Mumm-Ra sets up attacks on the Thundercats that leaves poor Snarf with a bad head injury, and this pushes for a full on battle between The Rockmen and The Thundercats! Snarf in a daze follows his friends into battle and meets the injured Rock Prince and the two figure out the whole fight is based on an accident and together they stop Lion-O and The Rock King from killing one another in a battle that was sure to end badly for one of them. In the end it appears as if peace has happened between the two sides and Mumm-Ra’s plan once again has failed him.

This issue gets back on track and is a pretty fun read and once more has a message packed into the pages: don’t over act on things before you get the full facts. Lion-O loses his cool in this issue and acts out of pure anger and rage and is letting vengeance cloud is judgement. Poor Snarf takes a nasty hit to his head and even with his major injury, he helps set the facts straight and stops the battle. I will say I like the fact that Snarf in the comic is not annoying and is used just right in the series and not over used. Making the Rockmen return was also cool to see showing that even these other races that live on Third Earth are not forgotten and pushed to the side like some of the other Star Comics we have read, the one that sticks out the most for doing this has to be Wally The Wizard. To sum it up this issue has drama, action and even slight humor and gets the series right back on the perfect kids comic track. So let’s not wait, let’s get to issue # 10! Oh yeah, Jose Delbo does the artwork and it looks pretty dang good as does the cover.

Thundercats # 10 ***
Released in 1987 Cover Price .75 Star Comics #10 of 24

The Thundercats are on the hunt for meat as they are all a little sick of eating Snarf’s veggie stew. The hunt is going nowhere fast, but Panthro does not want to give up and breaks off from Lion-O and the rest who are all now heading back home. Each hit a snag in their quest as Lion-O’s group runs into mutants who attack, and Panthro finds an old graveyard for an ancient race called the Si-Tare and upsets the spirit of the leader of the race named Ashtar who wants vengeance for what he thinks is disrespect from Panthro who entered their final resting place. As Lion-O and the rest escape the Mutants so does Panthro who flees from the angry spirit, and they all make it home to the Cats Lair

This issue once more is a spot light on Panthro who once more on his own stumbles into a bad situation. This time instead of Rockmen, it’s the spirit of a pissed off king. Panthro in this issue as well really knows the odds are against him and runs away from the battle with the spirit causing even more drama as the spirit takes its revenge on his fellow Thundercats hoping this will cause a final fight with its attended target. At this point in the series its starting to become clear that Panthro does not mix well with other races/monsters of Third Earth and has caused many fights, even tho for the most part he does not intend for bad things to happen nor to piss them off. Lion-O once more gets a high fever and this makes one worried for this young heroe’s brain as it’s had some major illness dished out to it. Ashtar is sinister and while bad, one gets the feel that he does what he does for honor. This is a great issue and showcases Panthro again in just a way that makes you really start to bond with the character. While the momentum is this high, let’s get onto issue 11!

Thundercats # 11 ***
Released in 1987 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #11 of 24

Small earthquakes are striking all around Cats Lair causing damage and injuries and almost leading to the drowning of WilyKit! The Thundercats figure out that it was not natures doing but that of molemen who have taken residence under that Cat Lair and this was their way of striking out at those who live above them. Lion-O leads them all underground and finds that the molemen are lead by Rix who is ordering his men to destroy the Thundercats! After a quick battle, a cave-in happens that separates Panthro, WilyKit, WalyKat and Snarf from the rest and they all find themselves prisoners, as Lion-O and the rest resurface and find that the Molemen’s past home has been taken over by an insect monster. Lion-O figures out that the molemen are blaming them for this and decides that to get things back to normal they must team with the molemen and rid the land of this insect problem. After some heated words both sides come together and kill the monster, and a new friendship is in place.

Pretty fun issue that has Lion-O using his brain over his muscles and turning a bad situation into a new friendship and a way to help a race of people get their homes back. The rest of the Thundercats are around but none of theme really get to shine tho we do find out that WilyKat is scared of the dark and not being able to see. We also get to find out that Cheetara loves her garden…yep. No Mumm-Ra or Mutants this issue, and Rix is the main “bad” guy who really is just a headstrong leader who thinks he was doing what was right for his people. Taking the Thundercats off the land and putting them underground was a nice touch as I felt that they were truly the underdogs…wait undercats in the battle and were out of their home turf leading to be that they could loose this fight. The Insect Monster was straight out of a horror movie as many tiny bugs come together to make one giant pissed off one, I love the fact at the end it’s set on fire and dies a painful and horrible death. The art work is once again done by Jose Delbo whose stuff just keeps getting better and better issue after issue and I am starting to really dig his style. The cover on this one is just ok and nothing special. Over all another solid issue and fits nicely in the series this far. Now let’s get to issue # 12 that marks the half way mark for Thundercats and let’s see if it can keep up the three star ratings. This also marks the point that the series had a price markup from .75 to $1.00.

Thundercats # 12 ***
Released in 1987 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #12 of 24

A small fishing village on Third Earth has been attacked and taken over by a band of Berserkers lead by the ax wielding Horak. One female escapes capture and asks Lion-O for help to free her people and to run these mad man from their land. Lion-O agrees to help as Cheetara is annoyed and thinks the only reason they are going to battle is cause Lion-O thinks the young lady pretty. When they get to the village, they see that the Berserkers are terrible people, but they also see that the villagers will not help themselves and with the odds against them, the Thundercats might just be over their heads on this one. Will Lion-O be able to raise the spirits of his team? Will he be able to get the villagers to also fight for their own freedom and will he be able to beat Horak in a one on one fight? Well of course he can on all these questions and along the way learns that it’s a good thing to stand up for those weaker than you.

Lion-O, once more being headstrong and not looking into facts, dives his team head first into a battle that they could have easily lost. And as always once it’s too late he looks back at his rush decision and second-guesses it. I do find the sexual tension between Lion-O and Cheetara interesting, and it’s very subtle and with Lion-O being younger, it’s less on his part and more on her’s as it’s clear she kind of has a thing for him. The villagers are odd ones as they do not lift a finger to help in the battle till the very end. It’s almost like they are too lazy to fight for their own lives. Horak is one mean mother who carries a huge ax and is ready to fight and kill at the drop of a hat. This is a guy Mumm-Ra needs to get on his side to help kill the Thundercats! It would have also been cool to see The Molemen or The Rockmen get involved in the fight as both have joined sides with the Thundercats and would have made great allies in the battle with the berserkers. Over all this is a great issue filled with action, a message and some great art by Jose Delbo, not to mention an eye catching cover! This is a solid issue and shows that this series at the half way make shows no signs of slowing down. So with that let’s get to issue 13 and see if the # will be unlucky and get the series its first one star or less!

Thundercats # 13 **
Released in 1987 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #13 of 24

Slithe has stolen a farmer’s herd of unicorns, and she rushes to the Thundercats to help get them back. The Thundercats rush to the Forest of Silence to get them back but instead they find traps set for them all and with this they become the prisoners of Mumm-Ra who had sent the mutants out to execute his plan. The only Thundercat left is Snarf who was helping some bats make nests and now has the gift to talk to the planet’s animals. When he finds out his friends have been kidnapped he goes to rescue them with the help of animals from the planet. In the end he frees them, Lion-O beats back Mumm-Ra and they all escape and return home to Cats Lair.

This issue seems like nothing more than a fill in and was very lack luster all around! The story has the Thundercats not taking Snarf serious as a fighter and in the end his skill of talking to the animals of the planet save them from doom at the hands of Mumm-Ra….so now Snarf is like Mark Singer, The Beastmaster! Not to mention now all of a sudden Mumm-Ra is afraid of his own reflection and is beat when he sees it in the Swords of Omen. Even the art of Jose Delbo is not as good in this issue making me think that 13 might be a curse for this series. I don’t know what else to say besides this issue is a major disappointment and is bland. So let’s waste no more time on it and get to issue 14 that I hope is better.

Thundercats # 14 **1/2
Released in 1987 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #14 of 24

Safari Joe, a galaxy famous hunter, has landed on Third Earth and is on the hunt for Thundercats! One by one Joe uses the Thundercats’ own fears and weaknesses against them leaving only Lion-O and Snarf left as the rest are all placed in cages waiting for their own D-Day. Safari Joe comes to the Cats Lair and tries to bag himself a Lion-O but with the help of Snarf, the two defeat Safari Joe who turns out to be a coward when the odds are against him. This leads to all the Thundercats being set free and Joe promising to stop hunting.

Another issue with a message, and this time around its about bullying and how most bullies are cowards and can’t take what they dish out. Lion-O once more uses his head and outsmarts Safari Joe and uses a simple bucket and a kick from Snarf to knock him down a peg and turn his spine into jelly. Snarf comes off again as a hero and is an up swing for the character making two issues in a row where he is a hero. Safari Joe and his robot sidekick Mule are great bad guy characters who use technology to hunt and by using his machines it also points out his preys powers and flaws making him very dangerous. Once more Mumm-Ra missed the boat and should have had him join his team of baddies trying to kill The Thundercats. The art work is pretty bad, this time done by Ernie Colon, and to me looks like sketehes and not a finished product, I am hoping they don’t let this guy take over from here because his stuff is weak. The cover is pretty good, nothing special, and sums up the issue pretty well itself. Over all no one likes bullies, and Lion-O and Snarf takes one down a peg making for a fun issue. Now let’s see what issue 15 has in store for us.

Thundercats # 15 **1/2
Released in 1987 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #15 of 24

Lion-O is once more homesick and is missing Thundara. In his downtime he gets a visit from Jaga’s spirit who tells him of a crystal that holds all of their doomed home planets history that was lost during the wreckage! Lion-O makes it a top priority for them to find this, and they all head out to find this key to the past, each go their own ways and each run into the likes of The Unicorn Farmer Girl, The Rockmen, the massive Black Widow Shark and even the Molemen! In the end Lion-O finds the crystal in the arms of some cavemen who are using its power to grow food for their village. A fight breaks out as Lion-O wants his history back but quickly gives in when he see’s that it will do more good to help feed hungry people than to live in the past. In the end all the Thundercats meet up and each feel better about the future they will all be sharing with each other.

This issue is all about looking to the future and not allowing the past to rule your life. It also touches on putting your own selfish wants and needs to the side if your wants and needs can negatively affect others around you. Lion-O once more learns that with being the leader of the Thundercats comes the weight of others’ fates by his decisions and that they are more important than silly quests. Rix, the leader of the Molemen, is now called Mole Master and has turned bad as he is bullying his own people and The Rockmen once more go in for the attack throwing out the friendships the past issues has built up between the two races and the Thundercats. Over all this is a pure go and fetch issue and is a fun average read. The artwork is done by Jose Delbo again and looks fantastic. The cover is misleading. While the Black Widow Shark is a pretty big part of the story, it also makes it look like a solo adventure for WilyKat and WilyKit that it is not. Average sadly seems to be the new norm for the series now and here is to hoping that some of these future issues capture the magic back of the past issues….wait, I must not have learned a thing from this issue, so it’s best that we move onto issue 16.

Thundercats # 16 **1/2
Released in 1987 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #16 of 24

Mumm-Ra has yet another scheme in mind to stop and kill the Thundercats and it involves the newly hatched Spidera the Queen of the spiders who is hungry for flesh. Mumm-Ra transforms himself into a tiny fairy and goes to Lion-O for help and uses his magic to hypnotize the young leader into following him into the forest and to the lair of the Spider Queen. Lucky for Lion-O ,Snarf follows and is able to wake him from his trance but not in time to stop him from being taken to Spidera’s web where the tiny Thundercat is used as bait for Lion-O who comes to his aid along with the other Thundercats. Together they defeat Spidera and trap her back in the egg from which she hatched.

This seems like yet another throw away issue and has filler written all over it as large panels and very little story is used to tell the very basic plot. Lion-O seems younger and not as wise as he does in issues before this, and with Jim Mooney back on art, this makes me wonder is this issue was one that had been done for awhile and had sat around the office waiting for a time when some one was behind on the current issue so they could use this one to meet the pressing. All the Thundercats besides Lion-O and Snarf are wasted and not used, and Mumm-Ra himself mostly appears as a rainbow winged fairy and in no way comes off as a threat. Spidera is a mindless insect and when the battle gets thick is easily defeated. The reason I would say that this is an average issue that holds some fun moments is because it reminds me of early Conan The Barbarian stories and pits a hero against a giant spider. Not much to say about this issue besides feels and reads like filler and served its purpose, as I was at least entertained.

Thundercats # 17 ***
Released in 1987 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #17 of 24

WilyKit and WalyKat are in the woods of Third Earth and try and help a man who is being robbed by Gargoyles who steal his daughter’s wedding gift that was left to her from her mother who had passed away. Sadly they get away with the crime and take the gift to The Black Tower that is the hideout of Baron Karnor who is the king of these winged thieves. The Wily ones travel to the tower to get the gift back but while there WilyKat goes missing leaving WilyKit by herself, that is till Lion-O with the help of the Sword of Omens finds that his friends are in trouble and comes to their aid. Lion-O and WilyKit enter the tower and find that it’s filled with traps and dangers and finally they find WilyKat and get the gift back and find that Baron Karnor has been dead for years and the Gargoyles only do this because of magic! Lion-O calls the rest of the Thundercats and they destroy all the Gargoyles who were made out of stone and make it to the wedding on time to deliver the gift.

This is what I want from my Thundercats Star Comics, and with this issue they strike back being a A-List kids comic series with a good story and some great adventure. WilyKit takes the lead role in this issue and runs with it as she is the one who teaches WilyKat a lesson that it’s not nice to pull jokes on people. She is the one who shows the pure heart as she wants to get back the stolen gift because she understands its meaning. WilyKat also has a bigger role and comes off as a jerk as pulling pranks seemed to be more important to him than helping a stranger in need as he plays dead after a brief scuffle. Lion-O of course plays a big part and flexes his muscles and leadership and helps the Wilys escape the tower. Great haunted house feel as well to the issue as the Tower is dark, scary and filled with traps making it feel right at place with a Vincent Price film, not to mention the Tower is also the main source of bad in the issue with the Gargoyles acting as its henchmen. Artwork done by Jose Delbo again looks amazing, and the cover once more is eye catching and well done. Here is to hoping that this is a sign that the series is back on the up swing and that it stays this solid for the remaining issues. So let’s get to issue 18 cause now I am back looking forward to the next issue.

Thundercats # 18 **1/2
Released in 1987 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #18 of 24

Slithe and mutants have attacked Cheetara and while she’s knocked out, Mumm-Ra transforms himself into a Thundercat and calls himself Pumm-Ra and acts as her savior. He is welcomed into a friendship with the rest of Thundercats for his rescue and taken to Cats Lair where at night he breaks their defense systems and steals the Sword of Omen. The next morning as all the Thundercats minus Lion-O and Snarf go on a hike Pumm-Ra shows his hand and calls in Slithe and the Mutants who take over the Thundertank. A brawl with Pumm-Ra gets the Sword of Omens back in the hands of Lion-O and together they run off the Mutants and get Pumm-Ra to show his true identity of being Mumm-Ra and they run him off as well.

The message of this issue is don’t trust strangers because they are more than likely an evil ancient wizard! Mumm-Ra as Pumm-Ra comes very close to finally beating the Thundercats but once more puts way too much faith in the mutants for assistance who are cowards and always flee when the tide turns in battles. Lion-O once more wants to rush into things and wants to make Pumm-Ra from the start a full member of the Thundercats and if not for Jaga’s ghost he very much so would have been one! Tygra for once gets to play the hero as he risks his own life to enter a vent that could be filled with fire at any moment to get inside Cats Lair after Pumm-Ra locks himself inside, and I will say I am really happy to see him finally get a heroic moment and I feel in the series he is the least used one. Ernie Colon returns to art and while still not the style I like, it’s better than the style he had in issue 14. The cover is eye catching and has Pumm-Ra standing over the knocked out body of Cheetara, and I am sure got a few new readers at the time to give the series a chance. Over all this is a pretty good issue and is above average but by no means a true stand out issue.

Thundercats # 19 ***
Released in 1988 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #19 of 24

A Man-O-War JellyFish Cloud has entered the small village and has kidnapped the robot bear girl Ro-Ber-Belle right before the Thundercats eyes! As Lion-O and Snarf head one way, Cheetara rushes ahead all in hopes to save their friend. Along the way Lion-O witnesses Jackal steal the shoe off a unicorn, and Cheetara has some of her hair cut off by Slithe, all in some sort of odd way this all seems to be connected. With the help of the Sword of Omen, they find that they have taken Ro-Ber-Belle to the top of a mountain and they are doing a spell to free Mumm-Ra’s sister Ta-She from a prison that has her roam the worlds forever. Ta-She is powerful and holds the power of the Doomgaze that can make anyone do what she wants them to and to be free she must have Lion-O take her place in the prison! She uses the doomgaze on him and all looks lost until he is able to use all his power and break free and send out the call that has the rest of the Thundercats crashing the party and sending the Mutants running and Mumm-Ra and Ta-She defeated…in the end Ta-She returns to her prison as Ro-Ber-Belle is rescued.

For some reason this issue reminded me of the old board game CLUE and had me thinking Mumm-Ra with the Unicorn Shoe at Cats Lair! Mumm-Ra is the main bad guy again in this issue and once more losses with the help of the coward mutants. You would think by now he would give up using those knuckleheads and would go and find himself some major help in his quest to kill the Thundercats. His sister Ta-She gets to do very little besides use the Doomgaze on Lion-O and to everyone’s shock it fails as his will was strong enough to break it with ease. Speaking of Lion-O, he once more shows why he was chosen to lead as his will and noble heart leads them to win and save their friend. I also once more picked up on some tension between he and Cheetara as he says in a round about way he was able to break the Doomgaze cause of thinking of her…yep, he wants her. This one was a lot of fun and I enjoyed every page and action packed moment, not to mention the artwork done by Mooney again is well done. Great issue and now let’s get onto # 20!!

Thundercats # 20 ***
Released in 1988 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #20 of 24

Mumm-Ra looks to the past and finds the tale of King Author and his mighty sword Excalibur and decides to trick the Lady of the Lake and get the mighty sword and use it to beat the Thundercats’ mighty Sword of Omens. Making himself look like a knight Mumm-Ra gets Excalibur and comes to Cats Lair and challenges Lion-O to a duel that happens the next morning all in the name of honor. The duel is going back and forth, and both swords and their handlers are holding their own until finally the swords take to the air by themselves. Excalibur wins by cutting the Eye of Thundara and making all the Thundercat loose their power! As Mumm-Ra brags of his win, the great Wizard Merlin appears and takes away Excalibur and returns the power of the Eye of Thundara to the Thundercats! In the end Merlin takes Lion-O to the Lady of the Lake, and he returns Excalibur to its watery resting place.

What a fun way to mix the legend of King Arthur with that of the Thundercats and to pit two of the worlds most powerful swords Excalibur and Sword of Omens against each other in such an epic way. Lion-O has the true warrior spirit and fights for the pride of his fellow Thundercats as their honor is questioned by a knighted stranger. Mumm-Ra for once has a great idea and if not for Merlin would have beat the Thundercats once and for all making this the closest he as been in 20 issues! The artwork is done by Colon and is some of his better work. At this point in the comic run it’s clear many of these stories in the issues are just adapted from the cartoon and its scripts, but at the end of this one they flex some muscle and claim from here on out they will be doing more original stories. So let’s see how this goes shall we?

Thundercats # 21 **
Released in 1988 Cover Price $1.00 Star Comics #21 of 24

Snarf is home alone at Cats Lair and finds that he has been left a baby to watch who is as strong as Hercules and as destructive as a tornado! While watching from the woods, Vulture Man thinks that Snarf has invented a formula that causes superhuman strength and with the blessing of Slithe he steals the baby and his bottle and brings it to their base only for the baby to run wild and break all that’s in its way! Snarf comes after the baby to rescue it but is meet by Slithe, Jackalman and Vulture Man who beg him to take him back! In the end the parents come and pick the baby up, and Snarf is worn out from his babysitting adventure.

They break into doing an original story and what they do is one generic and stale idea of having the un-wanting babysitter and the pain in the butt kid. Snarf is the main focus of the issue and all the “action” is done in slapstick and your very typical kid comic kind of way. While reading it I was like wow look it’s Vulture Man….wait, he being beaten up by a baby….look, Jackalman….wait, a baby just threw him into the water. It was very plain and kind of bland and so far I would say the worst issue in the series. Mooney returns for art and does a pretty good job even though there is not much to the story at all. This also marks the final issue for STAR comics as the remaining issues would be put out by Marvel, and it’s a shame that this generic issue marks the end for a company I love so much. I don’t wanna waste any more time with this vanilla issue, so let’s get to # 22.

Thundercats # 22 **1/2
Released in 1988 Cover Price $1.00 Marvel #22 of 24

Lion-O and the Thundercats are the guests of honor at the small fishing village, and as they go to have a fun filled day WilyKat and WilyKit are left behind to watch Cats Lair and are attacked by robot clones of themselves made by Vulture Man for Slithe. When Lion-O returns to the Cats Lair, he finds out that the Wily’s are being held ransom for diamonds and will be killed if those diamonds don’t make it to them on time! Lion-O, Cheetara and Panthro go and rescue the Wily’s and spend the day playing kickball with them to show how much they all love them.

Robot Wilykittens and a greedy Slithe make up this issu,e and this marks the first issue to be made by Marvel. While good, once more it has that VERY average feel to it. Slithe is a evil man and means to kill his prisoners who are children all over diamonds that he can’t really spend anywhere! Vulture Man shows that while a lack,y he still has a big brain as he is the one who creates the robot clones. Lion-O once more shows he is a man of honor and risks his own safety to save his fellow Thundercats in need. Art done by Jose Delbo is good, while the cover is generic and bland. This issue is just kind of around and was so average that I am looking forward to just moving on to the next issue, so that’s what I will do.

Thundercats # 23 **1/2
Released in 1988 Cover Price $1.00 Marvel #23 of 24

Dr Dometone along with his giant robot frog named Hercules watches over a plug that helps keep Third Earths waters safe, but a bad man named Scrape has been sent to pull the plug that would cause doomsday for all that live on the planet. Lion-o and WilyKat and WilyKit go with Dometone to try and stop the destruction and finally with the help of the rest of the Thundercats, they are able to stop Scrape and protect the Plug from being tampered with.

This issue is filled with way too much slow drama and the action is very generic and bland. While not 100% terrible, this is by no means a good issue. Lion-O, while the main hero, is wasted and given nothing to really do besides dress in a shark suit and swim around. The rest of the Thundercats take back seats and are barely used and are wasted on this lame story line. Scrape is no real threat and could be knocked out by a sneeze. His only threat really is his eel ship. Dr Dometone is lame and talks way too much though I do love that his two giant frog robots are named Hercules and Samson. The art work is done by Dwayne Turner and has that classic late 80’s Marvel Charm. In fact even the cheesy cover has that Marvel feel. Over all this issue is kind of bland and makes for a quick read.

Thundercats # 24 ***
Released in 1988 Cover Price $1.00 Marvel #24 of 24

WilyKat and WilyKit are in the woods when they stumble on some pods that hatch and unleash evil clones of all the Thundercats that were created by Mumm-Ra! These clones’ main purpose is to help spark a war between two mountain tribes so that the evil Mumm-Ra can weaken them and then rule them! The clones keep WilyKat and WalyKit hostage and start their evil quest and succeed in getting both sides to prepare for war. But the Wilys get free and help the good Thundercats defeat the evil clones, and Lion-O with the Sword of Omen is able to get the feuding sides to calm down and talk of peace.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers is what this final issue reminded me of and in fact it had a very Sci-Fi meets Fantasy film feel to it. The Clones were darker versions of the Thundercats and each were turned up a notch to be very narcissistic and self serving. The Wileys were the main heros of the issue as they were the ones to help find the sinister plot, tell the right people of said sinister plot and were the ones who help the real Thundercats win. Lion-O once more is very noble and carries the weight of Third Earth on his shoulders as he tries so hard to keep it a peaceful planet. Mumm-Ra, while having a good idea to use clones to start a war, once more should have pushed harder and helped his evil army to succeed. The issue also had a feel of importance as at any moment a war was about to pop off and all sides would have lost many lives and each also were targeting the Thundercats. Marvel in my opinion did disrespect the series and let it end with this issue and did not give it a clear cut final issue like it deserved. In fact I am going to say that Marvel as a whole disrespected Star Comics and did not fully support nor give them the time to grow as a power house in kids comics. The issue’s cover is cool looking, but not as epic as is should be, and the final issues art is done by Rodney Ramos and it looks okay. Over all this is a great issue and it makes me happy that at least the series ended on a high note!

Thundercats by Star Comics had many great issue, and while it did have a few duds, this is by far my favorite series I have read this far by Star! I am sure you are all noticing that this update has been posted way after Christmas Eve, and I must say that I am sorry for that. I had a few roadblocks in getting this one up from computer issues and long days At work, normal holiday stuff and even had a terrible case of the flu! But I hope that you all had a wonderful Holiday season and that your 2014 is going well this far. But to get back on topic Thundercats was a big part of my childhood as with many kids of the 80’s, and I was glad to see Star give these characters comics that fans enjoyed. I will say I wish they had less issues that were just based on the cartoon episodes cause this took away the fun factor of this being your fix to the next cartoon cause when reading the ones based on episodes the element of surprise was gone. It was neat to see Marvel take up the series after they closed Star and ran it to see if it could hang with their long running Transformers and G.I. Joe series and if given the chance I think it could have. Well next update I am going to do something a little different and thats I am going to showcase a Horror Host that I love and talk about the impact they had on me, the memories of watching and even do a little episode guide of the ones I own on DVD! I am calling the updates Horror Host Icon and the first one we will be taking a look at is the one and only Commander USA, I am sure you long time readers are not shocked by this one. Till next time stay nerdy, and stay safe this cold winter!