Roy Roy T Thomas' homas' Obsessive Obsessive Comics Comics F Fanzine anzine
No. 175 May 2022
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TM
REDUX WITH
ARVELL JONES RICHARD HOWELL JERRY ORDWAY
8
82658 00453 1
All-Star Squadron heroes TM & © DC Comics.
AND A RETROEXPLOSION OF GOLDEN AGE ART!
Vol. 3, No. 175 May 2022 Editor
Roy Thomas
Associate Editor Jim Amash
Design & Layout
Christopher Day
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Contents
Writer/Editorial: …And That’s The Last Time We’ll Ever Say “Final”! . . . 2 “Roy Kept Adding Characters To [The All-Star Squadron]” . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Arvell Jones interviewed by Richard Arndt about his early years in comics.
“[Drawing Golden Age Heroes] Was Sort Of A Dream Of Mine” . . . . . 27 Richard Howell documents his time on All-Star Squadron.
Gerry Turnbull
With Special Thanks to: Mike Alderman Heidi Amash Pedro Angosto Ger Apeldoorn Richard J. Arndt Jean Bails Jeff Balke Stephen Baskerville Ray Bottorff, Jr. John Burk Aaron Caplan Matt Childers Craig Demak Michael Dunne Janet Gilbert Grand Comics Database (website) Mike Gustovich Shane Foley Brendon Fraim Brian Fraim Scott Goodell Richard Howell Christopher Ivy Staz Johnson
C’mon citizen, DO THE RIGHT THING! A Mom & Pop publisher like us needs every sale just to survive! DON’T DOWNLOAD OR READ ILLEGAL COPIES ONLINE!
Arvell & Wanda Jones John Joshua Jim Ludwig James E. Lyle Mike Machlan Bob McLeod Al Milgrom Mark Muller Jerry & Peggy Ordway Bob Peak Barry Pearl Ian Richardson Randy Sargent Ron Shalda Derrick Simpson Ian Sokoliwski Jim Starlin Dann Thomas Gerry Turnbull Shawn van Briesen Mike Vosburg John Watson
“Something Different Or Distinct From The Justice Society…” . . . . . . 37 A conversation with Jerry Ordway about the 1980s All-Star Squadron—& Infinity, Inc.
The All-Star Squadron Covers That Never Were—Till Now! . . . . . . . . . 57 John Joshua reveals all concerning his multi-artist online fan project.
Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!: It’s A Cracked, Cracked, Cracked, Cracked World! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63 Michael T. Gilbert shines a spotlight on Mad magazine’s longest-lived competitor.
FCA [Fawcett Collectors Of America] #234 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71 P.C. Hamerlinck hosts Ger Apeldoorn’s look at Fawcett’s Mad wannabe—Lunatickle!
On Our Cover: Amid the many All-Star Squadron-related commissioned drawings that our three iridescent interviewees have done over the years, we had a plethora of riches from which to choose re this issue’s cover. But we decided at an early stage on Arvell Jones’ “wraparound”-style image of the AllStars, as inked by fellow pro Bob McLeod… and we thank both gents for permission to use it! Of course, when you first spy this issue’s front cover, it may look like “merely”a depiction of the 1940-spawned Justice Society of America—because all the non-JSA Squadders happen to appear on the left half of the Cinemascopic drawing, which means they wound up being relegated to the back cover. But then, if Arvell had decided to draw all the heroes in the Squadron, we’d have had to have at least a four-page cover, right? Special thanks to art owner Mike Alderman. [Characters TM & © DC Comics.] Above: One memorable example of All-Star Squadron splash-page art (among many!) is this one by Richard Howell & Larry Houston from #27 (Nov. 1983), in which Al (The Atom) Pratt and Danette (Firebrand) Reilly wave adieu to some friends, as they hold infant Terri Curtis, future mother of the Infinity, Inc. hero who’ll be known first as Nuklon, later as Atom Smasher. To see whom they’re waving to, sneak a peek at p. 27. [TM & © DC Comics.] Alter Ego TM issue 175, May 2022 (ISSN 1932-6890) is published bi-monthly by TwoMorrows Publishing, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614, USA. Phone: (919) 449-0344. Periodicals postage pending at Raleigh, NC. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Alter Ego, c/o TwoMorrows, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614. Roy Thomas, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Alter Ego Editorial Offices: 32 Bluebird Trail, St. Matthews, SC 29135, USA. Fax: (803) 826-6501; e-mail: roydann@ntinet.com. Send subscription funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial offices. Six-issue subscriptions: $68 US, $103 Elsewhere, $29 Digital Only. All characters are © their respective companies. All material ©their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © Roy Thomas. Alter Ego is a TM of Roy & Dann Thomas. FCA is a TM of P.C. Hamerlinck. Printed in China. FIRST PRINTING.
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Part One
“Roy Kept Adding Characters To [The All-Star Squadron]!” An Interview with ARVELL JONES About His Early Years In Comics Conducted & Transcribed by Richard J. Arndt
Arvell Jones in a recent photo, above a pair of All-Star Squadron art commissions he’s done in recent years: (Left) A Jones-penciled illo that could easily have become a Squadron cover, had he drawn it in the mid-1980s! Featured are Liberty Belle, Firebrand, Johnny Quick—and that time-traveling troublemaker Per Degaton from the first three issues of All-Star Squadron in 1981 (and originally, of course, from 1947’s All-Star Comics #35). Scan provided by Pedro Angosto. (Below:) Another Arvell Jones commission of the All-Stars, this one inked by Bob Peak and colored by Derrick Simpson. Thanks to AJ. [All-Star Squadron heroes TM & © DC Comics.]
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An Interview With Arvell Jones About His Early Years In Comics
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NTERVIEWER’S INTRODUCTION: Arvell Jones got his first professional comics gig doing background artwork for fellow Detroiter Rich Buckler on the early-1970s “Black Panther” feature in Marvel’s Jungle Action and on Buckler’s creation “Deathlok,” which ran in Astonishing Tales. After doing backgrounds and breakdowns on various comics, his first solo penciling credit came with Marvel Premiere #20 (Jan. 1975), featuring “Iron Fist.” During his time on that strip, he visually co-created Misty Knight, originally a supporting character, with writer Tony Isabella. Other Marvel books he worked on included Iron Man, Captain America, and Daredevil. For DC he drew Super-Team Family, The Superman Family, Superboy and the Legion of SuperHeroes, and All-Star Squadron. This interview was conducted May 22, 2019. RICHARD ARNDT: We’re welcoming Arvell Jones today! Thanks for agreeing to this interview. ARVELL JONES: Before I was working at Marvel, Roy Thomas was an idol of mine. I’ve always enjoyed his work. When I was a little younger, the original Alter Ego was the gold standard. After, what—forty or fifty years—it still is. I’m honored to do this. RA: Now, I know you were raised in Detroit. I’m originally from Michigan myself, the Big Rapids area… JONES: Really? I’ve never actually been to that town myself.
RA: It’s a nice town, but if you’re living in Detroit, most of what you’re really looking for is likely right around the corner. JONES: [chuckles] I was born and raised in Detroit. I only left that city because in the 1970s you had to go to New York if you wanted to work for Marvel. RA: How did your interest in comics get started? JONES: I probably had three big influences. My father was somewhat of a comicbook fan and somewhat of an artist in his own right. He saw what I could do as a kid, saw that I had an interest in drawing things, and decided to push that ability that I had. My original intentions were based on television. I wanted to be a TV producer or a director or a writer. I tried to push my father into buying me a super-eight-millimeter film camera. He went with me to a department store to take a look at one. I was probably eleven or twelve years old at that time. He told me that he was going to buy it for me. I was trying to convince him that I was going to do some amazing things with it. So we looked at the prices and I had a good feeling about it. My father pretty much had his wallet out to buy the camera. Then the salesman said that we were going to need film for it; and then, once we got the film developed—which we could do at the store we were at—then we’d need a film projector to see it and likely a screen to project it on as well. My father was deterred by the list of future attachments and expenses that the salesman was trying to sell us on. He then decided that a better investment was in order. He sat me down at our dining room table and gave me a stack of paper, a bunch of #2 pencils, and a stack of comicbooks. He told me that once I convinced him that I could create stories that people might buy, then he would buy me the film camera. Long story short, he never bought me the film camera. [laughs]
Let’s Appoint A Commission! (Left:) A 2016 All-Star Squadron commission, penciled by AJ and inked by Mike Gustovich—plus (right) a color one of Thor. Roy T. recalls that Arvell and his wife Wanda attended a comics convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, several years back… and when she saw the demand for his drawings of the All-Stars and various other DC & Marvel heroes, she said, “We’re gonna be going to a lot more conventions!” Covid concerns temporarily derailed those plans, but readers who’d like to inquire about a commission drawing by Arvell should see his ad on p. 9. [Heroes TM & © DC Comics & Marvel Characters, Inc., respectively.]
So when I finally got to Marvel and showed my father the books that I would be working on, he said, “Great! Now you can buy your own film camera!” [laughs] He did take me around to a lot of the comic-cons. Remember, this was in the late 1960s and early 1970s; comic conventions were nowhere near as huge as they are today. These would
“Roy Kept Adding Characters To [The All-Star Squadron]!”
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The Fist & The Mist (Left:) One of Arvell’s first solo assignments at Marvel was penciling the “Iron Fist” feature in Marvel Premiere #20 (Jan. 1975); he and scripter Tony Isabella started on the series at the same time. Inks by Dan Green. (Right:) By the next issue (#21, March ’75), the pair co-created Misty Knight, who’d go on to a long career in Marvel’s comics—and on Netflix. Inks by Vince Colletta. Thanks to Barry Pearl for both scans. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]
have been the ones that Phil Seuling put on in New York from the mid-1960s through the early 1970s. I remember finding out about the first convention from one of the fanzines that I subscribed to. I think I was only thirteen years old when I went to my first New York Comic-Con. From that experience I was inspired to create my own fanzine, called Fan Informer. My father always supported all of that. He gave me enough allowance, which, combined with my newspaper route, gave me enough money to buy everything that I wanted or needed. He also never minded taking me where I needed to go, either.
they’re called Crime Does Not Pay—adventure/drama comics, Prize Comics, Jack Kirby’s Blue Beetle. I think it’s the first Blue Beetle. It’s all torn up. You know, this came from the days when you rolled up or folded those comics and stuck them in a side or back pocket. It’s in horrible shape, but I’m keeping it! [laughs]
He would drive me to some of the other local fanzine writers’ houses. Me and my other friends. So my father was a big influence in terms of allowing me to develop as a cartoonist or an animator. He could see me making a living doing that. He was pretty good about everything, but he never did buy me that film camera. [laughs]
JONES: Yeah! Very well-used. Still, he never threw them away. He kept them in a box that kind of went along with him wherever he moved. Actually, they were originally in a bag, and then later in a box.
RA: You mentioned that he was a comics fan in his own right. What did he read? JONES: When he started to introduce me to comics, he did have a little collection of his own. He had some Fawcett titles, a few crime comics—in fact, I think I’ve still got a couple of those, I think
My father also had an old Captain America, some of Will Eisner’s Spirit newspaper comics from the Detroit Free Press. Again, though, anything he had from that era was in terrible shape. RA: I guess you could say that it was well-used, certainly well-read.
RA: What comics were you using for your inspiration when you were working on your early comics? JONES: Initially, my father went out and bought me a stack of used Marvel and DC comics. This would have been the early 1960s, again. I had Amazing Fantasy #15—the first appearance of Spider-Man—the first few issues of The Fantastic Four. I had some Incredible Hulk, some Batman, some Superman. All kinds of stuff,
“Roy Kept Adding Characters To [The All-Star Squadron]!”
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Like I said, it was a long time from my seeing that little clipping and actually doing the work on #50, but Roy wanted me to include that character, whoever he was, into that double-page spread where all the characters were moving from one universe to another. I called him when I got the page penciled and told him “I got everybody you wanted except that one character from that little clipping. Do you have another copy of it because I lost that clipping?” He said “What! You lost it! That was the only artwork I had on that character! I really wanted him to be in that two-page spread!” I felt so bad. I tore up my studio looking for that little clipping. My brother and another couple of people helped and we went all through that studio. I just could not find it. To this day I have no idea what happened to it.
“I Contain Multitudes…” Exhibits “A” through “C” in support of Arvell Jones’ statement that writer/ editor Roy Thomas “kept adding characters” to All-Star Squadron stories. (Clockwise from above left:)
RA: The irony of that is that today you could probably find an example of that character in a few seconds using the Internet. Back then, if you didn’t have a physical example in your grasp, you just couldn’t use it.
On this DeZuñiga-inked page from #53 (Jan. 1986), Liberty Belle and Johnny Quick are zapped into a scene coordinated with the ongoing Crisis on Infinite Earths series, joining mid-1980s (and other 1940s) heroes from Earths-One, -Two, and all other DC parallel dimensions, to learn about the threat facing the multiiverse (and, far more worrisome in RT’s view, the very existence of All-Star Squadron). The Jones/DeZuñiga cover of #55 (March ’86) showcased the female Firebrand leading a time-tossed tribe of DC heroes—namely, Miss Liberty (Tomahawk’s ladyfriend), The Silent Knight, The Black Pirate & son, Super-Chief, Valda the Iron Maiden (from Arak, Son of Thunder), and either Wayne or Walt, one of All Star Western’s 1950s Trigger Twins. And there were several more Crisis chrononauts inside! On the cover of #59 (July ’86), the same artistic team rendered the 23rd-century living robot Mekanique, framed by the visages of virtually the entire Squadron roll call… but if we named them all here, we’d have no room for the Howell and Ordway interviews that follow! Suffice it to say, the original art for this cover is currently framed prominently in the foyer of the Thomas residence in South Carolina! Thanks again for the gift and the excellent work, Arvell! [TM & © DC Comics.]
there’s a scene in there with… I don’t know how many super-heroes there were… but there were Quality characters, Fawcett characters, DC characters, All-American characters—I mean, a lot of characters, including the regular All-Star Squadron guys. But there was this one character who had appeared in that single clipped panel, which was only 2” x 3”, from that box.
JONES: So I let him down on that. I felt pretty bad about it. To tell the truth, I was also a little mad at him because if I’d known I was going to have to use all these obscure characters, I’d have probably kept better track… I mean, I knew I was going to be drawing a lot of DC characters, but some of these guys were from companies that hadn’t been in business since 1953. [laughs] I’d had that clip for a long time before Roy even mentioned using him, but I guess he wouldn’t have sent that clipping if he hadn’t been planning, a year or more ahead of time, to use him somewhere. RA: Now you know! JONES: Yeah! Now! I hope Roy can remember what character that was! Roy kept adding characters to the book. Before that book, I had pretty much been a one- or two-character-at-a-time guy. The only full group work I’d done was maybe that Super-Team Family story.
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An Interview With Arvell Jones About His Early Years In Comics
Maybe The Guy Should’ve Said “Please”? There’s a tale of sorts behind this panorama from #59 (July 1986), just one issue before the main thread of the series ended. Since by then the Golden Age Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and Aquaman were all scheduled to be erased “forever” from DC continuity following the events of Crisis, and because Aquaman had previously appeared in Squadron only in a single (symbolic) panel, a coordinating DC editor around this time asked Roy T. rather pointedly—for reasons he didn’t deign to explain—not to depict Aquaman again in the series before it wound up. No longer in a mood to be cooperative with the DC brass, Roy made certain the Sea King was front and center in this two-page spread, surrounded by most of his fellow Squadders and readily identified by his yellow (rather than green) gloves and calf-fins. Inks by Vince Colletta. [TM & © DC Comics.]
But other than that and the “Legion” stories I hadn’t really worked on a group book. But now, every time I looked up, Roy was adding more characters. We’d started off focused on one or two characters but then it branched out, so that by #50 I was drawing Quality Comics characters, Fawcett characters, as well as the old DC Justice Society characters. I was going, “Roy, what are you doing to me?” [laughs] RA: A smorgasbord of characters! You were having fun, anyway. JONES: I thoroughly enjoyed that book. Every issue it was a surprise to me where Roy was taking it. It was fun doing it and having a chance, with a reflective eye, to go back and look at all of those older characters. How they worked and all. I always loved Hourman and loved his Miraclo pill-based powers. There was one scene that I got to use him in where he was in the middle of getting beat up by two Nazi spies. They were putting him through the wringer, so he takes the pill but has to wait for the pill to kick in while they’re still beating him up! [both laugh] Just when they’re getting ready to throw him out the window and fall 50 feet to the street and his death, the pill finally kicks in. I remember trying to figure out how to visually depict that particular instant where his powers start up. Roy’s description was, he’s going out the window,
totally defeated, and then the pill kicks in. So I focused on his eyes, him looking towards the window, getting beat up, he’s already taken the pill and then, suddenly, his eyes perk up. He gets a little smile on his face. Roy’s description of that moment was “Hel-lo!”
No Photoshopping Was Employed In The Making Of These Two Pages! (Opposite page, top:) On page 16 of All-Star Squadron #60 (Aug. 1986), Johnny Quick takes a photo of the assembled group for President Roosevelt— and of course was swift enough to be able to appear in it himself. Art in these two scans by Arvell Jones & Tony DeZuñiga. (Opposite page, bottom:) Then the Crisis on Infinite Worlds finalized its dirty work—and, later that same day, the photo FDR received showed Superman, Batman, Robin, Wonder Woman, and Aquaman (all of whom suddenly no longer existed in Golden Age continuity) replaced by several Quality heroes—who otherwise would’ve still been on Earth-X. Of course, not all the restored Quality heroes were depicted, or else there’d have been another dozen or so folks in the picture! Incidentally, even this “photo” turned out not to be quite 100% accurate by the time it was printed, as DC’s upper echelons almost immediately decreed that Green Arrow and Speedy had also been “retroactively deconstructed.” Roy’s comment on hearing that news is unprintable in a family magazine. [TM & © DC Comics.]
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Part Two
[Drawing Golden Age Heroes] Was Sort Of A Dream Of Mine” RICHARD HOWELL Talks About His Time On All-Star Squadron
Interview Conducted & Transcribed by Richard J. Arndt
Richard Howell in a recent photo with some of his current work— juxtaposed with the double-spread title panel from his penciling debut on All-Star Squadron #27 (Nov. 1983). Inks by Larry Houston. Clearly, writer/editor Roy Thomas put him right to work drawing a baker’s dozen of All-Stars— after a first-page splash that depicted only The Atom and Firebrand, holding the infant son of the villain Cyclotron— as seen back on p.1 of this A/E issue. [TM & © DC Comics.]
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Richard Howell Talks About His Time On All-Star Squadron
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NTERVIEWER’S INTRODUCTION: Richard Howell (born Nov. 16, 1955) broke into comics in 1977 with his own self-published title Portia Prinz of the Glamazons. In 1980 he and Carol Kalish became the co-editors of the comics-related publishing & distribution company called New Media/Irjax. Among the titles they worked on was Comics Feature, which sported articles and interviews related to the field. Richard also edited two short-lived comics magazines—Fantasy Illustrated and Adventure Illustrated. In 1982-1983 he began working as an artist first for Marvel, then for DC, on such titles as Conan the Barbarian, Moon Knight, The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones, The Vision and The Scarlet Witch, All-Star Squadron, Hawkman, The Shadow War of Hawkman, Firestorm, and numerous others. In 1993 he became a founder of Claypool Comics, which published Deadbeats, Phantom of Fear City, Soulsearchers and Company, and Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. He also worked on various titles for Eclipse, Comico, and Harris Comics. This interview was conducted on April 19, 2021. RICHARD ARNDT: We’re talking with Richard Howell, largely about his work on DC Comics’ All-Star Squadron. Welcome, Richard. RICHARD HOWELL: Happy to be here. RA: Before we get too deep into All-Star Squadron, I wanted to ask you about New Media. I didn’t read a lot of comics-related material at the time, but was that also the publisher of Fantasy Illustrated, which introduced The Djinn and Alexander Risk, and Adventure Illustrated? HOWELL: Yes, I was the editor for both of those titles. RA: I did read those two titles and admired them quite a bit—they introduced the Steve Englehart-Steve Ditko & Steve Leialoha Djinn character and Don McGregor & Tom Sutton’s Alexander Risk, among other stories and serials. They didn’t last long, but I very much liked them. I still have them somewhere in the house.
HOWELL: I do, too, somewhere. We’d hoped to have them last longer than a single issue each, but it was hard to get people to continue to work for you, if your publisher doesn’t pay them. RA: Now, how did you get involved with All-Star Squadron? HOWELL: My wife, Carol Kalish, had just gone to work for Marvel. I was trying to break into the industry as… well, really anything… a penciler, an inker, a colorist. I wound up doing all of those things at some point. Marvel, at the time, however, was not a welcoming community for me. So, my first Marvel job, which was a Conan fill-in, also wound up looking terrible. I was not used to having other people ink my pencils. I got that fill-in job from Louise Simonson, sort of a good-will gesture. Also, just because she’s nice. It turned out that DC was a bit more open to employing me as a freelancer, not as an editor, which is what I’d been doing at New Media. Carol and I had already interviewed Roy for a New Media magazine called Comics Feature #11, so I had a relationship of sorts with Roy. I don’t know if Roy really wanted to keep the Justice Society adventures separate from what was happening in All-Star Squadron. It certainly wound up that most of the issues that I drew were largely Justice Society stuff. I got to draw the Golden Age versions of Starman, The Atom, and Wonder Woman. That was kind of a dream of mine. Roy basically called me up out of nowhere and told me that he had a two-part fill-in for All-Star Squadron and was I available? Well, boy, was I! RA: That would have been All-Star Squadron #27-28 (Nov.-Dec. 1983), correct? That was basically a Spectre and Dr. Fate story. HOWELL: Yes. There was some confusion about the first issue— #27. Larry Houston inked the first nine pages, then left to take on an animation job, which certainly paid better than inking for DC. So I got to ink the rest of the issue myself, which worked out well for me. I’m not sure that DC was all that fond of it, however. I had a discussion with Dick Giordano about inking the second issue—#28— and he said “Yeah, yeah, we can think about that.” Then the next thing I knew, it was inked by Gerald Forton. [chuckles] RA: Sometimes when that happens, there’s a worry on the company’s part that they’re going to lose control if they depend on one guy to do all the artwork.
And We Do Mean “Illustrated”! Howell served as the editor of the single issues of the anthology comics Adventure Illustrated (Winter 1981) and Fantasy Illustrated (Spring 1982), with covers by P. Craig Russell and Jim Starlin, respectively. They featured work by an honor roll of comics creators. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]
HOWELL: And they’re also considering deadlines, which can creep up on you so fast that you don’t really know that you’ve made a bad decision until the exact moment it turns bad. RA: Especially on fill-in
“[Drawing Golden Age Heroes] Was Sort Of A Dream Of Mine”
Meanwhile, Back At The Two-Page Spread… As Richard says, he was tapped to pencil (and ink!) this two-page spread for the third and final All-Star Squadron Annual (1984), in which Hawkman, Hawkgirl, The Spectre, The Atom, and Sandman battled villains Alexander the Great (no, not that one), Zor, and Tarantula (no, not that one, either) on June 28, 1941—a date that would turn out to have momentous importance in the tale’s last-page denouement. Script by Roy Thomas. Thanks to Jim Ludwig. [TM & © DC Comics.]
pages by Roy along the lines of “Oh, by the way, Hawkman and Hawkgirl defeat this guy, Starman defeats this guy, The Atom defeats this guy,” and then back to our regularly paneled pages. [chuckles] The last thing I did for All-Star Squadron was near the end of the series, in All-Star Squadron #57 [May 1986]. That was another extra-length issue which featured individual character chapters, and I got to draw the “Wonder Woman” chapter. Speaking of swiping, I did my best H.G. Peter impersonation for that issue. I enjoyed inking my re-do in his style, which is somewhere between fashion design and German woodcuts. [both laugh] It was a delight to draw in that style. I thought it looked great, but there aren’t that many people these days who would buy an H.G. Peter comic. Even in his day, I don’t think Peter’s style was close to the mainstream. RA: That’s a shame, because I remember his art as having day-glo colors that really popped out at you. If he had continued drawing into the 1960s, fans would have gone into raptures for it. His artwork was perfect for day-glo images. The credits on the Grand Comics Database for #57 are rather
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confusing. It appears that Roy was adapting old stories from the 1940s that were being retroactively tied into the Crisis on Infinite Earths series, although the issue itself is not identified on the cover as a Crisis cross-over like most such issues were. The story has been reprinted in the Crisis on Infinite Earths Companion Deluxe Edition (Jan. 2018). Your story was apparently taken from one that originally appeared in All-Star Comics #13 (Oct.-Nov. 1942). That original story was written by Gardner Fox and William Marston and illustrated by H.G. Peter. HOWELL: This would have been a story from early in the Justice Society’s run. I’m pretty sure that Roy splitting up the storyline into different chapters was based on how the story originally appeared. It was rare in the early All-Star Comics that the characters actually fought together as a team. They’d appear in an introduction chapter and then all split up into chapters done by their regular writers and artists for an individual chapter. RA: Even when they took on Solomon Grundy, they’d meet up, agree to take him on, and then all split up to fight him on their own. HOWELL: Yeah, that was great strategy. If Grundy could defeat Green Lantern, he could probably take care of Wildcat or The Atom fairly easily. I also did some inking on an Infinity Inc. Annual [#1, Dec. 1984], but I was never told who the penciler was. I think it might have been Ron Harris. It’s the issue where Green Lantern married the 1940s Harlequin. This Harlequin was a Golden Age Green Lantern villainess/love interest. I got to ink the page where they actually got married. It was a full-page splash. Todd MacFarlane also penciled
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Richard Howell Talks About His Time On All-Star Squadron
artists as possible, which I suspect was as exasperating for the DC brass as it was helpful to us. If he got three pages of pencils, he’d send it on directly to the inker and that meant yet another air-mail bill. I’m sure that he wanted to make sure that he’d make his deadline. He could have had someone else write a couple of fill-in issues for when deadlines were tight, but I suspect he didn’t want to do that. Once I was up at the DC offices and Pat [Bastienne], Dick Giordano’s assistant, said, “Do you know what I got from Roy today?” Now I barely knew Pat, so obviously she just wanted to vent. She shows me what looks like a phone book of air-mail bills and says, “These are all from Roy Thomas.” [both laugh] RA: I certainly would like to thank you for taking the time this morning to do this. HOWELL: It was fun.
And May All Your Problems Be Little Ones! (Yeah, Right!) Richard inked Ron Harris’ pencils on the final page of the 1985 Infinity, Inc. Annual #1, which features the long-delayed marriage of Alan (Green Lantern) Scott and Molly (Harlequin) Maynne, with the Justice Society and Infinity, Inc., in attendance—and maybe a few leftover All-Star Squadron veterans lurking just off-panel, for all we know. A final happy moment—before the Crisis on Infinite Earths spelled trouble, if not downright doom, for both Thomasconceived group comics that Howell had helped illustrate at one time or another. [TM & © DC Comics.]
some of that issue, but I’m 98% sure that I didn’t ink any Todd MacFarlane artwork. RA: That covers all the issues that you worked on. Before we go, do you have any anecdotes that you remember that you’d like to include? HOWELL: Roy insisted on absolute fidelity to all of the Golden Age characters, except when I wanted to put Wonder Woman’s culottes back on. He said “Absolutely not!” [both laugh] I remember this very directly—he said, “No comicbook ever sold worse because it showed more of a woman’s legs.” [chuckles] I don’t think he had any actual statistics to back himself up on. [laughs] Still, it probably is true. Basically, working with Roy was a lot of fun. I never had enough time to do my best work on anything for that series because everything was always overdue by the time that I got it. It did teach me to draw fast, however. Roy did try to make it as easy on the
“More Beautiful Than Aphrodite…” A very nice commission drawing of Wonder Woman by Richard Howell. Courtesy of the artist. [Wonder Woman TM & © DC Comics.]
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Part Three
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“Something Different Or Distinct From The Justice Society…” A Conversation with JERRY ORDWAY About The 1980s All-Star Squadron Conducted & Transcribed by Richard J. Arndt
Jerry Ordway was obviously feeling in a “Three Stooges” mood at a comics convention a few years back. Also seen is his first full-art cover for All-Star Squadron (#19, March 1983)—the first issue, likewise, in which he penciled the story as well as inking it. Thanks to the Grand Comics Database. [TM & © DC Comics.]
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NTERVIEWER’S INTRODUCTION: Jerry Ordway (born Nov. 18, 1947) is one of the mainstays of modern comic artists/writers. His artwork reminds one a bit of the classic work of Curt Swan; and, like Swan, he had a long run on DC’s various Superman titles, as inker, writer, penciler, and full artist. After appearances in various fanzines in the mid-late 1970s, he entered professional comics in 1980 at DC, inking the likes of Carmine Infantino, Joe Staton, Dave Cockrum, and Trevor Von Eeden. With writer Roy Thomas, he helped launch All-Star Squadron, the principal subject of this interview, in 1981. He also co-created Infinity, Inc. with his friend Mike Machlan and Roy & Dann Thomas in 1983. He inked the classic Crisis on Infinite Earths over George Pérez’s pencils in 1985-1986. In 1987 he helped re-launch Superman, in the pages of The Adventures of Superman, with writer Marv Wolfman. In fact, he spent nine years straight drawing, inking, and penciling (sometimes all three) on various Superman titles. He was the co-writer of the “Death of Superman” storyline in 1992. He has also drawn such characters as Batman, the original Captain Marvel (Shazam!), Wonder Woman, The Human Bomb, Challengers of the Unknown, T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents, and many others. Additionally, he has worked for Marvel, WaRP Graphics, AC Comics, Charlton Comics, Paragon Publications, Eclipse Comics, and Dark Horse Comics. One of his more recent accomplishments has been a stunning adaptation of one of Neil Gaiman’s Norse Mythology chapters for a Dark Horse comic. This interview took place on April 22, 2021. RICHARD ARNDT: We’re welcoming Jerry Ordway, to talk about his work on All-Star Squadron and, to a lesser extent, Infinity, Inc. How did you get involved with the All-Star Squadron, as your inking work there came before your pencil work on Infinity, Inc.? All-Star was set in the 1940s, correct? JERRY ORDWAY: Yes. It was a separate group from the Justice Society. I think Roy Thomas probably knows more about the reasoning behind that than I do. I suspect he wanted to do something different or distinct from the Justice Society. I mean, nobody is a bigger Justice Society fan than Roy is. Fans have often asked me why the book wasn’t just the Justice Society, but I think it really was Roy, and not DC in particular, who probably wanted it to be distinct from the Justice Society.
The way I look at it is that All-Star Squadron reminded me very much of what Roy did when he took over The Avengers from Stan Lee. At that time, he wound up inheriting the B-Team. Not the Avengers that everyone remembers from the early days, but the much-weaker team of Captain America, Hawkeye, the Scarlet Witch, and Quicksilver. Goliath and the Wasp had returned by
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A Conversation With Jerry Ordway About The 1980s All-Star Squadron
Drawing Comics The Ordway This commission drawing was done for collector John Burk; colored by Ian Sokoliwski. Our thanks for permission to print it here. It features some of the DC heroes Jerry Ordway drew for All-Star Squadron, Infinity Inc., and Shazam! Because Jerry has been interviewed a time or three before for Alter Ego, and those pieces were usually festooned with his covers and interior artwork, Ye Editor elected this time around to illustrate this offering partly with Jerry’s gorgeous commission work, most of it never printed before. Thanks to Jerry for permission to do so. Aficionados desiring to commission an illustration can reach him on Twitter @JerryOrdway. [Heroes TM & © DC Comics.]
the time Roy took over, but no Iron Man, no Thor. Roy gradually added in Hercules and whoever to bring up the power level for The Avengers; but, from a reader’s point of view, I thought the concept of a team based on members that were the B-level heroes, the concept that Roy revisited in All-Star Squadron, was brilliant. In fact, Roy took characters from DC that weren’t even the B-Team, but really the C-Team—characters like Robotman, Johnny Quick, and Liberty Belle—and made them the centerpiece of the group. He gave them backstories and characterizations and made the fans of the book care about these super-heroes, who’d previously been considered pretty minor characters. Roy’s take on those characters has really provided the background for other writers to continue to use them right up to today. RA: I have to admit I wasn’t even aware there was a Robotman in the 1940s, as the only one I knew by that name was the character from Doom Patrol. ORDWAY: Yeah, that’s probably the character most fans remembered. The good thing for me as a fan was that I bought all
the DC books from, I guess the mid-1970s, when they were doing the reprints in the books when all the titles were 48 pages for 25 cents. To fill up those extra pages they used reprints of some pretty obscure stuff. That was good for me as a fan, because it filled me in on characters that I never even knew existed, many of them drawn by artists I loved. The “Johnny Quick” reprints had artwork by Mort Meskin, and that was kind of cool. I think Roy gave those 1940s characters new life, just by developing them into a team where Johnny Quick was being kind of a smart-ass, The Shining Knight was a sort-of cross between Captain America and Thor in a way, and Robotman being annoyed by pretty much all the rest of them. There was a similar dynamic to what Roy had done in those inherited mid-1960s Avengers characters before he either created or settled on his own semi-regular bunch of heroes, many of whom were not the ones that Stan [Lee] had passed on to Roy. RA: I don’t think a lot of people realize that the Hawkman and Hawkgirl of the 1940s and the Hawkman and Hawkgirl of the 1960s on through 1986 were quite different from each other, no matter how alike their costumes looked. ORDWAY: Oh, yeah. And all the 1940s characters that appeared in All-Star on a regular basis were characters that hadn’t been carried on or reinvented by DC in the Silver or Bronze Ages. The 1940s Hawkman was a reincarnation character, whose powers came from ancient Egypt. The Hawkman of the 1960s was a Thanagarian police officer—an alien from another planet. I think that the Egyptianbased, reincarnated Hawkman of the All-Star Squadron came in when people, readers, were becoming interested or re-interested in
“Something Different Or Distinct From The Justice Society...”
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Roy also did something with Plastic Man that I don’t think had been done with him before. In one story, Roy had Plastic Man change himself into a duplicate of Winston Churchill to foil an assassination plot. In effect, giving Plastic Man shape-shifting powers. I was inking the strip at that point and I remember thinking, “Wow! I didn’t know Plastic Man could do that!” Still, it kinda made sense that he could. [chuckles] RA: Well, Plastic Man had impersonated inanimate objects before, things like tables, chairs and lamps. ORDWAY: Yes, but drawing a hero impersonating someone else so that impersonation looks close enough to a viewer to be mistaken for the actual person is different from impersonating a chair. [chuckles] That chair will never be as detailed as that person. When I started on All-Star Squadron, I was the finisher, which is an amped-up version of an inker. I started working over rough
All-Star Six-Pack This commission piece by Jerry O. seems to have been printed like a comicbook page. It features three of the actual Golden Age, non-JSA heroes that writer Roy Thomas wound up playing up the most: Liberty Belle, Johnny Quick, and Robotman—alongside Dr. Fate, The Atom, and Hourman (the latter, by the time of the events of the 1980s comic, was no longer a JSA member). Thanks to Jerry for permission to reprint this image. [TM & © DC Comics.]
things like reincarnation and archeology again. Probably from the Indiana Jones movies. RA: The first Indiana Jones movie—Raiders of the Lost Ark—and the first issue of All-Star Squadron came out at almost the same time. ORDWAY: Those notions of mystical objects that still hold massive power today became a very popular story hook for writers in a very short period of time. The 1940s DC characters were much more in the vein of being archeologists and fortune-hunters/adventurers than the average 1970s characters were. RA: A lot of those 1940s characters got their inspirations from pulps like The Shadow and comic strips like Terry and the Pirates. ORDWAY: Those same sources influenced the 1930s-1940s movie serials as well. Including Plastic Man in the group, who was originally from an entirely different company altogether, was, I think, a nice move. [NOTE: Quality Comics Group. —RA.] He was kind of a wacky character—kind of the comedy relief in All-Star.
Watching Him Like A Hawk, Man (Above:) A sketch of the Golden Age Hawkman by Jerry Ordway—apparently drawn in 1981, when he was “merely” inking and embellishing All-Star Squadron. (Right:) The Silver Age Hawkman has, since the events of Crisis on Infinite Earths in 1985-86, become the official “look” of the character, with a one-beaked helmet and a hawk emblem on his chest. While the original Winged Wonder was an archeologist, the one introduced in 1961 was a scientist from the planet Thanagar. Thanks to JO. [Hawkman TM & © DC Comics.]
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Part Four
The ALL-STAR SQUADRON Covers That Never Were— Till Now! A One-Fan (And Multiple-Artist) Project by John Joshua A/E EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION: I (that’s Roy, of course) had long assumed that the 70 or so covers that original editor Len Wein or later I myself had overseen for DC’s 1981-87 All-Star Squadron series were the only ones ever commissioned related to that particular concept. Imagine my surprise in 2020 when my longtime correspondent Ray Bottorff, Jr., sent me samples of a whole slew of imaginative “faux covers” that had been posted online, which picked up the numbering of the actual series after #67 (and of the Annuals after #3) and assumed the magazine had never been canceled and replaced with The Young All-Stars on the heels of Crisis on Infinite Earths. I quickly contacted the mental progenitor of all those covers, one John Joshua, and was delighted that he and the talented artists (a few of them longtime pros) involved would allow Alter Ego to print them, beginning in this issue. And we thank DC Comics in advance for its presumed indulgence in understanding that this is totally a fan homage for the fun of it, not an attempt by anyone to usurp trademarks or copyrights (which are rendered for DC in any event). Alas, we had room this time around for only the initial handful of these wonderful faux covers… but we plan, going forward, to stick a new batch of them into each and every issue of A/E where we can find the space, till they’ve all seen print! Meanwhile, here’s John Joshua himself on the subject….
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lending super-hero action, real history, and a strict adherence to Golden Age comics continuity, Roy Thomas’ All-Star Squadron has been my favorite series for forty years. Since DC wasn’t doing anything with the property in 2018 (or for years beforehand), I thought it was about time someone picked up the baton—and it might as well be me. I’d commissioned a few covers from artists, both professional and amateur, on other subjects prior to this, but I knew I wanted to do something special with this project. After some thought, I came up with the following rules: First, I’d assume the Squadron’s adventures would continue without being affected by the Crisis on Infinite Earths (as it was on our Earth), and with the heroes who were thereby removed from continuity (Superman, Batman and Robin, Aquaman, et al.) still in place; Second, not only would the team’s ranks include all the DC/ All-American and Quality Comics heroes either published or set in the World War II years, but the roster would also include the Fawcett characters, Charlton’s retroactively-wartime martial artist Judomaster (actually created in the 1960s), and the post-Crisis heroes and villains created for The Young All-Stars; Third, each and every commission would adapt the cover of some comicbook issue written, plotted, or scripted by Roy—for any
All-Star Squadron #112 Wait—hold it right there! Maybe it’d be best if you read John Joshua’s text before you peek at the image above. Oops—probably too late! Well, actually, we’re jumping the gun a bit here by showcasing this out-oforder (and colored) “faux cover” among the many commissioned by John to “continue” the World War II adventures of the All-Stars… or at least, the types of covers that might have accompanied such a continuation. In this case, actual All-Star Squadron veteran artist Rick Hoberg drew this one, an homage to John Buscema & George Klein’s for that of The Avengers #56 (Sept. 1968)—here with the emphasis on The Star-Spangled Kid and Stripesy. Colored by Ron Shalda. Pretty intriguing stuff, right? Okay—now read the article! [Characters TM & © DC Comics.]
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John Joshua’s One-Fan (And Multiple-Artist) Project
publisher—and it would be rendered in black-&-white, although a few might be colored later; Fourth, there would be regular “Altered Egos” spotlight issues, roughly every 8-10 outings, in which Jonathan (Tarantula) Law sits down with one of his fellow heroes to take notes for his post-war book that would take that name, as seen in various issues of Squadron. Initially, I saw this as a mechanism to use covers from the books Roy had written featuring solo characters, but over time that requirement fell away; Fifth, no artist would produce two consecutive issues; and Finally (and this is just a personal quirk), I had to know, at least in outline, what the underlying story for the issue was, rather than just creating random covers. I wanted to create my own continuity, and by doing so map out enough long-term plots that I could foreshadow upcoming events and stories. No pressure, eh? When I started, this was just for my own entertainment; but I soon began to share them in a few Facebook groups devoted to the JSA, and somewhat to my surprise they seemed to be quite popular. In 2020 a member of one of these groups shared a few of the covers with Roy, who was kind enough to e-mail me to say that he liked
what I was doing, and would I be interested in having some of them, alongside an article, featured in Alter Ego? I couldn’t say yes fast enough. A dozen of the earliest faux covers saw print in Michael Eury’s Back Issue magazine (#112, June 2019), but for this piece and subsequent ones they will be presented in numerical order, whether or not they were featured there. As I type these words, we’re currently up to a faux cover for All-Star Squadron #137—and there’ll probably be a few more completed by the time this first installment sees print. Meanwhile, if you want to view them online, you can visit my Comic Art Fans page at https://www.comicartfans.com/ galleryroom.asp?gsub=190068. Has this project been a success? Obviously, only the reader/ viewer can decide that – but it’s certainly given me a newfound appreciation for the All-Star Squadron and the complexities which Roy faced in writing their adventures. I’m not a professional writer, and I’m sure I’ve taken the team in directions which Roy wouldn’t have—but I hope I’ve done his creation justice. Oh, and a special tip of my hat to Rob Shalda, who colored the three faux covers which have been rendered into color hereafter. Now, let’s get started, beginning with “All-Star Squadron #67”….
Presenting—The Faux ALL-STAR SQUADRON Covers (All Heroes & Villains on next 4 pages TM & © DC Comics)
#68: Art by Ian Richardson; homage to Fantastic Four #158 (Rich Buckler & Al Milgrom). In the aftermath of Crisis on Infinite Earths, the newly expanded Squadron faces an attack by Spectre foe Kulak—or do they?
#69: Art by Brendon & Brian Fraim; homage to X-Men #90 (John Buscema). Five heroes must save FDR from the new Black Assassin! Plus—the final fate of the mystery-man known as The King!
#70: Art by Christopher Ivy; homage to The Avengers #75 (John Buscema & Tom Palmer). Wonder Woman and her fellow super-heroines attack the Justice Society, as the “All-Star War” begins!
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Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!
It’s a Cracked, Cracked, Cracked, Cracked World! by Michael T. Gilbert
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reviously, the Comic Crypt explored a bitter feud between the early Mad magazine and a gaggle of cheap imitations with names like Frenzy, Loco, Panic, Fooey, Frantic, Crazy, Lunatickle, Thimk, and Zany. Said feud was instigated by a snarky Mad article pretending to teach their imitators how best to copy Mad. None of these clones lasted longer than a fly’s lifespan--with one exception. Robert’s Sproul’s Cracked Mazagine [sic] not only survived…it thrived! The magazine lasted 365 issues plus countless spin-offs and specials over a period of over forty years! So why did Cracked succeed when so many others failed? In a word… Mad. Or more to the point, Mad’s leftovers. Before we continue, a quick history lesson may be in order. In 1956 Mad creator (and satirical genius) Harvey Kurtzman gave EC Comics publisher Bill Gaines an ultimatum: “Give me 51% and controlling interest of Mad or I’ll walk!”
Look Mom—No Originality! (Above:) Cracked wasn’t the only Mad clone. It was inevitable they and Mad would sometimes parody the same subject. (Top Left:) Norman Rockwell illustrated Crest toothpaste’s famous “Look, Mom—No Cavities!” ad from 1958. (Top Right:) A Kelly Freas Crest parody from Mad #43 (Dec. 1958). [Mad page TM & © EC Publications, Inc.; other ad TM & © the respective copyright holders.]
Here, Either! (Above Left:) Another Rockwell Crest ad. (Above Right:) A few months after Mad’s Crest satire, Charlton’s This Magazine Is Crazy also parodied one in Vol. 4, #8 (March 1959). Artist unknown. [Real ad TM & © the respective copyright holders; Crazy page © the respective copyright holders.]
What, Me Moonlight? How To Put Out “How To Put Out An Imitation Of Mad” (Above:) The intro page from Mad #43 (Dec. 1958), featuring “How to Put Out an Imitation of Mad.” It stirred up a hornets’ nest among the competition, which probably delighted Gaines and crew! [TM & © EC Publications, Inc.]
(Left:) A supposedly “rejected” John Severin cover idea, featuring the back of you-know-who, as published in Cracked #21 (Sept. 1961). [TM & © Cracked Entertainment or successors in interest.]
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Fawcett Behaving MADly The Truth About Lunatickle by Ger Apeldoorn
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hen I wrote my Eisner Award-nominated 2017 book IF YOU ENJOYED THIS PREVIEW, about Mad magazine imitations Behaving with CLICK THE LINK TO Madly ORDER THIS Craig Yoe, we had a small hiccup at the last moment. We ISSUE IN PRINT OR DIGITAL FORMAT! had carefully checked all the copyrights for the 160-page reprint section, but when the files were already in China to be printed we discovered that everything to do with the publisher Whitestone had to be removed because the copyrights were renewed by Fawcett in the mid-1960s as part of a company-wide copyright renewal of all their titles. This was a shame, because I had included in the book about twenty pages from the Whitestone titles Cuckoo, Cockeyed, and Lunatickle. They contained material by Joe Kubert, Lee Elias, Ross Andru, Mike Sekowsky, and editor Myron Fass. We were still allowed to use single illustrations from the Whitestone publications in the lengthy dossier section describing all of these Mad magazine imitators chronologically, but it had to fall in the category of “reasonable representation.” ALTER EGO #175
Lunatickle’s editor was an unlikely candidate: Myron Fass—a master of many trades, but doing none of them very well. He started out as an artist who did comics for a wide range of publishers in the late ’40s and early ’50s. By the mid-’50s Fass had moved on to editing and publishing. Lunatickle may have been his first editing job, and certainly was his cleanest one, as he soon moved into genres of increasingly outrageous sleaze, gore, and eventual soft-porn. It has always amazed me how big a connection there was between satire and so called “men’s magazines,” with many of the Mad-imitation publishers also being involved in sleaze and soft-porn and, on the higher end of the ladder, newsstand magazines such as Playboy and everything down from that always had some humor or satire in between the smut pics. The biggest link between Whitestone and Fawcett was in that same area. Looking at copyright lists, I found that Whitestone
Spotlighting the artists of ROY THOMAS’ 1980s DC series
SQUADRON! artists ARVELL“The JONES, Although I hated to loseALL-STAR all these greatInterviews storieswith (including RICHARD HOWELL, and JERRY ORDWAY, conducted by Horrible Comic Story behind the Horror Story Comic Books!”— RICHARD ARNDT! Plus, the Squadron’s FINAL SECRETS, including previously unpublished art, & covers of for issues that never Lee Elias and Jack Mendelsohn’s 10-page take-down the horror existed! With FCA, MICHAEL T. GILBERT, and a wraparound industry in Lunatickle #2, which I had cleaned up cover by ARVELLpainstakingly JONES! myself), I was quietly vindicated, because I had suspected all along (84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $10.95 that Whitehouse was owned by Fawcett! (Digital Edition) $4.99 https://twomorrows.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=133&products_id=1647
Initially, the evidence for this was completely circumstantial. It started with the fact that Lunatickle was obviously made with a lot of money. While some of the Mad imitations were cheap and quickly done, the two issues of Lunatickle had only the best writers and artists, and paid them enough to let them do their best work.
Ger Apeldoorn is flanked by (on left) the 2017 coffee table art book of Mad magazine imitators, Behaving Madly, which he wrote with publisher Craig Yoe—and the cover of Whitestone/ Fawcett’s Lunatickle #1 (Feb. 1956), with cover by Bob Bean, who had recently worked with and for fellow Lunatickle artist Joe Kubert on St. John’s Meet Miss Pepper comicbook. [TM & © the respective copyright holders.]