Favourite Comics: Thrilling Adventure Stories #2

During the 1970’s comic book newcomers Atlas/Seaboard stormed on to the spinner racks with no less than 23 colour comic titles and 5 black and white "adult-orientated" mags. Despite the many problems the company faced they did produce some decent books with arguably their best title being the black and white anthology magazine “Thrilling Adventure Stories” (TAS), in particular issue 2 of that title. While the first issue of TAS was a good attempt the title exploded with its second and sadly final issue with some wonderful strips by the top writers and artists of the day all wrapped up in the above wonderful Neal Adams cover. Below are a few pages from what I consider to be one of the best black and white magazines of the 1970’s and beyond.

Above: The splash page from perhaps the most famous of all the stories in this issue by the legendary "Manhunter" team of Archie Goodman and Walt Simonson (which I may shown more of later)

Above: The magazines only returning character from TAS #1 "Kromag" by Gabriel Levy with art by Jack Sparling. Although Sparling wasn't one of the top hot comic artists at this time, this was a pretty decent strip.

Above: 2 pages from the John Albano and Russ Heath tale "Tough Cop" - Heath at this time never failed to produce anything less than jaw dropping art.

Above: 2 pages from "Town Tamer" by Steve Mitchell and the wonderful John Severin. Second page image from Comic Art Collectors ( I deleted my image in error after scanning and I'm too lazy to scan it again lol ).

Above: "A job well done" by Rick Meyer and Alex Toth. This was a pretty grim and gritty tale even for the 1970's expertly drawn by Toth who added some nice touches including not using word ballons.

Above: The cover to the first issue of "Thrilling Adventure Stories" by Ernie Colon.

This issue wasn't quite the end of TAS as in 2021 a third issue (of sorts) of "Thrlling Adventure Stories" was published featuring text stories of Targitt 2021/ Man Hunter and Bog Beast by Jeff Rovin, John Albano and Richard Meyers. Cover image from Amazon.

Page Turners: The double page splash page - Buscema, Adams , Steranko, Kirby and others

One of the many things that made US comics so special back in the day was when they featured a double page spread. Below are a selection of some of my favourites to go along with the above classic from John Buscema from "Avengers Annual" #2 (September 1968) sadly I do not own that issue but the above page is taken from the Avengers Epic collection - enjoy:

Above: "Captain America Special Edition" #1 by Jim Steranko - This was originally published in "Captain America" # 113 and reprinted in the 1980's in the excellent two issue "Captain America Special Edition".

Above: "Conan the Barbarian" #16 (July 1972) by Barry Smith

Above: Jack Kirby - Originally published in "Fantastic Four Annual" # 6

Above: "Our Army at War" #253 by Russ Heath.

Above: "Avengers" #93 by Neal Adams - Probably my all time favourite double page spread.

Above: Detective Comics #526 by Don Newton and Alfredo Alcala

Above: "Not Brand Echh" #13 (May 1969)by Marie Severin.

Page Turners: Russ Health's (mini) Marvel Dracula Portfolio

Marvel's original foray into the black & white magazine format was with the wonderful "Savage Tales" #1 in May 1971. However, this was not an immediate success as the second issue took more than 2 years to produce when it was eventually published in October 1973. Thankfully Marvel reconsidered the black and white magazine market and produced no less than four horror magazines along with a revived "Savage Tales" magazine in 1973. The first of the black and white horror magazine to be launched was "Dracula Lives" in June 1973 no doubt chosen because of the success of the excellent "Tomb of Dracula" colour monthly. Although the first b&w issue only contained around 35 pages (out of 72) of original material it's success meant that more all new marterial would soon follow and some of it was horrifically wonderful as can be seen by the stunning Russ Heath Dracula protfolio that appeared in "Dracula Lives" #13

Sadly interest in horror and the black and white magazines started to wane and "Dracula Lives" #13 (1975) was the last issue. In the UK a weekly comic called "Dracual Lives" managed an impressive 87 issue run (October 1974 to July 1975) featuring tales from the colour monthly before merging with "Planet of the Apes" (with #88) and then appearing in the "Mighty World of Marvel".

Bring on the back ups - Vampire Tales issue 9 - Blood Lunge - by Russ Heath /Doug Moench

Continuing with the Halloween theme this time I focus on Marvel’s "Vampire Tales" magazine which ran for 11 issues and one annual, over the period 1973 to June 1975. The magazine featured various tales of horror based characters including Morbius, the Living Vampire, Blade the Vampire Slayer, Lilith, Dracula's daughter, and Satana, the Devil's Daughter (an amazing 4 page tale of Satana by Roy Thomas and John Romita Sr is shown here ). But it was a short vampire story by Dough Moench and Russ Heath from Vampire Tales issue 9 (December 1974) that has always stuck out in my memory. A nice tale taken to a different level by the genius of artist Russ Heath.

This story was originally printed in the wrong order in Vampire Tales issue 9 with the second page (above) being published as the fourth story Page. This was rectified when the story was reprinted in the first (and only) Vampire Tales annual in 1975.

Vampire Tales held a special place in my teenage nightmares as it featured a story that genuinely freaked me out. The tale “Where is Gallows Bend…?” written by Don McGregor and illustrated by Tom Sutton from issue 7 featured a few pages where a man is hung , the last page (below) of that story really shocked me when I saw it, but 14 years old me loved it !

Bring on the back-ups: Creepy 105 – Russ Heath magic

The first time I saw Russ Heath’s art was not on a comic strip, instead it was one of his many commercial advertising jobs where he drew those now famous Roman and Revolutionary War scenes advertising toy soldiers. These full page adverts appeared on the back page of many US comics in the 1960s and early 1970’s but at that time I had no idea who it was that drew these ads until many years later.

Among comic book fans Russ Heath (1926- 2018) was best known for his detailed art on western, adventure and war comics primarily for DC where he co-created with Robert Kanigher, the “Haunted Tank” strip (“GI Combat” issue 87) and drew the underwater adventure comic “Sea Devils” and various mystery comics. However, it was his work on DC's “Our Army at War” where he drew some Sgt Rock stories that I first became aware of his stunning artwork. As good as Heath’s art was on colour comics it was in the black and white field that he seemed to excel producing some of the his and comics best art. One of my favourites of his black and white strips was on the Nicola Cuti written tale “Dime Novel Hero” that appeared in the Warren black and white magazine “Creepy” issue 105 from December 1978. Enjoy the work of a genuine comic book master and one of comics best ever illustrators of werewolves (possibly only bettered by the late great Neal Adams) .

“Creepy” issue 105 from December 1978. – A fantastic issue that not only featured the above strip but also had a wonderfully illustrated John Severin tale “ Visit to a primitive planet” that I may show at some point.