Blue Monday Calendar 2018 Week 50

This week's lovely painting by Gil Elvgren is from 1953 - Sheer Nonsense -

art by Gil Elvgren, of course (1953)

Stellar Tribulations

Did everyone enjoy yesterday's Hide & Seek edition of Friday Fun & Games?

Yeah, still trying to get my peripatetic mind to wander back this way. We'll get there. Xmas is coming - that'll give it something to focus on here, eh?

Meanwhile, let's jump back a few days and revisit that issue of Rocket's Blast ComicCollector from which we pulled Don & Bill's Star Wars/Oz comparison. Star Wars, as you might recall, was making a big splash back in 1977 and unsurprisingly that was not the only reference in that issue. In fact, we got a short comic tale from Ron Wilber, whose work we've seen previously in Twilight Of The Heroes.
Wait - Did we get to that before the crash? Hmm...
If not, we'll go there soon.

For now, here's Ron's Star Woes from RBCC #139. Due to word size and density, these pages are a tad larger than usual for easier reading -

Actually, RBCC #139 was a Star Wars Special Issue, so there's plenty of other SW material, including artwork from Ralph Fowler, Steve Fabian, and others as well as a Mark Hamill interview. If i can get my brain to cooperate, we'll peek a bit more at the issue this weekend.

page art by Ronald Wilber for RBCC #139 (1977)

Before Ant Boy! - The Agony And The Ants

A quarter century before Ant Boy! burst  up from the hill, there was another human friend to the ants. The writing credit for The Ant-Agonizing Boy is uncertain - possibly Joe Gill? Artwork is by Rocco Mastroserio, whom we have seen previously exploring life from other worlds. Here's their view of life hidden within our own planet...

For those who cannot rest until they know - The Ant Agonizing Boy appeared in, and on the cover of, Mysteries Of Unexplored Worlds #29 in 1962:

Does that help Ant Boy! seem any less strange?

page art by Rocco Mastroserio for Mysteries Of Unknown Worlds #29 (1962)

Ant Boy - The Origin!

Okay - enough clamoring for more information on Matt Feazell's odd little Ant Boy and how such a thing came to be. (Or was that just the voices in my head?)

Here we have it - the epic two-part origin of our Formicidaean Hero -

And yes, as the closing note indicated, he did get a solo title - only two issues featuring mostly reprints from Captain Confederacy, but still...   not bad for an ant.

pages by Matt Feazell for Captain Confederacy #s 6 & 7 (1987)

The Wicked Sith Of The West

One of these days we'll finally get to The Pertwillaby Papers, Don Rosa's old comic from the Rocket's Blast ComicCollector. But, for the moment, let's jump back to 1977 when the first Star Wars movie was released. Here's a lovely observational piece from Don, aided & abetted by William Fugate:

Slowly getting back on track...

page art by Don Rosa and William Fugate for RBCC #139 (1977)

Blue Monday Calendar 2018 - The Missing Weeks

This week's calendar is appearing on The Other Voice Of ODD! due to the ... unabashed nature of the image.

But we've missed quite a few weeks, and we certainly wouldn't want to miss out on the lovely paintings of Gil Elvgren that should have appeared, so here they are. 

Week 36

A Polished Performance (1964)

Week 37

Aiming To Please (Shoving Off) 1960)

Week 38

Pleasant To Si (1969)

Week 39

In The Red (1950)

Week40

Charmaine (1957)

Week41

Net Results (1941)

Week42

Spotty Performance (Occupational Hazard; Stenographer) (1962)

Week43

Cold Feet (Cold Front) (1958)

Week44

The Finishing Touch (1960)

Week45

Waisted Effort (1950)

Week46

It's A Snap (Pretty Snappy, Snap Judgment) (1958)

Week47

Eye Catcher (1969)

Week48

Doctor, Are All Those Fellows Interns?
(September check-ups are the way to keep yourself in shape.
But too many cooks can spoil the broth, and too many doctors - gape.) (1946)

all art by the great Gil Elvgren, of course (see captions for years)

The Adventures Of Ant-Man When He Was A Boy?

Oh, no - that would be too easy. Too... sane.
And an entirely different sort of Odd, given that over a half century back we saw that Hank took his first trip down the anthill as an adult.

And yet...  Ant Boy!

From Matt Feazell, the mad genius who brought us Cynical Man and Anti-Social Man (true Hermit heroes!), and scholarly author of Understanding MiniComics, comes the tale of "an abandoned child raised by ants!?". Ant Boy got his full sized comic debut in Captain Confederacy #1 (Shetterly & Stone's great alternate history comic that's been on the topic list for ages)

Here are three short strips, his 2nd-4th adventures:

Have a day.

it's all by Matt Feazell from Captain Confederacy #s 1 & 3-5 (1986-7)

Hugh Mann - Still Impossible

Let's try this again, shall we?
Maybe this time the universe will allow us to continue...

We peeked once before at Hugh Mann - The Impossible Man from Earth living on another world. For a simple post today, let's revisit Hugh. This tale comes from Captain Wizard #1 featuring a much earlier edition of a later famus villain - Electro.

Now let's see if i'm allowed to keep posting. Tune in tomorrow...

page art by Charles Voight for Captain Wizard #1 (1946)