Retro-Modern Sunday Morning Funnies (on Sunday!)

Modern times require modern heroes. No matter how deranged the times. In a world where characters like Rambo have twisted the definition of "Hero" into "the psychopath who kills people we don't like" pretty much anything goes. But, that's not entirely new.

Let's jump back about 80 years to find someone to embody our times - Alibi Alice.
Ruth Leslie brings us a potential president with the motto "She Fibs" -

Alice had only 3 adventures, but i've never seen the first issue of Superworld, so the first one remains a mystery.

Meanwhile, also back in 1940, long before society exploded into dot com and dot net and dot this, that & the other...  Looy already staked out dot dope. (That one's out there now, isn't it?)

...and so it went. Looy was actually around for a fair bit, first appearing in comics back in 1936, usually in Comics On Parade or Tip Top Comics, but he also got his own single issue title in '38. 

Just because i have that obsession for 3s, let's toss in another strip from a few years later (1946), but moving the other way in time - Prehistoric Pete, another short-lived, migrating strip. Pete had at least a half dozen adventures, but was also reprinted several times in multiple countries, so it can be hard to track the exact number. And it's Sunday morning, so let's just get to the comic, eh?

page art by Ruth Leslie, Bernard Dibble, Joe Beck & Otto Eppers for Superworld #s 2 & 3, Comics On Parade #s 25 & 26, and Red Seal Comics # 18 (1940, 1946)

Rarebit Vs. Mincemeat

Two of the most famous early comic strips are from Winsor McCay - Little Nemo In Slumberland and the Dreams Of The Rarebit Fiend.  Both were hugely influential successes, and it's not surprising to find imitators out there.

But some are a little stranger than others, if perhaps not so immediately obviously. Let's look at a knock-off the latter strip - this one entitled Dreams Of The Mince Pie Fiend from this guy calling himself Silas -

Good work capturing the feel, eh? There were only 11 of these done for Superworld Comics. The book folded after only 3 issues, and the series died with it. I've never seen issue #1, so those three episodes are missing. The above four are from issue #2, and here are the rest from the final issue -

So - what makes this imitation comic so much more odd than the others? Silas.

Silas was an alias for Winsor McCay, so he was doing a knock-off of his own work.

No... That's not right. See, i hadn't realized that Silas was the name McCay signed on the original Rarebit Fiend strips because his contract prevented him from using his real name on work for the Evening Telegram. And now there's another story i want to know...

And this was 1940, three decades after the original Rarebit Fiend comics. So, not so much a knock-off as a revival, eh?
 
Too bad the title only lasted 3 issues. It could have been ... (Shut Up, Kor!) ... interesting.

Okay, gonna let the brain go wander now.

page art by 'Silas' McCay for Superworld Comics #s 2 & 3 (1940)