Generic Post #1

Standard introductory sentence for Generic Comic Book - Type: Super-Hero Action-Adventure. Published in 1984 by Generic Publisher #2, Generic Comic Book #1 was written and drawn by uncredited generic creators. 

(Note that this was back when generic products first started showing up in supermarkets with similar plain white labels)

Typical semi-obscure revelation as to the writer - Steve Skeates confessed just over a decade ago.

Generic Comic Book (GCB) starred a man. Our hero is an average joe working in a boring office job who one day has a strange encounter with radiation, as had so many before him...

Our hero tries to go about his normal daily life...

...and soon...

That night, he heads out on his first patrol...

His new powers allow him to easily deal with the thugs on the street, but then - his first supervillain shows up...

Left bruised and battered by the encounter, he tries to shake it off and lose himself in his daily routine...

...later, on his way home for the day..

...and that night, he returns to action and finds the thugs he'd beaten previously now serving the villain who took him down...

And so the generic origin of our generic hero comes to a generic end.

page art by generic artists for Generic Comic Book #1 (1984)

And So Flip Goes Spinning Through Space To Face The Great Unknown!

"Will Flip be forced to mate with the Insect Queen of Mercury?"

When we ended the previous post with that question, you had to know we weren't going to leave it unanswered, right? Let us return to Fantastic Comics for the final two episodes of Don Rico's initial run on Flip Falcon In The Fourth Dimension for the answer -

It's unknown who took over the art chores on Flip. Don returned for a few issues the following year. And he brought Lucifer back with him...

page art by Don Rico from Fantastic Comics #s 7 & 8 (1940)

Somewhere Out There Lucifer Is Going Crazy

As noted last time, my favorite strip in Fantastic Comics was Flick/Flip Falcon by "Orville Wells" - another rather obvious pseudonym, as with Professor Fiend's "Boris Plaster".

I don't know who wrote it, but in the beginning it was drawn by the late Don Rico, an artist whose name might not be too well known now since he died back in '85. But, as well as being one of the greats of the industry back in the old days, his influence is still being felt today. In fact, he's one of the credited writers for the upcoming Black Widow movie.

And he was there at the dawn of comics with this series launching back in 1939 -

Yeah - i was hooked pretty instantly on this one. 

With his return to Mars, he and Adele learn that there was more to the story than Flick realized in his first encounter -
 

The next few issues wrap things up and then expand the boundaries of the series. First they follow through on that last panel, meeting the real Martians...
 

...and then working to overcome the invaders.
The fight to free Mars is a quick one. Flick does his Lemuel Carter routine...
 

 ...and Adele impersonates a goddess to save the day...

After a quick name change from Flick to Flip and an accidental side trip through time on the way home, they start to explore the neighborhood...

...with a bit of savagely dated social commentary, deftly deflected by our hero...
 

...and, honestly, i'm not quite sure what to think about how the final battle ends...
 

Just why is that creature pouncing on it's dead mate? Let's all be glad the camera moved on...

And then things started to get weird -

In the next issue, Flip took his first trip to Mercury. Again.
Um...  different Mercury? Like, above he went to "the planet called Mercury" and next time he's going to actual Mercury? Did we switch writers? Was Venus not hot enough? Will Flip be forced to mate with the Insect Queen of Mercury?

Yeah, that's an actual question.

page art by Don Rico from Fantastic Comics #s 1-3, 5, & 6 (1939, 1940)