Friday, January 10, 2020

Features to Fire Up Your Facilities for Fun!

Hey, Kids! Comics from 50 Years Ago!
January 6 & 8, 1970




















Groovy Age Splash Page of the Week

Art by Jack Kirby and Mike Royer

Groovy Age Spotlight On...
Christopher Mills' Atomic Action Comics!
If you're like Ol' Groove, the above ad is a real grabber. We all miss comics made in the Groovy Age style. We long for the clean art, the fun storytelling, done-in-one stories that you could jump in on without having to search the Internet for a decade's worth of backstory before the mag you just bought could make any sense. Many an indie publisher promises and tries to do comics like they used to make 'em--but Christopher Mills and the Atomic Action gang have succeeded, baby!

Ol' Groove has purchased, read, and re-read all three of the Atomic Action mags that have been released so far (all pictured in the ad above) and I truly dig 'em, Groove-ophiles! They really do read like mags from the Groovy Age, the art really does look like art from the Groovy Age, the ads and editorial material really do give it all an authentic Groovy Age vibe! If the mags were on newsprint (an impossibility for small-press undertaking such as this, alas), you'd swear they came from the Groovy Age!


Mills' idea was pure, simple, genius: take PD characters from the Golden Age, create stories about them as if they'd been continuously published into the 1970s! THESE Atomic Action mags "are" the books that were published in the 70s!

Christopher Mills, a pro for 30 or so years has surrounded himself with other pros like Rick Burchett, Matt Webb, Peter Grau, Nik Poliwko, Joe Staton (!), and many others, to bring this dream project to life. Oh, and besides the three titles in the ad (Space Crusaders #'s 1-2 and Sleuth Comics #1--available RIGHT NOW at Indyplanet, by the way), Mills and company have several more titles and characters in the works as this pin-up by Rick Hoberg shows us...

Yep, besides Rex Dexter, Spacehawk, and The Owl, be on the lookout for "70s" updates of Crom the Barbarian, Cave Girl, Black Terror, The Heap, Miss Fury, and other Golden Age titans! For more info, get thee to Atomic Action Comics right now! And tell 'em Ol' Groove sent ya! See ya next week, Groove-ophiles! Pax!

9 comments:

  1. Action Atomic comics look amazing so I'll be getting a few of these. AA reminds me of the 70s Atlas comics although these look better produced. The house ad is very reminiscent of Atlas as well, which may have been intentional)

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    1. I'm pretty sure the house ad was inspired by the old Atlas/Seaboard ad, McScotty. Great catch! And Christopher and the gang will certainly appreciate your patronage! :D I'm sure you won't be disappointed!

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  2. Yo, Groove. That Mr. Miracle splash should've been saved for the end of this year. The indicia gives away that this was a winter 1970-71 release (cover dated March-April '71). You goofed.

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    1. Sorry for the confusion, hobbyfan, but only the covers in the "Hey Kids! Comics!" section are from 50 years ago--the splashes and spotlighted stuff are all random, just whatever I feel like posting. It'll all make sense (hopefully) as we mosey along.

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  3. GROOVY 1968-76 was my Golden Age of Comics! Happy to see your back!

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  4. I own the Aquaman comic with Jim Aparo on the lead feature & Neal Adams on one or his three Deadman backups which tied up loose ends in the prematurely cancelled original series.

    I also own House of Mystery 185. Great Adams cover, and a fine Al Williamson story (with uncredited background assists by Mike Kaluta) called "The Beautiful Beast." What's really interesting about the opening page of that 1969 story is the character's uncanny resemblance to Indiana Jones.

    Great Adams cover on Superboy. He was in top form in those days. And any Kubert war cover is always worth a close look.

    As for the "new" stuff helped by Mills & company, all the best to them! I remember when he was editing Mike Hammer or some such noir detective material for Tekno Comics in the early '90s.

    Regards,

    Chris A.

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  5. I had the Archie & Archie's TV Laugh Out issues. I think I had one Millie the Model issue.

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  6. I'll have to check out the Atomic Action comics. Thanks for the heads up. That House of Mystery had a beautiful Al Williamson story and the Thor was Kirby inked by Everett. Double yym.

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Special thanks to Mike's Amazing World of Comics and Grand Comics Database for being such fantastic resources for covers, dates, creator info, etc. Thou art treasures true!


Note to "The Man": All images are presumed copyright by the respective copyright holders and are presented here as fair use under applicable laws, man! If you hold the copyright to a work I've posted and would like me to remove it, just drop me an e-mail and it's gone, baby, gone.


All other commentary and insanity copyright GroovyAge, Ltd.

As for the rest of ya, the purpose of this blog is to (re)introduce you to the great comics of the 1970s. If you like what you see, do what I do--go to a comics shop, bookstore, e-Bay or whatever and BUY YOUR OWN!