“Yesterday’s” Comic> Space Adventures #42

I’ve never seen someone so bored while flying a pretty girl through outer space.

Space Adventures vol 3 #42

Charlton Comics Group (October, 1961)

While not the last issue in this series, this is the last issue to feature Captain Atom before he got his own comic. While I’m slightly curious about Mercury Man from a later issue, DC didn’t grab him and I’ve pretty much never liked reading this series. So maybe some other day I’ll look into him for the curiosity, but I’m done reviewing this snoozefest of a comic. The fact that I got to skip an issue because Captain Atom wasn’t in it doesn’t hurt my feelings, either.

[Read along with me here]

“The Saucer Scare”

Our first Captain Atom story. A flying saucer attacks an unmanned bomber plane in flight. Wanting to make sure this isn’t the first step in an intergalactic war, Captain Adam takes a new plane up to investigate but has to chase them off as Captain Atom. This might have been a more interesting story if it had time to be developed properly. We don’t know why the aliens attacked, so we don’t know if Atom was proven right.

“They Said He Would Die”

Our Captain Atomless story for the issue and the last one I’ll have to put up with. It’s Earth’s first flight to Jupiter, because apparently we didn’t know it was a gas planet in the 1960s? Everything turns out happy without even trying. It’s just kind of lame, which is par for the course with this anthology unfortunately.

“The Man In Saturn’s Moon”

Our remaining stories feature our hero before moving to his own comic. The elder statesman of not-called-Russia wants to end the Cold War and have peace, so his political enemies shove him into a satellite bound for Saturn. This is a level of “just go with it” right out of Space Ghost as sound travels through space, Captain Atom can now phase through objects, and one leader can end communism in his country despite not being the president or of similar rank. Okay. I would have accepted it if the story were interesting, but it isn’t.

“The Silver Lady From Venus” by Steve Ditko

Our final story…and the last one I’ll have to suffer through, has  the good Captain pursue a woman from Venus causing mischief by taking over the minds of American missile workers and nudging them into failing with her beauty. Captain Atom’s solution isn’t shipping her back to Venus because it’s “not possible at the moment”. This from a guy who has carried a kid who warped into some unknown part of outer space home even though his body was still on Earth. So he pulls a trick out of Mr. Scott’s playbook by dropping her off behind the Iron Curtain. If she’s going to cause trouble, do it to the commies. Victory?

overall

I mentioned the old Space Ghost TV show earlier. While science was iffy on that cartoon as well, it was a Saturday morning cartoon for kids and were far more interesting stories, better setting up the conflicts and resolutions than anything Space Adventures ever pulled off while I was reading it. I’m worried this will continue into early Captain Atom adventures, but at least I’m done with this series until my curiosity about this Mercury Man comes in and why he didn’t get a spot in the DC universe.