“This was not the right chair for my wood deck.”
Free Comic Book Day: Space Pirate Captain Harlock
Ablaze Publishing (2021)
STORY: Leiji Matsumoto & Jérôme Alquié
ARTIST: Jérôme Alquié
LETTERER: Dezi Sienty
EDITOR: Kevin Ketner
Previously in our “trek” through the sales pitch for the original Star Trek series we saw the concept and met the crew, nothing the changes between what was initially planned and what finally made it to television. In this installment we look at what goes into making a science fiction drama in the 1960s.
When I looked at the sales pitch for the original ThunderCats, they were focuses on the story because it was a cartoon. Everything was going to be drawn. For a live-action series you have to let the money people know how much money is going into pre-production and the actual production, the spending money before hopefully making money. I image the pitch for the animated series don’t have to worry about set pieces and what they cost. The writer’s guides didn’t have to worry about that, either. The writers had to have some idea what the recurring locations looked like, but they weren’t building the sets. We did get a layout of the Enterprise-D bridge in the writer’s guide for Star Trek: The Next Generation.
So we’re about to see in the next few pages just what was planned and considered necessary to build the sets, props, and costumes for this show. I’m not expecting price tags, just a sample of what they’re hoping to get out of it. The end results were limited by their budget and the available effects of the day (the transporter was used because it was cheaper than using the shuttlecraft everytime, which was late the first time they needed it, thus creating the transporter in the first place–don’t expect to see it in the pitch or guide), but we can look at what they wanted versus what they got.
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I’d bother making a joke, but I just can’t get interested in any of this.
Knuckles The Echidna #27
Archie Comics Publications (August, 1999)
WRITER: Ken Penders
LETTERER: Vickie Williams
EDITOR: J.F. Gabrie
“The First Date” part 2: “Who Wrote The Book Of Love Anyway?”
PENCILER: Chris Allan
INKER: Andrew Pepoy
COLORIST: Frank Gagliardo
Mighty The Armadillo: “Those Were The Days”
ARTISTS: Manny Galan & Andrew Pepoy
COLORIST: Barry Grossman
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In the webcomic Moon Freight 3, which sadly is no longer available complete online and I don’t think is still in print (leaving me short the final volume), a cargo inspector and his robot companion inspect cargo going between worlds. At least until his sister invents faster than light travel and he’s out of work. The theme of the comedy strip is just an average person living in the future, seeing how what’s science fiction and amazing to us is no more amazing to him than our microwave or cellphones…and they didn’t even have smartphones when the comic began.
I remember hearing an old Buck Rogers radio drama where Buck and Wilma were all excited about how fast their travel tube was taking them, but I wasn’t convinced it was anything new in their world. It should be like us getting in a car and noting it’s faster than a bicycle. Meanwhile in the Superman radio drama’s first episode, Lara notes how easy it is to visit her neighbor with one leap, since the source of Kal-El’s strength and leaping came from his biology and not a yellow sun. It was an error because the point was Earth’s lighter gravity allowed Superman to “leap tall buildings” back then, but for her it was a simple explanation of something Jor-El would tell her Earthings can’t do. For them the fantastic was just normal.
That’s not what we’re talking about here.
I’ve begun to see that in various ways, the fantastical worlds of science fiction, fantasy, and even the action dramas we loved in the 1970s and 1980s that were so wild and interesting are getting grounded in things like “reality” and “seeing yourself”. While I have nothing against grounded stories or any representation that isn’t just clueless stereotypes and lack of believing in yourself because of “the Man” keeping you down, and there are plenty I enjoy, it shouldn’t replace the more exciting and imaginative worlds that also entertain or could be used to speak on real world issues. Unfortunately, those worlds are now in the hands of people with limited imaginations and the results are actually kind of boring.
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A superhero comic with masks. Not sure that’s a selling point.
Blue Beetle #4
Charlton Comics (December, 1967)
PLOT/ARTIST: Steve Ditko
Blue Beetle: “The Men Of The Mask”
WRITER: D.C. Glanzman
LETTERER: Herb Field
The Question: “Kill Vic Sage”
WRITER: Warren Savin
LETTERER: Bob Agnew
BW Media Spotlight 
BW’s Daily Video> Do These Comics Replace The Classics?
NOTE: cursing by the hosts and stupidity by the article writer
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I totally called All-Star Superman‘s replacement and I was kidding when I did. The radio drama episode it adapts had more historic significance than the adaptation, which I do want to read someday, ever will due to when it came out and the work that went into convincing the company to release it.
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Posted by ShadowWing Tronix on October 17, 2024 in Comic Spotlight, DC Spotlight, Marvel Spotlight and tagged classic comics, Comics By Perch, commentary, Joe Corallo.
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