Number 1724: Star Spangled robots

Today we begin a theme week I’m calling Deceased Comics Week. Postings will come from DC titles no longer being published. Like the other comic book publishers, DC (aka National Comics or Superman DC), published what sold, and if it didn’t they axed it and published something else. The public is fickle, fads come and go, including what comic books sold the most.

First up are two stories, both featuring robots, from Star Spangled Comics #36 (1944, published in an anthology format for 130 issues, from 1941 to 1952 ). The character, Robotman, masqueraded as a human. The feature was drawn by veteran cartoonist Jimmy Thompson. Thompson was a good artist, but in this case it appears he didn’t read the script. Creatures are thawed out of the ice, and the script says they are “mammoths” and ancestors of elephants, but Thompson drew dinosaurs.

The second story features one of the female patriotic heroes of the World War II era, Liberty Belle, created, written and drawn by Chuck Winter and Don Cameron. In the story an inventor creates robot soldiers. Liberty Belle makes a rah-rah speech about Nazi soldiers acting like robots, and that American men, superior because they fight for democracy, should fight. Not robots. Say what...? Modern robots, as we know, are useful in many industries as utility devices, designed to do critical but repetitive work. I would say that if robots could stand in for humans when bullets and bombs are flying, then we need robots, not humans, to take the brunt of the attack.