Number 2337: Having a Ball? EH!

EH!, the Charlton Mad imitator, turned the popular situation comedy, I Love Lucy (1951-1957), into a hillbilly parody. Why? I guess someone thought turning Lucy’s husband’s Latin band into a hillbilly band was funny. Hillbillies in movies, Li’l Abner, and hillbilly music were popular in those days. What redeems the story is the artwork of Dick Ayers. He drew Lucille Ball as a leggy beauty in a skimpy outfit. Ball began her Hollywood career as a glamour girl, but with her gift for comedy stepped out of the chorus line and into stardom. Ayers is a favorite of mine, but even with his drawing skills I give this satire a rating of 3 on a scale of 1 to 10 for funny, for its attempts at Mad-style satire.

“Satire is what closes on Saturday night,” said humorist George S. Kaufman when his play, Strike Up the Band, did not make it to Broadway. It could also apply to personal tastes in humor. Is satire funny? Often it is, and I like it. But I think the humor in satire depends on whether the person watching it is familiar with what is being satirized. I Love Lucy was very popular in America in its time, and also known in other countries from syndication.

P.S. The title, “I Love Loosely,” sounds like a porno movie.

From EH! #7 (1954).

Number 2215: Ghost Rider whacks a dog

Aw, cool off there, dog lovers. The dog that Ghost Rider whacks is a comic book dog. (As Robert Crumb once said, "It’s just lines on paper, folks.”)

Ghost Rider fights a sinister force that has turned a Western town into Hate Town. People invaded by devils, big snakes...yikes! I’d hate to live there!

Anyway, the writer has concocted a denouement that is, well, hard to swallow. But, that was the world of the Ghost Rider, where things are usually not as they appear to be. Grand Comics Database doesn’t credit the script to anyone, but Gardner Fox was the usual writer of Ghost Rider. Dick Ayers and Ernie Bache are listed as artists.

From Ghost Rider #9 (1952).

Number 2195: Satan has no b*lls

EH! was another Mad imitation, published by Charlton, from the early '50s. The indicia reads “Designed by Al Fago Studios,” so we know to whom we can assign the blame. When I first read “Paradise Gained” I had some hope for it based on the Dick Ayers artwork, but after a couple of pages hope died. I wonder — rhetorically, since I don’t believe anyone is still alive to answer my question — if it was designed by someone who used other Mad imitators as a guide, rather than Mad itself?

In the story you see Satan in a department store. You see Satan is very popular with women. You see Satan appears to be nude under his cloak and cowl, yet without genitalia (page 5). Make of that what you will.

From EH! #2 (1954):

Number 2183: The Dead and the Living and the Dead

As a reader of horror stories I have read many stories of dead people returning from their graves to be among the living. In EC Comics it was usually because the dead had been wronged and were back for revenge. In “The Dead,” from Atlas Comics’ Adventures Into Weird Worlds #26 (1954), deceased relatives come out of their graves for an unknown purpose. Maybe they simply want a family reunion, but since they didn’t bring the potato salad the still-living family members are none too happy to see them. Dick Ayers did the artwork, working around an unwieldy script.  Too many words. A good editor would have cut the verbiage down by at least 50% or even more.

“The Living and the Dead” is a supernatural story about a writer for the very comics carrying the same type of horror stories we are reading today. This story is from Mystic #26, 1954. Writer and artist unknown. I have heard that horror stories often articulate unspoken fears. I had a lot of fears when young: ghosts, monsters in the closet...all the usual scary stuff kids worry about. Little did I know that when we become adults there are a lot more fears to worry about: earning a living, mortgages, car payments, raising children...I was more terrified by them than by any dead people

Number 1953: Ghost Rider's treasure chest

The Ghost Rider succumbed to the Comics Code. This story is from the last issue (#14, 1954) of Ghost Rider’s own title. He lasted for about another year in ME’s Western series, Red Mask, but much tamed from the spooky (and popular) character.

As we know from Don Markstein’s Toonopedia website, in the sixties Marvel took the name and essentially the same character, gave him a new origin, but had his original artist, Dick Ayers, draw him. (Don has individual listings for the four characters who use the name.) I was disappointed when I saw the '60s revival, and didn’t buy any of the half-dozen issues that were published. I somehow ended up with this 1970 issue of Western Gunfighters #2, but it is the only Marvel Ghost Rider I own.

I also own none of the later comics featuring the motorcycle guys with blazing skulls who have usurped the name Ghost Rider.

No, for me, no matter how silly the dialogue can be, no matter the implausible plots, I love Dick Ayers’ art on the pre-Code, one-and-only, original Ghost Rider.

Number 1523: No animals were harmed in the making of this comic book

Two stories from ME’s Ghost Rider #8 (1952). The longer story, featuring the Ghost Rider, has a panel where a dog gets killed. This is not to rile up any animal lovers who read this blog, but the dog is not real. Nor is his hunchback owner, nor the villain of the piece, nor the Ghost Rider. And while we’re at it, how can you be sure I’m real?

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For real, more Ghost Rider. Just click on the thumbnail.