ARCHIE "Christmas Cheers"

It's comics' all-American boy...as most of you don't know him...

...a buck-toothed, layabout, closer to Reggie (who doesn't appear in this tale), than the wholesome teen of today!

Written by Harry Sahle and Ed Goggin, penciled by Sahle and inked by "Ginger" (Virginia Drury), this story from MLJ's Pep Comics #46 (1944) is notable for the debut of two characters; Pop Tate, owner of "Pop's Chocklit Shop" (Called "Tate's" in this tale), and Gabby, a short-lived character who screwed-up other people's lives by continually blabbing things others were not meant to know!

As you can see, the original Bob Montana character designs (which Sahle and Drury matched almost exactly) had not yet been updated to the streamlined Dan DeCarlo versions, which serve as the templates of the characters to this day!

We're taking next two weeks off, and will return January 8th, so be here or...

You'll Cry Your Eyes Out If You Miss It!

Don't You Just LOVE Christmas?

It's great to be in love!

It's even better to be in love at ChristmasTime!
There's something about the scent of evergreen, the twinkling lights, the jollyness of the season that makes romance even better!

If your loved one is both an incurable romantic and a fan of pop culture kitsch, you can't go wrong with one of Atomic Kommie Comics™ funky True Love Comics Tales™ collectibles! Besides the usual t-shirts and tchochkies, we also offer matching intimate tops & bottoms and other cute clothes for the fairer sex!
PLUS: we have a kool 12-month calendar featuring the best of our collected covers! (It's cheaper than flowers or candy and much longer-lasting!)

So take a look at our True Love Comics Tales™ comics collectibles shop!

Then give her (or him) a kiss under the mistletoe for us!

SORORITY SECRETS "The Secret"

With the Thanksgiving break over, it's time to get back to class...

...where students are dillgently-applying themselves to the subject at hand!

Moral: if you don't like someone, blackmail them with a lie (if there's nothing truthful that's really juicy).

Ironically, that's exactly the sort of thing we see on prime-time soaps today, almost 60 years later!

This never-reprinted tale from Toby's Sorority Secrets #1 (1954) shows the styles of several noted Golden Age artists.

Among the talents listed as working on the book (but not as to which stories they did) are; Bernard Baily, Ben Brown, David Gantz, and John Rosenberger.

This particular story shows both Baily and Rosenberger's work in certain panels, so we'll go with them as the illustrators.

The writer, though, is unknown.

Next week:

We haven't decided yet what it'll be, but we can guarantee that...

You'll Cry Your Eyes Out if You Miss It!

(Oh, you've heard that, eh?)

And now a word from out sponsor...

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True Love Comics Tales™

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REALISTIC ROMANCES "Thrill Crazy"

When bad girls become even worse...

...there will be hell to pay, as seen in this tale from Avon's Realistic Romances #16 (1954).

The entire issue is more a crime comic than a romance comic.

The other tale we've run from that issue featured both unrestrained necking and "reefer" aka "mary jane" aka (gasp) "pot"!

Trivia:

This story was from the second run of Realistic Romances which ran #15-#17.

The first series ran from #1-#8.

A third series from another publisher ran #1, then #8-#9!

So if you're looking to collect this title, there's no #10-#14, but two #1s and #8s!

Next week:

We haven't decided yet what it'll be, but we can guarantee that...

You'll Cry Your Eyes Out if You Miss It!

(Oh, you've heard that, eh?)

And now a word from out sponsor...

Visit our

True Love Comics Tales™

Comics Collectibles Shop

DARLING ROMANCE "I Stole My Sister's Man"

It's time to get back to what this blog is really about...

...a story about a sleazy, sordid, and slutty sibling trying to steal her sister's guy!

(and it's from Archie Comics, no less!)

The success of Simon & Kirby's Young Romance unleashed a horde of romance comic imitators  including this decidedly non-Archie title from Archie Comics.

These pre-Comics Code series featured stories that rivaled the true confessions-style magazines for naughtiness and radio soap operas for ridiculous plot twists, as this tale from Darling Romance #1 (1949) demonstrates.

The unknown writer went under the pen-name "Mary Woods", but the art of Bill Fix (who did only romance stories during his short career in comics) is very distinctive...and he conveniently signed it!

Next week:

We haven't decided yet what it'll be, but we can guarantee that...

You'll Cry Your Eyes Out if You Miss It!

(Oh, you've heard that, eh?)

And now a word from out sponsor...

Visit our

True Love Comics Tales™

Comics Collectibles Shop

TIFFANY SINN "St Louis Stake Out"

The "CIA Sweetheart" is back (and on the cover, yet)...

Art by Dick Giordano

...and she's about to discover spy organizations don't place "employee relations" high on their list of priorities...

If you picked up the next issue of Charlton's Career Girl Romances, you didn't see "Three Shots of a Laser"!

Tiffany Sinn was MIA (Missing In Action)!

She re-surfaced several months later, in the back of Secret Agent #10 (1967) as shown HERE, with the plotline resolved by a flashback showing Tiffany shooting Rex's masked brother Al seconds after the end of this tale, and then, apparently, forgetting all about Rex!

Weird, eh?

Why the radical shift in storyline?

We'll never know, since there were no other Tiffany Sinn tales published...

This particular story from Career Girl Romances #39 (1967) was written by her co-creator Gary Friedrich and illustrated by Luis Domiguez, who, unfortunately, never had a high-profile ongoing series.

Instead he wandered all over the industry, doing almost 700 stories and covers in every genre imaginable...except super-heroes, which may explain why he's not better-known.

Western fans know him as the second, and longest-running, artist on the original Weird Western series of Jonah Hex.

I'd like to offer an extremely grateful "thank you" to reader ianintheuk for graciously providing the scans in this post!

Thank you, Ian.

It's pop culture fans like you who make this sort of sharing both fun and worthwhile.

Next week:

We haven't decided yet what it'll be, but we can guarantee that...

You'll Cry Your Eyes Out if You Miss It!

(You will! Really!)

And now a word from our sponsor...

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HARVEY "Harvey and Duke"

How close can you come to doing an Archie "imitator" without being sued?

...ask comics legend Stan Lee, who tried it...twice...and failed both times!

Stan "the Man" Lee will forever be enshrined in comics history as the co-creator of an astounding number of popular, long-running characters.
But Harvey wasn't one of them.
Despite taking all the established Archie tropes, reworking them slightly by making Harvey the "new kid in town", and adding Stan Goldberg's extremely Dan DeCarlo-esque art, Harvey was gone after only six issues from 1970-72!
At least it lasted longer than Stan's previous Archie clone, Homer Hooper, which went bye-bye after only four issues.

Next week:

The return of Tiffany Sinn: the "CIA Sweetheart" in a titanic tale of triumph and tragedy!

You'll Cry Your Eyes Out if You Miss It!

(Oh, you've heard that, eh?)

AMAZING ADVENTURES "Adonis 2-PX-89"

Our final Halloween entry is a weird combo of sci-fi and humor...

Art by Allen Anderson

...which was probably written by the man who created the Clark Kent/Superman/Lois Lane love/hate triangle...

This cover story from Ziff-Davis' Amazing Adventures #4 (1951) was illustrated by Henry Sharp who, during his decade in comics, illustrated only sci-fi or war stories!

Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel was the editor of the Ziff-Davis comics line, and wrote many of the stories that appeared in it, so it's not unreasonable to assume this tale, which contains many plot aspects common to those tales of Superman and Lois Lane, was scripted by the same writer

Next week:

We haven't decided yet what it'll be, but we can guarantee that...

You'll Cry Your Eyes Out if You Miss It!

(Oh, you've heard that, eh?)

And now a word from out sponsor...

Visit our

True Love Comics Tales™

Comics Collectibles Shop