One more Scenic Route, this time for Gold Key Comics. And only the smallest of selections, below.
By Gold Key, I mean the historical Gold Key, the imprint of Western Publishing that operated from 1962 to 1984, not the recently acquired Gold Key which misspells "its" in the first sentence of its About Us page. For the best overview of the company out there, check out this issue of Comic Book Artist, where that Bruce Timm homage above is from. Print edition is sold out, but you can still download a copy. You'll learn everything there is to learn about Gold Key there.
All info on artists can be found at Comics.org or your favorite internet site for such things. I included a link to the wiki for each title, except two which link to other DSO blogs. All screencaps from the issues indicated, all copyright to the owners, yadda yadda.
One last time: let's take the Scenic Route through the Gold Key part of town...! (As per usual: these are panels and pictures that convey deep truths about reality and/or western civilization caught my eye, grabbed without context, little to no continuity between selections. Enjoy the visuals.)
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The man in the minidress and go-go-boots, judo-chopping his way across North Am, taking zero guff from any anarcho or fascist robs! A hero made for 2021 if ever there was one, FFS. Get off your duffs, dreammakers.
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| Had to grab this series of sceencaps. Wow. |
All screencaps from Magnus, Robot Fighter, v1 issues 1, 4, 6-9, 11, and 12.
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I didn't grab too many from this one. I found this to be pretty sloppy, actually, both art and writing. Nevertheless, like all these Gold Keys, it should be rebooted/ turned into a HBO show, stat. Screencaps below from The Occult Files of Dr. Spektor issues 9 and 18.
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"Look out - honkers!"
Dumb people might feel uncomfortable about this tale of two Native American hunters who fall into a Lost Valley and must navigate its dangers armed only with their wits and a bow and arrow. I shouldn't say "dumb" people, people uber-conditioned to not enjoy something like Turok because wypippo or whatever. (First they came for Turok and I said nothing...) Ignore the haters and enjoy the dinosaur-hunting, is what I always say.
During the brief Valiant revival of Gold Key characters of the early 90s, Turok got some kind of 'roided-out reboot and even a NES game. I didn't know of this at the time - I was off comics then, "forever!" - but it's pretty lame. The originals are kind of lame, too, but they're charming and the art is fun. All Gold Key art is non-flashy but very clean; Turok's has all the great dinosaur and landscape illustrations, to boot.
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| All art from Turok v1 2, 3, 30, 50, 62, 64 |
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Never did finish making my way through all these TZ comics. Ah well. Here's what I had left in my folder, from issues 5, 10, 12, 14, and 26.
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| Menaced... by 1970s Leonard Nimoy...! IN SEARCH OF... TERROR! |
Speaking of Nimoy:
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I covered these in some depth before (although that post is kind of crap - the definitive Gold Key Trek site is here). Here's some more 'caps, though, just the same, from issues 14, 16-20, 22 and 35.
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| "Captain, please, we can't stop and look at every trio of harpies across the galaxy...!" |
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In many ways the best of the original Gold Key comics. I kind of liked the Dark Horse reboot, as well, though neither its writer (Jim Shooter) or the reading public agreed with me. Anyway, this is a fascinating comic, almost an anti-superhero comic, that is to say an unconventional hero who has a costume and super-powers and super-powered foes but otherwise is a genre of one. I like, too, how every issue has both inside and back-inside covers explaining whatever atomic physics you need to grasp the story within, but also a five page section from "Professor Harbinger."
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| All pictures from issues 1-4, 7, 10-13, 18, 20, and 27. |
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| Best date ever! |
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Another one that needs a HBO show. Or any show. Like Turok it seems to make a certain type of idiot uncomfortable. Good! Like the Phantom's skull ring, let such idiots walk around with the mark of the Phantom on their face as a warning/ message to the rest of us.
The movie was awful. Let us not speak of it. All pics from issues 1-8 and 17.
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| Not only the underwear on the outside of the pants but this crazy striped pattern to boot. |
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| Gold Key homage by Batton Lash and Bill Morrison, from Radioactive Man, Nov 2002 (nee Nov 1963) |
