Showing posts with label tv. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tv. Show all posts

Wednesday, June 26, 2024

FRONTIER DOCTOR "Storm Over King City" Part 1

A 1950s Old West TV series about a man who didn't carry a gun?
Yep, and this never-reprinted one-shot comic tale is adapted from one of the episodes!
To Be Concluded Thursday at...

This adaptation of the episode "Storm Over King City" in Dell's Four Color Comics #877 (1958) was illustrated by Alex Toth, whom Old West comics fans remember as the artist on the comics based on Disney's Zorro TV series!
The writer, however, is unknown, 
As for the 1958-59 syndicated TV series' protagonist...
Though he did not carry a gun, Dr Bill Baxter was not a wimp by any measure.
The medical man used his wits, medical knowledge, his fists, and, occasionally, other people's shooting irons, to aid those who needed help.
Rex Allen, who played Baxter, performed as a rodeo rider while in high school.
After graduation, he took up singing, first in vaudeville, then on radio, becoming a popular country/Western singers.
Like most of his contemporaries, he soon was doing Western b-movies as a singing cowboy nicknamed "The Arizona Cowboy", teamed up with comedy-relief sidekicks including Buddy Ebsen and Slim Pickens.
After a couple of dozen films, Rex tried to make the transition to TV with Frontier Doctor, but the show was cancelled after a single season.
But Allen made yet another transition, and became a successful voice-over artist and narrator, primarily for Disney film and tv productions.
TRIVIA:
Besides Frontier Cowboy, Rex had his own self-titled comic book series from Dell Comics that ran for thirty-one issues!
Allen was a cousin of Gunsmoke cast member Glenn Strange, who played bartender Sam Noonan.
Rex's son, Rex Allen, Jr., is a successful singer.
There's a Rex Allen Museum in Willcox, Arizona!
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Friday, February 2, 2024

FESS PARKER: DANIEL BOONE "Murderer's Cave"

Yes, the cover title actually was Fess Parker: Daniel Boone...

...because, by the time this TV show debuted in 1964, there had been several other comic book series about the legendary frontiersman and the comic's publishers wanted readers to know this comic was based on the TV series starring the guy who previously-played Davy Crockett!

As this never-reprinted tale from Gold Key's Fess Parker: Daniel Boone #2 (1965) demonstrates, racism was a part of the fabric of America from the very beginning!
Admittedly, the authorities are British, since the story takes place before the American Revolution, but even our Declaration of Independence calls Native Americans “the merciless Indian savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes, and conditions.”
So it's not surprising the judges take the word of disreputable, uneducated White settlers instead of the sworn testimony of an Oxford University graduate who was half-Cherokee/half-British!
It's rumored that this story, written and illustrated by Fred Fredricks, was based on an unused TV series plot.
It certainly reads as more sophisticated than the usual comic based on a movie or TV show.
Note: writer-artist Fredricks had produced all the stories in issues 1 and 2 (including this one).
Issue #3 had one story by him...which was partially-redrawn, and then he was gone from the series which ran another twelve issues.
Coincidence?
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Thursday, July 16, 2020

Confederate Comics THE REBEL "Bad Medicine" Part 2

...returning to his home town after the end of the Civil War and avenging the death of his father, former Confederate soldier Johnny Yuma feels there's no reason to stay...
Will Johnny Yuma rescue Dr Holcomb?
Will Little Buffalo Calf foul up the attempt?
Find Out...
...FRIDAY
at 
Secret Sanctum of Captain Video
Written by Gardner DuBois, penciled by Mike Sekowsky, and inked by Mike Peppe, this section of this never-reprinted tale from Dell's Four Color Comics #1076 (1960) shows Johnny Yuma as a rather typical noble hero wandering the Old West, without any reference to his Confederate past, an element usually played up in the live-action series!
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The Rebel
Season 2

Tuesday, October 10, 2017

Happy 60th Birthday, Zorro!

Sixty years ago today...
...Walt Disney unleashed his version of the already-legendary Zorro on America, creating a phenomenon equal to Davy Crockett-mania several years earlier!
Check out his premiere in both comics and tv HERE!
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Monday, December 5, 2016

"The Cisco Kid was a Friend of Mine..."

The Cisco Kid was the first Hispanic multi-media superstar, featured in books, movies, radio, comic books, newspaper strips, and eventually, television, predating Zorro in each media (except Zorro never had a radio show)!

As created by legendary writer O Henry, in the short story "The Caballero's Way" in 1907. the Kid was neither Hispanic nor a hero!
A 1914 silent movie of "The Caballero's Way" altered the character to the version that's became famous...a wandering hero, called "The Robin Hood of the Old West", who, with his sidekick, righted wrongs without killing (but with lots and LOTS of shooting) just like the Lone Ranger!
Over two dozen more films followed, as well as a long-running radio series, a newspaper strip, several comic book series, and a 156-episode tv show famous for being the FIRST American tv series filmed in color!
Some of the films and tv series episodes are on dvd.
Note that not all dvds have color tv episodes, some have have b/w versions!
(All the movies were b/w!)
In the 1990s, Jimmy Smits and Cheech Marin starred in a very well-done tv-movie pilot for a new series that, unfortunately, wasn't picked up (but is available on dvd).
But, there's talk of a new big-budget film version of the character sometime in the next couple of years!

Just in time for Christmas, we at Atomic Kommie Comics™ are proud to reintroduce the classic Western character to a new audience in our Western Comic Adventures™ line.
Just go to The Cisco Kid & Pancho for a look at 6 different designs, including his 1st comic appearance on t-shirts, mugs, messenger bags and other goodies including a kool 2017 12-month calendar!
They'll have you going "Oh, Cisco!" "Oh, Pancho!" just like Duncan Renaldo & Leo Carrillo did in the classic tv series!

Feliz Navidad, amigos!

For our faithful fans...a FREE early Christmas present...over 80 episodes of the radio show!

Monday, September 2, 2013

Harry J Smith: the Man Who Would be Tonto!

Since technical difficulties with Google+ Photos are keeping me from posting the usual comic tale, I thought I'd link to a story from Sunday's New York Times about 1950's TV's Tonto, Jay Siverheels, and his pre-Lone Ranger athletic career in Canada!
Here's the LINK to the site.

Monday, August 12, 2013

DAYS OF WELLS FARGO "Third Time Out"

Was this story a "pilot" for a comic adaptation of TV's Tales of Wells Fargo?
Read the story, which appeared in Dell's Western Roundup #19 (1957), then judge for yourself.
Well, the "Marshall" looks like Dale Robertson, star of Tales of Wells Fargo, which had been running on TV for several months when this story was published...
And Dell began publishing a series of Tales of Wells Fargo/Man from Wells Fargo stories, both in Western Roundup, and Four Color Comics only a couple of months after this tale.
Coincidence?
I think not...
Both the writer and artist of this tale are officially-unknown, but several experts peg Vic Carrobotta as the artist.
Considering there are elements of Alex Toth, George Tuska, and Mike Sekowsky's styles in the story and Carrobotta worked with all of them at one point or another, it's not an unreasonable guess.
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