50 years ago, the greatest kaiju of all battled pollution...literally!
Godzilla vs the Smog Monster (Gojira vs Hedorah) was a fascinating response to to the public's growing awareness to man-made ecological problems!
Though derided as part of the deterioration of Gojira near the end of the Showa Era, it's actually, an attempt to get back to the darker, earlier films, particularly the first one! (Thousands of people die in this film!)
See the Japanese version...if you can...and let me know what you think!
With a new King Kong movie featuring him and some other big guy hitting screens tomorrow...
...we're going to have a look at the only comic book story based on the first King Kong animated series from 1966...
...which was an indirect sequel to the first match-up of the two kaiju titans!
The animated series then led to another (Godzilla-less) Kong feature film...
...using elements from the animated series including the villain, Doctor Who!
the animated version
the live action version No, not the BBC's Time Lord...
...but a decidedly-hammy human villain!
Two interesting American-Japanese links to the tv series and movie.
1) The series, though produced by Rankin-Bass was animated by Toei Animation, making it the first anime specifically-produced for America!
2) The movie was a co-production of Rankin-Bass and Toho Studios., using characters and plot elements from the cartoon series including Doctor Who and MechaniKong!
Though it uses King Kong, it is not a sequel to King Kong vs Godzilla, and no reference is made to events of the earlier film.
Now, back to the comic...
While the writer is unknown (and the story may be adapted from one of the episodes), the art is believed to be penciled by Sol Brodsky and John Verpoorten and inked by Frank Giacoia.
If those names seem familiar, it's because the one-shot comic this tale appeared in, America's Best TV Comics (1967), was packaged by Marvel for ABC!
Besides abridged reprints of Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, and Casper tales, the 68-page comic featured the first (and only) strips based on the animated Journey to the Center of the Earth, King Kong, as well as George of the Jungle's first comic book appearance!
Here's a Doctor Who Christmas tale last seen in 1994...which originally appeared in 1965!
So it's been more than a generation since Whovians have laid eyes on it in any form!
Note, though the cover (with new art by Bill Mevin who drew the original story decades earlier) is from Marvel UK's Doctor Who Classic Comics #15 (1994), the story itself is scanned from Polystyle Publications' TV Comic 732-735 (1965-66).
The reprint's scans weren't very good!
Note the toy cars are Aston Martin DB-5s, James Bond's auto from the then-current movie Goldfinger!
Who are "Grandkids" John and Gillian?
The comic strip didn't license anybody or anything except the Doctor and TARDIS from the BBC, so they created new companions and foes for the Time Lord!
No Susan, Barbara, or Ian!
No Daleks or other established aliens!
For the record, these strips are considered either apocryphal or an alternate universe. (Unlike the 1960s Amicus movies Doctor Who and the Daleks and Daleks: Invasion Earth 2150 A.D., starring Peter Cushing, which are considered to be "fictionalized" re-tellings of actual events in the Whoverse!)
Merry Christmas
and
Happy New Year!
To paraphrase the end of 007's cinematic adventures...
One of the most popular kids' shows on radio in the 1940s-50s...
...was Smilin' Ed's Buster Brown Gang (later the Buster Brown Show), which had a long-running comic book spin-off!
Note: while this never-reprinted tale from Buster Brown Comic Book #33 (1953) was written by the show's scripter, Hobart Donovan, it's not an adaptation of a radio or tv episode!
Ed McConnell aka "Smilin' Ed" was a long-time radio personality who had his own (adult-oriented) radio show for over a decade before signing with the Buster Brown Shoe Company in 1944 to host their new juvenile radio series.
Smilin' Ed's Buster Brown Gang began on September 2, continuing on NBC radio every Saturday morning at 11:30 through April 11, 1953.
There was an adventure story to open the show, ads for Buster Brown shoes, and Froggy the Gremlin might sing a song or annoy another cast member, such as Shortfellow the Poet or Alkali Pete the Cowboy.
The character Midnight the Cat actually spoke a few lines on the show and Smilin' Ed was always prone to sing a novelty song or two by plunking his magic twanger. The term "plunking" may have come from McConnell's habit of plunking the strings on his piano to emphasize some of the action in his stories. McConnell was also the voice of Froggy, putting on a low, gruff, Popeye-like croak.
However, whenever McConnell had to sing a duet with Froggy, announcer Archie Presby was the voice of Froggy. When there was a live audience, Archie would sometimes dress up in a frog costume and carry on to the delight of the screaming kids.
Additional cast members included June Foray and John Dehner. Foray was called upon to voice Midnight and Old Grandie the Piano. Bud Tollefson, the sound effects engineer, growled the voice of Buster's dog Tige. Child actor Patrick Curtis (Baby Beau Wilkes in Gone With The Wind) played Buster Brown in 1949-50. "That's my dog Tige, he lives in a shoe, I'm Buster Brown, look for me in there too!"
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