Friday, November 15, 2024

NELLIE THE NURSE "Sweets For the Not-So-Sweet!"

Among many "lost", never-reprinted comic book series...
...was this amusing one about childhood "besties" who ended up working together at the same hospital!

Even though Snazzy's an intern/resident, Nellie's a nurse and Speed is an ambulance driver, the three don't allow professional, social or financial status to affect their decades-long relationship as equals!

Also note that Nellie is an extremely-comptetent professional, unlike the stereotype of the beautiful-yet-ditzy nurse prevalent in media of the period!
This story from Timely's Nellie the Nurse #2 (1946) reads like a radio dramedy (there was no TV back then), with lots of witty and charming character interplay.
Sadly, there are no credits for the creatives, even though the book was published by what is today Marvel Comics!
Apparently, they tossed the records during one of their many moves to new offices through Manhattan over the years!
Nellie the Nurse survived for 36 issues from 1946 to 1952, despite a couple of reformattings from this relatively-sophisticated version to becoming a stereotypical ditz, to vaudeville-level slapstick humor illustrated in an Archie Comics/Dan DeCarlo art style before being moved to the back of Millie the Model, where she lasted until 1958!
(She even did a cross-over with Millie the Model, which we'll bring you soon!)
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Friday, November 8, 2024

CITY SURGEON "Plague"

With RFK Jr about to become the Surgeon General of the US...
...we want to look at an example of how graphic fiction portrayed pandemics such as anti-vaxxer Kennedy seems to want to happen!
So the theme of this never-reprinted tale from Gold Key's City Surgeon #1 (1963)  shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone!
Tell the truth, Nurse Lake seems to be brains of the operation!
She's the one who figures out one of the two missing crewmen might already be deceased, and her quick thinking immobilizes the other when he shows up at the office!
In the early 1960s, one of the most-popular genres in pop culture was "medical drama"!
Spearheaded on TV by hunky prime-time physicians Dr Kildare and Ben Casey along with the related series The Nurses as well as daytime soap operas with hospital settings and paperback romance novels with covers featuring "studs in scrubs" with swooning nurses, comics hopped on the medical bandwagon!
DC and Marvel simply ran more medical-themed tales in their existing romance books.
But the smaller publishers were another matter...
Charlton launched numerous series featuring doctors and nurses in separate titles including Cynthia Doyle: Nurse in LoveDr Tom Brent: Young InternNurse Betsy CraneYoung Interns, and Sue & Sally Smith: Flying Nurses.
(Oddly, there were never any cross-over stories between the various books!)
Archie Comics published a short-lived series about Young Dr Masters!
Dell had popular comics based on Dr Kildare. as well as their own Nurse Linda Lark!
Gold Key published two different Ben Casey comics (including one done "fumetti" style using photos of the TV actors with captions and word balloons) and created their own doctor in City Surgeon!
Unfortunately, artist Jack Sparling's illustrations weren't consistent, showing Dr Blake Harper as young and virile in one panel and middle-aged in the next on the same page!
Plus there was no romantic element to the book!
For whatever reason, there was never a second issue of the title and Dr Harper never made another house call...
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Friday, November 1, 2024

Post-Halloween Hospital Horror Humor MAD "New Movie Monsters from the Medical World!"

We're Enjoying the Halloween Season So Much...

...We Just Can't End Our Celebration Without One More Entry,This Time, to Tickle Your Funny Bone!
Written by E Nelson Bridwell and illustrated by Jack Rickard, this short from EC's MAD #144 (1971) hasn't been seen since a reprint in 1980, so, unless you own one of those 44-year old (or older) issues, this is the first time you've seen it!
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1978 Paperback Which Reprints this 1971 Feature!
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Friday, October 25, 2024

Halloween Hospital Horror MISTER MYSTERY "All, or Nothing at All!"

Mister Mystery was the host of his own self-titled horror anthology.
Though he looked like a jovial stage magician in a mask, his stories easily matched those of the Crypt Keeper and other ghoulish comics hosts..as you shall see!
For such an innocent-looking guy, Mister Mystery tells a nasty story, aided by illustrator Tom Feelings (yes, that's his real name) and an unknown author in this tale from Stanley Morse's Mister Mystery #14, (1953)!
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Forgotten Horror Comics of the 1950s
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Countdown to Halloween 2024

Friday, October 18, 2024

Halloween Hospital Horrors WEB OF EVIL "Scared to Death"

College Hazing is a Problem Even Today...

...so imagine what it was like over a half-century ago, when standards about such things were much looser!
A graphic representation of the hazards of hazing as seen in this tale of terror from Quality's Web of Evil #18 (1954), illustrated by Charles Nicholas.
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Countdown to Halloween 2024

NELLIE THE NURSE "Sweets For the Not-So-Sweet!"

Among many "lost", never-reprinted comic book series... ...was this amusing one about childhood "besties" who ended up w...