Friday, April 17, 2026

Tales Twice-Told YOUNG DOCTORS "Star Patient"

What Do You Do When the Two Hottest Doctors on TV are Licensed to Another Comics Publisher?
Why, you put out a book about two doctors who look and sound just like them, of course!

Dr Kildare...excuse me, Dr Landon, treats his latest beautiful female patient...
Written by Joe Gil, inked by Vince Colletta, and penciled by someone whose name is, sadly, lost to the mists of time, this (sort of) never-repinted tale from Charlton's Young Doctors #3 (1963) was designed to lure unwary Ben Casey and/or Dr Kildare fans into buying what appears to be a team-up of the two incredibly-popular TV medicos!
It lasted six issues, after which Drs Landon & Burke disappeared from comics forever!
Ha!
Fooled You!
There's a reason this entry is classified "Twice Told-Tales", and you'll find out why...tomorrow!

Friday, April 10, 2026

Manga Medicine BLACK JACK "Is There a Doctor?" Conclusion

We Have Already Seen...

...after the spoiled-rotten son of one of the world's richest men crashes his car and lies near death, the oligarch hires the greatest surgeon in the world, Black Jack, to save the kid's life.
However, the kid needs numerous replacements for damaged organs and limbs.
So the oligarch arranges for an innocent to be convicted and sentenced to death, so his limbs and organs can be harvested!
Note: to understand this Japanese comic, you must read right-to-left instead of the usual left-to-right (like the way you're reading this text)!
Besides being a talented writer/artist, Black Jack creator Osamu Tezuka was also a licensed physician, though he stopped practicing after he became a full-time manga creator.
Black Jack has been called Tezuka's alter ego, the kind of doctor he wished he could have been.
Since this premiere appearance in Weekly Shonen Champion (Nov. 19, 1973), he's appeared in hundreds of manga tales, and (in animated form) in several TV series and feature films, plus one direct-to-video mini-series.
Unlike most other manga characters, he's never appeared in live-action form.
However, the iconoclastic sawbones did appear (in animated form) in 2010 opposite Hugh Laurie's live-action Dr House (as it's called in Japan) in magazine ads and a commercial on Japanese TV to promote the release of the 4th season of the House M.D. TV series on DVD in Japan...while plugging his own OVA mini-series!

(Both series were distributed in Japan by the same company, Geneon/Universal!)
To paraphrase the phrase used at the end of the James Bond films...
Black Jack Will Return!

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Friday, April 3, 2026

Manga Medicine BLACK JACK "Is There a Doctor?" Part 1

You're about to step into the world of Japanese comics, aka manga...

...and meet one of the strangest doctors in pop culture!
Note: unlike Western comics, manga is read right-to-left, not left-to-right!
Will Black Jack kill Davy and harvest his organs?
Be Here Next Friday for the Astounding Conclusion!
Black Jack was created and illustrated by Osamu Tezuka, aka "The Walt Disney of Japan", whose best known characters in America are Astro Boy and Kimba the White Lion,
Besides being a writer/artist, Osamu Tezuka was also a licensed physician, and created numerous one-shot manga tales with medical themes and physician protagonists.
Black Jack has been called Tezuka's alter ego, the kind of doctor he wished he could have been.

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Friday, March 27, 2026

LINDA LARK: STUDENT NURSE "Charley"

Linda Lark's Fellow Nurse and BFF, Charley, Gets the Spotlight...
...in her one (and only) solo strip appearance from Dell's Linda Lark: Student Nurse #1 (1961)!
Writer John Stanley loved including eccentric artistic characters in his stories, and apparently couldn't go this entire issue without slipping one in!

Friday, March 20, 2026

NELLIE THE NURSE "Who Will Care for the Millionaire?"

After the Last Three Weeks of Conflict and Chaos...

...and what was happening in this blog on Hope Ship was no laughing matter either, we're going to offer some medical-oriented laughs!


Written by Stan Lee and illustrated by Dan DeCarlo (before he settled in at Archie Comics and visually-redefined the characters for decades), this never-reprinted short from Atlas' Mille the Model Comics #88 (1959) was actually left over from a Nellie the Nurse comic that only ran one issue in 1957!
(The story was meant for #2)

Tales Twice-Told YOUNG DOCTORS "Star Patient"

What Do You Do When the Two Hottest Doctors on TV are Licensed to Another Comics Publisher? Why, you put out a book about two doctors who ...