For October, we're presenting sci-fi/fantasy...
...starting with a monster-fighting super-hero who's also a medical practitioner!
Doctor Jim Stearne was, initially, a Doc Savage clone, an MD (specifically, a psychiatrist) turned scientific adventurer. After a brief run in the Canadian comic book "WOW" Comics (yes, the quotation marks were part of the title), the character was reconceptualized for his next appearance in Terrific Comics #31 (1945)...
Stearne then moved (not to Unusual Comics, which was never published) but to Bell Features' Super Duper Comics #3 (1946)...where he finally appeared in color!
And, that was the end for Doc Stearne: Mr Monster...or was it?
In the early 1980s, writer-artist Michael T Gilbert revived the concept and name, doing a new version, Doc Stearn: Mr Monster (the missing "e" in "Stearn" isn't a typo.), revealed to be the son of the Golden Age character, as explained HERE! That version continues, on and off, to this day.
Trivia: Originally, Canada imported American comic books and pulp magazines, filling their newsstands with Superman, The Shadow, and loads of other American characters.
But, when World War II broke out, Canada banned all "non-essential" imports, including comics and pulps!
This opened up a whole new industry for Canadian writers and artists to finally do their own characters!
One major difference between the American and Canadian comic books was that the World War II Canadian books were black and white inside, not four-color like American comics!
(British comics were also b/w inside until the 1950s, when they started using a second color on some books.)
Some American companies licensed Canadian publishers to reprint US comics, but the interiors for those were b/w as well.
In addition, there was a limit to how much "non-Canadian content" could be included in Canadian magazine print runs, so there were relatively-few American reprints during the war.
After the war ended American comics were again imported, so most Canadian publishers began doing color insides to compete with the imports.
But the American characters were far better-known, and, within a year, the Canadian characters had all but disappeared!
(includes both the Golden and Bronze Age Misters Monster!)
