The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana

CLIP FROM TURKISH MANDRAKE MOVIE

2011-12-21T06:45:00.000-08:00

Late this summer, I had posted on this blog about an obscure Turkish movie from the late 1960s featuring Mandrake. Recently, I had been alerted by an old friend, David White from the US, that a short clip of scenes from this movie had been uploaded to youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fGNdlixSs0
Enjoy..

EARLY WAR-TIME FRENCH WAR COMICS

2011-09-12T00:01:00.000-07:00

Above scan is of a panel from the 8th installement of 'Vatan İçin [For the Homeland]' from the back cover o no. 36 (dated Mar. 11th, 1940) of Turkey's 1001 Roman weekly comics magazine. 'Vatan İçin', serialized between no.'s 29-54 of 1001 Roman, is the Turkish edition of 'Jean-Jacques Ardent à la Guerre ['Jean-Jacques Ardent at the War]' serialized in the French magazine Junior in 1939-40. Ardent was originally an athlete character created by René Pellos in 1938; Pellos (1900-1998) is better known for his 'Futuropolis', the first non-juvenile French sci-fi comics saga. 'Vatan İçin' was the only comics series published in 1001 Roman credited to its original source, with the tag "Fransızca Junior gazetesinden alınmıştır [taken from the French Junior gazette]" in its title caption. This was probably due to an intent to show sympathy for France in the newly erupted 2nd World War (Turkey had officially signed an alliance with Britain and France soon after the war had erupted, even though this alliance would in effect remain only on paper). Ironically, the German invasion of France would be initiated a few months after 'Vatan İçin' began to serialized in 1001 Roman and France would surrender before the serialization ended. The Turkish edition ends with Ardent being shot and falling down from a bridge which he had planted explosives, and sinking down into the waters below, with his last words as "Oh.! I am happy!.. I am dying for the sake of the independence of my homeland":
UPDATE: I've updated my below posts on Sept. 5th, Sept. 9th and Sept. 10th with the identifications of the original sources of the covered comics. However, comics covered in the posts on Sept. 8th and Sept. 11th still remain unidentified.

ATTACK OF THE GIANT INSECTS

2011-09-11T00:01:00.000-07:00

Above scan of a panel from 'Dünya Düşmanı [Enemy of the World]', an obscure science fiction comics serialized in the back covers of the first 28 issues of Turkey's 1001 Roman is from the no. 3 (dated July 24th, 1939) of this weekly comics magazine. The plot of 'Dünya Düşmanı' kicks off with an attack of giant insects on colonial Africa accompanied with a wireless ultimatum coming from a mysterious voice calling for total submission of world nations. Lieutenant Nelson volunteers on a rescue mission to a camp on the outskirts of Mount Kilimanjaro which has been raided by the giant insects. The camp is also being threatened by over-size lions, as seen in the below scan from no. 4:

Upon arriving at the camp, Nelson and his compatriots detain a suspicious young woman who is soon set free by over-size natives which then empower Nelson and co. (scan from no. 17):
Nelson and co. are taken to the hideout of the main villain (scan from no. 20):
They learn that the culprit is a scientist named Bravona who has developed a serum which he calls "serum B.K." that causes abnormal growth in the size of living beings. Meanwhile, airforce attacks the hideout of the mad scientist, but meets devastating defence by the giant insects (scan from no. 23):

The comics ends with Nelson shutting down an electric shield, allowing for missiles to hit the hideout.
I think this is a very interesting comics because it is probably the earliest manifestation of giant insects in the comics medium, predating the giant insect boom of the 1950s by more than a decade. The idea of a scientifically developed chemical substance causing abormal size growth of living beings might have been inspired by H.G. Wells' novel Food of the Gods (1905), but utilizing that idea within the context of a mad scientist bent on conquering the world is pretty original for the pre-war era as far as I am aware. If anyone knows any similar examples from the pre-war era and/or knows the original source of 'Dünya Düşmanı', p-l-e-a-s-e let us all know as well...

SHARK SCENE IN PRE-WAR COMICS

2011-09-10T00:01:00.000-07:00

Above scan is from the no.1 (dated July 10th, 1939) of Turkey's 1001 Roman, featuring a shark scene from the first installement of 'Korkusuz Adam [The Fearless Man]', serialized in the first 22 issues of this weekly comics magazine. 'Korkusuz Adam' is the Turkish edition of 'Metropoli Distrutta' by the Italian artist Ferdinando Vichi (1901-1944), originally serialized in the Italian comics weekly L'Avventuroso in 1938. The original Italian version is said to be anti-communisy and fascistic (*), but these sentiments are not as evident in the Turkish edition. During the course of the Turkish translation, the protagonist has been given a Turkish name and nationality. He is an "engineer" (=inventor?) who has made a valuable invention and hence is being sought after by a band of "international spies", seen in the below scan from no. 3:
In order to evade capture by the spies, the hero seeks shelter in an exotic island inhabited by "savages". Towards the finale, an elderly white man who commands apes appears, as seen in this scan from no. 18:

(*) Claudio Carabba, Il fasciso a fumetti, p. 273.

FANTASTIC GIANT OCTOPUS ATTACK SCENE IN PRE-WAR COLONIALIST COMICS

2011-09-09T00:01:00.000-07:00

Above scans are from the no. 19 (dated Nov. 13th, 1939) of Turkey's 1001 Roman, featuring an installement of 'Gizli Ülke [Secret Country]' serialized in the first 22 issues of this comics weekly magazine on a two half pages per issue basis. This marvelous episode turns out to be part of a series of nightmarish hallucinations induced on a pair of adventurous American millionaires who were kidnapped and drugged by independence-seeking rebels of India.
'Gizli Ülke' is the Turkish edition of 'La Regina d'Atalanta', originally serialized in the Italian weekly comics magazine L'Avventuroso in 1936. While the art by Giove Toppi is highly imaginative, the underbelly of the script by Paolo Lorenzini, the director of L'Avventuroso, is shamelessly colonialist; for instance, the Indian rebels are aided by a Chinese villain!.. Below panel depicts the resistance of the rebels against the colonial troops who raid the temple where the Americans are being kept, the ringleader exclaiming "We shall not be captives."

You can view some sample pages from the original color edition of 'La Regina d'Atalanta' here (scroll down a little bit to reach 'La Regina d'Atalanta' scans): http://annitrenta.blogspot.com/2011/02/lavventuroso-11-1936-quarta-parte.html

ANOTHER OCTOPUS ATTACK SCENE

2011-09-08T13:22:00.000-07:00

Above scan is from the no. 100 (dated June 2nd, 1941) of Turkey's comics weekly 1001 Roman, featuring the 13th installement of an obscure comics titled 'Denizlerin Dibinde [At the Depths of the Seas]' serialized between no.'s 88-119. The plot is about the search in a sunken ship for some lost documents involving a military invention. I believe it is an early war-time Italian product as the protagonists are Italian (the hero is named "Kolombo") and the antagonists are French (the illain is named "Jan"). Below is a scan of the signature of the artist that I spotted in one of the panels:

As always, any help in identifying the artist's name, the original title and source would be much welcome.

GIANT OCTOPUS ATTACK SCENE IN PRE-WAR COMICS

2011-09-05T10:46:00.000-07:00

Above scans are from the 13th and 14th installements of 'Denizaltı Tüneli [Undersea Tunnel]', an pre-war comics serialized in the Turkish comics weekly 1001 Roman, beginning with no. 23 (dated Dec. 11th, 1939) and lasting for 27 issues. 'Denizaltı Tüneli' is the Turkish edition of 'Il tunnel sottomariono', adapted from Luigi Motta's 1912 novel with the same title by comics artist Ferdinando Vichi and originally serialized in the Italian comics weekly Giungla in 1938 and published as an album in 1939. The plot concerns the building of an undersea tunnel across the atlantic from America to Ireland. Admittedly, it is a rather dull comics with the only exciting episode being this encounter with the giant octopus.

TURKISH MANDRAKE MOVIE

2011-08-30T15:04:00.000-07:00

The first adaptation of Mandrake the Magician to cinema was in the form of a serial in 1940. The first -and so far, only- Mandrake feature film would come from the low-budget exploitation cinema of Turkey in the late 1960s: Sihirbazlar Kralı Mandrake Kiling'in Peşinde (Mandrake the King of the Magicians After Kiling). Made in 1967 or 1968, this very obscure movie pits Mandrake and Lothar against Killing, a photo-comics anti-hero of Italian origin which was very popular in Turkey at the time. The craze for the skeleton-costumed Killing was so high that Turkish filmmakers had made 10 movies featuring Killing (with variant spellings of the name) in 1967-68 and Sihirbazlar Kralı Mandrake Kiling'in Peşinde was one of them, so this movie owes its existence as much to Killing as to Mandrake. On the above poster, Killing is depicted in the upper left, over Lothar's shoulders.
Sihirbazlar Kralı Mandrake Kiling'in Peşinde was scripted and directed by Oksal Pekmezoğlu (b. 1938), an illustrator by training and by early profession who had picked up a career as movie director after entering the Turkish film industry initially as a credits sequence artist. His prolific post-Mandrake filmography includes movies from a variety of genres from mainstream musical melodramas to adult-oriented sex-comedies. Top-billed Güven Erte, who presumably plays Mandrake, is a little-known actor credited in supporting roles in several Turkish movies from the second half of the the 1960s, the Mandrake vs Killing movie being his only starring role.
Several sources name this movie as "Mandrake Killing'e Karşı [Mandrake vs Killing]", but that may only have been an unofficial promotional reference during the production or pre-production phases; both the official censorship documents and the movie's own release poster give the title as Sihirbazlar Kralı Mandrake Kiling'in Peşinde. There is also an uncertainity as to dating the movie. Türk Filmleri Sözlüğü 1914-1973 compiled by Agah Özgüç and published by Turkish Filmmakers Union include this title, listed shortly as "Mandrake Kiling'in Peşinde", under the year 1967 and hence all subsequent sources date it from that year. However, the censorship document of the movie, kindly made available to me by my friend Dilek Kaya, is dated August 28th, 1968. Perhaps the project for this production was announced in 1967, but the movie appears to have been made or at least completed in 1968. As for its release, I can not find any listing for it in Istanbul. The movie appeared as part of a double-bill in the Çelik cinema of the south-eastern city of Adana on May 24th, 1969. Of course, the fact that I couldn't find any Istanbul release info does not necessarily rule out the possibility of an unreported release in Istanbul, but I had been told earlier by another researcher friend of mine, Metin Demirhan, that Turkish Z-grade masked/super/anti-hero movies of the late 1960s were said to be especially popular among audiences in Adana and some of these movies were rumoured to have been made primarily or even exclusively for this market; Sihirbazlar Kralı Mandrake Kiling'in Peşinde was perhaps one such movie.
TFS 1914-1973 list it as a b&w movie (most Turkish B-movies were still being made in b&w in the late 1960s) and the abscence of any 'in color' tag in the poster confirms this. The censorship document list the original running time as 75 minutes and the the censorhip commission has ordered the cutting of two "sex scenes" and one flogging scene! The brief synopsis on TFS 1914-1973 refers to the plot as "the adventure of an Indian princess who has come to İzmir on vacation," so the movie appears to be set in the Turkish western coastal city of İzmir, probably also shot there, at least partially. The second-billed name in the cast credits list on the poster is actress Mine Mutlu who might have played the "Indian princess".
Sihirbazlar Kralı Mandrake Kiling'in Peşinde has never been shown in Turkish televisions nor had been available during the video boom of the 1980s, so it was believed to have been a lost movie. However, Demirhan had once told me, about ten years ago, that he had heard that a 16 mm copy was present in the private collection of a collector. Indeed, a Turkish blog reported in 2009 that a battered 16 mm copy of Sihirbazlar Kralı Mandrake Kiling'in Peşinde was leased from a private collector in Ankara, repaired as best as possible in Istanbul and a transfer was made onto Betacam tape which was then sent to Greece-based Onar Film, a fan-driven label which had been releasing obscure Turkish Z-movies on dvd. Unfortunately, the owner&manager of Onar would become critically ill in 2010 before he could release on dvd the recently-discovered Killing movie he had hinted in his blog. Onar has sadly been inactive since then.
I conclude this post with the below mega-rare photo still from Sihirbazlar Kralı Mandrake Kiling'in Peşinde:

MANDRAKE'S RETURN TO X

2011-08-29T10:48:00.000-07:00

Mandrake the Magician had a few science-fiction adventures in the pre-war era, but, if I am not mistaken, none in the 1940s until 'The Amazing Ray' daily strip adventure, which involves a ray that shrinks people to miniscule size, from 1949 (probably inspired by the movie Dr. Cyclops from 1940). When science-fiction adventures became prolific in the 1950s, Mandrake's first-ever foray into the genre, 'The Chamber into the X Dimension' from 1936-37 (see below post), would serve as a model for more than one Mandrake adventure. 'The Doorway to Z', a Sunday continuity from 1952, is a watered-down remake, with another scientist inventing a doorway to an unknown world where human beings have been enslaved for hard labor by living balloon-like entities. While the gist of the plot is similar, the comical-looking rulers of Z are nowhere as menacing as the metal men and the crystal men of X. 'The Place Called X', a Sunday continuity from 1957, is very loosely related despite the designation X. Here, inhabitants of an American town and investigating Mandrake are sucked into a distant planet where peaceful (and fat and short) inhabitatants are threatened by fire people. However, Mandrake and Lothar would actually revisit the X of metal men and crystal men decades later in a direct sequel to 'The Chamber into the X Dimension' appropriately titled as 'Return to X'. Serialized as a Sunday continuity in 1974, 'Return to X' starts with Fran, who had chosen to remain in X at the end of 'The Chamber into the X Dimension', sending a distress message to Mandrake who then pays a visit to her father who had invented the chamber to travel to X. Mandrake, together with Lothar, use the chamber once again to be transferred to X where they re-encounter practically all the figures from their first visit, the metal men, the tree-men, the fire-bird and the crystal men, except the lake-monster. Actually, one panel in particular involves an exact rendition of a pose of a metal man...

from that of a panel from 1936!:

It turns out that Fran and her mate have been captured by the crystal men and Mandrake leads their rescue. She opts to stay in X once again.
'Return to X' was serialized in Turkey in 1977 in the no.'s 145-146 of the Mandrake weekly published by Tay Yayınları. Later, this story provided the basis of two cover illustrations, no. 222 (dated Sept. 29, 1978) and no. 242 (dated Feb. 16th, 1979)
The illustration on no. 222 is signed by Aslan Şükür, the most prolific cover artist for Tay, and while I can not spot any signature on no. 242, I think it is also by the same illustrator. Note that one of the metal men in no. 222 has actually been redrawn from a panel in 'Return to X':

MANDRAKE'S FIRST SCI-FI ADVENTURE (1936-37)

2011-08-28T13:26:00.000-07:00

Mandrake the Magician's first foray into science-fiction was with his 5th Sunday newspaper comics continuity, 'Chamber into the X-Dimension' from 1936-37. This adventure was one of the few Mandrake adventures reprinted in comics book format in the post-war era. Retitled as In the Land of X, it was published as no. 52 of David McKay Co.'s Feature Book series in 1948. I recently bought a copy of this issue from ebay and today read it, my first exposure to this truely marvelous adventure properly in its original form in color and in English.
Mandrake and Lothar meet scientist Prof. Theobold who had, "by means of molecular disintegration and atomic bombardment", invented a chamber through which one can be transferred into the "X Dimension." Professor is very distressed because his daughter Fran had volunteered to discover this new dimension, but hasn't returned from it. So, Mandrake and Lothar volunteer to search for her: "Lothar and I have been everyhere else. The 'X' Dimension sounds interesting. Lead the way, professor." In the X Dimension, our heroes are captured by metal men who use the human population as slaves for hard labor. Fran, who has also been captured, explains to Mandrake (p.9):

Our protagonists manage to flee during an attack of a "fire-bird" on the metal men (p.11):
Outside in the wilderness, they meet peaceful plant men, which provide an opportunity for laughs as Lothar (who, by the way, speaks in pigeon English and refers to Mandrake as "master" in this era of white supremacy) vainly tries to feed himself off the plants. Next, they are captured by crystal men who are even more vicious than the metal men as they skin humans alive!, note how perceptive Mandrake is in the fourth panel below (p.19):
Just when they thought it was safer to jump into the waters of a lake by the city of the crystal men than to face them again, our heroes face one more and an unexpected peril (p.22):
No worries, Mandrake will be saved in the nick of time by Lothar who quicky jumps with a spear in hand. For this, he gets the praise "He thought fast!". So, afterall, Lothar is acknowled as having a brain as well as muscles. The remaining pages are devoted to Mandrake inciting the humans of the X Dimension to rise up against their oppressors, the metal men and the crystal men. In the happy end, Fran, who has fallen in love with the leader of the human population of X, decides to stay in the X Dimension (just like Jane of Tarzan).
I think 'Chamber into the X-Dimension' is a minor classic of early 20th century science-fiction that, as entertainment presents highly imaginative mise-ancences in a fast-paced action-filled narrative, which at the same time embody the nightmare fantasy of a reversal of humanity's domination and exploitation of all non-human, organic as well as non-organic elements of the world.
Mandrake and Lothar would re-visit the X Dimension decades later, but that will be covered in the next post in this blog, so stay tuned in.

TRACED REPRINT MANDRAKE COMICS IN TURKEY - PART 2 (1960S)

2011-08-13T00:01:00.000-07:00

When Bilge Şakrak took over the publication of Red Kit, the traced Turkish editions of Lucky Luke, from Bilgi Yayınları (owned by apparently a relative, Adnan Şakrak) and began a new weekly series under the same title but with new enumeration in 1965, s/he initiated the practice of devoting 24 pages of each issue of 32 pages to secondary, filler comics. This was apparently a necessity to prolong the publication as new original adventures of Lucky Luke were not arriving fast enough to supply the weekly. The material s/he utilized for this end were mostly traced editions of pre-war comics earlier published in 1001 Roman, Mandrake the Magician included. Once, Mandrake was also co-featured on the cover as well, see the above scan of the cover of no. 4 (dated Aug. 31st, 1965). Mandrake adventures serialized in the 1965 series of Red Kit are 'Dar Geçit [The Narrow Pass]', the 3rd Mandrake daily strip adventure in terms of the sequence of the strip's original run in the US newspapers, in no.'s 1-6, 'Prensesin Sırrı [The Mystery of the Princess]', the 2nd daily strip adventure, in no.'s 7-12, 'Ölüm Şatosu [The Castle of Death], the 15th daily strip adventure, in no.'s 12-17, and 'Perili Çiflik [The Haunted Farm]', a post-war daily strip adventure. All but the last were traced from the war-time issues of 1001 Roman while the last and relatively more recent one from Haftalık Albüm, the 1950s successor of 1001Roman.
Early in 1968, Şakrak would reprint these traced reprints in a comics weekly under the Güneş heading , somewhat in the format of special issues of Güneş, a former comics weekly earlier published by Şakrak. I don't know the contents of the first three issues of this series, but no'.s 4-6 were Mandrake issues and their contents are as such: 'Prensesin Sırrı' in no.'s 4-5, 'Ölüm Şatosu' in no.'s 5-6 and 'Canlı Mumya [The Walking Mummy]' in no. 6, the last one being a post-war daily strip adventure traced from Haftalık Albüm. Later, the Mandrake issues were collected together in a volume 2 of Güneş whose cover scan is below:
The cover of weekly no. 5 is missing from the copy I have, but the cover of volume no. 2 (above)utilizes the illustration of the cover of weekly no. 6 and the cover of weekly no. 7 is below:
The cover illustrations are by Ferdi Sayışman (1926- ), a chemical engineer by training who made a successful career in comics lettering for several decades till mid-2000s. Earlier in this career, he had also done tracing jobs for low-budget publishers such as, but not limited to, Şakrak. During his employment for Şakrak, he would actually sign the last panels of comics he had traced/lettered, as he has done for 'Canlı Mumya' in Güneş no. 6. It should be added Sayışman had also made an indigeous 8 pages-long Phantom comics titled 'Arizona Soyguncuları [The Robbers of Arizona]' published in no. 134 (dated March, 1955) of 1001 Özel weekly comics magazine. His son Şevki Sayışman has also taken up his father's craft and is currently working as a letterer in Turkish satire/humor magazines.
Back to Güneş, the contents of no.'s 7-9 feature traced reprints of pre-war Phantom adventures. Some years later, the Phantom and Mandrake issues of Güneş were collected together without their individual covers and re-ordered with the later Phantom issues taking precedence over the earlier Mandrake issues and published as one single album under the title Kızıl Maske [Red Mask, the Turkish name for Phantom]. This odd album carries no official publisher info, but it may be the work of Nil Yayınevi as some books from that publishing house are advertised on the back cover.

POST-SCRIPT: POST-WAR MANDRAKE COMICS IN TURKEY
The second, and regular-sized, series of 1001 Roman (1946-47) had carried minimal amount of comics and Mandrake was not one of them. However, the third series, this time whose title was spelled as Binbir Roman, which kicked off in 1948 was back in the format of large-size European comics weeklies and Mandrake was back in its repertoire as well. The first Mandrake adventure serialized in this new series was actually a pre-war adventure, the first subplot of the 10th daily strip continuity where Mandrake is on the US (the second subplot of this continuity had earlier been published in 1001 Roman). Unfortunately, the untitled Turkish edition in Binbir Roman misses the beginning and the true end of the first subplot, ending prematurely. The following two Mandrake adventures serialized in Binbir Roman were post-war daily strip continuities and the subsequent ones post-war Sunday continuities. Binbir Roman continued till 1952. As replacement, Türkiye Yayınevi began to publish the weekly Haftalık Albüm in the format of former 1001 Roman's special issues. Mandrake was featured in several issues of this series in Turkish editions of post-war daily strip adventures. The covers of Haftalık Albüm, which lasted for about a year, were illustrated by Tan Oral. In 1956, Mandrake appeared in the short-lived comics weekly Arkadaş from Nebioğlu Yayınevi and in 1962, Ceylan Yayınları, Turkey's largest comics publisher of those years, published a weekly Mandrake comics which lasted only two issues.
The high time of Mandrake comics in Turkey would be the 1970s when Tay Yayınları,Turkey's leading comics publisher of the decade, would pick them up with license from Opera Mundi. Tay's Mandrake would begin its weekly run in 1974. The magazine began with strips from a few years back, but as it naturally caught up with the American run of the strip quickly, the backlog of daily and Sunday continuities stretching back to the previous decades were also used. Part of the credit for the success enjoyed by Tay's publications must be given to covers by Turkish illustrators, most notably Aslan Şükür who illustrated some of Mandrake covers as well. In the 1970s, when the Turkish market was flooded with comics of Italian origin (such as Zagor, Tex, Mister No and the like), Mandrake, together with Kızılmaske, also from Tay, were arguably the only American-origin comics that managed to take a foothold in Turkey. Mandrake lasted until 1979 in the weekly format. Tay repackaged back issues in fours or threes as 'albums'. After the weekly run of the magazine ceased, the albums continued their run with reprints and occasional brand new adventures (including a few short adventures of Italian origin) for several additional years. The weekly format would be revived briefly in the mid-1980s, which would again give way to an 'album' series, this time called as 'super albums'.
Tay would close its shop in the 1990s and Mandrake would not be seen in Turkey until 2009 when five daily strip adventures from 1999-2000, including the last one written by creator Lee Falk, were published in one album titled Sihirbaz Mandrake ve Abdullah as no. 2 of 'Çizgi Roman Arşiv Dizisi [Comics Archive Series]' from the Horoz Şekeri label, with license from King Features. In 2011, Demirbaş Yayıncılık, a venture set up by an owner of a second-hand comics shop in Istanbul, began a twin album series, one titled as Yeni Mandrake and the other as Yeni Mandrake - Süper Maceralar, which despite the word "yeni [new]" in the titles, actually reprint, without an apparent license, adventures previously published by Tay.

MANDRAKE IN AFACAN (1942-43)

2011-08-12T06:08:00.000-07:00

While Mandrake the Magician was already being serialized in Türkiye Yayınevi's 1001 Roman during the war-time era, it also appeared simultanously for about a year in another comics weekly from a different publisher. The weekly in question was Afacan published by Ömer Lütfi Tarhan in 1942-43. The fact that two different publishers carried Mandrake simultanously indicates that neither of them had officially licensed it. Mandrake, billed here as "Büyücüler Kralı [King of the Wizards]", a slight variation on 1001 Roman's "Sihirbazlar Kralı [King of the Magicians]" tagline, began to be featured on the cover pages of Afacan from its first issue (dated July 30th, 1942) onwards. The adventures reprinted in color in the covers originated from adventures originally serialized in the color Sunday newspapers in the US: 'Altın Şehirde [In the Golden City]', a Sunday adventure originally from 1939, in no.'s 1-21, 'Fuarda', a Sunday gag-continuity from 1938, in no.'s 22-25, and an untitled (whose origin I couldn't yet identify) gag in no. 26.
Beginning with no. 27, Mandrake was shifted onto the b&w interior pages of Afacan. The first adventure to be serialized there was titled as 'Hırsızlar Peşinde [Following the Thieves]', which was the Turkish edition of Mandrake's fourth daily strip adventure in terms of the sequence of the strip's original run in the US newspapers. Ateş, 1001 Roman's precessor from 1937-38, had curiously skipped this adventure from 1935, where Mandrake meets the soon-to-be-recurrent villain Clay Camel for the first time, when it had serialized the earliest strips. Unfortunately, the Turkish edition in Afacan is incomplete as well as censored. Afacan began to serialize it half way through the original continuity (from strip originally dated 9-16 onwards) and left out the final four daily strips as well, hence actually leaving Narda with Clay Camel disguised as Mandrake! In addition, two kissing sequences are completely deleted from the Turkish edition. See below the second instance from an Italian reprint (from 1991) and its Turkish counterpart from Afacan:
Also note that the scantily-clad Narda's bare belly has been painted over to make her appear dressed more modestly..
After 'Hırsızlar Peşinde' ended rather prematurely, an untitled Mandrake adventure began on no. 33. This was the 'werewolf' adventure, the 5th daily strip continuity which had previously been serialized in Ateş in 1938. By this time, the dire economic situation of the war-time era was apparently taking its toll on Afacan as paper and printing quality began to detoriate. Mandrake would be missing in no. 37 and when it resumed in the next issue, the image quality was at an all-time low. With no. 39, Afacan began to print Mandrake in a traced form. And that would not last long either as the werewolf adventure was left incomplete on no. 40 (*). Afacan, without Mandrake, survived for two more issues only.
(*) Actually, I am not sure if the werewolf adventure had been carried to its conclusion in Ateş either as the last few issues of that publication are missing in my collection.

TRACED REPRINT MANDRAKE COMICS IN TURKEY - PART I (1950S)

2011-08-11T13:37:00.000-07:00

Several low-budget publishers who emerged in the post-war era of comics publishing in Turkey began a trend of printing comics from traced material, that is from transparet sheets onto which 'copyists' they employed had traced the comics from printed material. The material to be exploited in this manner were often foreign comics albums purchased from specialized bookshops in Istanbul or sometimes even older Turkish editions from previous years! Mandrake the Magician comics were not left untouched from this trend either, so several pre-war Mandrake adventures which had earlier saw Turkish editions in 1001 Roman, either in its regular weekly series or in the monthly "special issue" series, were reprinted over and over in traced editions in the first two decades of the pre-war era.
One of the pioneers of this fad was Hamid Şendur (1920-?*), who is best known in Turkish comics history for putting out the first Turkish comics headlining Tintin in 1958 and whose first incursion into publication business seems to have been with the children's weekly Çocuk Alemi [Children's World] early in 1947. My collection of Çocuk Alemi is sparse and the earliest issues from this weekly with traced Mandrake comics in my collection are from 1950; the above scan, featuring a pre-war adventure earlier serialized in 1001 Roman, is from vol. 4 no. 55, dated April 15th, 1950. Meanwhile, Mandrake was also featured in Şendur's shorter lived all-comics weekly Kara Maske (1947-48) from no. 10 onwards, with again material earlier published in 1oo1 Roman. The children's weekly Ateş put out by Şendur in 1953 also serialized a traced reprint edition of a pre-war Mandrake adventure.
A very long-lived weekly comics printing traced material was 1001 Özel [1001 Special], published by Kemal Uzcan throughout the 1950s, titled as such in apparent attempt to cash-in on the popularity of the special issues of 1001 Roman from the previous decade. Actually, no. 67 (undated, but from estimated as late 1953) is a traced reprint of 1001 Roman monthly "special issue" no. 66 (Sept. 1945), with a few additional filler-space comics, but with the same cover illustration, this time signed by elusive Yılmaz, a signature frequently seen on the covers of traced comics from the same decade:

The no.'s 204-205 (undated, but estimated as mid-1956) of 1001 Özel featured a traced reprint of Mandrake's first-ever adventure, below scan is of no. 205:
Another traced reprint of a pre-war Mandrake adventure, which like all of the above-mentioned adventures had earlier been published in 1001 Roman, was also serialized in the first 16 issues of Küçük Afacan published by Erdoğan Egeli (1925-83) in 1955. This was Egeli's first publication, and unlike Şendur and Uzcan before him, he would soon upgrade to 'proper' publication techniques and become Turkey's leading comics publisher for the next two decades, introducing (licensed editions of) Italian western comics to Turkey.
(*) Şendur was arrested in 1966 on charges of espionage for the Soviet Union and sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment. In 1969, he mysteriously escaped from prison and was unheard of since then.

OBSCURE MANDRAKE PUBLICATIONS FROM TURKEY (1940-51)

2011-08-10T11:24:00.000-07:00

In 1939, a fad of publishing "sinema romanları [cinema novels]", novelizations of movies, emerged among low-budget publishers of Turkey. It should be noted that the name 'novel' might be misleading, these were usually 16 pages-long booklets issued often in weekly periods. One of the leading figures of this fad was Güven Basımevi [Güven Printinghouse] which put out close to 50 such titles in a few years. One of the titles in Güven Basımevi's list is Mandrake - Sihirbazlar Kralı (1940), which is probably a novelization of the film serial Mandrake the Magician (1939) which was released in Turkey in 1940. The book reportedly carries the credit "recounted by" Selami Münir Yurdatap, one of the most prolific authors of cheap popular fiction in Turkey. Yurdatap is also the author of the indigenous Sihirbazlar Kralı Mandrake İstanbulda [Mandrake the King of the Magicans in Istanbul] from 1943. Unfortunately, I have never come across any of these two early Mandrake books by Yurdatap myself, but I was lucky to get a fair-condition copy of his bizarre Tarzan ve Mandrake Mücadelesi [The Struggle Between Tarzan and Mandrake] from 1951. This 16 pages long booklet actually features four different stories by different authors, with the top-billed Tarzan vs Mandrake story by Yurdatap being the longest at six pages. Here is the plot summary: Mandrake and Lothar are visiting Africa, Dakar to be more precise. Lothar tells his master about a plant called Katopi which makes those who eat it invincible. This plant is to be found only in the 'jungle of the lions' where Tarzan happens to reside. Off to this jungle, Mandrake uses his powers to have a lion and a snake to attack Tarzan, but the lord of the jungle manages to kill the beasts. Impressed by this display of bravery and strength, Mandrake gives up his intention to fetch the magic plant which Tarzan guards. The two heros befriend and Mandrake leaves the jungle empty-handed, assured that the friendship of Tarzan is more valueable than any magic plant. Tarzan ve Mandrake Mücadelesi is from a series called 'Bizim Hikayeler [Our Stories]', but oddly there is no publisher info printed anywhere, only an adress of a distributor. The cover illustration is by Turkish artist Mehmet Tekdal.
In addition to Yurdatap's Mandrake books, the records of the Turkish National Library in Ankara lists two Mandrake titles from 1001 Macera series of circa 1944: 'İki Mandrake Karşı Karşıya [Two Mandrakes Against Each Other]' and 'Deli Kral [The Crazy King]'. These are probably comics (see this post on a Phantom comics from 1001 Macera), but I can not say whether they are by Turkish comics artists or Turkish editions of American strips.
Finally, I should add that Hakan Alpin's Çizgi Roman Ansiklopedisi (İnkilap Kitabevi, 2006:Istanbul) notes that the weekly comics Baytekin ile Bayçetin published by Mustafa Kızıltan featured (perhaps as secondary, filler material?, it's not clear from Alpin's wording) the strip 'Bay Tekin ve Mandraki Ankaraya Gidiyor [Mr Tekin and Mandraki Goes to Ankara]' by the then-young Turkish comics artist Şahap Ayhan; Baytekin was the name usually given to Flash Gordon in pre-war and war-time Turkish editions. Alpin fails to give a precise date for Baytekin ile Bayçetin, but records of the National Library clearly list it as being from 1944.

MANDRAKE IN 1001 ROMAN SPECIAL ISSUES (1940-46)

2011-08-09T12:37:00.000-07:00

Between 1940-46, Türkiye Yayınevi published monthly "special issues" of 1001 Roman alongside the weekly comics magazine of the same title. Unlike the tabloid-format weekly magazine, these issues were smaller in size and each issue headlined a complete adventure of one comics character. Mandrake was featured in eight of these monthly issues, beginning with no. 1 (Jan. 1940). The Mandrake adventure in no. 1 is called 'Hindistanda [In India]' and was originally serialized in American Sunday newspapers in 1935 (it was the 2nd Mandrake adventure ran in the Sunday comics format), but the Turkish edition is slightly abridged.
The first three issues of the "special issue" series included a shorter, second comics story of a different character alonside the main featured character and Mandrake was featured in this way in no. 2 (Feb. 1940), which was a Lone Ranger issue, as well. Titled as 'Haydutlar kralına karşı [Against the King of the Bandits]', this filler comics is the first-ever Mandrake adventure originally ran in the Sunday newspapers, but the mere five-pages long Turkish edition reprints its conclusion only (thanks to Marko Davidovic for leading me to this blog post for comparison).
Below is a list of the remaining Mandrake issues from the 1001 Roman special issues:
#10 (Oct. 1940): 'Tekinsiz Evin Esrarı [The Mystery of the Uncanny House]', originally daily strip continuity #13 (1938); slightly abridged
#16 (Apr. 1941): 'Merihli İnsanlar [Martian People]', originally daily strip continuity #16 (1938); slightly abridged

#23 (Nov. 1941 [on-print date: Nov. "1940", a typo): 'Zehirli Kılıç [The Poisened Sword]', originally daily strip continuity #14 (1938); slightly abridged
#29 (May. 1942): 'Sudan Şahı [The Shah of Sudan]', originally daily strip continuity #7 (1936); starts half-way through the original adventure and the rest still slightly abridged
#69 (Sept. 1945): untitled, originally Sunday continuity #8 (1938); starts half-way through the original adventure

#75 (Mar. 1946*): untitled, originally Sunday continuity #13 (1940)
* last issue of the series

MANDRAKE IN 1001 ROMAN (1939-46)

2011-08-09T06:07:00.001-07:00

In 1939, shortly before the outbreak of the 2nd World War, Tahsin Demiray's Türkiye Yayınevi, one of the leading pulishers of popular magazines in Turkey, launched the weekly 1001 Roman, Turkey's first comics magazine modeled on the European comics format (see this earlier post on a general coverage of this magazine). Mandrake the Magician soon joined the roster of comic strips serialized in this hugely popular magazine, beginning with no. 18 (dated Nov. 6th, 1939), as 'Mandrake - Sihirbazlar Kralı [Mandrake - The King of the Magicians]', a byline which would stuck with the character so much in Turkey that when, decades later, a weekly Mandrake comics would be launched in 1974, the logo on the first pages would once again utilize it.
The first two Mandrake adventures serialized in 1001 Roman were from American Sunday newspaper serials, reprinted in b&w here, but most of the subsequent adventures originated from daily strips. Between no.'s 87-108, Mandrake was published in the back covers and hence in color. With no. 197, after the end of the adventure where Mandrake faces his arch-nemesis Cobra for the second time (in terms of the strip's original run in US newspapers), 1001 Roman started re-running earlier adventures previously serialized in Ateş, beginning with Mandrake's first-ever adventure where he meets Cobra for the first time. So, the readers of 1001 Roman were presented with Mandrake's first encounter with Cobra after they were presented with the second encounter... It should also be noted that 1001 Roman, in the same manner as Ateş had done six years ago, presented Mandrake's first-ever adventure in an abridged form, omitting several panels, but the panels omitted in 1001 Roman were not same as those in Ateş, so 1001 Roman had not simply reprinted Ateş's edition; in anycase, the Turkish translation and the lettering were also different:
1001 Roman halted serializing Mandrake in 1945 after re-running three of the four adventures previously serialized in Ateş. After about a year of hiatus, one more Mandrake adventure was serialized in 1946, ending with the cessation of the publication of the weekly with no. 350. The final Mandrake adventure serialized in 1001 Roman was a daily strip continuity, originally run in US newspapers in 1938, where Mandrake visits Hollywood, but the Turkish editors began to serialize this continuity half-way through its first sub-plot and ended half-way through its second sub-plot at a convenient point when Mandrake teaches a spoiled child star some manners, before the kid gets kidnapped which was actually the main plot point of the narrative.
Here is a complete list of Mandrake adventures serialized in this Turkish comics weekly with the no.'s in 1001 Roman (and the years these issues were published), Turkish title [and translation], the conventional code referring to the sequence of American Sunday/daily strips (and the years they were originally ran in the US newspapers):
#18-36 (1939-40) Cüceler Ülkesinde [In the Land of the Midgets] s3 (1935-36)
#37-54 (1940) Gelecekte Bir Seyahat [A Voyage in the Future] s5 (1936-37)
#55-75 (1940) untitled d21 (1940)
#76-95 (1940-41) Sirkte Yangın [Fire at the Circus] s4 (1936)
#96-110 (1941) "Atmaca" Yarış Atı ["Hawk" the Race Horse] d10/2nd subplot (1937-38)
#111-132 (1941-1942) untitled d15 (1938)
#133-166 (1942) Meçhul Dünyalarda [In Unknown Worlds] d8 (1936-37)
#167-196 (1942-43) Kobra'ya Karşı [Against the Cobra] d9 (1937)
#197-246 (1943-44) Esrarengiz Adam [The Mysterious Man] d1 (1934)
#247-274 (1944) Dar Geçit [The Narrow Pass] d3 (1935)
#275-296 (1944-45) Gizli Oyun Yeri [The Secret Game Place] d2 (1934-35)
#342-350 (1946) untitled d11/only from 3-22 to 4-20 (1938)
Between 1940-46, Türkiye Yayınevi also published monthly 1001 Roman "special issues", and Mandrake were featured in several of them, but that will be covered in the next post in this blog.

MANDRAKE IN ATEŞ (1937-38)

2011-08-07T14:54:00.000-07:00

In an earlier post in this blog, I had covered the debut of Mandrake the Magician strips in Turkey in 1935 in an actuality magazine for grown-ups. This post will cover Mandrake's second appearance in Turkey which marks its first appearance in a Turkish publication designed for children. The publication in question was the weekly Ateş [Fire] published by Türkiye Yayınevi, a leading publisher of popular magazines in Turkey in the pre-war era. Mandrake the Magician began to be serialized as 'Mandrake - Şimşek Adam [Mandrake - The Lighting Man]' in two pages each issue format in Ateş with no. 14 (dated Feb. 2nd, 1937), joining two other comics series:The Mandrake adventure serialized in this first series of Ateş was his first-ever daily strip continuity originally from 1934, where he meets his arch-nemesis Cobra, which had already been serialized in Turkey in Büyük Gazete in 1935. However, while the former publication had began its Mandrake series with a perfect reprint (I don't have all the issues of BG with Mandrake, so I can not confirm if it continued that way to the end), Ateş presented it in an abridged form, omitting several panels, even entire strips.
Mandrake also appeared in the cover of no. 36, the first-ever appearance of the character on the cover of a Turkish publication:
The cover art is by Ercümend Kalmuk (1909-1971), a staff illustrator for Türkiye Yayınları.
Mandrake's first adventure ended in no. 52 which was also the last issue of the first series of Ateş. The magazine enlarged its size and started new enumeration soon afterwards. Mandrake was the only comics in this new series of Ateş and it was serialized on the back covers. The Mandrake adventures serialized in the second series of Ateş are 'Gizli Oyun Yeri [The Secret Game Place]', the 2nd daily strip continuity from its original run, where Mandrake meets his future-lover Narda, 'Kızıl Geçitteki Dev [The Giant At The Red Pass]', the 3rd daily strip continuity, and 'Kurtadam [The Werewolf]', the 5th daily strip continuity. For some reason, Ateş had skipped the 4th daily strip continuity where Mandrake meets the Clay Camel, who would be one of the recurrant villains, and is also temporarily re-united with Narda.
Following Ateş, Mandrake's next appearance in Turkey would be in Türkiye Yayınevi's full-fledged comics weekly 1001 Roman, but that will be covered in the next post in this blog.

TIGER TIM

2011-08-05T12:10:00.000-07:00

Tiger Tim holds the record for being the British comics character with the longest publication. It was created in 1904 (*) by Julius Stafford Baker (1869-1961) for the Daily Mirror newspaper at the detailed request of an editor on behalf of the publisher. The model which Baker was asked to emulate was 'Jungle Jinks' which had appeared in 1898 in a supplement of a women's magazine and boosted its sales. The commissioned strip debutted on April 11st, 1904. Tiger Tim (the tentative name suggested to the artist was "Tommy Tiger") is one of the mischievous kids in a kindergarten of humanized animals. Daily Mirror's children's corner did not generate much interest, but Tiger Tim and his pals re-appeared later that year in The Monthly Playbox, the children's supplement of a magazine called The World and His Wife. In 1914, they began to be featured on the covers of The Rainbow, the pioneer British comics magazine targeted for children, from its first issue onwards. The above scan is from no. 1234, dated Oct. 9th, 1937. By this time, Baker had long been replaced by other artists. I have also seen the cover of no. 1 from 1914 and Baker's work may or may not have been up to the standarts of its own era but, while the art has improved from 1914 to the above sample in 1937, I still find it to be relatively more stiff compared to the best humanized animals comic art of the pre-war era, esp. compared to original Disney material which had already landed in the British market in 1936 with the launching of Mickey Mouse Weekly in 1936. Nevertheless, despite looking somewhat out-dated, it eludes a naive charm. Tiger Tim and his pals are also featured in the editor's corner of this issue:... and there is also a herald for an upcoming give-away from sister magazine Tiger Tim's Weekly (from 1919 onwards, Tiger Tim had also acquired its own comics magazine in addition to The Rainbow, initially titled as Tiger Tim's Tales):Tiger Tim's Weekly would continue to be published till 1940 and The Rainbow till 1956, but Tiger Tim would appear in other British children's magazines till mid-1980s.

Sources: Denis Gifford, The International Book of Comics (WHSmith, 1988) and The Complete Catalogue of British Comics (Webb & Bower, Exeter: 1985).

(*) Most online sources give an even earlier debut date for Tiger Tim, but I have stuck to Gifford's account. Other sources might be confusing 'Jungle Jinx', which (according to Gifford) was the model for Tiger Tim and his pals with actual Tiger Tim. If anyone knows any better, please let us know.

SOME STRIPS FROM RAINBOW ISSUE FROM 1937

2011-08-02T12:41:00.000-07:00

Recently, when received an old issue of Mickey Mouse Weekly which I had bought off ebay, I was delighted to see that the kind seller had also enclosed an incomplete and hence unsellable copy of a pre-war issue (no. 1234, dated Oct. 9th, 1937) of The Rainbow, the pioneer British comics magazine for children, as a surprise bonus! The cover feature on The Rainbow is Tiger Tim, but I intend to cover that character in the next post in this blog, so here are scans of other strips from the copy I received. The above scan is from page 2 (the reverse of the front cover) and the below one from page 9:Judging by the contents notice on the cover, I gather that two more adventure continuity strips were featured in the four central pages missing from the copy I received, 'Chums of the Sea' and 'Secret of the Storm Castle', in addition to 'Full Speed Ahead'. And below is the back cover:I could find no info anywhere on these strips, so if anyone knows anything about them, please let us know.

KING OF THE ROYAL MOUNTED SEES "WHAT NO WHITE MAN CAN SEE AND LIVE"

2011-07-26T06:02:00.000-07:00

'Mystery of Little Snake', serialized in Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly no.'s 152-161 in 1938-1939, is my most favorite 'King of the Royal Mounted' adventure. It involves the attempt of a bunch of baddies to lay their hands on a loot of gold which a tribe of natives are believed to be hiding in the secret burial ground of reserved for their chiefs. For this end, they murder the current chief of the tribe and plan to discover the secret location by trailing his son. The new chief is perfectly aware of their intentions and wisely hopes to use it as an opportunity to avenge his father... Thus, a tense journey starts as three groups, the native carrying the corpse of his father, the baddies, and King accompanied by 'kid' (the little brother of his lover) travel through the snowy terrains towards a destination unknown to all except the native to reach their fate where death is certain to meet some or all of them.
The climax is reached as the baddies follow the chief into a cave he had went in, effectively passing the point of no return in this wonderfully colored panel:
King breaks into the scene, resulting in not only a confrontation with the baddies, but a stand-of with the chief:Btw, note the artist's unfortunate blunder as King's pistol in the panel on the left above disappears on the panel on the right, only to re-appear in the panel on the left below:
Despite this artistic blunder, the face-off between King and the native is highly dramatic as both face the burden of obeying their own laws which necessiates unwillingly confronting each other.

KING OF THE ROYAL MOUNTED AND THE CIRCUS HORRORS

2011-07-17T16:21:00.000-07:00

The earlier adventures of King of the Royal Mounted published in Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly (maybe I should paraphrase that as those published earlier in MMW as I cannot confirm whether the British publication followed the sequence of the adventuıres as they were originally run in the US newspapers) had a decidedly authentic tone as they often involved ordinary trappers and other locals of the Canadian countryside in their daily lives and were set in mountainous lanscapes. Eventually, the adventures took a turn in which the plots became more familiar comic-strip fare, such as 'The Terror of the Big Top' serialized in MMW no.'s 174-182 in 1939 where Sgt. King investigates a murder in a circus. The above panel is from the installement in no. 175, involving a dark, cloaked figure which had become a not-so-rare visual motif in the comics of the 1930s in the wake of The Bat Whispers (1930); below is a still from this mystery-thriller movie (whose Bat character was also an inspiration for the Batman):And the below sequence from the installement in the next issue involves the 'murder of a subject who is just about to disclose the identity of the culprit' theme so often seen in comics:The trapeze act in the below sequence from the installement in no. 178 provides an excuse for the first and only instance where some female flesh is displayed in any King of the Royal Mountain adventure that I've seen:
And the below segment from the installement in the next issue makes good opportunity of the circus setting for a tigers-set-on-loose sequence:

KING OF THE ROYAL MOUNTED AND THE PERILS OF FILMMAKING

2011-07-16T09:06:00.000-07:00

No, this post is not about any of the film adaptations of 'King of the Royal Mounted', but rather about an adventure in which Sgt. King, upon the request of his girlfriend Betty Blake who has taken up the job of a scriptgirl, investigates suspiciously frequent accidents occuring during the shooting of a film. Titled 'Mystery on Location', it was serialized in Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly no.'s 183-193 in 1939 (I don't know the date of its original run in the US newspapers); the above scan is from MMW no. 187. King's suspicions zero in on none other than the director himself, as in the below sequence from no.'s 189-190 whose coloring I especially like:The relatively advanced film making equipment on display in 'Mystery on Location' suggests an early 20th century time period for the strip.
'Mystery on Location' was the last 'King of the Royal Mounted' adventure serialized in MMW during the strip's consecutive run in this British magazine in 1936-39. Initially, the adventurues carried no specific titles of their own and were run under the generic title of 'King of the Royal Mounted by Zane Grey' from the start in no. 45 till no. 99. Here are the on-print titles of the remaining adventures and the issue numbers they were carried on, and the years these issue are from:
[The Mystery of the Sunken Treasure Ship (*)] # 100-109 (1938)
The Mystery of the Rush River # 110-131 (**) (1938)
The Helium Mine Mystery # 132-141 (1938)
Trouble At Skogen Ridge Ranch # 142-151 (1938)
Mystery of Little Snake (***) # 152-161 (1938-1939)
The History of the Synthetic Diamond Formula # 162-173 (1939)
The Terror of the Big Top # 174-182 (1939)
Mystery On Location # 183-193 (1939)
The Wild Man of the Wilderness 214-22? (1940)
(*) Actually, this title was given only at the end of #99 as the title of the forthcoming adventure, but # 100-109 carried only the generic title.
(**) 'The Mystery of the Rush River' actually consists of two consecutive adventures.
(***) The opening of 'Mystery of Little Snake' refers to the preceeding adventure as 'Border Terror', so at this point, MMW apparently broke out of sequence from the strip's original run.

'THE WILD MAN OF THE WILDERNESS'

2011-07-09T11:55:00.000-07:00

Above scan (broken into two due to the size of my scanner), featuring the first installment of a King of the Royal Mounted adventure titled 'The Wild Man of the Wilderness', is from the color central pages of the no. 214 (dated March 9th, 1940) of Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly. 'The Wild Man of the Wilderness' concerns a mysterious title character stealing pelts of trappers. The art is pretty good with impressive splash panels and some decent rendering of good-looking women, as in the below panels from no. 216:

I also like how the utilization of a windy and snowy setting contributes to the establishment of a moody atmosphere in the below panels from no. 219:

And below is a nice action sequence from no. 222:

I am not certain about the artist working on 'The Wild Man of the Wilderness'. The art chores of 'King of the Royal Mounted' had passed onto Jim Gary from Charles Flanders in 1939 and 'The Wild Man of the Wilderness' was serialized in MMW early in 1940, but this British magazine was probably running the American strip with some delay from its original run in the US newspapers, so its original run might have corresponded with the tenures of either Flanders or Gary.
'King of the Royal Mounted' is credited to famous Western writer Zane Grey, but Zane's byline was used for publicity purposes and the actual scriptwriter(s) of the strip are anonymous. The character is widely regarded as the brainchild of Stephen Slesinger, a literary agent who was one of the pioneers of merchandising popular literary characters. Eventually, Slesinger also conceived the idea of creating original characters and the Canadian mounted lawman King of the Royal Mounted was born. The Sunday strip kicked off in Feb. 17th, 1935 and the daily less than a year later; the original artist was Allen Dean who would eventually be replaced by Flanders. The strip would be popular enough to be adapted into the silver screen as a feature movie in 1936 and as serials in the early 1940s. It would also spin-off comics books headlining the title character who would remain in syndication till the 1950s.

DEBUT OF BUCK RYAN (1937)

2011-07-07T12:37:00.000-07:00

Above scan is of the first strip, dating from March 22nd, 1937, of 'Buck Ryan', a long-running British private detective serial, as reprinted in Buck Ryan volume 1: A Lady Vanishes by Newspaper Daily Comic Strip Library.
Buck Ryan was originally ran in Daily Mail, the British newspaper which pioneered British newspaper strips. Launched in 1903 by Alfred Harmsworth, the British media mogul who was also responsible for the boom of British comics magazines, Daily Mail had been running strips since 1904 including 'Mrs Hippo's Kindergarten', a historically important strip as Tiger Tim, soon to be a major British juvenile comics hero, made his first appearance there. However, the full-fledged proliferation of British strips in DM would occur in the 1930s and 'Buck Ryan' was created in that period. Writer Don Freeman and artist Jack Monk had initially created an Edgar Wallace adaptation strip, but reportedly had to to drop that one due to copyrights issues and created 'Buck Ryan' as a replacement. 'Buck Ryan' would be successful enough to run until 1962.
The first 'Buck Ryan' continuity, titled as 'A Lady Vanishes' in the reprint volume cover, has mediocre art and acceptable but undistiguished narrative about a kidnapping scheme. Visually the most interesting sequence is in the below strips:
However, the great visual potentials of an opium den setting is simply unexploited and wasted:

The same setting, on the other hand, is utilized for the utterance of some racially degrading jargon:

A noteworthy aspect of 'A Lady Vanishes' is the presence of remarkably brutal instances of violence against women, far more shocking than found in American mainstream strips of the same era as far as I am aware, one of which is in the below strip:
There are a few instances of pretty decent action sequences as well, such as the below strip:
There is also a relatively high body count:
I've also purchased vol. 9 of NDCSL's Buck Ryan reprint series and can attest that the strip had improved in terms of both art and story in two years from its inception. At some point in the future, I hope to post about that extremely interesting war-time (and war-related) continuity titled 'The Mystery of the Silent Bomber' as well. Artist Jack Monk would stay on board 'Buck Ryan' till the very end, but writer Don Freeman would eventually be replaced by others. It should be pointed out that this British comics writer (1903-72) should not be confused with an American children's books author and illustrator with the same name. The British Freeman would also contribute scripts to other leading Daily Mail strips such as 'Jane' and 'Garth'.
Newspaper Daily Comic Strip Library's reprint series appear to be computer printouts, but are quite acceptable in quality and the producers must be congragulated for the effort they put into compiling them. As I'd noted in an earlier post, these are the only available English-language reprints of Buck Ryan.

SMOKING MARMADUKE STRIP (1939)

2011-07-06T17:07:00.000-07:00

Above scan of Basil Reynolds' Marmaduke strip from no. 187 (dated Sept. 2nd, 1939) of Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly is a testament to times of a different attitude towards smoking...

"UGH!" 'PUSSYFOOT THE REDSKIN' (1922)

2011-06-09T00:01:00.000-07:00

Above scans are from the central pages of the no. 1653 (dated Jan. 14th, 1922) and no. 1656 (dated Feb. 4th, 1922) of the British comics magazine Comic Cuts, featuring the strip 'Pussyfoot the Redskin' by an unknown artist. It is the earliest comic strip that I've come across which headlines an American native and while the character's name might not sound flattering, it is noteworthy that he outwits the whites with his intelligence in these two samples. I cannot find any info on this interesting strip, so if anyone knows anything about it, please let us know.

THE COMIC CUTS COLONY

2011-06-08T00:01:00.000-07:00

Above scan is from the back cover of the no. 1653 (dated Jan. 14th, 1922) of the British comics magazine Comic Cuts and the below one from no. 1656 (dated Feb. 4th, 1922):
According to Denis Gifford (The International Book of Comics, W H Smith Exclusive Books, London: 1988), the Comic Cuts Colony had debuted in 1894 and was created by one Frank Wilkinson, about whom I cannot find any info anywhere. While I am admittedly reluctant to speak positively about it, the art is quite high-calibre and the humour is nowhere as repugnant as similar fare from most other racial-stereotying comics.

PERCY COCKING IN COMIC CUTS (1922)

2011-06-07T16:03:00.000-07:00

Recently, I had a chance to get two 1922 issues of Britain's pioneering comics magazine Comic Cuts from ebay (for an amazingly low price of app. 1 pounds each!). Comic Cuts, the first magazine to use the word "comic" in its title, was started by Alfred Harmswoth in 1890, and priced at 1/2 penny, half the price of similar magazines like Funny Folks, kicked off the boom of comics magazines in Britain. Above scan is of the cover of no. 1653 (dated Jan. 14th, 1922), featuring 'The Side-Splitting Adventures of Jolly Tom, the Merry Menagerie Man' by British comics artist Percy Cocking (1881-1964) who had been drawing the exploits of Tom in Comic Cuts since 1910. I find his art quite pleasing and high-calibre 'though the title character's twin nemesises are clearly modeled on Katzenjammer Kids. The back cover of this issue includes another strip by Cocking:

This strip is highly innovative in its utilization of the depiction of each flat as if a panel within the panels. Cocking's Mulberry Flattites had debutted in Comic Cuts in 1906. Cocking, a staffer for Harmsworth's Amalgamated Press (today's Fleetway), is better known as the artist who took over the hugely popular series 'Weary Willie and Tired Tim' created by the highly influential Tom Browne in 1896 for Illustrated Chips and continued it for more than four decades till the magazine folded in 1953.

SKIT, SKAT AND THE CAPTAIN BY WILFRED HAUGHTON

2011-05-28T11:03:00.000-07:00

Above scan is of a detail from the cover of no. 39 (dated Oct. 31st, 1939) of Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly featuring the non-Disneyic comics characters Skit, Skat and the Captain created by the British comics artist Basil Reynolds for MMW alongside regular Disneyic characters in an illustration by MMW cover artist Wilfred Haugton. The full image of the cover is below:
Later in 1936, Haughton, who had been drawing the covers of MMW since its inception, also began a series titled 'The De(f)tective Agency!' featuring Goofy and Toby Tortoise as private detectives. Reynolds' characters made a cameo appearance in this series as well, in no. 50 (Jan. 16th, 1937):

REYNOLDS' CAPTAIN IN YUGOSLAVIAN DISNEYIC COMICS (1936)

2011-05-26T11:38:00.000-07:00

British comics artist Basil Reynolds' Captain character from his (non-Disneyic) 'Skit, Skat and the Captain' series which he drew for Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly between 1936-1940 had made a cameo appearance in a Yugoslavian Mickey Mouse comics published in 1936: He appears in the 25th part (see above scan, taken from outducks archive) of the 'Donald & Mickey - A Trip: New Adventures' serialized in Mika Mis no.'s 32-56.
Reynolds' Captain's cameo in this Yugoslavian comics was first noticed by inducks indexer Mankkop in 2010. Actually, 'Donald & Mickey - A Trip: New Adventures', probably drawn by Yugoslavian comics artist Vlastimir Belkic, utilizes even more material from from MMW: For instance, the sea dragon which appears in part 4 is traced from a non-Disneyic gag, probably again the work of Reynolds, in MMW no. 4 and the tiger in part 19 from the 'Ted Towers' comics, of US origin, serialized in the early issues of MMW; I am sure that a patient examination would lead to identifying most of the figures in most of the panels to be traced from somewhere in MMW.

FIRST COLOR EDITION OF FELIX THE CAT IN TURKEY (1938)

2011-05-24T12:16:00.000-07:00

'Felix the Cat', the biggest star of early American animation, had been adopted to the newspaper comics medium in 1923. Felix comics debutted in Turkey in the weekly children's magazine Yarutürk in 1936, retitled as 'Kara Kedi [the Black Cat]'. Published in monochrome on either the reverse of the back cover or on the back cover itself, the earliest Turkish editions of 'Kara Kedi' were reformatted with speech balloons deleted and text material added beneath the panels (scan of a sample from this period was earlier posted in this blog). 'Kara Kedi' appeared in this format in Yavrutürk till no. 125. When it resumed at the reverse of the back cover of no. 135 (dated Nov. 26th, 1938) with a new continuity titled 'Kara Kedi Gemici [Black Cat the Sailor]', it was not only in proper comics format with speech balloons and no text outside the panels, but also in color (see above scan), marking the first time a comics was published as such in Yavrutürk. Actually, I think this was the first time ever any comics was published both in color and in proper format in Turkey (there had been comics published in ull color since 1935, but they had extra-panel texts; and comics in proper format had been published since the same year, but they were in monochrome).
The first installement of 'Kara Kedi Gemici' had clearly been intended to be printed on the back cover itself, but shifted to the reverse side due to an editorial decision at the last moment to allocate the front cover to a photo of the cascet of the recently deceased Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the Turkish Republic, and shift the original front cover to the back cover. With the subsequent issue, 'Kara Kedi Gemici' took its place on the back cover:

Nevertheless, the series was shifted to interior pages with no. 143 and began to be printed in b&w, although still in proper comics format. Unfortunately, while earlier 'Kara Kedi' continuities often entailed fantasy elements and hence had very imaginative narratives, 'Kara Kedi Gemici' was a fun, but more routine affair, as exemplifed in the below cannibal sequence from no. 159:
'Kara Kedi Gemici' ended in no. 165 (dated June 24th, 1939). The subsequent four issues of Yavrutürk featured 'Kara Kedi' once again in the outmoded reformat of extra-panel texts to compansate for deleted speech balloons. Afterwards, no 'Kara Kedi' comics were published in Yavrutürk for more than two years. 'Kara Kedi' returned to Yavrutürk when the magazine started its vol. 12 with new enumeration on Oct. 25th, 1941 (previous 11 volumes had consequitive enumeration). Proper format with speech balloons and no extra-panel text was resumed with no. 28 (dated July 18th, 1942). When Yavrutürk was replaced with Çocuk Haftası from the same pulisher at the beginning of 1943, 'Kara Kedi' continued in this new childre's magazine.

OBSCURE RACIAL-STEREOTYPING COMICS

2011-05-23T00:02:00.000-07:00

An obscure gag-a-week comics series based on degrading racial stereotyping of African blacks, titled in Turkish as 'Başkan Bambu [President Bamboo]', was ran in some issues of the Turkish weekly children's magazine Yavrutürk in 1938. Above scan is possibly of the first installement of the series (the issue no., as well as the date, are missing from the tattered copy in my collection, but it is probably no. 93). At the beginning of this gag, Bambu is introduced as "the most civilized president of the savages."
The presence of the ruling colonial forces is manifested in the below gag from no. 97:

Probably the most degrading portrayal is in the below gag from no. 98:

My Yavrutürk collection from 1938 is incomplete, but 'Başkan Bambu' was in most likelyhood published in less than ten issues.
If anyone knows the original source of this comics, please let us know...

OBSCURE TINTIN-LOOKALIKE COMICS

2011-05-23T00:01:00.000-07:00

In 1940, an obscure adventure comics titled as 'Bücür Görünmeyen Şehirde [Shorty in the Invisible City]' was serialized in the Turkish children's weekly magazine Yavrutürk no.'s 198-208. The plot starts with a white kid who looks somewhat like Tintin, named as Bücür in this Turkish edition, befriending a native kid called Duda in Africa. The two kids come across a city in the desert where they are imprisoned for attempting to buy some food with money; for transactions with money has been forbidden in this city where everyone is obliged to give any money they find to the city's ruler. Bücür manages to escape and take a leading part in a revolt against the ruler. In the end, when he wants to embrace Duda, his friend disappears as a mirage! So does the city! In a twist, it all turns out to be a feverish dream...
If anyone knows anythig about the original source of this weird comics, PLEASE let us know..

TURKISH DEBUT OF KATZENJAMMER KIDS

2011-05-22T09:09:00.000-07:00

'The Katzenjammer Kids', considered by many as the first proper US comics strip, arrived in Turkey with almost a four decades delay. Above scan is of its Turkish debut in no. 66 (dated July 31st, 1937) of the weekly children's magazine Yavrutürk. Retitled as 'Tosunla Yosun [Tosun and Yosun]', the Turkish edition was traced in b&w with the speech balloons deleted from the panels and supplemented with extra-panel texts (the source of the Turkish edition might be French albums by Hachette which is known to have reprinted American strips in similar re-formatting) which is especially unfortunate as 'the Katzenjammer Kids' was one of the earliest strips to utilize speech balloons.
In 1914, 'the Katzenjammer Kids' had been cloned by its original artist Rudolph Dirks when he had lost the rights of the title to publisher Hearst in a court case: While Dirks featured the same main characters in a separate untitled strip, eventually titled as 'the Captain and the Kids', for the rival publisher Pulitzer, Hearst continued 'the Katzenjammer Kids' with a new artist, Harold Knerr. Both strips continued seperately for several decades (the Hearst version is still continuig today). The Turkish edition is of the Hearst/Knerr version as it features the supporting characters private tutor Miss Twiddle (referrred simply as "teacher" here) and her niece Lena (renamed as Fatoş and referred as the teacher's daughter), both of which were created by Knerr in 1936 and hence utilized only in the Hearst version. Yavrutürk no's 66-73 ran gag-a-week episodes of 'Tosunla Yosun', each gag being about the kids' mischiefs against their tutor and/or her niece. A five-part continuity titled as 'Tosunla Yosun Dünya Gezisinde [Tosun and Yosun in World Trip]' started in no. 74 with the kids embarking on a balloon voyage where they utilize a sea tortoise as their engine:
The second episode came in no. 76 (no 'Tosunla Yosun' page was published in no. 75, as well as in no. 77) when the kids steal away the food of a native who shoots down their balloon in revenge:
and chases them to an island:
On the island, the kids and another shipwreck rescue a baby ape:
and the island's apes help them in repairing their vehicle:
No 'Tosunla Yosun' pages were published in the next three issues of Yavrutürk after the end of this mini-adventure, but a stand-alone gag appeared in no: 84:
In 1938, several gag-a-week episodes featuring some child guests appeared, probably beginning with the below one from possibly no. 92 (the issue no. and date is missing from the tattered copy I have in my collection):
Further gag-a-week episodes with these new supporting characters appeared in no.'s 96, 97, 99 and 104 (my Yavrutürk collection from 1938 is incomplete, so a few more episodes might have been published); if anyone knows their original names, please let us know.
No 'Tosunla Yosun' pages were ran in Yavrutürk in 1939, but, inbetween three issues with color editions in back covers in 1940 (see below post in this blog), the below half-page appeared in no. 216 (dated June 1st, 1940):

FIRST COLOR EDITIONS OF THE KATZENJAMMER KIDS IN TURKEY (1940)

2011-05-22T01:25:00.000-07:00

Above scan is of the back cover of no. 214 (dated June 1st, 1940) of the Turkish weekly children's magazine Yavrutürk, marking the first color edition of 'the Katzenjammer Kids' in Turkey. The back covers of no. 217 and 218 once again featured the Katzies, this time re-titled as 'Yosun ile Tosun ve Kaptan Baba [Yosun and Tosun with the Captain Daddy]', elevating the Captain to the title:

KATZENJAMMER KIDS CLIPPINGS FROM 1902

2011-05-21T00:01:00.000-07:00

These two Sunday newspaper comics clippings from 1902 (currently being offered on ebay) are the earliest samples of Rudolph Dirks' 'Katzenammer Kids' which I could find.
'Katzenammer Kids', which had debutted in 1897, is regarded as the first proper US comics (ie. structured as borderlined panels with speech balloons.

A HOODED NAZI GETS THE KICK (1943)

2011-05-20T12:42:00.000-07:00

Miss Fury was one of the earliest masked heroines in comics - and the first one created by a female artist. June Tarpé Mills did not use her female-sounding first name when signing her work, but when Miss Fury, which debutted as a Sunday newspaper comics on April 6th, 1941, became a success, the true gender of her creater was eventually made public. Miss Fury's comics book series began in 1942 and lasted on a bi-/tri-annual period for 8 issues till 1945. You can view all the covers of this series here: http://www.comicvine.com/miss-fury-comics/49-20505/ (from which the above image was also pasted from); note that the covers of no. 4 and 5 feature evil Japanese, allies of Nazi Germany in the 2nd World War. Miss Fury comics series seem to be highly collectible items as all single issues available on ebay are offered for three- or four-digit figures!.. On the other hand, I could find one sample of the Sunday pages which indicate that the artwork was quite high-calibre:
Mills' comics work prior to 'Miss Fury' include the one-shot horror comics 'The Vampire' and the 'Daredevil Barry Flynn' series, both from Amazing Mystery Funnies*.
* Denis Gifford, The International Book of Comics (1988: W H Smith)

BUCK RYAN - THE ITALIAN REPRINTS

2011-05-17T13:52:00.000-07:00

'Buck Ryan' was a detective strip published in the British newspaper Daily Mirror from 1937 onwards till 1962. During its heydays, there has been only a single one-shot Buck Ryan comics published in the UK (in 1946) and there was also an Australian Buck Ryan comics periodical. Other than what appears to be a fan-based reprint series from Newspaper Daily Comic Strip Library, there has not been any English-language reprints. However, there were some Buck Ryan albums published in Italy. The first one, in oblong format (see above image for cover) came in 1973; I don't know about its contents. Later in the same decade, the same publisher, Milano Libri Edizioni, also published a series of four albums, which appear to be hardcover editions, reprinting in chronological order from 1937 through 1940:

I've just ordered two issues of the British NDCSL reprint series and will post about them when I receive them.
Sources on the 1946 British one shot and the Australian comics: Denis Gifford, The Complete Catalogue of British Comics (1985: Webb & Bower, Exeter) and ibid, The International Book of Comics (1988: W H Smith) resp.

FIGHT COMICS

2011-05-10T04:47:00.000-07:00

While researching for some other topic, I incidentally came across this startling World War 2 cover yesterday. It is no. 32 (dated June 1944) of Fight Comics published by Fiction House. Fight Comics had lasted for 86 issues between 1940-54. It was the second comics magazine put out by American publisher Fiction House who are better known with Jumbo which had featured Sheena, the first jungle girl hero in the comics medium.
Obviously encouraged by the popularity of Sheena, Fiction House had introduced a new jungle girl, named Tiger Girl, in Fight Comics no. 32 (hence the reason I went looking for this issue). Tiger Girl would also eventually be popular enough to grace the covers of most of the subsequent issues herself, one of my favorites being this later cover from no. 73 (dated March 1951):

SKIT, SKAT AND CAPTAIN IN MICKEY MOUSE XMAS SPECIAL (1939)

2011-04-30T13:45:00.000-07:00

One of the few excursions of Basil Reynolds' 'Skit, Skat and Captain' out of Mickey Mouse Weekly, where it had debutted (see the earlier post in this blog), would be the four Mickey Mouse holiday specials put out by the weekly's publisher Odham Press between 1936-39. The above scan is from the last of these publications, titled Mickey Mouse Xmas Special. Besides 'Skit, Skat and Captain', Reynolds also contributed two Disneyic strips to this christmas special.

MARMADUKE IN COLOR (1942) AND THE RETURN OF MARMADUKE (1947)

2011-04-30T11:19:00.000-07:00

British comics artist Basil Reynolds, who had been on board at Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly comics magazine since its launch in 1936, was drafted into the British army in October 1940. However, little "bits and pieces" of material he had earlier produced and un-used at the time occasionally continued to appear in the now understaffed magazine till mid-1942. A few of these were some Marmaduke strips. Unlike the original run of Marmaduke which was in black&white (see the earlier post on this blog covering the debut of Marmaduke), these extra strips were printed at the bottom rim of the back cover and hence in color. The above scan is from no. 307 (dated Apr. 11th, 1942) and the below ones from the two subsequent issues:Reynolds would return to Mickey Mouse some time after the war and would revive his mouse character, this time simply as a host, in a new b & w strip titled 'Marmaduke Presents .. ?' in 1947-48. Below samples are from no. 448 (Sept. 20th, 1947) and 451 (Nov. 1st, 1947):Pinky Green in the strip from 448 is another character Reynolds had created in 1940 for a separate strip (see the earlier post on this blog covering the debut of Pinky).

SUSKE EN WISKE (BOB ET BOBETTE)

2011-03-08T12:39:00.000-08:00

'Suske en Wiske' is a Dutch-language newspaper comics serial from Belgium which had debutted in 1945 and still being run in its home country after more than half a century. The strip, created by Willy Vandersteen (1913-1990), had started on March 30th, 1945 (*) in De Nieuwe Standaard initially as 'Rikki en Wiske', chronicling the adventures of a teenage girl (Wiske) and her brother (Rikki). With the second episode ('Op het eiland Amoras') however, which started on Dec. 19th, 1945, Rikki disappeared and Wiske was joined by a male orphan named Suske and the series was re-titled accordingly. With the next episode ('De sprietatoom'), the teenage duo would be joined by the bald grown-up Lambik, a plummer by profession, who would eventually become the real attraction of the series. The strip would be popular enough to be reprinted in album format from 1946 onwards.
In 1948, Hergé, the creater of Tintin, who had launced a weekly comics magazine headlining his character, invited Vandersteen on board for its Dutch-language edition titled Kuifje. From 1950 onwards, Suske & Wiske also began to be serialized in the French-language edition (Tintin) retitled as 'Bob et Bobette'. French-language albums under this title began to be published in 1951. A total of eight 'Suske en Wiske' / 'Bob et Bobette' adventures were serialized in Kuife / Tintin till 1959. The adventures originally published in Kuife / Tintin were reprinted in albums of blue covers, distinct from newspaper strip reprint albums with red covers.
In the early 1970s, Vandersteen would hand over the strip to his assistant Paul Geertz, who ghosted for the creater until 1989 when he finaly began to be officially credited. Geertz handled the series until his retirement in 2001.
Sparodic English-language album editions of Suske en Wiske / Bob et Bobette have been published since 1976 as Willy and Wanda (US), Bob & Bobette (UK) and more recently as Spike and Suzy. For a complete list, see http://suskeenwiske.ophetwww.net/albums/engels/index-eng.php
(*) after Belgium had been liberated from the Nazi occupation, but several weeks before the war in Europe ended with the ultimate defeat and final surrender of Nazi Germany, thus making it a war-time comics, hence its inclusion in this blog
Source: http://suskeenwiske.ophetwww.net/
Coming soon in this blog:
THE TURKISH EDITIONS OF SUSKE EN WISKE / BOB ET BOBETTE

FANTOMAS (1941)

2011-03-01T00:00:00.000-08:00

Historically speaking, the most important comics serialized in the wartime French comics weekly Gavroche was 'Fantômas', the first-ever comics featuring the phenomenally popular pulp fiction anti-hero of the same name which was created by French writers Marcel Allain (1885-1970) and Pierre Souvestre (1874-1914) in 1911. Between 1911-13, the duo had penned a staggering amount of 32 Fantômas novels, several of which were adapted to the screen in a series of equally succesful movies between 1913-14. In 1926, Allain would revive the character in a news series of books (Souvestre had died in 1914). Hence, the 'Fantômas' comics which kicked off in the central color pages of no. 24 (dated April 10th, 1941) of Gavroche carries a "Marcel Allain presénte" tag.
Below is the scan of the bottom two rows of the first page where Fantômas makes his first appearance (apart from the extra-panel centerfold figure seen in the above scan) in the comics as he dramatically bursts from behind a wall clock (*):

The first installement of 'Fantomas' covered both of the two central color pages:

'Fantômas' lasted till no. 30 (dated May 22d, 1941) of Gavroche and the rest of the installements beyond the first one were apparently single-page per issue, so there are a total of 8 pages. The original art work for one of the pages (**) can be seen here:

http://www.comicartfans.com/gallerypiece.asp?piece=627395&gsub=110317

and thumbnails of all the pages and zooms of sample panels can be viewed here:

http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/fantomasfr/Fant300.htm

The last panel of the last installement promised a new episode titled 'Fantômas et l'enfer sous-marin [Fantomas and the underwater hell]' which was never published, presumably due to censorship.

I can't see any signatures either in the Fantômas pages of no. 24 of Gavroche which I have in my collection nor in the original art available online, but most French sources credit the art to Mat and Tori. The latter is the pen-name of Spanish-born artist Antoni Clavé (1913-2005). He was a distinguished painter in Spain who had to flee to France after the Spanish Civil War was won by the fascists. In France, he initially took up a temporary career in comics as he is known to have worked for comics weeklies Jumbo, Gavroche and Les grandes adventures. In this medium, besides 'Fantômas', he is notable for making the first comics version of Zorro in a series of albums from the Victorie collection published in Lyons, in the unoccupied regions of France, circa 1941. After the war, Clavé appears to have abandoned comics work in favor of painting and sculpture, even opening a joint exhibition with Picasso in 1946!
The identity of Mat, Tori's companion in 'Fantômas', is less clear-cut. It is tempting to identify him as the leading French comics artist Marcel Turlin (1895-1982) who used Mat as his penname. However, an online French comics dbase, la database BD du Loup, notes that Spanish emigre artist Martí Bas (1910-66) has also used the penname Mat in Gavroche. Bas, an illustrator who had produced propaganda posters for the Communist-led Republican government during the Spanish Civil War, was indeed a companion of Clavé even back in Spain where they had collaborated in stage set designs in Barcelona.

Footnotes:

(*) In a somewhat similar fashion, a female vampire appears from inside a wall clock in the French erotic horror film Les frisson des vampires (1970), directed by Jean Rollin. That scene might have been influenced by this sequence from the Fantômas comics as director Rollin was known to be a comics fan as well as part of the French surrealist circles which adored Fantômas.

(**) While the original art work of this 5th page was intended for publication in no. 28, as the pencilled note indicates, it has apparently turned out in no. 27 as no. 24 carried two pages.

DEMONAX (1941)

2011-02-27T00:00:00.000-08:00

Perhaps the most interesting comics series in the wartime French comics weekly Gavroche were 'Le clan des hommes oiseaux [The Clan of Bird-Men]' and its follow-up 'Les Hommes oiseaux au moyen-âge [The Bird-Men in the Middle Ages]', featuring the anti-hero Demonax, one of the earliest, perhaps the earliest anti-hero in the comics medium.
The Clan of the Bird-Men, which debutted in no. 13 (dated Jan 23rd, 1941), were a gang of masked and costumed villains with mechanical wings, led by Demonax. The second episode, which kicked off in no. 29, involves a time machine which takes the characters first to the Middle Ages, and then to the pre-historic ages, as can be seen in the above scan of the installement from no. 42 (dated August 14th, 1941). The saga ended in the next issue, which is unfortunately not available in my collection.
The original artwork of one of the earlier installements can be seen here:
http://www.comicartfans.com/GalleryPiece.asp?Piece=506191&GSub=79782 .
The series is signed by Lortac, the pen-name of the multi-talented Robert Collard (1884-1973). While his parents had intended a military career for him, Robert Collard was expelled from the French Military Academy at the age of 16 for lack of discipline. Instead, he attented painting workshops at Paris Fine Arts School and began working as an illustrator & caricaturist at newspapers in 1906. He was drafted for the 1st World War, but was discharged when he was wounded. Eventually, Collard took up an interest in animation and became one of the pioneers of this then-novel craft in France. He also penned several sci-fi and crime novels.
Demonax was Collard's first comics work. In the following years, he gave up comics art work, but became a prolific script-writer for comics. His ouvre in this category include the long-running outer space adventure comics 'Les conquerants de l'espace' serialized in Meteor between 1953-64, as well as several episodes, mostly of fantasy variety, of 'Bibi Fricotin' between 1948-69.
Main source on Lortac bio: http://www.bd-nostalgie.org/DIVERS/02_auteurs_Lortac.htm
For a detailed study of his animation work, see: http://www.pathefilm.freeserve.co.uk/95flmart/95lortac.htm

PROF. GLOBULE VS DR. VIRUS (1941-42)

2011-02-14T01:00:00.000-08:00

'Le professeur Globule contre le docteur Virus' was one of the fantastique oriented comics published in the war-time French comics weekly Gavroche. It debutted in no. 12 and lasted till the last issue (no. 66); the above scan is from no. 42 (dated Aug. 14th, 1941). The series was signed by Erik, the pseudonym of French comics writer and artist André-René Jolly (1912-74).
Gavroche was being published in Paris which was under German occupation and the Nazi occupation authorities were controlling the distribution of paper, which was in short supply due to war conditions, in favor of pro-Nazi publications. In 1942, Gavroche had to close shop together with several other French comics weeklies due to paper scarcity. Next year, a new comics magazine titled Le Téméraire emerged to fill the void with the support of the Nazis. André-René Jolly joined the team of this Nazi propaganda vehicle and introduced a 'new' comics series very similar to his earlier Prof. Globule vs Dr. Virus one titled as 'Le docteur Fulminate et le professeur Vorax'. One significant change was the fact that the antagonist in this new series was portrayed as a Jew...
Source of the info on Le Téméraire: 'Un illustré sous l’occupation' by Gilles Ragache

KID BROWN (1941)

2011-02-11T07:33:00.000-08:00

Beginning today, I will start covering some French-made comics published in the war-time era French comics magazine Gavroche for the next few posts. Gavroche was put out by Editions Renaudot in occupied Paris and lasted for 66 issues between 1940-42, that is in the early years of the Nazi occupation. It was one of the new comics publications which had sprang to fill the void when most of the major comics weeklies (such as Journal de Mickey) with American connection had re-located to the unoccupied southern coast of the country. It was non-political, neither pro-Resistance nor pro-Occupation.

Above scan is from no. 42 (dated Aug. 14th, 1941). The comics on this first page, 'Kid Brown, le champion', features a boxing hero. It was serialized in issues no. 31 thru no. 48. The art is by Niezab ([Gaston Niezabytowski] 1866-1955), who, after a stint at the Paris Opera as a decorator, had taken up a career initially as a magazine illustrator and then, beginning in the 1930s, as a comics artist. After 'Kid Brown' ended, another work of Niezab titled as "Criquet, gamin de Paris" started in Gavroche.
Judging by the above sample, 'Kid Brown' appears to be a rather mediocre work, but the other comics from Gavroche which I will cover in the coming posts are far more interesting, so stay tuned on..

THE FLOP FAMILY

2011-02-09T01:00:00.000-08:00

'The Flop Family' is an American newspaper humour strip, featuring a middle-class family, by artist George Swanson (1897-1981, who signed the strip as "Swan") which had debutted in 1943 and was in syndication till the death of its creator. It's in the tradition of 'Bringing Up Father' and 'Blondie', but I personally find its art more alluring then both of its better-known precedents. I might be wrong, but as far as I know it has never been reprinted in any compilation. The above sample of a Sunday is from a preprint from 1950, which is currently being on ebay.

It had debutted in Turkey in 1954 in the daily newspaper Milliyet, retitled as 'Allahlık Ali Bey'. Below image is from Oct 1st from that year:

I recall that 'Allahlık Ali Bey' was still being run in Turkish newspapers in my childhood, that is 1970s. In 1982, it was revived in the multilingual magazine Hello aimed at teaching English. In the same decade, it was also ran in the comics supplement of the Bulvar newspaper.

ALADDIN JUNIOR

2010-12-29T13:38:00.000-08:00

One of the non-Disneyic comics ran in Britain's Mickey Mouse comics magazine in the wartime era was 'Aladdin Jr.', chronicling the humorous exploits of a magic lamp genie accompanying a boy. 'Aladdin Junior' or alternatively 'Aladdin Jr' was an American import, a King Features Sunday newspaper comics written by Les Forgrave and drawn by William M. Prince. It had been syndicated in the US in 1942-43. According to Andy Madura's 'Comics and Paper Collectibles' site, "the story of the strip revolved around a young lad named Jack who was living the country life with his Aunt Belle and Uncle Pete. One day, his aunt breaks down and gives Jack a crate that his father had bequeathed to him. Inside was an arabian lamp, and when he rubbed the lamp a very mischevious Genie popped into Jack's life." The above scan is from MM no. 331 (dated March 13th, 1943) and the below ones from no. 358 (dated March 25th, 1944) and no. 371 (dated Sept. 23rd, 1944):

TURKISH-MADE PHANTOM COMICS FROM CIRCA 1944

2010-10-24T11:47:00.000-07:00

Proabably the rarest piece in my collection of war-era Turkish comics is this issue of the bi-weekly 1001 Macera magazine which features a Turkish-made Phantom comics. Simply titled as 'Kızıl Maske [The Red Mask]' (the Phantom had come to be known under this name in Turkey), it is credited to "Ş. Ayhan E.", the joint pseudonym for penciller Şahap Ayhan and inker Ayhan Erer, for its "story and illustrations."

The story begins with a prologue stating that Diana, the Phantom's lover, had been captivated by white slavers:

The vessel of the white slavers encounter a patrol ship which they manage to evade. However the signal from the patrolmen reach mainland and eventually the Phantom. Meanwhile, the slavers have also boarded Africa:

Diana sends a message in a bottle, informing of the location they are being held. This message also eventually reaches the Phantom who storms the slavers' hideout:

In the ensuing fight, the Phantom falls into a river, from which he finds out an underwater opening to the cave where Diana and other captives are being held:

After delivering the dames in distress to safety, he blows up the slavers' hideout:

If anyone recognizes any of the images as originating from a foreign (ie. non-Turkish) source, please let us know.

In addition to this 8-pages long comics, the publication also carries 16 pages of text. The number of this issue is printed as "14-1". I cannot see any date in the tattered copy I have, but it carries ads for other publications known to be published in 1944. It has been published by Kemal Özcan Kitabevi [Kemal Özcan Bookhouse] "established by" Kemal Özcan and directed by Melih Yener. Kemal Özcan may be the same person as Kemal Uzcan who published a long-running comics magazine titled 1001 Özel in the 1950s as the adresses for the offices of 1001 Macera and 1001 Özel are same.

The collaborative works of Şahap Ayhan (1926-2005) and Ayhan Erer (1929-1998) would begin to appear in the children's weekly magazine Çocuk Haftası in 1946 with the highly-acclaimed historical epic comics 'Gültekin'. The duo would work together for a few more comics in the coming years and then part ways with only Ayhan pursuing a career in comics.

ADDENDA ON OCT. 31ST: A post-war Turkish-made Phantom comics is the 8-pages long 'Arizona Soyguncuları [The Robbers of Arizona]' by Ferdi Sayışman published in no. 134 (dated March, 1955) of 1001 Özel weekly comics magazine. It tells the story of Phantom in the wild west where he has traveled to help Diana's sister against robbers.

RADIO FUN

2010-10-11T11:15:00.000-07:00

Radio Fun was a British weekly magazine featuring comics based on popular radio shows and/or radio personalities. It was published between 1938-61 by Amalgated Press. Above scan is of the cover of no. 291 (dated May 6th, 1944). The "Big-Hearted Arthur" of the comics on the cover is Arthur Askey, a popular British radio comedian (who also had a subsequent film career). On the other hand, I couldn't find out what this interesting comics on the back cover was derived from:

Note the text beneath the first row of panels where the black character abases himself by saying "No fish will understand Coon Language." This comics is the work of leading British comics artist Roy Wilson (1900-1965), best remembered for the 'Chimpo's Circus' published on the covers of the short-lived Happy Days comics weekly from 1938-39:

note: above image of no.1 of Happy Days is scanned from Denis Gifford's The Complete Catalogue of British Comics (1985).

TURKISH AD FOR MANDRAKE SERIAL

2010-10-09T03:18:00.000-07:00

Above scan from no. 303 (dated Sept. 6th, 1940) of Turkish children's magazine Çocuk Sesi Afacan is an ad for the upcoming Sept. 12 release of Mandrake the Magician (1939) film serial in Istanbul's Alkazar cinema. The ad includes the tagline "30 parts altogether", indicating that the whole serial will be shown with each screening, a common practice for serial screenings in Turkey.

TARZAN COMICS IN TURKEY IN THE WARTIME ERA (AND BEYOND)

2010-10-07T05:39:00.001-07:00

The serialization of Tarzan comics in b&w in Ülkü's children's weekly magazine Afacan, where comics of E.R.Burrough's jungle hero had made their Turkish debut in 1935, had ceased in 1939. Meanwhile, rival publisher Tahsin Demiray's Türkiye Yayınevi had began to publish the weekly 1001 Roman which allocated the majority of its pages to comics. With no. 78 (dated Dec. 30th, 1940), 'Tarzan' began to be serialized in color on the covers of this magazine, marking the color debut of Tarzan comics in Turkey. 1001 Roman started its run of Tarzan with an adventure where Tarzan encounters a Chinese colony which had been serialized as a Sunday newspaper continuity by Burne Hogarth in 1938-39 in the US. In addition, one issue of the monthly 'special issue' series of 1001 Roman also featured a Tarzan comics credited to the Turkish artist Ekrem Dülek (covered in the below post in this blog from Sept. 26). 'Tarzan' continued to be serialized on the covers of the weekly edition of 1001Roman without any breaks until the magazine folded in 1946.
Post-script - Brief overview of Tarzan comics in Turkey after the war:
In the post-war era, poorly traced Tarzan comics appeared in several Turkish magazines, an early example being 'Tarzan' serialized in Çocuk Alemi in 1948. The proper reprints of US Tarzan Sunday newspaper comics were ran in the supplement of Vatan newspaper in 1951.
The first Turkish comics magazine headlining Burrough's jungle hero would be the short-lived Tarzan published by Nihat Özcan in 1951. However, the longer-running Tarzan comics magazine from the late 1960s as well as its follow-up Süper Tarzan from the 1970s and 1980s would actually feature the Italian Tarzan-clone comics Akim! In similar vein, the 'Tarzan' photo-strip serialized in Yeni 1001 Roman in the late 1960s is actually Italian Tarzan clone photo-strip Antar. Meanwhile, the 'real' Tarzan comics would be serialized in children's magazines Doğan Kardeş with occasional breaks between 1967-77 and in Milliyet Çocuk in the 1980s.
It should also be noted that two parody-comics of Tarzan would be made in Turkey as well: 'Tarzan Eski Dünyalarda' [Tarzan In Ancient Worlds] scripted by Bülent Oran and illustrated by Suat Yalaz, serialized in satire/humour magazine Dolmuş in 1957 and the hugely popular 'Tarzan', later retitled as 'Tarzan ve Arap Kadri' [Tarzan and Kadri the Arab], serialized in Fırt from 1976 onwards.

TARZAN COMICS IN TURKEY IN THE PRE-WAR ERA - PART II: ILLUSTRATED STORY BOOKS BASED ON COMICS

2010-10-07T05:36:00.000-07:00

While the US daily newspaper strip continuity 'Tarzan and Leopard Men' was being serialized in the Turkish weekly children's magazine Afacan in 1939 as 'Pars Adamlar', the same publisher, Ülkü, put out a series of illustrated story books featuring Tarzan in August of the same year. The first of these pocket-sized, 32-pages long Tarzan books was titled simply as Tarzan and came out on Aug. 2nd. It is actually no. 7 of Ülkü's Çocuk Romanları [Children's Novels] series, most of the earlier titles in the series being Turkish editions of Whitman's Snow White & Seven Dwarfs books.
Tarzan is an illustrated text story version of a Sunday newspaper comics continuity by Hal Foster which had started in late 1934 in the US where Tarzan faces Dester Molu, an evil and fake White God of the natives. The illustrations in the book are select panels from the comics. Three more Tarzan titles followed in quick succession: #8: Tarzan ile Uçakçı Kız [Tarzan and the Aviatrix Girl], #9: Tarzan Yine Galip [Tarzan Triumphs Again] and #10: Tarzan Yeni Maceralarda [Tarzan In New Adventures]. I don't have these three books , but the title of #8 suggests that it must have been indeed derived from the next Sunday continuity where Tarzan meets a female aviatrix prior to encountering a Viking colony after the Dester Molu episode. These form the bulk of the Sunday continuities which the editors of Afacan had skipped while running 'Tarzan' in that magazine in the earlier years.
#11 of Ülkü's 'Children's Novels' series was a Dopey (of The Seven Dwarfs) title and its back cover announced the next in the series to be yet another Tarzan book, but I couldn't find out what the precise title of that book turned out be.

TARZAN COMICS IN TURKEY IN THE PRE-WAR ERA - PART I: AFACAN

2010-10-06T06:41:00.000-07:00

Tarzan comics, which were being serialized in the US newspapers since 1929, made their Turkish debut in b&w in the children's weekly magazine Afacan in 1935. Tarzan was first announced in the editor's page of no.9 as their upcoming new "sinema romanı" [cinema novel], a term frequently used in the era to denote comics which hadn't yet a fixed term to describe this new medium, and kicked off with no. 13 (dated Feb. 14th, 1935). Afacan alloted two full pages to Tarzan, the largest space given to any single comics in Turkey at the time (for instance, Jungle Jim, also being serialized there, had one full page). The first one-and-a-half pages of the first installement provided a quick summary background for Tarzan and then an adventure about elephants' graveyard began. This adventure is from US Sunday newspaper comics from 1932, at a time when Hal Foster had taken over the Sundays. However, the source material for the Turkish edition seems to be of French origin as Tarzan's friend in distress is named as "Jan Kursiye", rather than Erich von Harben as in the original US edition. It should also be noted that the b&w art is very 'clean', making one think that either b&w originals or b&w redrawings were used. Nevertheless, the Turkish serialization followed the US run, featuring the subsequent 'Egyptian saga' following the elephants' graveyard adventure, covering the whole run of Sundays from mid-1932 to early 1934.

After the Egyptian saga ended, a new adventure started at no. 80., unfortunately with decreased, somewhat muddy-looking print quality as if b&w reproduction was struck directly from a color source. This new adventure is originally from US Sundays starting in early 1936, the last Tarzan adventure Foster had a hand in. In other words, the editors of Afacan had skipped (or had to skip, depending on material they had access to at the time) approximately two-years run of Sundays (the bulk of those adventures would later be presented to Turkish readers in a different format, as will be covered later in this blog).

No further Tarzan comics would be published in Afacan until 1939. In the meantime, a sparsely illustrated text story titled 'Tarzan Kaçıyor [Tarzan Flees]' was serialized between no.'s 151-185. This was a Turkish translation of E.R.Burroughs novel Tarzan and the Lost Empire (1928). The illustrations are not from the daily strip adaptation serialized in US newspapers in 1930, but from a source I cannot identify.

Tarzan comics returned to Afacan at no. 222 (dated Feb 16th, 1939) with the start of the serialization of 'Pars Adamlar [Leopard Men]' which ended at no. 257 (dated Oct. 20, 1939). This is indeed the daily strip adventure with the same title by Rex Maxon which had started in the US newspapers at the tail end of 1935. This would be the last Tarzan comics published in Afacan, which, despite already merging with the same publisher's Çocuk Sesi magazine at no. 251 and hence being retitled as Çocuk Sesi Afacan, would cease publication in 1940.

Coming soon in this blog: Tarzan In Turkey In The Pre-war Era - Part II: Illustrated Tarzan story books based on comics

TURKISH-MADE 'SON OF TARZAN' COMICS FROM 1945

2010-10-02T02:00:00.000-07:00

Starting from no. 133 (dated July 14th, 1945), a comics titled 'Tarzanın Oğlu [Son of Tarzan]' and credited to Turkish artist Mehmet Tekdal was serialized in the Turkish children's weekly magazine Çocuk Haftası for 12 issues. The comics starts with the introductory caption that "Tarzan, with his wife, had gone to America and left his son as protector of his jungles."
The plot kicks off with the appearance of a small and hostile expedition in the jungle:

It turns out that the baddies are intent on stealing "Tarzan's treasure" hidden under a waterfall:

The whites dispose of the their native servant once he brings forward the treasure..

..and then set out to dispose of each other!:

Finally, it is upto Numa the lion to dispose of the surviving baddie:

Like Ekrem Dülek's 'Tarzan ve Numa' (see the post from last month), I suspect Tekdal's 'Tarzanın Oğlu' to be redrawn from some foreign materials. Again, if anyone has a hint, please let us know.

Tekdal, whose birth date is unconfirmed, was probably in his early twenties when his first works appeared on the back covers of a puzzle magazine in 1944 (*). He would turn out to be the most prolific of the young Turkish comics artists working in Çocuk Haftası. Most of his output are historical or mythical epics, including several adaptations of Dede Korkut tales. In 1955, he had a short-lived stint as publisher with Roket, Turkey's first comics magazine in 3-D. His works continued to appear in Turkish children's magazines till the early 1970s. At some point, he migrated to Germany to continue his career abroad and settled there (**).

(*) Hakan Alpin, Çizgiroman Ansiklopedisi (Istanbul: İnkilap, 2006)

(**) Levent Cantek, Çizgili Hayat Kılavuzu (Istanbul:İletişim, 2nd ed. 2002)

Coming soon in this blog: Historical Overview of Tarzan comics in Turkey

EKREM DÜLEK'S PUBLISHED SKETCHES FROM 1940

2010-10-01T11:07:00.000-07:00

While looking through my collection of the war-time issues of Turkish children's magazine Afacan, I've come across this 'how to draw easily' instructions from the 'For Your Free Time' section of no. 284 (dated Apr. 26th, 1940). The instructions note that the sketches were sent by "Ekrem Dülek, our friend from Zeyrek Highschool." This little item is interesting not only because it marks the earliest published 'work' of Dülek, the name behind the two 1940s comics covered in the two below posts in this blog, but also because it gives a hint, however vague it maybe, on the biographical background of this obscure Turkish artist: the reference to the highschool suggests he might have been a teacher, perhaps an art teacher, if not an eager student.
The only other credits of Dülek I've come across are as illustrator of two childre's books from 1944.

TARZAN AND NUMA: TURKISH-MADE TARZAN COMICS FROM 1943

2010-09-26T14:31:00.000-07:00

In the below post on this blog, I had covered Turkish artist Ekrem Dülek's 'Boğaç Han' comics serialized in Çocuk Haftası in 1943-44. Dülek is also credited as the artist for an odd Tarzan comics published in the no. 43 (dated Sept. 3rd, 1943) of the monthly "special issue" series of 1001 Roman from the same publisher, Tahsin Demiray. Titled as 'Tarzan ve Numa' [Tarzan and Numa], this is the only instance I am aware of where a comics credited to a Turkish artist had been published in 1001 Roman.
'Tarzan ve Numa' appears to be partially based on the 'Lion' story in E.R. Burrough's Jungle Tales of Tarzan (1919). The first 8 pages of the comics where Tarzan sets out to save a gorilla snatched by Numa the lion is a fairly faithful adaptation of the introductory section of this story.

Afterwards, the plot of the comics digresses from that of the original story. Tarzan sees natives carrying the carcass of a lion, but finds out that it is not Numa:

Just when Numa appears on the scene, the natives come back to assault Tarzan and his apes..

.. but Numa joins in the fight against the natives and hence Tarzan befriends the lion in the end:

I suspect Dülek might have created this comics by tracing from and/or redrawing one or more foreign source. If anyone recognizes any one or set of images from elsewhere, please let us know. For example, a possible source might be the French Tarzan et le lion (1937) album from Hachette, which I haven't (yet) seen.

Source for Jungle Tales of Tarzan plot summary: http://www.erblist.com/erblist/jtalessummary.html

Coming soon in this blog: Turkish-made Son of Tarzan comics serial from 1945!!..

TURKISH SWASHBUCKLER COMICS FROM 1943-44

2010-09-11T12:26:00.000-07:00

Above scan is of the back cover of no. 42 (dated Oct. 16, 1943) of Turkish children's weekly magazine Çocuk Haftası [Children's Week], featuring the first installement of the comics serial 'Boğaç Han' by Turkish artist Ekrem Dülek. The first Turkish comics artist (who received printed credit for his work) was Orhan Tolon who had worked extensively in the 1930s, creating several series of humorous juvenile adventure strips, most of which had utilized speech balloons. However, when he made his first realistic non-humorous comics, the historical epic 'Deniz Kurtları' which preceeded 'Boğaç Han' in Çocuk Haftası in the earlier issues of this magazine, he had curiously resorted back to the format of extra-panel text captions, omitting the use of speech balloons and captions inside panels. 'Boğaç Han' became the first non-humorous Turkish adventure comics utilizing speech balloons (actually, speech 'rectangles', as can be seen in the above scan) and captions within the panels without resorting to extra-panel text captions.
'Boğaç Han' is based on a medieval Turkish folktale. It starts with the public humiliation of a Turkish nobleman during a royal feast because he has no children. The nobleman returns home to scoff at his wife, he urges him to do good deeds and expect heavenly reward for these in the form of a child. He takes upon his wife's advice who soon begots him with a male child. The child grows up and shows extraordinary bravery and strength by overcoming a bull at a royal feast years after his father's earlier humiliation; the nameless child is thus publicly named as 'Boğaç', meaning "like a bull" in Turkish (no. 46):

Later, in an episode not included in the versions of the folktale which I am aware of and hence marking the only digression of the comics from its original source, Boğaç snatches another nobleman's daughter as his bride (no. 53):

Meanwhile, some subordinates of his father has become jealous of Boğaç and persuade the nobleman that his son is keen on ousting him and urge him to assassinate Boğaç, which he does; however, unknown to the plotters, Boğaç actually survivess the assassination and is secretly nursed back into health by his mother (no. 55):

When the plotters become aware that Boğaç is alive, they decide to kidnap his father and deliver him to the nobleman whose daughter Boğaç had forcibly taken as his wife. Nevertheless, Boğaç rescues his father (no.'s 61 and 62):

It all ends happily with the reconciliation of the father and son (no. 63):

The bearded person in the last panels as well as in the right side of the logo is a depiction of Dede Korkut, the wise old man who comments on the developments -the compiler and narrator of these mediveal tales collectively known as 'Dede Korkut Hikayeleri [Dede Korkut Tales]'.

Subsequent issues of Çocuk Haftası, which lasted till 1950, included several other comics, some of which were based on other Dede Korkut tales, by new Turkish artists such as Sururi Gümen, Mehmet Tekdal and Şahap Ayhan besides foreign material such Felix the Cat, Prince Valiant and some Yugoslavian comics. Çocuk Haftası was published by Turkish print media mogul Tahsin Demiray (see post on Oct. 25, 2009 for info on Demiray) and edited by Rakım Çalapala.

DEBUT OF BASIL REYNOLDS' MARMADUKE STRIP

2010-08-09T14:34:00.000-07:00

Above scan is from no. 157 (Feb. 4th, 1939) of Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly, marking the debut of British comics artist Basil Reynolds' Marmaduke strip. Marmaduke had initially appeared as a frequent background character in Reynolds' 'Adventures of Skit And Skat' comics in the same magazine. The strip would be renamed as 'The Adventures of Marmaduke' in the following issue.

DINOSAUR TERRORS FROM 'THE BUCCANEERS' (1939)

2010-08-09T13:20:00.000-07:00

Above scan (the series' logo and summary panel couldn't fit my scanner) is of the third installement of the swashbucler comics 'The Buccaneers' serialized in Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly between no.'s 194 (Oct. 21st, 1939) - 205 (Jan. 6th, 1940). The hero is a captain who, after a mutiny, is put on a boat together with his loyal men and left on open seas. They land on an island with dinosaurs, but the main plot is about the captain's fight against pirates. It all ends with a volcanic eruption, of course..
'The Buccaneers' had replaced 'King of the Royal Mounted' in the magazine's color central pages and I am not sure if it is another imported comics or a British production.

SK1 AMONG THE DINOSAURS (1935)

2010-07-04T02:20:00.000-07:00

Above scan (taken from outducks archive) is of the cover of no. 154 (dated Dec. 8th, 1935) of Italy's Topolino comics weekly, featuring the fourth installement of 'S.K.1.' by Italian artist Guido Moroni Celsi (1885-1962). 'S.K.1' lasted till (including) no. 184 (dated July 5th, 1936).

SPADGER'S ISLE

2010-06-25T23:01:00.000-07:00

Above scan is of the cover of no. 991 (dated Feb. 7th, 1942) of British children's weekly The Wizard, featuring the humorous comics known as Spadger's Isle by British artist Chick [Charles] Gordon (c.1890-1952). As can be seen in the above example, Spadger's Isle depicted African natives of an island ran by two Brits in 'funny' situations. The above example is also noteworthy for integrating World War 2 context. Spadger's Isle was reportedly very popular and published on the covers of The Wizard throughout the 1940s. The Wizard itself was a very long-lasting magazine, running from 1922 to 1963. It was published by D.C.Thompson, a major British publisher who had also put out the influential comics magazines Dandy and Beano. The Wizard, however, featured mostly illustrated stories rather than comics.

DEBUT OF BASIL REYNOLDS' PINKY GREEN (1940)

2010-06-13T02:22:00.000-07:00

Above scan is from no. 217 (dated Mar. 30th, 1940) of Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly, featuring the debut of Basil Reynolds' Pinky Green half-page strip.

DEBUT OF BASIL REYNOLDS' SKIT AND SKAT (1936)

2010-05-29T12:31:00.000-07:00

Above scan is of the debut of British comics artist Basil Reynolds' 'Adventures of Skit and Skat' in no. 1 (dated Feb 8th, 1936) of Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly. Born in 1916, the talented Reynolds, who had already done strip work for several newspapers, was only 20 years of age when he was given the full 3rd page of MMW, the flagship British Disney publication with more than half a million circulation. In his memoirs (reprinted in http://www.mouseplanet.com/), Reynolds has noted that he was recruited into the staff of MMW at the magazine's founding with the endorsement of his draft of 'Skit and Skat' by British Disney artist Wilfred Haughton.

The mouse which appears in the second panel of this first installement is the prototype of Marmaduke who would soon make semi-regular appearances in 'Skit and Skat' and eventually have his own strip.

Below is the scan of the 'Skit and Skat' page from no. 2 of MMW:

'Skit and Skat' would shift between gag-a-week or continuity narratives and lasted uninterrupted till (including) no 66 (dated May 8th, 1937). It would resume at no. 97 (dated Dec. 11th, 1937), retitled as 'Skit, Skat and the Captain', and last till 1940.

'THE ADVENTURES OF SIR ENDOR NEVAH THE KNUTTY KNIGHT' (1938)

2010-03-07T12:46:00.000-08:00

'The Adventures of Sir Endor Nevah the Knutty Knight' is a very interesting humorous adventure comics serialized in Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly in 1938 (no.'s 115-126, above scan is of the first episode). It features the exploits of the title hero and his page as they try to rescue a princess. What makes it stand out as almost avanguard is the presence of weird pseudo-futuristic motifs in its medieval setting:

I am surprised to find absolutely no mention of this exceptional comics anywhere on the net. If anyone knows anything about its writer and/or artist, please tell us...

ADDENDA FROM OCT. 2010: I've just realized that this obscure comics has also been serialized in the weekly Turkish children's magazine Afacan in 1939 as 'Kral İle Devin Resimli Masalı [The Illustrated Fairytale of the King and the Giant]'.

'HEAVENLY TWINS' (1936)

2010-03-07T12:08:00.000-08:00

Above scan is of the first installement of the gag-a-week comics 'Heavenly Twins' ran in Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly in 1936 (no's 28-44).

THE GREEN MEN (1935)

2010-02-07T11:50:00.000-08:00

In this post, I present select images (uploaded last month to the outducks archive by user Mankkop) from a great-looking Italian comics set in Atlantis: 'Gli uomini verdi [The Green Men'], which had started to be serialized in the back cover of Topolino no. 139 (dated Aug. 25th, 1935); the above installement is from no. 142 and the two below ones are from no. 146 and no. 148:

After no. 150, 'Gli uomini verdi', unfortunately was shifted to the interior b&w pages till it ended at no. 155 (dated Dec. 12d, 1935); the below installement is from no. 153:

'Gli uomini verdi' was the work of Yambo (Enrico Novelli, 1876-1943). Apart from his comics work, he was also apparently a prolific writer of adventure books. Soon after his retirement, he died of a heart attack during an air raid in the 2d World War.

FILM FUN

2010-02-05T15:09:00.000-08:00

I give a break to my coverage of the pre-history of comics in Turkey to post scans from two pre-war issues of the British film comics magazine Film Fun which I recently acquired. Film Fun was published by Amalgamated Press, pioneer of platinium (pre-golden) age comics boom in Britain, between 1920-1962. The two issues I acquired contain comics featuring comedy film stars of the era, as well as text stories.
No. 446, dated Aug. 4th, 1928 (which became the earliest comic in my collection [costing me 12.5 pounds]) has 10 of its 24 pages (including covers) reserved for comics. A 2-page Harold Lloyd gag comics starts at the front cover [above scan] and ends at the back cover:

Other comics in this issue are Lupino Lane (1 pg), Grock (2 pgs, which appears to be part of a continuity), Jackie Coogan (2 pgs), Ben Turpin & Charlie Conklin (1 pg), Buster Keaton (1 pg) and Charlie Murray (1 pg)

British artists known to be working in Film Fun in its first decade include George Wakefield and Tom Radford.

For no. 730, dated Jan. 13th, 1934, Harold Lloyd's place had been reduced to a single page...

... while Laurel and Hardy take up the two centre pages:

Other comics in this issue are Joe E. Brown (2 pgs: front and back covers), Sydney Howard (1 pg), Tim McCoy (2ps, part of continuity), Wheeler & Woolsey (2 pgs), Lupino Lane (1 pg) and Schnozzle (1 pg).
Some of the comics from Film Fun were reprinted in Turkey in the children's magazine Afacan (1932-34). See my post dated Dec 22nd, 2007 for a coverage of film comics in general, including the Turkish reprints. For a nice round-up of the evolution of Film Fun itself over the decades, see the post dated Jan 14th, 2010 at http://lewstringer.blogspot.com/

DEBUT OF BRINGING UP FATHER IN TURKEY (1925)

2010-01-26T14:26:00.000-08:00

Esin Bayraktar provides a detailed coverage of the very interesting debut of 'Bringing Up Father' in Turkey in her article 'Seni Bir Yerlerden Gözümüz Isırıyor Bican Efendi...' in Serüven [2nd series], no. 1 (Winter 2006), pp. 41-45. The scan and the info in this post are from that article.

'Bringing Up Father' debutted as 'Bican Efendi' in no. 1, dated May 28th, 1925, of Resimli Perşembe weekly and was published in its first eight issues. As can be seen in the above scan, a moustache was added to the face of Jiggs and, furthermore, the characters were depicted in traditional Turkish dresses of the time. Five of the eight installements carry the abbreviated signature "İ"; however, the identity of the artist in question is unknown. Bayraktar speculates that the installements with the İ signature might have been Turkish productions while the rest are modified versions of original American sources.

The name Bican Efendi comes from the title of a Turkish comedy film series.

Beginning with 1950s, licensed and faithful reprints of 'Bringing Up Father' would be published in the Hürriyet daily newspaper as 'Güngörmüşler'.

EARLIEST KNOWN CONTINUITY COMICS PUBLISHED IN TURKEY (1925-26)

2010-01-24T23:36:00.000-08:00

Currently available research so far indicates that the earliest continuity comics published in Turkey had appeared in a periodical titled Resimli Mecmua in 1925-26. Hülya Eraslan, in her article 'Resimli Tefrika: Acar'ın Sergüzeştleri ve Abbas Yolcu' published in the now-defunct (but much missed!) comics research journal Serüven [2nd series], no. 1 (Winter 2006), pp. 46-49, had covered the comics published in Resimli Mecmua at length. All the info and the scans in this post come from that article:
The first six issues of Resimli Mecmua serialized 'Acar'ın Sergüzeştleri [The Adventures of Acar]', chronicling the globe-trotting adventures of a Turkish character named Acar. The first four installements credit the script to Abdullah Ziya, a famous Turkish writer of popular fiction, better known in the later decades as Abdullah Ziya Kozanoğlu, who would create the trend-setting Turkish swashbuckling comics hero Kaan (later re-named as Karaoğlan) in the 1950s. In these four episodes, Acar is a mischievous kid who is sent by his father to work in a ship. There, he befriends a Chinese and a black kid ad together they go to the poles.
The art and the content drastically change in the fifth and the sixth installements where Acar is now a youngster who solves a murder mystery in Paris.

'Abbas Yolcu [Abbas On the Road]' starts at no. 26 and continues for 18 issues. It starts with the house of a rich guy named Abbas being flooded and the character washed over to the sea in his bed where he is picked up by a ship:

Abbas' adventures take him first to a deserted island, then to the poles. Eventually, he becomes a film star on the strength of his newly gained fame as a globe-trotting adventurer. The saga ends in Paris, where he had already bought a house before embarking on his journey.
If anyone recognizes the original source of this comics, please let us know.

EARLIEST KNOWN GAG-COMICS PUBLISHED IN TURKEY (1913-14)

2010-01-19T12:42:00.000-08:00

Prior to the introduction of the Latin alphabet in 1928, the Arabic script was used in Turkey. The illegibility of pre-1928 Turkish publications to subsequent generations in Turkey has caused a void in knowledge about such items. Hence, the history of comics in Turkey before 1930s has been documented very little. Çocuk Dünyası, a children's magazine published between 1913-14, is one of the earliest Turkish publications known to sparadoically print gag-comics. The scans in this post are from the first 49 issues, in my collection, of its 79 issue run. The scan above is of the first appearance of a gag-comics in this publication; titled as 'Devekuşu ile Maymun [The Ostrich and the Monkey]', it was printed in no. 10, dated May 16th, 1913.
The next issue, no.11, dated May 23rd, 1913, carried the below one and a half page item titled 'Hayvan Hikayeleri: Tavşan ile Tilki [The Animal Stories: The Rabbit and the Fox]':

Note that the Arabic script requires a reading directed from the right to the left. Whether this item should be called a comics with text beneath the panels or simply an illustrated story is open for debate. Nevertheless, the illustrations are framed as panels even though they are not ordered in rows.

The no. 25, dated Aug. 29th, 1913, would carry the below comics strip, titled simply as 'Yazısız Hikaye [Story Without Text]':

The below strip was serialized in two issues:

Note the last panel carries the signature Sewell Collins.

The below scan, titled as 'Yazısız Hikaye [Story Without Text]', is from no. 46, dated Jan. 23rd, 1914:

and the below one, titled 'Bizim kedi kardeş, çok cesurdur!! [Our kitty is very brave!!]' is from no. 47, dated Jan. 30th, 1914:

Gag comics were also apparently published in another Turkish children's magazine of the same era, Çocuk Duygusu (see Esin Bayraktar, 'Yazısız Hikaye', Serüven [2nd series] no. 2 (Summer 2006), pp. 62-65 *).

* Bayraktar identifes the publication date of Çocuk Duygusu as 1911, but other sources note it as from 1913-14. In the same article, Bayraktar also covers comics published in Çocuk Dünyası which she also misidentifies as being from 1911.

RUPERT BEAR IN TURKEY

2010-01-17T13:43:00.000-08:00

The ever-popular British comic strip Rupert Bear, created in 1920 for Daily Express and still running today!, was serialized in Turkish children's magazine Çocuk in the late 1930s as 'Küçük Ayı Ruperin Serüvenleri [The Adventures of Ruper the Little Bear]'. The above scan is from no. 121, dated Jan. 13th, 1939, and features the third and concluding installement of an episode titled as 'Yıkık Kaledeki Hırsız [The Thief at the Ruined Castle]'.

Rupert Bear was created by Mary Tourtel (1874-1948), the wife of Daily Express' editor. The episodes reprinted in Turkey are probably by Alfred Bestall, who had taken over in 1935.

TWO ORIENTALIST ADVENTURE COMICS FROM MMW (1936-37)

2009-11-29T15:03:00.000-08:00

In this post, I will cover two orientalist adventure comics serialized in Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly. 'Gordon Gale - Air Rover' by British artist Stephan Chapman began in no. 43, dated Nov. 28th, 1936. It tells the story of the title hero, a pilot-mechanic who has invented a special type of plane called Hydro-Gyro. In its first full-fledged test flight, he is accompanied by a young woman who is desperate to deliver some papers to her uncle in Africa. First half of the story takes place in Morocco where the protagonists are assaulted by Arabs:

Morocco was under French occupation at the time, and several textual references to the Arabs as "rebels" testify to the colonialist stand of the comics. Furthermore, in one instance, the Arabs are also humiliated for lacking the know-how of the westerners:

The second half of the story takes place in tropical Africa, with appropriate jungle perils:

The comics ends with the protagonists getting hold of a treasure and becoming wealthy, ie. by looting Africa...

Right after 'Gordon Gale - Air Rover' ended, another orientalist comics, titled 'Green Eyes', started in its place in no. 53, dated Feb. 6th, 1937:

'Green Eyes', by an unknown author and whose plot is apparently inspired from the Hollywood film The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932), tells the story of the title villain's attempt to get hold of four scarabs (all in London, but apparently brought to the UK from the Orient, ie. stolen in the first place!) which will somehow give him authority over certain "tribes" in Egypt (under British occupation at the time). Admittedly, this comics features several visuals with delicious imagery:

Even routine action scenes are well staged:

In the end, Green Eyes manages to get the scarabs back to Egypt, but secret service agents trail him:

It all ends happily -for the westerners, of course, and not for the Egyptians..

If anyone knows the artist of 'Green Eyes', please let us know.

Both 'Gordon Gale - Air Rover' and 'Green Eyes' were also serialized in the Turkish children's magazine Çocuk Sesi. The former was re-titled as 'Havalar Kahramanı Bay Metin', with the protagonist given the Turkish name Bay Metin! It started in no. 366, dated Dec. 28, 1936, only one month after its original debut in MMW.

GRACE DRAYTON'S PUSSYCAT PRINCESS IN TURKEY

2009-11-28T16:09:00.000-08:00

'The Pussycat Princess', created by Grace Drayton (1877-1936), one of the first female comics artists in the world, was serialized in the Turkish children's magazine Çocuk Sesi in 1936 under the title 'Prenses Sarmanın Serüvenleri' [The Adventures of Princess Sarman (a popular Turkish name given to cats)]. The above scan is of the first installement of the series published in no. 335, dated May 25th, 1936. With the next installement in the subsequent issue, the comics began to be reprinted in proper format without the superflous texts beneath the panels:

Drayton would unfortunately die of a heart attack in 1936, a year after she started 'the Pussycat Princess' which would be continued by other artists. The comics serialized in Çocuk Sesi date originally from 1935 and are by Drayton herself.

Drayton's 'Pussycat Princess' was also ran in Italy's I tre porcellini comics magazine in 1935.

OBSCURE CHILDREN'S ADVENTURE COMICS FROM 1930'S

2009-11-28T07:54:00.000-08:00

An obscure children's adventure comics with fantasy elements was serialized in the Turkish children's magazine Çocuk Sesi between 1935-36. Titled as 'Yamanla Duman' [Yaman and Duman], it told of the adventures of two teenage kids, initially accompanied by their parrot (which seems to have disappeared in the later episodes).
The series began its run in no. 274, dated March 25th, 1935, with a typical orientalist (good whites versus bad Arabs) episode, admittedly with some mystery trappings. A train has simply vanished in the forests of Egypt and the two kids named Yaman and Duman boldly set out to solve the mystery. Below are scans of the first two pages:

Fantasy elements first begin to emerge with the appearance of two giant birds during the interim between the first and the second episodes:

Next, the kids come across a land of midgets whom they befriend:

After which they encounter a colony of ancient Egyptians:

The subsequent adventure kicks off with the kids being captured by what appears to be a giant octopus..

..which turns out to be a mechanical submarine in reality. The boys are taken to an enclave beneath the waters in which they encounter an evil robot!

Further adventures entail a return to the colony of ancient Egyptians where they are mummified to buried alive after the death of the phorah, encounter with giants, with cannibals et al... The run of the strips ends with no. 345, dated Aug. 3rd, 1936.

If anyone knows about the original source of this interesting comics, please let us know..

SWEDEN'S ADAMSON IN TURKEY

2009-11-27T15:47:00.000-08:00

The Swedish gag-strip 'Adamson', featuring a cigar-smoking middle-aged man and created by Oscar Jacobson (1889-1945), was ran in the Turkish children's magazine Çocuk Sesi between 1934-36. The Turkish edition was initially titled as 'Bican Efendi', probably in an allusion to the Turkish short comedy film series from 1921 with the same name. However, the title was soon changed into 'Bican Aktüre' with the hero given a 'proper' a surname, in keeping with the government's modernization reforms which entailed introduction of surnames in Turkey!

As seen in the above scan (from no. 252, dated Oct. 22nd, 1934), the strip was accompanied with extensive extra-panel texts in the Turkish editions.

Adamson was reportedly syndicated in several other countries the throughout world.

DEBUT OF MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN COMICS IN TURKEY

2009-11-26T02:21:00.000-08:00

Mandrake the Magician's Turkish debut came in 1935, less than a year after the strip's debut in the US. A weekly actuality magazine titled Büyük Gazete began to serialize Mandrake in its back covers beginning with its no. 30 on 13.5.1935. This makes Mandrake's Turkish debut one of the earliest known appearance of this hero outside newspapers anywhere in the world.
Below are scans of the beginning of Mandrake's first-ever adventure from its Turkish edition in Büyük Gazete, featuring the first-ever appearances of not only Mandrake and Lothar, but also of their arch-nemesis Cobra.

Note that the last two rows (dailies) feature the signature of artist Phil Davis; it has widely been reported that creator-writer Lee Falk was largely responsible for drawing the first few dailies before Davis took over drawing.

'BOBBY & CHIP' IN TURKISH CHILDREN'S MAGAZINE FROM 1939

2009-11-23T12:59:00.000-08:00

I've just realized that the 'Bobby & Chip' gag-a-week strip from Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly (actually a British re-titling of Otto Messner's 'Bobby Dazzler') was also ran in the Turkish children's magazine Afacan in 1939. Re-titled as 'Hop ile Top', it debutted in the bottom third of the reverse side of the front cover of no. 221, dated Feb. 9th, 1939 (above scan). It turned into monochrome from no. 235 onwards and lasted till no. 249. Afacan had also ran some British-made Disney comics from MMW as well.

BOBBY & CHIP WITH MICKEY MOUSE

2009-11-22T05:43:00.000-08:00

As noted in an earlier post in this blog on Oct. 31st, the gag strip 'Bobby & Chip' (actually a British re-titling of Otto Messner's 'Bobby Dazzler') which had been running in Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly since its inception was discontinued after no. 27, but resumed early in 1937. Its resumption was first heralded in no. 51's editorial page with the announcement that in the magazine's anniversary issue two weeks from then, "two old friends are coming on a visit to pages 6 and 7, laden with laughter." This news was made more explicit in the editorial of no. 52 with the 'two old friends' disclosed as Bobby and Chip, accompanied with the above illustration, whose artist is unknown. 'Bobby & Chip' would indeed resume in no. 53.

'BOBBY & CHIP' IN THE US COMICS

2009-11-15T15:21:00.000-08:00

I've recently realized that the 'Bobby & Chip' gag comics, featured in Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly for several years since its inception in 1936, had also been published in some US comics, including Mickey Mouse Magazine. The above scan is from vol. 4 no. 1 (Oct. 1938) of MMM, reprinting a 'Boby & Chip' gag from no. 15 (May 16th, 1936) of MMW (note that the above American reprint edition is missing the second panel of the original UK edition):
In the same year, 'Bobby & Chip' was also reportedly published in the no. 1 of a US publication titled Nickel Comics from Dell Publishing.
UPDATE FROM JUNE 18TH, 2011: As blog reader fortunato has noted in his comment appended to this post on May 4th, 2010, 'Bobby & Chip' is indeed a British re-titling of Otto Messner's 'Bobby Dazzler', the topper of Messner's Felix. I've recently even come across (in http://itsthecat.com/blog/) the original source of the 'Bobby & Chip' strips referred to in this post, the 'Bobby Dazzler' strip from Apr. 12, 1936:

BRITAIN'S FIRST SCIENCE-FICTION COMICS

2009-11-02T06:38:00.000-08:00

Apart from gag comics, the non-Disneyic material in Britain's Mickey Mouse Magazine also included serious adventure comics. These consisted, on one had, of reprints of American Sunday newspaper comics in the color central pages, and, on the other, black&white comics by mostly British artists. Pioneer British newspaper comics artist Hugh Stanley White (1904-84) was responsible for most of the latter material in the early issues. The first issue of MMW, dated Feb. 8th, 1936, featured two comics by White: the full-page 'Ian on Mu' and the three-row 'Ginger Nick the Whaler'.

'Ian on Mu' is referred to as Britain's first science-fiction comics by online comics encyclopedia Lambiek. As can be seen in the above scan from its first installement at no.1, it tells the story of an expedition to a mysterious planet. Nevertheless, apart from the appearance of some robots, full-fledged sci-fi elements do not really bloom in its 15-issues run. The expedion discovers a Chinese (!) colony on this planet and sets out to rescue its imprisoned princess from rouge elements.

'Ginger Nick the Whaler', on the other hand, is more mundane and lasted for only 11 issues.

Black&white adventure comics by British artists continued to be serialized in MMW until 1939 when their pages were taken over by 'Lone Ranger':

title MMW issues year artist

The Road to Rome 16-25 1936 Reg Perrott

Gordon Gale - Air Rover 43-52 1936-37 Stephan Chapman

Green Eyes 53-60 1937 ?

The City of Jewels 61-72 1937 John McCail

The Lost Colony of Atlantis 73-87 1937 ?

Hawkeye 88-99 1937 ?

Wings of Fortune 100-109 1938 Reg Perrott

Phantom City 110-121 1938 Hugh S. White

Flashing Through 122-135 1938 Hugh S. White

Oil and Claw 136-147 1938 Hugh S. White

Conquest of the Gulf Stream 148-165 1938-39 ?

NON-DISNEYIC GAG COMICS IN BRITAIN'S MICKEY MOUSE WEEKLY (1936)

2009-10-31T08:43:00.001-07:00

Britain's Mickey Mouse Weekly is notable for many reasons. As frequently cited, it is Britain's first comics magazine to be published with photogravure printing which allowed high-quality color reproductions, a factor which undoubtedly contributed to its circulation of more than half a million. It featured, naturally, Disney comics and stories, some of them reprints of US newspaper comics and some of them original British products, but its contents also included non-Disneyic material as well. The non-Disney comics ran in MMW can be grouped into two categories: the humourous, gag-a-week comics and serious, adventure comics with narratives continuing into subsequent weeks. This post will cover the gag comics ran in the early issues of the magazine.
The first issue of MMW, which came out on Feb. 8th, 1936, featured four non-Disneyic gag comics. The most prominent of them was the full-page 'Adventures of Skit and Skat'. However, since it frequently experimented with continous narratives, it needs to be covered separately. The longest running of the strictly gag-a-week comics from the first issue would be 'Bobby & Chip' (see the image at the top of this post for its debut in no.1). It lasted for 27 issues only to be replaced by another gag comics, 'Heavenly Twins'. However, early in 1937, it would re-emerge in a new format as a single-row strip covering the bottom portions of the central color pages and would continue there for several years. Another gag-a-week comics of no.1 was 'Troubles of Father', but it would last for only the first 16 issues.

Rounding up the gag-a-week comics of the first issue of MMW was 'The Adventures of Bobby Bear'. This last comics was also being run in the British newspaper Daily Mail since 1919.

The second issue of MMW saw the debut of 'Percy Go-Bang' ...

... which would be replaced from no. 18 onwards with 'Little Lulu':

'Percy Go-Bang' would briefly be revived in some issues later in 1936, but would't survive into 1937. A similar fate befell 'Bob the Bugler' which had debutted in no.7:

'Sea Shanties', which had debutted on no.12, differed from the other gag comics of MMW with its elaborate, if not labourous, artwork:

From no. 19 onwards, it would be reformatted in a more creative layout:

From no.33 onwards, 'Sea Shanties' would be replaced by 'Circus Capers' which would contiue till no. 44.
The writers/artists behind these gag comics (other than 'Skit and Skat', which is known to be the work of Basil Reynolds) are unknown to me and any help in that regard would be welcome.
UPDATE: From http://bearalley.blogspot.com/, I've recently learned that the artist of 'Troubles of Father', 'Bob the Bugler', 'Sea Shanties' and 'Circus Capers' was Reg Carter; see post dated July 30, 2008 from that blog for info on Carter.

THE LEGENDARY 1001 ROMAN

2009-10-25T03:31:00.000-07:00

Türkiye Yayınevi's (Türkiye Publishing House) 1001 Roman weekly is a legendary title in the history of comics publications in Turkey. It was highly popular, very influential and is still fondly remembered by older generations. For instance, in a recent poll on living Turkish authors, many cited it among the top of their childhood favorites. And for the new generation of comics fans, it radiates a magnetism so powerful as to make them nostalgic for an era they have missed.
Türkiye Yayınevi's founder and owner Tahsin Demiray was actually a quite shadowy figure. Self-confessed to working for the secret intelligence service spying on Communists in Turkey in the early 1920s, he would be involved with right-wing politics in his later life (*). He is said to have built his fortunes by receiving the monopoly of publishing alphabet material from the government in the late 1920s, quite a big business in Turkey in those years as the Arabic script was banned and the Latin script made obligatory as part of westernization reforms.
In 1936, Demiray's Türkiye Yayınevi (whose locomotive publication would be the popular cinema magazine Yıldız) began publishing two children's magazines, Yavrutürk and Ateş, both of which featured some comics among their pages alongside stories, etc. While Yavrutürk, which appealed to a more juvenile readership, ran 'Kara Kedi' (Felix the Cat) continuities as well as 'Vakvak Kardeş' (Donald Duck) gags, Ateş's 1st series (1936-37) serialized Mandrake's first-ever adventure as well as some obscure comics; its 2nd series (1937-38) only featured Mandrake as comics material. On the other hand, 1001 Roman which began on 10.7.1939, less than two months prior to the outbreak of the 2nd World War!, devoted the majority of its pages, even including its front page, to comics. The stable of comics featured in 1001 Roman over the years includes 'Brik Bradford', 'Alptekin' (Buck Rogers), 'Sevim Gazeteci' (Connie), Mandrake, 'Kartal İzciler' (Eagle Scout Roy Powers), 'Maskeli Süvari' (Lone Ranger), 'Gizli Polis X-9', 'Yıldırım Polis' (King of the Royal Mounted), 'İki İzci' (Tim Tyler's Luck), 'Kızılmaske' (Phantom) and Tarzan. Beginning with 1940, Türkiye Yayınevi also began to publish monthly 'special issues' of 1001 Roman, each issue of which was devoted to a single character.
1001 Roman survived throughout the war years thanks to high sales, which was said to be in "tens of thousands", even though paper scarcity eventually necessitated a cutback in the number of pages. However, continuing economic hardships even after the war caused a cessation of 1001 Roman's publication in its original format after no. 350 in 1946, as well as the cancellation of the special issues after no.75 at the same time, with the promise of going back to more comics when possible. 1001 Roman's 2nd series included only neglible amount of comics. As promised, the 3rd series (1948-52) emerged in the original format. A novelty of the 3rd series was the introduction of romance comics, but another highlight was 'Nat Pinkerton' (Rip Kirby). The production techniques in 1001 Roman were various. It is not known if any of the comics were licensed or not; the magazine carried no copyright claims, so it can assumed that they were unlicensed. However, unlike the unlicensed comics of the 1950s and onwards, most were printed from originals, and not from traced copies even though some were, and increasingly more so over the years.The 3rd series ended in 1952 after no. 213. That year, Türkiye Yayınevi began to publish Haftalık Albüm (Weekly Album) similar to the format of 1001 Roman's monthly special issues from the war years. It lasted for about a year, after which Türkiye Yayınevi pulled back from comics publishing for several years.
(*) In 1952, Demiray took part in the foundation of Türkiye Köylü Partisi (Peasants' Party of Turkey) and became its secretary general. Upon the death of the party's chairman in a plane crash in 1954, Demiray became the party leader. However, the Peasants' Party couldn't gain a significant foothold in the Turkish politics and Demiray led the party into merger with another small party in 1958. In 1961, he took part in the foundation of Adalet Partisi (Justice Party) and was elected to the parliament on the party's ticket where he served a full term till 1965; he seems to have withdraw from politics after his term ended.

DEBUT OF FLASH GORDON IN TURKEY contd.

2009-10-25T03:13:00.000-07:00

Above: The first panels, announcing impending disaster of a star approaching the Earth. Right: Introduction of Baytekin & Miss Yıldız (Later they embark on a mission to an alien planet which is the source of the threat against the Earth). Below: First vision of the planet.

Below: First perils on the planet

Above: They are taken to the ruler of the planet. Below: The emperor's daughter objects to his father's death ruling on Baytekin and both flee.

Above: The emperor's warcrafts go on a rampage. Below: Difficult times for Yıldız who had remained at the hands of the emperor.

DEBUT OF FLASH GORDON IN TURKEY

2009-10-25T02:53:00.000-07:00

While it has been reported that 'Bringing Up Father' was published in a Turkish magazine before the 1930s, it can safely be said that the potential of the comics medium was first realized by Mehmet Gürtunca in 1935. Two children's magazines published by Gürtunca, Çocuk Sesi and Afacan, were giving place to comics among its pages alonside stories, etc. Afacan's 1st series, which started in 1932, capitalized on Mickey Mouse strip continuities. Both Afacan and Çocuk Sesi, which had started in 1930, also published humorous juvenile comics continuities by Orhan Tolon, regarded as the first Turkish comics artist. Afacan's 2nd series, which started in 1934, began running 'Avcı Baytekin' (Jungle Jim) and Tarzan. Then, 'Baytekin' (Flash Gordon) began in color in the center pages of Çocuk Sesi with no. 281 (13.5.1935) and caused a big sensation.

Above: cover of Çocuk Sesi no. 381, announcing the start of the amazing adventures of Baytekin. Below: two further covers of Çocuk Sesi from 1935.

On July 6th, Gürtunca's Ülkü Yayınevi (Ülkü Publishing House) published an Avcı Baytekin album, which is apparently the first comics book ever published in Turkey. It was followed in August with six Secret Agent X-9 albums, confusingly titled Baytekin (it should be noted that the Turkish publishers presented all three characters by Alex Raymond as if they were the same character, venturing into the jungles, into the space and working as a secret police from time to time!). In September, seven Mickey Mouse albums and at least three more Baytekin (X-9) albums were published. It was claimed that some of these albums, for instance the Baytekin / X-9 ones, reached a circulation of 50,000.

THE MYSTERIOUS FLAME OF QUEEN LOANA IS BACK

2009-10-25T02:32:00.000-07:00

Well, I've had a turbulent and recently very rough period of my life this year; and couldn't get back on any of my blogs. Now, I am trying to pull together again.
I did have an extensive web site on comics publishers of Turkey over at geocities which is closing down. So, I will take that as an opportunity to re-flame this blog by moving pre-war related material over there to here.

YUGOSLAVIAN COMICS IN TURKEY - PART 1: COUNTESS MARGO

2008-12-23T13:38:00.000-08:00

Several pre-war comics of Yugoslavian origin were among the many comics published in Turkey's major war-time weekly comics magazine 1001 Roman during the last two years of its first series (1939-46). Especially the works of artist Konstantin Kuznjecov appear to have been featured regularly between 1945-46. The first comics by Kuznjecov that I have been able to identify as being reprinted in 1001 Roman is the outstanding 'Grofica Margo (Countess Margo)' which was serialized in no.'s 283-327 in 1945 as 'Kontes Margo'. It had originally been published in Yugoslavia's Mika Miš comics magazine in 1938.
'Grofica Margo' is remarkable for both its story and for its graphic qualities. The non-conventional page layout with playing cards imaginatively scattered amongst the panels in the above scan is a good example of the latter quality. As for the story, it is built on a terrific mystery plot with some delicious gothic trappings, both in terms of themes and of motifs. The comics begins with an elderly count living alone in a castle dying of fright at the appearance of a ghosly female figure at midnight. His heirs come to the castle and learn the terrible curse haunting the family. The recounting of origin of the curse entails a very long flashback, running 17 full pages in the Turkish edition. More than 300 hundred years ago, an ancester of the family had married a peasant girl named Margo. Unfortunately, she couldn't bear him a male child and, worried that she might lose her husband because of this reason, the misguided young woman, assisted by her grandmother, kill her female newborn with the intention of replacing the poor infant with a male baby! I guess the theme of maternal infanticide is very rare in comics. This shocking murder is depicted as such in the below panel:

The gruesomely cruel actions do not end here as the husband, who happens to fall onto the scene just too late, has poor Margo walled up in a chamber alive... Her grandmother curses the whole family as a result.
After the long flashback ends, the plot resumes with further appearances of a ghost in the castle terrorizing the new owners as well as some less supernatural-looking attempts on their lives. With secret passages and black hooded figures, it reminds me the best of Edgar Wallace mysteries, esp. The Black Abbot (1926).

The Turkish edition in 1001 Roman is a flawed reprint unfortunately. Some sequences during the flashback appear to be abridged with a few pages completely redrawn ineptly for some reason. Furthermore, roughly halfway through the story, the format changes from full page (as in the first scan at the top of this blog) to 2/3rds of a page with standartly neat row/panel design (as in the above scan) at the expense of the free-style layout of the earlier pages.
Prior to its run at 1001 Roman, 'Grofica Margo' had also been reprinted in the French comics magazine Gavroche (no. 13-54) in 1941 in a colorized edition which foregoes the subtleties of the original black&white art.
'Kontes Margo' was followed in 1001 Roman by yet another Kuznjecov comics, but that will be covered in the next post in this blog, so stay tuned on...

MACISTE IN VINTAGE COMICS ADAPTATION OF CABIRIA (UPDATED WITH NEW INFO)

2008-12-13T15:23:00.000-08:00

Maciste is the most prominent hero of Italian popular cinema and also probably the oldest recurring character in world cinema. He was featured in a long-running series of Italian films from mid-1910s to late 1920s in the era of silent cinema and was revived in Italy in the 1960s with more than a dozen further Maciste films in the first half of the decade (Since most of the 1960s movies were re-named as Hercules movies when released in the US, he is not as well known in the English-speaking lands).
Maciste had actually made his first appearance as a side character (and a black-skinned one) in the seminal Italian silent film Cabiria (1914) before rising to hero status in the follow-up series. Cabiria tells the story of the misfortunes of a Roman maiden, the title heroine, abducted to Cartagha. Maciste is the side-kick of the hero who rescues her from ritual sacrifice.
A comics adaptation of Cabiria, co-illustrated by Raffaele Paparella and Antonio Canale, was serialized in the Italian weekly comics magazine Topolino no.'s 527-554 in 1943 which was later reprinted in Turkish comics weekly 1001 Roman in 1945-46 (no.'s 306-337) under the title 'Kabria'. The above panel (all scans in this post are from the Turkish edition) is the first appearance of Maciste (spelled as 'Masist') in this comics adaptation. The plot synopsises of Cabiria refer to Maciste as the lead protagonist's slave, but the Turkish text refers to him as his servant. Below is another panel with Maciste, breaking his chains a la Hercules:

The comics appear to be a pretty faithful adaptation of the movie, as witnessed in the below panel and its corresponding still from the movie:

Below is another impressive panel, depicting the march of Hannibal's war elephants, reprising another scene reportedly in the film ('though I couldn't find any stills of it on the net):

UPDATE: Armando Botto from Italy kindly informs that the Turkish edition in 1001 Roman has been re-colored as the original Italian edition in Topolino was in black and magenta; he also adds that some panels in 1001 Roman have been re-formatted together with some other changes such as "while your "temple" panel is just a part of the original one, the"elephants" one has had some details added (part of the mountains in the background,and also a few elephants)." Thank you once again, Armando..

PROFESSEUR NIMBUS

2008-03-20T13:32:00.000-07:00

'Professeur Nimbus' was a wordless pre-war French comics strip created by former animator André Daix [Delachenal] in 1934. While the initial gags reportedly featured Nimbus as an inventor, his scientist career was eventually phased out even though the professor credential lingered on in the strip's title. Daix became a Nazi-collaborator during the 2nd World War and had to flee his country after the war for exile in Latin America.

Nimbus made his Turkish debut in the children's weekly magazine Yavrutürk which had started publication in 1936. He was renamed as 'Tektel Amca' (Single-hair Uncle). At least in one occasion, he was featured on the cover, which was a quite unusual practice in Yavrutürk as the magazine almost never featured any comics character on its covers. Below are a sample of Nimbus strips published in several issues of Yavrutürk in 1937:

FELIX THE CAT IN TURKEY

2008-03-19T15:30:00.000-07:00

'Felix the Cat' comics, featuring the legendary silent-era animation character of the same name, first appeared in Turkey as 'Karakedi' [Blackcat] in the weekly children's magazine Yavrutürk which had began publication in 1936. Below is the back cover of the no.63, dated 10.7.1937, of v.3 of Yavrutürk featuring Felix in the Stone Age (if you click on the image, a larger-sized version will appear). If anyone can identify or estimate the original US publication date of this material, please let us know.

JUNGLE JIM (pt. 2)

2008-02-12T15:01:00.001-08:00

JJ05 (7.10-1934-7.7.1935): With this adventure, whose duration is more than that of all previous episodes combined, the creativity in 'Jungle Jim' blossoms with regards to both the art and the content. After the death of her villainous father, Joan seems to have settled with Jim for the time being, and Zobi the jungle-boy has parted them; hence, a scantily-clad adolescent boy has departed and left the scene for a young woman. The adventure truly kicks off with the arrival of a seasoned adventurer named Malay Mike who claims that the extinct species of saber-tooth tigers live in a valley where no man other than himself has set foot in. Sceptic and yet intrigued, Jim nevertheless set out an expedition on this tip. Grisly sights such as the below mise-an-scene encountered at the onset of the expedition signal that this adventure will be no routine stuff.

Jim and his companions discover more than saber-toothed tigers in the valley where an extinct volcano has been hollowed out and turned into a fortress and a religious temple, the headquarters of a Chinese despot bent on exploiting the gold mines in the region. While the presence of a Chinese villain is superficially reminiscent of the 'Yellow Peril' narratives in the vein of Fu Manchu, the fact that a Chinese secret agent as well as local (Malayan) natives join forces with Jim and friends rule out this adventure from such racist territories.

The story is also enriched by several 'guilty-pleasure' motifs such as girl in bondage, girl-girl fight and gun-toting girl (all featuring Joan):
In terms of graphic design, Raymond experiments with several styles in the course of this long adventure which starts as a 'three-tier' (three rows of panels) as were all the previous adventures. On the Dec. 12nd page, he begins to introduce larger panels among regular-size ones, thus breaking up the neat panel-row structure. For several weeks, he alternates between this irregular format and a two-tier format, abondoning the three-tier format completely. From February onwards, the page even leaves out the oblong-size format altogether and becomes taller than wider. Towards the end of the adventure, it reverts back to the oblong-format, settling with a two-tier structure. Meanwhile, the routine "to be continued" tagline at the end of each page has also disappered, eventually giving way to the announcement of the subject of the coming weekly page.

[JJ06] River Pirates (14.7.1935-27.10.1935): A simple adventure where Jim rescue a widow and her infant from a disgruntled ex-lover, the high point of which is Jim and Kolu being left buried in the sand for ants to devour them, not to mention lovingly rendered damsel-in-distress illustrations. Surprisingly, Joan departs with the widow to head back to the US, leaving a note disclosing that she loved Jim but did not want to impose herself on him (a situation which will be repeated in several early 'Phantom' adventures). Reading the note, Jim says to himself "what a blind fool I am", perhaps referring to the two nights ago where they had slept outdoors all along by themselves on opposite sides of the fire.

In the coming adventures, Jungle Jim will meet an imposing female, but that's another story, to be reconted in future postings in this blog.

AN INAPPROPRIATELY SPECULATIVE APPENDIX WITH NO COMMENT:

JUNGLE JIM (pt 1)

2008-02-01T15:41:00.000-08:00

'Jungle Jim' is an underrated comics which has been overshadowed by legendary US comics artist Alex Raymond's other works, 'Flash Gordon' being the most famous one. However, not ony its artwork is bestowed with the quality of other Raymonds works from the pre-war era, but its characterizations and narratives are also noteable for many reasons.

Simultanously as 'Flash Gordon was commissoned by the King Features to compete with 'Buck Rogers', 'Jungle Jim' was commissoned as a competitor to 'Tarzan' and both debutted on Jan. 7th, 1934 as complementary Sunday features (see the below image for the first appearance of the hero on its first page). Though only the Raymond byline appeared on the comics, it was scripted by Don Moore and most reference sources identify him as the creator. Moore (1904-86) was a former newsman who was editing adventure stories for a NY magazine when he was recruited into the comics field by the King Features. Later he would move onto television as script-writer.

At least at its inception, Jungle Jim was clearly modeled directly on real-life adventurer Frank Buck who was very famous in those years on the basis of his best-selling memoir book Bring 'Em Back Alive and its movie adaptation with the same title, which he himself starred. In the first story, Jim Bradley alias Jungle Jim was presented as a trapper and tamer capturing wild-life specimens for zoos, precisely as a fictional replica of Frank Buck. Moreover, he was based in the Malay peninsula, which happened to be the setting of Buck's first movie.

Jim was accompanied by a native "servant" named Kolu, making 'Jungle Jim' probably the first American adventure comics to feature an inter-racial duo as protagonists, predating Mandrake and Lothar by several months. Moreover, whereas the pre-war Lothar was portrayed frequently as an 'all muscle, no brains' figure strictly for ridicule, Kolu was a genuinely indispendable right-hand man for Jim with no inferiority attributed to him, other than being an employee. Actually, at least in the first one and a half years of the comics' run which I have read so far, Kolu, thanks to his marksmenship talent, turned out to be Jim's saviour at the last moment in more occasions than Jim saved him or other people! Furthermore, in one occasion (Aug 8th, 1934), he speaks on behalf of himself and Jim, in the presence of Jim and a third party without Jim expressing his opinion first.

Bits of scarce info on the web name Jim's steady as Lil De Vrille, but a blonde named Joan appears as the candidate for this role in the first stories. Despite the fact that she is introduced into the comics by way of being rescued by Jim and Kolu from jungle perils (see the above image), she doesn't turn out to be the standard feminine stereotype, asking for instance Jim to teach her to tame wild animals (which he complies) and joining the men in dangerous missions as any other character (withoout any objection from Jim). To revert to comparison with the Mandrake strip, she is the direct opposite to Narda, and on even more equal footing with the male protagonists than Phantom's Diana.

The graphic and narrative qualities of the comics evolve progressively during the comics' first one and a half years' run. None of the adventures have episode titles, so I will be assigning them codes for convenience.

JJ01 (7.1.1934-3.3.1934): Almost every single page has Jim fighting a wild animal leaping at him in the forest during the course of a simple story about a villain named Tiger Peters (Joan is his daughter) stealing the animals Jim had captured. The adventure ends with Peters managing to escape, taking his daughter with him.

JJ02 (3.3.1934-3.6.1934): This adventure has got a more interesting and relatively more complex story, but the plot is poorly developed. A black lion is terrorizing a nearby tribe and Jim sets out to capture this never before seen specimen. On the other hand, a white guy seeks refuge from natives who want to sacrifice him to a god. It turns out that an evil white man has imposed himself as god onto a tribe and using this power to extort money from foreigners. However, how and where the black lion angle fits into this schema is not satisfactorily explained, esp. with regards to the double revelation that, on one hand, some of the attacks attributed to the black lion were the work of natives in costume and on the other hand the black lion was real enough itself. It seems Moore was undecided on what course the story should develop and eventually could not manage to pull all the conflicting ends let loose. As for the racial representations involved in this story, Jim's earlier reference to the native tribe dominated by the white villain posing as a god as "ignorant blacks" appears as a fly in a glass of milk and yet in the end, when he urges these folks to return to their "old faith that taught you kindness and brotherly love", the comics stand in contrast to the racist rhetorics of colonialist stories.

JJ03 (3.6.1934-1.7.1934): This mini-episode perhaps should better be viewed as a prologue of the next adventure. A panther captured by Jim turns out to be the pet of a jungle boy named Zobi, who'll accompany him and Kolu in the coming adventure. It seems writer Moore was tentatively considering introducing Zobi as a permament side-kick in this period.

JJ04 (1.7.1934-30.9.1934): An old friend of Jim visits him to request help in defeating a gang robbing gold miners. The leader of the gang turns out to be Tiger Peter from the very first adventure and hence Jim and Joan reunite. Except for one single instance of a lion attack, this is a standart action adventure, climaxed by gun fights, without any jungle perils and could have been set in any location and not necessarily in the jungle region.

From Aug. 19th onwards, one third of the 'Jungle Jim' Sunday comics half-page is devoted to cut-outs, usually featuring scantily-clad female characters from 'Flash Gordon', but, in two occasions, Joan from 'Jungle Jim' itself, the first of which is below:

Around the same time, the art of the comics itself began to show some signs of flair, such as in the below panel:

With the next adventure, the creativity in 'Jungle Jim' will blossom with regards to both the art and the content, but that will be discussed in the next installement in this blog.. TO BE CONTINUED

GIOVE TOPPI'S GOLDEN CAGE (1938)

2008-01-28T10:59:00.000-08:00

Gabbia d'oro (Golden Cage) is a pre-war Italian jungle perils comics album published in 1938 by Nerbini which is of interest due to both the name behind it and also for its disreputable content.

Both the art and the story are credited to Giove Toppi (1888-1942). Toppi was initially an illustrator for the Florence-based publisher Nerbini. When Nerbini started publishing comics, Toppi joined in the staff of this craft as well. He single-handedly earned his name a permanent place in the history of European comics by making a gag-comics featuring Mickey Mouse for the cover of the first issue of Nerbini's Topolino comics weekly in 1932:

However, Topolino had been started without license from Disney and from the 3rd issue onwards, Mickey Mouse proper would have to be dropped from the magazine upon Disney's legal intervention until Nerbini would get the rights of Disney comics for the Italian market. In the meantime, Toppi made gag-comics featuring another (non-Mickey) mouse for Topolino:

When Nerbini became the legal publisher of Disney material, it would be Toppi who would illustrate most of the covers of the first series Italian Disney comics albums in 1935, such as the below cover:

Another retrospectively interesting episode in Toppi's career came when he collaborated with Federico Fellini in the comics field! In 1937, long before he would embark on a famed career in cinema, then 17 years-old Fellini had moved to Florence and began working for Nerbini as a writer. When Italy's fascist government banned the import of American comics in 1938, Nerbini would begin producing local-made versions of these popular comics and Fellini was among the script writers of this obligatory fad with Toppi at the art chores. The fruits of the collaboration between Fellini and Toppi reportedly include one Flash Gordon comics.

Gabbia d'oro, on the other hand is a solo effort by Toppi. It was published in Turkey as no. 22 (Oct. 1941) of 1001 Roman's monthly special issues. The Turkish edition might be slightly abridged as there are some unresolved sub-plots. Nevertheless, the main plot appears complete in its essentials. The hero is an Italian named Mario who is accompanying a British archeolog and his daughter Alice in an expedition in black Africa. Despite Mario's objections, Alice secretly joins a research party to locate the treasures of a "savage" tribe and eventually gets captured. The natives see in her the return of their divine Daughter of the Sun (Alice had landed in an aeroplane). She demands to be released, even calling the natives' chief as an "ape-man". The chief says that the "civilization has made her rebellious", but that he "knows how to tame her." Consequently, she is locked up in a golden cage to stay there "till her nerves calm down." Mario saves her by massacring the whole tribe with a machine gun and the archeolog confiscates the natives' treasure, including the golden cage. The comics end by Mario warning Alice that he will lock her up in the golden cage whenever she makes him angry and she submissively replies as "understood, love".

The obvious colonialist trajectory of Gabbia d'oro need no elaboration as it is apparent from the above plot summary. It suffices to add that the portrayal of one non-savage black character, "a faithful servant", is also very derogotary as his 'foolish' amazent at the westerners' technology such as aeroplanes and radio is depicted as a matter of ridicule, as in the below panel:

And yet, it shouldn't be missed that this colonialist/white-supremacist context also serves as a background for another dynamic in Gabbio d'oro, that is the fantasy for the subordination of 'rebellious' women. It is ironic that in that case, the 'savages' serve as a double for Mario himself.

APPENDIX: (SPECULATIVE) TRIVIA

'Women in cages' is an iconic image in sado-erotic imaginary and it is naturally very recurrent in exploitation cinema as well. It is also a matter of fact that comics in general has served as inspiration for many filmmakers. Jesus (Jess) Franco is one prominent European exploitation filmmaker with a professed devotion to comics. Franco has made several 'women in cages' films, but one of his more obscure movies include one episode which apparently has some semblance to Gabbia d'oro in particular. Franco's Sex Charade (1970) feature one scene where a white woman is held in a cage in what appears to be a jungle setting (see above still). Though the natives holding her captive are not African but Indian and the cage is not golden, the concomittance of 'woman in cage' and jungle natives tentatively reminds Gabbia d'oro, esp. given the fact that Franco is known to be well versed in European comics. Franco would later be involved (as assistant director) in another movie titled Une cage doree (1976) without any natives but with a golden cage holding captive women.

SOURCES:
http://www.papersera.net/
http://coa.inducks.org/
The Films of Federico Fellini by Peter E. Bondanella
'Manacoa Files' by Alain Petit in Cine Zine Zone

A FORGOTTEN ITALIAN-MADE WESTERN COMICS FROM 1941

2008-01-20T10:10:00.000-08:00

La pista d'argento (The Silver Track) was a western comics album published in 1941 as part of Florence-based publisher Nerbini's 'Collona albi grandi avventura' series. It is signed by Italian artist Mario Tempesti. I couldn't find much info on Tempesti other than the fact that he was a staff artist of Nerbini's comics magazine L'Avventuroso; he also seems to have made cover illustrations for publications outside of the comics media.

La pista d'argento was published in Turkey twice during the war era. In its first edition, as the headline comics of 1001 Roman's monthly special issue no. 27 (March 1942), it was titled as 'Gümüş İz' (The Silver Track). The story concerns an expedition to find a team of geographers who had been lost in the wilderness. The search party gets captured by American natives whose chief has plans to organize an uprising to set up an "empire" by uniting all native tribes.

Even though it is a mediocre comics in all aspects from art to story, it had a second edition in Turkey two years later in the same series, the first and only time a comics was published twice in 1001 Roman. The no. 57 (sept. 1944) of the monthly series headlined it as 'Ölüm Yolcuları' (Voyagers of Death). This 2nd edition was not a reprint, but an abridged version with a new Turkish translation. The heroine's name was given as Violetta whereas she was Miss Edna in the earlier edition. The 'Ölüm Yolcuları' edition expanded on the dialogue between the tribal chief and the leader of the captured search party. In the 1st edition, the hero simply calls the chief's plans as "madness", but in the 2nd addition, he strikingly also adds that they are "a minority and should be content with the amount of land they have". In this manner, the story not only assumes a blanket identification with the white people over the non-white people, but also attempts to provide a generalizable justification for the suppression of 'minorities'' aspirations.

In the subsequent monthly issue, the editors of 1001 Roman published a reply to the readers who had apparently written letters to point out that this comics had already been published earlier in the series. In this rather unconvincing reply, they claimed that this was not a case of an unintentional mistake on their part, but they had decided to go ahead with a second edition because the earlier one had sold out.

SYNOPSISES AND MINI-REVIEWS OF ‘TIM TYLER’S LUCK’ EPISODES IN THE WEEKLY SERIES OF 1001 ROMAN

2008-01-16T05:05:00.000-08:00

The first post of this blog was devoted to an overview of ‘Tim Tyler’s Luck’; and synopsises and reviews of ‘Tim Tyler’s Luck’ episodes published in Turkey were promised for future posts. A total of five ‘İki İzci’ (Tim Tyler’s Luck) episodes were run in the Turkish weekly comics magazine 1001 Roman between 1940-43. The source of the Turkish editions appear to be the French ‘Raoul et Gaston’ albums published by Moderne as part of their Collection Appel de la Jungle series starting from 1938. The below images corresponding to each episode are the covers of the post-war reprints of those albums.

no. 39-59 ‘Örümcek ile Karşı Karşıya’ [Against the Spider]
A villian named Spider has escaped from prison and seeks to take revenge on the Ivory Patrol. This is one of the better 'Tim Tyler’s Luck' adventures, largely due to the extraordinary persona of the villain in question: Spider has a habit of weaving webs in between trees and hanging his victims on it. Visually, he is presented to the readers often as a silhouette or in shadows. This strategy functions to depict him more as a menacing ‘presence’ and not merely as a figure. It is hard to accept that this particular episode is the fruit of the same mind who conceived the other Tim Tyler’s Luck episodes. It should also be noted that the name of the villain in the 1937 movie serial was “Spider Webb” and this strip episode is probably its follow-up.
French album title: Contre l'Araignée (1st ed.:.1938, repr.: 1949); Italian album title: Il ragno ritorna (1938);

No. 60-82 ‘Siyah Gözlü Mona’ [Mona with Black Eyes]
The Turkish edition of this episode appears to start with actually the finale of a seperate adventure where African natives (“savages”) attack a fortress of the colonial forces; I think that particular episode, which the Turkish readers were presented only the last fragment of, was the episode titled as Lo spirito di Tambo in the Italian editions.
The ‘Mona’ episode truely kicks off with the subsequent arrival of a beautiful brunette to the fortress. The routine and undistinguished story revolves around a pack of diamonds which have been stolen by her brother and ex-suitor. Spud does not appear in this episode.
French album title: Mona aux yeux noirs (1st ed.:.1938, repr.: 1948); Italian album title unknown.

no. 83-113 ‘Mis Larsen’in Milyonları’ [The Millions of Miss Larsen]
This episode starts as if a modest ‘jungle perils’ adventure with a safari, the highpoint being a rhino attack. However, after the safari ends, events take a new turn and the episode evolves into a different and rather engaging direction. The captain in charge of the Ivary Patrol begins to develop a romantic interest to the rich girl of the safaring party even though she has another suitor from her companions. The two men fight and the foreigner gets shot and critically wounded under mysterious circumstances. The captain is naturally the main suspect and gets arrested for court-martialing...
French album title Les millions de Miss Larcet (1st ed.:.1938, repr.: 1948); Italian album title unknown.

No.114-146 (18.5.1942) ‘Vahşiler Geliyor’ [The Savages Are Coming]
This is a very simple, action-oriented episode in which a violent tribe of African natives wearing Falcon corpses as head-wear attack a watch-tower manned by Spud. The action sequences are very well-done, but the colonialist position of the episode is obvious.
French album title unknown; Italian album title Fra gli uomini Falco (1941).
The serialization of this episode in 1001 Roman corresponds (1941-42) to the peak of paper shortage in Turkey stemming from economic hardships of the war era conditions and the weekly magazine suspends publication for more than a month between issues no.135 and no.136. After this episode ends, no new ‘Tim Tyler’s Luck’ comics appears in the weekly magazine until a final one several months later.

No.175-188 ‘Trebor’un Esrarı’ [The Mystery of Trebor]
A very mediocre adventure revolving around the question of whether a stranger is a wanted fugitive or not.
French album title L'énigmatique M. Trébor (1st ed.:.1938, repr.: 1949); Italian album title unknown.

In addition to its run in the weekly magazine, 'İki İzci' was headlined in several of 1001 Roman's monthly special issues; the synopsises and reviews of those episodes will also appear in this blog in the near future.

RADIO PATROL

2008-01-04T08:51:00.000-08:00

Largely forgotten today (for example, it doesn't have an entry in Toonopedia.com), 'Radio Patrol' was one of the above-average strips of the pre-war era. It was created for a local Boston newspaper in 1933 by crime reporter Ed Sullivan and staff artist Charles Schmidt, but picked up for syndication by King Features. It had been initially titled as 'Pinkerton, Junior', referring to the kid character who helps the cops, but was retitled by King to capitalize on the public's infatuation with the introduction of the two-way radio into police force's fight against crime. It would later be once again retitled as 'Sergeant Pat of Radio Patrol' even though the protagonists of the strip were a team, nominally led by Sgt Pat due to his rank, and consisting of a female cop named Molly, as well as the kid Pinky and his dog.

'Radio Patrol' is considered noteworthy for its realistic look and feel in terms of its characters, settings and stories, as opposed to the 'larger than life' protagonists, situations and villains featured in other crime-fighting strips. Even the physical geographical depictions of Boston locales is said to be true-to-life.

What strikes me most in ‘Radio Patrol’ is the cinematic look of it. Not only the art, but even more significantly, the compositions and the pacing is excellent, with dynamism of the scenes established by the masterful sequencing of different ‘camera-angles’ positioning the view-point of the readers. Indeed, pursuing an analogy with cinema, while most pre-war comics, however ‘beautiful’ their artwork might be, look like the works of Edison, ‘Radio Patrol’ looks more akin to the level of Griffith (not in terms of duration, but in terms of mastery of filmic 'language').

In 1937, the strip was adapted to the screen as a serial and four 'Radio Patrol' 'big little books' were published between 1935-40. Starting from 1941, the strips were reprinted in King Comics. Nevertheless, the strip couldn't survive for decades and would cease in the early 1950s.

It was one of the popular American strips in Italy in the pre-war era, with 11 Radio Pattuglia albums being published by Nerbini between 1935-38.

In Turkey, it debutted in the weekly children's magazine Çocuk Sesi published by M. Faruk Gürtunca in 1937, retitled as 'Küçük Yılmazın Maceraları' [Adventures of Little Yılmaz]. While the top-billed Pinky was given a Turkish name, the rest of the cast had preserved their original names. In 1943, 'Radio Patrol' resurfaced in rival publisher Tahsin Demiray's comics weekly 1001 Roman, starting with no. 189 (15.3.1943) where it replaced the outgoing 'İki İzci' [Tim Tyler's Luck] on the magazine's last page. In 1001 Roman, it was titled more properly as 'Radyolu Polisler', but the character of Pinky was once again Turkified, this time renamed as Oğuz.

SYNOPSISES AND MINI-REVIEWS OF ‘RADIO PATROL’ EPISODES IN 1001 ROMAN:

‘Radyolu Polisler’ serialized in the weekly 1001 Roman starts with the first-ever syndicated ‘Radio Patrol’ episode and follow the original sequence of the first four episodes in the strips from their start at 16.4.1934 till 12.1.1935. They also correspond to the first four Italian Radio pattuglia albums published in 1935. As published in 1001 Roman, the episodes did not have separate titles.

No.189 - No.204: It starts with Pinky and his pet dog catching a criminal and getting introduced to Pat and Molly who take him for a ride in their patrol car. Upon an announcement on the police car radio of a bank robbery, they fall on the trail of the robbers. This is an action-packed adventure involving car chases, shoot-outs, Molly getting kidnapped, and ending with a fatal fist-fight on a ship. While the ‘Radyolu Polisler’ pages in 1001 Roman were initially printed in mono-chrome for the first 13 issues, enabling a faithful reproduction of the original b&w art, the Turkish publishers later began to colorize them and poor color printing demolished their quality somewhat.
Italian album title of this episode was simply Radio pattuglia della polizia.

No.205-217: Pinky’s dog finds the lost dog of a lady who in turn invites him and Molly to her sea-side house. At night, a male corpse is found on the raft off the shore. In contrast to the previous adventure, this is more of a police procedural story with less action even though the second night-time attack in the house is once again masterfully depicted visually.
The Italian album title was Il mistero del galleggiante (Mystery of the Raft). This and the previous episode would later be re-printed in traced versions as filler space in the weekly Red Kit [Turk. ed. of Lucky Luke] comics magazine (no. 12-19) in 1965.

No. 218-?: A contractor is resisting bullying from racketeers and our heroes come to his aid. Unfortunately, issues featuring the conclusion of this episode are missing from my collection (as are those with the start of the next epissode), but a scene along the way on the catwalks high atop a construction was breathtaking.
The Italian title was La distruzione degli intoccabili (Destruction of the Untouchables).

?- No.263: When Pat is sacked for meddling in affairs outside his jurisdiction and Molly resigns in protest, Pinky uncovers the plot behind a stolen race horse. Pat and Molly are re-admitted into the police force after a very dynamicly visualized finale.
The Italian title was I filibustieri dell’ippodromo (Filibusters of the Hippodrome).

In addition to its run in the weekly magazine, 'Radyolu Polisler' was headlined in two of 1001 Roman's monthly special issues: no. 48 (Dec. 1943) and no. 51 (March 1944). Unfortunately, these special issues appear to print only the concluding segments of two episodes. The former is titled as 'Kalpazanlar Çetesi' [the Gang of Counterfeiters] and start with a raid on a counterfeiters hideout and feature the eventual capture of the ringleader who evades the raid. It is almost certainly the strip episode about the counterfeiters from 1938-39. The latter is titled as 'Gece Baskını' [Nightime Raid] and features the capture of another criminal who has evaded arrest. I couldn't identify it precisely, but it must also be a strip from 1938 or onwards as it includes the assistant prosecuting attorney Buster among the cast who had began appearing in the strip in 1938.

SOURCES:

http://en.wikipedia.org/

http://comics.org/

http://members.aol.com/mg4273/comics.htm

http://www.comicartclub.com/

http://www.fumetti.org/