All of the recent hub-bub about dangerously advanced AI technology reminded me of this cool post code tale illustrated by Jay Scott Pike, from the August 1956 issue of Strange Tales #49. See? A little water = nothing to worry about, folks!
All of the recent hub-bub about dangerously advanced AI technology reminded me of this cool post code tale illustrated by Jay Scott Pike, from the August 1956 issue of Strange Tales #49. See? A little water = nothing to worry about, folks!
The panel of Benson's face in panel 6 on page two is great. Also love the one on panel 4 of page 3. Of course, most likely due to post code rules, the robot wasn't allowed to run amok afterwards. I was half expecting it to end with the robot still on the loose.
ReplyDeleteWait... the scientist....wanted to shoot the robot?!?
ReplyDelete@glowworm
ReplyDeleteThere was an old Tarzan comic too of a mad German scientist who built a robot in his castle, only to be attacked by the usual village mob with torches and pitchforks. Whereupon he and the robot relocated to Africa (apparently skipping about 75 years going by the technology around), and set up a jungle base where he built many more robots (¡on hovercrafts!) with which he began attacking African villages (because that makes total sense). Then Tarzan infiltrated his secret underground riverine base, whereupon the robots attacked him and he threw them into the river. Where they immediately short circuited, because this genius mad scientist who set up a river bank underground base never thought of making the robots waterproof (insert eyeroll emoji here).
There has always been a fear of machines turning on their masters, the Human Race. The trope of rise of the machines has been done in movies, radio and TV, and of course, comic books.
ReplyDeleteI guess it is a variation of The Sorcerer's Apprentice or Frankenstein, where human beings find themselves unable to control what they created and the havoc that is unleashed.
Neither the great brain of the scientist or either robot planned on water? Hoo boy, guys.
ReplyDeleteI love the very human look of the robot, especially the final panel, and then the close up of the scientist face on page 2, panel 6.
ReplyDeleteEven post code the Atlas 3-4 row action panel remains, this one on the bottom of page 3.
A lot of times, a 4 page story can feel rushed but this one is short enough that it works well in 4 pages, even with the old "reading a journal" taking up half a page. Artist got to draw some fun lab equipment!
I know Ambrose Bierce a little better than I know most other horror writers, so the chess game made me think at first of his Frankenstein type short story "Moxon's Master," even thinking this might be an updated version of it.
ReplyDeleteAnd of course the ending could be right out of The Wizard of Oz.
Alien invaders always get defeated by the deadly Earth water, too. I mean, it's basically a WMD. Yet our own kind shoot each other with it when we're children. Fill balloons with with the stuff and nuke each other as jokes. Sit in vats of it, just to relax. Ha ha ha. No alien or robot is a match for us.
ReplyDeleteNice art! I love how crazy the robot's eyes looked. Doesn't seen too far fetched he'd be some psychopath.
lTheres a feel to Atlas horror, even after the code. Kudos on that fib=nal panel with its "no quire Hunan look
ReplyDeleteThenagain hadn't the inventor read NY SF/. sentient robots alway go Suso....then again that was probably why neither robot was rust proofed
Nerodart