The Flying Dutchman

Time to end the month with one more weird war tale from the pulse-pounding pages of Fiction House's Wings Comics, our spotlight series for March 2025 (check the archive if you missed any.) And though I typically tend to fly clear of stories created in a sort of historically factual, narrative style as this one, I do find the highly efficient story-telling and surprisingly chilling final panel to be very worthy of a THOIA post. Hope everyone enjoyed this month of high-flyin', hair raisin' hits from above, stay tombed in April for more hits coming up from below! From the November 1941 issue of Wings Comics #15.

Better Tombs and Graveyards

In the late 50's, Pierce Publishing attempted to cash in on the MAD Magazine craze, frantically cranking out 5 issues of nicely illustrated comedy madness before calling it quits, --but not before assembling this silly monster mash spoof of Better Homes and Gardens for the April 1959 issue of Frantic! V2 #2.

Strange Case of Henpecked Harry

While ACG is credited in creating the very first horror comic book series with Adventures into the Unknown in 1948, Avon actually beat them by one year with the first full horror comic issue one-shot with Eerie Comics #1 (1947.) Some top-notch artists joined in for the creation of this landmark title, like legendary Joe Kubert, the great George Roussos, as well as Bob Fujitani (who also illustrated that superb cover, see below!) We're actually going to take a look at the frighteningly funny Fred Kida tale today though, where his unique, organic style, and cinematic staging / character posing was really beginning to take sensational shape. And to anyone who doesn't think that you can be titillated by a woman falling on some train tracks, well, I present one seriously gorgeous splash page, as well as a couple of panels on page 6 that will absolutely convince you otherwise! "OH-HHH!"

The Thin Ones of Skeleton Island

We've been randomly looking at the spookier sides of Fiction House's wild, WINGS COMICS war series throughout the month of March, and this Suicide Smith (and the Air Commanders) on a cursed island entry from the February 1948 issue of Wings Comics #90 fits our THOIA bill nicely. Smith was one of the longest running back-up characters from this series, and today's post features great art by precode fan fave, John Celardo too, loadin' every page with fast paced adventure, a few tricky horror overtones, plus gorgeously illustrated ladies to really spice up the action. Also, if you ever wondered what the silhouette of a bad guy getting smooshed by a giant boulder looks like, well then --you came to the right island!

Death Ship

The highly unlikely, artistic credit guess in our previous post HERE sent me on quest to find an actual story containing actual art by joltin' Jay Disbrow. And I believe I found a good one, (well, good for me anyway because I love tragically unhappy endings!) --this time from the March 1954 issue of Ghostly Weird Stories #122. Please scroll down and compare the two posts. You will immediately notice that there is, in fact, no comparison. Disbrow has a very distinct style (especially with faces, as one example), which is absolutely non-existent in the "Revenge!" story. But enough complaining, prepare to blast-off into the brutal reality of scary space with this sizzlin' Star Publications, sci-fi screamer, complete with an extra awesome, blacklight poster-esque L.B. Cole cover. (Don't forget the Kleenex, you whiners!)

Revenge!

One of us! One of us! Yes, it's time to get freaky cuz the circus just pulled into town-- and there's trouble brewin' with the sideshow! This is another one that'll bring to mind a certain EC vibe, though continually saying so is a bit unfair as this superbly sickening Story Comics series definitely had a vicious vibe all its own! Okay now, someone at GCD has taken a wild guess at the art here and believes it's by Jay Disbrow! I cannot even begin to tell you how much I disagree with that absolutely terrible guess. So who does it looks like to you? From the August 1953 issue of Mysterious Adventures #15, 

No Noose is Good Noose

After presenting "The Choker" post (HERE!) the other day, we at THOIA have re-evaulated our gallows stance and decided there actually just wasn't enough hanging around these parts lately to satisfy our terrible tastes! Enter our next story from the June 1954 issue of Mysterious Adventures #20. Charles Nicholas delivers some real swingin' artwork on this (*choke!) classic about a hangman who justifiably, gets no respect... though oddly enough, he does get the last laugh!

Jane Martin vs. The Undead Nazis

After our Wings double blog-a-thon at the beginning of the month HERE and over at AEET HERE, a few of you wrote in asking to see more wild 'n wicked, war weirdness. Meanwhile, I always gets requests for more Lily Renee art, so here we go, killing two birds with one post! Jane Martin was a reoccurring back-up feature in Wings Comics, going all the way back to the very first issue in 1940, and thus, strutted her high flyin', long leggy stuff for well over 100+ issues. First appearing as a nurse, then a spy, and eventually a pilot over the expanse of her many appearances, Jane's adventures are always loaded with sexy fun, and were total diversions from the usual war stuff seen in the rest of this overly macho hero series. I especially like this story because we get one of the earliest comic book hints at Nazi's performing horribly nasty experiments by creating an unstoppable living dead army out of corpses! We also get plenty of great views of that little line running up the back of Jane's stockings, as only Lily Renee could draw it-- so there ya go! From the October 1943 issue of Wings Comics #38, and swiftly scripted by F. E. Lincoln.