THE SHADOW "Night of Neptune's Death" Conclusion

We Have Already Seen...

Unpublished cover for #5 by Michael Kaluta

It is late 1940-early 1941.

Professional terrorist General Sodom plots to kill US ambassador Cyril Bench before the diplomat can broker a peace treaty and prevent America's entry into World War II.

To achieve this, Sodom hijacks the SS Neptune and threatens to kill all the passengers and crew unless Bench, traveling on the nearby SS Boxer, is turned over to him...

The Shadow survived...but so did Sodom!

He would return to battle DC's other pulp crimefighter, The Avenger!

But that is a story for another entry...

Many fans, used to Mike Kaluta's intricate illustrations, were surprised, and somewhat put-off, by Frank Robbins' art.

Ironic, since Robbins had been a comic strip (and book) writer/artist since his work on Scorchy Smith in 1939, and was one of a handful of Golden Age talents still producing quality work over 30 years later in the Bronze Age!

Support Crime & Punishment!

Visit Amazon and Buy...

Shadow Scrapbook

by Walter B Gibson

THE SHADOW "Night of Neptune's Death" Part 1

While The Shadow stories by Mike Kaluta have been reprinted several times...

..they are less than half of the 1970's DC Comics' 12-issue run!

The remaining seven issues, illustrated by other artists, have never been reprinted!

But, The Shadow's not about to let that happen...as we shall see...next week!

While Denny O'Neil, who wrote all of the Mike Kaluta-illustrated stories, continued his run, the meticulous (but slow) Kaluta ran into deadline problems with The Shadow #5 (1974).

Golden Age writer/artist Frank Robbins, who was also scripting (and occasionally illustrating) Batman stories in Detective Comics, stepped into the breach for the first of several Shadow stories.

This particular tale also introduced the only recurring villain in the DC Comics Bronze Age pulp universe, General Sodom, who next appeared in Justice, Inc #3 (1975), DC's other hero-pulp title, starring The Avenger!

Support Crime & Punishment!

Visit Amazon and Buy...

Shadow Scrapbook

by Walter B Gibson

IN THE DAYS OF THE MOB "Welcome to HELL!"

In 1971, Jack Kirby wanted to re-introduce "true crime" comics...

...as part of a line of adult-oriented b/w magazines covering various genres.

We covered one of the other proposed books, Soul Love, in our "sister" blog True Love Comics Tales™.
Of the various titles Kirby wanted to do, only two saw publication; Spirit World (about psychic phenomena) and In the Days of the Mob, and they only had one issue each!
We'll be re-presenting both that first issue of ItDotM and a couple of stories from the never-published second issue that did see print in various other HTF venues.

Support Small Business

Visit Our

Crime & Punishment™

Comics Collectibles Shop

CHARLIE CHAN "Hit and Run Murder Case"

Remember, despite stereotypes, Inspector Chan is always the smartest man in the room...

...as this 1948 tale from the first issue of his Golden Age run demonstrates!

Charlie Chan was already a multi-media success with six novels, a radio show, an ongoing b-movie series, and a newspaper comic strip (which was reprinted in comic books), when this series of all-new comic book stories debuted in 1948.
Produced by the Simon & Kirby comic studio for Prize Comics, the book ran for five issues before Prize cancelled most of their titles and sold off the unpublished material to Charlton Comics, where Charlie Chan ran for another four issues.
While the newspaper strip based it's portrayals on the movie actors' likenesses, the Prize comic book took it's cues from the radio series and used the show's descriptions of Chan and his sons for their renderings.
The plots were original tales, not based on either the novels or radio show scripts.
This particular story was penciled and inked by Carmine Infantino, who later revamped Batman from the gimmicky sci-fi/fantasy strip it had become in the late 1950s back to a costumed detective series.

Support Small Business!

Visit Our

Crime & Punishment™

Comic Collectibles Shop

TRUE CRIME COMICS "James Kent"

We present, with pardonable pride, the single most notorious crime comic of all...

Art by Jack Cole

...True Crime Comics V1N2 (1947), which was probably mentioned more often in Fredric Wertham's Seduction of the Innocent than any other book!

If you want to know why, just feast your peepers on the cover story...

x

...and this Jack Cole-written and illustrated (inked by Alex Kotsky) story isn't the sleaziest or most tawdry of the book's tales!

That distinction goes to the second story, which we presented HERE!

As to whether this tale is "true" or not, we don't know.

But it is kool!

Check out the

True Crime Comic

Collectibles Shop

featuring the cover art from the issue this story came from!

ACE HARLEM

Before Virgil Tibbs!

Before John Shaft!

Before Easy Rawlins!

There was..Ace Harlem...

...one of the characters in All-Negro Comics (1947), the first comic book by a Black publisher, written and illustrated by Black creators and featuring Black characters.
A complete issue is unavailable on the Net since every copy I've seen is "slabbed", but an incomplete version of the book is available on-line from several sources.
The pages below are all that is currently extant of the Ace Harlem story...

The publisher, Orrin C. Evans, wrote in his editorial...

Through Ace Harlem, we hope dramatically to point up the outstanding contributions of thousands of fearless, intelligent Negro police officers engaged in a constant fight against crime throughout the United States.

A second issue was written and illustrated, but never published.

Visit the

All-Negro Comics

Collectible Store