Giddy-up — and take us to your leader!
Our old friend Craig Yoe has an appropriately weird new comics history book coming out next week from Dark Horse:
The book collects all the stories from Charlton’s 1950s series that featured Spurs Jackson and his Space Vigilantes — a collision between classic Westerns and the burgeoning postwar sci-fi craze. There are even extras.
So saddle up, set your rocket thrusters on full power, and dig 13 BIZARRO FACTS ABOUT SPACE WESTERN COMICS:
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By CRAIG YOE
1. The cowboy hero of Space Western Comics was drawn on the first cover (used for the cover of the reprint collection) as a woman but, before the comic went to press, the artist gave Spurs Jackson a sex change! Look closely and you can still see that the cowpoke has a low-cut blouse, shapely legs, and sexy short-shorts!
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2. Move aside, haute couture! Here come the evil Moon Borers rocking the catwalk wearing only their stylish adult diapers! Now, THAT’s a fashion statement!
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3. The co-publishers of Space Western Comics, Charlton’s John Santangelo Sr. and Ed Levy, met in jail! It was ex-con Levy who thunk up the idea of the mashup of Space and Western for their company!
From The Charlton Companion by Jon B. Cooke
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4. In the new Yoe Books/Dark Horse collection of the complete Space Western Comics stories, you’ll witness Spurs Jackson’s Native American sidekick Strong Bow fighting dinosaurs! Yabba-dabba-DUMB!
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5. Truth-y! In the story “Spurs Sees Red,” Commies arrive from outer space in flying saucers in an attempt to thwart our cowboy hero and take over the United States! Those damn planet-hopping pinkos!
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6. The soon-to-appear Space Western Comics book includes a crazy “lost” story that snobby fanboy critics will say should have STAYED lost, but that you’ll love! Critics gonna critique!
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7. What has been called “the greatest art team ever”— Al Williamson, Frank Frazetta, and Roy G. Krenkel (all of the famed EC Comics) — collaborated on a story restored for the book. And the group’s exquisitely drawn story features actor Buster Crabbe, who played space heroes (Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers), as well as cowboys in the movies but never in the SAME movies at the SAME time! Hollywood left those kinds of unholy couplings to comic books!
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8. Charlton’s Space Western Comics were written by Walter Gibson, creator of the Shadow’s pulp fiction! Why would such an esteemed writer pen such nutzoid so-bad-they’re-good outer space/Old West tales?! Don’t ask us. Only the Shadow knows!
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9. Hey, Trekkies! In this book you’ll learn that the Aztecs built huge spaceships and traveled to the planet… VULCAN! This was ears, I mean YEARS, before Mr. Spock and the beloved Star Trek tee-vee show aired. Totally illogical, Spurs Jackson!
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10. Forget collecting comic books! Spurs Jackson’s hobby was bringing back from his space escapades strange outer-space creatures. For instance, one of Spurs’ rescue animals was the Saturlope, a kooky combo kangaroo and dragon. It’s a zoo in Space Western Comics!
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11. Cosplay was first depicted in Space Western Comics 70 years ago! Hank, another sidekick of Spurs, gets a visit from a sci-fi club whose geeky members are devoted cosplayers. In a kind of revenge-of-the-nerds, the club defeats atomic weapon-wielding alien invaders by utilizing ordinary fly spray. Cosplayers for the win!
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12. By sheer coincidence, we’re sure, the cover of Space Western Comics #43 by Stan Campbell bears an absolutely UNCANNY resemblance to a famous splash page of Will Eisner’s Spirit drawn by the world’s greatest comic book artist, Wallace Wood! Why, it’s almost as if Campbell copied it! And finally… drum roll please…
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13. Spurs Jackson’s most fantastic and formidable foe is HITLER, whom he fights — on MARS! — in a story spanning two issues (rare at that time). Astonishingly, it turns out der Nazi Führer is still alive in 1953. In “Madman from Mars,” said funny-mustached madman launches hydrogen bombs from the Red Planet that destroy Paris, Moscow, and New York, not to mention Honolulu. Thankfully, cowboys from Arizona to the rescue!
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Space Western Comics,
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MORE
— 13 REASONS You’ll Love YOE BOOKS, by KELLEY JONES. Click here.
— 13 COVERS: The Golden Age of JUNGLE GIRLS. Click here.
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CRAIG YOE is a multiple-Eisner winner who digs weird comics.
