ANOTHER QUEEN OF THE JUNGLE by Dave Goode

Fight Comics 32...Tiger Girl

The argument can always be made that the most popular Tarzan comic book imitator was Sheena, Queen of the Jungle. Her popularity would lead to the creation of a number of "jungle queen" imitations. My favorite of the Golden Age Sheena imitations was Tiger Girl created by Robert Webb and often drawn by legendary good girl artist Matt Baker. Appearing originally in Fight Comics No. 32 from Fiction House in 1944 she was no relation to the Tiger Woman from Republic Pictures. THE TIGER WOMAN (1944) was a 1944 serial that starred the stunning Linda Stirling, who just might have made a great Tiger Girl.

Linda Stirling as Tiger Woman

Someone else who would have made a good Tiger Girl would have been my favorite ecdysiast Lilly "The Cat Girl" Christine. It has been reported that the sensual Miss Christine was considered by producer Sol Lesser to play Sheena of the Jungle in a series of films in the late 1940s. Unfortunately that series never materialized. 

She would have been great as the whip - wielding Princess Vishnu a.k.a Tiger Girl who fought the forces of evil in the Indian jungle with her pet tiger Benzali.

There was another Tiger Girl in the Silver Age of Comics. She was a one-shot character that appeared in her own title from Gold Key in 1968. Created by Superman's co-creator Jerry Siegal and Jack Sparling. A fun little story starring circus performer Lilly Taylor who put on a tiger - striped costume and fought the bad guys in this high camp adventure with the aid of her pet tiger "Kitten" and other performers of the circus. I really wish there had been more than one story.

And now, Dave Goode and Vance Capley present

a brand new Golden Adonis strip!

"I've Heard The Natives Mention Him. He's Quite A Guy According To Them." by Dave Goode

 

Back when I first discovered "men's sweat mags" as I was entering puberty my favorite stories found within were the jungle adventures. Probably because they reminded me of Jungle Jim. The Johnny Weissmuller movies based on the Alex Raymond comic strip from King Features and not the comic strip itself. They were two different animals. Of course the stories in the sweat mags featured very a little bit more violent. And had a lot more sexual content. But the stories were more or less like the ones you found in the Weissmuller flicks produced by Sam Katzman.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One of my favorite flicks from the series was THE LOST TRIBE (1949). It stars Weissmuller, Elena Verduga, Myrna Dell, Ralph Dunn, and Ray "Crash" Corrigan as Simba the Gorilla. The screenplay is by Arthur Hoerl and Don Martin.

 

It's a formula jungle adventure revolving around a lost city and it's hidden treasures. Plenty of stock footage and cheesy dialogue. It's a wonder that the  MSFT3K crew never got a hold of this. Former Olympic swimming champ Weissmuller fights a lion, a shark, an alligator, and a gang of modern day pirates. Weissmuller is at his two-fisted best in this one. He even gets tied up and worked over the bad guys. Not great art. But a lot of fun.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Funny thing is I was re-reading the Frank Frazetta - illustrated jungle romance tale "Untamed Love" when it struck me that the "great white hunter" in that story reminded me of Victor Mature in the jungle adventure SAFARI (1956). Made me think that Mature might have made a good Jungle Jim in a big budget production. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another actor I can see playing the jungle adventurer was Rory Calhoun. Calhoun had played big game hunter Jonathon Kincaid on an episode of GILLIGAN'S ISLAND that spoofed The Most Dangerous Game, Richard Connell's classic short story.

Hope you enjoyed this weeks' blog! Help support us by buying cool items!!

 

 

Thanks for stopping by...see you next week!

CAPTAIN AFRICA,THE COMIC BOOK by Dave Goode

 

I often think of the one-shot Republic serial heroes like the Masked Marvel , the Copperhead and the Tiger Woman starring in their own comic books. Likewise I can see Columbia serial heroes starring in spin-off comic books. Especially Captain Africa if he was illustrated by Glenn Cravath. Born in 1897 and dying in 1964 Cravath started as an illustrator for the New York Journal in the 1920s including working on a Sunday Frank " Bring 'Em Back Alive " Buck comic strip for that publication. This strip was based on the adventures of the famed real-life jungle adventurer. Gravath would also work as an illustrator for the King Features Syndicate. In 1928 he started freelancing for movie studios. Most notably Columbia and RKO. It was for RKO that Cravath created some memorable poster art for the classic adventure movie KING KONG. He also did comic strip ads for King Kong , The Song of Kong and Africa Screams , an Abbott & Costello jungle comedy that featured Frank Buck.

 

 

Cravath would create posters for Columbia serials like The Flying G-Men and B programmers like the Jungle Jim / Johnny Weissmuller series. And of course he did the poster art for Columbia's 1955 serial The Adventures of Captain Africa. If you're a fan-boy you already know that this was originally supposed to have been a Phantom serial , a sequel of sorts to Columbia's 1943 serial starring Lee Falk's classic comic strip hero. Well after production on the film started it was found that the studio had let their movie rights lapse. And King Features was asking for more money than Columbia was willing to pay to use the character. So the movie studio created a knock-off hero and gave him a similar costume to match the Phantom's costume in long shots.

 

 

The best thing about the Captain Africa serial was Cravath's poster work. Captain Africa's costume looked ridiculous on actor John Hart. But looked great illustrated by Cravath. Truthfully a lot of super-hero costumes that look great on the pages of a comic book look awful on actors. But this one looked especially stupid. So it's easy enough to imagine a Captain Africa comic book drawn by Cravath. But not a sequel to the serial.

 Greetings, blog fans! Dave Goode has written an article about Konga (1965) for Monster Magazine #1. You can read more about Dave's article and the magazine >>>HERE<<<

Did you enjoy this weeks blog? Share it on social media with your friends or better yet, show your gratitude buy purchasing our fine products:

Then click >>>>>HERE<<<<<< and buy ours!

Buying cool T-shirts and what not help support this blog!

Click >>>HERE<<< to see our latest designs! 

The Olympian and The Burlesque Queen by Dave Goode

I'm a huge fan of low-budget jungle adventure movies.The kind with potted plant jungle sets and tons of decades old stock footage.I think I developed this particular flick fetish in my pre-teen years watching the syndicated Ramar of the Jungle and Jungle Jim television shows.

I also loved PRC jungle programmers. The ones starring Buster Crabbe were special favorites.As I've said before Crabbe in safari togs and a pith helmet was a dead ringer for Doc Savage. My favorite of these was Nabonga.Where you not only have Crabbe fighting a crocodile and delivering the line "Those crocodiles can sure give you a work-out." But you also get the ape-suited Ray Corrigan. Plus a teenage Julie London. 

But another Crabbe jungle flick I've come to enjoy is Jungle Siren. Directed by Sam Newfield and written by George Wallace Sayre and Milton Ralson this flick stars legendary burlesque queen Ann Coriro in the title role playing Kuhlaya a Sheena-type who helps Crabbe fight Nazis in the wilds of Africa. Buster plays Captain Gary Hart and Paul Bryar is his comic relief sidekick Sgt. Mike Jenkins.

Bryar has the flick's funniest line. He wakes up one morning and starts flexing his muscles while commenting "Another 10 days of this and I'll have a physique like Buster Crabbe."

And I suppose this was the purpose of casting the former Olympic swimming champion opposite Coriro the ecdysiast.The PRC producers probably thought putting two such perfect physical specimens in the the same movie as romantic leads would be good box office.

The Return of Jungle Johnny by Dave Goode

Arguably the greatest swimming champion of the 20th century , Johnny Weissmuller was as big , if not bigger , than Michael Phelps. In the 1920s he stood on equal ground with such sports legends as Red Grange , Jack Dempsey and Babe Ruth. He of course would become a movie star portraying a variation of Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan of the Apes in six movies for MGM. And then in another six pictures for RKO. But I knew Weissmuller first as Jungle Jim from the syndicated television series. Later I would discover the 13 Jungle Jim movies he made for Columbia Pictures. And from 1954 to 1955 Weissmuller would play himself in three more flicks for Columbia, CANNIBAL ATTACK , JUNGLE MOON-MEN and DEVIL GODDESS. All of which would have been great adapted to the comic book page.

Considering just how little Columbia's Jungle Jim movies had to do with Alex Raymond's comic strip , which they were based on , you could have taken the stories from the movies and translated them into comic books without anyone ever noticing. With art by the likes of Frank Frazetta , Al Williamson and Wally Wood. That trio would have been great illustrating some of the sexy sarong-clad native girls that appeared in the movies. As well as the adventures of "America's No.1 Jungle Hero".  And as I could easily imagine a Johnny Weissmuller comic book I can just as easily imagine a Johnny Weissmuller adventure digest magazine. Just like with the Johnny Weissmuller comic book I can't understand why some
publisher didn't give it a shot.

 And now....Dave Goode and Vance Capley present:

Do you love comics?! We do too! We love them so much we made Judo Comics!! Don't be a CHUMP, grab your copy of Judo Comics by clicking this Link!

Watch Dave Goode and Vance Capley discuss this blog  and comic on youtube: