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Sunday, September 23, 2012

Adventure Comics #200 - May 1954

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Comics Weekend "Aquaman, Microbe Hunter!" by George Kashdan(?) and Ramona Fradon.

It's Adventure Sunday!

Aquaman takes a fantastic voyage in this month's adventure:

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Aquaman is injected into the scientist's body, and soon he finds the malevolent Virus X, wreaking havoc on all the red and white blood cells. Using his telepathic powers, he commands the blood cells to bind together and attack the virus. But:
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...and with that, so ends another adventure for Aquaman!

Great Neptune! After dancing around the edges of science fiction premises in these Aquaman stories, this tale jumps into the pool neck-deep with a completely fantastical adventure.

When I started this post, I was just making a joke about how similar this is to Fantastic Voyage, but it really is. I don't think the writers of that movie in any way stole the idea from here (the odds are, of course, they never saw it), but it is fun to consider how similar they are. Raquel Welch as Aquagirl!

6 comments:

Richard said...

Okay, wait, what? This isn't just "similar" to Fantastic Voyage but hits multiple plot points in the same order...and does so a dozen years before the film was released. I'm a big fan of the film but this just leaves me stunned. I suppose it has to be pure coincidence but I find that extremely hard to accept given the nontrivial resemblance of the two plots.

Anthony said...

Wonder if there's any other "shrink and send inside someone's body" plots made before "Fantastic Voyage"...

I'm reminded of the "Batman: Brave and the Bold" episode where Aquaman goes inside Batman for similar reasons as this story...


Re: Superboy: This month's plot sees Clark goes with the Langs to return an ailing ape to his native jungle, then tangles with a disgruntled aide of Prof. Lewis Lang.

Russell said...

Interesting for a few reasons besides the "Fantastic Voyage" connection: this is the first time I think where we are told explicitly that Aquaman is an American. Obviously in 1954 he would have to be (swearing oaths all over the place, prolly) but still weird to see.

Also, is that TUSKY!?!?! :-)

Joseph Brian Scott said...

So what happened to the rabbit? Is it still in that guy? Can it breathe plasma like Aquaman?

Earth 2 Chris said...

The visual of Aquaman shrinking down is depicted much like the Atom will be by many artists years later. Funny how visual cues like that become part of comic book language.

Chris

Unknown said...

Viva Adventure Sunday!

Wow! This makes up for the countless Black Jack wannabees we've been subjected to. I'm sure even Aquaman was glad to have a different kind of adventure for a change.

Not only does this seem to foreshadow Fantastic Voyage and the Atom, but it's only the first of Aquaman's microscopic experiences. Didn't battle through a Jim Aparo designed microverse when Skeates-Aparo-Giordano took over?

Hard to think of Aquaman as American, but I guess he was born and raised in Florida.

James Chaterton