Post #72

Issue #60
December 1944

Rating: 3

Regretfully, this issue has to rank as one of the worst of the series.

Not only is the Martin Naydel artwork flat (his treatment of Joan is unforgivable), the Fox Flash story reads like an Angela Lansbury 'Murder, She Wrote' vehicle – YUK!

Ghost Patrol, Johnny Thunder – painful to read. The 3 page 'Picture Stories from History', "The Story of Ferdinand Magellan" just doesn’t feel like a good fit for the series.

The Hawkman and Hawkgirl story is well done. Shelly’s art is top notch. The Humming Bird makes another appearance. If only Sheldon Mayer would have picked-up on the value of having super-villans oppose the heros earlier, it would have made for more interesting stories. It wasn't until Julie Schwartz took over before the appearance of super-villian became mandatory later in the series.

This panel is a rare acknowledgment by Hawkgirl that  the world was at war.

Post #71

Issue #59
November 1944

Rating: 4

The Flash story may hint to Gardner Fox’s boredom with writing mobster yarns and his need for a vacation. The John Chester Kozlak art in the story is ok.

Peachy Pet, along with Johnny’s help, continues to have fun in Hollywood.

"The Story of Leif Ericsson and the Norsemen by M.C. Gaines and Don Cameron. Doesn’t seem to transition well with the other stories.

Although credited as the last Minute Movie strip in Overstreet and CGC Labeling, Ed Wheelan’s Fat and Slat is actually featured as a single page.

DC begins adding the title of the series to the top of the page.

Post #70

Issue #58
October 1944

Rating: 5

When ‘The Creature From The Black Lagoon’ was matinee gold in 1954, Gardner Fox must have been saying to himself, ‘Yeah, I did that ten years ago’.  The Jon Chester Kozlak art has a murky green bog feel to it – and it works!

The story begins with a Moses like origin of the Merman. As he becomes an adult his duel nature finds that he is not accepted as a man. The missing link between fish and man turns to a life of crime and has to swim upstream when the Flash is in pursuit.

Hawkman and Hawkgirl serve up the corny jokes with their punches.

This issue is the correct end of the run of 'Minute Movies' strip. Overstreet and CGC Labeling mistakenly cite the next issue.

Post #69

Issue #57
Sept 1944

Rating:  4

The Ghost Patrol find themselves off the battle front and in an art gallery. Martin Naydel art for the Flash is still challenged by adjusting his cartoon style art to suit the superhero genre. This issue would be Ed Wheelan's penultimate Minute Movie strip which began in 1921 in newspaper form and ran in all Flash Comics thru issue #58. Below follows the typical format of a silent film parody. Most of which I found very entertaining..