The SUPERMANSION episode "Sympathy for Black Saturn" parodies the UNDERWORLD franchise, opposing a clan of vampires ("the Dracuvlads") against one of werewolves ("the Wolvenlykes"). The two clans also appear in "Saturn's Six," but only long enough to get wiped out.
Saturday, August 15, 2026
Sunday, July 19, 2026
MONSTER MASHUPS #163
JLA #53 features a technically unnamed villain (though two captions call him "The Master Thief") who challenges the League with a bunch of animated statues of folkloric monsters-- the Monster of Leeds (aka the Jersey Devil), the Doodang, the Ring-Tailed Roarer-- plus one folk-hero and his animal-buddy: Paul Bunyan and his blue ox Babe.
MONSTER MASHUPS #162
Though the monstrous foes of the Heroic Moby Dick get top billing in their only appearance--
-- apparently no one did any screengrabs of the nasty subsea swarm. But someone DID record the appearance of the episode's second big beastie, described as a Giant Man-o-War.
Saturday, July 11, 2026
RAR #106: ENSIGN WALKING BEAR
The animated STAR TREK introduced a Comanche crewmember because the Enterprise encountered an ET claiming to be the Mayan deity Kukulcan, so they needed a crewman who could discourse on pre-Columbian culture.
RAR #105: THE LOST MESA TRIBE
BATMAN #26 (1944) introduced the duo to the Lost Mesa Tribe, who forged their own lost city to escape the torments of the conquistadors 400 years ago. The Indian tribe is not specified, though they call their abode a "pueblo."
Wednesday, July 8, 2026
MONSTER MASHUPS #161
Three inventive aliens from WORLD'S FINEST #96.
THE STORM TOP.And THE CRAWLER.
Also, from HOUSE OF MYSTERY 146, J'onn J'onzz gets two demons for the price of one in AROO and THE CHULKO.
Monday, June 22, 2026
CROSSOVER MADNESS
The Marvel title CAPTAIN SAVAGE took "The Skipper," a minor support-character from SGT FURY #10, and gave him his own title for 19 issues. The first issue shoehorns Fury and his Howlers into the tale to coax Fury-fans to sample SAVAGE.
The next three issues also pitted Savage against Fury's recurring foe Baron Strucker, who discourses on his success in creating the terrorist cabal Hydra.
Sunday, June 21, 2026
MONSTER MASHUPS #160
Oh, those 1950s twist-ending tales. In "Deadline" (JOURNEY INTO UNKNOWN WORLDS #16 (1953), horror-writer Herbert Carvel tries three times to get his editor to buy a story involving a conflict between vampires and ghosts. The editor doesn't like pitting two types of monsters in the same story, but he must be desperate for stories because he accepts an invitation to Herbert's house for dinner, only to learn that (1) Herbert is a ghost, (2) wife Lydia is a vampire, and (3) the editor is the dinner! What a twist!
Friday, June 12, 2026
CROSSOVER MADNESS
I never think of Ed Wood as a crossover-guy, but technically he is, in that he uses one support-character, "Kelton the Cop," in three of his 1950s wonders: BRIDE OF THE MONSTER, PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE, and NIGHT OF THE GHOULS. BRIDE and GHOULS seem more like a standard XO, thanks to the more substantial presence of Tor Johnson's Lobo.
Saturday, May 30, 2026
MINING POLITICAL MINEFIELDS
Another blog-comment.
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I think the Liberal attitude toward Islam goes further than just deflection to the evils of Christianity.
Consider: the negative reaction toward colonialism in the West, while not confined to Liberals and/or Marxists, resulted in the idea that relatively helpless tribs, such as the Pacific Islanders, should have been protected from cultural pollution. A real-world, after the fact application of something like STAR TREK's Prime Directive.
Too often, though, Liberals act as if Islamic nations, often empowered by the technology of refining petroleum resources, deserve "protection" from the evils of Judeo-Christianity. Of course the Islamic nations practiced colonialism on a grand scale, as well as organizing the first trans-national slave trade.
The valid question Daisy raised, as *I* would word it, is, "Is Islam more extreme than other major religions in terms of destructive rhetoric, and does thar rhetoric have real-world consequences?" Someone mentioned the Catholic Church shielding pederasts. But does any of that result from Christian rhetoric? And aren't those crimes being kept secret precisely because many Christians would condemn such practices? In comparison, does anything in Shariya Law DIRECTLY condemn suicide bombers?
Monday, May 25, 2026
CROSSOVER MADNESS
Herman Melville turned over you know where when he learned that ORIGINAL GHOSTBUSTERS had the ghosts of Moby Dick and Captain Ahab be best of friends in the afterlife. Note the Samta makeover.
Saturday, May 23, 2026
MONSTER MASHUPS #159
Here lie the feminine fear-figures of MONSTER MARRIAGE SHOP, starting with --
URURU THE WEREWOLF.
CAMILLA THE VAMPIRE.
MEISA THE GORGON.
YUKO THE UNICORN.
KANAME THE AKANAME (scum-sucking demon)
ARK THE SELKIE.
BAPHOMET THE DEMON.
Saturday, May 2, 2026
RAR #102/103: BLACKHAND AND RUNNNG DOG
TIM HOLT #39 brings back an Evil Indian trope not much seen since colonial days: the cannibal Indian. Blackhand plots to devour hero Red Mask and four famous westerners in the belief that he'll gain the supernatural power he needs to beat the Whites.
The negatively named Running Dog devises a giant rattle filled with rocks in TH #41, into which he places victims-- and then it's "shake, rattle and pulverize."
CROSSOVER MADNESS
RED MASK unites with four famed westerners-- Jesse James, Billy the Kid, Grat Dalton and Wild Bill Hickock-- to battle a common threat in a mere six pages.
Saturday, April 25, 2026
MINING POLITICAL MINEFIELDS
For whatever reasons, I've never encountered the word "systemic" in any context but its current political meaning. So I was intrigued to learn, courtesy of Rachel Carson's 1962 SILENT SPRING, that it also had a biological connotation:
What makes an insecticide a systemic is its ability to permeate all the tissues of a plant or animal and make them toxic. -- Chapter 3
I know that the term "institutional racism" dates back to 1967, but a quick online search does not say when "systemic racism" came into vogue. I have no reason to think that the coiner of the term knew of the biological association, but it would be appropriate given the portrait of "whiteness" by authors like Kendi and Higginbotham is one of irredeemable toxicity. That amply explains why the "anti-racists" think it's OK to stigmatize white people even if they've committed no specific sins against POC, because they've all absorbed, as by cultural osmosis, the toxic nature of racists-- though the same authors would rage against "typing" POC by their cultures.
Thursday, April 16, 2026
CROSSOVER MADNESS
RETURN OF THE BAD MEN is an efficient B-western in which one of Randolph Scott's usual stolid heroes is forced to contend with a gang of famous outlaws, including several who never knew one another in history: the Daltons, Bill Doolin, Billy the Kid (a very brief appearance), the Youngers, three bandits I'd never heard of, and the standout Sundance Kid, portrayed by Robert Ryan as a cruel sociopath. Anne Jeffreys plays a fictional lady outlaw, niece of Bill Doolin, and when she's challenged for being in a man's business, she name-checks Belle Starr as her model. This was a loose sequel to another outlaw-teamup, BADMAN'S TERRITORY, which I have not been able to re-screen yet.
Saturday, April 11, 2026
RAR 101: SANCHO THE YAQUI
I've only read the opening of the Mex-western "Yaqui Gold" (CHAMPION COMICS #3, 1940), but probable sidekick Sancho makes a forceful debut. ADDENDUM: This ongoing serial petered out in three episodes, as if the author was told by his editor to wrap things up, in order to make room for a new feature. The muddled ending states Sancho's not just a sidekick, but "The Black Panther," the ruler of a new Aztec rebellion, albeit one that never gets started. He covets the lead White girl for a potential bride, but she doesn't accept him or the lead White suitor either-- which is so atypical an ending that I think the author meant to elaborate some more involved plot and was forced to just throw up his hands and whip together the existing conclusion.
Thursday, April 9, 2026
MINING POLITICAL MINEFIELDS
More comment-preservation, re the Iran conflict.
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It's the Libs on this thread showing irrational paranoia. You want to celebrate Iran as the "good guys" in this geopolitical contest, simply because "they didn't attack first"-- even though Iran sent agents to assassinate a sitting US president, which in your world is not an "attack."
And then there's the rush to assume that whatever Iran says is an honest representation of the facts on the ground, that they control the Straits because they say they do. Here's what they control: drones that can attack cargo ships if those ships don't pay up. Can other European and Middle Eastern countries choose to fight? Sure, but apparently, according to Louis Vittert (on a recent O'REILLY SHOW), they won't because Euro insurance companies have already rolled over, stating that they won't pay for cargo ships being attacked, but they will pony up for extortion. Vittert has a refreshingly practical take that you Libs could benefit from-- don't assume that either Iran or the US is telling the unvarnished truth, but judge what happens from the actual results. The constant carping of the media, Vittert points out, has strengthened Iran's position, not anything Trump did, because thanks to the Menace of the Midterms, the Iranians feel they can ask for more stuff despite their having been the aggressors in the conflict. To Trump it's like, "I'll use American resources to protect American interests, but I'm not doing squat for Europe. They can roll over and show their bellies, or they can fight."

































