Number 376


Rocky X is stranger than strange!


Norm Maurer, who was a prolific comic book artist, was also a movie producer. In 1947 he married Moe Howard's daughter, Joan. Moe was one of the Three Stooges, and in the early '60s, after the Stooges shorts got popular on TV, Maurer put them back before the cameras for a popular series of feature films.

But before that Maurer had a comic book career for Charles Biro, and also with Joe Kubert at St. John's line of comics. He had a clean and appealiing style. I like this episode of Rocky X from Boy Comics #86 because of the (to me) nostalgic 1950's science fiction, space cadet-style of story, flying saucers and a great-looking tentacled monster. Too bad the story is continued and I don't have the follow-up episode, but you can guess it probably turns out OK for Rocky.

Maurer died in 1986.