Mark Reznicek

Two pages of surreal, psychedelic panels by Jack Kirby showing a man trapped in the Fourth Dimension.

Here you go, Dave. Some very Ditko-looking art from Kirby. But from 5 or 6 years before Dr. Strange!

Yes! Drawn at roughly the same time, within a few months.

I Want To Be A Man! A gigantic robot looms above and behind a man walking.

Splash page from the last story in Alarming Tales no. 2 (Nov 1957) by Jack Kirby. Patented Kirby machinery in robot form. Reminiscent of robots and machines Kirby would illustrate in Challengers Of The Unknown and some of his Atlas/Marvel monster stories.

The Fireballs! A farming family and their horse recoil in surprise and horror at a group of fireballs flying just over their heads.

Splash page from a story in Alarming Tales no. 2 (Nov 1957) by Jack Kirby. Possibly inked by Kirby himself and/or George “Inky” Roussos. Another story that could have fit in well with Kirby’s concurrent work at DC in titles like House of Mystery, House of Secrets, etc.

The Big Hunt - A big game hunter wearing a pith helmet takes aim at a large diaphanous blob heading toward him.

Splash page from a story in Alarming Tales no. 2 (Nov 1957) by Jack Kirby. This page looks like it would have fit in perfectly in one of the DC titles Kirby was doing work for concurrently, such as My Greatest Adventure. Also a vague foreshadowing of his Atlas monster stories from a year or 2 later.

A man reaches his hand into a dark hole in the wall, an unearthly green glow bathing the room.

Splash page from a story in Alarming Tales no. 2 (Nov 1957) by Jack Kirby. I love the colors in the main panel, that eerie green glow. Kirby’s art here is on par with what he was doing in DC’s mystery books at roughly the same time. Great stuff. He was probably the writer on this, too.

That’s what looks most like Mort’s art to me.

A green, glowing humanoid being floats in the air in front of a man walking through the swamp holding a lantern. In the black sky, a series of green fireballs can be seen.

Alarming Tales no. 2 (Nov 1957). The GCD credits Joe Simon with this cover, which I’m a little dubious about. It has also been credited to Mort Meskin with George Roussos. Not sure about that either. Regardless, it’s a cool cover, with some nice, subtle grey shading. Interiors are mainly by Kirby.

Two pages of surreal, psychedelic panels by Jack Kirby showing a man trapped in the Fourth Dimension.

Here you go, Dave. Some very Ditko-looking art from Kirby. But from 5 or 6 years before Dr. Strange!

Okay, I’ll snap some pics tomorrow 👍

Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972)
Young Frankenstein (1974)
Jaws (1975)

I think I either have that or used to have it. Cover seems really familiar.

FYI

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Still have my copy I bought off the spinner, a little worse for wear now.

Ditko!!

FYI

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I wonder what it was?

It’s so good and so fascinating.

Some of the other panels in the story seem even more Ditko-esque than this one!

Donnegan’s Daffy Chair! A man is flying high into the sky on a flying chair, zooming past some jet fighters.

The splash page from a story in Alarming Tales no. 1 (Sept 1957) by Jack Kirby. Seems to pretty obviously be a prototype for Metron’s Moebius Chair from Kirby’s New Gods book a decade+ later. Here’s it’s more of a humorous take on the concept, but it’s definitely there nevertheless.

The Last Enemy! A man stands in awe of a large bulldog standing upright and wearing a military general’s uniform. Behind the dog, two other animals, a bear and a… llama? stand at attention.

The splash page from a story in Alarming Tales no. 1 (Sept 1957) by Jack Kirby. This one definitely seems like a prototype for Kirby’s beloved Kamandi series from 15 years later. A man travels through time to find a world ruled by animals.

The Fourth Dimension Is A Many Splattered Thing! A man attempts to pull his friend back from a barrier into the fourth dimension. On the other side of the barrier, the friend is transformed into abstract art, reminiscent of a Picasso painting.

The splash page from a story in Alarming Tales no. 1 (Sept 1957) by Jack Kirby. It appears Kirby arrived at psychedelia 10 years before the Beatles! Not a prototype per se, but many of the panels in this wild story could have easily fit into Ditko’s Dr. Strange comics from 6 or 7 years later.

Yeah, Bob Larkin was the maestro.

The Cadmus Seed! Two scientists watch as a series of humanoid figures emerge from plants on an assembly line.

The splash page from a story in Alarming Tales no. 1 (Sept 1957) cover by Jack Kirby. If you’ve ever seen Kirby’s Jimmy Olsen from the early 1970s, one of the central concepts was the DNA Project aka the Cadmus Project. He first explored those ideas, i.e. cloning, in this story. A prototype kinda.

The Simon & Kirby Library - Science Fiction. An astronaut floats in space as a Sputnik floats by with a monster hanging onto it.

It’s a really great issue, well worth tracking down. Probably much easier to find (and afford) is this hardcover which reprints the entire issue and much, much more great stuff, too.

A number of comic book panels with a man in a flying chair zipping around them.

Here’s the Table of Contents for Alarming Tales no. 1 (Sept 1957) by Jack Kirby. I always thought it was kinda cool that Harvey comics used to have these. Kinda whets your appetite for the stories that follow.

A man is in a chair flying through the air. He looks as surprised as all the onlookers below.

Alarming Tales no. 1 (Sept 1957) cover by Jack Kirby. One of my favorite Kirby comics from this era, containing as it does a number of stories that could be seen as prototypes for themes and ideas he’d explore later in his career in titles like Jimmy Olsen, Kamandi, New Gods, etc. A special comic.

Planet of the Apes magazine no. 1 with a cover painted by Bob Larkin

How about this?