To kick it off, here are the covers of the two Space: 1999 comic book & record sets published by Power Records, circa 1976. This isn't the first time I've showcased the Power Records Space: 1999 books here; back in the early days of this blog, I posted YouTube video versions of the first issue.
I'm not sure who the artist(s) is(are), but it's a fair bet that the work was executed through Neal Adams' Continuity Associates, as they provided the artwork for most of Power's comics. I find it interesting (and I'm probably the only one that does) that John, Helena and Victor are portrayed on both covers wearing those orange spacesuits and floating in space... without helmets! Hmmmm.....
I noticed that also! Were these "books on tape"?
ReplyDeleteThanks for these. Looking forward to your March posts already. Are you going to include some 70's superheroes soon? Personally, I'd love to see something on the Nicholas Hammond 'Spider-Man' series. Almost as much as I'd love CBS to put them out on DVD. Hopefully the new movie will be a huge summer hit and they'll jump on the bandwagon
ReplyDeleteI had the second one! I remember them trying to convince the people that Noah wasn't crazy.
ReplyDeleteTime travel, space travel, and bible story mashup. This was an odd bird, which I realized even as a little kid. But that kind of over-the-top weirdness always appealed to me.
I still have my Star Trek book/record sets that came out around the time of STTMP.
ReplyDeleteAs we all know, people don't really need a suit or a helmet to survive in the vacuum of space--just watch The Black Hole!
ReplyDeleteI commented on these before, but I've a couple new ones regarding the art: the artist(s) actually drew the spacesuits correctly; must've had good photographic references. The artwork throughout is enjoyable, though a couple of the characters and many of the backgrounds are not as accurate to the tv series as Johnny Byrne's Charlton comic art. But these Power comics are still well-done, and each had a couple of nice 'splash' panels (full page or half page) to highlight really exciting scenes.
ReplyDeleteIf you can find these via a used comic store or some other source--with or without the records--they are worth having!
CR
I was born in 1983, and hubby was born in 1968--that said, he finds this stuff to be fond remembrance of his earlier years and is quite pleased to see that others share the same or greater enthusiasism for this era of sci-fi as himself.
ReplyDeleteFor me though...
It's discovering a whole new universe!!!
Universes, I should say...
I am working on bettering my skills as a sci-fi writer
(and am gonna put in a shameless plug/link with my signature for my blogspot blogs where my works can be found)
but to find such older avenues of bygone eras, from where so much of the modern stuff either originates from or is merely a pale shadow of is something I never dreamt I'd be able to find!!
I missed out on a LOT of really good stuff before 1983!!
This is REAL, GENUINE sci-fi, these older universes!!
I am so glad I found your blog and sincerely Thank-You for creating this blog to share these universes with people like me who are too young to have been able to enjoy them firsthand.
~Marlene~
http://undisrealms.blogspot.com/
http://explorationspacetime.blogspot.com/
I used to have (and probably still do somewhere) a couple of Batman book and record sets and loved them. Now, allow me to direct your attention to the price - $1.49. Yes, for that low price you got a comic book AND a record which you would enjoy again and again. Needless to say that $1.49 won't buy you even a single comic book nowadays, much less a record to go with it.
ReplyDeleteI still have all of the Power/Peter Pan Trek and 1999 sets on vinyl ( even the albums without accompanying books ). To say they were juvenile is being kind, but the weird thing about the 1999 records was that over half of the stories on the two albums were adaptations of actual episodes...and not always the most kid-friendly episodes either.
ReplyDeleteBesides "Breakaway", which was a logical choice, they covered "End Of Eternity ( about an immortal psychopathic killer freed from an asteroid and set lose on Alpha with an agenda of torture and sadism ), and "Mission Of The Darians" which had at it's heart a story of survival by essentially transplant surgery and cannibalism. Kinda dark stuff for kids ( well, back THEN anyway ).
About the character drawings that were off; my understanding is that they only had the rights to use the likenesses of the lead actors, and that in the case of Sulu and Uhura, there was some sort of legal dispute going on. If you look at Uhura, in some panels she's a dead ringer for Nichelle Nichols ( obviously drawn from a pubicity still ) but the coloring was changed to avoid a lawsuit. In the case of Sulu, it often appears that the artist started out drawing him as Asian, but when it became known they couldn't use Takei's likeness without paying, he was redrawn with an afro, and given African American coloring ( maybe they though "Sulu" sounded like "Zulu"? ).
This seems likely, because the artists got so many other details right ( like the environmental suits only seen in "The Tholian Web" episode ) that for them to have done those characters that way for any other reason would show a shocking ignorance of the series.
Dep1701
I'm surprised that with all your coverage of Space: 1999 and the never-left-the-drawing-boards UFO remake that you haven't covered the Space: 2099 announcement. (Not the Retcon Studios edits of the old show, but the new ITV/HDFILMS concept announced a couple of months ago.)
ReplyDeleteThe art on both Space:1999 Power Records stories was: pencils by Rich Buckler, inks by Dick Giordano, Frank McLauglin and Sal Trapani with touch-ups by Neal Adams.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure it's been mentioned before, but all the "Paul Morrow" renderings are based on the likeness of the late, great, Gray Morrow, who was the art director for the Charlton b/w mag, and produced key ad art for Year One!
I stumbled across this site, but I just wanted to say...THANK YOU.
ReplyDeleteI forgot about the Power records, I used to own quite a few in the day.