I Love Lucy Comics #34 (2026 Comic Book & Graphic Novel Reading Challenge)

During the last season of I Love Lucy, the Ricardos and the Mertz family moved to the suburbs of Connecticut. This helps to explain the setting of this issue's last story. A sudden snow storm makes it impossible for Ricky to get out of his driveway. Things get chaotic when the Ricardos' inventor neighbor turns their lawnmower into an ersatz snowplow.

One of the main plot points for I Love Lucy is Lucy's constant attempts at fame, often to disastrous effect. In the opener, Fred gets Ricky hired to perform at a dude ranch. In return for Lucy and Ethel tagging along, the girls have to work a few shifts at the check-in desk. When Lucy learns that a famous TV producer is visiting in hopes of researching a new Western series starring a woman cow hand, Lucy tries to show the exec that she's the only woman for the show! Spoiler- she really is not.

The middle story features the forgotten member of the Ricardo clan: Little Ricky! When Ricky and Lucy go on a ski trip, they take their son along. Being his first time skiing, Little Ricky is given a beginners level course on the bunny slopes. However when it's determined that the tyke is a natural skier, he runs laps around mom and dad!

I Love Lucy stopped producing new episodes in 1957, 4 years before this issue debuted on newsstands. A smattering of one-hour specials kept Lucille Ball and Desi Arnez on people's minds, but the reason I Love Lucy continued as a comic book published by Dell until 1962, 2 years AFTER Lucy and Desi divorced, was because I Love Lucy never left airwaves! 

Desi Arnez was a Hollywood executive genius. Being a Cuban entertainer, he had been screwed over by agents and movie execs before. So when he brokered the deal for I Love Lucy, Arnez made secure the rights to the series. This, along with the use of revolutionary high-quality 33-mm film helped ensure that I Love Lucy lived on in syndicated rerun history literally till the end of time. 

I Love Lucy Comics was not Lucy and Desi's first time in sequential art form. The show was tested out in 2 Dell Four Color issues (#535 and #559). Those two issues were retroactively numbered as the first two issues of the series. Before that, I Love Lucy was run as a daily newspaper comic strip from 1952-55 through King Features Syndicate. 

This would be the penultimate issue of the series. #35 (April, 1962) would be the final issue of I Love Lucy Comics. However, it would not be the end of Lucille Ball, nor the other cast members in comics. From 1963-64, Gold Key released 5 issues based on Ball's first post-divorce comedy, The Lucy Show, which costarred Vivian Vance who played Ethel on I Love Lucy. In 1990, Eternity Comics produced several Collector's Edition issues that reprinted stories from both the comic strip and Dell Comics catalog. 

Paul S. Newman is colloquially attributed as the series writer and artist. As it wasn't a common practice at that time for Dell Comics to give their creators any sort of by-line credit, it is possible that this issue was written and illustrated by someone else. 

Cover photo was provided by either CBS Studios or Desilu Productions.

Completing this review completes Task #21 (Live Action Comic Adaptation from the 1960s) of the 2026 Comic Book and Graphic Novel Reading Challenge.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.

Bullwinkle #1 (2026 Comic Book & Graphic Novel Reading Challenge)

Jay Ward's beloved characters Rocky the flying squirrel and his best friend Bullwinkle J. Moose made their first comic book appearance in what is collectively known as Dell Four Color #1128 (Aug., 1960).  The first issues were titled 'Rocky and his Friends' and included fan favorite segments and characters such as Peabody and Sherman, Dudley Dooright, and Fractured Fairy Tales. However, once it became clear that Bullwinkle was the star of the show, later issues forthcoming from the Four Color series were singularly titled Bullwinkle.

Those Four Color editions are quite rare and command hefty price tags. CGC listed a 9.6 rated slab of issue #1270 as being sold for $980 in 2013. As long as you don't mind getting a facsimile edition reprint, you could take your chances with a more affordable issue of the moose and squirrel's first official solo series from Gold Key. The risk being that while material from the nearly dozen issues of Four Color devoted to the NBC cartoon that ran from 1959-64 ran as reprints in the 1962 Gold Key series, not every issue was a faithful reprint of that earlier material. 

Making things even more difficult for collectors is that this Gold Key series was later retitled Bullwinkle and Rocky in 1972 with issue #3, after a nearly decade long hiatus. Some collectors try to overlook the repeated contents in various issues and set a goal to own a copy of each Four Color release as well as the 25 total issues that made up the first series. Some of the Gold Key issues also had Whitman variants. 

Issue #1 has a full slate of segments, just like a typical episode of The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle, at this time retitled The Bullwinkle Show on NBC. In the bookending Rocky and Bullwinkle stories, the duo run afoul of secret agents Boris and Natasha. First, they stumble upon a plot where the spies have been stealing rare birds for use in appropriating Top Secret government blueprints. Later, Bullwinkle gets a chance to start in a major Hollywood picture. Only it's another plot by Boris and Natasha to kill the Moose. 

The Dudley Do-Right story is a caper in which Snidely Whiplash kidnaps the Mountie's girlfriend Nell during a blizzard. Mr. Peabody takes his boy Sherman on a trip to visit Odysseus inspiring him to build the Trojan Horse. Lastly, the Fractured Fairy Tale sees the Ugly Duckling trying to find his place in the world, only to become a model for beauty cream: the BEFORE model!

Credit for artists and authors were not yet common place in comics published in the early 1960s. Al Kilgore was originally believed by most comic book historians as being the main artist of these pages. However, later research has come to light that Jerry Robinson, Fred Fredericks and Mel Crawford all may have contributed to this issue as well, as they all worked at times on the previous Four Color series issues. Dave Berg and Jack Mendelsohn are amongst those attributed as having written in various Rocky and Bullwinkle titles.

Completing this review completes Task #18 (Cartoon Comic Adaptation from the 1960s) of the 2026 Comic Book and Graphic Novel Reading Challenge.

How to Live With a Calculating Cat by Eric Gurney

I haven't a clue where I got this 1962 comedic paperback from. I was cleaning out my home office and found it buried under a pile of assorted things that my wife and I had been throwing into the room indiscriminately. The book is only 141 pages. So, before taking it to a used book shop or a thrift store, I figured 'what the heck' and gave this book a quick read. 

How to Live With a Calculating Cat reads like a parody manual for new cat owners. From the history of cats to how to name them; proper feeding techniques to how to integrate them with the family dog- there's a wide range of topics that first time cat lovers would need info on. 

Peppered heavily throughout the advice are illustrations that highlight the author's points in hilarious fashion. These cartoons are just as funny, if not more hilarious than the expert satire written in prose. Some of the artwork is done like those informative illustrations found in textbooks- only with a humorous slant. But a good half of these sketches are similar in the type of humor you'd see as filler material in the pages of Reader's Digest; only the subject matter of all of these lampoons are feline. 

The author and illustrator of this work is Eric Gurney. Some of you might be familiar with the name. That's because Eric illustrated a number of Random House Beginner Books such as The Digging-est Dog and The King, The Mice and The Cheese, which he wrote with wife Nancy Gurney. Unbeknownst to many, Eric Gurney was also behind a large chunk of our childhood as he was the story writer behind such Disney classics as Bambi and Pinocchio. 

How to Live With a Calculating Cat was an enjoyable read. I got a few chuckles out of the prose parts of this book. I laughed a lot at the cartoons as many of those jokes reminded me of my 45-years plus as a cat lover and owner. 

This book must have been a hit because a sequel was issued in 1978. That book lists a Nancy Prevo as providing the text. I checked to see if Nancy Prevo was the same Nancy who wrote those children's books with Eric Gurney. She wasn't. Instead, Nancy Prevo was the second wife of Eric Gurney. (BOTH NAMED NANCY!) Prevo probably went by her maiden name in order to not cause a licensing conflict with the works Eric Gurney created with the previous wife Nancy. But that's mostly speculation.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.

Dell Four Color #1245- The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (2023 Comic Book & Graphic Novel Reading Challenge)

The world's greatest detective returns in a pair of cases in this 1961 edition of Dell Four Color. First Holmes and Watson tackle the case of 'The Derelict Ship'. Inspired by the mystery of the Mary Celeste, a desperate man employs the sleuth to uncover the whereabouts of the gentleman's missing crew and its load of contents. After a 2-page short in which Holmes schools Inspector Lestrande on a case involving a early morning break-in and trio of suspects, the private eye goes face-to-face with the Napoleon of Crime, Professor Moriarty! A single-page article in the inside back cover of the book that details the methods of deduction Holmes would have used during the Victorian Era close out this issue. 

This was the second issue in less than a year that Dell would publish of all-new mysteries involving Holmes and Watson. Unfortunately, this issue, #1245, would be the last time Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's most beloved characters would grace the voluminous Dell Four Color series. The fan-favorite series stopped publication with issue #1354 in the Summer of 1962 after Dell's publishing agreement with Western Publishing came to an end.

The two main stories have been attributed to Paul S. Newman. One of Newman's most enduring claims to fame was as writer for the series Turok, Son of Stone. The writer crafted stories of the time displaced Native American warrior for an impressive 26-years. Paul S. Newman would later be credited in the Guinness Book of World Records as the 'World's most prolific comic-book writer' with over 36,000 pages of published work to his credit. 

The cover of this issue, along with Holmes' 1961 Dell debut, were painted by George Wilson; a prolific artist for both Dell, Gold Key and later Whitman. Wilson's beloved works included covers of comic book adaptations of popular 60's TV shows such as The Twilight Zone and Star Trek. 

Though interior art credits were not assigned in this book, a couple of websites claim to know who did the artwork. Mycomicshop.com, for instance, cites Bob Fujitani as the main artist. Fujitani must have really enjoyed working with Paul S. Newman on this project as the pair, along with editor Matt Murphy, would eventually co-create the sci-fi character Doctor Solar for Western's new comic imprint, Gold Key. 

None of these stories were adaptations of works by Sir Arthur. Though a radio series of the same name ran on the ABC radio network for over a dozen years decades prior, a quick rundown of the complete series shows that these whodunits are not from that mystery drama either. The content of this book was truly New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.

Completing this review completes Task #22 (A Mystery) of the 2023 Comic Book and Graphic Novel Reading Challenge.

Dr. Kildare #3

There's just something about the TV comic book adaptations from Gold Key and Dell. They're a little bit dated and yet I find them to be classic, wholesome, fun reads. Even though I might not have ever seen the TV series the book was based on, if I can find one for a good deal, I'm gonna get it. 

All of that is exactly the case for how I ended up with today's book: Dr. Kildare #3. I've never seen the show. My mom might have been a fan; I just don't rightly recall. I know star Richard Chamberlain right well from his starring in miniseries like Shogun and The Thornbirds. Yet upon a recent trip to a used bookstore, I found a copy of Dell's adaption of the young surgeon who often finds love with his patients or their loved ones, for less than $2! And since I had trade credit, I just couldn't pass it up. 

This issue is from 1962, during a time where America is riding a high wave of positivism. The Kennedy Camelot is in full swing. Vietnam is a distant blip down the road. And though dark days are ahead, an economic boom is making Americans feel euphoric and invulnerable right now. But that's not the case for Dr. James Kildare.

A shortage of doctors has Kildare working double shifts. Managing a few hours of sleep, the young surgeon is called back into the hospital to care for a young woman injured in a gruesome car wreck. The surgery is intense. But it's the drama outside the operating room that is boiling over. 

The girl's father doesn't approve of her boyfriend, a struggling playwright. Complicating matters is that the patient's injuries aren't properly healing. With Kildare needing to go back in to do some complicated skin grafts, can the doctor also heal the rift between his patient's loved ones?

As a secondary plot, Kildare's mentor, Dr. Gillespie, must amputate the leg of a very young boy. An act which really rattles the elder physician and Kildare uses as a learning opportunity.

Having watched the TV show Emergency! a ton of times with my wife, I am not very surprised at how technical the medical dramas of the 60s and 70s were. But I am surprised how detailed a 1962 comic book aimed at young readers was. In the first 1-2 pages, Kildare works on a gunshot patient. That in itself probably isn't too controversial for the time period. But the GSW was a head wound with a very gruesome wound. Even more surprising is that this book doesn't have a Comics Codes label on the cover!

Adding to the medical jargon that fills this story are 3 educational one-page comics that fill the inside covers and the back outside cover. Two of them are about doctors and their influence in military history and aviation lore. The third strip is about how researchers develop vaccines. The story is basically about Dr. Jonas Salk and one of the sketches is clearly that of the polio vaccine developer. But I'm stumped as to why they don't acknowledge Salk and his achievement in that segment...

The artwork was a pretty good representation of star Richard Chamberlain. Unlike with my experience with the Car 54... Where Are You? comics, it doesn't appear that the artist kept reusing the same 5 or 6 head sketches of each main character. But I am sure I'd need to see other issues of the series to know that for sure. 

As for the appearances of other characters in this book, I have no idea if they look like the actors they're meant to resemble or not. I'm just not that familar with them or the show. I do wish that whoever colored this book would have got Kildare's hair color right. He was not a man with raven colored locks.

I also thought that the plot was a bit too full. Dell was guilty of this a lot. They'd build up this really engaging story that was complex and rather intelligent. Then- BAM! They'd run out of pages and everything is sloppily wrapped up in 2 pages. We don't really find out what happened to the kid amputee and that might be Dr. Kildare in the last panel. It just doesn't look like him and it's not mentioned. 

I tend to be a little kind to these abrupt endings like when I reviewed that batch of John Wayne movie adaptations from Dell. But there's no excuse here. I understand that according to US Postal regulations, the publisher had to include a prose story in order to maintain their first class postage. So no complaints for that. But there was a very clunky 4 page story about a pair of doctors operating in the African bush that could have been set aside for a future publication in order to devote a little more time and energy to the main story. 

For the price I paid for a 60 year old comic from a publisher I hold dear in my heart and memories, I don't regret my purchase. It was very entertaining. But it wasn't perfect. You can still like things that have flaws to them. If only the rest of the world could be a lot less like the dad in this book and overlook the blemishes in others.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 7 out of 10 stars.

Dennis The Menace Giant #11

As a kid, I was a Dennis the Menace fanatic! I loved the old black and white TV show starring Jay North. I enjoyed the animated cartoons. And I just adored the comics- both in newsprint and comic book form.

One of all-time favorite issues involved Dennis and friends getting ready for an eclipse. I just happened to have the book right around 1983 or 84 in which a major sun blockage was set to occur. This issue might very well rank up their as a personal favorite.

In this huge edition from 1963, Dennis gets all of the toys of his dreams from Santa, treats the Wilsons to a night of Christmas shopping, and fills in for an important role in the church nativity. 

There was also a couple of prose stories. These tales were vital for publishers as at the time of distribution, it was the only way for comics to maintain their first class mailing status. Normally, these sections are fodder just to keep the USPS happy. But both were really quite good here.

A rare and hard to find (but oh so fragile) gem that I found at a recent Con.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.