Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea Issue #5

Back in the 1950's and 1960's, a lot of movie and T.V. cross over comic books were published by Dell Comics and Gold Key Comics.  Gold Key was actually the successor of Dell...you can read all about that on Wikipedia if you are interested.

These comics can be hit or miss when it comes to internal art-work.  Frequently though, the painted covers are fantastic!  This book was published in 1965, at the same time the T.V. series of the same name was running.  The series was rather successful, running four seasons from 1964 through 1968 - so it's no surprise that there was a companion comic published to go along for the ride.

Comics like these were sometimes challenging for the artists because they had to capture the likeness of the television characters accurately.  I have read interviews of some artists who found this challenging, and some just plain did not like having to do it (probably because they weren't that good at portraiture).  But the painted covers could go a little more over the top, and with the overlay of the real life actor on the front cover, a kid walking by the news stand would instantly associate the magazine with the T.V. show.

Unfortunately, a lot of the artists who did these painted covers are anonymous to us today.  The Grand Comicbook Database does not list the artist for this issue. That's too bad, because it really is a nice piece of fantasy artwork!

Until next time...