DC; October 1971
Cover by Jack Kirby
Title: “The Man From Transilvane!”
Synopsis: Vampires and werewolves and aliens from Krypton, oh my! All in a day’s work for the intrepid Jimmy Olsen.
Writer: Jack Kirby
Penciler: Kirby
Inker: Vince Colletta
Review: Leave it to Jack Kirby to transform a book as habitually uncool as Jimmy Olsen into something weird and a little wonderful. This issue, it’s classic monsters that get the Kirby makeover, thanks to a dash of super science. Now, if only he’d lose that annoying Newsboy Legion…
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Title:“ ‘Hairie’ Secrets Revealed”
Synopsis: A two-page short looking at the technology that keeps the youth culture of the “Hairies” on the move.
Writer: Uncredited (probably Jack Kirby)
Penciler: Uncredited (probably Kirby)
Inker: Uncredited (probably Vince Colletta)
Review: It’s the youth culture of the ’60s seen through the lens of ’70s Kirby. “Messed up” is probably too kind.
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Title: “Last Mile Alley”
Synopsis: When the original Newsboy Legion heads into Suicide Slum to sell newspapers, only the Guardian can save the day.
Writers: Joe Simon (and probably Jack Kirby)
Penciler: Kirby
Inker: (probably Simon)
Review: This Golden Age reprint offers a taste of early Kirby; it’s nice, but lacks the power of later work.
Grade (for the whole issue): B
Cool factor: It’s Kirby doing vampires – need you ask? (FYI, the vampire looks less like a drag queen on inside pages.)
Not-so-cool factor: DC’s insistence on having Murphy Anderson redraw Kirby’s Superman and Jimmy Olsen heads It’s just wrong, wrong, wrong.
Notable: The Newsboy Legion backup story first appeared in Star Spangled Comics #8… There’s an LOC from future Answer Man Bob Rozakis on the “Jimmy Olsen’s Pen-Pals” letters page.
Character quotable: “Stay back, you matted masterwork of murderous malignancy! Come closer and you’ll have lumps as big as boulders!” – Jimmy Olsen, spouting some of Kirby’s very best dialogue
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