It Stalks the Public Domain - Moment of Decision

List of these early Ditko stories, and links to them if they're posted, over here.

This is a rather unusual story among the work of Ditko's first few years in comics.  Appearing in Charlton's SPACE ADVENTURES #11 [1954], along with two other Ditko stories and under a Ditko cover, "Moment of Decision" is the only one page story Ditko did in the era. It's pretty good for all its lack of space, with a good space-ship design and alien landscape in the first panel, some creepy aliens in the second panel and then some tense action with a wrap-up where the art supports the story point. An excellent job all around.

Most scans in this series adapted to my personal tastes from those found, and available for free download with registration, at the Golden Age Comics Download site. For comics on paper first head over here for ordering info on his available creator owned material co-published with Robin Snyder (including his new book, OH NO! NOT AGAIN, DITKO and the upcoming DITKO ONCE MORE) and head over here for info on recent and upcoming books with Ditko from all publishers, including the recently revived DITKOMANIA, #71 now available, and now accepting PayPal for subscriptions.

Click image to embiggen.

Ghostly Tales #117 [1975]

Ditko draws "Gremlin in the Cockpit", an 8-page story by Joe Molloy. An American plane is shot at during WWII, with most of the crew bailing out as the pilot takes it down in the mountains. The crew go to find the plane, which has landed perfectly, but inside find the pilot dead at the controls with a broken neck. One of the crew spouts some nonsense about Gremlins, but the others don't believe it, fix the plane and take off. As they fly into a storm, the Gremlin suddenly appears and attacks the crew, only to be killed by the ghost of the captain, brought back by his love for his crew.

Not one of the more inspired stories of the mid-1970s, and the first half doesn't have much of visual interest either, but the story makes up for it in the last few pages when the Gremlin appears, looking suitably demonic, and then the fight with the heroic fighter pilot ghost. That stuff is golden.

Where Creatures Roam #5 [1971]

This issue contains a reprint of the 5-page "He Waits in the Dark" from TALES TO ASTONISH #24 [1961].  In a run-down tenement building in Europe, a janitor laments the sorry state of repairs, and quits when the landlord, who lives in luxury, refuses to spend any money fixing the place. A mysterious new man takes over the job, and makes some repairs on his own, then gives the landlord a chance to change his ways.  That doesn't happen, of course, so the new janitor sends the tenants away and waits in the cold and dark until the landlord, in his quest for his rent, enters the building and is condemned to stay with it forever as both blink out of existence.

Kind of a vague morality play, but a lot of things worth noting in the art. Ditko really sells the poverty of the tenants contrasted with the luxury of the landlord, and the cold and dark really comes through.  That sequence at the bottom of the page below really works well, the deep shadows with just enough detail to create a sense of impending doom that you know is coming.

Adventure Comics #467 [1980]

This issue features the debut of Starman, the last regular feature Ditko would draw for DC. Created and written by Paul Levitz and designed and penciled by Ditko and inked by Romeo Tanghal, the creative team for all 12 chapters of the story.

"First Encounter" sets up the premise of this space opera deftly in its 9 pages, serving as a teaser for the whole series, making sure to at least briefly show all six of the characters who would be regulars and hint at their backgrounds and relationships while still telling a self-contained story (in fact, back when this first came out I started reading the series with the next issue, and it was some years before I finally got this first chapter, and while it's enjoyable the series isn't written so that this chapter is essential). In this story Starman, flying through space unaided by a ship or suit, rescues a distressed spaceship. Boarding it, he's greeted by Lord Oswin, and we see that Oswin has a prisoner, Jediah Rikane, who had been on a mission for the new Empress when he discovered that Oswin was plotting against her. After Oswin tries to keep Starman on the ship by force to discover the secrets of his powers, Starman rescues Jediah and they escape from the ship and go to Starman's home base where they meet his mysterious comrade, the alien Mn'torr.

The story is obviously partly inspired by the then-recent success of STAR WARS, but has enough new or drawn from other common influences. Ditko's design for the main character is very good, obviously similar to his original Captain Atom design, and the other characters are distinctive. Tanghal is solid on the inks, not quite as good as Ditko's own inks on books from the same era, but not losing much of the Ditko flavour.

Ditko also pencils half of the cover, with the other half featuring the other featured star of the issue, Plastic Man, as penciled by Dave Cockrum, with Dick Giordano inking both. It's the only time Ditko's art was on the cover in this run, and unless I'm mistaken the only time Giordano ever inked Ditko.

Questar #2 [1978]

 Ditko writes and draws a 6-page story for this issue of William G. Wilson Jr.'s SF/fantasy magazine, this time debuting "The Destruction Agent". It's a frantic and dense little story about the attempt of Spago, an agent of the dictator Zenek, trying to get the security codes to the planet Atn, using his traitors he has on the inside. Young Captain Brash is fired from the security unit for voicing suspicion that there's a traitor and gets some experimental devices from Dr. Veg that enable him to follow Spago to his base and then defeat Zenek's armada.

This is a good example of Ditko's science fiction work of the era (and with some obvious similarities to SHADE, which he was likely still working on or had just wrapped up when he did this). Not a lot of time available for characterization or explanations, some interesting twists and some great artwork (which is reproduced much better here than in his colour work at this time).  Check out some of the detail in those panels, the ships in the space armada, the feeling of depth in the last two panels. Really prime Ditko stuff.

Ditko's work appeared in the first five issues of QUESTAR, including the "Cosage" story in #1.

The Unexpected #190 [1979]

Here's a rather unusual bit from Ditko's work at DC. During the "DC Implosion" some of their horror comics were cancelled (HOUSE OF SECRETS and DOORWAY TO NIGHTMARE) and the planned contents for them were placed in the new triple-sized "Dollar Comic" version of a surviving title, THE UNEXPECTED. This format not having ads, the introductory page was printed on the inside front cover, and in this case featuring the hosts from the two defunct books, Abel and Madame Xanadu.

This page was written by Mike Barr and drawn by Ditko, and is Ditko's only contribution to this issue. A slight gag, but Ditko puts his experience in drawing rooms full of mystic and arcane curios to good use, and the black and white reproduction on slick cover stock serves his work better than a coloured interior page would have.

New Ditko - Ditkomania #71

DITKOMANIA #71 is now going out to subscribers and (along with the previous issues) available for order, and featuring a great cover by Neil Vokes.

See Neil Vokes' site for some of the background work on the cover, including sketches for several unused versions.

DITKOMANIA mailing list

DITKOMANIA ordering information

Texas Rangers in Action #77 [1970]

While the vast majority of work Ditko did for Charlton in the 1970s was in the fantasy/horror titles, he did dip his toe in a lot of the other genres that Charlton continued to produce.

TEXAS RANGERS IN ACTION #77 [1970] has an 8-page Ditko story called "Enemy Ground", which opens up with the outlaw Lopez and his men gunning down ranger Hyte Tolliver in the streets of a small Texas town.  After the ranger's body is carried away, Lopez and his men continue to run roughshod over the town.  After they threaten the local barkeep, his daughter asks Tolliver (still recuperating in secret in a local widow's basement) for help, and being a gallant ranger he goes to confront the bad men, prevailing with some help from the barkeep.

Pretty standard story, but it's always good to see a Ditko western, the action and characters fit nicely with his style.

The cover of this issue is also partly Ditko artwork and part Pat Morisi, although just taken from the splash pages of their interior stories, as was often the style at the time.