The Diversions Turns 10 "Best of" Birthday Bash! Tigerman and Lawrence of Arabia from Thrilling Adventure Stories #1

Happy anniversary, Groove-ophiles! This coming Saturday Marks 10 years since the Diversions hit the interwebs, so Ol' Groove thought we'd celebrate by looking back at some his favorite, but least viewed, posts from our first fateful year! We'll be back new and live next Monday with a special anniversary post. Until then, enjoy these "reprints" and rap with us about 'em!

Atlas/Seaboard's Thrilling Adventure Stories made its debut in November, 1974. To make this an extra-special Thanksgiving treat, I thought I'd share not one, but two far-out features from that magnificent mag's pulse-pounding pages. See who loves ya, baby? First up is "Tigerman and the Flesh Peddlers" by John Albano and Ernie Colon!

Now dig into "Lawrence of Arabia" by Jeff Rovin and Frank Thorne!

The Diversions Turns 10 "Best of" Birthday Bash! Alex Nino In the House of Mystery

Happy anniversary, Groove-ophiles! This coming Saturday Marks 10 years since the Diversions hit the interwebs, so Ol' Groove thought we'd celebrate by looking back at some his favorite, but least viewed, posts from our first fateful year! We'll be back new and live next Monday with a special anniversary post. Until then, enjoy these "reprints" and rap with us about 'em!


Greetings, all you nightmarish nerds! Welcome back to...

I, Cain, am borrowing the Groovy Agent's blog--ABEL! You idiot! Tighten his gag before someone hears him!--er, as I was saying, I'm filling in (a grave) for the Groovester while he takes a dirtna--er, nap. All this blogging about Halloween has really worn him down. Don't worry, I'll have Gregory dig him up when I'm done. Hey, it could've been worse. He might've fallen into that horrible Eve's clutches and become the Groovy Goat or some stupid thing. Wouldn't that have been baaaaad?

Anyway, if you know anything at all about great comicbooks, you'll know that my House of Mystery was the most far-out of all the fiendish fear mags published during the Groovy Age. Ol' Groove mentioned (between screams and mouth fulls of dirt) something about Alex Nino being his favorite of all the artists I, ahem, imported from the Philippines, so I thought I'd do the kid a favor (besides having Gregory dig him back up later, that is) and post a classic story the uber-talented Mr. Nino illustrated from a John Albano script (From HOM #213, January, 1973). Enjoy! The Groovy One should be back tomorrow...unless Gregory's hungry when he digs him up...

Decent Comics: "Promise for a Princess!" by Albano and DeZuniga and "A Time to Die" by Bates, Adams, and Wrightson

Howdy, Groove-ophiles! You'd have thought that when DC changed All-Star Western's moniker to Weird Western Tales with ish #12 (April 1972), that Jonah Hex, the mag's new star, would have been the cover feature. Well, t'weren't the way it was. El Diablo actually got the coveted  cover spot (illoed by none other than Joe Kubert)...

...but Hex did lead off the mag with "Promise for a Princess" by co-creators John Albano and Tony DeZuniga. Hex's third outing shows the creators getting comfortable with who Jonah really was (a savage barbarian out of time--Ol' Groove thinks of Hex as a sort of Conan with guns). The tale is action packed, emotional (and admittedly a bit manipulative in that department), and beautifully illustrated. Check it out...

Speaking of beautifully illustrated, if you're still wondering why El Diablo got the cover on this ish, well, Ol' Groove can't tell you for certain--especially when you notice that his story is only four pages long. Perhaps editor Joe Orlando just had a beauty of a Kubert ED cover lyin' around? Or maybe four pages worth of the art combo of Neal Adams and Berni Wrightson illustrating a Cary Bates western automatically made it cover-worthy...

All Ol Groove can say for sure is that Weird Western Tales #12 was one fantastic comicbook!

Decent Comics: "The Hundred Dollar Deal!" by Albano and DeZuniga

Saddle up, Groove-ophiles! We're'a gonna slap leather with Jonah Hex today! Ol' Groove just recently re-read Hex's second appearance from All-Star Western #11 (February 1972) and I truly dug it! Co-creators John Albano and Tony DeZuniga were still experimenting a bit with our hard-as-nails anti-hero (just check out the blackly humorous ending), but you can sense as you read that they knew they were on to something special. So special that, with the very next issue due, no doubt, to the rapidly rising popularity of the Jonah Hex strip, the mag's very title would be changed to reflect our weird western hero. More on that next time! Now let's siddown next to the campfire and dig on the story of..."The Hundred Dollar Deal!"

Cover art by Tony DeZuniga and company