Gorgo No. 15: The Land that Time Forgot

(This follows is the second in my posts about Charlton's giant monster comic books, written by Joe Gill.)


The story comes straight from the pages of Edgar Rice Burroughs, so much so it even steals the title of one of his books. But let's call it an homage, rather than a theft.

The story is almost certainly written by Joe Gill, but I'm a little unsure about the artist. Steve Ditko famously drew most of these comics, but this one looks very different from No. 3. Also, in No. 3 Ditko's name was right there on the splash page. No such signature here. Looking over this checklist, I only see issues #1, 4, 11, 13, 16, 18 listed, but No. 3 was definitely a Ditko issue. So we'll have to leave it a mystery for now. If anyone has further information, leave a message in the comments.

All right, on with the story. After a splash page depicting a scene we'll get to later, we start off "many years ago" as young Professor Carl Engstrom hears about a place in the African jungle where dinosaurs still live. He decides not to go, despite his interest, because of his wife and child. But his wife convinces him otherwise and they head off to unexplored African jungles where dinosaurs are expected to live. Do you see where this is going?

Of course, their "fella boys" (I assume this is some kind of slang for the black natives) jump ship as soon as they near the "land that time forgot" and Engstrom thinks they should turn back. His wife, once again, convinces him otherwise. Three days later, they see dinosaurs along the shore and they decide to head into the jungle. They are set upon by natives, Engstrom is knocked out and left behind.

Here we have a great transition between pages. At the bottom of page 5 (seen here), we get an image of Engstrom moving through the jungle and finding his wife. We don't see the wife, we only see a stressed out Engstrom's shocked face set against vines and flowers. On the top of the next page, we get a different image of Engstrom standing before a handmade wooden cross, behind him is an empty field.

He buries her body and searches for his daughter.

"But his search was in vain and finally, exhausted, mentally and physically, heartbroken and without hope, he left that land of death that time had forgotten..."

And with that, the prologue ends and we get our first glimpses of the title hero/villain. Gorgo and Orga (his mother) are swimming up river into the African jungle. On the way, they apparently fight a giant squid for food. Engorged, the duo falls asleep on the river bottom. But Gorgo, being the energetic youth that he is, swims to the surface to check things out. He smells "the odor of creatures of his own kind" and decides to go ashore.

And now, we see what has become of Engstrom. He's a bitter old professor kicking out a student for "wasting my time and yours." This student, Jay Conners, is expecting it, however, and says he's taking a vacation. Engstrom then heads off for a meeting that has been on his thoughts.

He meets a wounded explorer at the Explorers Club (what, your town doesn't have one?). It's the same place Engstrom heard about the land of dinosaurs at the beginning of the story. The adventurer tells consistent rumors of a white goddess have come out of the jungles. Also, talking about how the information got to him, the adventurer mentions this:

"No! Even the natives shun the place! You know the stories ... about prehistoric men and beasts! The other natives got their information through some mental telepathy of their own ... very strange but always true! That's all I can tell you about it, old chap!"

Telepathic natives. Fascinating! And yet this is the only mention of it. I guess telepathy comes in handy when it's hard to get a plot point to your hero.

Engstrom heads off to Africa, hoping this white goddess will be his long lost daughter. The first person he meets in Africa is his student Jay Conners who is there for his vacation, a hunting trip in Africa. The two go their separate ways, Engstrom up river and Conners through the jungle.

We follow Conners until his native baggage handlers run away. Conners, smarter than Engstrom's wife, decides he'll need to turn back. But just as he starts, he sees Gorgo tearing up trees and heading inland. So, "almost hypnotized by the adventure," Conners follows the monster into the jungle.

Meanwhile, we turn to Engstrom who is tramping through the jungle. His baggage handlers have also taken off, but Engstrom expected it. He now is hoping to find the natives that once took his wife and child. Sure enough, they come out of the trees and take him, bringing him back to their white goddess.

The white goddess has lived with the natives since she was a baby. And yet, when Engstrom starts speaking to her, calling her Gloria and trying to get her to remember him, she does! In fact, she even knows some rudimentary English. Wow! What a memory on that kid.

Now the story gets into high gear. A dinosaur attacks! It's kind of a weird looking thing.It's yellow and it's head is like an egg on its side with a mouth. It looks nothing like the more accurate T-Rex on the cover. It still looks like a dinosaur though, and it's angry. The natives decide that their goddess is no longer protecting them, so they have to sacrifice her to "Scaley." Meanwhile, we see that Gorgo's mother has risen from the river in pursuit of her child. There's a funny panel with Orga walking and all the beasts of the jungle running before her to get away. (Sorry, I don't have the editing tools or knowhow to take single panels out.)

Engstrom and daughter are tied to posts, just like on the cover. Scaley hovers over them. It seems they are doomed! That is until Conners arrives in the next panel wielding his shotgun. Engstrom tries to tell Conners that his bullets won't hurt the creature. But Conners, the able hero, says "If I can't stop it, then I can't! Anyway, I'll know I did my best!"

Conners faces Scaley down over the next page. There's one neat panel here. It's taken from the perspective of Scaley's mouth. We see black shadows of teeth above and below (picture that scene in the Empire Strikes Back when the Millenium Falcon escapes the sea slug: "The cave is collapsing." "That's no cave.") and the view below of Conners aiming at the creature. The gunshots annoy the Scaley. Conners' gun jams. It seems they are all doomed.

But then Gorgo arrives. He and Scaley rush at each other. The tremendous noise attracts other monsters and, in a scene that Peter Jackson would love, a total of three Scaleys and one triceratops join the battle. This gives Engstrom, Conners and Gloria time to escape.

On the next page, it's all neatly wrapped up in four panels. Orga joins the fight and tosses the Scaleys aside. The three explorers make it to their boat, where Conners starts hitting on Gloria. And finally we see Gorgo and Orga playing together as they head back to the river. And Conners says:

"I imagine that after they get through with it, there's nothing left of the creatures ... in the land that time forgot!"

Well, this comic book certainly had the thrills. We get Gorgo, dinosaurs and a hidden African land from the prehistoric past. We also get references to ERB, H. Rider Haggard and about a hundred other English lost world stories.

It is odd that none of the people recognize Gorgo. When Conners and Engstrom each see him for the first time, neither recognizes the creature. Which is weird, you'd think a monster that wrecked London (in the movie), New York and a few small Central American countries (early issues of the comic book) would be pretty well known by now. It's weirder because there is definitely a continuity to the stories in the earlier issues.

The art is not Ditko. Gorgo is drawn much skinnier and the T-Rex's are just downright weird. But overall I think it works. And some of the perspectives used are just terrific. The artist adds lots of fun little details in the background and other animals (monkeys hanging over Gorgo's rising form, lions and other creatures fleeing before Orga) are done with humor.

There is, of course, some racism in this story. I think that comes with a lot of these lost world type stories. They basically come straight out of an 19th-century British imperial perspective. Still, it's something that could easily have been removed. One strong African character would have done wonders for this comic.

Having said that, a lost world story is a perfect setting for a Gorgo comic and this one takes full advantage of it. A good fun story in one issue.

Next up will be Fantastic Giants before we get into Konga.

Godzilla's storytelling engine

I've been reading the blog Fraggmented for a few weeks now. It's mostly a comic book blog and one of the main features is "Storytelling Engines." With this series of posts, John Seavey looks at the protagonist of a comic book series and tries to delineate how the writers create "storytelling engines" -- the ongoing goals, characters and situations that keep the plot moving perpetually -- for that protagonist. (You can find some background on this idea here and here.)

This week, Fraggmented takes on Marvel's Godzilla series. Seavey talks about how Godzilla was added to the Marvel universe and how the story was run on the basis of a "false status quo" (think "The Fugitive" or "The Hulk" TV series). It's interesting stuff, Seavey thinks strongly and well about series and has interesting insights. Take a look at the Godzilla entry and let it lead you through his blog to the other Storytelling Engines, all of which are highly recommended.

The post makes me think about the Gorgo comic books (which I promise I will get back to). It might be interesting to look at the storytelling engine there, if there was one ...

GORGO #3

It's very clear this is a Steve Ditko comic as he put his name right there in the bottom left corner of the first page. As for Joe Gill, like many of his productions, he was never credited. Still, most of Charlton comics were written by him and it is common knowledge he did this series.

As with most of these reviews, this is mainly going to be a summation of the comic with a few comments from me. For those who are worried, there will be spoilers.

The story starts out in media res, the opening splash page showing the young Gorgo destroying some Central American city while in the foreground, dictator Mandel Astro convinces this country's leader to surrender because "The beast destroys your nation at my orders!" Gill is obviously pulling this story out of the headlines of his day. In the early '60s (the time of the Cuban missile crisis) Cuba was the big fear. Communists at the country's border and all that. Ditko adds to the obviousness of the caricature (Mandel Astro/Fidel Castro) by dressing the dictator in a military uniform and continually chomping a cigar.

On to the next page and we jump back "some months before" when Astro is informed of Gorgo's presence. Astro forces Dr. Valzo -- a scientific aid who has promised control over any living thing -- to go out and make the creatures obey him. Valzo is worried but Astro convinces him:

VALZO: "S-serve you president? It would destroy me, it w-would..."
ASTRO: "Perhaps, Valzo, only perhaps! But, of a certainty, I will destroy you if you fail!"

By the next panel, Valzo has set out to capture Gorgo and his mother.

On page 3 (pictured), we've gone on to the capture of the younger Gorgo. Both in the opening splash page and in this page, there are references to the creatures being wounded in a previous battle. I can only assume this is from earlier issues of the comic book. The creatures are found east of Long Island.

Valzo uses an electrical rod to control the young Gorgo in a much less wordy sequence underwater. Electricity not only hurts Gorgo, it actually stuns him, allowing Valzo to tie up the creature and tow it along back to their native country. There, for several pages, Valzo trains Gorgo to do his bidding.

Astro, impatient as any comic book dictator would be, has Valzo send Gorgo across his border (apparently this isn't an island nation) and defeat the enemy's forces. After Gorgo crushes the city, we are returned to the conversation between Astro and his enemy, who threatens to shoot him.

ASTRO: Shoot me and Dr. Valzo will send the monster after you.
ASTRO: You want that amigo? You want it coming for you, talons, teeth and tail? Or would you rather flee with the millions you have stolen from your poor, down-trodden people?

That's pure pulp dialog, but man it's fun.

But as Astro celebrates his victory, Valzo meets with his "pet" and tells him he will no longer use Gorgo to win power for others. "It is I who will reap the rich rewards!" Valzo orders Gorgo to take out Astro as he gives a speech from a balcony, telling his people not to revolt. By the end of the page, we see Valzo wearing his own uniform under the caption:

"When the dust cleared, the abused proletariat had a new master in the palace but there was no real change..."

Valzo teaches his army to control Gorgo and sets off to conquer yet another nation. Finally, as they reach the border, Gorgo has had his fill. He turns on Valzo and then faces Valzo's army. But the new dictator makes his escape as his army fights. He makes off to a waiting yacht filled with gold bullion plundered from the country's treasury.

But Gorgo follows the dictator. The yacht's crew deserts him, but Valzo makes a desperate attempt to escape the monster. Out at sea, he puts the ship on automatic and prepares to gloat. Unfortunately:

"Yes, Valzo forgot that Gorgo was a marine animal ... more at home in the water than on dry land ..."

Gorgo destroys the yacht, and Valzo floating on the sea make a desperate plea for his life. Surprisingly, Gorgo listens:

"Almost as though he understood the abject fear, as though he felt pity in his huge heart, Gorgo did resist and turn away, swimming strongly for the deep, quiet place where his mother still slept!"

Valzo is left floating at sea, his fate uncertain. The last panel shows Gorgo rejoining his sleeping mother beneath the waves, ready for the comic's next issue.

Of course, much of the excitement here is due to Ditko's work. His decisions on panel placement (I'm assuming he made those decisions) and keeping action going even when there is only talking makes this comic a joy.

But don't count out the story. With the exception of Valzo forgetting Gorgo is a marine animal (he did, after all, have to risk his life underwater to capture the creature), there is little here that would make me cringe. Gorgo acts much as he did in the movie and the surprise ending seems perfectly in keeping with that. In fact, Gorgo is really the hero of this story.

The political story is pure 1960s scare tactics. Mandel Astro is vain and power-hungry and overthrown quickly. His successor is venal. All their talk of the proletariat are just ways to control the masses. Still, stories like this were part of their age. For example, there is a Twilight Zone episode from this same era featuring a similarly thinly veiled Fidel Castro (played by Peter Falk) facing his own ego.

The worst moment in the comic is seeing the innocent civilians, Pablo and his friend wearing a bright yellow sombrero, in one of the attacked countries.

What does work well is the combination of monster and human stories. Often in giant monster movies, the hardest part is making the monster plot connected to the human story. Too often you get world leaders watching a TV screen as the monster destroys a city. Here, Gorgo is enmeshed directly in the plotting and politics of these Central American dictators.

All in all, a fun comic and a great place to start reading the Gorgo comic. Next up is Gorgo, issue 15.

RIP Joe Gill

Charlton comic book scribe Joe Gill died last month. For the purposes of this blog, he would be primarily known for his work writing Charlton's giant monster comics Gorgo, Konga and others. In the next few weeks, in tribute to Gill, I'm going to describe and review the Konga and Gorgo comics I have in PDF form (You can find out more about that here.)

Titano: The Monster that Time Forgot!!

At a flea market a few weeks ago, I picked up the No. 7 issue of "Tower of Shadows," a 1970 reprint Marvel comic. It's filled with wacky stories done by great artists. The first oneis called "Titano: The Monster that Time Forgot." Monster Blog has a few pictures and a description of the giant crab monster. It's a silly story, but fun. It has no credits, but there is no doubt that Jack Kirby drew it.
Titano splits boats in half and causes tremendous tidal waves over Japan, before our stalwart Navy hero comes on the scene. He paints his submarine in luminous yellow paint and gets the monster to chase him. Eventually, they embed the monster in a glacier in the arctic.
Kirby was the master of giant monster in comic books. Check out Monster Blog, which includes articles on all Kirby's giants. It's great stuff.