Win Mortimer and George Roussos are the artists on the Superman story from Action 101 (Oct. 46), which actually does have Superman filming a nuclear explosion as part of the story.
At first, it seems as if the story will have no relation to the cover. It deals with some criminals who have developed a serum that drives people crazy. They use it in a blackmail scheme, only providing the antidote when the relatives of the wealthy victims pay up.
Superman gets onto the case, after a famous actor goes crazy during a performance, and almost kills his scene partner.
The serum proves to even affect Superman, and he goes into a wild flight around the world. He winds up at a Pacific atoll, and is at ground zero for a nuclear test. But all that does is clear his mind, and he grabs a camera and films the next explosion, just to be a nice guy. And, sane again, has no problem rounding up the bad guys. An odd and roundabout way of reaching the cover.
Congo Bill gets shipwrecked, winding up on a small island with a scientist and his criminal assistants, in this story by Alvin Schwartz and Edwin Smalle. The scientist is so into his giant octopus, which he calls the devilfish, that he has not noticed that the men who work for him are intentionally causing shipwrecks to loot the cargoes.
Bill figures it out pretty fast, but the men are also wary of him, and decide to kill Bill and their boss.
And of course the big octopus gets involved in the climax of the action, and Congo Bill grabs the eyeball of the creature to get loose. Look at that. He almost pulls it right out of the socket. Oh, my gosh that is so gross. I think I’m traumatized.
Samachson, Meskin and Roussos provide a much less disgusting story for the Vigilante. Some enterprising thieves begin pulling horseback robberies of the carriages that drive around in parks in the US. I’m guessing this is meant to be New York’s Central Park, as that’s the one always shown with these type of carriages.
Vigilante knows his horses, and recognizes the one on the poster for a travelling rodeo as the same as one of the horses used in the robberies. This puts him and Stuff on the trail pretty fast.
Still, it’s a fun story, with both hero and villain on horseback by the end, and an impressive jump off of a bridge.
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