Magnus, Robot Fighter 2 (May 1963)

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For the second issue, Magnus has much more reasonable villains. Someone figured out how to make robots look like humans and is trying to take over the government. Manning sets it up pretty well–there’s lots of action, lots of big fight scenes, but he does take a moment for Leeja and her senator father to discuss what robots place in daily human life should be.

There are some problems, of course. Manning’s city-state, North AM, takes up the entire North American continent, yet Magnus and friends can zip around it in no time at all, which means they’re going at such incredibly dangerous speeds… no one could be out walking around in the unprotected open….

There’s a backup–there was first issue too–but it’s pretty lame. Manning’s space art is lovely, but the story’s just about how great human beings (American ones) are and how everyone else should learn from them.

CREDITS

Operation Disguise; writers, Russ Manning, Robert Schaefer and Eric Freiwald; artist, Manning; editor, Chase Craig; publisher, Gold Key.

Magnus, Robot Fighter 1 (February 1963)

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Manning neglects to establish one important point in Magnus‘s first issue. Are robots sentient? Evil or not, Magnus is smashing up a lot of robots here and the heroic little kids throw one off a roof just because they can.

It’s rather important. Maybe I’m thinking too much about it, but the dying robots certainly seem to suffer.

Then there’s the matter of Leeja, who’s not mad at the robots for being evil, she’s mad they’re going to stop her from driving dangerously. She wants to be free to cause car accidents.

Manning’s art is really good–it has to be to overcome such exceptional logic holes–and Magnus is great to read. Manning’s future designs are great too, with his six panel a page system allowing for a lot of great visuals. The geography of this future is amazing; lots of people have, without attribution, borrowed from it.

Overall, it works.

CREDITS

Writer and artist, Russ Manning; editor, Chase Craig; publisher, Gold Key.