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Because it's a cartoon there's a notion that the Rocky and Bullwinkle Show (and the other variants of this title) is for the stereotypical "children of all ages". I'd actually reject that and suggest that these cartoons are primarily for adults and if kids get some fun from them it's purely ancillary. The best way I've heard these shows described is that they are radio shows with some few pictures. That's why the animation (such as it is) doesn't really matter all that much. It's the words and the character designs that make the show work. If they move, that's just gravy. 

And that's likely why Rocky and Bullwinkle have had such a checkered career in comics. Unlike other animation powerhouses which hold their edge decades later like Popeye, Woody Woodpecker and the Disney gang, the Bullwinkle universe is not one conducive to the primary audience for comics -- kids. That said, the artist Al Kilgore does a bang up job in these earliest issues of Gold Key's offerings. IDW reprinted these stories some years back, likely in connection with a revival of the cartoon on Amazon.  (That cartoon by the way owes more to Ren and Stimpy than it does to Jay Ward's universe.) Whatever the reason it was fun to see these well rendered comics which attempted to evoke the satiric fun of the show. This first volume in the collection brings together four issues.

It's easy to get the goofiness of Bullwinkle, but the heroic sweetness of Rocky is more difficult. And while the format of these comics does a delightful job of emulating the show in regard to offering multiple features such as "Fractured Fairytales",  "Mr. Peabody's Improbable History" and "Dudley Do-Right of the Mounties" does a splendid job of making the comics, especially the earliest issues resemble the cartoon show. 

While there is some meager attention to plot, the notion of a serial story is not used alas and that's likely a good thing for folks picking this up at the time. One of the early Bullwinkle stories does have a two-part element and features the Moon Men in an especially aggressive mode. 

And that alas is the miss on these adaptations. While they get the look pretty well (given that the cartoons themselves had a range of looks) the snap and crackle of the characters is a smidge off base. There is the occasional fourth-wall breaking reference but not the ongoing gag of the interactive narrator which keeps the satiric boil on in the shows. These comics are an imperfect reflection of what The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show might've been if it had been more traditional in its time. I'm so very glad it was not. 

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