Showcase Corner - Adventures On Other Worlds!

Adam Strange is one of DC's most exquisite creations. He's an Earthman who is regularly transported to the planet of Rann where he is faced relentlessly with menaces to defeat. The difference between Adam Strange and other heroes, is that he uses his brain to defeat the enemy. His wits and understanding of science are the weapons with which he defends the hapless people of Rann. He's motivated to continually solve their problems because his gorgeous girlfriend Alanna lives there. Adam goes to Rann, which is a planet 25 trillion miles away circling the sun Alpha Centaui by means of the Zeta Beam which was first sent to Earth as a desperate means of communication. My favorite parts of the stories are always at the beginning when Adam is scheming to intersect the beam which never hits the same place twice and only hits Earth in the Southern Hemisphere. Once he gets to Rann, he plants a big kiss on Alanna and then gets to work doing his hero stuff. 

Adam Strange debuted in the pages of Showcase with Mike Sekowsky and Frank Giacoia handling the artwork. Gil Kane supplied some fantastic covers for the series. Adam is an archeologist but soon proves to be a polymath, knowing whatever he needs to know to battle the menace at hand. 

Adam Strange then took up residence in Mystery in Space with Carmine Infantino and Joe Giella handling the art. Infantino's vision of the future is so sleek and inviting that he's an ideal artist for his series. The stories are nine pages, just enough space for Adam to get to Rann, kiss Alanna, discover the menace and scheme a solution. Nice and neat, the stories resonate with the comfort that many Silver Age stories accomplished. 

With the seventy-first issue the feature was expanded to seventeen pages and later still to even more pages. For this reader, more proved to be less. Gardner Fox is a writer for his time, creating puzzles which the reader was invited to solve along with Adam. With the additional page count came more and more complications making the momentum of the stories lose steam. It did give Infantino more pages to let his artwork open up and that's a good thing, but sadly it was in service to stories that often lost me by the middle of the story. Murphy Anderson also began to ink some of the stories and he was Infantino's ideal inker. 

A milestone was the seventy-fifth issue in which Adam comes into contact with the Justice League of America and they help him defeat the JLA villain Kanjar Ro. 

The series does have a memory with villains recurring. Adam battled the Dust Devil three times, the third time is the last issue in this volume of Showcase Presents. These are delightful stories in any format, but in the case of Adam Strange bright colors are a definite asset. These are stories told in bright daylight and the colors shine. But I'm happy to have read these classics in any format. Highly recommended. 

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