Monster of the Day #167

Updated on December 30, 2010 By Ken Begg 30 Comments

This one has already circulated in the comments of yesterday’s post, so here are some bonus ones. These are a bit more traditional. I have to say, men got up to a lot more back then.

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  • Ericb

    Gee, these adventure men sure love the water, it seems they always do their fighting shirtless in waist deep water, even when fighting essentially terrestrial aninmals like gorillas and weasels.

  • Reed

    Well, obviously when fighting viscious beasts like gorilla weasels (I think those were in the 2nd edition Monster Manual) you want every advantage you can get, and so any adventuring man would seek waste deep water where evolution has equipped us as the ultimate fighting machines. He obviously used his shirt to… OK, I got nothin’. I do feel sorry for the guy fighting the gorilla, though. He’s screwed.

    I’ve been looking at the vicious octupus attack on the last cover, and I can not figure out what vehicle they are supposed to be fighting on. Is it a downed airplane? A badly realized submarine? An overturned boat?

    My theory for the genesis of the octupus attack, given the way that the man are dressed, is that there were engaged in a good natured oily wrestling match like manly chums sometimes get up to. The octopus was drawn to the scent of the oil in the water, and decided that it wanted to wrestle as well. Octopii are known for their love of wrestling.

  • Gamera

    Thanks Roger for the cool snapping turtle cover and thanks Ken for reposting it. Though it brings back bad memories of what little SOBs my nephews were they were toddlers…

    ‘LEONARDO, MICHELANGELO, DONATELLO, RAPHAEL!!! lEAVE THAT POOR MAN AND HIS WIFE ALONE! UNCLE GAMMY IS VERY MAD AT YOU!!!’

    Gee, guess most guys these days are wusses, I mean these days most would shoot the gorilla whatever from a distance with a high powered rifle and all. Back then a real man would rip off his shirt and charge in to fight hand-to-paw with a Bowie knife.

  • Ericb

    The octopus’s eyes hang like breasts. I’m sure that was unintentional.

  • BeckoningChasm

    He really needs to find a different girlfriend. All she does is collapse in a faint. In the gorilla cover, she even looks like she’s saying “Is it time? Should I faint now?”

  • Gamera

    Well to be honest, I’d be scared if someone did these covers today the woman would be fighting the critter while the guy looks on helplessly. To play devil’s advocate I prefer stuff like this when men were real men (however over the top).

    Although, if I had my choice both the man and woman would be fighting the critter together…

  • Yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s a capsized boat. The one guy is grabbing the rudder, I believe.

  • Marsden

    Ericb posted:

    The octopus’s eyes hang like breasts. I’m sure that was unintentional.

    Gee, I guess tentacle rape isn’t exclusive to Japan?

  • roger h

    My made up my own background to explain the cover artist’s “style”.

    The young man had talent and went to art school. He completed his courses in human faces and torsos but, was not able to get into the very popular “legs’ class, very popular at the time since ladys gams’ were the hot thing in pin-up calendars. He took the woodland and jungle animals class and a seminar in sea creatures and water instead.

    By the time the “legs” class was taught again, he had ran out on money for lessons and had to get any work available. The rest is is internet content history.

  • OTL
  • roger h

    hey Gamera, is that mortally wounded little guy flying away on the right ninja turtle Rembrandt?

    “tell my mother I loved being a turtle, uuugh”

  • Ericb

    otl, while they probably don’t qualify as “ferocious” I’m sure a giant panda in the wild could inflict quite a bit of damage on a human if provoked.

  • Gamera

    Roger, I don’t really like to think about it (sniff)…

  • Ericb

    … and only one week from retirement. Tough break.

  • Ericb

    One first site I thought the turtles were pretty small for snapping turtles but I was willing to give it a pass but when I saw that they were supposed to be “giant turtles” I was kind of mystified by it all.

  • roger h

    AAAAH, I just unlocked a memory of “Ernest Goes to Camp”.

  • No one else noticed that it is a wiffle-ball octopus? And the idea of being “swarmed” by turtles makes me grin all over. So to speak.

  • roger h

    That cephalopod does look rather vented. Evolved to avoided hot headedness?

    I only see 5 appendages, however, I an am guessing there are two more and it is the dreaded septopus!

    Beware the mighty Septopus
    What a dandy guy
    He lives on top of the submarine
    And he’s always eating pies
    He’s always eating pies up there
    And throwing festivals
    He’s the grandest guy in town
    With seven testicles
    Septopus!
    Septopus!
    Septopus!
    Septopus!
    Septopus!
    Septopus!

  • “…but when I saw that they were supposed to be “giant turtles” I was kind of mystified by it all.”

    To be fair, though, that guy is over 80 feet tall.

  • roger h

    Glenn was 80 feet tall!

  • I can neither confirm nor deny any connection between the two.

  • Gamera

    For anyone here who doesn’t already read James Lilek’s blog you’ll find simular covers under his ‘Comic Sins’. The rest of his stuff is pretty good too:

    http://www.lileks.com/institute/index.html

    Personally I really liked these two:

    http://www.lileks.com/institute/funny/07/53.html

    http://www.lileks.com/institute/funny/07/57.html

  • Ericb

    Hah, Gamera, I was thinking jsut that and have been looking at those covers for the past 20 minutes or so.

  • Rock Baker

    Great stuff! Man, I miss great exploitation art like this!

    Funny the whole ‘hidden legs’ issue comes up (and the art class story definetley made me laugh), because I have trouble with the lower half of the male body myself. Women are no problem, but then thats my specialty. Men I only have the knack for drawing down to the waist unless the figure is in a long shot. If you ever see my pages, you’ll notice that the men tend to be in medium shots or have their lower halves obscured by something. Funny how you get into a habit like that, instead of trying to remedy the situation… (In my defense, I didn’t attend any sort of art school, so the faults found in my work are because I’m self-taught.)

  • So you *are* Rob Liefeld! (Ok, so he just couldn’t draw feet…)

  • roger h

    A real tragedy would be to only be able to draw mens’ legs.

  • Too bad these magazines dried up by the late ’70s. What a great cover they could have made of Jimmy Carter being attacked by that swamp rabbit that one time!

  • Rock Baker

    Ugh, don’t get me started on feet! And since I draw the Rowena strip, and others that involve giant women, I’ve had to take a -again, self-taught- crash course in drawing feet! That some people have a fetish for feet mystifies me, and I felt that way before I had draw them big enough to fill a panel!

  • It’s that damn Monty Python foot! It’s ruined more than one generation.

  • sandra

    It appears to be the same woman in covers one and two, but not the same man . Whoever she is, she had terrible luck with boyfriends. Every guy who took her out wound up fighting off some sort of animal attack !