There were gorillas in my recent posting, "Conan on the Cover of Weird Tales," and there are gorillas here, on two covers of Weird Tales. I expected more before beginning my search, but then Weird Tales didn't survive very long into what one website calls "The Gorilla Age of Comics," when images of simians proliferated on the covers of the nation's comic magazines. I'm not sure why gorillas were so popular in those days, especially in DC comics. In any case, Weird Tales beat them all to the punch with the images shown here.
 |
| Weird Tales, June 1923. Cover story: "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" by Edgar Allan Poe. Cover art by William F. Heitman. That's not actually supposed to be a gorilla but an orangutan. Oh, well, at least it's a passable drawing of a simian. The figure of the woman on the other hand is pretty poorly handled, no pun intended. The only thing I can think is that the artist was in a hurry on the day he drew this picture. |
 |
| Weird Tales, September 1929. Cover story: "The White Wizard" by Sophie Wenzel Ellis. Cover art by Curtis C. Senf. Before there was King Kong, there was this cover for Weird Tales. |
 |
| Here are two gorilla covers out of millions. Above, Strange Adventures #45 from June 1954 with cover art by Murphy Anderson. I wanted to show this one because the concept of civilized apes--from a place called "Gorilla World" no less--is so much like that in Planet of the Apes. Everybody remembers the movie from 1968. What is less well known is that the movie was based on a French novel, Pierre Boulle's La Planète des Singes, from 1963, nearly a decade, I might add, after this comic book came out. Below, Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen #10 from January 1956 with cover art by Curt Swan and Ray Burnley. |
 |
| You never want to pass up on a chance to show Dave Stevens' art. Here is his cover for King Kong #1 from 1991, evidence that the age of gorilla covers extended into later decades . . . |
 |
| Even as recently as 2013 when I drew this picture for the back cover of our self-published comic book Five Star Comics. So gorillas were popular on the covers of comic books from the 1950s and '60s. Well, so were atomic bomb explosions and infinity covers. What you're seeing here is--I think--the world's first and only gorilla/A-bomb/infinity cover. (There is also an element of time travel.) It illustrates my story "A-Bombs into Infinity." The only thing it's missing is a flying saucer. Image copyright 2016 Terence E. Hanley. |
Text and captions copyright 2016 Terence E. Hanley