« All realities, all dimensions are open to me! » — Prince
Growing up, Lee Elias (1920-1998) never was a particular favourite of mine. A handful of stories in DC’s mystery titles aside — and I’ve grown to love those — I probably came across his work for Marvel’s Human Fly series, and I was always disappointed when Elias, not my beloved Frank Robbins, turned up in the credits. For the record, Elias drew ten of the nineteen HF issues, and Robbins drew six, plus five covers.
Over time, I noticed his gloriously gruesome cover work with art director-designer Warren Kremer for Harvey’s Pre-Code Horror titles of the early 1950s. His work on DC’s Adam Strange in the mid-1960s is best forgotten — there is only one Adam Strange, and it’s Carmine Infantino‘s (with trusty inker Murphy Anderson along for the Zeta Beam ride, of course). However, I adore Elias’ brief run (with writer Dave Wood) on Ultra the Multi-Alien, the splendidly wacky feature that replaced Adam Strange in Mystery in Space (issues 103 to 110, 1965-66).
As a treat, here’s one of those Ultra covers.
Why am I so fond of this particular story? It’s the little things: for once, a story in a Jack Schiff-edited title makes some semblance of adhering to scientific — or at least science-fictional — principles; here, Elias designed an alien race that, given their grumpy, unprepossessing mugs, would typically have been cast as villains, but instead turn out perfectly honourable; the story’s human protagonists give aid to strangers in need, never asking for a thing in return: no Zarkan mineral rights, no salacious dirt on J’onn J’onzz, just selfless dedication to doing the right thing and the satisfaction of averting a crisis. How refreshingly old-fashioned, a cooling balm for these harrowing times.
-RG
p.s. my partner ds should return to our blog soon… she’s at present battling a mild case of writer’s block, so I’m filling in.
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