The Gift of Insanity

Wishing Happy Holidays to everyone out there! As for me, I just want to mention one gift that particularly made my Christmas merry...the two-book set of the complete comics work of Fletcher Hanks: "I Shall Destroy All the Civilized Planets" and "You Shall Die by Your Own Evil Creation."

If you haven't heard of him by now, suffice it to say that Fletcher Hanks was a mad genius of the Golden Age of comics, creator of such demented characters as the all-powerful Stardust the Super Wizard, the skull-faced Fantomah, and the completely interchangeable triumverate of space heroes: Space Smith, Whirlwind Carter, and Buzz Crandall. (Hanks was also a horrible, abusive human being who came to a miserable end, as revealed by the reminiscences of his son Fletcher Hanks Jr...but that's another matter entirely.)

I'll just leave you with a typical image, courtesy of Paul Karasik's Fletcher Hanks website:

Merry Christmas!

I have been remiss in posting, haven't I? Well, here's a little present from a couple of my friends from Dad's Garage Theatre Company. (Yes, that's right, I'm re-gifting it to you.) This is quite possibly the best thing to happen to the worst Christmas song ever...



Merry Christmas!