This weekend’s escapist, light-hearted superhero post from Balladeer’s Blog looks at the first year of Wonder Woman stories in the 1940s.
ALL STAR COMICS Vol 1 #8 (Dec 1941)
Title: Introducing Wonder Woman
Villains: Nazis
Synopsis: When a pair of Nazi spies hijack an experimental American aircraft, U.S. Army Captain Steve Trevor pursues them and seizes control of the vessel from them.
The Nazis are driven off, but Captain Trevor crash-lands and washes ashore at Paradise Island in the Mediterranean Sea.
The island is inhabited by THE Amazons from Greco-Roman myths and they are still ruled over by Queen Hippolyta. The Queen’s daughter Princess Diana nurses Trevor back to health and falls in love with him but while he was recovering, Hippolyta used magic to probe Steve’s mind.
She learned about the ongoing World War and felt that a champion from Paradise Island should accompany Steve Trevor back to the human world to help combat the Axis Nations. Diana won the all-Amazon tournament to become that champion.
Hippolyta bestows on the princess her paraphernalia like her wrist bands, tiara, invisible plane and costume based on the flag of Steve Trevor’s homeland (but not yet her lasso). The queen also granted her the title Wonder Woman. She and Captain Trevor left Paradise Island together for human lands. Continue reading
Here’s a Boxing Day current events roundup from 
BAD MOVIE REVIEW: TOWING (1978) – Even though this film’s cast includes JOE MANTEGNA, SUE LYON and DENNIS FRANZ it is a thoroughly bizarre attempt at a comedy. It’s based on some real-life unethical procedures by towing companies in Chicago. Relentlessly unfunny and very weird. Click 
FORGOTTEN TELEVISION – Bird of the Iron Feather (1970), the pioneering soap opera about the lives of black Chicagoans 
WHISKEY JIM – A neglected Old West gunslinger who interacted with the likes of Billy the Kid, Pat Garrett, Hoodoo Brown, Bushwacking Joe and the 4th Cavalry. He also fought in the Buffalo Hunters War and later against the Las Lagunas Comanchero Gangs. Click 
KARATE GIRL (1973) – This Turkish martial arts film is one of that country’s premier violent revenge flicks. Fun-bad yet badass all at once. I reviewed it in detail 
NON E MAI TROPPO TARDI aka It’s Never Too Late (1953) – This is one of the few Italian movie adaptations of A Christmas Carol, so that alone makes it worth seeking out for obsessive Carol fans like me. 
The misdirection went so far as to list Marcello’s name above the actual star Paolo Stoppa in the movie’s re-release title A Wonderful Night (Una Notte Meravigliosa). 
THE SMURFS: A CHRISTMAS CAROL (2011) – I generally dread Smurfs productions, which is why I put off watching this Carol for so long. Happily this was a pleasant surprise, and I really enjoyed it. 
ASTOLPHO IN ETHIOPIA – When we left Charlemagne’s Paladin Astolpho, he had just vanquished the evil sorcerer Atlantes, then freed all of the captives in his invisible castle. Among those captives was the great Roland, the Emperor’s nephew and most accomplished warrior. 
A CHRISTMAS CAROL (2015) – This 59-minute rendition of the Dickens Yuletide classic is often referred to as “the Colin Baker version.” Too bad Baker can’t sue somebody over that, since he had nothing to do with this laughable production beyond portraying Charles Dickens and narrating the story. 
Soon the image improves to conventional standards (well, sort of) and the sound improves to 1950s television levels. Unfortunately, this is a 2015 production, not a 1950s presentation, and the weak, amateurish sound work will plague this Carol the rest of the way. 
RICHARD DENNING’S PSYCHOTRONIC MOVIES – Before he was the governor on Hawaii Five-O, Richard Denning appeared in several campy sci-fi movies in the 1940s and 1950s. ** Those included Target Earth, about alien androids invading Chicago; Unknown Island, about “modern” people finding an island populated by dinosaurs; Creature with the Atom Brain, about atomic-powered zombie gangsters; Day the World Ended, about post-nuke survivors fighting a monster; The Black Scorpion, about two giant scorpions on the loose, and the iconic Creature from the Black Lagoon. They’re all 
THE DOUBLE DAGGERS (1877) – The second Dime Novel about the fictional masked Old West outlaw and champion of the underdog – Deadwood Dick. This time he and his Nighthawks face a traitor within and defeat a new set of villains. Plus, our hero falls in love and gets married in the finale! Click 
THE PENOBSCOT CAMPAIGN FROM THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR – The massive 1779 American effort to drive the British out of the area of Maine that they had seized and renamed New Ireland. Click 
FORGOTTEN TELEVISION – Stagecoach West (1960) starring Wayne Rogers as a gunslinging stagecoach driver who has adventures 
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