Bibliobimbo

An interesting collection of a forgotten artist. Hanks created comics in the early days of the medium, quitting around the beginning of WWII. The stories are fairly much the same--they mostly feature Stardust, a "super-wizard" of technology who lives in space and Fatomah, guardian of the jungle. Both of these creations have amazing superpowers, and are utterly invincible. Which quickly removes any narrative tension from the stories--neither character is ever in any danger, there is never any question of them being defeated by the bad guys. The only question is why it takes them so damn long to stop whatever evil plot is underway (usually after people have died, tornadoes have been unleashed, giant panthers have been let loose in New York, etc.) But, the artwork is quite fun, almost Crumb-like and amazingly colorful, and the details are a hoot. Fatomah flies on her natural "superiority" and the pseudo-science nonsense in the Stardust stories must be read to be believed. Probably the most interesting part of the book is the short comic at the end by the editor, who hunted down Hanks' son, only to find out Hanks was a good-for-nothing abusive husband and father who abandoned his family. Whoops. was that a spoiler? Anyway, I enjoyed it.