American Hero: Bob Belcher

Every year here on Rotten Ink, we take a break from our cook-outs and fireworks to honor an American hero for our Independence Day update, and this year is no exception.  Hi everyone! It’s Juliet, back in the blogger’s seat to tell you about an all-American hero of TV and comics; he’s a humble man, a burger man.  That’s right, this year we’ll be spending the Fourth of July with Bob and the entire Belcher family 

Known for his work on celebrated animated shows Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist and Home Movies, Loren Bouchard created Bob’s Burgers to fit into Fox’s animation brand in the mid 2000s, the most successful shows of the time focusing on families. He teamed with King of the Hill writer and producer Jim Dauterive to develop the concept with the aim of showing being able to explore some workplace comedy tropes while keeping with the family theme.  There was one aspect of the original concept, however, that only made it into the finished product as a joke:  Bouchard actually wanted the Belcher family to be cannibals, something that gets used as a plot device in the pilot episode but only in the form of a rumor Louise starts at school.  Another switch is that there were originally two Belcher sons, but before production began, Daniel became Tina and given her popularity, that was most definitely the right choice.  

Bob’s Burgers premiered on Fox in 2011 on Fox with a special preview airing the prior Thanksgiving on the network.  The first season was met with shaky reception, but really found its stride with critics by the second season.  In 2017, Fox announced the development of a Bob’s Burgers, which, as many fans (myself included) rightly guess, would be a musical.  However, we’re still waiting to see this movie because several things happened: in 2019, Disney acquired 20th Century Fox, which wasn’t initially going to interfere with the film’s slated summer 2020 release, but then the coronavirus pandemic happened.  Like so many films, the Bob’s Burgers movie shifted around the release schedule for a while when it wasn’t certain when movie theaters would be safely reopened (and moviegoers would feel safe visiting).  Right now, it’s been delayed indefinitely, which I’m hoping is just a product of the studios having to completely redo essentially two years of release schedules.  It’s still super disappointing, though. 

Despite being told by numerous people that I’d like Bob’s Burgers, it took me several years to give the show a try.  In fact I was rather stubbornly set on not watching because I was convinced that it was yet another show trying to be a Family Guy clone (and that’s unappealing because I’m NOT a fan of Family Guy), but what I learned is that it’s quite the opposite.  Somehow Matt convinced me to give Bob’s Burgers a try….or maybe he just put an episode on in the hopes I’d sit down and watch it, which I did, and I absolutely loved it.  In addition to being very dryly funny a lot of the time, Bob’s Burgers appeals to me because all of the characters are genuinely good people that are trying hard (even though they sometimes fail epically).  The family feels like an actual family — totally quirky but absolutely ready and able to have each other’s backs no matter what.  Unlike so many other animated and live action shows, Bob isn’t a lazy, bumbling idiot who somehow impossibly has a fairly cushy job; we get to see him as a businessman who genuinely cares about what he does (sometimes a little too much).  And then there’s Tina, who is me and I am her. It’s so great to see an utterly dorky teenage girl who isn’t a punching bag.  In fact, her family celebrates and affirms the fact that she’s into horses, writes erotic friend fiction (one of my absolute favorite details about her) and is boy crazy.  The show also has some amazing side characters from Teddy to twins Andy and Ollie to Marshmallow, who could easily be the butt of every joke as a Black trans woman but is instead celebrated and admired.  So despite my initial hesitation, Bob’s Burgers has become one of my favorite shows.  It’s utterly hilarious and is one that I both look forward to new episodes and can rewatch over and over again.  

As Bob’s Burgers has increased in popularity and become more universally well-known, naturally, there’s been an explosion of merchandise.  The show is available on DVD (the early seasons were given proper retail releases with the latter seasons being released as “on-demand” DVDs available through Amazon).  You’ll see the Belcher family on a variety of shirts, hoodies, socks (yes, I’m the proud owner of Tina Belcher socks) and even an amazing pair of high-top sneakers made by DC Shoes.  There are Bob’s Burgers coffee mugs, a full set of Funko Pops and a variety of board games including Clue and Trivial Pursuit.  Two soundtrack albums have been released along with an awesome cookbook, The Bob’s Burgers Burger Book and its smaller companion The Bob’s Burgers Burger Box.  Check out the image below for a look at some of my Bob’s Burgers collection.

In the summer of 2014, Dynamite Entertainment began releasing a short-run series of Bob’s Burgers anthology comics.  Each issue would follow a formula with stories and features led by/highlighting each member of the Belcher Family.  That series lasted five issues, but fans wouldn’t have to wait long for more as Dynamite released a special Bob’s Burgers issue for Free Comic Book Day 2015.  That was immediately followed by another short-run (7 issue) series that began in July 2015.  Dynamite would also continue releasing Bob’s Burgers issues for Free Comic Book Day through 2019, and I can’t help but wonder if both the coronavirus pandemic and the Disney acquisition, both of which also delayed the movie, caused the delay of further comics.  Hopefully we’ll see more Bob’s Burgers comics (and the movie!!) from Dynamite, or perhaps even Marvel, in the future. 

Today on the blog we’re going to look at that first series of Bob’s Burgers comics released by Dynamite.  Matt and I have had our copies for quite a while, but I think the majority of them came from Bell, Book and Comic here in Dayton.  As a reminder, here on Rotten Ink we grade comics on a star scale of 1 to 4 and are looking for how well the comics stay to the source material, their entertainment value and their art and story. So grab another Hit Me With Your Best Shallot Burger and get another helping of fries (NOT sweet potato fries though, as according to Bob, they’re not real fries) and let’s visit Ocean Avenue and get a booth at our favorite family-owned restaurant.

Bob’s Burgers #1  ***1/2
Released in 2014     Cover price $3.99     Dynamite    #1 of 5

This anthology comic features the following stories:

Tina’s Erotic friend Fiction Presents: My So-Called Life as a Horse showcases Tina as “a horse in a people world,” going to school and spending time with her human family.  However, Tina Belcher the horse aka Tinasus Belcher has a secret life as a member of the Equestranauts, and the team needs her as their secret weapon against the evil Xander, who’s stolen the Electric Leash of Doom, retrofitted to control horses. 

Burger of the Day Ideas: TV Catch Phrase Burgers & Hits of the 80s Burgers brings us a pun-tastic look at possibilities to grace the famed Burger of the Day board. I think some of these did actually make into the later years of the show

Louise’s Unsolved Mysteries and Curious Curiosities: takes on Picture Day as Louise tries to avoid having her brain stolen by an alleged alien photographer.

Letters From Linda: this one-pager features a modest proposal from Linda about a new wine pairing system: pairing the quantity of wine with an activity.

Gene Belcher Presents: The Boy in the Burger, a Musical: After Gene passes out from hocking samples in his burger suit on a hot day, the suit fuses to his body. Unsure of what his life will be as a burger boy, Gene disappears into the suit ala a turtle until a wintery day when his sisters need help for some snow fun.

Each member of the Belcher family gets to shine in this inaugural issue of the Bob’s Burgers comic with the kids getting longer stories and Bob and Linda each getting a one-pager.  I think this formula works well though I’d love to see Bob and Linda get featured just a tad more in future issues.  Tina’s story was, perhaps predictably, my favorite of this issue because I felt that of all stories, it was the closest to something you’d see on the actual show.  That’s not to say, however, that others weren’t good.  The entire comic is extremely well-done, and the fact that writers from the show worked on this really shows in terms of the quality of each section and the attention to getting each character’s voice spot-on.  The interior artwork also fits with the look and feel of the show, making this a quick, fun read for fans.  The exterior covers (there are several variants) get a little more experimental in terms of style, but keep the spirit of and vibe of the Belchers while being very eye catching. A special bonus for this first issue were some joke ads for businesses in the show, and a cut-out that would allow you to recreate the Bob’s Burgers Food Truck from season two.

Bob’s Burgers #2  ***1/2
Released in 2014     Cover price $3.99     Dynamite   # 2 of 5

Following the same formula as issue 1, we get 3 main stories from the kids and one page features from Bob and Linda.  The book opens with Battleship Galac-Tina, another installment of Tina’s Erotic Friend Fiction Presents that features Tina as the admiral of a starship during a robot war.  After an epic space battle, a robot hostage helps teach Tina and the rest of humanity how to dance.  Louise seeks out a fellow history book defacer in Louise’s Legacy and ends up discovering that her unseen partner in crime was librarian Mr. Ambrose.  Gene’s story, Genemadus, the Musical, pits him against Peter Pescadero in a keyboard battle ala Salieri and Mozart in the classic film.  For their features, Bob explores The Ten Commandments (well five of them at least) in burger form, and Linda pitches a raccoon playground turned disco turned apop turned reality show in a letter to her local trash collection service.

This is another really solid, fun installment of the Bob’s Burgers comic that showcases each character well and once again feels as if it could have been part of an episode or two of the TV show.  My favorite story this time around was Gene’s, which is surprising because in general he’s my least favorite of the Belcher family.  However, the way they took on Amadeus and twisted into a story for Gene was really smart and funny.  I also loved Linda’s letter this time around because the escalating absurdity of it was perfect. This time around, we see many more of the supporting cast including Andy and Ollie, Regular Sized Rudy, Daryl, Peter Pescadero, and of course we get several sketches of Little King Trashmouth in action as part of Linda’s letter. The cover and interior art are once again fun and well-done and fit into the vibe of the show.  This time around, we didn’t get any fake ads, but there was a nice pinup in the middle of the book.

Bob’s Burgers #3  ***
Released in 2014     Cover price $3.99     Dynamite   #3 of 5

We begin this issue with another installment of Tina’s Erotic Friend Fiction, entitled Trick Shot Tina that has the titular character teaming up with another gun slinger, Jazz Hands Jimmy Jr., to win back a shiny belt buckle. Bob’s Burger of the Day Ideas is an attempt at a Fortune Cookie Burger, while Linda writes to Smellopolis.com to suggest new fragrances including Pinot Noir. Louise builds the ultimate cardboard box fort in Who Forted? In Guys & Frogs, Gene adopts and promptly forgets about a bunch of tadpoles, while six weeks later overrun the Belcher’s apartment and the restaurant. 

As with so many great series, this one lost a little steam with issue #3, but only a little.  There were some super fun touches like the Uncle Pennybags (aka the Monopoly Man) cameo in Tina’s story.  Once again, Linda’s letter was great because you could absolutely read it with her voice in your head. This time around my favorite story was Louise’s, although it took a more bizarre turn than you’d normally see in the show, it felt like a sequel to the season two Halloween episode Fort Night (though that episode isn’t referenced at all, which I felt like was a missed opportunity).  Some of the interior art in this issue strayed a little bit from the style of the series, but still fit the overall vibe of each story so it was distracting at all.  

Bob’s Burgers #4   ***1/2
Released in 2014    Cover price $3.99     Dynamite   #4 of 5

It’s a (mostly) Halloween issue this time around as Tina’s Erotic Friend Fiction presents Franken-Butt, the story of a girl scientist and her creation…but who’s really the monster of this tale?  After her science teacher warns of the dire consequences for doing an experiment wrong, Louise of course plans to capitalize on those consequences and turns herself invisible.  She wreaks havoc on her family and the restaurant, but then realizes she doesn’t know how to make herself reappear.  The Belcher kids go on a hunt for a chupacabra and meet the mystical creature only to learn that it wants to be a children’s magician.  So Gene, Tina and Louise set out to make their new friend’s dream come true at the restaurant.  In our non Halloween features, Bob creates a list that explores “If Heartwarming 80s Movies Were Burgers,” which includes the She’s Having a Bay Leaf Burger (cooked with bay leaf, comes with baby romaine), and Linda writes to the president of Super Sounds Records to inform them that she’s ready to record her long awaited sola album “Appetite for Lin-struction.”

Issue #3 may have been a slight disappointment, but issue #4 absolutely delivered.  Bob’s Burgers is known for its stellar Halloween episodes, and this issue delivered that spirit in comic form.  All three of the main stories felt like they could have been part of an anthology episode of the show, and the artwork and writing supported that.  It’s hard to even pick a favorite story because they were all so solid and each was special in its own way, but if pressed I’d choose Louise Is Invisible.  The other two elements, though not Halloween themed, were extremely well done too making this such a great entry in the series.

Bob’s Burgers #5  ***1/2
Released in 2014     Cover price $3.99     Dynamite    #5 of 5

In a world filled with 14 to 16 year old boy zombies, Tina is the last person on Earth or so she thinks until she meets and saves the life of Jimmy Jr.  Together they realize that the zombies aren’t actually out to make them part of the hordes of the undead; they just want to play ping pong. Louise tries to get to the bottom of a boy band conspiracy in The Faux Boo Boo, and Gene takes a musical journey to Robot College. Bob works on ideas for Book Burgers including the Brine and Bunishment Burger, and Linda writes to Ginger about her revelation that somewhere in the world there’s another Linda whose family runs another restaurant.

What a fabulous way to wrap up this first run of Bob’s Burgers comics.  This issue’s stories are stellar with The Faux Boo Boo being my favorite (Louise’s obsession with Boo Boo is so funny), and Robot College being a delightful expansion of a tiny scene in season two’s “Bob Day Afternoon.”  Like the prior issue, everything in this one feels like it could have come right from an episode with great writing and artwork.  We also get a bit of bonus content with several pages of pinup artwork wrapping up the issue.  

Comics based on TV shows are super tricky.  It can be hard to translate beloved characters to the page and capture their voice and humor, but this series proves it can be done well.  If you’re a fan of the show and looking for a quick, fun read, check out this miniseries.

Well it’s time to shut down the grill for the night and get ready to watch some fireworks.  I hope you had a safe and happy July 4th, however you spent it.  I’ll be handing the blog back to Matt for our next update which will focus on Satanic bicycle safety…..yes, really.  In the meantime, read a comic or two, make a delicious burger (meat or veggie depending on your preference) and support a family-owned restaurant.  Join us next time for Danny and the Demoncycle.

Captain D’s Fast Food Greasy Sea Adventures

When I was a youngster many fast food restaurants used to not only have kids meal with must have toys in them but they also used to give away comic books based on their mascots! The biggest and most popular fast food comic book hands down was “Adventures Of Big Boy” that was released by Frisch’s Big Boy restaurant here in the Dayton, Ohio area. But many others followed like McDonalds that I have covered here before as well as even Long John Silvers, but the ones I want to talk about for this update came from Captain D’s. To me, these comics were more iconic than the Big Boy comics and were ones that felt like must reads when waiting in the booth for food to be done while at the restaurant. While I was never a huge fan of Captain D’s and their fish, I did always love to eat one of their greasy cheeseburgers with an order of fries, and yes as I said before, I was teased about my choice by family members. But besides the oh so good burger and fries and free comic book, one other thing that I remember about the Captain D’s we ate at in Kettering, Ohio is the appearance of the restaurant. The outside was a dull grey color and the wood around the building was done up to look super old and as if it was near the ocean and got erosion from the salt water. The sign up front showed the company’s logo as well as features the one and only Captain D himself, and seeing the Captain’s grinning face was pretty cool to see. Walking to the doors to enter was roped off by thick wood pillars that had massive ropes through them acting as the railing like if you were on a peer. The inside was made up to have the feeling that you were in a ship and had nets, fish and even a porthole. Sadly while some of the inside decorations are still up, the appearance of our Captain D’s is now pretty modernized and lacks character that the old style had. Now I am craving a cheeseburger so I think its time to step aboard with Captain D’s and tell tall tales of adventures, fishing and of course fast food goodies.

On August 15, 1969 in Donelson, Tennessee, the first ever Captain D’s was opened and was founded by Raymond L. Danner Sr. and originally called “Mr. D’s Seafood and Hamburgers.” By 1974 they changed the name to “Captain D’s Seafood” and fish, shrimp and fries became their main focus. Throughout the 70’s Captain D’s expanded and grew at a fast rate and did its best to compete with companies like McDonalds and Burger King to capture the kids market by offering the Birthday Club, Kids Meals and of course comic books, and this worked for a short amount of time before the restaurant finally became a must eat place for the elderly with mountain of coupons and the classic senior discount. While Captain D’s was the king of fast food sea food restaurants for a short time, they did have a rival in Long John Silvers that was also created in 1969 and to this day has more restaurants opened and brings in more money marking them as king of the fast sea food. In 1984 Captain D’s was bought by Shoney’s and was growing in size and expanded their menu items. By 2012 they revamped their look and designs, and in 2017 they were bought by Sentinel Capital Partners who is looking at how to expand the chain and make Captain D’s the must east fast food seafood place in the world. I for one loved the more classic looks for Captain D’s and dislike the more modern designs to not only them but all of fast food as the new looks are very soulless and hollow looking. What will the future holds for Captain D’s has yet to be seen, and we can only hope that they return the hamburgers to the menu as well as bring back the FREE kids comics based on Captain D and his friend Silly Sailor.

As I have stated before, way back in 2012 while covering the toys and Star Comics based on the Inhumanoids, I never have been a major fan of the food of Captain D’s and the one menu item I did like was their super greasy cheeseburgers that sadly they have removed from their menu. Over the years I have had to eat at Captain D’s so many times due to my grandparents or friends and most of the time when having to order the fish or even chicken strips, the meal is average at best…but because of this update Juliet and I braved it and decided to eat a meal at Captain D’s at the very one that I had eaten from when I was a kid…and this time I am going to eat the fish! And of course due to the 2020 coronavirus pandemic, we ended up having to get our meal via the Drive-Thru and ate the meal at home while we played old Captain D’s Commercials via YouTube streaming off our Apple TV. I ordered a four piece fish meal with a loaded baked potato and Mac N Cheese as my sides, it came with two hushpuppies and a small Pepsi to drink. I added an order of Fried Green Tomatoes as well as they were new to the menu, and we had this for lunch on August 19, 2020! Let’s start with the drink; it was a good size for a small and had a good fountain Pepsi taste to it! The Mac N Cheese was tasty and had a creamy texture and a great taste. The loaded Baked Potato was good and had cheese, bacon, sour cream and butter bringing a rich mixture of flavor with the potato itself being soft. The Hushpuppies were on point and packed flavor that helped add to the over all meal. The fish had crispy breading that had a good flavor and the fish was tender and fluffy a total shock as it was really good! The star of the meal was the Fried Green Tomatoes as my gosh they were the highlight of the meal and makes me want to go to Captain D’s again to order more of them!! I was shocked as this meal from Captain D’s was very good and none of the food tasted bad or had and flaws for me to point out or make the meal poor, in fact I would eat their again in the future and that’s shocking as I am never in the mood for Captain D’s and yet this meal has now put them on my radar…wait am I getting old and turning into my Grandpa?

I want to thank Mama Young, Game Swap Kettering, Ebay, Lone Star Comics, Etsy and Bell Book And Comic for making this update possible and having these issues in stock, and it’s crazy that these comics are kind of hard to get nowadays, and at times when you do find them, they hold a pretty high price tag for a comic that was a free give away, but when thinking about it I am sure many of these comics were destroyed by kids with only a few adult collectors keeping them in good shape. Looking back at it, I can remember copies of the comics in the trashcan with half eaten fish parts and coleslaw on top of them, and my brother, cousin and I confused as to why someone would throwaway a free comic book. But now I am off topic as we are talking about Captain D’s trash bins of comics so with that I can hear the Silly Sailor wanting me to remind you all that I grade these comics on a star scale of 1 to 4 and am looking for how well the comics stay to the source material, its entertainment value and its art and story. So if you are ready let’s sail the fast food seas with Captain D’s and his friend Silly Sailor and see how these comics hold up after all these years. Oh and keep in mind these comics had been released and rereleased causing numbering to be odd and doubled sometimes.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 1  **
Released in 1976   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #1 of 41

This first issue has a brief life story of sea captain John Paul Jones who fought the British for America in 1776 and how he went down in history for fighting outmanned and out gunned and said the phrase “I have yet begun to fight!” to the rival captain. Then we get a few puzzles and a short about Captain D himself alongside his young shipmates going to Nashville to see the sights and then get some food at guess where? If you guessed Long John Silvers, you are wrong.

This issue, while a fun very brief history lesson about American icon John Paul Jones, is really nothing more than one big advertisement for the restaurant chain and Pepsi Cola. But then again what did you expect for a free comic about the restaurant’s mascot? The art inside is pretty poorly done for the John Paul Jones segment but the Captain D’s stuff is fun and cartoony. Speaking of Captain D himself, it’s a shame that the old red beard mascot has been sent off to the great blue sea of forgotten fast food icons, and the food chain no longer uses him. Over all for a free comic, these were always fun and for the $1.93 I paid for it on Ebay, the trip down memory lane was worth it.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 12  **1/2
Released in 1978   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #12 of 41

This time Captain D tells the story of Captain James Cook, the son of a farmer who became a ship crew member and later joined a ship during the war with France. He is known for multiple things that changed the way we all sail: he introduced a healthy diet for sailors who spend long times at sea that helped them fight off sickness. He also was a very detailed navigator who drew up detailed maps and even introduced the dotted lines to map routes and dangers that one might face if following it. Sadly Captain Cook died in Hawaii when during a fight with natives over a stolen boat he was stabbed in the back. The Fish Story for this one is called “The Fish That Floated” and is about a young fish who just floats as he does not know how to swim, and his mom has to save him when fisherman almost nets him! The rest of the comic is filled with games and letters.

This issue does a great job of giving you the meat and potatoes of the life and career of Captain James Cook and they show you how he made some great changes to how the world at sea operates with one very important one is the diets of the sailors. And it’s great that it’s sauerkraut that is what was introduced to them and is what helps them fight of sicknesses like scurvy. Being from Waynesville, Ohio it’s great to see the kraut getting respect as we had a whole festival based around it! In other words, Captain Cook is an interesting icon of sea captains. The Fish Story is pretty good and again written by a kid and is about not being lazy and never giving up as one day what you need to do in life just might save your life. The cover is fine, and while not super eye catching, it’s still solid, and the interior art is great for a free promo comic and shows why these were a great tool for Captain D’s to try and capture the kids market. Good solid issue and worth reading if you like Fast Food comics.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 15   **
Released in 1986   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #15 of 41

In this issue Captain D tells us about a young Mark Twain and how when he was a young man he wanted to badly travel down the Amazon River, and learned his boating skills by becoming a “Cub” to a ship to learn how to become a river pilot! This takes him from being tested by the boat captain and also shows how he got the name Mark Twain as his real name is Samuel Clemens and this was all before he became the amazing writer we all know. The Fish Story for this issue is called “The Fish That Sang All Night” and is about an old man who while fishing hooks a very tiny fish who can talk and sing, and when the little fish begs the old man not to throw him back in the pair team up and the little fish becomes a TV star. The rest of the issue is filled with games, jokes and letters.

This is a pretty cool issue that showcases the early life of writer Mark Twain! And while he grew up near the river and waterways and had some sailing experience it’s a little crazy to put him in the same series as true Captains and Adventurers of the seas, but I am sure they knew that young readers and even older readers would know that name. The tale of Twain is super dragged out as its really just about him learning on a boat to understand the curves and shape of the waters. A good read yes but a pretty ho-hum tale that leaves you wanting something a little more ground breaking and world changing. The Fish Story is pretty fun and has a tiny singing fish becoming an over night star in the world of TV. The cover on this issue is ok and for some reason Mark Twain looks like a ghost with eerie yellow light all around him. The Interior art is good and is clearly your standard promo comic stuff. Over all a good issue but not a great issue and is pretty middle of the road as Mark Twain is cool him as a young man on a boat learning and being tested is kind of a bad choice. Oh I should also note that for some reason Captain D acts as if Mark Twain was a true hero that did so much for America via the waters…yeah poor old Captain was stretching to justify it.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 16   **
Released in 1986   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #15 of 41

This go around Captain D tells us about Captain Oliver Hazard a man who was born to be on the sea like his father before him and who once in the Navy rose the ranks in record time! He also created the phrase “Don’t Give Up The Ship” a saying still used till this day and during Americans war with Britain he won Lake Eerie and this victory helped up win the war! The Fish Tale is called “The Wise Fish” and is about a fish who outsmarts a shark at his door. As always the rest of the comic is filled with games, letters and jokes.

This is a solid and fun issue that showcases the heroic actions and life of Captain Oliver Hazard a man who was born to be a legend of the waters! This comic does a quick and fast job of alerting readers to what he has done to make America the nation it is today! Plus unlike the last issue Captain Hazard is a true hero of the waters and helped in battles and lived his life on the waters. The Fish Tale is ok and has a fish at home who gets a knock on his door from a shark trying to trick him to eat him, and the fish out smarts his would be attacker. The cover is pretty funny and has Silly Sailor goofing up again and the interior art is as always good for this level of promo comics. A good read for sure if you like Captain Hazard or even just goofy kids comics about history.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 18  *1/2
Released in 1978   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #18 of 41

Captain D in this classic issue tells the take of two captains who fought a battle with ironclad ships during the Civil War! For the North was Lieutenant John Lorimer Worden and for the South was Lieutenant Catesby Rodgers Jones and they sides fought a battle that lasted many rounds and neither side could make major damage to the others iron made ships. In the end both sides while no ship sunk claimed victory for the battle that was a strange one for sure that took place at America’s Civil War. The Fish Story for this issue is called “Fat Fish” about Ronald an over weight fish that is made fun of by all the other fish and this makes him run away from home, only to run into a shark who wants to eat him. Ronald swims so fast to save his life that he looses all the weight and returns home to be now popular cause he is no longer fat. The rest of the comic is filled with puzzles, letters, jokes and games.

This issue I have to point out has bright and flat coloring, but this makes this over all bland issue pop! The main story of the ironclad ship battle during the Civil War is entertaining but goes by way to fast, and the highlight is when a flash makes Lieutenant John Lorimer Worden go temporally blind and the art of it made me chuckle out loud. And I do like the back and fourth panels showing what was going on both ships. But again is way to fast and wish they would have built up the battle a little more. The Fish Story is the worst this far and the whole story is Fat Kids are to be made fun of until they loose weight…so silly and is the normal mindset of that time. The cover for this issue is action packed and eye catching for those who picked up the issue at Captain D’s and the interior art is good as always. Over all just an ok issue that has a cool yet to fast told Civil War story and a terrible messaged Fish Story.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 21  **
Released in 1987   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #21 of 41

In this issue Captain D talks about Confederate sea raider Raphael Semmes who manned one of the first war ships for the Confederate army and even brought down on of the North’s major stock ships. But finally was taken down in a battle in the Civil War and at first was a wanted man and then latter became a “Hero” in American history. The Fish Tale is untitled and is about a fish saving a King Fish from a witch who was forcing him to work in a salt mine. The rest of the issue is games, puzzles, jokes and letters.

This issue has a very quick look at Raphael Semmes and his time in the Civil war were he brought down a supplies ship and then when faced with a warship from the north was brought down, and he fled and was wanted for being a traitor and then once the war was over was honored by the US Navy…pretty standard and uneventful tale as his battles was few. The Fish Tale was fun and features a Witch and a cool creepy Salt Mine and a hero fish saving a King Fish…good silly kid comic stuff. The cover is pretty cool and has Captain D and Silly Sailor and they are doing a silly sailing joke. The interior art is good for this style of comic and once more I will say the coloring is pretty good and is bright. Over all an average good kids comic read featuring a fast food mascot.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 23 **
Released in 1987   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #23 of 41

Captain D in this issue wants to share the story of Portuguese explorer and Captain Ferdinand Magellan who fought battles as well was one of the biggest pushers that the Earth is round and not flat. After the quick history lesson there is some puzzles and games and finally Captain D shares a young readers Fish Tale called “The Fish That Got Away” that has a young boy being tricked by a super smart fish who steals his fishing boat.

In this issue Captain D gives a very quick history lesson about a very respectable world explorer from the 1400’s named Ferdinand Magellan, and while it is super fast and leaves out lots of Ferdinand’s life it does do a good job of trying to get you to want to learn more about him. The Fish Tale from this issue is pretty silly and cheesy and clearly was written by a youngster, plus I love how Captain D kind of alerts the kid that his title of the story should have been slightly different. Captain D in this issue comes off very well and seems to love sharing this issue with readers. The art in this issue is as most from this series and has a great kids comic feel, the cover is pretty good and to be honest the ones that had Captain D on them were the ones my brother and I were more into reading. Over all this issue is another average read and is one I semi remember from when I was a kid.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 25 **
Released in 1981   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #25 of 41

In this Exciting Issue, Captain D tells us about Italian explorer John Cabot who mapped the world and wanted to find a land to trade for silk and riches and after making a fake promise to the King went on some expeditions only to have failed at the task, but did find some land to claim for his King. He was badmouthed and labeled a failure and shortly after passed away. The Fish Story is called “Harry’s Close Call” and fallows Harry a tiny fish that is playing hide and seek with his friend and while hiding he is captured by a fisherman’s net and due to his small size he is thrown back into the water and is tagged by his friend. The rest of the issue has jokes, letters and games.

This issue is a standard read that features the quick history of explorer John Cabot who was an expert mapper and even “found” and claimed some land…but also told a fib in order to be able to map the areas with promises of silk and trades. I love how in one panel the people of the village call John a failure out loud so he can hear it…brutal! The Fish Story is pretty cool and has a fish playing hide and seek being netted by a fisherman and lucky for him because his size was thrown back and ends up being tagged and it! The cover is ok and for the most part is very generic and the interior art is standard. Over all an ok issue that is a fast read.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 25.5 *1/2
Released in 1988   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #25 of 41

In this issue Captain D brings you a look at Prince Henry of Portugal who was never going to be King as he had three older brothers in line so he spent his time training explorers and sailors in order to discover land and claim it for the nation. While he never did get to see the land the men he trained claimed, he still was an inspiration in the world of sailing for all he did. The Fish Tale in this issue is called “Fish Story” and is about a young fisherman hooking a fish on his first cast as the fish himself was eager to eat as the hook didn’t even have bait on it yet! The rest of the issue has puzzles, games, letters and jokes.

This issue is pretty good but does have a pretty weak look at Prince Henry who only trained people to explore and sail and never did so himself, while interesting it is a little silly of a choice to pick as an icon of sailing history. I will say the take is pretty quickly done and hits all the major marks it needs to. The Fish Tale in this issue is pretty weak and is just about a sloppy young fisherman who forgets to bait his hook and a hungry eager fish who wants to eat…not really all that amazing of a story. The biggest disappointment of this issue is that the cover makes it appear as if it has ghosts and a ghost ship and they do not show up in any story, but with that said the cover is good and eye catching and the interior art is solid like all others this far.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 27 **1/2
Released in 1988   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #27 of 41

In this issue Captain D shares the story of explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton who was exploring Antarctica and ran into some very hard times when his ship is sunk in the ice and he and his crew must take smaller boats in order to survive the very harsh weather and conditions. Along the way Shackleton leaves his crew in camps and makes the long journey for help as he will not give up to and finds help and saves the life of his crew. The Fish Tale is called “Little Fishy’s Dream” that is about Teenie a fish who finds a chest full of gold and when her moms says she can’t spend it or eat it she makes a deal with a fisherman that if he sends down worms she will give him gold coins, and the pair make the deal and Teenie opens up her own worm shop. The rest of the issue is filled with jokes, letters and games.

This issue is very fast paced and both main attraction stories are pretty dang good! Sir Ernest Shackleton and his strong will to save his crews life is the stuff of legend and he travels and fights against the harsh bitter cold weather to do so. Sir Ernest Shackleton shows that the human will to live and help is strong and this is a trait I hope is passed on to more humans in these modern times. The Fish Tale is lots of fun and I like how Teenie used her mind and turned gold coins into meals for her and her mother! This is a really solid and fun issue that does not drag and while the story of Sir Ernest Shackleton is rushed it’s done well and keeps you interested and invested into the story. The cover is cool and once more has Captain D and Silly Sailor exchanging a cheesy boat joke. The interior art is good and has that classic promo Captain D’s charm. Over all a solid issue that also features a goofy Dracula joke and its awesome to see the vampire in a kids comic.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 28 **
Released in 1988   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #28 of 41

In this issue Captain D shares a brief history lesson on the Battle Of Lake Champlain that was between America and United Kingdom having a massive naval battle on September 11, 1814 and had Commandant Macdonough win the battle, we also get a brief look at his life. The Fish Story in this issue is called “ My Greatest Catch” that is about a kid fishing who gets a big fish on his line and a diver tries to help him only to find the kid has hooked a big catfish who drives away driving a car underwater. The rest of this issue is puzzles and games.

This 28^th issue in the Exciting Adventure starts with a half bio and half war tale of true to life American hero Commandant Macdonough who led America to victory via a sea battle. And this while again very crammed this history tale is a fun quick read that I am sure made kids at the time feel like they knew a little more about our nations history. The second tale is pretty cheesy and is a tall tale of catching a fish that ends with a joke, but I will admit its pretty cool seeing a massive catfish driving a car. Captain D in this issue comes off excited about sharing the war story and is amused by the Fish Story. The cover for this issue is pretty good, but I do not think it’s very eye catching for kids. The interior art is good and has still that true kids comic appeal. Over all this as well is just a solid average comic read that is based on a fast food mascot.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 29 **1/2
Released in 1988   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #29 of 41

This issue Captain D shares the story of Jean Lafitte a pirate who lived in New Orleans and was a well liked figure in the city, once he had a price put on his head by the American Government and got it dropped when he helped win a battle for America against the U.K! After the war he was once more well liked for a short amount of time, but was once more turned on and ran out of America and was never seen again. The “Fish Tale” for this one is about a young girl from Iowa who stays summers with her Grandparents and her Grandpa made her “bait” out of a bike horn and this made her catch more fish than anyone at the lake that year. And as always this is filled with puzzles, games and coloring pages.

This issue wins brownie points from me as it starts with saying that the ghost of Jean Lafitte is said to haunt the streets of New Orleans, and then goes into the Pirates history of ups and downs while in America. This part is a very good read and makes me want to write a comic about the ghost of Jean Lafitte for Blood Scream Comics! The Fish Story in this issue is a little silly, but very charming as its clear a little kid wrote it who enjoys fishing with her grandpa and clearly also like to ride her bike complete with horn! I am going to say this I really wish that this issue would have been a kind of Horror Comic and would have been about the Ghost of Lafitte in the Big Easy. The cover for this issue is pretty good and showcases Captain D, with the interior art being solid and good for this type of kid’s promo comic.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 30 **
Released in 1988   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #30 of 41

This issue Captain D talks about Naval Commander Isaac Hull from his life as a youngster all the way to beating Britain’s navy in a battle in 1812, this man helped build America’s pride and helped prove that we can win our freedom and be a powerful nation. The “Fish Tale” for this issue is called Tricky Fish and is about a fish who has figured out how to steal he worms off hooks without being caught, but after getting greedy he finds himself hooked and learning a valuable lesson. And of course the rest of the comic is filled with kids letters, puzzles, jokes and games.

This is a great read and it was pretty cool to learn about Isaac Hull in a fast and very compact history lesson. Guys like him is why America is the nation it is to this day as he fought for freedom and rights. The Fish Tale is pretty fun as well and I like the idea of a greedy sneaky fish stealing worms and when he pushes his luck too much he makes the biggest mistake of his life. This issue’s cover is pretty good and the colors make it eye catching, the interior art as always is a solid kids promo comic style. While this is another average issue in this series I still find it very entertaining like the others in this series.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 31 *1/2
Released in 1988   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #31 of 41

Captain D in this issue shares a brief look at a man who helped sailors by exploring and making charts named Amerigo Vespucci who America is named after. He talks about how Amerigo was a cargo shipper and how he questioned some of the journeys of Christopher Columbus and due to his own wealth he and his shipmates decided to become explores and meet natives around the world that they made peace with and not war and when returning fellow explores desecrated his quest and it was not until decades later that he got the respect he deserved. The “Fish Tale” in this issue is nothing more than a quick Dr. Seuss style poem called The Fish And The Ish. And as always the rest of the comic is filled with games, puzzles, ads and fan letters.

This issue while good is a little below average and the main tale of Amerigo Vespucci goes by way to fast and I feel like he had more a story to talk about. The Fish Tale as well in this one is kind of blah and while the poem style story is fun and written by a kid from Ohio it just didn’t click. Over all really this issue is just ok and while the cover is great and has Captain D and Silly Sailor in a JAWS style situation, and the interior art in this issue seems a little rushed and not as classic as like the issues that came before it. Not much to say about this issue besides it was just kind of blah and that’s a shame as the explore they covered is very interesting.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 32 **
Released in 1988   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #32 of 41

This issue Captain D is bringing explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano who was the first white man to sail from Georgia to Maine and how he and his crew came across many Native America tribes who treated them in many different ways as this was the first time many of them have ever seen a white person. His voyages are legendary and he like all the other sailors we have looked in these comics is important to history. The “Fish Story” for this issue is called “Tale Of Three Minnows” and is about three tiny minnows who want to open their own restaurant and pick an old cave to open it, but sadly for them their first costumer is their last as a massive alligator appears and eats the three new business owners and he closes the restaurant down. The rest of the issues is filled with ads, puzzles, letters and games.

The story of Giovanni da Verrazzano is an interesting one if you like early American history and I for one find him interesting as I love to find tales of Native Americans and how they dealt and felt about white people entering their land. I also think they do a great job of bringing his story to life in the promo fast food kids comic. The Fish Story is really grim as it has three very happy go lucky minnow that want so bad to open a business only for them to be brutally murdered in their business! Pretty brutal stuff for a kids comic as it’s clearly a murder on paper. The cover for this issue is pretty good and showcases Giovanni da Verrazzano, and the interior art work is back to being good and over all this is a pretty solid issue that reminds me why I enjoyed these comics in my youth.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 33 **
Released in 1989   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #33 of 41

Captain D brings you a very brief look at inventor and ocean filmmaker Jacques Cousteau and follow how when young was very much into swimming and even created the aqualung so that divers can stay underwater so much longer. They also show that he was one of the worlds most leading maker of underwater films and as well fought for the world to stop polluting the waters. The “Fish Tale” for this issue is called “Castaway” is about a man who is stuck on an island for 20 years cause a shark keeps circling the island, and finally the man decides to try and make a swim to get to safety and finds that the shark was just made of plastic and now he lives back in the city and is happy. The rest of the issue is filled with games, jokes and letters.

This issue is pretty fun, but sadly delivers a way to fast bio on Jacques Cousteau one of the worlds most respected ocean life filmmakers and an innovator on how we all are able to now “breath” underwater thanks to his tanks. But to also be honest I think kids eating a fish kids meal probably did not care about the full life of Jacques Cousteau. Not to even mention that the Fish Tale in this issue is a little goofy and can clearly be seen that is written by a young kid. The cover is pretty great and has Captain D and Silly Sailor playing chess and really highlights the mascot for this seafood restaurant. The interior art in this issue while good also has a tad of rush look to it. Not much more to say about this issue besides it was an ok average promo comic read.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 34 **1/2
Released in 1989   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #34 of 41

This issue covers Captain Josiah Creesy who is known as the King Of The Clipper Ships who as a young man knew that he was destined to be a captain of a ship! This follows how Josiah Creesy set a world record of sailing a clipper ship from New York to San Francisco in 89 days even though he had a shipmate named Texas Jack and his friend that tried to set him up to fail to set a record. In the end they also talk about how Josiah came out of retirement to command a ship during the Civil War. The “Fish Story” is called “The Lazy Fish” about a super lazy fish who ends up being displayed by his fellow fish so they could make money off just how lazy he is. The rest of the comic is filled with letters, puzzle and games.

This issue of the Exciting Adventures is pretty dang entertaining and they do a fantastic of bring you the quick history story of Josiah Creesy and his world record run that lead him from New York to San Francisco in a short time, and its crazy he did so as the weather and even some of his shipmates tried their best to stop him from doing so. Plus I love that Texas Jack and his no good friend tried their best to in-danger the lives of all aboard just so their Captain would not get the fame. Well done also to keep kids interested in the history lesson as they show the elements of excitement. The Fish Story is silly and yet still fun on a kids comic level as it shows that they understood and helped grow creative minds of kids who wrote in with their tales. This issue is really good on a Fast Food Promo Kids Comic level and the cover is just ok and a little boring and the interior art is pretty good for this style of comic. Over all this is a good read and showcases an interesting history lesson and some simple and fun puzzles and games.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 35   *1/2
Released in 1989   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #35 of 41

In this issue Captain D shares the story of Rachel Carson a young woman who grew up the country in Pennsylvania and dreamed of one day living by the oceans. As she grew up she was a super skilled writer and went to collage for writing only to switch to science were when graduating she go a job in the field of her dreams by being able to work in and around the waters. And while working in this field she learned that humans with poisons used to fight weeds is killing many ocean life when it gets into the waters, and next came her big help to sea life as she wrote the book “The Silent Spring” a book that alerted the world and our government on just how harmful we have been to our nature. The “Fish Tale” in this issue is called “Stanley Saves The Day” and is about a family of catfish who are all talented and spend their days meowing, all but son Stanley who for some reason barks like a dog! All the other catfish dislike him as they think he is weird, that is until his barking scares off a massive shark saving lives and then he becomes a hero. The rest of the issues like always has letters, games, jokes and puzzles.

This is another one of those issues I feel they ran out of a bio topics to talk about and decided to just talk about a book writer who worked in water science who wanted to help save the little fishes from weed killer…most of her bio is spent talking about her schooling….kind of bland and not sure how kids eating their Captain D’s kids meal would feel about it. While Rachel Carson is an interesting person, not sure she is the right choice to excite kids to read. The Fish Tale in this issue is pretty fun and shows Stanley the catfish who is an odd one but also is one who stands his ground, is true to who he is and saves the day…good little story that teaches kids to be who they are. The cover is pretty good and has Captain D and Silly Sailor telling a joke and is eye catching to those who were in the restaurant, and the interior art is good and fitting for a fast food giveaway comic. Over all this issue is kind of boring with the main reason it got 1 ½ stars being that the Fish Tale was pretty good.

Captain D’s Exciting Adventures # 36  **1/2
Released in 1989   Cover Price FREE   Paragon Comics   #36 of 41

In this Exciting Adventure Captain D brings us the story of Captain Samuel Reid who by the age of 11 was working on a ship and even fought with Pirates to make the waters safe for sailors. But one night in 1814, his ship was attacked by British Warships in a neutral docking port, his small crew of brave men were able to hold them off and cause damage to many of their ships. In the end while Reid’s ship was brought down in the port the British Army had such bad damage that all three of their ships had to be docked and get major repairs…helping Americans during the time of war. The “Fish Story” in this issue is called “The Crazy Catch” is about a fisherman who rushed to the lake and forgot his bait and decides to use a picture of a fish as his bait, when he gets a bite and reels in he finds a picture of a bass on his hook! The rest of the issue is filled with letters, puzzles and games.

Ok first thing I have to say is that the coloring on the story of Samuel Reid is top notch and are so bright and well done that it rivals many of the indie comics from the same era of release. The story of Captain Samuel Reid is a good read as the issue focuses on a battle that he and his ship were out numbered and out manned, but still stood their ground and brought down a fleet of British ships. I also like that they through in the fact that he and his wife were apart of the minds that designed our nations flag. Very cool guy Captain Samuel Reid was and a true American Hero who loved his country. The Fish Story in this issue was good and silly and I am sure got a few laughs from young readers at the time. The cover for this issue is ok and nothing special and the interior art is good and again have to praise the coloring. Over all this is a solid issue of Captain D’s Exciting Adventures and brings a thrilling bio of an American hero alive on cheap newsprint pages. Check out the artwork bellow to see the style used in this fast food promo comic series.

But I do want to take a few moments before I end this update and get off this ship to also showcase this amazing art of Dracula that was used in one of these issues and I was thinking about this that for Halloween they should have done a issue of the comic that had Dracula on a ship with Captain D and Silly Sailor and play up on the vampire trying to bite them, but things keep going wrong for him and in the end thanks to Captain D’s sailing skills he saves them all from a terrible hurricane type storm, and this causes Dracula to become their friend. I also want to say that over the decades Captain D’s has had their fare share of merchandise that includes T-Shirts, Hats, Toys, Plush Dolls and of course the comics. So if you are a fan of this fast food joint you can collect some pretty cool stuff. And around 2018 they also tried a pair of new mascots called the D-Gulls (Dave and Desmond) two animated seagulls that sadly did not go over very well.

So Captain D has just docked the ship and our travels on this greasy sea has come to an end and I am really shocked on just how much these comics have aged and while they are by no means masterpieces they are fun FREE kids comic adventures that blends humor and history. I am also shocked on how good the meal was from them and I have to say the Fish and more so the Fried Green Tomatoes were on point. And I want to stress that Fast Food Restaurants should bring back the Free Comics for customers and I am looking at you Big Boy, McDonalds, Shoney’s, Burger King, White Castle and Captain D’s all places that have cool mascots that need to return to or make their comic debuts. Well now that we are back on dry land it’s time to tell you that I will be turning over Rotten Ink to Juliet for the next update as she will be helping me out this year many times so that I can focus on many of the Horror Host Icon updates and besides she wants to share her thoughts of She-Ra and the newer Netflix series that is a reboot to the classic 80’s cartoon and toys. So until next time read a comic or three, eat a fast food meal or two and as always support your local Horror Host. Make sure to come back for the Princess Of Power talk!

Horror Host Icon: Rocky Rococo

Welcome back to Rotten Ink! One thing that goes hand and hand with late night watching of Horror Hosts is a good old pizza pie! That’s right, sitting back with the lights turned down watching your favorite host deliver some laughs alongside the horrors on the small screen all the while munching down on a slice was a way of life for many monster kids over the ages. But what if the world of Horror Hosting and the world of pizza combined and made a show that was like no other? For the folks of Wisconsin this was reality as the restaurant Rocky Rococo brought viewers Masterpizza Theatre, hosted by Rocky Rococo himself, and delivered good times to those who tuned in. So for this update, it’s with great honor that I bring to you Horror Host Icon: Rocky Rococo. Make sure to get some pizza by the slice and enjoy this quick and fun update. Also this is my second Horror Host Icon update of this year to celebrate the 10^th Year Of The Horror Host Hall Of Fame!

Rocky Rococo was born in New Jersey in 1948 and got his love of pizza from his mother and even spent time pushing a food cart in the streets selling pizza by the slice to hungry Jersey residents, all the while wearing down his shoes and making money for his family. Rocky did this for 20 years and decided to leave real pizza behind for a while and spent sometime selling pizza peels for ovens, selling coupons & encyclopedia books as well as running the ring the bell game for a traveling carnival! While selling the pizza peels he ended up in lots of pizza restaurants trying many different styles and while he enjoyed them, he knew he could do better…and in 1974, he proved it when he opened his own restaurant in Madison, Wisconsin and like that, Rocky Rococo became a pizza juggernaut. Rocky is a white suit wearing, wise guy talking, sunglass wearing, pizza loving nice guy who really does enjoy selling pizza by the slice. Rocky is also married to Bess Quality, and together they have one child named Dinah Mite Rococo. Besides selling pizza by the slice, Rocky also really enjoyed rapping, meeting with fans and of course hosting cheesy films for viewers. His hosting style was very fun and upbeat, and he would do skits and such in-between. While Rocky Rococo might not be a household name when it comes to Horror Hosting, he did make his mark and made a major splash in Wisconsin not only with his show MasterPizza Theatre but also with his amazing restaurants.

Rocky Rococo and his MasterPizza Theatre started in the 1990’s and was a way for the pizza chain to showcase their food as well as have their mascot host all types of cheesy family friendly films. The show was viewed late night on Fox 47 in the fine state of Wisconsin and was a fun treat to viewers. The show would feature fun and goofy breaks featuring Rocky and was filmed in the chains restaurants and would have fellow “workers” as people around him all the while promoting the pizza and salad bars they had. They would also feature comedians as well as musical and dancing bits and all the while Rocky would have a smile on his face. MasterPizza Theatre had a fantastic and super fun vibe and was a smart why to not only entertain but also showcase the food they could get for lunch and dinner, I for one would have had friends over and ordered a couple of pizzas from Rocky Rococos and had a movie night when the show was on air…that is if I lived in Wisconsin during this shows run on TV. While MasterPizza Theatre might not be a massive household name when it comes to Horror Host shows and while Rocky Rococo is more known as a mascot for a fast food pizza place then a Horror Host…they both made an impact in the world of Horror Hosting and meant something to the viewers.

James Martin Pedersen was the actor who played Rocky Rococo and was in fact the whole face of the pizza brand as he starred not only in MasterPizza Theatre but also was in their commercials as well as in their logo. James Martin Pedersen was very well loved in Wisconsin and was by all accounts an icon of the state’s culture. But sadly James passed away on February 6, 2016, and this was indeed a sad day for fans. With his passing the people of Rocky Rococo Pizza, his fans, pizza lovers and of course his family suffered a big loss. While he is gone, the icon that is Rocky Rococo will live on forever.

I first found out about MasterPizza Theater in 2019 when the man Rocky Rococo was suggested to be considered for a future Horror Host Hall Of Fame ballot, and after getting an episode I myself became a fan of Rocky as a Horror Host as I found his style silly and very fun and I can see why the state of Wisconsin loved him so much. What was so surprising is that Rocky Rococo, who was a fast food pizza joint mascot, worked really well as a movie host, and of course it was a great way to make viewers and myself crave some pizza as they clearly used the show as one giant commercial. The thing that really made this show work was Rocky Rococo himself as he is just such a fun character who had such a fun loving attitude as well as seemed like a cartoon character come to life. I am sure some viewers at the time would get annoyed at all the plugs for the types of pizza they had on the menu, but to me that just added to the over all good natured charm. I feel that many local TV stations are missing the boat nowadays by not featuring a local or even syndicated Horror Host on their networks. I mean sure some are lucky to have a Host from their neck of the woods on broadcast TV and all those who get ME-TV get Svengoolie…but to me this is sadly not enough and as you fans of Horror Hosts know streaming services are delivering the hosting goods as Joe Bob Briggs is on Shudder and for awhile Mystery Science Theater 3000 returned on Netflix…while stations like USA Network, TNT, TBS and our local stations like Channel 22 are just playing terrible reruns of crime shows and could bring back the likes of Up All Night, Monstervision, Super Scary Saturday and Shock Theater. In other words the world needs more fun Horror Host shows like MasterPizza Theatre and hosts like Rocky Rococo.

Here in Ohio, we have no Rocky Rococo’s anymore due to the fact our state just didn’t support it when they did take a chance. Ohio, believe it or not, is a state that is filled with many pizza restaurants with some of Dayton’s most popular being ones like Marion’s Piazza, Cassano’s Pizza King, The Pizza Bandit, Flying Pizza, Happy’s Pizza, Troni’s, Cousin Vinny’s, Jet’s Pizza and The Pizza Factory. But to do this Horror Host Icon update right, Juliet and I knew we had to drive over 6hrs away to have a meal at the closest Rocky Rococo’s to us…well that was until the coronavirus pandemic of 2020 that put a big damper on our plans and canceled our trip to Racine, WI to have a slice of Rocky Rococo pizza along with our pals Scott Scarborough and Damien Brunk. Now I cannot complain too much as safety during these times should come first, and while I really wanted a piece of pizza from Rocky, it was just not meant to be. Once things get back to normal, Juliet and I will try and make this quest, and I will update this Horror Host Icon update with it!

So as you can see, Rocky Rococo pizza is pretty tasty treat for fans of the pizza chain, and now we are at the point of this update where I will take a look at the episode I have of MasterPizza Theater. I only have one episode, and I want to thank Horror Host Freakshow for hooking me up with it. I want to remind you that I will not be giving this episode a star rating and I will be taking the film’s write up from IMDB and will be writing the host segments breakdown myself. So grab a pizza by the slice, and let’s see what MasterPizza Theatre has to offer.

MasterPizza Theatre: Stoogemania
Starring – Josh Mostel & Victoria Jackson     Rated PG      1986

Host: Rocky Rococo opens the show at one of the restaurants and before we start the first part of the movie, we go to a music video with a song by Rocky who talks about the Pizza Blues. Next is a storybook skit about pizza told by Patsy and then Rocky talks about his birthday bash and a sale they have going on. Rocky next brings in a comedian named Dave to do a quick stand up act for the people in the studio of MasterPizza Theatre. And then Rocky once more promotes his pizza and then Dave returns with more comedy in a Twilight Zone skit. Next are fans trying to do lines for a Rocky Rococo Pizza Commercial, and they are all terrible. Rocky then introduces a new segment he calls “Guys That Can’t Rap” and two terrible guys try to rap and dance…and they are bad. In the end Rocky comes out and thanks the cast and crew plus the viewers and the janitor comes in to clean up. Oh and I should say throughout is commercials for Rocky Rococo Pizza!

Movie: The film centers on Howard F. Howard, an overweight everyman. Engaged to Beverly, the woman of his dreams, Howard has one problem – an overactive fixation with The Three Stooges. Everywhere Howard goes, he sees Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Curly Howard intruding on his life. Determined to overcome his fixation, Howard and Beverly prepare for their wedding. But on his way to the ceremony, Howard descends into Stoogemania and finds himself walking into the city streets with other Stoogemaniacs. His only hope is commitment to the Stooge Hills sanitarium, under the care of a renowned psychologist, until the inmates take over the asylum on graduation day.

Rocky Rococo and MasterPizza Theatre is a great example of how a business can develop a Horror Host program, deliver family entertainment by choosing mostly comedies and old horror films with gorillas, all the while making them hungry for a slice or your company’s pizza or even a salad from your salad bar. I am really happy that Freakshow introduced me to this show as this was lots of fun and made a fan out of me. And I am going to do my best to track down more episodes of MasterPizza Theatre and when I find them, I will add them to this update…so make sure to check back and see! For our next update, we will be walking away from Rocky Rococo and Horror Hosting for the time being as we will be trading Pizza for a look at Fast Food Seafood as I will be covering the free promo comics from Captain D’s. So until next time, read a comic or three, watch a movie or two and as always support your local Horror Host. See you next update for a greasy fried fish good time!

Best Fried Food Chicken – Dayton, Ohio Edition

Welcome back to Rotten Ink. For this update I am going to do something a little weird and yet so fitting for my tiny slice of the world-wide-web. I am sure you are wondering just what I am up to, right? Well alongside my cousin Stephen and my pal Josh, we are going to decide who has the best fast food fried chicken in the Dayton, Ohio area! You see originally a few years back we were going to do this for signature fast food hamburgers, but unlucky me cannot eat red meat anymore…so we all decided to do this with ranking fried chicken instead! We decided that Saturday nights would be our Fried Chicken eating time, we would have to eat a three-piece meal after work and we would base our voting on these things:

Presentation: How well the chicken looks as well as the over all look of how the restaurant put our meal together.

Breading: How the breading tastes with how much flavor it packs.

Tenderness: How juicy the chicken meat is.

Taste: The over all taste of the Fried Chicken, how well do all these elements blend together.

Each of these things are graded on a scale of ½ – 5 points each with a perfect score being 20 and the lowest being 2 points. So if you are ready, let’s talk Fast Food Chicken for this silly update that could be the start of Rotten Ink’s food reviews! So pack some extra napkins as this one is going to get a little greasy. Oh and let’s start our list from worst to best. We ate a total of six restaurants, and “Thank You” to all these Fried Chicken places for making this update possible. Also we only based this on one meal and keep in mind all fried chicken is good fried chicken so just sick back and have fun with this update.

# 6

Lee’s 3pc Chicken was one we ate around 8:35pm, and the presentation for me was very low as I found my chicken not too appealing and very dry looking and my wing was thrown in with my green beans. So I gave it a 2.5 as again the presentation was not that appealing at all. Next up was the breading that was lacking in flavor and had just a black pepper taste earning a score of 2. The tenderness was not present for most of the chicken in this meal, and because the leg was pretty dang tender I gave it a 2.5…and I am not sure why I gave it that high. And lastly is taste, and over all I gave it 2.5 as well as the Presentation and Tenderness was not top notch and the Breading was what kept the meal very tasty. I should also note that after I ate the chicken I had green beans, mashed potatoes with gravy and a Pepsi to drink. Lee’s is the second most popular fast food chicken restaurant here in Ohio, and while I’ve had good meals from them before, this was not one of them, and that’s why here on Rotten Ink it made it to the #6 spot. I should also say that both Stephen and Josh rated their 3pc chicken about the same as mine which helped it lock this spot. Total Score for Lee’s is 24.5 out of 60.

# 5

Church’s 3pc Chicken was one we ate around 9:00pm, and the presentation for me was standard as I found my chicken to appealing but nothing special. So I gave it a 2.5 as again the presentation was average. Next up was the breading that was lacking in flavor and was very bland. I mean the breading to me had no flavor at all so that earned it the score of 2 from me. The tenderness for Churches was very surprising as I found the meat to be tender and juicy, and this was a solid 3 from me! And lastly is taste, and over all I gave it 2.5 as the Presentation and Breading was average and the tenderness was what kept the meal really good thanks to the Chicken leg. I should also note that after I ate the chicken, I had mashed potatoes with gravy that was just okay and a tasty honey biscuit. Church’s Chicken was a fast food place I ate lots when I worked near one, and I find it to be a good cheap chicken restaurant that, while not at the top, it did lock the # 5 spot! And this was one 3-piece meal that we all gave almost the same scores! Good old Church’s brought in a total score of 31.5 out of 60.

# 4

The KFC 3pc Chicken was one we ate around 8:30pm, and the presentation for me was very low as I found my chicken not too appealing and also I felt was very small compared to other chicken I have had from them in the past. So I gave it a 1 as again the presentation was not that appealing. Next up, the classic 11 herb and spices for the breading is legendary and there is a reason so many other fried chicken places have tried to mimic the recipe, so I gave it a very solid 4! Now for tenderness I would say that the three pieces I ate was good but was lacking in juice and tasted more like store bought oven baked fried chicken…so in other words, it was middle of the road hence I gave it the score of 2.5 as it was very average. And lastly is taste, and over all I gave it 2.5 as well as the Presentation and Tenderness was not top notch and the Breading was what kept the meal very tasty. After I ate the chicken, I had green beans, mashed potatoes with gravy and a Pepsi to drink. Over all KFC is the most popular Fast Food Fried Chicken Restaurants and here on Rotten Ink it made it to the # 4 spot, showing that not all popular things are the best! Keep in mind, I do like KFC and respect what Colonel Harland Sanders did for the world of Fried Chicken it’s just a shame that the meal this time for me was just so-so. I should also say that both Stephen and Josh rated their 3pc chicken slightly better then I did which helped it lock this spot. The 11 Herb and Spices brought in a total score of 36.5 out of 60.

# 3

Popeyes was eaten on October 5, 2019 at around 9:45pm and was our dinner for the evening. When getting this three piece meal, it came in a box with the companies logo on it and once opened the fried chicken was covered in Caujun Fries and the chicken itself looked really good and that’s why I ended up giving it a score of 3 for presentation! I moved on to tasting the breading that was on my chicken and after taking bites of it I found that it was really good and had its own style of flavor unique to Popeyes and that’s why I as well gave it the score of 4! The Tenderness of the chicken was good with the leg being juicy and the wing being kind of dry, and that’s why I decided to give it a score of 3.5. The taste of the chicken, the great presentation and the tasty breading made for a top notch meal, and that’s why it got a 4 and was a solid meal with a great tasting biscuit, flavorful fries and a cold Coke to drink. I have yet to have a bad meal from Popeyes and after adding up the scores from Josh, Steve and I they got 40 out of 50 locking the 3rd spot easily.

# 2

On October 11, 2019 we had Sharks Fish & Chicken for lunch, and as always we all got a three-piece meal and we ate it around 1pm. The meal came in a Styrofoam container and the three pieces of chicken sat on top of a mountain of french fries, two pieces of white bread and came with coleslaw and hot sauce, and when looking at this I was impressed and it reminded me of a good home cooked meal so that’s why for presentation I gave it a very solid 3 ½. Next up was the breading and after taking a few bites off one piece that tasted slightly over cooked, I decided to take some off another piece, and wow it was very good and had a salty and yet kind of sweet taste and I gave it 4 points. When eating my first piece as I stated before it was slightly over cooked and the meat was a little dry, but good gosh the next two piece was so juicy my mouth is watering just thinking about it and that’s why for tenderness I gave it a 4. And lastly, the taste over all was great and the breading and the juicy meat is what locked 4 more points from me! I would say that this was a really good meal and very tasty and after adding up all out points Sharks got a score of 43.5 out of 50 showing that Sharks knows how to do friend chicken right!

# 1

Krispy Krunchy Chicken was eaten on September 28, 2019 at around 2:30pm and instead of dinner, we had them for lunch! When getting this three piece meal it came in a nice white bag that had the companies logo on it and once out of the bag, the friend chicken and sides looked very tasty and that’s why I ended up given it a score of 3.5 for presentation! I moved on to tasting the breading that was on my chicken and after taking several bites of just the breading, I found that it was amazing and rivaled the 11 Herb and Spices of KFC and that’s why I as well gave it the score of 4! Like the breading the tenderness of the chicken was on point and was very juicy and very tender and that’s why I gave it a 4.5 as it was very close to being perfect. The taste of the juicy tender chicken and the flavorful breading made for a fantastic meal that was top notch and that’s why it got a 4.5 and was again almost perfect. I want to also note that I had Mashed Potatoes and a biscuit with my meal, and they as well were really good. Stephen and I rated Krispy Krunchy very similar as Josh was a little more rough with them and gave lower points. And after adding our scores together Krispy Krunchy brought in 45 out of 60!

So there you have it, in Dayton, Ohio a group of three friends have awarded the Best Fast Food Chicken Award to Krispy Krunchy Chicken as the meal we all had was pretty dang fantastic! But I am sure you are wondering what each person’s top three chicken places were. Well, let me break that down for you as well and will list starting with the top ones on each person’s list.

Stephen: Krispy Krunchy, Sharks and Popeyes
Josh: KFC, Sharks and Popeyes
Matt: Krispy Krunchy, Sharks, Popeyes

Well I hope you enjoyed this silly update and who knows maybe next time we will cover some other weird food and let you the readers know what is the best of the best in our books. I am also working on the design for these Food Review updates so bear with me as I know this one is not that visual appealing, and I hope for the next one it will be amazing! So for my next update I am walking out on Fast Food and will diving into another of our American Hero updates, just in time for the Fourth of July.  Our hero this time? Super Green Beret! So until next time, read a comic of three, eat a friend chicken meal or two and as always support your local Horror Host. See you next time for the adventures of the Super Green Beret.

 

The Super Powered Cow Heroes Of Chick-fil-A!

Welcome back to Rotten Ink, can I take your order? Wait what am I saying!? I am in the mood to talk Fast Food again, and this time around we are leaving McDonalds, Dominos and KFC behind and will be looking at the chicken place Chick-Fil-A and their kid’s meal comics called “Amazing Cow Heroes” that features super powered cows who want the world to eat more chicken! In this update we will be taking a look at not only the comics they made but also the history of the company, its founder, their mascots and of course I will eat a meal from there and review it as well! So if you’re ready to once more dive into the greasy world of fast food restaurants, let’s slide our way into Chick-fil-A and see why this is Americas favorite chicken place.

So let’s start by taken a look at Samuel Truett Cathy, who was the founder of Chick-fil-A and was more than just a man who wanted to sell chicken sandwiches! Samuel was born on March 14, 1921 in Eatonton, Georgia and when older went to Boys High School in Atlanta. Once able, he joined the army and survived during World War II. Once back he opened his first restaurant in Atlanta called the “Dwarf Grill” and while the owner he and his brother Ben created what would be the signature chicken sandwich for the chain of restaurants they would call “Chick-fil-A”! And in 1948, he married his wife Jeannette and had a total of three children all of whom now own and run his chicken empire. Samuel was also a very religious man and was a Baptist who taught Sunday School for 50 years at the First Baptist Church in Jonesboro. He made it that his Chick-fil-A as well as his pizza place called “Upscale Pizza” closed on Sundays in order for workers to spend time with their families as well as attend church. He also had scholarships for his workers and was given many awards over the years like President’s Call to Service Award and he was named a Georgia Trustee! He also wrote five books and even became a motivational speaker and was well respected by his friends, family and community. And in 2013, he retired from being the CEO and chairman of Chick-fil-A and turned it over to his son Dan. Sadly Samuel passed away on September 8, 2014 at the age of 93 from complications from diabetes and so ended his legacy of being a visionary when it came to fast food. During his lifetime, Samuel built himself an empire of chicken and even pushed that all his restaurants food quality be very high and never settled for processed and low-grade food. While some people judge him for his overly religious views and how that’s reflected in the current Chick-fil-A, the one thing many of us can agree on is that their chicken sandwiches are pretty dang good.

Chick-fil-A was created as its own brand in 1967 and was an offshoot of a restaurant called Dwarf Grill both created by Samuel Truett Cathy who used a pressure cooker for his chicken that would rival the cook time of any burger place. Many people may not know that the first Chick-fil-A was in the Greenbriar Mall in Atlanta, and from there, the expanded and wound up in many malls all over the USA making them a must eat for many mall goers. The first stand-alone store was in Atlanta as well and opened on North Druid Hills Road in 1986, and this helped spark them to grow even more. And besides malls and stand alone restaurants, Chick-fil-A is now in hospitals, colleges and airports making it a very popular place to eat for people in a hurry. Over the years Chick-fil-A has dug its claws into the world of fast food chicken and has taken the lead money maker in that fast food fight and has made KFC have to step up their game and has left “Lees Famous Recipe”, “Krispy Krunchy Chicken” and “Popeye’s Chicken” way behind when coming to bringing in money. But while they are a very popular chicken restaurant, they have also had their share of issues with fast food eaters and people in general as they have been questioned about the ingredients of their food as well as the use of antibiotics in their poultry, all things they are claiming to be fixing or have fixed. But the biggest hit against them comes from their stance on same sex marriage and LGBTQ rights, and current owner Dan Cathy has gone on the record denouncing marriage equality as well as had their company donate to many anti-LGBTQ churches and groups. This, of course, sparked heat on them as people are upset that a Fast Food place would take a stand that would deny human rights, while other sides were proud that they stood strong in the religious beliefs that their company was founded on. While nothing has been really settled about their political agenda, Chick-fil-A continues to be a money making fast food place who for a short time after marriage equality became federal law tried to distance themselves from political issues. But let’s move away from that as Rotten Ink is about fun and not politics and religion which seems to be the source of lots of anger. As of today they have over 2,200 stores and plans for more in the cards, not to mention they are a company worth billions of dollars! If you like chicken sandwiches, they are a place to go…unless it’s Sunday…then you will have to go elsewhere for your fast food.

Here in the Dayton, Ohio area the Chick-fil-A that I knew of was in the Dayton Mall and is still there to this day in 2019! And I can remember eating there when I was a youngster with my parents as well as cousins and always enjoyed their waffle fries and a chicken sandwich with cheese. Over the years now they have gone into all our indoor malls as well as stand alone restaurants have popped up, and I have found myself eating at them more often than before because of co-workers at work who enjoy them and one of my ex-girlfriends also really enjoyed them. So for this update I am going to go and get myself a meal from there and grade it! For this update I ordered myself a Chicken Sandwich with Cheese and a large order of Waffle Fries with a chocolate milkshake to drink from the location that was near Town N Country on September 18, 2018. I will grade this meal on a scale from 1-4 stars and keep in mind this scale is based on fast food level and not on the scale for a good home cooked meal or a higher end restaurant. So let’s start with the chocolate milk shake that was well made and had a rich taste with a fresh taste, I would gave it 3 stars as it was very tasty! The waffle fries that normally are my favorite part of the meal at Chick-fil-A this time around were a little bit of a letdown as they were just kind of bland and I even had to use Texas Pete to spice them up and give them a little more taste, I would give them 2 stars for this visit. Now the main event is the chicken sandwich with cheese and pickles, and man I have to say this was one tasty juicy sandwich that gets a 3 ½ star rating from this comic reader as the taste was top notch and the mix of chicken, pickles and cheese was a great combination. Oh and I would say the over all experience at the restaurant would be 3 stars as it was a nice and clean and the workers were all nice people and did their jobs well. Over all I would say this was a good meal from a place that does chicken sandwiches right.

Most fast food places have a mascot like Burger King has the Magical Burger King, McDonalds has Ronald and Dominos had The Noid to name a very few, and Chick-fil-A is no different as they have Cows as theirs….yep cows….beef….and the slogan “Eat Mor Chikin” was made for them as they want you to stop eating burgers and eat chicken instead. These cows are always trying to warn and get their message across that red meat is not good and chicken is tasty! It also seems like their main target is “McDonalds” that is called “Circus Burgers” in their world. These cows do silly things in the commercials from stealing fast food burgers from humans all the way to interrupting football games with their messages. The thing that sets the Chick-fil-A Cows apart from most other fast food mascots is that they are not just geared toward youngsters but are fun and silly for all ages. But while they are meant for all ages, this also makes them a little less fun and iconic as the other mascots meant for kids as they are nowhere near as iconic as Ronald McDonald, but I would say they are on par with Mr. Delicious from Rax who was also more geared toward all ages. But while they might not be that colorful or over the top entertaining, they still have made their mark on the world of fast food advertisement and many fast food eaters know who they are and have enjoyed them over the years.

I want to also bring to you reader’s attention that the superheroes the Amazing Cow Heroes were pretty popular, and Chick-fil-A really pushed them hard by making not only the comic books but also a t-shirt and wall calendar! They even had them in a few commercials showing that they really did stand behind their heroes. It would have been crazy if this group of cows ended up taking off and taking the comic world by storm…would we be all flocking to theaters to see the newest CFA Properties Inc. shared universe movie? Would Netflix have a show based on Cold Cuts that millions would binge watch? And would Hasbro be releasing action figures of the Gristle Missile! All these questions could have had the answer yes if only Amazing Cows would have hit it big with comic readers.

So now that we have taken a look at Chick-fil-A as a restaurant, their cow mascots and even their founder S. Truett Cathy, it’s that the time we take a look at the comic books based on their cows who are now superheroes! These comics were promos in their kids meals and started in 2010 with a total of five issues, and then in 2012 it came back for another five issues. The first five issues are adventures of a single cow, and think of them as the “Marvel Premiere” issues as they showcase our cast of heroes with the last five being more like “Marvel Team Up” as it pairs two of them together in an adventure. So for this update I decided to only cover the first five issues as they seemed like the more fun ones plus they all had amazing and silly covers as you will soon see, plus for some reason these comics are pretty pricy for something so silly. I want to thank Mavericks Cards And Comic as well as Amazon for having these issues in stock for making this update possible. And these cows are standing next to me and want me to remind you that I grade these issues on a star scale of 1 to 4 and you are looking for how well the comic stays to the source material, its entertainment value and its art and story. And I should say these are first time reads for me and my first impression is that I am going to dig Gristle Missile the most. So if you’re ready, let’s eat a chicken sandwich and take a look at these super powered cows brought to us by Chick-fil-A!

Amazing Cow Heroes # 1  **1/2
Released in 2010      Cover Price $0.00      CFA Properties Inc.      # 1 of 10

Sir Brisket, the owner of Royale Beef Buffet has a sinister plan to set free a cloud that will make the people of Burgerburgh crave only burgers from his restaurant, and this evil plan is being carried out by burger robots! But before this plan can happen, cow hero deciBell and her super sonic moo saves the day and defeats the burger bots and destroyes the cloud machine. The cops and deciBell are clueless to what fast food burger place had this plot at hand and deciBell finds some scrap metal from the machine and decided to run some tests on it to find the mastermind behind this plot! Meanwhile King Brisket is ragging mad at his plot failing as he wanted to make tons of cash and his sidekick Amazing Merloin has a magic lasso that he can use on people and make them crave burgers from their restaurant, and they start using it on the good people in town. Meanwhile deciBell finds BBQ sauce on the metal and traces it back to King Brisket and she informs the cops who head to Royale Beef Buffet as does she. But when she gets there, to her horror, the cops are all eating burgers as is the good people of Burgerburgh as the lasso has turned them all into mindless red meat eaters! deciBell does what she knows will work and that’s sonic moo at them all and it breaks the trance, and she along with the cops head towards Sir Briskets homebase and bust him, but not before he himself is lassoed by accident and now craves chicken sandwiches!

Wow, this was a silly read and yet I found myself enjoying this kids comic as I feel like it fits perfectly with many of the comics that Archie, Harvey and even Star released in the 80’s and early 90’s. The plot is very simple and has our super sonic voiced cow hero deciBell stopping plots by a greedy fast food burger tyrant that only cares about money and not the food he is making for people to eat. The Amazing Cow Hero we meet in this first issue is deciBell who has the power of a sonic moo that can defeat enemies as well as break trances and brainwashing people are under. She is also super smart and can run analyzes on clues as well as can drive a van. Her goal is to protect the good people of Burgerburgh and to spread the word that people should eat more chicken. Our main villain is Sir Brisket, a fat mascot and owner of a fast food burger place that really loves money and will do under handed and illegal things to make people crave and eat at his restaurant and is a parody clearly of the Magical Burger King and maybe even a little Roy Rogers thrown in as he owned a chain of Roast Beef food chains. Sir Brisket is also surrounded by other weird characters that are a mix of medieval and cowboys including the even more goofy Amazing Merloin! No joke, while the story is very cheesy, it does serve a purpose as making a cow a likable hero could turn young readers away from eating red meat as it humanizes and gives cows a bigger more lovable personality and pushes for them to eat chicken. The cover is great and also for some reason reminds me of a milk ad and for a kids meal promo comic cover, it’s pretty eye catching. The interior art is done by Jason Howard who many of you comic readers might know from his work on the Image Comic series Amazing Wolf-Man, and his art is really good and fitting for this type of kids comic. Over all this is a great start for a comic series given away by a fast food chicken joint.

Amazing Cow Heroes # 2  **
Released in 2010     Cover Price $0.00     CFA Properties Inc.     # 2 of 10

A cow is involved in a very bad tractor accident that leaves her head and limbs damaged. Her owner Dr. Waffl Frize rebuilds her using parts on an old broke down mechanical bull turning her into Cowborg, a half cow and half machine creature who has powers beyond any normal cows including super jumps and the power to lift things with her fake eye! Dr. Waffl Frize and Cowborg decide to go to the county fair and enter the cow judging contest, and there they meet the evil The Judge who disqualifies her and then fails all the other cows and tries to steal them to turn into hamburger meat! And while the townsfolk are in an uproar Cowborg goes into action and has to save the people on a ferries wheel that The Judge has sabotaged as well a stop a rampaging monster truck! Finally Cowborg is able to track down The Judge and save the cows from the slaughter and have this crooked crook judge arrested.

This second issue is just as silly as the first and has the plot of a cow that is rebuilt with mechanical parts and given super powers having to save other cows from being kidnapped and turned into hamburgers! Our Cow Hero in this issue is Cowborg who is clearly based off DC Comics Cyborg with a little of TV’s Six Million Dollar Man thrown in. Her superpowers are she is able to run fast, jump super high and far, freeze things, short out wires and has a tractor beam eye. While Cowborg is cool, she is also lacking a personality like deciBell and seems to come off kind of you know robotic. Her owner Dr. Waffl Frize is a goof who clearly cares about cows as imagine all the hard work and money that was spent to turn one injured cow into a superhero. The Judge is a bad guy who has a big ego and seems to enjoy bulling others and really just wants to make money on selling stolen cows for their meat, and he doesn’t mind injuring and possibly killing people to get what he wants. This issue does have a great kids comic vibe I just found it to be a little slower and lacking slightly in the charm department. The cover is good and looks more like a poster and not a comic cover, and the interior art is solid and is done by Dan Panosian who is known for his work with Marvel Comics and heroes like Hulk, Conan and Iron Man. Over all it’s a good silly read that is nothing special and is used to spread the message of red meat is bad and chicken is good.

Amazing Cow Heroes # 3  *
Released in 2010     Cover Price $0.00     CFA Properties Inc.     # 3 of 10

All across America hamburgers from Circus Burger have become missing off the company’s grills as well as out of customers hands! And the CEO Seymor Greez of the company decides to send in three clowns to solve the mystery, and they find out that the cow hero Swatter is to blame. Seymor hires a pair of rodeo clowns, and they are able to sneak attack Swatter and tie up his tail that leaves him captive and at the mercy of Circus Burger. Seymor ends up having a big circus event in town and uses the captured cow hero as the main attraction as he is going to force him to do the trapeze with no net and his tail still tied up! As the evil CEO pushes Swatter off the platform, our hero’s tail becomes untied and he is able to pull off some amazing stunts and even leave a message drawn on the ground by his tail that says “Eat Mor Chikin”!

This superhero cow adventure kids comic is sadly not all that good and is really bland and kind of boring. The plot of this issue has Swatter, a cow hero stealing grills and burgers from people at Circus Burger with his super long and fast tail, and this makes the CEO mad who ends up kidnapping the cow hero and tries to force him to do a stunt and die in front of a crowd of people…only for his plot to fail. Swatter is thus far the only male hero in our comic series, and I guess he should be call Amazing Bull Hero! His superpower is that he has a long tail that he can use as a whip…yep, that’s it. The main bad guy is Seymor Greez, who is the CEO of Circus Burgers who has hired clowns as goons and doesn’t mind taking an animal and trying to make it have an accident in front of a ton of families who came to a circus for good times! So think about that, this guy wants kids to watch a cow fall from the sky and splat on the ground. This guy could be the worst in our villains thus far as he is cold blooded, not only to cows but other humans. Over all not much to say about this issue besides it was pretty lame and not much adventure goes on in it. Oh and it’s clear that this one is making fun of McDonalds. The cover is good, and Gregg Schigiel who is known for his work on Spider-Man for Marvel and is just okay in this comic as its nothing special does the interior art. So with that, let’s move onto issue four and see if they can get this moootastic series back on track.

Amazing Cow Heroes # 4  **
Released in 2010     Cover Price $0.00     CFA Properties Inc.     # 4 of 10

A massive ship at sea is caught in a terrible thunderstorm and lightning hits the side of the ship causing a hole, and one of the cows being shipped falls through it and is left to freeze in the water. Once the cow turns into a solid block of ice, a whale helps get her to land and penguins unfreeze her and give her a superhero suit as now her breath can freeze things and she is now known as Cold Cuts! While mastering her powers she even saves her new friends the penguins from a hungry seal by freezing it and knows she must find the ship she fell from so she can save her friends from becoming people’s dinners. Cold Cuts uses her ice breath to build an ice bridge and catches up with the ship and takes down the captain and his crew and frees her friends and sails the ship back home as her mission is clear and that’s to spread the word that people need to eat more chicken.

This is another fun but average kids comic featuring the hero cows of Chick-fil-A who really are trying their best to make kids fall in love with cows so they will stop eating at McDonalds, Burger King, Wendy’s and other fast food burger places. This issue’s plot is bare bones and has a cow freezing and getting powers to freeze other things with her breath stopping a ship filled with cows who are slated to be killed for their meat. Cold Cuts is very much inspired by Marvel Comics Iceman and can use her breath to not only freeze objects and people but also can use it to communicate and tell a story. She is a pretty cool cow hero and one of the better ones thus far behind deciBell. The bad guys in the issue are the ship’s crew but they put up no fight and are super weak and are defeated really fast. I dig the idea of Cold Cuts’ friends being penguins and that at the end of the issue she is steering the ship…I just picture her still lost at sea as clearly she can not read a compass! The issue is over all pretty good but really gives not much to talk about as it’s so simple and only has two real messages and that’s eat more chicken and be a good person. The cover is pretty great and eye catching, and the interior art is done by John Sprengelmeyer and is good as you might know his work for well Chick-fil-A! Over all fun kids comic read and showcases cows can be heroes!

Amazing Cow Heroes # 5  **
Released in 2010      Cover Price $0.00     CFA Properties Inc.     # 5 of 10

As a young calf, Gristle Missile came in contact with a meteor from space and gained the ability to run super fast! Once grown up he has had enough as his owner the farmer is grilling out hamburgers and he decides to zoom by and take them as well as leave a message for him to eat more chicken! The farmer is mad and gets on his lawnmower and starts to chase the Gristle Missile who makes the run of his life as he zooms past race horses and wins the big one. He then zooms past a cop who joins the chase and he is able to out run them all! Once away from the farm, he knows his mission in life is to stop people from eating burgers and sets his sight on Beefytown Burger and always steals all their meat! Well they set a trap for him that backfires as Gristle Missile escapes it and saves the day by taking down the Beefytown Owner and exposing his plan to take over the town! In the end Gristle Missile gets the key to the city and is the town’s savior.

This 5^th issue in Amazing Cow Heroes not only shows our second male hero but also is a pretty solid kids comic issue that features a hero who means business when it comes to people not eating red meat! The plot has a cow getting super powers from a meteor that allows him to run super fast and this scares evil people who push hamburgers on people as his goal is to make sure they don’t! Gristle Missile is silent yet super cool as I think he is my favorite of the cow heroes as his speed is like The Flash and he has a go get them attitude and really hates hamburgers. Plus he doesn’t treat people like the enemy only the meat is. The issue’s main bad guys are the Beefytown people as they push terrible burgers on people and are placing restaurants all over town with the goal being to over run and take over, plus I think they really hate Gristle Missile as he steals their meat giving new life to the saying “Where’s the Beef?” that Wendy’s made popular in the 80’s. So while the plot is pretty standard, the over all feel has a nice mix of Fast Food Promo Comic and Kids Comic making it a fun and enjoyable read for youngsters and the young at heart. The cover is eyecatching and reminds me of a Flash cover with the interior art being good and done by Josh Adams. Over all a great comic to end our look at Chick-fil-A comics on and is one I enjoyed. As I said before, this comic series has five more issues but they are team up issues and I only wanted to cover the solo issues so if you have any interest make sure to track them down. Below is some art from some of the first five issues so you can get a feeling for the series.

So as you can see, Chick-fil-A entered the world of fast food promo comics and over all did not do that bad of a job bringing enjoyable kids comics to readers. In fact, I would like to see them return and offer more solo Amazing Cow Adventures featuring new super powered cows done by new artist and writers. But I think it’s time we leave the world of greasy fast food behind and take a look a classic Horror Movie character! Yep, we will be taken a look at The Hunchback From Notre Dame from the 1956 version! So until next time Eat More Chicken, Read a comic or two and as always support your local Horror Host. See you next time for a bell ringing good time!

Harland Sanders The Fried Chicken Colonel Of Kentucky

Who doesn’t love some good old greasy fried chicken? Well maybe vegetarians, vegans and people who are watching their weight are not so much fans of this crispy fried death. When I was a youngster, my Grandma Salyers was an amazing cook and made lots of great southern style meals complete with collared greens, green beans with salt pork, fried green tomatoes, green onions and of course fried chicken! I loved eating at my Grandma’s house as her home cooking could not be beat and her fried chicken was at the top of my request list next to her homemade chicken or beef noodles and fried green tomatoes. One of the best parts about the meals also was that all the veggies were picked from their garden.  Man, I miss those days and more importantly miss my grandparents who sadly both have passed away. The theme of this update is fried chicken and one man, who along with 11 herb and spices made a recipe that took the United States by storm and gave us the fast food restaurant called Kentucky Fried Chicken.  That man is Colonel Sanders! So let’s order a bucket of chicken with some mashed potatoes and gravy and some biscuits with honey and talk about this Kentucky icon.

Harland David Sanders was born on September 9, 1890 in a small house near Henryville, Indiana and was the oldest of three children. He grew up going to church and enjoying a good farm family environment, but things got a little rougher when his father passed away and his mother had to take a job. Harland was forced to act as his siblings’ caretaker, but at this young age he learned to make food and do some creative things with meats, breads and vegetables. At the age of 10, he also took a job as a farmhand for a to help out with money. In 1902, seven years after his father’s death, his mom re-married, and they all moved to Greenwood, Indiana.  Harland found himself at odds with his new stepdad, and this lead to him dropping out of school in the 7^th grade and taking lots of jobs in the surrounding towns. At the age of 14, he moved away from his mother with her blessing and lived with his uncle in New Albany, Indiana to work as a steelcar conductor. In 1906 Harland joined the United States Army as a teamster and survived in Cuba until being honorably discharged in 1907 as he lied about is age.  He then moved to Alabama where another of his uncles lived and worked for the railway as a blacksmith’s helper and later cleaned ash pans of trains, and at 16 he became a steam engine stoker. While working for the railway of Alabama, he meet Josephine King who he would marry and have one son and two daughters with.  Sadly his son Harland Jr. passed away very young from infected tonsils.

The Sanders family would next move to Jackson, Tennessee as Harland took a job for the Ilinois Central Railroad as steam engine stoker and studied law at night via La Salle Extension University. Harland lost his job at the railway when he got into a a brawl with a fellow worker. He found work at another railway company and his law work came to an end when he once more got into a brawl with his own client in court! Harland and his family had a rough time as he floated from job to job and even was fired from selling life insurance for insubordination. Things turned around for him in 1920 when he established a ferry boat company on the Ohio River that operated from Jeffersonville and Louisville. In 1922, he took the job of Chamber of Commerce in Columbus, Indiana but was not very good at the job and left his post less than a year into it. Sanders made a boneheaded move when he sold off his shares in the ferry boat company to open  an acetylene lamp manufacturing plant that failed after Delco sold electric lamps on credit. Sanders moved to Winchester, Kentucky to work as a sales person for Michelin Tires but once more was let go after one of their manufacturing plants closed.  He then went on to work at a Standard Oil Gas Station as a manager, but it closed during the great depression in 1930 leaving him once more jobless.

But his luck would once more save him as Shell offered him a service station in North Corbin, Kentucky rent free as long as they shared a percentage of sales with them! Sanders started to make good home cooked meals that he would sell at the station like country ham and steaks as well as chicken and would later attach a restaurant to the gas station which became a huge hit with visitors. Sanders did have his enimies at this time as Matt Stewart owned a rival station, and a fight over a street sign lead to Stewart shooting and killing a Shell Oil official and being convicted of murder, eliminating his only competition. In 1935 Kentucky Governor Ruby Laffoon commissioned Sanders as a Kenticky Colonel as his popularity and reputation of serving great food grew and grew. Over the years Sanders opened more restaurants that were also attached to hotels and motels and would do his part to help during Word War II and the gas shortage. In 1947, Harland divorced Josephine and married his mistress for many years Claudia Ledington-Price in 1949.  By this time he had also perfected his fried chicken that was the talk of the town as his 11 secret herbs and spices as well as his style of cooking the chicken became a signature flavor. By 1952, Sanders allowed his “Kentucky Fried Chicken” meals to be franchised to a man named Pete Harman of South Salt Lake, Utah.  Pete saw his sales triple, all of it coming from the fried chicken! A fun little fact is that Don Anderson, a sign painter hired by Pete, came up with the name Kentucky Fried Chicken as he used the term to draw people into his restaurant in Utah as the customers loved the southern sound and style of this tasty chicken.  Plus, Sanders made .04 off each chicken sold at this location.

But by the age of 65 Sanders sold his restaurant, and he and his wife Claudia opened a new restaurant and headquarters in 1959.  Sanders would travel around to places and try to sell the franchise rights to his friend chicken.  This would include him making a batch of his famous chicken and having workers eat it, and when they liked it he would work out a deal with the owners on the price of the deal.  This was the birth of the Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) fast food restaurants that are still going strong to this day. Sanders would later just sell all the US rights to the chicken concept but retained the rights in Canada and Englund and would remain the spokesman and mascot for the fast food joint to this day. But Sanders and KFC had feuds over the years as both have slung lawsuits at each other over all types of things such as bad mouthing gravy all the way to misusing Sanders’ image on products.  Sadly Sanders’ time came to an end as on December 16 1980 he died of leukemia at the age of 90, but his legacy and chicken still lives on to this day.

Colonel Sanders was known for his white suit, classic southern black bow tie as well as his white goatee. But here are some weird a fun things you might not know about Sanders: at first he treated the whole Kentucky Colonel thing as a joke but later would take it seriously.  He was a foul mouthed man when it came to food quality and would visit KFC restaurants in the 70’s and if the meal did not live up to his standards he would cuss and shove the food to the floor! He used his own stock holdings to create the Colonel Sanders trust as well as Colonel Harland Sanders Charitable Organization that were used to aid charities as well as scholarships. Japan’s Hanshin Tigers baseball team has an urban legend called “Curse of the Colonel” that has them performing poorly after some fans in 1985 tossed a statue of Colonel Sanders into a river that lead to the statue being lost. In 2011 in KFC’s archives, a manuscript was found written by Colonel Sanders that had recipes as well as life lessons.  They claimed that they were going to try some of these recipes and put the 200 page writings online but to my knowledge they never did. Lee Cummings, the nephew of Colonel Sanders traveled around with his uncle selling the 11 Herd and Spices as well as pressure cookers in 1952 to franchises, and in 1966 Lee made his own recipe that he called his “Famous Recipe.”  He is the creator of the chicken restaurant known as “Lee’s Famous Recipe Chicken,” one of KFC’s big competitors in the fast food chicken world.

Growing up my parents were not fried chicken eaters, and we would get KFC only time to time as my Dad always thought the buckets cost too much.  As I stated before, most of the time we did have it was at my grandparents’ house as my parents would get a big old bucket so my grandma didn’t have to cook as she and my grandpa were big chicken eaters. As I got older, my brother had a KFC kick, and he and I used to go out to eat.  Most of the time he chose between Taco Bell and KFC, and now I think he enjoys eating Lee’s more than KFC. At work we seem to eat KFC pretty often as Todd The Fox loves himself some fried chicken or a famous bowl, and Garrison Kane loves his double down sandwich. For those who don’t know what a double down is, it’s two chicken patties that act as the bun to some bacon and cheese…yeah it’s an artery clogger for sure. When I eat at KFC this is my standard order: 3 piece dark meat meal with mash potatoes and green beans with water to drink. So what do you enjoy eating at KFC?

I covered KFC’s birth above, so I figured I would skip the huge history lesson on KFC and what big company owns them and how many times it’s been sold and such and decided to instead cover the classic KFC Commercials that use to air on broadcast TV and can now be found on Youtube. It’s really cool to see these classic commercials from the late 60’s and 70’s and watch Harland Sanders in his white suit and cane prepare chicken or watch cooks make chicken, all the while the catch phrase “It’s Finger Licking Good” is said to highlight just how good the chicken at Kentucky Fried Chicken is thanks to the secret recipe. Also, you can see commercials from the 80’s. 90’s and even the modern stuff with the “fake” Colonel Sanders…we will get into those a little later in the update. It’s really crazy to think that while other fast food joints had more colorful mascots like Ronald McDonald for McDonalds, The Magical Burger King for Burger King and The Noid for Dominos Pizza to name a few, KFC more played up Colonel Sanders, a Southern gentleman who lived the American Dream. So if you’re bored and have a few minutes to kill, check out these commercials on Youtube and learn why the chicken is finger licking good as well as how you can get buckets of chicken to go for that after church dinner!

Over the years besides the two comics we will be diving into on this update, many other great merchandise has been made based around Colonel Sanders that includes Halloween costumes, penny banks, PVC kids meal figures, hand puppets, clocks, t-shirts, vinyl records, bobble head, a Let’s Play At Kentucky Fried Chicken playset and statues to name a few. It’s great to see Colonel Sanders live on with lots of these collectable items, and while I don’t own any of these things besides the comics I have mentioned above I have seen the penny banks at many antique stores and have thought about buying one many times. So if you’re a collector of fast food mascots or just love KFC, you might want to try and track down some of these collectibles for your own collection.

With the original Colonel Sanders passing away in 1980, KFC thought of other ways to use his image like in the late 90’s they had an animated version who was cartoony in nature and was voiced by actor Randy Quaid. In 2015, we had two actors playing the “role” of Colonel Sanders, both former Saturday Night Live actors.  The first was played by Darrell Hammond, who had a touch of creepy to his portrayal.  This caused a huge backlash on social media from people who found it disrespectful to turn a classy gentlemen into a giggling chicken obsessed freak. I for one enjoyed the silly nature of Hammond’s version of Sanders, and it’s a shame they fired him from the role. During Hammond’s commercials he would sing little songs about fried chicken like “Chicken In The Bucket, Chicken In The Beans” or the classic about the $5.00 Fill Up Meal in which he explains that you not only get taters and gravy but also a big ol cookie! Norm Macdonald took over the role of Sanders and plays him more straight laced, but no matter how much or is it how little he tries, he just sounds like the Norm Macdonald we all grew to love while he was on SNL. During his commercials, Norm also explains that Hammond was an imposter trying to act as if he was the real Colonel Sanders. So will these three be the last to play the gone but not forgotten Colonel of Fried Chicken? Only time will tell. I should also note that it’s nice to see them at least use Colonel Sanders again as sometime in the 2000’s I can remember them wanting to drop his image from their marketing and wanted to embrace the KFC name and phase out that it stood for Kentucky Fried Chicken as health food nuts of the net went on a smear campaign against fast food joints.

For this update, co-workers Stephen Alexander, Garrison Kane and I ordered some food form our nearby KFC, and I wanted to break the meal down and give each food item a grade like on a report card! I ordered a 3 piece meal dark meat (leg, thigh, thigh) with mashed potatoes and gravy and green beans and a lemonade to drink. The meal cost about $8.50, and let’s see if it was worth it! Let’s start with the sides, the green beans were fantastic and had a nice mix of diced onions mixed in, and the flavor was really good. I would get them a B+! The mashed potatoes and gravy were okay. The potatoes tasted great, but the gravy was so-so. I would give them a grade of C. The biscuit was dry and tasteless, and I only ate a small part of it before I gave it to Stephen; I would give it a D. The lemonade was really good and tasted freshly made so I would give it a solid A! The main event was the chicken, and man it was dry.  The chicken leg was so small and dry, it was a waste of frying! The two thighs the meal came with were a little more meaty but tasted kind of bland, and I had to use the Finger Licken Good Sauce to make it pop with flavor.  I would give the chicken a C – as it was not great but not total garbage. Over all, it was an average meal from KFC that did its job of filling my tummy on a long day of work.

Speaking of eating chicken, while working on this update I thought of yet another idea for a comic book that I would like to see made and that’s one based on a Troma Movie that has a metal teethed maniac who bites the heads off chickens, murders people and can only speak with clucks…that’s right, I am talking about Luther The Geek! This 1990 film was directed by Carlton J. Albright and was about a man named Luther Watts who as a child got his teeth knocked out while at a freak showing watching a geek eat the head off a live chicken.  He had his missing teeth replaced with steel ones and became crazed and craved human flesh. After being in prison for twenty years, he is paroled and sets back out biting people’s necks in order to taste their blood, and sadly for Hilary and her daughter Beth, their farmhouse becomes a nightmare as Luther comes to roost.  I should also mention Luther does not talk but clucks and crows like a rooster! Luther kills anyone foolish enough to get in his way as his thirst for blood knows no bounds and no age, gender or race is safe from his metal teeth of death. I first saw this film on VHS when my Brother and I rented it from K&L Video, and from that moment on, it became a film that I enjoyed for its over the top nature and creepy killer. I also want to mention that Stacy Haiduk, who played Beth, is a stunning raven haired beauty in this movie and is also helped fuel my like for this film as she has a great shower scene! My idea to make this into a comic would take place after the events of the movie and have Hilary being insane and locked up in an asylum, but little does she know that the body of Luther is missing and he is on the hunt for his “hen” as he thinks that she is now his mate! When Luther sets the crazies of the asylum free to run the nut house, Hilary must gain her wits back in order to survive as Luther is on the prowl and hungry for human blood and flesh. The best part of this comic idea is that Luther, while in the Asylum would also be attacking other inmates as he does not understand friendship. I would also throw in the original geek that inspired him to become one, who would be really old and the end would have the two fighting over Hilary like two roosters. I would love to see Troma make this comic themselves, and if not them, then I would say Blood Shed. From my friends, I think Bruce O’Hughes or Jason Young would do fantastic work making it come alive. Who knows maybe one day this comic idea will come alive!

With all this fried chicken talk, I am sure many of you readers are craving some KFC or some sort of other chicken restaurant like Lee’s, Churches or Popeyes so I am now going to bring out the main course of this review, the comics based on Colonel Sanders! One of them was made by KFC themselves, while the other was made by DC Comics and has Sanders teaming up with The Flash and Green Lantern to stop bogus chicken from being served trying to ruin KFC’s good name. I want to thank both Amazon and Ebay for having these comics in stock and I need to remind you that I grade these comics on a 1-4 star ranking and am looking at how well the comic keeps to the source material, its entertainment value, and its art and story. So let’s bring out a 500pc bucket of Chicken and get looking at the comic adventures of Colonel Sanders!

Colonel’s Adventure # 1  **1/2
Released in 2015    Cover Price FREE    KFC    # 1 of ???

Colonel Sanders is sitting on a stool and decides to share his life story with the readers.  He explains about his childhood, from losing his father at the age of 5 to cooking meals for his siblings when he was only 7. He goes on to tell of his teen years lying about his age and joining the army where he was stationed in Cuba to watch after the donkeys.  He then tells of his time working for the railroad as well as later opening and selling a boat company on the Ohio River and losing his money when putting it all into gas lamps. This issue ends with Sanders opening his gas station and restaurant and having a shoot out with his rival who had been painting over his sign, that left one man dead, his rival wounded and sent to jail and Sanders still alive and kicking ready to make some chicken!

This promo comic is fast and straight to the point and is 100% a marketing tool to show the weird and wild life Colonel Sanders lived before and during making his world famous chicken. The story is basic and nothing is really fleshed out as each life event and milestone for him is summed up in a panel or two, and no names are used besides his own. The one nice thing is also you get a mini history lesson as they give you the dates when the phone, jazz music and electric lamps all came into culture during his lifetime. Some things I didn’t know were that he had a terrible car wreck on a bridge when he was selling tires and was lucky to be alive and that he spent time also delivering babies! Also, the father of a new born baby in this comic looks a lot like Don Knotts! The bottom of each page as a tiny adventure of Colonel Sanders going on, and at one point he runs into The Incredible Hulk.  Yeah, how weird is that?! The art in the comic is pretty good but has a kind of souless digital look to it and was done by Dan Burke.  The cover is pretty kick butt and makes Colonel Sanders look like The Lone Ranger! Over all, this is a cheesy quick read comic used to make one learn and respect Colonel Sanders. Check out some artwork from this comic below.

Now let’s get onto the next comic based on Sanders done by DC Comics that was given away at Comic Con and features some famous superheroes and villains.

Colonel Of Two Worlds # 1  **1/2
Released in 2015    Cover Price FREE    DC Comics    # 1 of 1

Captain Cold and Mirror Master are sick and tired of being on the losing end of fights with The Flash, and they decide to join forces with Colonel Sunder who came from another dimension called Earth-3. They open a restaurant called Easy Fried Chicken where henchmen go out and rob people to get money to open more of these lousy fried chicken joints, while Mirror Master and Captain Cold serve lousy food for cheap prices to customers. The Flash and Green Lantern stop a bank robbery, and The Flash goes to look into Easy Chicken as crime has went up when they moved into town.  As he is about to enter, he runs into Colonel Sanders who is pissed off about this fake looking Colonel making chicken the easy way when the world knows it tastes better when you do it the hard way! Colonel Sanders confronts Sunders, and the pair fight as Sanders mops the ground with not only Sunders, who is using a pink slime gun, but also his henchmen.  All the while, Captain Cold and Mirror Master watch in shock as their hope to be crimelords is tossed back into a portal that leads him to Earth-3 where he belongs! In the end The Flash and Green Lantern visit Colonel Sanders at KFC and find out that both Mirror Master and Captain Cold are working there as part of community service as Sanders has taught them that working hard is better than the easy way.

This comic is as silly as the description above sounds. First off, the plot is about another world Colonel Sanders coming to our world and trying to make cheap gross fried chicken restaurants as his way to take over the world and rip people off of money.  Along for the ride are two of The Flash’s top bad guys who are forced to work in this gross fast food restaurant as they think this will lead them to world domination! And the kicker is that the real Colonel Sanders is the one who kicks butt as the superheroes just watch in amazement and later offer Sanders a seat in the JLA…yeah, this is truly a strange take of crispy strange goodness. Colonel Sanders is so heated up when he finds out someone looking like him is selling gross friend chicken that he marches down to his restaurant knocks The Flash out of his way and starts to rumble with anyone who stands in his way! Colonel Sanders in this issue is a badass and by the looks of it could have gone toe to toe with Doomsday if he was selling chicken that was not of high standards. While they do stop a robbery, the Flash and Green Lantern are clearly just background players in this silly game of chicken. Colonel Sunder is a black suit wearing lazy Sanders look alike who on Earth-3 is the king of poultry but here is just a no good thief who sells gross food and is such a bum that he won’t even lift a finger to take over the world. I do like how he uses guns that shoot chicken nuggets as well as pink meat slime! Captain Cold and Mirror Master as well just take backseat roles, but they do take a strange role in the end as both work for KFC and seem to enjoy doing so! It also makes the pair of baddies aware that they are looked at as a joke when it comes to super villains. The cover is amazing as it shows the two Sanders clashing as the DC characters watch on in amazement. The art inside looks like most of your modern DC issues and is done by Tom Derenick.  While not my favorite style of art, it works well for this promo comic. Man, they should have had Colonel Sanders join the JLA as I would have loved to seen him beat The Joker to death with his cane or even uppercut Darkseid through a window as this issue makes Sanders out to be a ticking timebomb of pride that, if pushed, nothing can stop! Check out a piece of art from the comic below, and if you like weird promo comics featuring mainstream heroes, then make sure to add this to your must-read list!

I hope you enjoyed this deep fried look at Colonel Sanders and his chicken.  It was a fun one to write as I always like talking and researching mascots for fast food restaurants. But while many of you might think that KFC’s greasy chicken is scary, our next update will be about that famed haunted house in New York that spawned many movies, books, theories and yes, even a comic.  That’,s right be prepared to be scared as we look into The Amityville Horror! So get your nerve of steel as we will enter the house and expose the curse, but until then, read a comic or three, support your local Horror Host and enjoy some fried chicken if you eat meat!

Avoid The Noid In 3-D With Extra Cheese

Welcome back to Rotten Ink.  Today’s update we will be taking a look at that pizza hating mascot of the 80’s, The Noid, and Blackthrone’s two issue series based on the little booger. Growing up my family didn’t order out for pizza very often, and when we did, it was from places like Dagwood’s in Waynesville or we would pick up a pie from Pizza Hut or Marion’s. But most of the time we would make our own. I can remember my mom and dad letting me and my brother pick what ingredients went on our pizza and than watching it go into the oven and waiting for it to bake as the smell of cooking cheese and crust filled the air. I enjoyed eating homemade pizza, and when I was younger I always drank Mountain Dew, Kool-Aid or chocolate milk with my slices…I know the milk sounds kind of gross, but it was good! To be honest though, I have never liked pizza all that much and always found that it hurt my stomach after eating it.  Oddly enough, the only pizza that doesn’t hurt my stomach is homemade or Pizza Hut! Before we really dive into Dominos and The Noid, I should say that I am a fan of just cheese pizza, sausage and only some places deluxe like Marion’s.

Dominos Pizza started in 1960 when brothers Tom and James Monaghan went in together and bought DomiNick’s, a small pizza joint in Michigan, for $975.00! James gave up his half of the business in trade for a car giving Tom full control only eight months into them owning it, and by 1965 the name changed to Dominos.  By 1967 the first franchise opened sparking it to becomes a major player in the pizza restaurant war. A cool little fact is that the famous logo that has the three white dots on the blue/red domino was supposed to have more dots as they were going to add a dot for each store that opened! By 1978 they had 200 locations and more planned, so in loose terms of the rock band Megadeth: Pizza was their business and business was good! Starting in the 1980’s, they got so big that they were able to open pizza joints all over the world in such places as England and India making them grow even bigger as a Pizza Empire! In 1998 Tom wanted to retire and sold 93 percent of the company to Bain Capital for a billon dollars, and by 1999, they made David A. Brandon the new CEO of Dominos. Over the years Dominos slipped and became one of the lower pizza places.  When it came to the taste tests via customers, it tied for last place with Chuck E Cheeses.  So in 2009 they revamped their menu and used better ingredients to make their pizza better, even taking shots at themselves for making poor tasting pizzas over the years. This marketing has helped them bounce back and become a fighter once more to try and compete to be the # 1 pizza place in town. Dominos doesn’t only serve pizza though, they have added chicken wings, subs and even salads over the years. The only major media issue the company has had was with there “30 Minutes or It’s Free” promise that told customers if you order a pizza from them and it comes after 30 minutes of placing said order, then you got your food free. This pressure on delivery people was high, and many of them were involved in serious accidents as they would run red light to make it on time.  The company was sued for millions by those the drivers hurt making the promise disappear from their marketing. So after reading all this about Domino’s, are you thinking about ordering a pizza?

1986 was the year a strange imp claymation man wearing a red body suit with bunny ears and a chest piece with a giant N creeped his way onto TV screens across America trying his hardest to ruin the pizzas made by Dominos that were out for delivery with the 30 Minutes Or It’s Free promise. The Noid became such a popular mascot with kids and adults that a computer video game was made based on him as was other merchandise. The actor who did the voice of The Noid was Pans Maar who later went on to have roles in films like Return To Oz, The Golden Child, The Blob, Theodore Rex and even played Saurod in the live action Masters Of The Universe film. His TV credits include the popular show Dinosaurs where he played multiple smaller characters. But like all good things, The Noid was put into the mascot retirement home and only gets dusted off once in a while when Dominos sees fit to try and squeeze a dime out of the little guy. I can remember watching the commercials on TV and always being so hyped to see The Noid try his darnedest to ruin the pizza. I kind of always wanted to see him be able to do so at least once just to help his self esteem.  In fact he reminds me a lot of Looney Tunes character Wile E. Coyote who tries so hard to catch Roadrunner but just can’t. In the late 80’s, The Noid was everywhere including a Michael Jackson video/movie showing he was truly an icon and always was a hit when seen by the young Brassfield brothers. It’s a shame that Dominos didn’t bring him back when they redid their menu as it would have been amazing to see The Noid try and make not only the Pizzas cold and trashed but also chicken wings, subs and cheesy bread! While The Noid has been off TV for many years and not a mascot of the pizza place any more.  His impact on pulp culture is still felt thanks to things like Family Guy, The Simpsons and The Irate Gamer all who have had the little Imp in episodes. While not as iconic as Ronald McDonald or as beloved as Billy Bob, The Noid remains a favorite to all those who remember his fun and zany antics.

 

In the 1980’s Nintendo was the top video game system a kid could have.  Sure Atari had the 7800, and Sega had The Master System but the classic NES put them all to shame. In 1990 Capcom, the company that makes games like Street Fighter, Resident Evil and Ducktales, released a video game called Yo!Noid that was a side scrolling action game that had you playing as the red suited imp going from town to town in New York to stop the evil Mr. Green (a green suited imp) who is using slime people to ruin the city.  The promise to The Noid if he can save the day..is pizza..yep. The game in Japan is called Kamen No Ninja Hanamaru and has another hero and villain instead of The Noid and Mr. Green.  It was only in the United States that the pizza mascot was used. The game was by no means a classic but was a fun playing experience.  I can remember renting the game from K&L Video years and years after it came out and enjoying it as did my brother at the time. Over the years the game has become a punching bag by many because it’s a tie in to a massive company that sells pizza, but put all that internet B.S. and wannabe Angry Video Game reviewers reviews out of your mind and enjoy a fun silly side scrolling adventure game.

Besides Yo! Noid for the NES and the BlackThorne comics, some other merchandise that came out included a game that came out for the Commodore 64 called Avoid The Noid, PVC figures of The Noid in all types of outfits like boxing gloves and wizards hat, stuffed dolls, bendable figures, halloween masks, t-shirts and key chains among many other small things that had his goofy face on it. The only thing I had growing up was the bendable figure that I got from a garage sale as a kid, and I can remember eating home made pizza at the kitchen table while acting as if The Noid  was trying to ruin my dinner…that damn Noid. So if you’re a collector of mascot merchandise or just a fan of the claymation character you can find some really cool stuff based on the little nut job.

 

All my friends can tell you I love old mascot costumes that were used at restaurants and amusement parks and try my best to buy them when ever I can find them. So I wanted to take this brief moment to share some pictures I have found that are amazing and creepy all at the same time. Two are people wearing mascot costumes being silly and the other is a odd Halloween mask that looks as if its melting before our eyes. So sit back and enjoy the wonders of these pictures!

Husband and wife Steve Schanes and Ann Fera opened BlackThorn Comics in 1985 after they left the defunct Pacific Comics that closed in 1984. The company started small and was built from the ground up thanks to credit cards.  The first comic to come out from them was based on the classic character Sheena Queen Of The Jungle that was reprints of her old adventures. The company grew over the years and gained attention for putting out comic books taken from old newspaper comic strips from such characters as Dick Tracy and also for breaking the mold and not just selling their comics at normal comic stores as they got their titles into Hallmarks, Spencer Gifts and 7-Elevens making them more distributed than other smaller comic companies. The company also was able to nab some important IP’s for comic series like Battle Beasts, Battle Tech, Rambo, Waxworks and Werewolf based on the FOX TV Show. They also were the masters of making 3-D comics and cornered the market with such titles as Bozo The Clown, G.I. Joe, Transformers, Bravestarr, Gumby to name a few but it was the 3-D series based on the Californian Raisins that proved to be the big hit and money maker for them. By 1987 the cost and low sales of their normal comic lines caused them to cancel those titles and focus only on the black and white reprints of classic characters and the 3-D comics. Sadly they made a very poor choice in 1989 when they over paid to get the license to the film Michael Jackson’s Moonwalker that they turned into a 3-D comic that didn’t sell well causing them to have a huge financial loss for the year. By the start of 1990, the company was on its last legs even though they were the 5^th largest comic publisher in America.  That major blow they took at the hands of Moonwalker was too much, and they closed the doors for good. This really bums me out as I respected this company.  Even at a young age as I could recognized they took chances and were not so cookie cutter like many other companies at the time. I for one would have loved to see what they would have made if they would have made it through the 90’s and were still making comics to this day. Some projects have leaked on what they were working on before they closed up that included A Nightmare On Elm Street as well as a WWF comic that would have focused on The Ultimate Warrior…Now I am even more pissed off about them closing and have to say thanks Moonwalker for ruining everything! Below is some of the original art for those two never published comic series that were taken off EBAY that were up for sale. Over all to this long time comic reader, Blackthorn is truly missed.

So now that you have the history of Dominos Pizza, The Noid and even Blackthorn Comics I feel we are at the point now that we are ready to dive into the comic reviews and enjoy a slice of pizza and a part of mascot history. And I must really say I would have loved to have read Blackthorn’s A Nightmare On Elm Street 3-D adaptation as well as see what the WWF 3-D comic would have been about..dang that Moonwalker, it’s a curse on comics I tell you! I need to remind everyone I grade these comics on a standard 1-4 star rating and am looking at how well the comic keeps to the source material, its entertainment value, and its art and story. So with that let’s NOT avoid The Noid but instead see what kind of adventures he is having! 

The Noid In 3-D!  # 1  **
Released in 1989   Cover Price $2.50   Blackthorne   #1 of 2

The first story is Mondo Rotundo who is the overseer of mischief and mayhem, and he is very upset over the failure of The Noid who has yet to make Domino’s Pizza cold and gross for customers, so Mondo has his little electric ball side kick Fister to bring The Noid to him. Mondo takes The Noid into a room and shows him the past Noid’s and how they succeeded in their quests to be food pranksters and that The Noid himself is the reason he fails as when he was “born” to be a food ruining imp, he lost the one and only Noid handbook.  He then tells The Noid that he will give him one last chance to prove himself, so as The Noid leaves he decided to ruin Mondo’s dinner! The second story has The Noid thinking he is a super hero after he reads his own 3-D comic and wants to join the Super Hero club but is laughed at by all the other heroes.  This hurts his feelings and he decides to play some pranks on them and as well as keep them prisoner and by doing this he is asked to join the super villain club!

The first thing I would like to point out is that the 3-D aspect of the comic doesn’t really work well and for the most point while reading the comic I had my left eye closed and only read with the right.  Why, you ask, cause that’s the only way the comic even looked like it should have! I must also point out that pages in the comic were in the wrong order, showing that this title was not on the top of Blackthrones list of A-List comics. The first story was kind of lame and while very cool seeing Noids of the past, the pay out of The Noid ruining the fat Mondo’s dinner was very ho-hum. The second story as well was lame and had The Noid tricking super heroes in dumb ways.  For instance, he gave one hero who is like Wolverine a glass of milk and that fact it’s healthy knocks him out….yep. I didn’t expect much from a comic series based on a fast food mascot from a small comic company that used a terrible gimmick like 3-D to try and sell it to the masses.  I did however think that it would hold a little more entertainment value than it did. The Noid in the comic is very likable and really comes off as a goof down on his luck that was born to be a prankster who just can’t get it right. The art in the comic (via 3-D) looks a little bland with very little backgrounds and lots of use of white empty spaces. The Noid himself looks good and is how I would picture him in comic book art. I went back and fourth on what star rating I should give this issue, and I decided to go two stars only because while idea and presentation of the comic made me very nostalgic for 80’s gimmick comics and the fact it was all about that loveable goof The Noid, if your removed The Noid from the picture and inserted some Blackthorne made up character I would have given this issue a one star…so with that let’s hope issue two is better! 

The Noid In 3-D!  # 2  **
Released in 1989   Cover Price $2.50   Blackthorne   #2 of 2

The Noid is sick of being yelled at by Mondo over losing the Noid Handbook and decides to go back to school in order to learn what he couldn’t from the missing book. While at college he pulls some pranks like acting as a professor and tricking students.  He also joins the football team and comes up with new plays that make no sense and he also ruins Homecoming for the elected Queen by ripping her dress off. In the end The Noid is booted from the school once some frat boys learn he never even went to high school. The second story has The Noid and Fister traveling to the jungle to find a Temple of Noids that may hold secrets of the missing handbook, but while in the temple The Noid keeps making the wrong choices and Fister has to keep saving him.  In the end they both find that there is no secret as a note has been left behind that blames The Noid for the missing book!

Issue two is just as lame as the first and only really changes that were made are that the backgrounds are better and the stories are slightly more entertaining than those is issue 1. The 3-D still is bad and really is distracting when trying to read the comic, and I really wish the series would have come out not using this terrible gimmick. The Noid is still likable in both of these stories and is as goofy as ever, When reading these two issues and seeing that he is the verbal whipping boy for a fat slob and that he seems not never make the right decisions, you almost wish he would at least be able to make one of those dang Domino Pizzas cold to boost his self esteem. Mondo Rotundo who is his boss is kind of bland and just seems like a filler character as does Fister who to me seems like he should be in the Kool-Aid Man comics. The better of the two stories in this issue is the more Indiana Jones inspired Noid Temple as we get to see him out of his element and not pulling pranks but just really trying to survive! The art once more is good on characters and better for backgrounds than the past issue.  I should also note that Andy Ice does the art for both issues and I do like his cartoon looking style. To sum it up not much change from issue 1 to 2, and I found it an ok read that I wouldn’t recommend to fellow comic readers. Also below is some 2-D artwork done by Ice from his original storyboards so check em out!

Blackthrone gave this two issues before the plug was pulled, but I am not sure how many of you readers knew that an issue three was planned and the cover was made! Below is the mock up cover that was planned and it appears as if in the unfinished issue The Noid must have visited Mount Rushmore or had some sort of interaction with the President. Andy Ice did the cover art once more and it looks pretty dang great as did all of his Noid 3-D covers. Even though I was not a fan of this series I would have liked to have read issue 3 and see what kind of odd adventures the little Imp would have gotten into, but I still would have much rather seen the A Nightmare on Elm Street film adaptation and WWF 3-D comic over Noid issue 3. But enjoy a look at what could have been the 3^rd issue in the mascot’s comic run.

On Monday April 14^th 2014 while at work me and friend and co-worker Todd The Fox tried the New Dominos for the first time we placed our order online and was treated to Pete the Pizza Maker, a cartoon little guy who acts as the way to track your pizza as its being made placed in the oven and when it goes out to be delivered. On this day we ordered a large bacon cheeseburger pizza, spicy jalapeno pineapple chicken bites as well as an order of stuffed cheesy bread, and I was really wanting to try this new and improved food so that I could talk about it on this blog. The delivery was fast and the driver was a nice guy who even brought us extra plates and silverware just in case we didn’t have any in the store, and I should note he made it under 30 minutes. The pizza was pretty good and was a big improvement over the flat cardboard style they had in the past; the only thing I will say is that it was a little dry. The chicken bites were fantastic and had a rich flavor to them, but the best thing was the stuffed cheese bread that was mouth watering good and even more fantastic when dipped in the garlic sauce. Over all Todd and I both really enjoyed the pizza and we even had to fight off The Noid who showed up to try and ruin lunch…below is photo evidence of that little creeper being around. 

While I loved watching the Noid on TV on the classic Domino commercials and even liked my old bendie toy, I am kind of glad that I did not read this series in my youth as I think I would have hated it while the older me just thinks it is ok at best. I also find it very odd that I never even remember Domino’s ever pushing this comic.  In my mind it would have been very smart of them to give the comic out when someone would have bought a large pizza and a 2 liter of pop on carry out or delivery. Another very odd thing is that in both issues pizza is only briefly showed once…why the heck did Domino’s not have Blackthorne make the comic into one giant ad for their product! Major company marketing, who can’t figure it out? Well for my next update we will be leaving the pizza place and heading down DC Boulevard as we take a look at a relatively unknown super hero called Steel…and no I ain’t talking about the metal man one time NBA Star Shaq played in a crappy Superman tie in film.  So come back next time and learn all ’bout Commander STEEL, The Indestructible Man!

Walking In A Greasy McDonaldland

Welcome back!  I hope you all are having a fun and safe winter so far.  I used to love the winter when I was younger because there was always a chance of a snow day away from school, and if one did happen, that was a day spent playing Nintendo, reading a comic, watching a movie and playing toy wars! Of course this would also be a day of snow ball fights, that wonderful way to throw frozen ice balls at your friends face and pass it off as a fun time.  I remember having snow ball fights in Waynesville against my brother and friends like Mike Censsna, Bill Hamm, Brad Burns and so many more kids from the neighborhood.  This would also carry over to Kettering when I was working at Kroger as a teenager, and my pal Josh Weinberg and I would spend time throwing snowballs at each other while pulling carts. But one thing about winter always made me upset, the weather men who would predict snow and lots of it and poof, the next day not a flake had fallen.  Being a kid, I would stay up later the night before in my room reading comics or watching my little black and white TV and be grumpy the next day when I would find I would have to go to school. My brother Bryan and I use to always make fun of Carl Nichols, the weather man for Channel 2 who would predict “Winter Storms” and the next morning his reporting was wrong. But here is to winter and here is to all the fun memories that go along with this season, from building snowmen to sledding, this is a fun season to be a kid. Next update I will share a little more of my winter memories and fun times.

Fast food restaurants were running wild in the 1980’s, and most of them were all trying to get the youth of America to choose their place to eat over the others and would use all types of things from kid meal prizes to cookies to get customers’ money. The thing the worked for me to choose a place to eat was the mascots and TV commercials that would show the adventures of these characters, acting as 30 second TV shows hyping the cheap food and fun idea of that place to eat. Most places had some sort of mascot. Burger King had The Burger King Kingdom with guys like Magical Burger King and Sir Shakes A Lot, and later they had the Burger King Kids Club. Wendy’s had Wendy, the cute red head with the pigtails; Captain D’s had Captain D’s, the sailor who loved history and seafood; Dominos Pizza had the Noid, a creepy little guy in a red costume and rabbit ears and so many more.  But the one that always stood out and was super popular for kids back in my time was Ronald McDonald and the rest of McDonald Land characters who were the mascots for the mega burger chain McDonald’s. Everyone in the world would say that when it comes to fast food burger joints, McDonald’s is king, and I for one grew up loving the place. Growing up in Waynesville, there were no fast food chains in downtown.  All we really had was The Hammel House, Dagwoods, Village Family Restaurant and The Dairy Corner, and all were very good and classic style small town restaurants. The Dairy Corner was a place my Mom would take us a lot, and I can remember always ordering a cheeseburger and fries and and enjoying sitting with my family and enjoying the food.  A few times over the years I would drive to Waynesville with girlfriends or friends, and we would eat at the Dairy Corner. Sadly it’s gone now and where once a fun ice cream shop that served food was alive, now sits a shell of a building. Why did it close up you ask.  Well one of the major reasons was the coming of McDonald’s, the first major fast food place to enter the small village of Waynesville and later came Subway. But while it’s gone, Dairy Corner will never be forgotten by this comic book reader.

In 1940 Richard and Maurice McDonald opened up a restaurant that was a BBQ place, but in 1948 they changed into a hamburger joint and started to use drive-thru service, paving the way of “Fast Food” along side White Castle. In 1955, Ray Kroc became a partner in the company and later bought out the brothers to become the owner of McDonald’s, and he turned it into the The King of Fast Food with changes in how the company ran and franchises it supported.  But the buyout was not a smooth one as Kroc and the brothers feuded over the business, and this went on for years. Kroc won the battle, and McDonalds expanded outside the United States and has restaurants all over the world. The restaurant is known for selling hamburgers, chicken nuggets, milkshakes, fish sandwiches and McRibs and has expanded its menu to cafe-style drinks, chicken wings and gourmet salads. McDonald’s also was a pioneer in kids meals when they introduced The Happy Meal in 1979 that had food placed in a box or bag that came with a toy.  Growing up, I loved to a Happy Meal and eat the tasty food and also collect toys based on the likes of The Muppet Babies, Barensteen Bears or Charlie Brown. McDonald’s is still the top fast food joint in the world and it continues to evolve and stay on top by doing so.

I don’t eat McDonald’s very often, but I still do enjoy it from time to time.  The charm of the place has been lost to me once they cut back on using Ronald McDonald and phased out the rest of the McDonald Land characters. But when I do go, I have a order that is a must for me and consists of the same items I have ordered for a very long time:  two cheeseburgers (sometimes a double cheese burger), a large french fries and a medium orange Hi-C.  The fries for me are the highlight of the meal, and I would say out of all the fast food places they have the best french fries followed by Burger King. I know some people will trash the food and spew out the same gargage that Morgan Spurlock did in his documentary Super Size Me, but if you don’t eat the food every day in extra-large portions, then you’ll be all right. I say if you’re out and are looking for a cheap burger, get yourself a Big Mac and enjoy it!

In 2013 McDonald’s unleashed on the market their own take on chicken wings when they put out Mighty Wings! My girlfriend and I love chicken wings and have tried every major wing place in our area.  For me, the four best have to be Roosters, Wing Zone, Buffalo Wild Wings (BW3s) and Fricker’s.  So when McDonald’s said they were getting into the wing game, I knew I had to try them. I was working hard on editing a Baron Von Porkchop episode and needed to take a break for lunch.  So I called up my Mom, and we decided to go to McDonald’s to get a quick bite to eat.  In the drive thru I saw the advertisement for Mighty Wings and ordered a 5 pack. I ate them before I touched my fries or took a drink from the Hi-C, and I must say they were pretty good.  They had a nice spice level, and the meat, while a little fatty, was very juicy and flavorful. The downside to them is price at almost a dollar a wing, and the meduim size of each wing makes you really wonder just how much you overpaid. But if you like wings and are looking for a snack, a 5 pack of Mighty Wings might just hit the spot.

Growing up I have many memories of McDonalds and many of them have to do with the whole McDonald land characters and merchandise. I can remember going to the local McDonald’s and pestering my Mom and Dad to get me a Happy Meal so that I could get the Baby Fozzie from the Muppet Babies on his rocking horse and they did! It always felt magical to open up the Happy Meal box with all the cool artwork around it and pulling out your food and seeing what prize you got this time. It’s a shame that nowadays they have switched meals to putting them in a paper bag and put less time pushing these meals. Another thing that always stuck in my mind was The Apple Pie Tree statue that was placed inside the stores and also outside in the playground area.  The giant grinning face also made you as a kid feel welcome. I can remember climbing all over the Tree with my brother and cousin Norman.  The Tree is burned into my memories and if I ever get a house in the country like I want, a McDonald’s Tree will for sure be in the backyard. Another memory has to be the birthday parties that McDonald’s would have.  I can remember going to one for my cousin Norman and having a fun time on the playground and being around my family. I remember the cake not being all that great but thinking it was cool to see all the McDonaldland characters on it, but to be honest I dislike cake and am not a fan of it at all. So there you have it, Ronald McDonald and his magic fast food are apart of my youth, and I am okay with that.

McDonaldland pull back racers aka Fast Macs were a hit with me and my brother Bryan.  I can remember getting them and turning our kitchen in Waynesville into a drag strip as my brother and I would race them. He had gotten the Hamburgler in a slick red dragster built for speed and tricks, while I had Officer Big Mac in a bulky yet fast police car. We spent awhile racing them, and most the time they would crash into the kitchen table or get caught up on the walls.  I can remember losing a lot in the races, but I am sure that my brother bent the rules in his favor by saying things like “if I pop a wheelie, I win the race.” Later on we got Ronald McDonald in his yellow car of doom and Birdie in her pink race car. Over all these were great cheap toys that delivered a lot of fun for the Brassfield Brothers.

Besides the Fast Macs and The Muppet Babies toys, I also remember liking the Changeables aka McRobots who were generic style Transformers that would change from food items into simple robots. I had a few of these growing up and would use them in toy war and even had them get crushed many times by Transformers and GoBots. The simpleness of these changing robots was their charm, and the fact that McDonalds jumped on the popular 80’s robot boom was a given. My favorite was the Big Mac one because my brother and cousins all use to say he was the leader of the others much like Optimus Prime and Leader One were in charge of their robot friends. The second best one was the milk shake one who in my mind was like the right hand man and the fighter of the group. The store I am the manager of has an Amazon store, and I have sold many of these McRobots to the masses! I am sure many of you readers have a smile on your face as you are now thinking back on these generic transforming robots.

Not only were robots and fast food places big in the 80’s but so were collector glasses that restaurants, pop companies and even gas stations would sell and give out. Growing up I remember drinking Coke out of a Superman glass or strawberry milk from a Bugs Bunny one. Even as an adult as I am writing this I am drinking water from a Rocky The Squirrel glass put out by Pepsi. I know many of these glasses used lead paint so maybe that explains why I still love to read Star Comics. Some of the cool ones that were put out at this time were the 1977 McDonaldland character glasses.  You could choose from Ronald McDonald, Mayor McCheese, Officer Big Mac, Captain Crook and the others! Collector glasses are awesome and always helped add to a bland meal at home.  Sitting at the kitchen table and having to eat spinach chicken and peas was always a terrible time, but add in a Batman glass filled with Kool-Aid and the meal is still bad but a little easier to have to deal with. I have many of the McDonaldland glasses as well as many other character glasses and these are a super fun and cool way to make drinking fun. You can find these cool glasses on Ebay, Thrift Stores and Flea Markets.

Now that I have given you all a rundown on some of the cool stuff about McDonald’s we should now get to the main course of this mind meal and take a look at all the characters that made up the magical Mcdonaldland. Before we get into the main cast, let’s take a small look at three that did not make it to the land.

Speedee

Speedee is a hamburger headed chief who was the mascot for McDonalds from 1948-1962. Speedee’s main purpose was to show how fast your food would get to you after you placed your order. Speedee sadly never caught on and was phased out and replaced by the 1st Ronald McDonald in 1962. While gone for many years now, Speedee will never be forgotten by fans and historians of the fast food burger place he promoted.

Ronald McDonald # 1 

The original Ronald McDonald is nothing like the one we all know and love.  He was dubbed The Ham-Burger Happy Clown and wore a tray on his head, a magic tray belt that kept him supplied with hamburgers and a paper cup on his noise. This original Ronald was slightly creepy, and his voice was deeper and kind of menacing. He really loved to push hamburgers and tried to befriend kids to follow him back to McDonalds…wait, doen’t this kind of sound like Pennywise the Clown from the Stephen King Novel IT? Years later his look was changed and became the more iconic version of the character we all know and love. To me this first version was like the modern’s weird and crazy brother who later was locked up in the McDonaldland Asylum of Mental Health. I should note that Willard Scott played the original Ronald McDonald on TV in the D.C. area, who is known for being a weatherman on NBC, and this version started in 1962.

Mac Tonight

McDonald’s was going to start staying open late nights via the drive-thru and needed a way to let people know.  So enter the moon headed, sunglasses wearing, piano playing Ray Charles style Mac Tonight. Mac Tonight started in 1986 and was a smooth operator and gained a following with young and old and became a main stay of McDonald’s ads. Mac Tonight was so big that his image was used for over 20 commercials, was made into Happy Meal Toys and was used to great customers along side Ronald McDonald. But the moon headed man’s fun ended in 2007 when he got a CGI make over and started to be used less and less. While his image can still be seen on signs at McDonald’s, this jazz loving moon man’s popularity has dropped. Here’s hoping at some point he will rise to the charts of mascot history and be used properly once more.

So with this let’s get into the cast of characters that made up McDonaldLand! I will try and make these brief and just give you a little background of each iconic mascot.

Ronald McDonald

Ronald McDonald is a fun loving clown who loves to bring joy and food to his friends thanks to McDonalds. Ronald is the ring leader of all the characters in McDonaldland and has many friends all over the world and even on other planets. Ronald is also very active and likes to go out a play sports and enjoy nature making him a very energetic. Ronald is always in a good mood and makes the mood of any room rise and turns frowns upside down. He is also the face of McDonald’s and is so popular his image has been made into toys, shirts, comics, video games, and he even had a cameo in the movie “MAC AND ME” . Ronald McDonald is more recognizable to children than JFK, Abe Lincoln, Magical Burger King and many more famous people and mascots from around the world. Ronald is the man and remains one of the most iconic characters of all time. 

Grimace

1971 was the year kids were introduced to a giant purple character named Evil Grimace with four arms who loved soda and milkshakes and would steal them! In 1972/74 two arms disappeared, and Evil was dropped from his name and the lovable dimwitted Grimace became a well loved mascot for McDonald’s. Grimace acts as the comic relief of McDonaldland and is Ronald’s best friend. Even after turning good, Grimace still loved a good milkshake and soda as does his uncle known as O’Grimacey who loved the St. Patricks Day themed Shamrock Shake. Sadly Grimace was put into mascot retirement in 2011. Grimace in his prime had his image used for toys, cartoons, video games and even cookie cutters. Grimace is one of my favorite characters of McDonald’s. 

Birdie The Early Bird

In 1980 an egg fell in McDonaldland. Ronald showed it love and it hatched to be Birdie a yellow female bird who is a terrible flyer and loves breakfast food! Birdie is much like Grimace and is very clumsy and is the first official female character mascot for McDonald’s. Over the years and many different forms of media Birdie has learned karate and even try to find aliens. Birdie has been used to sell toys, video games and dolls. Biride sadly was sent to the Mascot retirement home in 2011 alongside other characters from McDonald’s. 

The Hamburglar

In 1971, a pint size thief entered McDonaldland, and he had one thing on his mind: to steal hamburgers!  When first seen by viewers, he was older with a big nose and was called The Lone Jogger.  In the 1980’s he was transformed into a younger guy who while bad, became friends with all the other characters. Hamburglar spoke gibberish and his catch phrase was “Robble Robble” and was the second major villain to be introduced in the commercials. During the 80’s I always remember him being one of the most popular characters with kids wanting to collect his toys that were in Happy Meals. Sadly like Birdie and Grimace, he joined them in the mascot retirement home in 2011. 

Mayor McCheese

In 1971 Mayor McCheese was the silly cheeseburger headed Mayor of McDonaldLand, who tried so hard but was a little dimwitted and relied on the help of Ronald and the rest of the gang. The Mayor spoke with a giggly voice and was mostly a background character for the company. The Mayor was voted out of power in 2008 as McDonald’s sent him to the mascot retirement home. Mayor McCheese remains a popular character and has become a pop culture icon thanks to the internet and shows like Family Guy.

Officer Big Mac

Law and Order was brought to McDonladland in 1970 as Officer Big Mac was on the case to bust the likes of The Hamnurglar and Captain Crook! Officer Big Mac was a by the book character who was the main source of law in the land, also making him one of the good guys. Big Mac was phased out in the 1980’s and made a small appearance in 2008 before being sent to that sad place known as mascot retirement. While remembered, Officer Big Mac did not gain cult status like his fellow hamburger headed friend Mayor McCheese. 

Captain Crook

Starting in 1970, the people of McDonaldland’s Filet-O-Fish were in big trouble as a pirate named Captain Crook took to the waterways and began stealing this sandwich, making him the first official bad guy of the land. Captain Crook was close friends to The Hamburglar and would translate his mumbles. Crook also spent a lot of time trying not to be captured by Officer Big Mac who always had his eyes on the beady eyed pirate.In the 1980’s  Captain Crook started to be phased out, and in 1999 he was sent to that retirement home for mascots. 

The Professor 

1971 was the year that a grey haired old man known simply as The Professor also made his mark in McDonaldland and was the inventor for the magical land. At first he was just a minor character, and later he became a major one that was given even a lightbulb hat. But like many other of his friends he was set to the retirement home for good in 2001 but not before being in a few cartoons and a video game. 

Happy Meal Gang/Hamburger Patch/McNugget Buddies/Fry Guys

The Happy Meal Gang was a group of talking food items such as a hamburger, fries and a cold drink who were all friends of Ronald and brought joy to customers. They were introduced in 1984 and were later joined in 1989 by the McNugget Buddies who later would replace the Happy Meal Gang altogether. In 1973 The Hamburger Patch was the main talking food and were hamburgers that grew on plants and were picked to be eaten by Ronald and customers.  They were phased out in the mid 80’s. The Fry Guys were odd colored short shaggy creatures who like to steal and eat french fries who were introduced in 1972.  They were so popular that they were used all the way till 2008. So many fun and odd talking food characters!

CosMc

In 1980-1985 Ronald McDonald and his gang of friends also befriended an alien from space who had many arms and wore a giant round space suit! He was a kind character who always wanted to trade McDonald’s food and wanted to share the great taste of the food with his people. CosMc was not a mainstay character and was used only a handful of times.  He did however make it into a video game and animated series based on the characters of the restaurant. I should also note he spoke like a surfer dude.

So there was a very quick rundown of some of the amazing McDonaldland characters.  I tried to make them all brief for if we broke them down too much, we would be here for another few pages of who epic and amazing they are! So now you know a little about them and your mind is recharged with memories of these characters making it time for the comic reviews that were free give aways and were called McDonaldLand Comics! I just want you all to remember I grade these on a standard 1-4 star rating and base it on entertainment value, quality of the story, the art and how true it stays to the source martial, and I would like to think Mile High Comics and Amazon for having these comics in stock.

McDonaldland Comics  # 101  **1/2
Released in 1976   Cover Price FREE   McDonald Corp. Comics   #101 of 102

It’s America’s 200^th birthday, and Mayor McCheese has gotten an invitation to be a guest at the country’s huge birthday party! The Mayor invites Ronald, Officer Big Mac, The Professor and Grimace to go along with him on a magical train, and they decide to leave Captain Crook and Hamburglar back in McDonaldland to watch after things. Crook and Hamburglar sneak aboard the train, and they all take a tour of the amazing sites of America. But along the way the Captain Crook falls from the flying train and could be lost as they arrive at the party! The second small story in the issue is about The Hamburglar who is giving up stealing hamburgers, but now is stealing things that begin with the letter H!

The first story is a silly adventure that is a way for Ronald McDonald to teach the readers American history.  So while you as a youngster read this, you were also learning! It’s odd how in this issue the bad guys of the land, Hamburglar and Captain Crook, are supposed to be the ones left behind to watch over things.  Now don’t they like to steal and cause panic…so why would they want to leave them behind? Plus Officer Big Mac seems to be a one trick pony in the issue and repeats about the railroad being too bumpy and about arresting people.  Ronald is clearly the ringleader of the group as his word is law, and at one point he is being questioned by a cop and escapes without showing his ID so he won’t be late for the party! The story is short and ends with a cliffhanger as they get to the party but Captain Crook has fallen from the train that is flying now, so did he die? The next issue I hope will explain this. The second back up story of Hamburglar stealing things that start with an H is just a cheesy joke as the rest of the comic is filled with puzzles and such. The artwork is great and has that classic 70’s kid comic look and each character looks like they should. The cover is also pretty cool, and I am sure in 1976 kids picked up this free issue like crazy! So over all this is a fun and average free restaurant comic that was worth a read. I am going to say that the best character in this first issue would have to be Ronald McDonald himself followed by Captain Crook.  So with this let’s move onto issue 2!

McDonaldland Comics  # 102  **1/2
Released in 1976   Cover Price FREE   McDonald Corp. Comics   #102 of 102

The McDonaldland gang is gearing up for a silly version of the Olympics that include pogo stick jumps, and hamburger dashes! The gang that includes Ronald, Captain Crook, Hamburglar and Grimace are going up against The Fry Guys! But late the night before the event, a short man named Sneak-Snoop Snoggly of the Sneak-Snoop race who live in the hills comes to town and causes mischief and pranks on all the group! The pranks leave Mayor McCheese falling down a hole, Grimace squashing a giant tomato and Ronald’s pogo stick spring being so tight that he bounces up way to high and smacks into a bird! In the end they confront Snoggly who in turns falls of a high dive board and wins a medal that puts a smile on his face and all is well again in McDonaldland. The second mini story of this issue is about The Professor taking the gang around again on the flying train to see historic sites from around the USA and uses a machine that lets them see the past in the spots they are visiting.

The McDonaldland Olympic Games are filled with silly things that kids would have fun doing, pogo sticks and bouncing, sounds like Field Day events to me! This time around a trickster is causing issues in the fast food land and almost leads to Ronald’s and a bird’s death as they collide in the air and both are stunned. It’s clear that Captain Crook must have lived after his fall in issue one as he is in the Olympic Games, though they should have some how worked in how it all worked out. This main story as well only really highlights Ronald as the rest of them all take back seats, and this is to be expected as Ronald is the main mascot for the company. The second story seems a little lacking and is just more history lesson left over from the first issue.  While very informative, I wish they would have not repeated the American History lesson. The rest of the comic issue is filled with puzzles and such and I am sure had kids of the time entertained. Over all the first story is pretty fun though I wish had a little more to it.  The second story is just okay, making this issue another average issue but well worth the read, and the price it coast when it was released…FREE. 

One has to wonder why McDonaldland Comics only lasted two issues when Big Boy and Captain D’s both had comic series going at the time and years after even. One has to wonder if the cost of making the free comic just didn’t outweigh the payout of making kids have a collectors item based around their mascots. I for one would have loved to have gotten comics for free based on these characters in the 80’s and would have looked forward to getting an issue anytime we ate there. The comic series really focused on Ronald and that makes sense with the surprise two characters that seemed to get a lot of panel time being The Professor and Captain Crook. Hamburglar, Mayor McCheese and Officer Big Mac all had solid roles to play in the two issues, and Grimace was almost a second thought and offered very little to the story lines, and that’s a shame cause he would have been a perfect character for a kids comic. The art, as I stated before, is great and would have been right at home if Star Comics was going in 1976.  The covers were both very well done and eye catching and better than any other free restaurant comic cover. I wish that McDonald’s would bring back all these classic characters for this modern generation who are lacking the fun wonders of mascots.  I also wish they would bring back free comic books based on these characters, and I also wish they would stop being the target of parent groups and TV “chefs” who want to make a name for themselves by attacking the worlds largest burgar chain. Well the chill in the air is telling me it’s time to go, but before we do I must tell you readers that next update will be on Christmas Eve and will be all about Thundercats! So make sure to come back and give it a read! Till then, have a great holiday season, read a comic or two and eat a Big Mac.