Compared to the many TV series of the 50s and 60s that generated comic book versions of their shows, “My Favorite Martian” had the good fortune to enjoy a brightly successful transition to the Gold Key comic pages. Sustaining dialogue that closely patterned itself on the television series, the comics are engagingly written and manage to retain the comic style of the show through conversation as much as situation. Aside from the first portion of the premiere comic, all the MFM comics contain original stories although they tend to parallel the introduction of key inventions and gimmicks of the filmed episodes.

The renowned comic artist Russ Manning did the artwork for the first issue which appeared on newsstands in Oct. 63. MFM #1 basically retells the pilot episode although it drops the character of Mrs. Brown’s niece Annabelle and develops a good running gag with Mrs. B’s teenage daughter Angela. But the real surprise is that the comic book version actually incorporates three scenes from My Favorite Martian’s unaired pilot! The first shows Tim phoning in a story about the “UFO” and uses virtually the same dialogue. The other two scenes have the Martian speaking Italian to the Air Force inspector and later, it is shown how he moved his spaceship into Tim’s garage with the help of a levitator device. The second half of the story is a solid escapade built around the Martian’s efforts to borrow some rocket fuel from an Air Force Base. Had this story been filmed it would have been a welcome addition to the series episodes.

Issue #2 appeared over six months later, in Apr. 64 with the best artwork of the series and the funniest moments. It contains two stories, the first of which deals with the Martian trying to get selected to command a test rocket to Mars. (A robot gets chosen instead). A point of contention with the story is that the Mars rocket reaches the Red Planet seemingly within a couple of hours and returns the same day -- a feat not even possible for today, but, this dramatic device was necessary in order to have the whole story work, and plotwise, it would have also made a good filmed episode. The second story takes a silly premise (caring for an escaped gorilla) and makes it work with a number of classically constructed comic moments. Illustrations from the robot story appear on the children’s MFM magic writing slate toy put out by Whitman Publications, the parent company of Gold Key comics.

Comic book #3 came out in Nov. 64, but it is a weak issue, with the artwork not being nearly as good as in the previous issues and the stories being geared to a more juvenile appeal.

The same can be said for the stories in issue #4 which came out in Feb. 65. Based on the premise of the first episode of the second season, that of Martian dreams achieving 3-dimensional form, the first story has a cute dino-like Martian creature appearing from a dream. The second story, about undergoing a physical regression is equally dismissible, except, in retrospect, from today’s context, it can be found to contain a strong anti-drug message.

But it is in this fourth issue that Gold Key seems to have settled on the artist whose work would appear in all the future MFM comics. The drawings are serviceable and represent an improvement over those of issue #3.

The comic stories improved as well with MFM #5 (May 65) which features an action-adventure set in a Mid-East desert and involving mishaps with the Martian’s duplicator machine. The second story works around the problem of the Martian’s sub- conscious self emerging while he is asleep. Both stories would have succeeded on film.

Issues #6 (Aug. 65) and #7 (Nov. 65) contain routine stories, nicely written and even perhaps preferable to some of the filmed shows of MFM’s second season. Although, the story about conjuring up a 2-dimensional cartoon-like entity to assist the Martian (issue #7) stretched the MFM concept a bit too far.

The entire issue #8 is taken up with one complete time travel adventure back to the old west of 1876, presumably due to the plot of the two-part opening episode of the 3rd season. But in the comic, Martin and Tim travel back in time due to a mishap with the Martian’s spaceship orbiting counter-clockwise at the speed of light, and not through the suitcase-size time machine. And even though the story has the cliched elements of a heroine, a mortgage and corrupt bankers it works very well, except for one scene that is out-of-character for the Martian: In wanting to convince an outlaw that his escape from jail is not a set-up (of course it is), Martin allows the bad guy to sneak up on an unsuspecting Tim and conk him on the head. It is doubtful that scene would play without a rewrite (the use of a force field comes to mind), but aside from that, the story is good enough to merit having been filmed.

Finally, the last Gold Key comic #9, issued July 66, easily contains the best adventure yarn ever written for the show. Patterned on the Bond/U.N.C.L.E. themes of the time, Martin and Tim travel to a small island in the Indian Ocean (via instantaneous transport by use of the time machine controls being set to zero) to stop a sinister force from taking over the world through hypnotic radio waves. The robotic and android adversaries they meet are all taken from characters in “The Odyssey” (this is acknowledged in the story) and the tale is pretty much non-stop action. The only complaint with the entertaining script is that the one major piece of the plot puzzle is missing -- it is never explained or revealed just who or what put all these devices there and sent out that hypnotic signal in the first place! Still , if any comic book story shoulda been filmed, this was it, and the heck with breaking the special effects budget to do it.

As a point of information, a concluding story where the Martian succeeds in returning to his home planet never appears in the comic books. (Nor in the show itself).

Again, weaknesses in storylines aside, and remembering that comic books were designed with kids in mind, “My Favorite Martian” Gold Key comics still rate an articulate and fun read.

JH Harison.