I Shall Destroy All The Civilized Planets! [Paperback]

Fletcher Hanks (Author), Paul Karasik (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 20, 2007

Welcome to the bizarre world of Fletcher Hanks, the mysterious cartoonist who created a hailstorm of tales of brutal retribution from 1939-1941...and then mysteriously vanished. His obscure and hard to find stories are finally collected here.

Welcome to the bizarre world of Fletcher Hanks, Super Wizard of the Inkwell. Fletcher Hanks worked for only a few years in the earliest days of the comic book industry (1939-1941). Because he worked in a gutter medium for second-rate publishers on third-rate characters, his work has been largely forgotten. But among aficionados he is legendary. At the time, comic books were in their infancy. The rules governing their form and content had not been established. In this Anything Goes era, Hanks' work stands out for its thrilling experimentation. At once both crude and visionary, cold and hot as hell, Hanks' work is hard to pigeon hole. One thing is for certain: the stuff is bent. Hanks drew in a variety of genres depicting science-fiction saviors, white women of the jungle, and he-man loggers. Whether he signed these various stories "Henry Fletcher" or "Hank Christy" or "Barclay Flagg" there is no mistaking the unique outsider style of Fletcher Hanks.

Cartoonist Paul Karasik (co-adapter of Paul Auster's City of Glass, and co-author of The Ride Together: A Memoir of Autism in the Family) has spent years tracking down these obscure and hard to find stories buried in the back of long-forgotten comic book titles. Karasik has also uncovered a dark secret: why Hanks disappeared from the comics scene. This book collects 15 of his best stories in one volume followed by an afterword which solves the mystery of "Whatever Happened to Fletcher Hanks," the mysterious cartoonist who created a hailstorm of tales of brutal retribution...and then mysteriously vanished.

2008 Eisner Award WINNER: Best Archival Collection/Project — Comic Books
2008 Eisner Award Nominee: Best Short Story, "Whatever Happened to Fletcher Hanks?" by Paul Karasik Full-color comics throughout

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

One of the strangest cartoonists of American comics' Golden Age, Hanks had a short career—the 15 stories collected here were all published between 1939 and 1941—but the deranged, nightmarish vigor of his work has made it something of a cult item. Hanks created pulpy characters like Stardust the Super Wizard, the scientific marvel whose vast knowledge of all planets has made him the most remarkable person ever known and the jungle heroine Fantomah, whose face becomes a snarling skull when she uses her magic powers. The artist's manic obsessions turn up again and again: global-scale atrocities, miraculous rays and, most of all, poetically apt punishments. In a typical story, Master-Mind De Structo tries to suffocate America's heads of state with an oxygen-destroying ray, so Stardust turns him into a giant head, then hurls him into a space pocket of living death occupied by a headless headhunter. Hanks's artwork is crude and technically limited (each of his characters has exactly one, wildly caricatured, facial expression), but nearly every page has some image that sings out with deep, primal power. In an afterword, editor Paul Karasik explains how he tracked down Hanks's son and learned a bit more about the artist's sad life and death. (July)
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From Booklist

Hanks, who plied his trade in the late 1930s and early 1940s, has been called the Ed Wood of comic books, but his narratives are far more bizarre than Wood's film scenarios, and his naive artwork resembles that of outsider artists like Henry Darger. His creations include jungle queen Fantomah, who morphs into an all-powerful, skull-faced avenger; he-man lumberjack Big Red McLane; and his chef d'oeuvre, Stardust, "master of space and interplanetary forces," a tiny-headed, barrel-chested, eight-foot superhero with limitless powers. Hanks definitely had a vision, albeit a loopy one. In every story here, justice is meted out in cruelly imaginative ways to "spies and grade-A racketeers," "a gigantic fifth column," and other miscreants. Stardust transforms them into icicles that melt away, or giant rats he then drowns. Hanks' crude but powerful draftsmanship makes such grisly executions laughably nightmarish. In a comics-format afterword as sensitive and nuanced as Hanks' work is harsh and blunt, compiler Karasik tracks down the fate of the elusive Hanks, who vanished from the scene after producing a handful of hauntingly demented works. Flagg, Gordon

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Product Details

• Paperback: 124 pages
• Publisher: Fantagraphics Books (June 20, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1560978392
• ISBN-13: 978-1560978398
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 0.5 x 11 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (29 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #87,100 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #19 in Books > Comics & Graphic Novels > Publishers > Fantagraphics

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 21 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars The most important collection of comics I've ever read. July 28, 2007

By Katie

Format:Paperback

by Glenn Phillips (Atlanta GA)

I've collected comic books for 50 years, and this was probably the most important collection of comics that I've ever read. The work of Hanks is surreal, crude yet beautiful (and impossible to take your eyes off), highly imaginative, and more importantly, it's a one-of-a-kind direct connection to a man's subconscious that exemplifies the power of the creative process.

What really put this book over the top for me, though, was the afterword by the book's editor, Paul Karasik, told as a 10-page graphic novel. In it, Karasik tracks down Hank's son and uncovers the disturbing story of Fletcher the man. This puts the violent and retributive nature of Hank's comics in an entirely different light, and is filled with surprises (including the fact that Hanks foreshadowed his own death in one of his stories, and the ultimately redemptive legacy that his son was able to wrestle from his upbringing).

For me, this book was an unforgettable journey into the world that lies just beyond the realm of imagination, yet is, nonetheless, forever linked to reality.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Raw, Primitive and Super Strange! July 3, 2007

By Riley0091

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

Fletcher Hanks, pioneering comic artist, created the most surrealistic comic environments brimming with wonder and unspeakable evil at every page turn. His larger than life heroes, Fantomah (mysterious jungle woman), Stardust (omnipowerful wizard), Big Red McLane (two-fisted lumberjack), and Buzz Crandall (space ace), all rendered with slight heads and powerful bodies, use occult powers, super science or just a powerful right hook to banish the legions of offbeat and oddball villains -- with fatal results.

Hanks' rough-hued, boldly primitive artwork and "pre-comic code" visceral storytelling, makes this volume a must for anyone who enjoyed early comic collections like Dick Briefer's The Monster of Frankenstein or Art Out of Time: Unknown Comics Visionaries 1900-1969.

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Demented Gem from the Genesis of the Comic Book era October 13, 2007

By W. Hohauser

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

Exceptionally strange, very crudely drawn comics from a time when crudely comics were the norm. It seems that Hanks would make only three drawings of his main characters and traced them over and over for his entire comic book career. Many other drawings seem to be traced photographs or stolen from other drawn art of the time. His stories have the same traced over and over quality. Hanks was obsessed with characters destroying New York City with squadrons of bombers flown by gangsters. New York gets it over and over. Most stories have the heroes figuring out the villian's homicidal plans by the third panel but allowing the horrible destruction happen regardless. Interestingly, most of the villains' plans involve extreme mass destruction and near total genocide. Stardust seems inspired by the awesome powers of comic book hero the Spectre but it's hard to tell which came first as no dates are given for the stories.

Between the crude drawing, the bizarre logic and the odd language you are transported into a world that crosses outsider art, a mental institution and that strange kid in high school who drew disturbing comics in the corner all day. If you are familiar with Rory Hayes of the 1960's underground scene, you'll have some sort of idea what's in these pages. The exceptional afterword fleshes out the world of Fletcher Hanks a little bit but believe me it doesn't make it any less disturbing.

A great item for the comic collector especially if they have a taste for some of the more extreme psychological comics that have been produced over the past 40 years. There are certainly a number of people I would never show this to.