In Mystery in Space 45 (Aug. 1958), Gil Kane’s cover spotlights the story Flying Saucers Over Mars by writer Joe Millard and artist Carmine Infantino.
“Martians begin to see flying saucers in the sky, which they suspect are from Earth,” wrote comics historian Michael E. Grost. “Amusing role reversal story, with many ingenious twists. The story takes place entirely on Mars. The Martians are friendly, normal beings, and not at all the monsters they were sometimes depicted in prose SF and movies. There is perhaps a bit of a political allegory here: people in other countries and other races are a lot like us.”
Inside the issue is a house ad for a new hero, Space Ranger, who would soon take over as the cover feature of DC’s Tales of the Unexpected.
Meanwhile, one year later — in August 1959 — Adam Strange would become the cover feature for Mystery in Space.
And the Adam Strange formula is anticipated in Strange Adventures 94 (July 1958).
The story Elevator to the Future! (writer Gardner Fox, artist Murphy Anderson) features a protagonist who, like Strange, is whisked away to an alien environment by fantastic means, and manages to resolve a crisis there.
Proofreader Tom Jackson steps off the elevator in his office building and finds himself in the future, where he helps free humanity from alien control.
“(T)he aliens are motivated by the same forces that cause 20th Century Earth dictators such as Hitler and Stalin to enslave people,” Grost observed. “Stories like this are about the terrible menace of totalitarianism, a subject that weighed deeply on the minds of people in 1958. This whole approach is typical of Mystery in Space and Strange Adventures.”
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