Action Comics #142
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeAction Comics #142 (March 1950) holds a quiet but concrete place in DC's publishing history as the issue that introduced Captain Brent Wood, the co-pilot and superior officer who would become Tommy Tomorrow's permanent partner for nearly a decade of space-adventure backup stories. That partnership gave the Tommy Tomorrow feature its lasting shape: two Planeteers flying the solar system's 'Space Ace' patrol craft, a dynamic that ran through Action Comics until 1959 and then continued in World's Finest Comics. The issue also lands at a transitional editorial moment for Action Comics itself: Zatara's long-running backup strip had just ended the previous issue (#141), and Tommy Tomorrow's science-fiction backup was actively replacing the magic-themed anthology content with space-age adventure stories, mirroring postwar America's growing fascination with rocketry and the cosmos. The Superman lead story's opening caption — explicitly stating that Kryptonite harms Superman and only Superman — reflects the period's effort to codify and stabilize the rules of Superman's mythology for a mass readership.
In "The Conquest of Superman!", the notorious Red Sanders flees through uncharted space, conjuring a planet with a desperate wish—only to find himself outmaneuvered by two newcomers, Tommy and Brent, who wield the same mind-over-matter power. Written by Edmond Hamilton and illustrated by Curt Swan with inks by John Fischetti, this 1950 adventure sees the trio locked in a battle of wills on a planet shaped entirely by thought. The cover by Wayne Boring and Stan Kaye captures the surreal stakes of a world born from imagination.
In "The Conquest of Superman!" from Action Comics #142, the mystery of the stolen synthetic kryptonite deepens as Lex Luthor's latest scheme takes a dangerous turn—his missing weapon has vanished into the hands of an unknown thief, leaving Superman to confront a threat he can't yet see. The story unfolds with tense urgency, as the hero races to track down the rogue element before it can be used against him.
In "Wishing World!", Red Sanders flees through uncharted space, desperate for a hiding place—until a wild wish conjures a planet out of thin air, complete with a town that wasn’t there a moment before. When rookie Planeteers Tommy and Brent land on the same strange world, they quickly learn that thought can shape reality, turning the planet into a battleground of wills. As minds clash in a high-stakes test of mental strength, only one wish will end the game—and it might not be the one they expect.
In "Big Game in Andorra!", Bill uses his sharp eye and knowledge of Andorran shepherds to expose a fraudster pretending to be one of them—by comparing bare feet. The story unfolds with quiet suspense, turning a simple insurance claim into a clever test of identity and deception.
In "The Making of a Man!", millionaire Jethro Anderson enlists the Vigilante to transform his pampered son Frank into a man of grit and purpose. Sent to his father’s remote Western ranch, Frank must face the harsh realities of frontier life, where survival and hard work slowly reshape his outlook.
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By early 1950, Action Comics was deep into its anthology-era late Golden Age, with editor Mort Weisinger overseeing a Superman line that was increasingly rationalizing and systematizing the Man of Steel's powers and weaknesses. The Tommy Tomorrow backup had been running since Action Comics #127 (December 1948), created by Jack Schiff, George Kashdan, Bernie Breslauer, and Howard Sherman, and originally conceived in the quasi-documentary spirit of Real Fact Comics. By issue #142, the creative team on the Tommy Tomorrow strip — writer Otto Binder and artist Curt Swan — introduced Brent Wood as a supporting character in a story involving a wish-granting world; Binder and Jim Mooney would go on to define the feature's tone for most of the 1950s. The Superman lead story, 'The Conquest of Superman,' was produced during Wayne Boring's dominant period on the art side of the title, though specific writer credit for this individual story has not been widely documented in secondary sources.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Cover date: March 1950; part of Action Comics Volume 1, published by DC Comics (then National Comics Publications).
- First appearance of Captain Brent Wood, Tommy Tomorrow's co-pilot and Planeteers superior officer, introduced in the Tommy Tomorrow backup story.
- Brent Wood was created by writer Otto Binder and artist Curt Swan; he would appear sporadically (issues #148, #152, #154) before becoming a regular fixture in the Tommy Tomorrow strip.
- Tommy Tomorrow and Brent Wood piloted the patrol spacecraft 'Space Ace' through science-fiction adventures set in what the strip initially presented as the 21st century; beginning with Action #149 the setting was shifted further forward to the year 2050.
- The Superman lead story is titled 'The Conquest of Superman'; its opening caption explicitly establishes that Kryptonite is uniquely dangerous to Superman alone — an early example of DC editors formally codifying the rules of the Superman mythos in-story.
- The issue's Tommy Tomorrow story appeared during the backup's run from Action Comics #127 (December 1948) through #251 (April 1959), after which the feature moved to World's Finest Comics.
- Tommy Tomorrow himself was created by Jack Schiff, George Kashdan, Bernie Breslauer, and Howard Sherman, first appearing in Real Fact Comics #6 (January 1947) before transitioning to Action Comics.
- The Crisis on Infinite Earths Compendium retroactively categorized the Earth depicted in some Tommy Tomorrow stories as 'Earth-54,' reflecting the strip's ambiguous chronological setting within DC's pre-Crisis multiverse.
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↩ Reprints Adventure Comics #109 (1946)
Reprinted in Stålmannen #7/1953 (1953), Stålmannen #8/1953 (1953), Buzzy #70 (1956), Superman in Action Comics #1 (1993), Superman: The Golden Age Omnibus #7 (2023)
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