Jungle Comics #36
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeJungle Comics #36 (December 1942) is a solid mid-run representative of Fiction House's flagship anthology title, which ran an extraordinary 163 issues from January 1940 through Summer 1954 — one of the longest-running jungle-adventure comics of the Golden Age. The issue showcases the full roster of recurring Fiction House characters in a single package, demonstrating how the publisher developed a consistent, ensemble-driven anthology model that distinguished it from single-hero titles. Its cover, rendered by house workhorse Dan Zolnerowich, exemplifies the 'Good Girl Art' house style that made Fiction House one of the most visually distinctive publishers of the era. The issue also carries a Fantomah installment at a point in the character's history when she had recently been retconned into a new Egyptian-princess origin — making this era of the anthology an active creative laboratory for character evolution.
Jungle Comics #36 is an anthology featuring multiple adventure stories. "Kaanga—Jungle Lord" follows the title character as he attempts to rescue his mate from a curse of the moon goddess, dealing with mystical forces at Juju Mountain. "Fantomah" involves the jungle boy Wambi and supernatural threats within a voodoo temple. "Simba, King of Beasts" depicts the fierce lion engaged in battles with other jungle creatures, with a subplot involving characters D'Guna and Boko struggling for dominance in the African wilderness.
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We Buy Collections ▸History
Fiction House launched Jungle Comics in January 1940 as the comic-book companion to its long-running Jungle Stories pulp magazine, with Kaänga — a Tarzan-archetype character created by artist Alex Blum — serving as the title anchor in every issue. By the time issue #36 arrived in December 1942, the book was deep in its wartime run under Fiction House's in-house editorial operation, which had evolved from its early reliance on the Eisner-Iger packaging shop. Dan Zolnerowich — whose cover art for this issue also illustrates the lead Kaänga story — was a reliable Fiction House staff artist who contributed both cover and interior work across many issues of the title during this period. The anthology format, with its rotating cast of jungle characters, was standard Fiction House practice and allowed the publisher to keep page counts high (the title was still at its 52-page format in this era) while cycling multiple creative contributors through each issue.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Published December 1942 by Fiction House as issue #36 of the ongoing Jungle Comics anthology series (1940–1954, 163 issues total).
- Cover art and lead story ('The Flame-Death of Juju Mountain') both executed by Dan Zolnerowich, Fiction House's recurring interior and cover artist for the title.
- Lead story features Kaänga and his companion Ann Mason — the title's central characters since issue #1 — on a rescue mission involving a villainess named T'gara, who is worshipped as a moon goddess by a cannibal tribe.
- Includes a Fantomah story illustrated by George Appel; by this point in the series (post-issue #27), Fantomah had been reinvented as 'Fantomah, Daughter of the Pharaohs,' an ancient Egyptian princess reborn to protect the jungle — a retcon introduced earlier in 1942.
- Also contains a Tabu, Wizard of the Jungle segment (art by Saul Rosen) and an Andy Lone Eagle segment (art by Al Stahl), showcasing the anthology's deep roster of supporting features.
- Kaänga, the series' lead, had originated in Fiction House's Jungle Stories pulp magazine before transitioning to comics in Jungle Comics #1 (January 1940); artist Alex Blum created his comics incarnation.
- Fantomah — who appears throughout this run of Jungle Comics — is recognized by comics historians as one of the earliest superheroines in American comic books, first appearing in Jungle Comics #2 (February 1940), created by Fletcher Hanks under the pseudonym 'Barclay Flagg'.
- Fiction House was, by this point in 1942, well-established as the leading 'Good Girl Art' publisher of the Golden Age, employing an unusually large number of women artists and consistently featuring strong female leads across its titles, a quality noted by comics historian Trina Robbins.
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