Li'l Pals #3

Marvel's all-ages humor title serves up a wonderfully chaotic cover scene for this January 1973 issue: a very unhappy escaped zoo lion has cornered a duck character named Buck on the living room floor, while a worried female duck character looks on from the doorway, frantically calling out to him over a TV news bulletin about the very lion now looming over him. Stan Goldberg's pencils and John Verpoorten's inks bring a lively, rubbery energy to the predicament, with smashed furniture and splashing water adding to the mayhem. If you have a soft spot for funny-animal comics with a good dose of slapstick peril, Li'l Pals #3 delivers exactly that kind of cheerful chaos.