Sunday, April 7, 2013

Gold Key Comics...Doctor Solar, Man of the Atom

Another of Gold Key's popular super hero books from the 1960s was the power packed Doctor Solar Man of the Atom. Dr. Raymond Solar was a physicist who was exposed to a massive amount of radiation in an attempt to save a fellow scientist, Dr. Bently. Bently lost his life due to sabotage in a nuclear power plant by the evil Dr. Rasp, an agent of the mastermind named Nuro. Solar survived the accident, but soon discovered that he now had powers to convert his human form into any kind of energy. The use of these powers though depleted his "store" of energy which would require the physicist to re-expose himself to extreme radiation for his replenishment. Using his new found powers, our atomic hero began searching for the villain Nuro, who would clash with Dr. Solar many times. Nuro often used a robotic "double" of himself called Orun in his many schemes, and later even transferred his mind into the android, now known as King Cybernoid. In the first five appearances Doctor Solar did not even have a costume until the fifth issue, when he created a suit designed to shield others from his deadly radiation, that also made his skin turn green when using his powers.  Since "Doctor Solar" was his 'real' or 'civilian' name, he often went by "The Man of the Atom" when fighting criminals. With an original run that lasted twenty seven issues, from October of 1962 to April of 1969, he also appeared in a cross-over issue of The Occult Files of Doctor Spektor. In the early 1980s, the series was resumed with issue #28 and lasted four more issues, and has recently been reprinted in its entirety in a hard back format.


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