Joe Gill

writer
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #1

La Caverna del Pasado

Hoping to sell a big story to his editor, reporter Jim Foster fakes photographs of prehistoric animals in a legendary Latin American cave, but when he takes Professor charles Beaduy to the cave, they find more than what was promised.

The cave does bring together animals and people from different times, but whether any actual time travel occurs is debatable. And before you ask, I don’t know what a mastondia is either. —Michael Main
Time must have stood still in this region of Earth. Take a picture of this mastondia before it goes for us.
"Don
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Debatable Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #2

Madam Futura

Madam Futura has an infallible knack for seeing the future—a knack that businessman Ben Gainer plans to exploit, even though he figures her for a fake. —Michael Main
That Madam Futura knows everything! She can see the past, the present, and the future!
In the first two panels, a mystical woman in a green turban looks over a crystal ball and reads the future of two people.
  • Fantasy
  • Weird Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Time Phenomena
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #2

Ramakos II Doubled

After actor John Montaro immerses himself in the role of Ramakos II, he receives a visit from the original Ramakos II, who takes Montaro back to ancient Egypt. —Michael Main
Won’t things become rather confused if people see and hear there are two of us?
In the large first panel, two identical Egyptian pharaohs in purple and yellow robes argue in on stage in front of an audience.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #3

The Lodestone

Businessman Burt Carpe and his scientist sidekick Jeff struggle with coming up with a plan to make money from their time machine. In the end, they take a large lump of carbon back to an unspecified ice age a few million years in the past. Can you guess why? —Michael Main
There she is, my cyclo-metronome, a real live time-machine!
In three panels, a 1950s brown sedan drives through the rain at night.
  • Science Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #3

Why?

The Bailys are the perfect family with the perfect baby, until one day young Billy wails all night long. —Michael Main
He cried all night—he didn’t stop till just now! He can’t be just teething! I’m taking the day off . . . We’re going to the doctor to find out why!
In the large first panel, a baby wails at night from within a second-storey bedroom in a suburban home.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Time Phenomena
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #5

The Man Who Changed Times

A prisoner, Vincent Rand, is offered a way out of his ten-year sentence. —Michael Main
Wouldn’t you prefer being free, even five hundred years in the past, to serving out a ten year sentence in this prison?
In three panels, a man in a green suit makes a proposal to a prisoner about travel to the past.
  • Science Fiction
  • Weird Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #6

Caveman

Herman Pringle despairs of ever having the respect of his wife Clara, so much so that he daydreams of living the life of of a caveman where every man’s wife was his servant. —Michael Main
But she’d never push me around if we lived back in the time of the cavemen! No, siree! I’d be boss.
In the large first panel, a man in a business suit stands in front of a larger version of himself as a caveman.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #7

The Man Who Could See Tomorrow

A plain Joe just wants to get rid of the scarey power he has to see tomorrow’s events today. —Michael Main
I heard that story you just told . . . and I believe you!
In the large first panel, a man in an unbutton shirt pleads with a doctor who assures him that nothing is wrong.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Time Phenomena
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #9

Clairvoyance

Young David Fenner just wants to play baseball, but when an electric charge zaps him with the power of clairvoyance, researchers at the local university have other plans for the boy. —Michael Main
There were no ill effects from the shock! But some days later, the first signs of his hunusual new power appeared . . .
In the large first panel, a group of visitors marvel at a statue on a university campus of a young boy posing with a baseball and bat.
  • Science Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Time Phenomena
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #9

The Day I Lived Over Again

While on the lam, hardened criminal Blackie Nelson gets a chance to live the day over—and this time he plans to evade the police and win the girl! —Michael Main
The day’s starting over again! This doll’s going to fall for me . . . Only this time I’m going to work things different!
In the large first panel, a man in a business suit stands in front of a larger version of himself as a caveman.
  • Fantasy
  • Weird Fiction
  • Mystery and Crime
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #10

Man from the Ages

A military post in Alaska discovers a prehistoric man frozen in ice. —Michael Main
You are right, Jason. This is big!! A beast-like human, frozen solid for who knows how many thousands of years . . . perhaps millions of years, and perfectly preserved!
In the large first panel, three military men stand around an ice hole discussing a frozen man in the ice.
  • Science Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Time Phenomena
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #11

Dream On . . . !

Fred Cotton refuses to sleep because each of his nightmares later comes true! —Michael Main
He fought sleep like a man fighting demons! But no man can stay awake forever! His eyelids began to close, heavy with fatigue, his head began to nod . . .
In three large panels, Fred Cotton wakes up from a seemingly impossible dream of a giant sea monster.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Time Phenomena
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #11

Noise in the Cellar

Once again, a plumber receives an emergency call from 12 Hedge Row. —Michael Main
Will you come right over? My water heater looks dangerous!
In May of 1915, a woman asks her husband to go into the cellar to check out a strange noise.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #11

Second Chance

After Dr. Paul Faine accomplishes his life’s work, he begins to reflect on the past and whether the world is ready for limitless power. —Michael Main
Now we will see into the coree of the atom . . . the core which is the basis of all things! We will be able to produce life in the test tube, blow up the world with the touch of a finger!
In three large panels, a white-haired scientist examines something through a large microscope.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #12

Time of the Dragon

RAF pilot Clive St. George is a snooty chap because of his fine ancestry until one day he has motor trouble while flying through a storm. —Michael Main
Motor trouble! Must go down! According to my reckoning I must be close to my ancestral home in West Croyden . . .
The life of snooty Clive St. George is shown in a series of three large panels
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #13

After Tomorrow!

While preparing for war against Bulavia, King Gustave of Translovia sees two visions of the future by way of a magnificent timepiece. —Michael Main
I have had a vision of my victory tomorrow!
Three large panels depict King Gustave of Translovia awaiting the arrival of a magnificent timepiece.
  • Fantasy
  • War
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Time Phenomena
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #14

Giant from the Unknown

While digging a well, farmer John Grainey stumbles upon a buried giant. —Michael Main
I believe your giant was in some scientific vault from another age [. . .]
In one large panel and two smaller panels, farmer John Grainey uncovers the body of a giant and calls in the local university.
  • Science Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Time Phenomena
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #20

The Time Cap

Phil Winship, an executive at an American company in Iran, finds an odd cap in the desert that transports him to a strange laboratory. —Michael Main
Now I realize what happened! This cap is some sort of time-travelling device!
In the first of three panels, a modern man sits in a chair with his cap attached to electrical equipment as an ancient woman and two men look on.
  • Science Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #20

The Forbidden Camera

Archeologist Wayne Banford ignores the sanskrit warning to leave the camera where he found it in a cave with an idol. —Michael Main
He who would claim this camera as his own will have a life of woe heed this warning.
In the first of three large panels, we see a sweating archeologist frightened over a photo of himself in years to come.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Debatable Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #25

The Confederate Girl

Civil War mythbuster Hiram White moves to a small Georgia town where the townspeople believe that Confederate ghosts still ride through the dusk. —Michael Main
Miss Belle Herbert once lived here! During the Civil War she was a southern spy and captured by Major Joshua White!
A collage of three panels taken from "The Confederate Girl" by Steve Ditko.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #26

Where Is Amelia?

At a happenin’ party, a beatnik puts Amelia into a trance, sending her to, like, the the 25th century! —Michael Main
Sleep, chick, sleep deep! You will like go into another world. A world without squares. A world where everyone is like real sweep people!
In the first of three large panels, we see a beatnik playing the bongos and hypnotizing a young woman at a party.
  • Science Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #27

Look into the Future

Decades ago, a prescient dream gave a young man confidence to ruthlessly pursue his ambitions. —Michael Main
The mine did cave later . . . but mining is a dangerous business and some always die! The important thing is, I got production!
A collage of three panels taken from "A Look Into the Future" by Steve Ditko.
  • Weird Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Time Phenomena
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #29

Where Does It Go?

J. L . Standish finds himself unexpectedly on a flying bus to the future where the automata have a job for him. —Michael Main
But what would I do? If your automated processes are as efficient as I believe, a mere mortal cannot be important to you!
A purple city bus flies above startled onlookers.
  • Science Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #30

A Small Matter of Time

The title suggests that Professor Amos Shute’s intrepid travelers are going back in time to four planets that are identical in every way to our own, but then again, perhaps those four planets were merely at earlier times to begin with. We won’t say one way or another, but we are glad that the Spanish Flu pandemic, World War I, World War II, and World War III were all averted on some Earth. —Michael Main
In what time period will you find yourselves when you land at your particular destinatoin!
In two large panels with spaceships and a large model of Earth, Professor Amos Shute explains a mission to four space pilots.
  • Science Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Debatable Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #33

Death of a Hot Rod

After high school, young Joe Bragan is offered a job driving his hot rod around the deserts of Libya. —Michael Main
He looks for real! So does the chariot!
A nineteen-sixties teen drives a blue hot rod with a Saracen chief in the back toward a Roman legion.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #47

The Unwelcome Guest

After a car accident, Steve Teller stumbles into a house that takes him from one time to another. —Michael Main
Open up! I’ve had enough of this! Whatever crazy explanation there is, I want it now!
Standing in front of a medieval knight, a startled man exclaims "I . . . I must be dreaming."
  • Horror
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Gorgo 23

The Land of Long Ago

Charlton’s Gorgo comic was inspired by the the 1961 movie of the same name Unlike the movie, however, the comic book Gorgo had one adventure in time when Dr. Hobart Howarth rescues Gorgo from YaPa* by sending the giant reptile back to the late Jurassic. Sadly, as a child, I bought only one Gorgo comic, which was not the time-travel issue, although that one issue I had was drawn by Steve Ditko, hooray!
* Yet another Pentagon attack —Michael Main
I will send Gorgo back into is own era in the stream of time. Here he is an anachronism . . . In his own time, he would be in harmony withhis surroundings!
A giant green reptile bats at a dark pterodactyl while a man cowers to one side.
  • Science Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Nonfiction Comic

Gorgo #23

Time Pocket

Although this one-page feature is title “Time Pocket,” it seems to be about travel to another dimension rather than through time. —Michael Main
A person can suddenly disappear before our eyes, by accidentally or purposely stepping into another dimension.
A five-panel single-page feature describing how people step into "other dimensions."
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • No Time Phenomena