Believe it or not there are genres of comics that I’m not immediately attracted to; war, horror and yes, romance. But I’ve been a fan of Matt Baker one of the best comic book artists of the Golden Age for a couple of decades, thanks mostly to Bill Black’s A/C Comics reprints. So I already knew the Matt Baker who drew “the girls”; South Sea Girl, Sky Girl, Tiger Girl and my absolute favorite jungle girl (head and shoulders over Sheena) Rulah, Jungle Goddess. He also drew Canteen Kate, a character who deserves, and will get, a column of her own.

Image via Wikipedia

But I recently discovered his work on romance titles and was absolutely blown away by his work there. Sure, Baker could draw beautiful women; it’s an ability that should be appreciated and admired, but a lot of artists can draw beautiful women. But I was stuck by how in these stories, and especially these covers, he captured simple human scenes; sexy simple human scenes, sure, but the people in them are far more than stock figures in stock romance comic situations. Watch how they dress, move and position themselves; they’re alive, and no matter how stock the situations they carry with them moments of (here’s my ‘I-went-college’ phrase) felt life.

Oh, and did I mention they were sexy? The stories might have been about romance but the covers were about sex. And often enough to shatter some of our preconceptions about how people in the 1950′s acted, the women on these covers knew what they wanted from men and weren’t ashamed to go after it.

These are things of beauty. Somebody really needs to collect this material and until they do, here’s “They Called Me A Wayward Girl” from Diary* Secrets #10.

*I like to say I “use” to have dyslexia when I was a kid but it’s never far from me. As I prepared this piece I repeatedly and relentless kept typing “Dairy Secrets”. Now there’s a comic I’d like to read.