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Conventional wisdom holds that comic books of the post-World War II era are poorly drawn and poorly written publications, notable only for the furor they raised. Contributors to this thoughtful collection, however, demonstrate that these comics constitute complex cultural documents that create a dialogue between mainstream values and alternative beliefs that question or complicate the grand narratives of the era. Close analysis of individual titles, including EC comics, Superman, romance comics, and other, more obscure works, reveals the ways Cold War culture--from atomic anxieties and the nuclear family to communist hysteria and social inequalities--manifests itself in the comic books of the era. By illuminating the complexities of mid-century graphic novels, this study demonstrates that postwar popular culture was far from monolithic in its representation of American values and beliefs.

Cover -- Table of Contents -- Preface -- Introduction -- Part I: Containing Communism, Controlling the Atom -- 1. Lights, Camera, Action 101 -- 2. Decrypting Espionage Comic Books in 1950s America -- 3. "He Was a Living Breathing Human Being" -- 4. "I Can Pass Right Through Solid Matter!" -- 5. Jack Kirby's Challengers of the Unknown -- 6. Red Menace on the Moon -- Part II: Containing Sexuality in the Cold War -- 7. Girls Who Sinned in Secret and Paid in Public -- 8. Rebellion in Riverdale -- 9. The Amazon Mystique -- 10. The Girls in White -- 11. Horror Camp -- Part III: The Problem of Consensus -- 12. "Dedicated to the Youth of America" -- 13. MAD's Guest Writers -- 14. Beyond the Frontier -- 15. East Europeans in the Cold War Comic This Godless Communism -- 16. The Fantastic Four -- About the Contributors -- Index.