Goodbye Germany : at the Wild Wild West !

With nine posts still unfinished I should put all my energy on wrapping those up but at the same time I have been adding so many western related videos to those posts that I thought, why not make a spin - off post with some of these videos which might be quicker in the long run ?

Also it´s a good opportunity to continue my GOODBYE GERMANY series .

Now this is not the first time I am writing about western comics on this blog since I covered everything from DC Comics´ JONAH HEX to german western comics from my misspent youth , Jean Giraud a.k.a. Moebius BLUEBERRY , Landrömer´s KAUBOI UND KAKTUS , the many times Marvel Comics changed the original Ghost Rider´s name , Karl May´s WINNETOU , Gil Kane´s western comicbook covers , Gardner Fox´ western comicbook covers , Harvey Comics´ BLACK CAT , my post about Matt Wagner´s ZORRO and also the WILD WILD WEST movie with Will Smith in my cult siren post´s about all natural 36E ( !!! ) - 25 - 37 supreme blow up sex doll Salma Hayek .

Before we get to my usual mix of pop cultural relevant stuff, curvy cult sirens and personal favorites I have to mention a celebrity birthday that I forgot to include in my last post. Granted, since coming to Spain I have only been able to insert the anniversaries of notice sporadically but I have to mention blond Busenwunder Patricia Arquette who celebrated her 54th birthday on April the 8th. Thankfully this often overlooked brabuster nixed her plans to become a nun since she has won various awards during her career including one Oscar, three Golden Globes, two Primetime Emmy Awards, two Screen Actor Guild Awards and a British Academy Film Award.

Patricia is a hot mix of French - Canadian, Swiss, German, Jewish, English, Scottish, Irish, Welsh and Russian and when you see her all natural 38D ( !!! ) - 28 - 36 measurements you know why she was one of my first candidates in my SEARCH FOR POWER GIRL series. Although I never got to write that post. Or mention her on this blog which is why I had to include her Today.

Now usually when I include a top 5 of the best videos I start with the number 5 and work my way through to the best one but somehow things got a bit mixed up so we start with the best and then get to the rest.

Coming to the topic of Today´s post, we start with a few reading recommendations for those who have read and enjoyed LUCKY LUKE.

Not really a reading recommendation since I don´t know if I would enjoy it as much without the huge nostalgia factor but I just had to include a video about one of my favorite western series as a kid : BESSY, not Lassie.

Speaking of favorite western series, here is proof that even I don´t know everything : I thought that Winnetoonz was the first animated adaption of Winnetou but it seems there was an even earlier one. Does anybody know more about it ? The animation looks like Lou Scheimer´s Filmation.

Apropos Winnetou, Lex Barker really has done it all : Old Shatterhand, Kara Ben Nemsi Effendi, Tarzan, pirate, FBI agent and even outlaw Robin Hood.

I couldn´t include this in my - still unfinished - MASK OF THE ZORRO MONDAY WITH MATT WAGNER post because it already had a video with an anlysis of the movie. I try to avoid having two similar videos in one post.

This video serves two purposes : firstable it is a musical introduction to the next part of the bonus section but I also want to show a bit of love and moral support to Will Smith. I´m probably the only person on the planet who has not seen the Oscars since they don´t show them in Spain but what they have shown on every channel is what happened between Will Smith and Chris Rock. Which I refuse to comment until I have seen the Oscars. Whatever happened - justified or not - in my opinion most people forget too quickly what a great singer, musician and actor Will Smith is who has kept us entertained with his great performances for decades.

I have found quite a few episodes from the original WILD WILD WEST tv show on YouTube but as a comicbook fan I had to go with the one which has the original Batgirl 37C - 23 - 36 cult siren Yvonne Craig as a guest star.

Here´s the lovely Yvonne working on her tan in a clip from The Man from U.N.C.L.E. And before you go through your DVD collection this is from ONE SPY TOO MANY, a feature film version of the tv show that combined both The Alexander the Greater Affair episodes. The subplot and footage with Yvonne Craig was just shot for the film and did NOT appear on television.

You can also see the full clip - as well as many more with Yvonne Craig on such shows like STAR TREK or MY FAVORITE MARTIAN - on this website .

Coming from the WILD WILD WEST tv show to the 1999 movie, a big part of the pull of the film was ultimate latin blow up sex doll Salma Hayek who didn´t have a sexy table dance scene like in FROM DUSK TO DAWN but apart from that wore ..... let´s face it : not too much clothing. At least in her first scenes, later on she wore a lot of fabric. I guess they needed some spicy clips for the trailer so they could get the moviegoers money.

I mean what´s the deal with designing such an lingerie outfit for Salma Hayek and then covering her up for most of the movie ? I´m not saying that well endowed actresses have to be naked all the time. They can wear something for five minutes and get naked later on which is more sexy.

No, really, in my opinion if you have an actress with a stunning physique than you have to use that if you are a good director. And you seize the opportunity if you have an oscar - winning actor like Mickey Rourke in a movie instead of giving Dennis Rodman more screentime because you want to be his buddy or you´re smoking weed together. Also I think it should be a rule in horror movies that female characters only die after they have been naked. You might think this IS a rule - especially if you have seen the SCREAM saga - but it isn´t. Trust me, I have seen dozens of horror movies were whole squads of hot, nubile chicks met their end before undressing. What a waste. And it´s the same with Salma Hayek.

Back to WILD WILD WEST Salma Hayek does have some good scenes in the movie but ultimately she´s not a very likeable or sympathetic character because she plays the helpless damsel in distress the whole movie until the end when the old, decrepit " father " Will Smith and Kevin Kline have almost died to save turns out to her virile, potent and young husband.

It´s the part of the movie that bugs me the most. I guess it´s realistic that this sweet and hot looking massita is in reality a lying, scheming woman who seduces the heroes to get what she wants and doesn´t get her deserved upcommance but I don´t have to go to the movies for that.

According to internet sources the latin sex godess´ measurements are - all natural - 36E - 25 - 37 but here it looks to be much more. Anyway, at the moment Salma is married to a rich guy who just drowned her in expensive jewelery so you know what women really want. And you can find more pictures, videos and animated GIFs with Salma in my old cult siren posts .

You may have wondered why there was a giant mechanical spider in the movie and the answer to that is simple : producer Jon Peters put it in.

He was the producer along with director Sonnenfeld and in AN EVENING WITH KEVIN SMITH, Kevin Smith talked about working with Peters on a fifth potential SUPERMAN film in 1997, revealing that Peters had three demands for the script. The first demand was that Superman is not allowed to wear the suit, the second was that Superman not fly, and the third was to have Superman fight a giant spider in the third act. After Tim Burton came on board, Smith's script was tossed away and the film was never produced due to further complications. A year later, he noted that WILD WILD WEST was released with the inclusion of a giant mechanical spider in the final act. Neil Gaiman has also said that Jon Peters insisted a giant mechanical spider be included in a film adaptation of THE SANDMAN.

To keep the western theme going - and to post something about another sexbomb with black hair and a huge rack here´s the swedish techno / folk / bluegrass band REDNEX . The group was very popular in Germany in the 90s although I have to say that I really started to like the band as soon as new front woman Julie Anne Tulley a.k.a. Scarlett joined their line up.

Wikipedia says they´re mostly known for the hit song " Cotton Eye Joe " in 1994. Although extremely popular in Germany, where the band holds the record of most total weeks ( 25 ) at No.1 on the German singles chart over the past 30 years - scoring such hits as " Old Pop in an Oak ", " The Spirit of the Hawk ” and " Wish You Were Here " - " Cotton Eye Joe " remains Rednex's sole hit in the United States. Now the real reason the Rednex are so popular in Germany is Scarlett and her bouncing action fan service.

They had another front woman with big boobs before ( a blonde ) but they really became most popular when Scarlett joined in 2001. Because they did a lot of live gigs on tv and Scarlett really knows how to shake it.

She always puts some extra effort on making her boobies bounce as they often just jump up and down to the music. In one show ( I think it was called APRES SKI HITS ) Scarlett´s huge breasts where jumping up and down so wild they almost came up to her chin. And in this instance the cameraguy even filmed it which almost never happens on german tv.

Staying in Germany - since this is a GOODBYE GERMANY post - I like to throw one of these in once in a while : videos that don´t fall into my obligatory five categories ( comicbooks, movies, tv shows, cartoons and music ) but still ties in with the topic of the post. I couldn´t find an episode of Klassiker der Weltliteratur with a western author so instead here we have a documentary about the true history of the wild wild west.

We come to a less serious version of the wild west with Vierzig Wagen Westwärts ( Forty Wagons Westwards, original title The Hallelujah Trail, spanish title The Whiskey Battle ) one of my favorite western movies.

I don´t know if it´s my favorite western movie but it´s up there with James Garner´s Auch ein Sheriff braucht Mal Hilfe ( Support Your Local Sheriff ), Jane Fonda´s Cat Balou ( that red dress as Trixie, daiiiiiiimn ! ),

the Rio Bravo / El Dorado double feature ( since it is basically the same movie ) the Magnificent Seven two parter, Terence Hill´s My Name Is Nobody ( only the first part and only with the german dubbing because they added a ton of jokes ) and a few other Terence Hill and Bud Spencer western collaborations, Sergio Leone´s The Man With No Name / Dollar trilogy, all of the Winnetou movies especially Unter Geiern with a very young Götz George and german all natural 40B - 22 - 36 Busenwunder Elke Sommer plus a few 1980s / 1990s westerns like Silverado or Young Guns.

Anyway, it´s easily in the top five and I still watch it every time it´s on tv.

It took me quite some time to find the right versions with the best quality although I am not one hunded percent sure if I got the right ones since the german version is listed as 149 minutes long and the original US version as 165 minutes long while we only have a difference of 3 minutes here.

Nevertheless I wanted to include both versions so you can see - and hear - the differences. Speaking of which, I haven´t watched the entire original US version but from what I have seen so far there are two differences.

Firstable, in the US version Donald Pleasance character is just refered to as Oracle while in the german dubbing his name is Orakel Jones. Second, the original version seems a tad more serious as in the german dubbing they felt the need to have two narrators : one who tells what the narrator in the original version tells and a second one who throws in some witty remarks and jokes. This is a practice you will experience in a lot of german dubbed movies where the german distribution company felt the original version was not funny enough and add more jokes in the dubbing. I really can´t say if that´s a good thing or a bad thing - in the case of My Name Is Nobody I tried to watch the spanish version and I just couldn´t - since I am just too used to the german dubbing which makes me clearly biased.

Apropos dubbed versions, I already posted a german episode of Hoot Kloot or how it´s called in Germany Sheriff Donnerknall ( Sheriff Thundercrack ).

This wraps up the western part of Today´s post addendum but wait - there´s more. I know that there are people out there who don´t like westerns and probably skip this entire post but for those who still soldiered through here are a few more nuggets starting with another episode from the fine folks at Ayer Nomas about another cult tv show.

Speaking of tv shows, we continue with two videos that I couldn´t fit into my PATRICK DUFFY´S MAN FROM ATLANTIS post . First up we have Journey To The Bottom Of The Sea - or how it was called in Germany Die Seaview - In geheimer Mission ( The Seaview On Secret Mission ) from 1966, a show I never knew existed. Now I swear I did not plan this but there is also an episode with Yvonne Craig as a guest star ( episode 7 from the first season called Turn Back The Clock ) and if you´re wondering why I didn´t include it the reason is that I simply couldn´t find it on YouTube. 

The title of Journey To The Bottom Of The Sea was of course borrowed from the famous book with the same title from the father of modern science fiction so our second video is the 1978 tv movie Jules Verne - Adventure In Atlantis original title The Return Of Captain Nemo.

Closing things out for Today we have one of these incredibly rare once in a lifetime YouTube finds since I didn´t even know a Beatles cartoon existed.

New to the blog ? Everything you need to know about TALES FROM THE KRYPTONIAN : top ten posts / more posts of interest / best of the best

This post will self - destruct in five seconds.

German comics 101 : Karl May´s Winnetou

As I´ve often said I don´t believe in coincidences so you can make what you want about the fact that in my post about Gail Kim honoring her brithday a few days back I included the trailer for the Karl May movie Der Ölprinz because Heinz Erhardt was in it ( he also was born that day ) as if I knew I would come back to that subject Today, on Karl May´s birthday.

I have written about Karl May and the Winnetou movies in a few posts so I decided to write a bit about the comics since this is still a comic blog despite posts about movies, wrestling and hot movie and tv cult sirens.

Karl May is one of the most read german authors and the most translated one. He was probably the earliest german author to achieve rockstar like status which may have been in part because he claimed to be the Old Shatterhand narrator from his novels going as far as having gunsmiths build the famous rifles Bärentöter ( Bearkiller ), Silberbüchse ( Silverrifle ) and the Henrystutzen ( Henrycarbine ) from his books. Now when I think about Karl May the first thing I think about is of course the westerns of Winnetou, Old Shatterhand and Old Surehand but I never read much of the comic adaptions so I had to do some research. There are two names that you will most likely encounter when you look for WINNETOU comics.

The first one is Helmut Nickel who did the best and most commercially successful comic adaptions which were first published by the Walter Lehning Verlag between 1963 and 1966 in the regular comic book format. 

Not only had Helmut Nickel been a big fan of Karl May since infancy he also had studied ethnology which he brought into his work. His body language is impeccable, he always gave the different native american tribes distinctive features and he integrated nature and the landscapes - which were always a big part of Karl May´s travel reports - in his pages.

Originally Helmut Nickel wanted to become a veterinarian but because he wasn´t allowed to study in East Berlin he moved to West Berlin where he found out that his prefered course of study was not offered at the free academy so he chose ethnology, pre - colombian culture and art history.

To finance his studies he worked for an advertising studio where he came into contact with the comic publisher Gerstmayer. Beginning in 1954 he drew wild west stories, The Three Musketeers, The Count of Monte Christo and the futuristic Titanus based on a novel trilogy by Claus Eigk.

At the same time he created the series Don Pedro about the conquest of the Aztec empire by Hernando Cortez which was integrated as a back up series in Hot Jerry. All these comics didn´t have a long life span which was about to change when Helmut Nickel took charge of the comic series Robinson in 1955. During the second half of the 1950s Robinson was the only successful competition to the Lehning Verlag which dominated the market of adventure comics with its house artist Hansrudi Wäscher.    

Nickel´s art captivated german readers with perfect compositions, great perspectives and varied graphics but the content might have been too much for the audience of children ages eight to fourteen. " Too text - heavy ! " was one of the main criticisms of the publisher. After his studies Helmut Nickel moved to New York where he worked as the curator of the Arms and Armor division of the New Yorker Metroploitan Museum. At the same time he took the offer of Walter Lehning to do a comic adaption of Karl May´s Winnetou stories. Nickel drew the comic until 1965 when the payments from Germany were delayed for months and then stopped.

Besides WINNETOU the Walter Lehning Verlag published OLD SUREHAND

and KARA BEN NEMSI ( he´s Old Shatterhand ), both Karl May properties.

I could not find any info on who did the art on those books but later on OLD SUREHAND and KARA BEN NEMSI were published with KIT CARSON.

Helmut Nickel´s WINNETOU comic series was first reprinted by the SPLITTER Verlag in a album sized hardcover edition from 1989 to 1994.

From 2012 to 2013 Verlag Sackmann und Hörndl a.k.a. comicplus+ did another hardcover edition with a limited print run of 1,000 copies.

And because 2012 marked Karl May´s one hundredth birthday they did an over 400 pages thick special for the masses that include the first two volumes from the limited edition print run - without the editorial pages. 

Now the Helmut Nickel WINNETOU was not the first comic adaption as you can see by the FIX UND FOXY cover on the top of this post. I´m not sure when this particular issue came out but it must have been before 1953 when the Zeichenfilmbuch comic by Walter Neugebauer was reprinted.

In 1975 the swiss comic company Gevacur AG published KARL MAY EXTRA which presented the Winnetou series by spanish artist Juan Arranz. 

This series was republished in a limited edition by comicplus+ in 2013.

Condor also published Winnetou in KARL MAY from 1976 to 1977.

And from 1977 to 1979 Condor published WINNETOU UND OLD SHATTERHAND by spanish comic artist Juan Lopez Ramon. 

The next Winnetou comic came out by Wick from 1999 to 2007 although it had little to do with Karl May. The art is by belgian Willy Vandersteen who also did the very successful SUSKE EN WISKE ( published in english as Spike and Suzy, Luke and Luzy, Willy and Wanda or Bob and Bobette ).

And this is the second name you will probably come across when looking for Karl May comics. The series was published by Standaard Uitgeverij from 1962 to 1987 and the only thing the comics have in common with the Karl May books are the names of the main characters. Despite all this the series was successful enough to last 83 issues which is no small feat.
 

Although the studio of Willy Vandersteen was not new to western comics as they produced the BESSY comics which were a big thing in Germany.

And speaking about comics which were big when I was a kid, when superheroes and especially Batman became hugely popular in Belgium and Germany thanks to the campy tv series Willy Vandersteen was asked to create a comic series to capitalize on that trend so he turned the strongman from the SUSKE EN WISKE comics Jerome into a superhero.

The comic was called WASTL in Germany and between 1968 and 1972 a total of 173 stories were produced with a print run of 150,000 at the height of its popularity. Sadly due to the declining quality of the stories the series ended much to my chagrin as I was heavily into that series.

In 2011 there also was a tribute book to Helmut Nickel by Edition 52. 

And although it was not available to the general public I should mention that the german comic organisation INCOS released a WINNETOU UND OLD SHATTERHAND comic album in 2012. It was limited to 200 copies and contained a comic by hungarian artist Ernö Zorad which was first published in 1983 in the east german youth publication TROMMEL. 

Lastly there was a Kara Ben Nemsi comic by Unipart from 1975 to 1976. 

There also were some foreign editions like in Spain but the post is long enough with only the german publications. And I want to do other things Today ( like drool about Elke Sommer´s cleavage in Unter Geiern ).

And speaking about impressive cleavages from my youth : since I didn´t post Yesterday I couldn´t give a shout out to Playmate of the Month April in 1986, Teri Weigel who celebrated her 54th birthday. Because of Teri´s perplexing physique and her protruding torpedo shaped sweater puppies she became quite popular and was in a few specials from PLAYBOY. She also was one of the few playmates who also appeared in PENTHOUSE although not as a Pet of the Month. She was just everywhere during the 80s. She later had her breasts enlarged and did porn but I think she looked best in her famous appearances as Jade on Married with Children.

Since we´re on the subject of centerfolds and birthdays I have to mention another Andy Sidaris related anniversary. Penthouse Pet Samatha Phillips who played Samatha Maxx, the buxom blonde with the high squirt factor in The Dallas Connection ( a.k.a. Deadworks ) and who holds the record for getting her nude pictures published in the most countries turns 50.

Well - rounded in more than just the physical sense, Sam is a woman for the new millenium : she´s ambitious and she´s busy and not above using her spectacular naked body as fame currency. Sam has been a member of an all girl rock group, The Lykettes, a talk show host. a reality tv host, radio DJ, a spokesmodel, she has hosted any kind of show that exists on the planet and she became a pop icon as one of the most sought after models of the 80s. However the walking blow up sex doll template reaped the greatest exposure in the realm of sexploitation quickie flicks thanks to her rack - tastic 34D - 26 - 35 measurements and she´s famous for producing the Busty Cops movies starring all her centerfold friends.

Sadly she was only in one Andy Sidaris movie but you can see her naked in classics like Hot Springs Hotel, Passion Cove, Bedtime Stories, Fallen Angel, The Regina Pierce Affair, Passion´s Obsession and Sexual Malice. 

Our first video is a documentary about the author Karl May.



On Karl May´s 100th birthday in 2012 this special edition of Nachtstudio took a look at the relationship between the germans and Karl May.



And because I had to include cult siren Elke Sommer in some way here is the trailer for Unter Geiern ( Among Vultures ) also starring Götz George and Terence Hill ( still under his name as Mario Girotti ). Like always Pierre Brice played Winnetou but instead of Old Shatterhand played by Lex Barker he teamed up with Old Surehand played by Stewart Granger who reprise the role two more times and got a lot of german fans from this.



There also was a Winnetou cartoon although I could only find a short bit.



Naturally the germans had to make a political correct version for new audiences called WinneToons which naturally is one big crapfest.



Originally I wanted to add the movie Durch die Wüste from 1936 but since the embedding was disabled for that video I´m going to include german - british Schlager singer Ireen Sheer who celebrates her 67th birthday Today. In 1974 she represented Luxembourg in the Eurovision Song Contest but here she is with Feuer which gained Germany a sixth place.



New to the blog ? Everything you need to know about TALES FROM THE KRYPTONIAN : top ten posts / more posts of interest / best of the best