Awful Monkey Lollipop Thoughts to Share

Reading one of these old comic books: a TALES TO ASTONISH from 1967. One of the ads is for a "Sensational COLOR-V screen" that "instantly changes dull, dreary black & white pictures to brilliant, eye-filling colors. Attach it yourself in a few seconds. You, your family, your friends will really enjoy the color effects which, while not to be confused with genuine color TV will afford a wonderful treat to the eyes!" As much as I like the formality of "will afford a wonderful treat" all I could really think about was a bunch of disappointed families. Like, just a crushing sense of doom, dead-end jobs, childhood innocence blighted, marriages torn apart, this cheap screen a symbol of some secret rot settling into the American dream... too much? (See also.) Next page - and as I recall, this one was still being run in the 1970s, when I started reading comic books - offered a pet monkey through the mail. Every thought about that made me feel horrible, but somehow worst of all was the ad's promise that your hypothetical monkey "even likes lollipops." Sad monkeys with lollipops and mange. I can't go on. Those are just the beginnings of the terrible thoughts that haunt my very soul. The Hulk story was pretty good, though. See, the Silver Surfer was about to cure the Hulk of being the Hulk, but the Hulk misunderstood and tried to punch him, so the Silver Surfer flew away in kind of a silver snit.