Weird Science-Fantasy: The Flying Machine

[alicemacher]

"[Krigstein's] second EC job, 'The Flying Machine' [...], was a bona fide comics classic, a rare instance where the artist's style and script were in perfect harmony. Original author Ray Bradbury thought so, too. In a letter [...] Bradbury wrote: '"The Flying Machine" is the finest single piece of art-drawing I've seen in years. Beautiful work: I was so touched and pleased by the concern for detail.'"
-- S.C. Ringgenberg, Master Race: And Other Stories Illustrated by Bernard Krigstein (Fantagraphics, 2018), 211



From Weird Science-Fantasy #23 (officially; actually the debut issue, Spring 1954). Adaptation of Bradbury's story by Al Feldstein.


It's 400 C.E., and the (fictional) Chinese Emperor Yuan hears from a servant who's just seen a man fly with a paper-and-bamboo dragon. After witnessing it for himself, he calls the man down and asks him, "What have you done?" Then he asks whether anyone else knows about this.

Comments

[locuatico]

"look, if people discovered their taxes to keep the wall were a huge waste of time and money, they would be upset."

[arilou_skiff]

Sorry, i can't hear you over the analogy of the A-bomb.

[ozaline]

Which makes me wonder why this story wasn't actually set in in Japan. I would think the shogunate would be even more hostile to the invention of a flying machine because it would negate their biggest natural defence against the outsider they didn't want to deal with. Plus you could show pre-firebombed Edo, ah well.


That said I've seen a picture of a couple of Americans posing on China's great wall with a sign reading, "Walls work," and don't they realize that as a defensive feature... no the Great wall definitely didn't work, and fixed fortifications have only become less relevant since?


...

Of course they don't.

[cricharddavies]

Which makes me wonder why this story wasn't actually set in in Japan.

Because when this was written, in the view of the audience, Japan had gotten what it deserved where China was a victim.

[full_metal_ox]

That said I've seen a picture of a couple of Americans posing on China's great wall with a sign reading, "Walls work," and don't they realize that as a defensive feature... no the Great wall definitely didn't work, and fixed fortifications have only become less relevant since?
Not to mention that the Great Wall was only ever a series of line segments to begin with (and it isn't visible from outer space, and wasn't filled with human sacrificial remains.)