Where Monsters Dwell #16: "I am Googam -- And I am Power!!"

"I am Googam -- And I am Power!!" is from a word bubble that appears on the cover of Where Monsters Dwell #16 (July 1972) followed by another bubble which reads, "Die -- like the ants you truly are!" The cover is a Bronze Age original by the cover artist extraordinaire Gil Kane.

The Silver Age original cover of "Beware of Googam, Son of Goom!" was by Jack Kirby; it first appeared in Tales of Suspense #17 (May 1961). I think it is superior to Kane's (which accentuates Googam's childishness by clothing him in a diaper). But Kane's cover features those superbly megalomaniac lines, "I am Power!! Die -- like the ants you truly are!" Try saying that out loud a few times.

"Beware of Googam, Son of Goom!" is a perfect example of Lee-Kirby Silver Age monster scifi. An all-powerful alien arrives from outer space bent on global domination only to be foiled by the pluck and determination of humans in all their humanity. In the case of "Beware of Googam, Son of Goom!" a Ward Cleaveresque radio astronomer bests Goom, father of Googam, while Ward's son, Billy, beats Googam by tricking him into quicksand.

All the cultural verities of the Cold War era are on display here: a father who knows best; a daring, agile teenager; a belligerent, powerful alien brought down by his own hubris -- and a convenient patch of quicksand.

Below you will find a scan of the splash page, and then I pick up the story at the beginning of part two with 14 more scans.

I think it is a fairly noncontroversial to interpret these Silver Age scifi monster stories as allegories of the Cold War, the Free World against the global Red menace. The alien in these Lee-Kirby yarns was the stand-in for the commie.

Now that we are entering a New Cold War, with the U.S. initiating a coup in Ukraine that is turning into a civil war, at the same time it is pivoting to Asia to confront China, what cultural verities will emerge?

The New Cold War narrative will be tricky to construct. The alien from outer space will no longer do. We live in a world ruled by capitalism. Thomas Friedman and other cheerleaders of American hegemony are trying to reconstruct a familiar storyline by having "authoritarianism" replace communism. The authoritarianism of Putin, of China, of Iran's Khamenei, et al. The problem with this is that some of our closest allies are the most authoritarian on the planet. I speak here of the Gulf Sheikhdoms. And today people are less trusting of government and public intellectuals. So it is hard to say what is going to stick in this jaundiced, online age of ours. If the Googam story were written today -- and I think this is a hopeful sign -- the evil alien would be the USG.