Out of This World has hitherto focused on various themes - romance comics, nurses in comics, diversity in comics (including anti-racist propaganda and desegregation of the comic book medium), and British girls' comics. Certain artists have also been given attention, notably Demetrio Sanchez Gomez. 'Demetrio', as he signs his work, is one of a number of Spanish/Latino artists who were drawing for Charlton and DC romance comics in the late 60s and well into the 1970s. The Charlton romance comics of this period often contained one story of superior artistic quality (usually but not always the third and last in the book), and many of these were drawn by those Spanish/Latino artists. Besides Demetrio, there was Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez, who did a lot of superhero work for DC, but also a number of other, less well-known artists. One such was Luis Avila. A search in the Grand Comics Database suggests that in American comics he only worked for Charlton. The table below includes all the works attributed to him in the Database, in chronological order of publication:
Date
|
Title
|
#
|
Story
|
#pages
|
Signed
|
Cover
|
08/67
|
I Love You
|
69
|
Where happiness lies
|
8
|
Y
(V Avila)
|
N
|
10/67
|
I Love You
|
70
|
Too many kisses
|
8
|
Y
|
|
12/67
|
Love Diary
|
52
|
I betrayed you, darling!
|
8
|
Y
|
|
2/68
|
Love Diary
|
53
|
Unfaithful heart
|
8
|
Y
|
|
6/68
|
Love Diary
|
54
|
A few lies, many tears
|
10
|
Y
|
|
7/68
|
Teen Confessions
|
50
|
I’ll be your kind of girl, darling!
|
10
|
Y
|
Y
|
8/68
|
Love Diary
|
55
|
I too am in love
|
8
|
Y
|
|
11/68
|
Just Married
|
61
|
I’ll be a modern wife
|
8
|
Y
|
|
7/69
|
Romantic Story
|
101
|
Flee from heartbreak
|
8
|
Y
|
Y
|
8/69
|
Love Diary
|
61
|
A soldier’s promise
|
8
|
Y
|
|
10/69
|
Career Girl Romances
|
53
|
How to succeed in love
|
10
|
Y
|
Y
|
11/69
|
Teen-Age Love
|
67
|
No good!
|
10
|
Y
|
Y
|
12/69
|
Romantic Story
|
104
|
A heart of gold
|
10
|
Y
|
Y
|
1/70
|
Grand Prix
|
29
|
Not for reel
|
7
|
Y
|
|
1/70
|
I Love You
|
83
|
A Frenchman’s Kiss
|
10
|
Y
|
Y
|
1/70
|
Love Diary
|
64
|
Nobody kisses a goddess
|
10
|
Y
|
Y
|
3/70
|
I Love You
|
84
|
Drop out!
|
10
|
Y
|
Y
|
5/70
|
Time For Love
|
16
|
Love lies deep and cold
|
10
|
Y
|
N
|
7/70
|
I Love You
|
86
|
Happiness guaranteed
|
10
|
Y
|
Y
|
4/71
|
Career Girl Romances
|
62
|
No time for kisses
|
5
|
Y
|
Y
|
4/71
|
Teen Confessions
|
67
|
Moonlight should be shared
|
9
|
Y
|
Y
|
5/71
|
I Love You
|
91
|
Beyond love
|
9
|
Y
|
|
10/71
|
Sweethearts
|
119
|
Men are unessential
|
8
|
Y
|
Y
|
1/72
|
Love Diary
|
76
|
Is this all there is?
|
9
|
Y
|
N
|
4/72
|
Just Married
|
84
|
Once we were happy
|
9
|
Y
|
|
7/72
|
Hot Rods and Racing Cars
|
115
|
Desert madness
|
7
|
N
|
|
5/73
|
For Lovers Only
|
71
|
Second chance
|
9
|
Y
|
Y
|
6/73
|
Career Girl Romances
|
75
|
My love returned
|
9
|
Y
|
Y
|
8/73
|
Time For Love
|
35
|
An ancient spell
|
9
|
Y
|
|
9/73
|
Teen Confessions
|
82
|
Tomorrow is now
|
9
|
Y
|
|
10/73
|
Time For Love
|
36
|
Betrayed by a kiss
|
9
|
Y
|
N
|
9/74
|
For Lovers Only
|
75
|
The whispering
|
9
|
Y
|
Y
|
12/74
|
Just Married
|
103
|
Putting it together
|
9
|
N
|
Upcoming Out of This World posts will be focusing on Avila and some of the other artists providing romance stories to Charlton in the specified time frame. Today's post features "I'll Be Your Kind of Girl, Darling!" from the July 1968 issue of Teen Confessions (#50). The story is about a high school senior who best friend of many years has started skipping school to hang out with the 'in' crowd, especially a motor-bike riding young man who graduated last year but then didn't go to college despite having a scholarship. Our protagonist is a very sophisticated and mature for her age young lady who bides her time, makes all the right moves, and ends up with the desirable guy, gets her friend back in school, gets him back on the college track, and gets a very nice mod look in the process. Avila's art tends to remind the reader of fashion model poses from the period (e.g. Twiggy, Mary Quant) - there's a lot of posing going on in the story as well! It is visually attractive and draws the attention of the eye. The script is reasonable, but a couple of word balloons seem to be inaccurately assigned. It is a notch up from much of Charlton's art, and refreshingly different for American comic book art of the time. Spanish/Latino artists did a lot of romance and other comic book genre art in Europe in the 60s and 70s, including in the UK, and their distinctive styles seem to have a more European rather than North American look. Here's the story from Teen Confessions 50 - see what you think!
The mod backgrounds in some panels, along with the hairstyles and clothes, make it an interesting cultural artifact, in addition to it being an example of a particular style of art and of the romance comic genre.
Thank you for this Luis Ávila.
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