Valley of the Dinosaurs No. 2 Cover by Fred Himes

1974 was the prehistoric year for Saturday morning TV shows on the three major American networks. NBC debuted the live-action The Land of the Lost which would live the longest at three seasons, ABC had the live-action Korg 70,000 BC which survived one season, and CBS green-lit the animated Valley of the Dinosaurs which also lasted a single season.

In Valley, the Butler family is sucked into a river vortex in the Amazon, and when they are spit out on the other side find themselves in a valley filled with dinosaurs and prehistoric peoples. It was typical cartoon fare of the day and I remember enjoying it as a kid.

When I started backfilling my Charlton Comics collection some years ago, I found Charlton had done the Valley comic book. And for whatever reason I started going around doing an announcer voice saying, “Valley of the Dee-Noh-SOURS!” Thankfully, I kept these occurrences to myself, but I’d still like to clear out the thoughts that somehow created this brain fart.

So maybe colouring and packaging up one of the fun covers like this one will purge this questionable behaviour.

As published.

Original art by Fred Himes.

Cleaned-up art ready for production.

The character guide used for the animated series.

New colour.

Re-created trade dress added. Couldn’t resist creating a new logo with some more oomph to it.

New Charlton Comics trade paperback version.

If it had been a DC TV comic.

DC Comics trade paperback version. DC and Hanna-Barbera are both owned by WarnerMedia.