Space Mouse

Did You Know?

• The original Space Mouse's girlfriend is named Millie, but she is also spelled 'Milly' in the story 'Atomic Attack!' and later referred to as 'Molly'.
• The 1959 Space Mouse cartoon by Universal Pictures features a cat named Doc trying to sell two mice, Hickory and Dickory, to NASA for lab tests.
• The Walter Lantz Space Mouse was created by Western Publishing editor Chase Craig, who got Lantz's permission to publish the comic as a Lantz property.
• The Walter Lantz Space Mouse lives on the planet Rodentia and flies around in a Lunar Schooner.

Incarnations

The original Space Mouse first showed up in Space Mouse #1, which had a cover date of April 1953. He made regular appearances in several Avon comic titles during 1953, but after that he only popped up now and then from 1954 until about 1956. The very first story in that issue is called "The Great Electro!" It starts with a big, mean cat named Electro calling Earth from Mercury.

He tells Space Mouse that some Earth explorers landed on Mercury, got caught, and are being held as slaves. Space Mouse and his girlfriend Millie take his rocket ship to Mercury. Electro shoots lightning at them, but it does nothing. Then he hits them with sound waves, and they have to pull back out of range.

They find out the whole city is wired with electricity. They try to sneak in but get captured and thrown in a cell. Space Mouse spots some loose wires, blows a fuse, and then zaps Electro with his ray gun, making the cat weak. He learns the explorers have been turned into horses, but he uses his ray gun to change them back.

Then he leads them home to Earth. The last story in that first issue, "Atomic Attack!," seems to happen earlier in the timeline. In it, Space Mouse and Millie see a weird growth in the backyard. It is caused by an atomic ray from Mars.

Space Mouse thinks the growth will cover the whole Earth and kill everything. He shows Millie a new rocket ship he just built, and they fly to Mars. They wander around the planet and find nobody. While they are sleeping, Millie gets kidnapped.

Space Mouse follows the kidnapper to a strange city, where he finds a ray machine shooting the atomic growth at Earth. He throws a monkey wrench into it, wrecking it. Canine soldiers then capture him and bring him to the Great Master, the ruler of Mars, who is a giant metal dog holding Millie. The Master says Space Mouse and Millie messed up his plan to invade Earth and make everyone slaves, so he sentences them to death.