Venus in Fiction - Comics and Manga

Comics and Manga

• The Buck Rogers comic strip included several story lines related to Venus, starting with the Sunday sequence "Marooned on Venus" (12/7/30 to 7/12/31), featuring teenage protagonists Buddy and Alura.
• The Hydrads of Venus, who resemble huge animated sponges, appear in Planet Comics, in the Lost World section. If hurt, water can restore them to health. Though opposed to the Voltamen who have invaded Earth, they are also enemies to Hunt Bowman.
• Venus features prominently in the British comic Dan Dare (original run 1950–1967). Dan Dare's Venus was divided into two hemispheres, north and south, separated by a "flamebelt" of burning gases. North Venus was the home planet of the hyperintelligent, dictatorial Mekon, Dare's arch-enemy, as well as his people, the Treens. South Venus is inhabited by a different people, the Therons. The Treens are green, and mostly emotionless. Descendants of humans abducted from Earth millennia ago are slaves to them. Venus may have been a comment on the divisions of North and South Korea.
• Action Comics No. 152 portrays Venusian’s civilization as a futuristic version of Earth’s, and Venusians as humanoids who have adopted English as their planetary language (Act No. 152, January 1951: “The Sleep That Lasted 1000 Years”).
• Superman No.151 on the other hand, portrays Venusian life humorously, depicting Venus as a world inhabited by cute “tomato girls,” “pumpkin men,” “cucumber men,” and other comical “plant-beings” (February 1962: “The Three Tough Teenagers!”).
• Venus is Cosmic King’s native planet (S No. 147/3, August 1961: “The Legion of Super-Villains!”, and the place where Van-Zee and Sylvia lived prior to taking up residence in Kandor (SGLL No. 15, February 1960: “The Super-Family of Steel!” pts. I-III—”Super Husband and Wife!”; “The Bride Gets Super Powers!”; “Secret of the Super-Family!”).
• In November–December 1948, Superman journeys to Venus to obtain an exotic Venusian flower as a gift for Lois Lane (S No. 55/2: “The Richest Man in the World!”).
• In January 1951, Dr. Dorrow attempts to exile Superman and Lois Lane to Venus by shutting them inside transparent cylinders filled with “suspended animation gas” and launching them into outer space, but Superman and Lois are released from their cylinders by friendly Venusians and soon succeed in returning to Earth (Act No. 152, January 1951: “The Sleep That Lasted 1000 Years”).
• In December 1953, when a meteor is about to destroy Venus, Superboy smashes it and visits Venus to quench his thirst. Upon returning to Smallville, he unknowingly brings back a Venusian spore that grows rapidly into a tree. The tree's strange odor begins to affect the population, making them behave strangley or act out dreams. Superboy uproots the tree, hurls it into space and solves the problem of the alien tree's aroma (Superboy No. 29, December 1953: "The Tree that Drove Smallville Wild!").
• In February 1962, Superman flies a juvenile delinquent to Venus and threatens to abandon him there as part of his plan for teaching the young troublemaker a richly deserved lesson in good manners and respect for others (S No. 151/1, February 1962: "The Three Tough Teen-Agers!”).
• In the DC Comics universe, Venus is home to millions of mind-controlling worms which might have once ruled Earth, such as Mister Mind (1943), an enemy of Captain Marvel. It is also the homeworld to the villain Cosmic King (1961), who was banished for performing transmutation experiments. As shown in the Wonder Woman 1,000,000 special, it is also the potential future home to the Amazons in that universe in the 853rd century. In Golden Age Captain Marvel stories Venus was the base of Sivana, the mad scientist. It is inhabitated by giant frog-like amphibions and somehow the Sivana family hold royal status there. All of Sivana's four children spent most of their life growing up on Venus, and in early stories it appeared like a safe haven for Sivana. It contained many prehistoric beasts, which Sivana once tried importing to Earth to make a circuis.
• In the Golden Age Showcase #23 (the one with Green Lantern) the planet was populated by blue-skinned humanoid cave dwellers and yellow pterodacyl-like predators called Bird-Raiders, which are sealed in a cave by Green Lantern, after he is sent by the Guardians operating through his power battery, to prevent the humans being wiped out..
• In the English adaptation of Black Magic, one of Masamune Shirow's earlier works, a habitable Venus several millions of years before the present is used as the principal setting. It is home to a technologically advanced civilisation of humans and human-like beings. It is implied that the planet later somehow deteriorated into its current (real-life), uninhabitable state.
• In the manga Venus Wars, an ice asteroid designated Apollon collides with Venus in 2003. This has the effect of dispersing much of the planet's atmosphere, adding enough moisture to form (acidic) seas, and speeding up its rotation to give it a day that matches its year. Simply put, due to an unlikely yet scientifically sound accident, it takes amazingly little effort for humans to make the planet marginally habitable - the first manned ship lands in 2007, colonization begins in 2012.
• In Sailor Moon, Sailor Venus was once the princess of Venus. Magellan Castle, named after the Magellan probe, is where the princess and royal family lived on Venus and ruled over a race of Venusians prior to the events in the manga. While the inhabitants of Venus are not explored, the character of Adonis in Codename: Sailor V is also from Venus.
• In DC Comics All-Star Comics #13 the JSA are gassed by Nazis and rocketed to different planets. The goddess Aphrodite directs the rocket bearing the unconscious Wonder Woman to the planet Venus, and the Amazon is brought before Queen Desira of the race of Fairies who live there, who immediately recognizes her as the oracle of Aphrodite. Wonder Woman is asked to help battle giant men-warriors, who are killing and capturing the men of the planet. In a series of desperate adventures, Wonder Woman defeats the warriors and is given the gift of magnetic hearing by the Queen.