Planet of the Apes/Ghostly Sounds Ad

More Warren, more Power Records for sale! Putting the POTA and Ghostly Sounds records together suggests Captain Company had some extra inventory lying around and decided to throw them together in one ad, rather than any sort of merchandising plan. But who cares, they are three avenues to excitement!

Planet of the Apes: 4 Exciting New Stories

Tracks:

Battle of Two Worlds
Dawn of the Tree People
Mountain of the Delphi
Volcano

This was another one of those Power Records that I completely missed as a child: it wasn't until recently that I had any idea there were original POTA adventures, not just the movie adaptations.

For some reason, only three of the adventures found here were released as 45s, with "Volcano" being only found on this LP. The sleeve neatly represents the two different visual approaches Power used sometimes--the front looks like the work of the Fillipino artists that Marvel used in their comics and on the movie adaptations, while the back is cartoonier (the work of Bill Gow again?), presumably being done in-house. Zap!

Planet of the Apes - Battle of Two Worlds

Tracks:

Battle of Two Worlds

Another POTA TV show-centric plot, another stunning Neal Adams cover. The audio adventure is pretty good, and features some grisly moments that were hallmarks of the Apes franchise, despite it being aimed at, and sold to, children. It still distracts me that the guy who plays Peter Burker was also Peter Parker on the Spidey records. Now...Spider-Man on the Planet of the Apes, that would be something!

Another thing: the first time I looked at it, I really thought that one ape was angrily biting a banana.

Planet of the Apes Display Header

This beauty is the header card used for the Power Records Planet of the Apes in-store displays. They just don't make stuff like this anymore!

The fact this thing is still around gives me hope that other Power Record miscellanea is out there, too. Not that my wallet needs more trips to eBay, but still...

(h/t: Hunter's Planet of the Apes Archive)

Planet of the Apes - Dawn of the Tree People

Tracks:

Dawn of the Tree People

Another POTA TV show-centric plot, another stunning Neal Adams cover. "Dawn of the Tree People" features pour intrepid astronauts Burke and Virdon running afoul of a small pocket of surviving humans who live in the swamps, who don't take too well to strangers, to say the least.

Like the other audio adventures from this series, there's a lot more excitement to be found in the premise than in the execution. Maybe when the Power Records folks were contriving their own Apes stories they felt more constrained than when they were adapting the movies, which featured nuclear devastation, lobotomies, gun play, and city-wide ape riots.

Planet of the Apes - Mountain of the Delphi

Tracks:

Mountain of the Delphi

I completely missed covering these non-film Apes records during the first run of the blog, and I guess that was because I didn't have them as a kid and simply forgot they existed. But how could I have missed these beautiful sleeves by Neal Adams?

Using characters from the short-lived POTA TV series, Mountain of the Delphi is a fine, if a bit talky, adventure--which, IMO, makes it a very accurate adaptation of the source material. As usual, Neal Adams makes it look way, way more exciting.

These "other" Apes adventures were released as separate 45" records as well as all together on one LP.

Planet of the Apes LP - 1974

 
Tracks:

Planet of the Apes

Beneath The Planet of the Apes

Escape From the Planet of the Apes

Battle for the Planet of the Apes

Power Records never met a reissue they didn't like, but in this case it makes total sense--collecting all four of the Planet of the Apes audio adventures onto one record. Produced by Arthur Korb, this LP features a spiffy Ernie Chan front cover (an unusual choice for them), and a back cover by no one whose style I recognize.

Oh, if only Power Records had decided to complete the Apes story...

Battle For The Planet of the Apes

Track:
Battle For The Planet of the Apes

Produced by Arvid Knudson and Associates.

I guess cooler heads prevailed at Power when it came time to adapt the most violent film in the series, Conquest of the Planet of the Apes.Now, of course, I'd give my MOC Mego Ursus doll* to hear how they would've handled it, but it makes total sense that they didn't even bother releasing a hacked-up version and skipped the film entirely, going straight to the final movie, Battle For The Planet of the Apes.


*which I don't own.

Escape From the Planet of the Apes

Track:
Escape From The Planet of the Apes

Produced by Arvid Knudson and Associates.

When Power Records bought the license to adapt the Apes series, did how dark the series got ever concern anybody? This film starts out light and goofy, and then ends in a hail of bullets, including the harmless Zira!