Rocco A. "Rocke" Mastroserio (June 8, 1927 — early March 1968[1][2][3]) was an American comic bookartist best known as a penciler and inker for Charlton Comics. He sometimes signed his work "Rocke M.," "RM," "Rocke," or "RAM."[3]
Because comic-book writers and artists during this time were not regularly given published credits, a full bibliography is not always possible. Mastroserio's first confirmed comics work is in Avon Comics' Famous Gangsters #2 (cover-dated Dec. 1951), inking penciler Mike Becker on the seven-page crime fiction story "Waxie Gordon". With his first name variously credited as "Rocco" or "Rocke", he inked stories for a variety of publishers and titles, including Prize Comics' Prize Comics Western; American Comics Group's Adventures into the Unknown and Operation: Peril; Key Publications' Mister Mystery; and the Harvey Comics' horror anthologies Black Cat Mystery, Chamber of Chills, Tales of Horror, and Tomb of Terror, and Comic Media's Horrific.[5]
Charlton Comics
His first known work at Charlton, where he would spend the bulk of his career into the 1960s, was the four-page humor story "The Ride of Paul Revere!", penciled and inked by Mastroserio and Dick Ayers as, respectively, "Rock" and "Rye", in the Mad-like satiric comic Eh! #4 (June 1954).[5]
He inked all but the last two issues of Captain Atom, the full run of which numbered #78-89 (Dec. 1965 - Dec. 1967),[6] penciled by comics artist Steve Ditko, co-creator of Marvel Comics' Spider-Man, who almost invariably inked his own work.[5]
Other work in Charlton's occasional superhero titles including co-creating Mercury Man, with an unknown writer; the character appeared only twice, in Space Adventures #44-45 (Feb. 1962), with Mastroserio drawing only the debut. Other Charlton superhero work includes one-page fillers in some issues of Blue Beetle. Mastroserio also pencilled and inked stories of the masked Old West hero Gunmaster.[5]
Later career
In the late 1960s Mastroserio drew stories for Warren Publishing's black-and-white horror magazines Creepy and Eerie, often working with writer Archie Goodwin. Both penciling and inking, he made his Warren debut with the six-page "Monsterwork" in Eerie #3 (May 1966). He helped his friend Pat Boyette, a fellow Charlton artist, join the stable of Warren creators, initially having him ghost-pencil, uncredited, "The Rescue of the Morning Maid" in Creepy #18 (Jan. 1968), which credited artist Mastroserio as inker.[7][8]
Mastroserio's final Warren work was inking Boyette on "The Graves of Oconoco" in Eerie #15 (June 1968).[9] Mastroserio died of a heart attack in early March (possibly March 4),[1] shortly after completing that story, and the following issue ran a memorial page.[2] His final published comics work was the full cover art and nine inked story pages, over penciler Mo Marcus, of Charlton's Ghost Manor #3 (Nov. 1968).[5]
Reprints
Mastroserio's first known comics work, from Famous Gangsters #2 (December 1951), was reprinted in Skywald Publications' black-and-white comics magazine The Crime Machine (May 1971). His Mercury Man story appears in reprint specialist AC Comics' Men of Mystery #32 (2001).
Mastroserio stories appear in the DC Comics hardcover collection Action Hero Archives Volume 1, the company's first archive of Charlton material. The book collects penciler Steve Ditko's 1960-66 Captain Atom stories.
^ abcdefgh"The Creepy Fan Club". No. 16. (Rocco Mastroserio biography) Creepy (Warren Publishing). August 1967. Reprinted in Creepy Volume Four. Dark Horse Comics. 2009. p. 50. ISBN9781621154488. Note: Information in this biography supplied by Mastroserio. A capsule biography in Action Heroes Archives, Volume 1 (DC Comics, 2004, ISBN978-1-4012-0302-3) erroneously gives Bari, Italy, misspelling it as "Barre, Italy".
^The series had taken over the numbering of the science-fiction anthology Strange Suspense Stories, in which the superhero Captain Atom had debuted, in #75.
