And now, for a different view of mad science. It is perhaps significant that all three of the examples that struck me as salient had the word “corpse” somewhere on the cover. November 1939 features what might be a simple electrocution, although given the halo of energy that surrounds our hapless heroine, it might also be an irradiation with strange consequences.
While May 1939 features an x-ray of the innards of what does not look like a consenting patient, a woman who swallowed something someone else very much wants. I’m afraid that Brother Yellow-Robes there does not exactly look like a licensed surgeon.
But for full-on mad science, we should turn to February 1940. This cover painting is the full-on classic, with something going on that bears no resemblance to any known legitimate scientific process, a leering, obviously nuts experimenter working some sort of control a naked victim whose nudity makes it ever-so-barely into the category of “implied,” who is also in a tube or sorts, of course, and a stack of what appear to be previous (failed?) experimental subjects in the background. (Note: see Row of pretty corpses post, coming in a few days.)
Whew! I gotta go cool off.
The young lady in the first picture is apparently going through an auditing session with an early acolyte of L Ron Hubbard.
As for the last picture, I see the caption: “Dr. Badhair was certain she would reward him when he finally cured her high blood pressure… and turned her into his willing mistress!”