By the time The Atlas heroes hit the newsstands in my young mind comics were DC, Dell, and everyone else. That said...the title, Young Men, way too large and (as noted) said nothing about the comic. Then the covers themselves, yes dark in color but not too strange for the Atlas line in general, I feel it was the shot being way too tight. The drama of the scene was lost in the tightness of the shot. Giant tight shots or close-ups of war scenes worked "ok", but not super heroes. Just not enough space for the super hero action to be read. The stories not terrible for the period nor was the art I think the major blame, outside of distribution was the cover art choice. I compare this period for Atlas and the product as a whole to Charlton's Space Adventure comic. The big difference for me - cover art.