World of the Myth, one of seven short stories in the 1967 collection, I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream,
a tale where Harlan Ellison scoops up those tried and true themes from
the Golden Age of Science Fiction, turns them upside down and shakes.
It
all starts with a crash landing in the jungle on a distant planet, the
lower half of the rocket ship in the air and the front half deep under
the surface. Drat! What ever happened to those smooth Buck Rogers
landings?
At least the tale's main character, a conscientious
sort by the name of Corny, can see Captain Rennert is still alive. As is
Iris Crosse, the biologist along on the mission. Oh, yes, as Buck
Rogers had his Wilma, so Captain Rennert has his Iris.
What's
this? Iris has broken her legs from the crash. The boys will have to fix
her up with some leg splints. I wonder if Buck ever found Wilma with
broken legs? I doubt it - Amazing Stories could only be amazing if the hero and his gal can walk around and explore once they land on a distant planet.
Uh-oh.
Looks like the crew in Harlan's '67 tale is not exactly the happy,
harmonious 1920s, 30s or 40s type. Captain says: "Didn't you hope I'd
been lost, Corny? Then you could have Iris all to yourself. Even with a
pair of busted legs she's a pretty good lay."
And what ever
happened to those optimistic sci-fi adventures where good-looking
American space heroes tame the subhuman aliens and win new worlds the
way cowboys won the West? None of that in Harlan's yarn. Nope. Just the
reverse. The Earthlings learn hard lessons about life and death from
alien beings with special powers, alien beings that most resemble (gulp)
-- ants!!
World of the Myth is a Harlan Ellison snapper not to be missed. 
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