6-21-2023
DAWN OF DC: KNIGHT TERRORS FCBD SPECIAL EDITION 2023 (DC, 2023) – untitled, [W] Joshua Williamson et al., [A] Chris Bachalo et al. The first sequence in this preview comic has some excellent artwork by Chris Bachalo, but otherwis this is just a boring preview of a dumb crossover event. I’m pissed that Nightwing and Titans have to be interrupted for two issues because of some stupid crossover that I don’t care about.
FANTASTIC FOUR #55 (Marvel, 2002) – “An Evening Out!”, [W] Karl Kesel, [A] Stuart Immonen. After making a huge mess and pissing Sue off, Ben and Johnny have to escape the Baxter Building for the night. They find themselves battling a Skrull called the Grand Acquisitioner, who is in fact Yellowjacket, disguised as a Skrull in order to embarrass them and teach them a lesson. This is a really fun issue, but it does carry the unfortunate implication that Sue does all the housework and emotional labor, while her three teammates do nothing.
SUPERMAN #164 (DC, 2001) – “Tales from the Bizarro World,” [W] Jeph Loeb, [A] Ed McGuinness & Carlo Barberi. The main plot of this issue is about Jimmy Olsen and Bizarro, while the subplot is about Luthor running for president. Luthor has managed to get rid of any evidence of his criminal background, and Superman is unwilling to use his powers to intervene in the election; he says “you have to put some faith in the American people to do the right thing.” After 2016, we now know that this faith was misplaced. And we are now learning that even if we do know that a presidential candidate is a career criminal, some voters don’t care.
CAPTAIN AMERICA: WHITE #2 (Marvel, 2015) – “Lost Horizon,” [W] Jeph Loeb, [A] Tim Sale. This series began in 2008 with issue 0, but it took seven years for the next issue to come out. That’s embarrassing, though it’s a much shorter delay than the 30 years that passed between consecutive issues of Miracleman. Captain America: White’s title is also unfortunate, though it was meant as a callback to other color-coded series by the same creators, such as Spider-Man: Blue. Captain America: White #2 takes place in December 1941, with Cap and Bucky teaming up with Fury and the Howling Commandos. It’s a pretty standard story, where the main plot point is that Cap loses his shield in the ocean, and then Namor brings it back. The strength of this issue is Tim Sale’s incredible visual storytelling.
AVENGERS #54 (Marvel, 2022) – “Even Thunder Can Burn, Even Deathloks Can Die,” [W] Jason Aaron, [A] Juan Frigeri. I love the Avengers and I love Jason Aaron’s writing, but I don’t love Jason Aaron’s Avengers. It’s never felt like a real Avengers comic to me. This issue is part of a convoluted and incomprehensible story arc involving Deathlok(s) and Starbrand.
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #557 (Marvel, 2008) – “Dead of Winter,” [W] Zeb Wells, [A] Chris Bachalo. Spider-Man battles a Mayan deity and a villain who’s trying to take advantage of the deity’s power. This issue has excellent art but just average writing. The only memorable scene is on the last page, where Peter gives his last twenty dollars to a beggar.
2000 AD #2320 (Rebellion, 2023) – Dredd: “Taking Doors,” [W] Ken Niemand, [A] Kieran McKeown. A one-shot about doors and the various ways that different judges react to barging through them. Quite well written. Joe Pineapples: “Tin Man Part 9,” [W] Pat Mills, [A] Clint Langley. In the flashback, Sue Bananas gets killed. In the present, Ro-Jaws eats the asteroid that he and Joe were sitting on. The Out: “Book 3 Part 9,” [W] Dan Abnett, [A] Mark Harrison. Cyd meets an old lover, and he takes her to a place called Baliquam. The Order: “Heart of Darkness Part 4,” [W] Kek-W, [A] John M. Burns. Ben Franklin survives being attacked by shadows, and he and his friends plan a counteroffensive. Proteus Vex: “Crawlspace Part 9,” [W] Mike Carroll, [A] Jake Lynch. Midnight Indicating Shame plots a rebellion.
GIRL TAKING OVER: A LOIS LANE STORY FCBD SPECIAL EDITION 2023 (DC, 2023) – untitled, [W] Sarah Kuhn, [A] Arielle Jovellanos. A young Lois Lane moves to National City for the summer to work with famous journalist Cat Grant. Just as Lois gets there, Cat is fired, and Lois finds herself working for Cat’s boss, a misogynistic asshole. In this continuity, Lois is Asian, and her struggles with racism are an important theme. This comic is appealingly written and drawn, but I think there are better YA graphic novels out there, particularly on the theme of Asian-American identity. Also, this story has no connection to the DC Universe except that it uses the names Lois Lane and Cat Grant. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, it’s just interesting.
ARCHIE HORROR PRESENTS: THE CURSED LIBRARY #0 FCBD (Archie, 2023) – “The Cursed Library,” [W] Magdalene Visaggio, [A] Craig Cermak, etc. A collection of pointless non-stories, reprinted from earlier Archie comics. The Cursed Library isn’t as bad as other recent Archie horror comics, but it still raises the question of why Archie bothers to publish monthly comic books, since their comic books are such low-effort slapdash productions.
BABY-SITTERS LITTLE SISTER FCBD (Scholastic, 2023) – “Karen’s Haircut,” [W/A] Katy Farina. An adaptation of the Baby-Sitters’ Club spinoff series for beginning readers. In this volume, Karen, Kristy’s little sister, gets an awful haircut and is so embarrassed she decides to change her name. This comic is well-executed, but it’s not at the same level of quality as Raina Telgemeier’s Baby-Sitters Club adaptations.
SUPERMAN #39 (DC, 2018) – “Goodnight Moon,” [W] Peter Tomasi & Patrick Gleason, [A] Barry Kitson. Superman visits a pediatric cancer ward and takes the kids on a tour of the JLA satellite. A funny moment is that he sends them on a scavenger hunt, where one of the items is a picture of Batman smiling. This comic is cute and heartwrenching – perhaps to the point where it feels emotionally manipulative. It could almost be called “The Kids Who Collect Superman,” except that in “The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man,” the power of the story comes from the fact that Tim’s cancer isn’t mentioned until the last panel. To their credit, Tomasi and Gleason don’t undercut the power of the story by having Superman cure the kids’ cancer. (Because if he could do that, why can’t he cure everyone else’s cancer too?)
AMAZING X-MEN #1 (Marvel, 2014) – “The Quest for Nightcrawler Part 1,” [W] Jason Aaron, [A] Ed McGuinness. In the first half of the issue, Nightcrawler begins to explain why he left heaven. In the second half, Firestar arrives at the Jean Grey School and is shocked at all the weird stuff going on, such as a Brood wearing glasses. The two plotlines converge when the X-Men decide to try to bring Nightcrawler back to life. At Heroes Con I briefly attended Chris Claremont and Alan Davis’s Excalibur panel (until I had to leave to deal with an emergency), and they mentioned how Kurt was much more the hero of Excalibur than Brian was. Incidentally, Alan also said that Brian’s physical appearance was based on the British comics character Garth.
BATMAN #2 (DC, 2016) – “I Am Gotham Part 2,” [W] Tom King, [A] David Finch. Batman trains two new superheroes named Gotham and Gotham Girl. Also, a man visits Commissioner Gordon and warns him about “monster men,” then commits suicide. Unsurprisingly, we learn that Hugo Strange is responsible for the monster men. This issue is lettered by John Workman, who I met briefly at Heroes Con.
KOTTO KOTORRA (Arcana Studio, 2023) – “The Legend of Sweetfoot” etc.., [W/A] Dave Alvarez, [W] Sean O’Reilly. This comic seems to be intended to promote knowledge of Puerto Rican culture, but what it really is is an unoriginal Disney ripoff, with unfunny jokes and poorly reproduced art. It also makes no serious attempt to engage with or to teach about Puerto Rican identity, so it feels like a huge missed opportunity.
ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #560 (DC, 1998) – “The Super-Rivalry That Rocked Metropolis!”, [W] Karl Kesel & Jerry Ordway, [A] Tom Grummett. This is part of the Dominus Effect story, in which each Superman title became a deliberate throwback to a previous era of Superman. AOS #560 is a parody of old World’s Finest stories. Batman and Lois fall in love, and meanwhile, Superman’s head becomes swollen due to red kryptonite, and as Clark Kent, he tries to conceal his head under a ridiculous tall fur hat. Then things get even weirder: Batman reveals that he and Superman are brothers, and Jor-El and Lara turn up alive. This is a very fun issue.
SUPERBOY #73 (DC, 2000) – “Point of No Return!”, [W] Karl Kesel, [A] Adam DeKraker. Superboy fights the Point Men, a group of Project Cadmus mutants who are posing as superheroes. Also, Dubbilex is mind-controlled by a little green guy. This issue has a complicated plot, but it’s still fun. Karl Kesel is an underrated writer. Part of this issue is set in a town called Kurtzberg, an obvious reference to Kirby.
THE HELLBLAZER #14 (DC, 2017) – “The Inspiration Game Part 2: Poetic Justice,” [W] Tim Seeley, [A] Jesus Merino. Investigating a murder, Constantine visits a pub where he has a long history. By casting a spell that causes him to remember his own history, he remembers being involved in a bar fight and then a drunken hookup in this same pub. Then he revisits the events of the murder, and discovers that it happened because of the mead of Kvasir from Norse mythology. The theme of this issue is memories and how they’re linked to particular places. This isn’t a bad issue, but it’s weird reading a Hellblazer comic by an American writer.
SCOURGE OF THE GODS #1 (Marvel/Soleil, 2009) – “Morituri Te Salutant,” [W] Valerie Mangin, [A] Aleksa Gajic. This French comic is a science-fictional version of the story of Attila the Hun. In the far future, the star-spanning Roman Orbis is collapsing under the attacks of the Huns. The Huns’ king, Rua, is an ineffective drunk, and the priest Oktar is the power behind the throne. But Oktar’s son Attila, the real protagonist, wants to take over both the Hunnic and Roman empires for himself. A captured Roman girl named Flavia, who is claimed to be the incarnation of the Huns’ goddess Kerka, becomes a political pawn in this struggle. In its original French context, Scourge of the Gods (aka Le fléau des dieux) was probably just a standard commercial science fiction comic. But it shows a level of craftsmanship and complexity that’s rare in American comics. Marvel published three issues of this series, reprinting three of the six original albums. I bought the second and third issues at Heroes Con, but I haven’t gotten to them yet.
ACTION COMICS #422 (DC, 1973) – “The TV Show That Menaced Metropolis,” [W] Cary Bates, [A] Curt Swan. Young Woodrow Nescott has a disease where if his white blood cells are exposed to the air, they come to life and turn monstrous. Therefore, Woodrow has had to stay confined to his house, and his parents tell him that the outside world doesn’t exist and is just a TV show. By accident, Woodrow discovers that Superman, who he’s seen on TV, is real, and therefore he assumes his favorite TV show, Police Agent Y-6 (a blend of The Fugitive and Secret Agent X-9) is also real. When the guy who plays Agent Y-6 is fired from the show, Woodrow sneaks out of the house to warn him, and chaos ensues. This story is pretty funny, though it has an anticlimactic ending where Superman uses an alien serum to cure Woodrow. If he could have done that all along, why didn’t he do it sooner? I assume this story was inspired by the real-life bubble boy cases of David Vetter and Ted DeVita. These same cases also inspired a TV movie, a Seinfeld episode, and a Paul Simon song. This issue includes a Human Target backup story by Wein and Giordano. Much of this story is an origin recap.
INCREDIBLE HULK #601 (Marvel, 2009) – “Banner’s Back,” [W] Greg Pak, [A] Ariel Olivetti. On the subway, Bruce witnesses a man abusing his child, and threatens to take revenge if the man ever does it again. Instead of threatening, he should have reported the man to CPS, and also the IRS, since he knows the man is a tax cheat. After this encounter, Bruce meets some other superheroes, and then his sort-of son Skaar. There’s also a boring Savage She-Hulk backup story by Fred Van Lente and Michael Ryan. Ariel Olivetti’s art on the main story is too photorealistic for me. I wonder what his art looked like when he was working in Argentine comics.
2000 AD #1827 (Rebellion, 2013) – Dredd: “Suicide Watch Part 2,” [W] Gordon Rennie & Emma Beeby, [A] Paul Davidson. Dredd investigates a cult that’s enabling people to voluntarily retcon themselves out of existence, thanks to the power of a mysterious shadowy creature with a giant smile. Dandridge: “The Copper Conspiracy Part 4,” [W] Alec Worley, [A] Warren Pleece. This story is narrated by Dandridge’s robot valet Shelley, who is currently separated from his head. Dandridge resembles other dandyish 2000 AD protagonists, like Nikolai Dante and Bix Barton, but Dandridge, like Bertie Wooster, is very stupid. 3Rillers: “The Ghostship Mathematica Part 1,” [W] David Baillie, [A] Inaki Miranda. A human boy works as a slave in a bar for aliens. Some robots rescue him, and he joins them on their quest to rediscover the story’s eponymous spaceship. The ship contains the minds of the entire human race, as well as the only known way of returning to Earth. Stickleback: “Number of the Beast Part 4,” [W] Ian Edginton, [A] D’Israeli. We’re introduced to the villains, who are plotting to breed a race of regenerative lizards. There’s a mention of an American doctor who used a serum made from lizards to regrow his missing limb, though “it was not without certain… side effects.” This is obviously a reference to Marvel’s Curt Connors, the Lizard. Zombo: “Planet Zombo Part 3,” [W] Al Ewing, [A] Henry Flint. This chapter includes some characters who are parodies of the Beatles, but otherwise I can’t summarize it. Much like Curse Words, Zombo is deliberately absurd and over-the-top.
NEVERWHERE #7 (Vertigo, 2006) – “Chapter Seven,” [W] Mike Carey, [A] Glenn Fabry. This is just a straightforward adaptation of the Neil Gaiman novel of the same name. It doesn’t seem like it’s adding much to the original book, though I don’t remember the book well – I have read it, but I’ve forgotten most of it. The art in this issue is excellent, but not excellent enough to justify collecting the rest of the series.
STAR WARS: RETURN OF THE JEDI #3 (Marvel, 1983) – untitled, [W] Archie Goodwin, [A] Al Williamson. For some reason this was published as a separate miniseries, rather than in the ongoing Star Wars title. Al Williamson’s artwork in this issue is excellent, but it’s not his best. His fine linework is overwhelmed by Carlos Garzon’s inking. The other problem with this issue is that I think ROTJ is a pretty dumb movie.
TRUE BELIEVERS: WOLVERINE – SWORD QUEST #1 (Marvel, 1988/2018) – “Sword Quest,” [W] Chris Claremont, [A] John Buscema. Originally Wolverine #1. Logan fights some pirates and rescues some kidnapped women and a Yashida clan samurai. The Yashida clansman dies after telling Logan about a plot to steal the clan’s ancestral sword. Following the sword’s trail, Logan travels to Madripoor and encounters an old Claremont character, Lindsay McCabe. This issue is notable for its high level of violence. As a Claremont fan, I probably should be collecting the early issues of Wolverine. But I’m not all that interested in Wolverine as a solo character. I like him better as a teammate or a foil to other characters.
FCBD 2023: GENERAL (Dark Horse, 2023) – Umbrella Academy: “Safe,” [W/A] Gabriel Bá. This seems to be a prelude to an upcoming story featuring a Lovecraftian cosmic villain. The interesting thing about this story is the new character Abhijat, a Sikh man. This issue includes some depictions of Abhijat’s memories, and these scenes were created in collaboration with a sensitivity reader. There’s also a Witcher backup story about a young woman who was accidentally cursed by her overprotective mother.
THOR #619 (Marvel, 2011) – “The World Eaters, Chapter 5,” [W] Matt Fraction, [A] Pasqual Ferry. I don’t remember much about this issue’s plot, except that it’s about a war between the Asgardians and some aliens, who speak in black word balloons with white highlights. Pasqual Ferry’s art in this issue is phenomenal, thanks in part to Matt Hollingsworth’s coloring and John Workman’s lettering.
DETECTIVE COMICS #595 (DC, 1988) – “Our Man in Havana,” [W] Alan Grant & John Wagner, [A] Irv Novick. In an Invasion! crossover, Batman goes to Cuba and fights some Durlans and Thanagarians. In a flashback, we see that Batman tracked the aliens to Cuba when he discovered that they were smuggling contraband weapons into Gotham inside boxes of Cuban cigars. The problem with this scheme is that in 1988, the Cuban cigars were just as illegal as the weapons were. The editor must have noticed this, because in a word balloon that appears to have been added at the last minute, Batman says that “being aliens, they didn’t realize that Havans are illegal here” (and this may also be the actual explanation, since Wagner and Grant were “aliens” to America). This issue includes a Bonus Book insert by Jeff O’Hare and Roderick Delgado. It’s an awful story, and it presents Mr. Freeze as a cliched mad scientist. Paul Dini’s revived version of the character was far more interesting than that. O’Hare has no other credits in the GCD, and Delgado only ever published one other story that was longer than a single page.
TARZAN FAMILY #60 (DC, 1975) – “Forbidden Tomb,” [W] Robert Kanigher, [A] Rudy Florese. Korak rescues a prince who’s cursed with bad luck. Tarzan Family was a renumbering of Korak, Son of Tarzan, and Korak continued to be Tarzan Family’s flagship character until it was cancelled with #66. The other new story in this issue is “Amazon of Barsoom” by Kanigher and Noly Zamora. The issue also includes a reprinted Carson of Venus story from Korak #46, and some reprinted daily strips by Russ Manning and Hal Foster.
SUPERBOY #25 (DC, 1996) – “Whom the Gods Would Destroy!”, [W] Karl Kesel, [A] Tom Grummett et al. Kon and Knockout battle Knockout’s old teammates, the Female Furies. I This was the first issue of this series I ever read. I probably bought it not long after it came out. However, my existing copy has no cover, so I had to buy a new one. Reading this issue again, I found that I’d forgotten most of it, except for Knockout and Kon’s kiss near the end. On rereading this issue, I notice a couple things I must have missed the first time around: almost everything Knockout says is a sexual innuendo, and the unnamed character on page 22 is Himon.
DONALD DUCK ADVENTURES #26 (Gladstone, 1994) – “The Terror of the River,” [W/A] Carl Barks. A villain is using a robot sea serpent to terrorize ships sailing the Ohio River. There’s no particular reason he’s doing this; he just likes to scare people. After a lengthy series of encounters with the sea serpent, Donald and the nephews succeed in defeating the villain. This is an exciting adventure story with a vividly realized setting. I have some nostalgic associations with the Ohio River, since I lived near Cincinnati for a couple years. I’m surprised that this was one of Barks’s earliest long-form stories, given its level of craft. The backup story is an adaptation of the film Donald in Mathmagic Land. The original film is a classic, but Don Christensen and Tony Strobl’s adaptation is inferior to the source material.
INCREDIBLE HULK #709 (Marvel, 2017) – “Return to Planet Hulk Part 1,” [W] Greg Pak, [A] Greg Land. This issue comes after Totally Awesome Hulk #23, so at this point Amadeus Cho is still the primary Hulk. In this issue he travels to Sakaar, which has turned into a Mad Max-style wasteland since the last time we visited. Amadeus now has to fight to reclaim Sakaar from the warlord who’s currently tyrannizing over it. This story doesn’t feel very original.
2000 AD #1828 (Rebellion, 2013) – Dredd: as above. The cultists try to convince Dredd’s partner Hamida to have herself erased from existence. Dredd himself is caught by the “stygian devourer,” and the chapter ends with Hamida asking for Dredd and being told “Say again, Hamida. Who’s Dredd?” Dandridge: as above. Dandridge is captured by the villain, who has a stack of videotapes with labels like EXPLANATION OF EVIL PLAN and DIABOLICAL LAUGHTER, VOL. 8. Also the villain is referred to as “Master Beta” (say it out loud to see the joke). 3Rillers: as above. Some years after the first chapter, the kid and the robots discover the Ghostship Mathematica, but it’s destroyed by pirates before they can get to it. Stickleback: as above. The white-haired scientist tells Stickleback that the lizard drones are much smarter than they were designed to be. Then he turns into a lizard himself. D’Israeli’s grayscale art style in this story is very stunning at first, but it’s difficult to read. Zombo: as above. Zombo, or possibly his evil clone Obmoz, sings “Pure Imagination.” Also there’s an appearance by the character who speaks in Kirbyesque dialogue.
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #264 (Marvel, 1985) – “Red 9 and Red Tape!”, [W] Craig Anderson, [A] Paty. Spider-Man meets an arrogant young superhero named Red 9. While trying to deal with Red 9’s harassment, he also has to save an old man from being thrown out of his nursing home after being falsely declared dead. This story is cute, but also silly and amateurish. Craig Anderson and Paty were both longtime Marvel staffers, but neither of them did much work as a writer or artist respectively. “Red 9 and Red Tape” feels like a fill-in or a try-out story, and I’d be curious to know how it came to be published. The theme of a living person being declared dead was used much more effectively by Will Eisner in Invisible People, and it also happens in the real world, as in the case of Lal Bihari.
FANTASTIC FOUR #210 (Marvel, 1979) – “In Search of Galactus,” [W] Marv Wolfman, [A] John Byrne. Suffering from rapid aging, the FF have to find Galactus in order to save the human race from the Sphinx. In order to get Galactus’s help, Reed has to free Galactus from his promise to leave Earth alone. Sue is in more danger from the rapid aging than Reed or Ben because of her family’s history of early death. This raises a couple questions: first, I’m not sure why Johnny isn’t also aging rapidly, and second, neither of Sue’s parents died of natural causes, and her father seemed like a pretty old man when he died. John Byrne’s artwork in this issue is good, especially his depictions of the aliens in Galactus’s zoo. However, his art is hampered by Joe Sinnott’s inking, and his solo FF run a couple years later was much better.
BATMAN #589 (DC, 2001) – “Close Before Striking Act 2,” [W] Brian K. Vaughan, [A] Scott McDaniel. In a flashback, we learn how Batman assumed the secret identity of Matches Malone, after the real Matches Malone apparently killed his brother and then committed suicide. In the present day, we learn what happened: Matches Malone’s brother accidentally killed a homeless man, then committed suicide out of guilt, and Matches faked his own death, passing off the homeless man’s corpse as his own. Then Matches dies for real. This issue is a nice callback to Matches’s debut in Batman #242. It establishes that in both pre- and post-Crisis continuity, Matches Malone really existed, and Batman assumed Matches’s identity after Matches’s (real or feigned) death.
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #595 (Marvel, 2009) – “American Son Part 1,” [W] Joe Kelly, [A] Phil Jimenez. Unfortunately, this issue is mostly about Norman Osborn and how he tries to control the lives of his son and the Jameson family. I despise Norman Osborn, and I wish he had stayed dead. Also, because this issue is partly about Norman and Harry Osborn’s toxic father-son relationship, it reminds me of Joe Kelly’s current series Immortal Sergeant, which is about another such relationship. I flipped through Immortal Sergeant #5 at the store today, and I think it’s an awful comic. The protagonist is a loathsome man, and the creators allow him to say a bunch of racist shit and get away with it.
THE LONE RANGER’S FAMOUS HORSE HI-YO SILVER #36 (Gold Key, 1960) – “Pursuit in the Blizzard” etc., [W] Gaylord Du Bois, [A] Tom Gill. In four separate stories, Silver helps save two Apaches from freezing to death, herds some sheep, saves some cows from a tornado, and fights a wolf. These stories are beautifully drawn, but they have a severe complaint: the main character can’t talk, because he’s a horse, and so his emotions have to be conveyed through caption boxes. Perhaps that’s why this series was cancelled with this issue. I could make an argument for filing this comic under L, H or S, but I think I’m going to go with L, so I can put it with my other Lone Ranger comics.
MARVEL TEAM-UP #140 (Marvel, 1984) – “Where Were You When the Lights Went Out?”, [W] Bill Mantlo & Tom DeFalco, [A] Ron Frenz. This story is named after a 1968 movie, which was itself based on the 1965 Northeast blackout. This issue is perhaps more directly based on the 1977 New York blackout, which is alleged to have helped kick-start hip hop music, because it created an opportunity for people to steal DJ equipment they couldn’t afford to buy. This event is depicted in Ed Piskor’s Hip Hop Family Tree. Anyway, in this issue, a pawnbroker is shot dead while defending his store during a blackout. A teenage boy, Juan Santiago, is falsely accused of the murder, and Spider-Man and Black Widow have to clear his name. But before they can do so, Spider-Man is teleported to Battleworld for Secret Wars, and the story continues next issue with Daredevil replacing Spider-Man. This story’s racial politics are kind of ambivalent. On one hand, Spider-Man is obligated to defend the law by bringing the pawnbroker’s murderer to justice. On the other hand, the pawnbroker was a white man who exploited his black neighbors, so he’s not a very sympathetic victim. And Juan Santiago is an innocent person of color who gets framed for the death of a white man. On another topic, I met Tom DeFalco at Heroes Con, and he told me some fascinating information about Star Comics.
THE FLASH #304 (DC, 1981) – “One More Blip… and You’re Dead!”, [W] Cary Bates, [A] Carmine Infantino. Willard Wiggins, an evil toy company owner, is attacked by a computerized villain named Colonel Computron, and the Flash has to save Wiggins. It’s implied that Colonel Computron is really Wiggins’s employee Basil Nurblin, who’s responsible for the company’s success, but who receives no credit for it. In later stories, Nurblin was explicitly stated to be Colonel Computron. This story has not aged well; because of its depiction of obsolete computer technologies, it feels more dated than many Flash stories that were actually published before it. This issue also includes a Firestorm backup story.
SUPERMAN #219 (DC, 1969) – “Clark Kent, Hero… Superman, Public Enemy!”, [W] Cary Bates, [A] Curt Swan. This story’s gimmick, as its title indicates, is that Clark Kent and Superman’s reputations are reversed, with Clark becoming a hero while Superman becomes a figure of fun. As usual with Cary Bates, the explanation is extremely convoluted and bizarre; it has something to do with a planet of shapeshifting aliens that somehow find themselves transformed into duplicates of Clark Kent. In the backup story, by Leo Dorfman and Swan, Superman hunts down a Phantom Zone villain during a heat wave.
THE ATOM #33 (DC, 1967) – “Amazing Arsenal of the Atom-Assassin!”, [W] Gardner Fox, [A] Gil Kane. The main event in this story is that the Atom fights the Bug-Eyed Bandit. This issue includes some excellent fight scenes, but its story is hampered by a complicated, non-chronological plot structure, and also by an excess of text. A notable minor character in this issue is Sue Shan, a Korean war orphan.
WEIRD WESTERN TALES #52 (DC, 1979) – “The Plot to Kill President Lincoln,” [W] Gerry Conway, [A] Dick Ayers. During the Civil War, a Union spy invites Bat Lash and Scalphunter to visit Washington DC. When they arrive, Secretary of War Edwin Stanton tries to hire Bat Lash and Scalphunter to assassinate President Lincoln. Bat Lash, who will do anything for money, accepts the offer, but Scalphunter refuses and has to avoid being assassinated himself. This story is concluded next issue. I wonder if the Stanton in this issue is an impostor, because it seems doubtful that the real Edwin Stanton would have tried to kill Lincoln. When Lincoln really did get assassinated, Stanton was not fond of the new President, Andrew Johnson. I thought I remembered that Scalphunter was renamed because his original name is offensive, but I was confusing him with the Marvel character of the same name.
DAREDEVIL #127 (Marvel, 1975) – “You Killed That Man, Torpedo–And Now You’re Going to Pay!”, [W] Marv Wolfman, [A] Bob Brown. Matt gets in a pointless fight with Torpedo in a residential neighborhood, and as a result, he destroys a suburban black family’s house. The wife of the family rebukes Matt for his irresponsibility, leaving Matt ashamed of himself. This issue was rare for its time in depicting black people living a middle-class lifestyle. There’s also a subplot about Foggy Nelson’s political campaign, and there’s an embarrassing scene where Heather Glenn tries to seduce Matt, and Matt shoves her away.
BEETLE BAILEY #23 (Dell, 1959) – “Killer Meets His Match” etc., [W/A] unknown. This was a gift from Andy Kunka. The stories in this issue are just longer-form versions of Beetle Bailey comic strips, with the same style of artwork and humor. It’s odd that Beetle Bailey is a comic strip about the American military, yet it never makes any references to any of the actual wars that American soldiers are involved in, and Beetle Bailey never gets deployed. Perhaps that’s the reason for the strip’s success – it offers an idealized, sanitized version of military life, in which nothing traumatic can ever happen.
FABULOUS FURRY FREAK BROTHERS #11 (Rip Off, 1990) – “The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers Break Up!”, [W/A] Gilbert Shelton w/ Paul Mavrides & Dave Sheridan. Unlike most of this series, this issue is in color. In the first issue, the FFFB decide to go their separate ways, but by a whim of fate, they all end up moving into the same apartment. In another story, Fat Freddy invents an imaginary drug called “squeak”. Then he gets himself appointed as a drug czar to fight the “threat” of squeak, while Franklin and Phineas sell some sugar pills which they claim to be squeak. The villain of this story is the FFFB’s archenemy Norbert the Nark. In the longest story, the Freak Brothers set up a bus line from San Francisco to New York. Freak Brothers comics are a bit awkward to read because of their extreme length and hyperdetailed art, but the Freak Brothers are perhaps the best characters in all of underground comics, and Shelton is a hilarious writer.
SUPERMAN #345 (DC, 1980) – “When Time Ran Backward!”, [W] Gerry Conway, [A] Curt Swan. Superman discovers that time is going in reverse. It turns out that this is because aliens are stealing Earth’s chronal energy. Superman manages to get time moving in the proper direction again. This is an unmemorable story, but at least it’s less complicated than if Cary Bates had written it.
DETECTIVE COMICS #589 (DC, 1988) – “Night People Part 3: The Burning Pit,” [W] Alan Grant & John Wagner, [A] Norm Breyfogle. Batman fights the Corrosive Man and Kadaver, who are also trying to kill each other. At this point Kadaver looks like a normal man wearing a devil disguise, but later in the issue the Corrosive Man puts his hand on Kadaver’s face. That explains Kadaver’s corpselike appearance when he reappears in issue 610. Much of this issue is narrated by a DJ, but at the end of the issue the DJ gets high on cocaine and is involved in a car crash. Ironically, the other person in the crash is Harlan Wolff, a cocaine dealer, who appeared in the first part of this story arc. This issue includes a Bonus Book segment by Lewis Klahr and Steve Piersall (co-writers) and Dean Haspiel. Like the Bonus Book in #595, this story is a boring and unoriginal depiction of a character – Poison Ivy in this case – who, a few years later, would be given a new and definitive portrayal by Paul Dini. Neither Klahr nor Piersall ever published any other comics, while Dean Haspiel went on to a successful comics career.
NOBLE CAUSES #32 (Image, 2008) – “Family Dynamics,” [W] Jay Faerber, [A] Yildiray Cinar. This issue was published after an eight-month hiatus. It claims to be the start of “a bold new direction,” but I don’t know what’s new about it. I like the premise of Noble Causes – a multigenerational family of superheroes – but I would only buy more issues of this series if they were very cheap.
MYSTIC #22 (CrossGen, 2002) – untitled, [W] Tony Bedard, [A] Fabrizio Fiorentino. As with Noble Causes, I only collect CrossGen comics if they’re very cheap. Mystic seems to be about a sorceress character who’s a bit like Zatanna, but I don’t remember anything about this particular issue’s plot.
TONY STARK: IRON MAN #10 (Marvel, 2019) – “Stark Realities Part 5: Parental Code,” [W] Dan Slott & Jim Zub, [A] Valerio Schiti. The Collector is rampaging through the eScape, and Arno Stark and Sunset Bain are using the Collector’s attack as an opportunity to spring their own plot against Tony. Meanwhile, Tony himself is trapped in a virtual reality created by Motherboard, an artificial intelligence which manifests as digital versions of Tony’s parents. This issue is a bit hard to follow, but it’s very entertaining.
TRINITY #29 (DC, 2009) – “It’s All in the Cards,” [W] Kurt Busiek, [A] Mark Bagley. In the first story, Clark, Diana and Bruce are trapped in a strange alien world and have lost their memories. Meanwhile Charity from Starman is trying to find them. I know it was revealed at some point that Charity and Mason O’Dare were married and expecting a child, but I don’t know if the child’s birth was ever mentioned. There’s also another segment, co-written by Fabian Nicieza and drawn by Tom Derenick, in which the JSI (Justice Society International, I assume) fights against an invasion by an army of villains. Like much of Kurt’s recent work, Trinity has a rather weird feeling to it.
THOR #616 (Marvel, 2010) – “The World Eaters Part 2,” [W] Matt Fraction, [A] Pasqual Ferry. Kelda is crippled by grief over Billl’s death. A scientist tries to tell Thor that something weird is going on with the World Tree, but Thor arrogantly refuses to listen, which seems out of character. The aliens from #619 begin their invasion. This comic looks like a classic Simonson Thor comic because of John Workman’s lettering. Offhand I can’t think of any other letterer who’s so strongly associated with a particular artist.
2000 AD #1829 (Rebellion, 2013) – Dredd: as above. Hamida discovers that no one remembers Dredd ever existed. She uses her own psychic powers to defeat the “jinn” and restore Dredd to existence, and people suddenly remember their loved ones who died in Day of Chaos. I haven’t read any of Day of Chaos, but I’d like to. It seems like the most consequential Dredd story since Apocalypse War. Dandridge: as above. Shelley kills the mad scientist, but this only makes matters worse. Zombo: as above. The Sc4rabs sing a parody version of Yellow Submarine. According to the Kirbyesque character, this somehow causes Earth to turn into the “Life-World.” Zombo comes back to life. 3rillers: as above. The protagonists defeat the pirates and finally reach Earth. I don’t remember if we’re told what happened to the computerized souls of the human race. Stickleback: as above. Stickleback is saved by his son’s guardian, and they go looking for the lizard army.
TEEN TITANS ACADEMY #3 (DC, 2021) – “Need for Speed 2: Extradition,” [W] Tim Sheridan, [A] Rafa Sandoval. Red X and his allies invade Titans Tower, looking for one of the students, a paraplegic indigenous Australian girl named Alinta. I want to like Teen Titans Academy, but it’s disappointing. None of the students get enough panel time, because there are too many students, and on top of that, about half of each issue is devoted to the adult Titans. And the students don’t seem very interesting either. I’m going to quit collecting this series.
FANTASTIC ADVENTURES #17 (I.W., 1964) – “Echoes of an A-Bomb!”, [W] Ruth Roche or Lee Stokes, [A] Matt Baker, etc. This entire issue is reprinted from Seven Seas Comics #6. Its first story is essentially a jungle girl story, except it’s set on a Pacific island. Matt Baker’s art is beautiful, especially his facial expressions. The GCD gives conflicting information about who wrote this story. In “Tugboat Tessie,” a buff red-haired woman defeats a gang of corrupt union thugs. Tessie is a figure of fun, but at least she’s not explicitly fat-shamed. The third story, “Old Ironsides,” is the same one that appears in another IW comic, Battle Stories #16, though the GCD doesn’t seem to realize this. “Marty and the Mermaid” is a dumb mermaid story drawn in a funny animal style. The last story is about a female pirate, Captain Cutlass.
TOMAHAWK #137 (DC, 1971) – “Night of the Knife!”, [W] Robert Kanigher, [A] Frank Thorne. A flashback story depicting how Tomahawk met his indigenous wife Moon Fawn. A notable aspect of this story is that Moon Fawn spends several pages topless. Thorne, of course, was best known for his cheesecake art, though he keeps this story Code-approved. There are also three reprinted backup stories, including two about Native Americans, and one about the invention of the song Yankee Doodle. I don’t think any of the Native American depictions in this issue are very accurate, but at least they’re not grossly offensive. I’ve been a bit disappointed with the Tomahawk comics I’ve read recently. It seems like the high point of this series was the Firehair backup series, and Firehair only appeared in three issues of Tomahawk. I already have one of them, #134, so I need to look for #132 and #136.
THE FORGED #2 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Greg Rucka & Eric Trautmann, [A] Mike Henderson. After a lot of fighting, the soldiers discover their target: a “Cassandra,” a prophetic woman in the service of the empress. The Cassandra reveals that the empire is being invaded by aliens. The Forged includes some striking action sequences, but each issue ends with an unnecessarily long infodump in text form. Mike Henderson was at Heroes Con, but I didn’t get a chance to speak to him.
CAPTAIN AMERICA #361 (Marvel, 1989) – “Bloodstone Part 5: Lair of the Living Mummy,” [W] Mark Gruenwald, [A] Kieron Dwyer. Cap and Diamondback are trapped in a ruined pyramid, and Diamondback is captured by the Living Mummy. Also, Cap is pursued by Baron Zemo and his minions, including Batroc. It’s been a long time since I’ve actively collected Gruenwald’s Captain America, and maybe I should start collecting it again. He was quite a good Cap writer, despite some embarrassing storylines like Capwolf and Iron Cap. A strange moment in this issue is when Diamondback is able to understand the mummy’s speech, because she’s learned “modern Egyptian” from her Serpent Society teammate Asp. That doesn’t make sense, because the modern language of Egypt is Arabic. The modern language descended from ancient Egyptian is Coptic, but Coptic became extinct as a primary language around the 17th century, and is now used only as a liturgical language. And even if Asp speaks Coptic as a liturgical language, why would she have taught it to Diamondback?
RUMBLE #5 (Image, 2018) – “Soul Without Pity Part V: War and Peace,” [W] John Arcudi, [A] David Rubín. In a flashback, Rathraq gets his dog brought back to life, then he goes into battle with his companion Borogald, but Borogald is killed. David Rubín’s artwork in this sequence is beautiful and epic. Then there’s a present-day sequence which I don’t understand. This scene makes reference to the skunk ape, a cryptid which has also appeared in The Goon.
ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #565 (DC, 1999) – “The World is My Backyard,” [W] Karl Kesel & Jerry Ordway, [A] Tom Grummett. Superman forces a Southeast Asian dictator to resign. This behavior is out of character, and the Justice League stages an intervention, fearing that Superman is being mind-controlled. There’s also an appearance by Outburst, whose secret identity is Mitch Anderson, the kid from Funeral for a Friend who blamed himself for Superman’s death. The theme of superheroes intervening in foreign politics has been addressed much more extensively in comics like Planetary and Squadron Supreme.
BATMAN #93 (DC, 2020) – “Their Dark Designs Part 8,” [W] James Tynion IV, [A] Guillem March. A villain called the Designer tells Batman his scheme to take over Gotham. Batman discovers that the Designer is actually dead and that the Joker is animating his corpse. Also, Harley Quinn fights Punchline. This issue is labeled as a prelude to Joker War, but luckily the Joker only makes a brief appearance in it. (Luckily because I hate the Joker.)
2000 AD #1830 (Rebellion, 2013) – This prog’s cover is designed to look like a much older issue of the series. it has an old logo, Ben Day dots, and a background colored like old paper. It’s signed M. Aitken, in reference to a character in the 3rillers story. Dredd: “The Forsaken Part 1: Kessler,” [W] Mike Carroll, [A] P.J. Holden. Dredd discovers a Judge cadet named Kessler who’s been missing since Day of Chaos. He begins to tell his story, and the Judges go looking for Kessler’s other missing comrades. 3rillers: “Gunheadz Part 1,” [W] T.C. Eglington, [A] Boo Cook. A young comics fan goes looking for Maurice Aitken, the mysterious artist of the classic comic strip Gunheadz. When he finds Maurice Aitken, he also finds an actual Gunhead, a mutated creature with a gun for a head. The present-day scenes are interspersed with scenes from the made-up Gunheadz strip. This story is an interesting piece of metatext. Dandridge: as above. In pursuit of the villain, Dandridge and Shelley hijack a bus. Stickleback: as above. Stickleback and his son’s guardian descend into the sewers, where they meet the Rat Queen and her Ratlings. Zombo: as above. The planet Earth becomes sentient and goes to war against the villain Hank Epislon. I’m completely unable to follow the plot of Planet Zombo, but it’s a very funny series.
JON SABLE, FREELANCE: ASHES OF EDEN #1 (IDW, 2009) – untitled, [W/A] Mike Grell. Jon Sable is hired to protect a priceless diamond, as well as a corporate mascot, Bashira, who is described as being like a flawed diamond herself. Bashira is based on the Afghan Girl from National Geographic, though Bashira is from Iraq, not Afghanistan. A poignant scene in this issue is when a drunk racist dude tries to bully Bashira into giving him an autograph, and Sable whacks the guy in the throat. I talked to Mike Grell briefly at Heroes Con, and photographed him drawing Mariah.
ALIENS: DEAD ORBIT #2 (Dark Horse, 2017) – untitled, [W/A] James Stokoe. A fairly typical story about aliens invading a space station. It’s notable only for James Stokoe’s hyperdetailed draftsmanship and beautiful page layouts. One of my favorite photos I took at Heroes Con was of a woman cosplaying as Ripley from the first movie, with a plush Jonesy on her shoulder.
TARZAN: LOVE, LIES, AND THE LOST CITY #2 (Malibu, 1992) – untitled, [W] Henning Kure, [A] Peter Snejbjerg & Teddy Kristiansen. Wayne Colt, a character in Tarzan the Invincible, asks Jane to rescue his missing granddaughter Zora, from the same novel. Tarzan and Jane both find themselves in the city of Opar, but Tarzan has lost his memory. This issue has excellent artwork and coloring, but its lettering is hard to read. These Malibu Tarzan comics may have been better than any subsequent Tarzan comics published in America.
2000 AD #1831 (Rebellion, 2013) – Dredd: as above. The judges reconstruct the circumstances in which Quillan, another of the cadets, was killed. Also there’s a plot point I don’t understand, about how none of the cadets know whether or not they’re clones. 3rillers: as above. Maurice Aitkin begins to explain the origins of the Gunheadz strip and the actual Gunheadz. Dandridge: as above. Dandridge and Shelley defeat a squad of copper robots, and the prime minister’s conspiracy is exposed. Stickleback: as above. The Rat Queen dies, and Stickleback is joined by the last of her daughters. Zombo: as above. Zombo and another character parachute onto the now-living Earth. I still can’t follow this story’s plot, but I’m not sure its plot can be followed.
DCEASED #3 (DC, 2022) – “War of the Undead Gods,” [W] Tom Taylor, [A] Trevor Hairsine. The entire DC universe is besieged by a zombie plague, and there are separate scenes starring Adam Strange, Lobo, and Wonder Woman. I’m willing to read anything Tom Taylor writes, but this issue was just okay. My copy has a variant cover that’s an homage to Jim Lee’s X-Men #1 cover.
DETECTIVE COMICS #999 (DC, 2019) – “The Price You Pay,” [W] Peter Tomasi, [A] Doug Mahnke. Batman has a bizarre confrontation with his own younger self. We then learn that this is a vision he’s having while immobilized in a tank, and he does this every year on his birthday – he tests himself by fighting another version of himself. Also, Bruce evaluates his performance based on the number of Gotham citizens murdered each year. This issue is worth owning just because of its issue number.
ACTION COMICS #530 (DC, 1982) – “Fantastic Deadly Voyage!”, [W] Marv Wolfman, [A] Curt Swan. Superman and a now-benevolent Brainiac are trapped inside a Planet-Eater device, which Brainiac created when he was evil. To save Earth from the Planet-Eater, Superman has to turn Brainiac evil again. In this issue Curt Swan tries to achieve a Kirbyesque effect, particularly on page 5, a splash page depicting the interior of the Planet-Eater. Swan does not quite succeed in imitating Kirby, and his art just looks garish. There’s also an Atom backup story by Rozakis and Saviuk. Alex Saviuk was at Heroes Con again, but I didn’t talk to him.
FABULOUS FURRY FREAK BROTHERS #7 (Rip Off, 1982) – “Burned Again” etc., [W/A] Gilbert Shelton w/ Paul Mavrides. Fat Freddy finds a canister of plutonium. When they realize what it is, the Freak Brothers decide to turn it over to the Department of the Interior, where their nemesis Norbert the Nark is currently employed. But instead they end up selling the plutonium to another hippie, while the government agents go after a canister of ice cream, mistaking it for the plutonium. Lots of hilarious mayhem ensues. The next long story is “Phineas Gets an Abortion,” which I already read in Rip Off Comix #8. Next, in “Come Down,” the Freak Brothers try to go an entire morning without smoking pot, and the next few pages are rendered in dull grayscale instead of the usual line art. Then the Freak Brothers grow tired of abstinence and get high, and the last two panels are in the normal style. This was the last Freak Brothers story to which Dave Sheridan contributed before his death. Other stories include a flashforward to the Freak Brothers in 2003, and “Knock ‘Em Dead,” about the brothers’ brief and disastrous musical career.
KULL THE CONQUEROR #8 (Marvel, 1973) – “Wolfshead,” [W] Len Wein, [A] Marie Severin. Kull and his men are shipwrecked in a city ruled by a slave trader named Vinsala. While there, Kull befriends a man named Demontur who’s secretly a werewolf. This story is a very liberal adaptation of REH’s 1926 story Wolfshead. Not only did that story not include Kull, but it was set in contemporary Africa, and its central characters were named Dom Vincent and De Montour. I don’t like Kull as much as Conan, because Kull seems to lack either a sense of humor or a sex drive.
PIRATE CORP$ #1 (Slave Labor, 1989) – “Poor… Tired… and Depressed on Planet Earth”, [W/A] Evan Dorkin. The Pirate Corp$ land on Earth, and then they attend Ron Chitin’s hockey game, where Vroom Socko is on the other team. At this point, Dorkin seemed to decide to change Pirate Corp$ from an outer space adventure series, to a slice-of-life comic that just happened to be set on a science-fictional Earth.
POWER MAN AND IRON FIST #102 (Marvel, 1984) – “The Scarlet Ruse,” [W] Kurt Busiek, [A] Richard Howell. This issue starts out as a sort of parody of The Maltese Falcon. A mysterious woman leaves a sealed package with Luke and Danny, which proves to contain one of the Twin Idols of Zor. and then an even more mysterious man shows up at their office looking for the package. We then learn that the woman was the Scarlet Witch, and Luke and Danny have to team up with Wanda and Vision to protect the idols from the Cult of Zor. This is a fairly cute issue. It’s strange to think that Kurt has been working in comics for forty years.
Another trip to Heroes:
MIRACLEMAN: THE SILVER AGE #5 (Marvel, 2023) – “What Lies Beneath,” [W] Neil Gaiman, [A] Mark Buckingham. Dickie accidentally reveals his true identity to Meta-Maid, and they continue their quest for information about Dickie’s past. When they finally get to Dickie’s old orphanage, Dickie sees some ghosts and then collapses. The problem with this series is that it’s too short. The main story in this issue is just 16 pages, and the rest of the issue is an old Marvelman reprint. And after the next issue, who knows how long it’ll be before Miracleman: The Dark Age comes out, if it ever does. I also get the sense that Gaiman’s writing style has gotten looser and more decompressed since he last worked on Miracleman, and so there’s less narrative content in The Silver Age than in earlier Miracleman storylines. Nonetheless, any amount of new Miracleman material is cause for celebration. I strongly suspect that Meta-Maid is Miraclewoman, because she acts just like Miraclewoman.
SAGA #64 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Brian K. Vaughan, [A] Fiona Staples. Gale continues looking for Alana and Hazel. Petrichor is reunited with her mother. Hazel and Prince Robot go looking for “wormfood,” and they encounter a man claiming to be a plainclothes policeman, who tells them that wormfood is fake. But Squire Robot, who has suddenly regained the ability to talk, doesn’t believe him. Alana gets hired as a security guard, but she has to start in thirty minutes, and her kids aren’t back yet. Issue #65 came out this week, but for some reason Heroes didn’t get it.
TITANS #1 (DC, 2023) – “Out of the Shadows,” [W] Tom Taylor, [A] Nicola Scott. The Titans’ opening ceremony for the new Titans Tower is interrupted when they have to fight Titano the giant ape. Peacemaker tries to assert jurisdiction over Titano, and Dick rebuffs him. On returning to the tower, the Titans discover the dead body of Wally West. The original New Teen Titans is one of the absolute classics of the superhero genre, but most attempts to revive it have failed. In particular, Devin Grayson’s 1999 Titans series was so disappointing that it caused me to quit following the franchise. But if any writer can recapture Wolfman and Perez’s magic, it’s Tom Taylor, and I’m really excited about his Titans. A smart thing he does is to establish that these characters are adults, not teens anymore – besides the Dick/Peacemaker scene, he also reminds us that Wally doesn’t live in Titans Tower because he has his own family. He also makes Gar and Raven seem like a really cute couple. My complaints about this series are that first, Starfire doesn’t get enough dialogue. Second, after issue 2, this series is going on a two-month hiatus because of some stupid crossover event that I don’t care about. As a footnote, New Teen Titans (1984) #1 and Titans (2023) #1 both include a scene showing two unmarried characters in bed together. But in 1984, such a scene was highly controversial, while in 2023 it seems totally normal.
FLASH #799 (DC, 2023) – “Assault on Eternity,” [W] Jeremy Adams, [A] Fernando Pasarin et al. Wally and the Terrifics confront Granny Goodness and her three mysterious kid sidekicks, and Wally succeeds in recovering his newborn son. We then discover that one of the three kids is Mr. Terrific’s unborn son, who was thought to have died with his mother. My guess is that the other two are Donna Troy’s son Robert and Aqualad’s son Ceridian. Both Donna and Garth are currently appearing in Titans, so it would be nice if I turned out to be right. This issue is a cute conclusion to the best run of Flash comics since Mark Waid’s original run. I have issue 800, but I haven’t gotten to it yet.
SHE-HULK #13 (Marvel, 2023) – “Girl Can’t Help It Part 3,” [W] Rainbow Rowell, [A] Andres Genolet. Jen has tea with Patsy, then she has another encounter with the mysterious blue-suited dude. Her romance with Jack continues to deteriorate, since they can’t touch each other. Jen convinces Mallory Book to let her take superhuman clients. Nothing in this issue was as funny as the “bulkhustler” line from last issue. It seems like She-Hulk might have been cancelled, and that’s a shame, because it’s more fun than any other current Marvel title. It’s the last survivor of the group of fun Marvel comics, like Squirrel Girl and Runaways and Ms. Marvel.
THE GREAT BRITISH BUMP-OFF #2 (Dark Horse, 2023) – “Death by Chocolate Cake,” [W] John Allison, [A] Max Sarin. Shauna continues investigating the murders, but finds that she herself is becoming a suspect. As a mystery comic, this series is perhaps less effective than Wicked Things, but on the other hand, GBBO is full of hilarious gags and dialogue, and Max Sarin is an excellent humor artist.
BLACK CLOAK #5 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Kelly Thompson, [A] Meredith McClaren. Phaedra confronts her real dad and discovers his shrine to her memory. She also meets her previously unknown half-brother, and they seem to like each other. Then Phaedra and Pax infiltrate the elf palace during a party. After a confrontation with Phaedra’s other brother Hadrian, an awful jerk, Phaedra and Pax discover a lab where magical creatures are being bred. At Heroes Con, I met Meredith McClaren and told her that I’m really enjoying this series, although I had trouble following its plot at first. I would love to meet Kelly Thompson someday.
DARK RIDE #6 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Joshua Williamson, [A] Andrei Bressan. In a black-and-white flashback sequence, the twins and their mother enjoy an idyllic day in the park – until the twins’ mom starts coughing up blood, and their dad blames them for aggravating her illness. In the present day, Summer and Samhain escape from Alister the insane trash collector, but then they’re confronted by Halloween, who’s just as bad as her father. And then Arthur himself makes a rare public appearance. This comic’s plot has become very compelling. I really want to learn more about the mysterious history of Devil Land.
LITTLE MONSTERS #13 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Jeff Lemire, [A] Dustin Nguyen. In order to save Laura from the other kids, Romie has no choice but to turn her into a vampire. And so the status quo continues, with the surviving kids living stagnant, immortal lives, and occasionally recruiting a new member to their group. This is a satisfying conclusion to the latest of Jeff Lemire’s many important works.
SECOND COMING: TRINITY #2 (Ahoy, 2023) – untitled, [W] Mark Russell, [A] Richard Pace. God gets sick of hanging out with the people in heaven, so he decides to visit Earth and hang out with Sunstar and Sheila. I really like Mark Russell’s take on God; Russell writes God as a cranky but well-intentioned old eccentric, rather than as an omnipotent figure of awe. Meanwhile, Jesus babysits Jordan and negligently allows the baby to fall out a window, though Jordan isn’t hurt. A funny plot point in this issue is that Sunstar “cuts” his hair by traveling back in time to when his hair looked good. And he uses the same time travel technique as in Christopher Reeve’s Superman movies – that is, he flies around an alien planet until its rotation reverses.
SPIRIT WORLD #1 (DC, 2023) – untitled, [W] Alyssa Wong, [A] Haining. This is one of three new DC titles with Asian protagonists. I ordered all three. Spirit World is about Xanthe Zhou, a nonbinary “spirit envoy” who lives in Gotham’s Chinatown. I don’t remember much about this issue in particular, but Xanthe is an interesting protagonist, and Wong draws upon Chinese traditional ghost stories, just like Pornsak Pichetshote in Dead Boy Detectives. Also, Cassandra Cain guest-stars in this series, which is good since Batgirls has been cancelled.
BATGIRLS #18 (DC, 2023) – “From Hell’s Heart Part 2,” [W] Becky Cloonan & Michael Conrad, [A] Robbi Rodriguez. The Batgirls make a plan to catch the snipers. Grace O’Halloran leads a “We Are All Batgirls” campaign, intentionally making herself a target for the snipers. Batman makes a guest appearance. I met Becky Cloonan at Heroes Con and told her that I loved Batgirls, that my favorite artist on the series was Jorge Corona, and that I figured out that the cipher was a book cipher. I think she said that the cipher came from an actual book that she had. Michael Conrad was also right there at the same table, but I didn’t get to talk to him.
NOCTERRA #14 (Image, 2023) – “No Brakes Part 3: How,” [W] Scott Snyder, [A] Tony Daniel. In a heartbreaking flashback sequence, Emory finds his mother, and she claims that she didn’t abandon him on purpose, but rather he was kidnapped by her drug dealer. Emory promises to help his mother escape from poverty, but when he goes to look for her again, she’s vanished without a trace. In the present, Val and Em confront the people of Lux, including Gus’s avatar, but Lux claims they can’t help without making things worse. To complicate matters further, Blacktop Bill shows up alive yet again.
SANDMAN UNIVERSE: NIGHTMARE COUNTRY – THE GLASS HOUSE #2 (DC, 2023) – untitled, [W] James Tynion IV, [A] Patricio Delpeche. Max sleeps with Madison’s undead friend Kells, who was murdered in the previous series. Azazel tries to tempt the Corinthian into betraying Daniel. This issue is very creepy and disturbing, but its plot is hard to understand. It’s been too long since I read the previous volume, and I’ve forgotten who the new characters are.
HOUSE OF SLAUGHTER #15 (Boom!, 2023) – “The Butcher’s Return Part 5,” [W] Tate Brombal, [A] Antonio Fuso. Jace frees himself, fights off a horde of Boucher agents – killing a twelve-year-old girl in the process – and rescues Sunny. But Sunny chooses to stay with Jolie because she’s nicer to him. That’s how cults work, or at least this kind of cult. They act nice and friendly at first, before they show their other side. I’m not buying the next House of Slaughter arc because, for some reason, it’s written by Sam Johns again. Their first story arc was so bad that I never want to read another comic they write.
PHANTOM ROAD #3 (Image, 2023) – “Infomercials”, [W] Jeff Lemire, [A] Gabriel Hernandez Walta. A secret agent named Theresa investigates whatever is going on with Dom and Birdie. In a flashback, we see that Theresa herself has had uncanny experiences with Billy Bear truck stops. Then a masked man breaks into her hotel room. Dom and Birdie themselves don’t appear in this issue. I like this series, but I’m still mystified as to where it’s going.
MISS TRUESDALE AND THE FALL OF HYPERBOREA #1 (Dark Horse, 2023) – untitled, [W] Mike Mignola, [A] Jesse Lonergan. This issue begins with a scene in 1880s Paris, depicting two women involved in the occult movement. Then we flash back to a scene set in ancient Hyperborea, starring a female gladiator. Eventually these two story arcs converge. I don’t really care about this comic’s plot, because I’m buying it for Jesse Lonergan’s art. His page layouts here are more sedate than in Hedra or Planet Paradise, but he uses his characteristic trick of motion lines that merge with the panel borders. Jesse Lonergan was another person I didn’t get to speak to at Heroes Con.
JUNKYARD JOE #6 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Geoff Johns & Gary Frank. The villain reveals himself as a mad scientist who created Joe, and who now wants to take him back. The scientist holds Emily hostage, but Joe resists its programming and saves her. Then some Homeland Security agents arrive to reclaim Joe, but the town’s entire population resists them, and Joe is allowed to stay. Joe and Muddy become part of Emily’s family. The series ends with a brief cameo appearance by a time-traveling Geiger. Overall, I still think that Junkyard Joe is Geoff Johns’s most satisfying work. Most of his comics are Silver Age pastiches with extra unnecessary violence, but Junkyard Joe is a serious treatment of the legacy of war.
MONARCH #4 (Image, 2023) – “When the Dark Heart Breaks,” [W] Rodney Barnes, [A] Alex Lins. One of the kids, Todd, goes nuts and tries to kill the others. Todd and his dad are interesting characters, but the trouble with Monarch is it wastes too much time on its plot, and so it doesn’t have enough space to explore its themes of race and family. This is the same problem I had with Know Your Station (which, by the way, I never got the last issue of) – it fails to smoothly integrate its plot with its thematic concerns. In the case of Know Your Station, the point of the story is to deliver a message about economic inequality. But most of each issue is taken up with a detective plot that tells us nothing about economic inequality. Monarch has the same problem: whatever its theme is supposed to be, that theme gets lost behind a pointless plot. Telling a compelling story that also conveys a political message is difficult, but it can be done better than Rodney Barnes does it in Monarch. I’m going to finish reading Monarch, but only because I already started it.
X-MEN RED #11 (Marvel, 2023) – “A Storm on the Horizon,” [W] Al Ewing, [A] Stefano Caselli & Jacopo Camagni. Storm and Xavier have a tense confrontation, part of which is illustrated with images from old X-Men comics. Nova hangs out with Sunspot. Vulcan appears on the last page. I think I’m enjoying X-Men Red a bit more than Immortal X-Men, but neither of them is among my favorite current titles.
GREEN LANTERN #1 (DC, 2023) – “Back on Earth,” [W] Jeremy Adams, [A] Xermanico. Hal returns to Earth and tries to get a job with Ferris Aircraft, because when he’s not Green Lantern, all he knows how to do is fly planes and seduce women. There’s also a backup story starring Guy and John Stewart, written by Philip Kennedy Johnson. I bought this comic because I love Jeremy Adams’s writing on Flash, but part of the appeal of that comic is its depiction of family life, and Hal is not a family man. Rather, Adams writes him as kind of a creep. I already bought issue 2, but if that issue isn’t significantly better, I might give up on this series.
FEARLESS DAWN: THE BOMB #1 (Asylum, 2023) – “Zombie Island Party!” etc., [W/A] Steve Mannion. The first story is a weird piece of metatext, and then the bulk of the issue is devoted to a flashback explaining how Fearless Dawn got her costume. Like Flex Mentallo, Fearless Dawn gets her powers by answering a Charles Atlas ad. The issue ends with some short “Jungle Chick and the Dinosaurs” strips, drawn in a Crumb-influenced style. The entire issue is in black and white, and it reminds me of Corben’s cruder, less photorealistic works. I regret that I didn’t get to talk with Steve Mannion at Heroes Con. He was never at his table when I passed by, or if he was, I didn’t notice.
THE VIGIL #1 (DC, 2023) – “Jig in a Storm,” [W] Ram V, [A] Lalit Kumar Sharma. An Indian superhero team rescues some hostages from Indian Ocean pirates. Meanwhile, their former boss decides to retire, but is promptly murdered. This is the second of the three new Asian-inspired superhero titles, but so far it feels like just a standard superhero comic, and its setting could have been changed from India to America without affecting much else. However, I do look forward to seeing where Ram V goes with this premise.
FANTASTIC FOUR #700 (Marvel, 2023) – “The Enemy of the Good,” [W] Ryan North, [A] Iban Coello. The FF move into Aunt Petunia’s house, but then they realize that they’ve lost the ability to say words with certain letters. Eventually they’re reduced to just three letters – D, M and O – which spell DOOM, and then guess who shows up. There’s a funny scene where the FF keep singing the alphabet song to check how many letters they can remember. I think Ryan North succeeds in writing the FF’s dialogue without using any forbidden letters, though he continues to use all 26 letters in the captions. Anyway, then Doom goes back in time in order to save Valeria from losing a year of her life, but all his efforts are unsuccessful, and he ultimately has to give up and admit defeat. This is Ryan North’s first issue in which the kids appear (meaning Franklin, Valeria, Jo-Venn and N’Kalla). Even though they only make brief cameos, he writes them quite well. I’m not sure why he chose to write them out of the series. He wrote an excellent Power Pack miniseries, so he does have the ability to write convincing child characters.
ARCADE KINGS #1 (Image, 2023) – “Quarters Up!”, [W/A] Dylan Burnett. In a flashback, fighting champion Victor McMax retires unexpectedly. This character seems to be based on Guile from Street Fighter II, and his opponent in the opening sequence looks like Blanka. Many years later, a local video arcade has a new champion, a homeless boy named Joe who wears a dragonfruit mask. Joe befriends Rikio, the nephew of the arcade’s owner, and then has a fight with a girl and her giant robot. Finally we learn that the girl was trying to kidnap Joe on behalf of an old sick, Victor McMax. I had never heard of Dylan Burnett before, and I bought this comic solely on the strength of its premise and its beautiful cover art. I was not disappointed. Arcade Kings is a gorgeous piece of work, with vivid coloring and exciting action sequences, and its story is a passionate tribute to the video games I grew up with. It’s a bit odd how Arcade Kings is set in a world based on video games, and yet video games themselves still exist within this world.
CAPTAIN MARVEL #49 (Marvel, 2023) – “Revenge of the Brood Conclusion,” [W] Kelly Thompson, [A] Sergio Davila. Some X-Men arrive as backup, allowing Carol and her friends to defeat the Brood. Then Binary is buried. This whole storyline was rather boring, and it was an anticlimactic conclusion to Kelly’s run. A weird thing about this issue is that it guest-stars Revanche, or Kwannon, but she looks exactly like Psylocke did when I was growing up. I started reading X-Men long after Betsy became Asian, and so I always think of Betsy as Asian rather than white, even if I now know that her transformation into an Asian woman was a regrettable and offensive plot point.
SUPERMAN #4 (DC, 2023) – “Screams from the Past,” [W] Joshua Williamson, [A] Jamal Campbell & Nick Dragotta. The villain this issue is the Silver Banshee. Also, Luthor keeps trying to manipulate Superman. This issue, like the first three, is unexciting, and it also doesn’t feel like a Superman comic. I already bought #5, but I think it’ll be my last issue. (Edited later: Never mind. See my more positive review of #5 below.)
EARTHDIVERS #7 (IDW, 2023) – “Ice Age Chapter 1: Tawny,” [W] Stephen Graham Jones, [A] Riccardo Burchielli. In a new story arc, an indigenous woman travels back in time to the prehistoric era, when European people visited America for the first time. Her goal is to kill all the white people, but she inadvertently finds herself stuck with an abandoned white child. I’ve been consistently dissatisfied with this series, but this issue is an improvement on the previous story arc. The present-day plotline still makes no sense, but it’s mostly irrelevant to this issue.
THE SEASONS HAVE TEETH #2 (Boom!, 2023) – untitled, [W] Dan Watters, [A] Sebastian Cabrol. The protagonist, Andrew, tries to take a photo of Summer, which is so explosive that no one can get close to it. Andrew succeeds in getting a photo, but his fellow photojournalist, Aster Soni, is killed. A series of flashbacks depicts Andrew’s history of putting himself in risky situations for the sake of news photographs. The Seasons Have Teeth is my favorite Dan Watters comic so far. It has a fascinating idea, it’s an interesting allegory for climate change, and its plot is easy to follow. And in this issue, the intertwining of the present-day sequences and the flashbacks is done quite well.
DARK SPACES: GOOD DEEDS #1 (IDW, 2023) – untitled, [W] Che Grayson, [A] Kelsey Ramsay. A photojournalist travels to St. Augustine, Florida to do a puff piece, but while there, she encounters a murder conspiracy. There’s also a subplot about a single mother and daughter who have recently arrived in town. So far this comic doesn’t have much of a plot, but its setting is interesting, and I’m going to keep reading it for now. Because of the rather loose style of art, I thought at first that the journalist and the single mother were the same character.
DAREDEVIL #11 (Marvel, 2023) – “The Red Fist Saga Part 11,” [W] Chip Zdarsky, [A] Rafael De Latorre. Matt has been hiding out in Cole North’s place, but Cole shames him into doing something proactive about his problems. Matt visits the Stromwyns and forces them to release all their prisoners from the Fist’s island. He proves his commitment to them by cutting out his own eyes, which is no problem for him since he’s already blind. Then Matt decides he has to die. I’m getting kind of sick of this series, and I think Zdarsky has turned Matt into an unsympathetic character. For more on this point, see my review of #12 below.
CHILLING ADVENTURES PRESENTS… JINX: A CURSED LIFE #1 (Archie, 2023) – untitled, [W] Magdalene Visaggio, [A] Craig Cermak. Jinx tries to deny rumors that she’s the child of Satan, but the rumors are true, and her father comes to claim her. She defeats him with the power of music. I bought this because Mags Visaggio wrote it, but it’s not her best work. Also, it ends just a couple pages after the staple. Again, I really wish Archie would put more effort into their periodical comic books.
ICE CREAM MAN #35 (Image, 2023) – “The Book of Necessary Monsters,” [W] W. Maxwell Prince, [A] Martín Morazzo. This issue’s cover is an homage to the cover of the Penguin edition of Borges’s Book of Imaginary Monsters. In this issue, a middle-aged man, a typical Ice Cream Man protagonist, is writing a catalogue of monsters, while ignoring his wife and son. The twist ending is that the wife and son are already dead or zombified or something. The story is partly told through the entries in the book that the man is writing. Ice Cream Man suffers from formulaic plots: almost every issue is about a white guy having a middle-age crisis. But part of what makes it interesting is W. Maxwell Prince’s wide range of unusual story structures and formats.
WONDER WOMAN #799 (DC, 2023) – “Whatever Happened to the Warrior of Truth? Part 1,” [W] Becky Cloonan & Michael Conrad, [A] Alitha Martinez et al. Etta, Siggy, Steve and Nubia each have dreams about Diana. The dreams are each illustrated by different artists, including Terry Dodson and Paulina Ganucheau. Terry Dodson’s sequence looks a lot like Adventureman. This comic’s title is an obvious reference to Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow, but this story is not at the same level of quality as that one. I think this series has run out of steam, and I’m not sorry it’s ending, although I’m also not excited about Tom King’s run.
THE GIMMICK #3 (Ahoy, 2023) – untitled, [W] Joanne Starer, [A] Elena Gogou. Shane and Sam (the daughter of the man he killed) become lucha libre wrestlers. Shane fights another aspiring wrestler who’s jealous of the attention Shane is getting. Shane wins the fight, but the other wrestler pulls his mask off just as Shane is being photographed, and his location is revealed to the world. Shane’s mother and babymama also make a brief appearance. This is a fun series, and I’m looking forward to Joanna Starer’s next comic, Sirens of the City.
DAWN OF DC PRIMER #1 (DC, 2023) – untitled, [W] Joshua Williamson, [A] Leandro Fernandez. In a short preview story, Amanda Waller creates a new Suicide Squad and orders them to assassinate all the superheroes. The rest of the issue consists of non-comics advertising material. This is a pointless comic, but at least it was free.
DANGER STREET #6 (DC, 2023) – “The Dingbats of Danger Street,” [W] Tom King, [A] Jorge Fornes. The best thing about this issue is its cover, which is formatted like a cereal box, showing Darkseid eating Danger Steet cereal “with Omega 3”. Kaare Andrews already did a cover like this, for Incredible Hulk vol. 2 #41, but it’s a funny idea and it was worth using again. This issue just provides some further development of all the intersecting plotlines. Lady Cop finally meets Warlord, Highfather and Darkseid are seen for possibly the first time in the series, and we finally meet the Outsiders.
CLARK & LEX AND FANN CLUB: BATMAN SQUAD FCBD SPECIAL EDITION 2023 (DC, 2023) – “Clark & Lex,” [W] Brendan Reichs, [A] Jerry Gaylord. A preview of an upcoming YA or MG graphic novel about Clark Kent and Lex Luthor’s teenage friendship. Lex is presented here as a more sympathetic character than usual, though he seems a little creepy. It’s notable that Clark presents as white, but Pa and Ma Kent are black. Clark & Lex looks like a reasonably interesting book, but I don’t plan on buying it. The other half of this issue is a preview of Jim Benton’s Fann Club: Batman Squad. This comic seems intended for very young kids, and it’s of no interest to me.
NO/ONE #3 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Kyle Higgins & Brian Buccellato, [A] Geraldo Borges. Another issue full of political intrigue, with only a little bit of superhero action, and that’s fine with me. The most compelling scene in this issue is when a reporter, Julia, is accosted in a coffeeshop by a man who was involved in a shooting. Then when she walks back to her car alone, the man follows her and pulls a gun on her, and No/One has to intervene to save her. This seems like a realistic depiction of violence committed by an entitled white dude. The biggest problem with this comic is that it’s hard to follow the plot from one issue to the next. The chart of characters at the end of the issue is helpless, but even then it’s hard to keep them all straight.
USAGI YOJIMBO #8 (Dark Horse, 1996) – “A Promise in the Snow,” [W/A] Stan Sakai. I already read this issue long ago, because a friend sent me a photocopy of it, but it’s worth reading again. In this issue, Usagi is traveling alone in the snow when he encounters a merchant, Araki, who’s being assaulted by bandits. Usagi kills the bandits, but the merchant is seriously wounded. The merchant’s little daughter, Fumiye, appears out of nowhere and makes Usagi promise to save her father. After overcoming various perils thanks to Fumiye’s moral support, Usagi manages to get Araki to safety. But when Usagi gives Fumiye the credit for saving Araki, he learns to his shock that Fumiye died a week ago, and it was her ghost that helped him save her father! This is one of Stan’s cleverest and most powerful short stories. It demonstrates his ability to tell a simple but unforgettable story. The climactic scene is one of his most epic, memorable moments: Usagi is about to fall asleep and freeze to death, but Fumiye keeps him awake by shouting “You promised, Usagi-san! YOU PROMISED!” One curious thing I noticed on rereading this story is that at several points, Fumiye interacts with physical objects: for instance, she collects the bandits’ capes, and she grabs her father’s cart to stop it from falling off a cliff. If she’s a ghost, then logically she shouldn’t be able to touch anything. But the existence of ghosts is inherently illogical, so maybe this is an invalid critique.
RED ROOM: CRYPTO KILLAZ! #1 (Fantagraphics, 2023) – untitled, [W/A] Ed Piskor. This issue focuses on Brianna, the daughter of Davis Fairfield, a Red Room killer who was himself killed in a previous miniseries. After her dad’s death, Brianna discovers his true identity, and what’s worse, her lawyer, Dominic, is himself a Red Room agent, and he’s only working with Brianna in order to get access to her late father’s bitcoin wallet. Brianna gets access to the wallet by accident, while Dominic’s masters subject him to well-deserved punishment. This is another gripping and frightening issue. Red Room is vulnerable to criticism on grounds of its extreme, exploitative violence, but this comic is not intended for mass audiences, and I think anyone who reads it is fully aware of what they’re getting into. I talked to Ed Piskor at Heroes Con, and he was kind enough to say that it doesn’t feel like a real Heroes Con unless he sees me.
MOSELY #4 (Boom!, 2023) – “The Most High!”, [W] Rob Guillory, [A] Sam Lotfi. Marvin continues his fight with the AI gods, who are plotting to do away with humanity entirely, and he and his ex-wife and daughter team up for the final battle. The relationships between Mosely’s three central characters are interesting, but otherwise I don’t enjoy Mosely as much as Chew or Farmhand.
AVENGERS #1 (Marvel, 1963/2023) – “The Coming of the Avengers!”, [W] Stan Lee, [A] Jack Kirby. Loki tries to turn the Hulk into a public menace, so that Don Blake will have to transform into Thor in order to fight him, and then Loki can bait Thor into returning to Asgard where Loki can defeat him… yes, that’s a really stupid scheme. Anyway, Iron Man, Ant-Man and Wasp all chase after the Hulk as well, then they all team up together to fight Loki, and they decide to make their team-up permanent. The name “Avengers” is the Wasp’s idea. Avengers #1 is a pretty dumb example of the early Marvel Universe style, but the series would get more interesting with issue 4 and then issue 16.
HEXWARE #6 (Image, 2023) – “The Drowning Hymn Revisited,” [W] Tim Seeley, [A] Zulema Scotto Lavina. The villains are defeated, and Jesi/Which-Where, her dad, and Ren become a found family. This was a confusing and incomprehensible series with no clear central theme, and I’m glad it’s over.
KA-ZAR #14 (Marvel, 1976) – “Two Worlds in Frenzy!”, [W] Doug Moench, [A] Larry Hama. When Tongah goes temporarily insane for no reason, Ka-Zar has to travel to London to investigate the cause of the madness. Whlie in London, Ka-Zar is interviewed by lots of curious people, and he meets a potential love interest named Tandy Snow, a Lois Lane-esque reporter. Then he fights Klaw. Tandy Snow is an intriguing character, but she only appeared in this series, and in a flashback in X-Men #115. A funny moment in this issue is when a reporter asks Ka-Zar if he runs around the jungle naked, and he says “Yes, if it is warm enough – or necessary. However, I often wear a loincloth.”
BATMAN #559 (DC, 1998) – “Dead City,” [W] Doug Moench, [A] Bob Hall. This is a chapter of Aftershock, which was itself a part of the year-long No Man’s Land saga. Gotham has descended into complete anarchy, and Batman and the police have to prevent things from getting any worse. Much of this issue focuses on Harvey Bullock, Moench’s pet character, and a nurse named Brass, as they try to defend a hospital that’s under siege from criminals. Nurse Brass is an interesting potential romantic partner for Harvey, but this issue was her only appearance ever. I wonder why Moench never used her again.
IRONHAND OF ALMURIC #3 (Dark Horse, 1991) – “To the Lair of the Ancients,” [W] Roy Thomas, [A] Mark Winchell. An adaptation of a minor work of Robert E. Howard. Almuric is technically science fiction, but it’s a planetary romance in the vein of John Carter’s Barsoom stories, and so it only has cosmetic differences from REH’s usual sword-and-sorcery stories. The planetary romance genre is also called “sword and planet” because it’s just sword and sorcery in an extraterrestrial setting. A notable plot twist in Ironhand of Almuric #3 is that the hero meets a young bat-human hybrid who is actually his own son, conceived less than a year ago but born as a near-adult. Otherwise, this is a rather boring comic with mediocre art, and I’d hesitate to buy the other three issues. Roy Thomas was at Heroes Con for one day, but I never saw him.
AVENGERS #206 (Marvel, 1981) – “Fire in the Streets!”, [W] Bill Mantlo, [A] Gene Colan. This is one of the only Avengers issues between #100 and #300 that I haven’t read already, and the reason is because of who wrote it. In this issue the Avengers fight Pyron the Thermal Man, whose motivation is to get revenge on his former employers for setting him permanently on fire.
PURGE #0 (ANIA, 1993) – “Purification Agenda,” [W] Roosevelt Pitt Jr, [A] Bill Hobbs. An awful superhero story with trite, overwritten dialogue and sub-Liefeld art. It’s unusual only because its protagonist is black and it’s set in Greensboro, North Carolina. The backup story, about a supervillain named Pathos, is even worse; it has some of the worst lettering I’ve ever seen in a professionally published comic. These ANIA comics are of historical interest, because ANIA was an early attempt to publish comics from a black-centric perspective, and so it can be seen as a precursor to current Afrofuturist and Africanfuturist comics. However, all the ANIA comics I’ve read have been terrible. See here for more information on this publisher.
KARATE KID #13 (DC, 1978) – “Tomorrow’s Battle… Yesterday!”, [W] Bob Rozakis, [A] Juan Ortiz. Karate Kid and his fellow Legionnaires fight Major Disaster and the Lord of Time. An interesting wrinkle is that these Legionnaires are from a period where they haven’t met Karate Kid yet. Besides that, this issue is of no interest.
IMPOSSIBLE TEAM-UP #1 (Scout, 2023) – untitled, [W] Karl Kesel, [A] David Hahn. Impossible Jones teams up with a superhero named Captain Lightning, and there’s a guest appearance by Kesel’s other creator-owned characters, Section Zero. I don’t remember much about this comic, but it’s very fun, and I hope there will be more Impossible Jones comics soon. On the first page of this comic, a villain tries to steal the earliest-printed copy of Shakespeare’s First Folio, and we’re told that this particular copy is recognizable because the author’s name is spelled “Shakespear” on the cover. This is wrong for a couple reasons. First, books at the time did not have standardized covers, they were sold as unbound sheets, which would only be bound after purchase. Even when books did get bound, they didn’t have titles on the front cover. Second, spelling was not standardized in Shakespeare’s time. He himself used five different spellings of his surname, and none of those spellings was “Shakespeare.”
CLEAR #3 (Dark Horse, 2023) – untitled, [W] Scott Snyder, [A] Francis Manapul. Sam discovers that the real world with no veils is even more awful than he thought. Then, during a confrontation with the villain, Sam finds that his wife is still alive, but she gets killed again. Sam uses a video recording of his dead son to inform the world of the truth about the veils. This was an interesting series, but its main problem was the excessive length of each issue. It should have been published as six issues rather than three.
THIS IS WHAT DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE #nn (Center for Cartoon Studies, 2023) – untitled, [W/A] Dan Nott et al. A guide to American politics, in a similar format to Health & Wealth. As with Health & Wealth, the overarching message is that the current system is broken and unfair, and we need to work to change it. I was hesitant to read this comic because I’m frustrated and pessimistic about American politics. I got this comic on the day the North Carolina Supreme Court permitted gerrymandering, and I’m reviewing it on the day the federal Supreme Court legalized discriminating against gay people. I’ve had to limit my reading of political news in order to protect my own mental health. Still, this comic is important, and CCS deserves kudos for creating it and distributing it for free.
REID FLEMING, WORLD’S TOUGHEST MILKMAN #3 (Eclipse, 1990) – “Rogue to Riches Chapter 3,” [W/A] David Boswell. Having been fired from his job as a milkman, Reid Fleming starts a cable installation business, but his alcoholism and irritability lead to utter chaos. This is an extremely funny comic with gorgeous draftsmanship, and I need to colllect more of it.
ALIENS: DEAD ORBIT #3 (Dark Horse, 2017) – untitled, [W/A] James Stokoe. The humans put up an ineffective resistance against the aliens. In terms of plot, I can’t see any difference between this comic and any other Aliens comic or film. It just seems like a formulaic Aliens story. But James Stokoe’s draftsmanship is utterly gorgeous.
2000 AD #1832 (Rebellion, 2013) – Dredd: “The Forsaken Part 3: Tanuma,” [W] Mike Carroll, [A] P.J. Holden. The next missing cadet is Tanuma, who fled in terror after getting another cadet killed. She provides a lead to the remaining cadets. 3rillers: “Gunheadz Part 3,” [W] T.C. Eglington, [A] Boo Cook. The origin of the Gunheadz is fully revealed, and the surviving Gunhead kills his creator and then dies. This story is a clever tribute to earlier British comics. Sinister Dexter: “Witless Protection: Malone Again,” [W] Dan Abnett, [A] John Burns. Finnigan Sinister is living in witness protection, but he’s already been recognized by some old associates of his. In a funny moment, Sinister gets hired to do “wetwork,” but he interprets this as assassination, when it’s really just mopping. Stickleback: “Number of the Beast Part 9,” [W] Ian Edginton, [A] D’Israeli. Stickleback and his associates, including the last ratling, fight a horde of lizards, and they’re saved by a man named Bob who’s magically compelled to protect Stickleback. Zombo: “Planet Zombo Part 8,” [W] Al Ewing, [A] Henry Flint. This chapter starts with a song parody, but I don’t recognize the song being parodied. Also there’s a lot more ridiculous mayhem.
HELLBLAZER #71 (Vertigo, 1993) – “Finest Hour,” [W] Garth Ennis, [A] Steve Dillon. In a drunken stupor, Constantine falls asleep next to the corpse of a World War II pilot, and he experiences a vision of the pilot’s last moments. In witnessing the pilot’s death, Constantine regains his own will to live, and he sobers up and tricks a rich Uncle Pennybags type into giving him money. This issue is sort of a prototype of Garth Ennis’s later war comics. I’ve only read a few of Ennis’s war comics, but in recent years they’ve been his only seriously intended works (as opposed to non-serious works like Jimmy’s Bastards or All-Star Section Eight).
DONALD DUCK #269 (Gladstone, 1989) – “Red Apple Sap,” [W/A] Carl Barks. Donald tries to grow some apples to win a prize at an agricultural fair. However, Gladstone has moved in next door to Donald, and despite Donald’s hard work and Gladstone’s laziness, Donald’s apple tree withers, while Gladstone’s tree grows. In the end, though, Gladstone can’t be bothered to pick his own apples, so he lets Donald have them for free. Donald wins a prize, while Gladstone gets a prize for laziness. Barks’s stories might seem pro-capitalist, but it’s notable how Gladstone is an exception to Barks’s Protestant capitalist ethic. Gladstone does no work, but gets rewarded anyway. Other stories in this issue are by William Van Horn and Daniel Branca.
JONAH HEX #75 (DC, 1983) – “The Bloody Saga of Railroad Bill! Part 2,” [W] Michael Fleisher, [A] Dick Ayers. Jonah Hex is pursuing a criminal named Bill Clinton (not that Bill Clinton), but an overzealous bounty hunter, Graphus, is chasing the same criminal, and is willing to kill Clinton’s innocent mother and sister as collateral damage. Clinton kills Graphus to save Hex, and then threatens Hex with a rifle. Hex kills Clinton, only to discover that the rifle wasn’t loaded, and Clinton baited Hex into shooting him. This issue isn’t bad, but its plot was confusing.
FANTASTIC FOUR #369 (Marvel, 1992) – “With Malice Toward All!”, [W] Tom DeFalco, [A] Paul Ryan. In an Infinity War crossover, Sue confronts her evil duplicate, who, unlike the other evil duplicates from this storyline, is already a preexisting character: it’s Malice, introduced in issue 280. This issue is partly redundant in that it duplicates scenes that are already depicted in the Infinity War miniseries. Infinity War was the first crossover comic I ever read, so I have nostalgic memories of it, but they’re mostly bad memories. Infinity War was a boring story that trivialized the Marvel Universe’s cosmic entities by turning them into just another normal group of characters. Infinity Crusade compounded that problem even further. On this issue’s letters page, a reader asks if Reed and Sue will ever have another child, and the response is “doubtful.” However, they did have another child nine years later.
KELLY GREEN VOL. 1 (Dargaud, 1982) – “The Go-Between,” [W] Leonard Starr, [A] Stan Drake. Kelly Green’s husband, policeman Dan Green, is murdered at the instigation of one of his colleagues. To investigate his murder, Kelly becomes a “go-between,” exchanging money and contraband goods between criminals. Kelly Green was part of Dargaud’s short-lived attempt to break into the American market. It’s published in the French album format, and it includes an introduction by Michel Greg, who signs himself as “Mike” for perhaps the only time. Starr and Drake were both veteran artists of newspaper comic strips, but since Kelly Green was intended for adults, it gave Drake and Starr the opportunity to include things that their syndicates wouldn’t have permitted, including nudity, drugs, and gay people. The main gay character in this comic is a flaming stereotype, although at the time it was unusual to see a gay person in a comic in any capacity. As far as its quality, Kelly Green has beautiful draftsmanship and an interesting story. However, the creators both seem uncomfortable with the book-length format, and it somehow feels as though they’re still trying to write comic strips, which have a punchline at the end of every page. See here for an additional review. There were three additional volumes of Kelly Green, and I bought one of them at Heroes Con (in fact, I bought it directly from John Workman and his wife), but I haven’t read it yet.
ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #632 (DC, 2004) – “Time Elapsed,” [W] Greg Rucka, [A] Paul Pelletier. Lois is dying from a gunshot wound, and Superman spends the entire issue standing by her bedside in a state of complete shock. There are also a few subplots. Superman does not come off very well in this issue; he just stands at Lois’s bedside and refuses to either accept help, or do anything proactive. This is how a normal person might react when a loved one is dying, but Superman is not a normal person.
2000 AD #1833 (Rebellion, 2013) – Dredd: as above. The next missing cadet is Angela Sorvino. When found, she says that she and her squadmates hijacked a bus full of mutants, and one of the mutants, understandably terrified, hit Sorvino in the face with a pot of hot coffee. As a result Sorvino is now missing both her eyes. Afterward, the cadets abandoned the mutants to their fate. This whole story is a brutal depiction of the horror of Chaos Day. Cadet Anderson: “One in Ten Part 1,” [W] Alan Grant, [A] Carlos Ezquerra. Anderson arrests a criminal scientist who’s growing babies in a lab to use them for spare parts. Both of this story’s creators have died within the past five years. Sinister Dexter: as above. Sinister discovers that he and his old enemy Moses Tanenbaum are living in the same town, and Tanenbaum and his goons open fire on Sinister and his witness protection agent. John M. Burns’s art here is excellent as always, but I wonder why he draws Sinister with pale white skin. Stickleback: as above. Stickleback and Bob rest and compare notes. Zombo: as above. I can’t summarize this story, but it’s amazing. It has the same deliberately-ridiculous aesthetic as God Hates Astronauts, but it’s better written than God Hates Astronauts.
TARZAN #3 (Marvel, 1977) – “The Altar of the Flaming God!”, [W] Roy Thomas, [A] John Buscema. An adaptation of Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar, which was previously adapted in the Gold Key series. Thomas and Buscema’s Tarzan feels more savage and less civilized than either Russ Manning or Joe Kubert’s Tarzan. Perhaps Thomas was trying to distinguish Tarzan from Conan. On the subject of Tarzan, I just learned that Dark Horse published a collection, Tarzan: The Land That Time Forgot / The Pool of Time, which includes Russ Manning stories that never appeared in any American comic book. Also, there’s a Korak series by Evanier and Spiegle that was done for the European market, but its only English-language publication was in the British Tarzan Weekly, and it’s never been collected.
ANGEL LOVE #6 (DC, 1986) – “The Search for Mary Beth Part II,” [W/A] Barbara Slate. Angel’s ditzy roommate Wendy puts a personal ad in the newspaper and is deluged with responses. When she finally chooses to date one of them, he turns out to be a preteen boy. Meanwhile, Angel is desperate to find her sister Mary Beth, so she emulates Wendy’s tactics by taking out her own personal ad. The ad falsely claims that Angel and Mary Beth’s mother is dead and that Mary Beth needs to contact Angel to claim a million-dollar inheritance. Hundreds of people respond to the ad, none of whom are the real Mary Beth. I think this was the only Angel Love story that I hadn’t read. I need to return to the Angel Love section of my manuscript soon.
APOCALYPSE NERD #2 (Dark Horse, 2005) – untitled, [W/A] Peter Bagge. After an unspecified apocalypse, two men are living alone in the woods. They quickly grow sick of each other’s company, and also they shoot another survivor dead in front of his family, mistakenly thinking he’s going to shoot them. This comic is identical to Hate in its style of writing and art.
JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #66 (DC, 1968) – “Divided – They Fall!”, [W] Denny O’Neil, [A] Dick Dillin. A would-be dictator named Demmy Gog (demagogue) steals a device that lowers people’s morale, intending to use the device to conquer the world. By coincidence, the device was invented by a professor at Snapper Carr’s college, and Snapper gets the JLA involved. This issue seems intended to be funny – on the first page, we’re told that Demmy Gog is from “Rottberg, capital city of Offalia (land area, 5.67 square miles; population, 727)”. But Denny’s humor is only mildly funny.
HERO FOR HIRE #5 (Marvel, 1973) – “Don’t Mess with Black Mariah!”, [W] Steve Englehart, [A] George Tuska. A man is murdered in Cage’s theater, and to get justice, Cage has to battle the crimelord named Black Mariah, a grossly fat black woman. This issue is entertainingly written, but Black Mariah is an offensive stereotype. She hardly ever appeared again until she was reintroduced in David Walker and Sanford Greene’s Power Man and Iron Fist series. She was also a major villain in the Luke Cage TV series, but in that show she was turned into a very different character.
100 BULLETS #18 (Vertigo, 2001) – “Hang Up on the Hang Low Conclusion,” [W] Brian Azzarello, [A] Eduardo Risso. Yet another issue with boring, overly violent, borderline racist writing, but spectacular artwork. As I have often stated, I love Risso’s art, but I hate Azzarello’s writing, and it’s annoying that two creators of such unequal talents are now so closely linked.
EX MACHINA #13 (Vertigo, 2005) – “Fact v. Fiction Chapter 2,” [W] Brian K. Vaughan, [A] Tony Harris. This issue begins with a metatextual flashback in which Kremlin buys a comic book for the young Mitchell. In the present, Mitchell gets summoned for jury duty and is chosen for a jury, but while they’re in the jury room, another of the jurors takes a third juror hostage and demands that Mitchell cure his Gulf War syndrome. When I read this comic, I thought it was unlikely that the mayor of New York City would have to serve on a jury, but it actually has happened. Tony Harris was at Heroes Con, but I didn’t talk to him.
2000 AD #1834 (Rebellion, 2023) – Dredd: as above. Sorvino explains that she murdered a fellow cadet, Echavez, because she was afraid Echavez would reveal the cadets’ complicity in the deaths of the mutant family. Then there’s a further plot point about the cadets not knowing whether they’re clones. I don’t undersatnd this clone business. Cadet Anderson: as above. The cadets do their own investigation of the case of the baby-cloning doctor. Sinister Dexter: as above. Sinister tries to rescue his witness protection agent from his old enemy Frontal Loeb. Stickleback: as above. Stickleback and his allies confront the people who are creating the lizards. Zombo: as above. “Planet Zombo” ends with another hilarious chapter that makes no logical sense.
STRANGE SPORTS STORIES #3 (DC, 1974) – “Gridiron Knightmare!”, [W] Frank Robbins, [A] Curt Swan. Merlin travels forward in time and helps out a football team by casting a spell that gives them invisible knight armor. This story’s premise is basically that the Knights of the Round Table go to the future and become a football team. The ‘90s TV cartoon King Arthur and the Knights of Justice had exactly the opposite premise. “Man Who Leaped Over the Earth!”, [W] Elliot S! Maggin, [A] Dick Giordano. In the future, a pole vaulter jumps so high that he travels back in time. He meets a young boy who grows up to become the founder of the Interplanetary Olympics Foundation. Overall this comic is kind of dumb, and it shows little actual knowledge of sports. American comics publishers have never really known how to do sports comics. DC should have tried to learn from contemporary British comics like Roy of the Rovers.
BIZARRE ADVENTURES #34 (Marvel, 1983) – “Son of Santa!”, [W] Mark Gruenwald, [A] Alan Kupperberg, etc. This was the last issue of Bizarre Adventures, formerly Marvel Preview, and it was the only issue published as a comic book rather than a magazine. The GCD says that this issue was a “test,” but I don’t know what it was a test of. This issue consists of five parody Christmas stories, most of them creator-owned. None of the stories are particularly funny or well-drawn. Perhaps the best is the last one, by Steve Skeates and Steve Smallwood, simply because it looks like an old Kurtzman comic. Steve Smallwood’s other GCD credits are mostly from Crazy or Mad.
JUSTICE LEAGUE: A MIDSUMMER’S NIGHTMARE #3 (DC, 1996) – “Daze & Knights,” [W] Mark Waid & Fabian Nicieza, [A] Jeff Johnson & Darick Robertson. This series was a prelude to Grant Morrison and Howard Porter’s JLA run. A villain named Knowman is turning Earth’s entire population into superheroes, and Earth’s seven greatest heroes have to team up to defeat them. This convinces them to join together and form a new Justice League. I was unimpressed by this comic, though I might have liked it better if I’d read the previous two issues.
SUPERBOY #26 (DC, 1996) – “Losin’ It! Part 2: Strange Bedfellows,” [W] Karl Kesel & Steve Mattsson, [A] Staz Johnson. Kon and Knockout fight a giant robot crab with Absorbing Man powers, and Roxy trains as a police cadet. Due to the lack of Tom Grummett or the Female Furies, this issue is less fun than #25. This storyline’s title is an obvious innuendo referring to virginity. Steve Mattsson seems to have been mostly a colorist. As a writer, he’s most notable for co-creating Superboy and the Ravens, again in collaboration with Karl Kesel.
THUNDERBOLTS #21 (Marvel, 1998) – “Decisions Part 2: Trust,” [W] Kurt Busiek, [A] Mark Bagley. Hawkeye joins the Thunderbolts as their new leader, telling them that he can get them all pardoned, although the reader is shown that he doesn’t have the authority to make that promise. However, Hawkeye’s condition is that Mach-1 has to turn himself into the authorities, since he’s the only Thunderbolt who’s guilty of murder. (The murder in question occurred in Deadly Foes of Spider-Man #3, and this is a good example of Kurt’s encyclopedic knowledge of Marvel continuity.) Also, there’s a flashback to Songbird’s origin. I’m hesitant to read Thunderbolts because of its sometimes annoying prose style and because of its excessive emphasis on inter-team politics. I think I’m particularly frustrated with Moonstone and her constant meddling. But Thunderbolts #21 is not bad. It has a fascinating plot, and it shows a good understanding of Hawkeye’s character.
DARK HORSE PRESENTS #10 (Dark Horse, 1987) – Concrete: “Straight in the Eye,” [W/A] Paul Chadwick. Concrete rescues Larry’s brother, who’s stranded in remote wilderness after crashing his biplane. This is a satisfying and beautifully drawn story. The other two stories in this issue, starring Masque and Sole Survivors, are of little interest. If not for Paul Chadwick, I’m not sure Dark Horse would still be around today, because Concrete was overwhelmingly better than anything else Dark Horse published in its first year or so. It was probably the licensed properties, like Star Wars and Aliens, that ensured Dark Horse’s success, but without Concrete, I wonder if they’d have survived long enough to get those licenses.
AVENGERS ACADEMY #19 (Marvel, 2011) – “Things Fall Apart,” [W] Christos Gage, [A] Tom Raney. In a Fear Itself crossover, the Avengers Academy kids are trapped in the Infinite Avengers Mansion, which is located in a microverse. The mansion is about to grow to normal size and destroy the city of Chicago, and to prevent this, one of the kids will have to sacrifice their life to activate the mansion’s self-destruct mechanism. On top of that, the kids have to fight the Asgardian-powered Absorbing Man and Titania. The adult Avengers arrive and save the day, but Veil is so traumatized that she quits the team. This may have been the last issue of Avengers Academy that I hadn’t read. I think Tom Raney was at Heroes Con, but I didn’t meet him.
DONALD DUCK ADVENTURES #17 (Gladstone, 1989) – “The Curse of the Lost Empress,” [W/A] Ben Verhagen. Donald acquires a cursed puppet that brings him bad luck. To break the curse, Donald has to bring the puppet to the Indian Ocean island of Suheli, where he can reunite it with a second puppet. This is an exciting story whose artwork and adventure plot are both very Barksian. In particular, the scene with the storm at sea reminds me of Barks’s “The Flying Dutchman.” I hadn’t heard of Ben Verhagen before, but Lambiek describes him as one of the most prominent Dutch Disney artists. This issue also includes a very early Barks story that has some offensive depictions of Native Americans.
POWER MAN #40 (Marvel, 1977) – “Rush Hour to Limbo!”, [W] Marv Wolfman, [A] Lee Elias. Luke fights two villains named Cheshire Cat and Big Brother. I don’t remember anything in particular about this issue. Because of the NHL player Patrik Elias, I somehow can’t help myself from pronouncing Elias as “el-ee-ash,” even when I know it’s supposed to be pronounced in the usual way.
ARCADE #7 (Print Mint, 1976) – [E] Art Spiegelman & Bill Griffith. This was the last issue of Arcade, but it was followed four years later by Raw, an even more important comic that included many of the same creators. Arcade #7 begins with Kim Deitch’s “Possessed,” a typically bizarre and sordid crime story. It was later reprinted in Beyond the Pale. “Possessed” is the longest story in the issue by far. There’s also a selection of pages from Crumb’s sketchbook, and a selection of old Tijuana Bibles. This issue also includes shorter features by Aline Kominsky (not yet Kominsky-Crumb), Justin Green, Robert Williams, Robert Armstrong, Michael McMillan, Bill Griffith, Michele Brand, Diane Noomin, Spain Rodriguez, and S. Clay Wilson.
DENNIS THE MENACE GIANT #47 (Hallden/Fawcett, 1965) – “Dennis the Menace in California,” [W] Fred Toole, [A] Owen Fitzgerald? This issue is reprinted from #33 of the same series, but with nine pages removed. Dennis and his parents go to California, where they visit Yosemite National Park, gold rush country, the Calaveras County frog jump contest, San Francisco’s Chinatown, etc. In San Francisco they stay in a hotel that washes all their guests’ coins; this hotel really exists and still does this. Dennis the Menace in California is a funny and charming story, but it’s also interesting for its historical context. It gives the impression that in 1958, when these stories were first published, California was still a foreign country to most Americans. (And it still is today, at least in the eyes of Republicans who claim that California isn’t really America.) An especially notable moment is the three-page scene where the Mitchells visit to Chinatown. This scene is full of ethnic stereotypes, but at least it acknowledges the existence of Chinese-Americans, who were almost invisible in the media of the time.
NOWHERE #2 (Drawn & Quarterly, 1997) – “Summer of Love Part 2,” [W/A] Debbie Drechsler. Lily and Steve begin an awkward teenage romance, Lily goes to Steve’s band practice, and then the two of them walk through the woods to an unknown destination. Given Debbie Drechsler’s previous work, Daddy’s Girl, I was expecting this issue to end with some sort of horrific rape or sexual abuse. But nothing like that happens, at least not in this issue. Instead, this issue is just a slice-of-life story, a realistic depiction of teenage romance and sibling rivalry. I really like Drechsler’s coloring technique, which is just a step away from black-and-white, in that the only colors used are green and red. It’s unfortunate that Summer of Love was Drechsler’s last work in comics. I’m surprised to discover that Drechsler is 70 years old. She was already almost 40 when first published by D&Q. I assumed she was much younger.
WEIRD WAR TALES #110 (DC, 1982) – “A Mirror for Monsters!”, [W] Robert Kanigher, [A] Dan Spiegle. The Creature Commandos acquire a new female member who’s a medusa. This comic has good art, but its story is of no interest. A World War II comic starring a werewolf, a vampire and a Frankenstein monster ought to be more fun than this comic is. There are three backup stories, with art by Noly Zamora, Angel Trinidad, and an uncredited Tom Mandrake. One of these stories is written by David Allikas, a now-forgotten writer who mostly worked for Crazy and for DC’s anthology titles.
THE BEAUTIFUL DEATH #2 (Titan, 2017) – untitled, [W/A] Mathieu Bablet. Some sort of postapocalyptic story set in a mostly abandoned city. I probably ordered this from DCBS because it was translated from a French comic. Mathieu Bablet’s art and coloring are very distinctive, but unappealing to look at. He makes everything look sordid and dingy, and his people look like they’re made only of straight lines. I’d buy more of this comic, but it wouldn’t be high on my priority list.
SNARF #15 (Kitchen Sink, 1990) – [E] Denis Kitchen & Dave Schreiner. The highlight of this issue is “Chomdu” by the Franco-Egyptian cartoonist Édika. It’s about a man who visits the unemployment office and is unable to make the receptionist understand what his job is (dental surgeon). This story reminds me of Carmen Cru or certain Cerebus stories, in that it’s about people completely failing to understand each other. However, I do wonder why a dental surgeon would be unemployed. The other high point is a series of single-page autobio strips by Joe Matt, although these strips are very cumbersome to read: they each have 20-plus panels per page, with lots of tiny lettering. There are also a couple humorous farmer stories by George Jablonski, who draws in a pointillist style resembling that of Drew Friedman. Other contributors include Richard Sala, Steve Stiles, Bernie Mireault, and P.S. Mueller, whose art, in my opinion, is hideous.
BILL & TED’S EXCELLENT COMIC BOOK #4 (Marvel, 1992) – “Times^2 Station,” [W/A] Evan Dorkin. While Bill and Ted are riding a time-traveling rollercoaster, their wives are kidnapped, and they have to travel through a series of alternate dimensions in order to find them. One of the dimensions they visit is the “Gap of Pretentious Artists,” where they meet a parody version of Grant Morrison. We know this is Morrison because they themself confirmed it in an interview, calling Dorkin “the f***ing c*** who does Cheese and Chocolate, or whatever it’s called, in Deadline.” This entire exchange makes both Dorkin and Morrison look bad, although they’ve both matured a lot since 1992.
THE SILENT INVASION #1 (Renegade, 1986) – “Atomic Spies!”, [W] Larry Hancock w/ John Ellis Sech, [A] Michael Cherkas. Another 1950s-era story about an alien invasion conspiracy. I don’t remember anything in particular about this issue’s plot. Cherkas’s artwork here is much looser than in the later miniseries Secret Messages.
CAMELOT 3000 #6 (DC, 1983) – “Royal Wedding Funeral,” [W] Miike W. Barr, [A] Brian Bolland. Arthur and Guinevere get married, but Guinevere is assassinated at the wedding, only to be revived thanks to Lancelot’s sacrifice. Tristan meets the reincarnated version of Isolde. Morgan le Fey continues to make mischief. This comic has some beautiful art, but I’ve stated my complaints about this comic before: Bolland couldn’t do his best work while maintaining a monthly schedule, and Barr only had a basic knowledge of Arthurian myth.
JLA #49 (DC, 2001) – “Unhappily Ever After,” [W] Mark Waid, [A] Bryan Hitch & Javier Saltares. The JLA fights the Queen of Fables and her army of fairytale creatures. The Flash defeats her by trapping her inside a boring book: the United States tax code. This comic has some brilliant artwork, but just an average story. The subject of fairytale characters in the modern world was depicted with much greater depth in Fables, which came out the following year.
HEAVY METAL V7 #3 (HM, 1983) – [E] Julie Simmons-Lynch. Notable stories in this issue include: Starstruck by Elaine Lee and Kaluta, which is redundant because of the definitive IDW edition of that series. Doomscult, a photocollage story by Corben. Spacehunter by Jerry Bingham, who was at Heroes Con, but I didn’t talk to him. The City That Didn’t Exist by Christin and Bilal. The Odyssey by Navarro and Sauri, specifically the Circe episode. “I Got Them Apartment Dweller’s Blues” by Caza. The Man from Harlem by Crepax. I really want to read more Crepax, but all the book-length editions of his work are extremely expensive. Other contributors to this issue include Steve Bissette, Jeff Jones, Howard Cruse, Drew Friedman, and Rick Veitch. On Facebook, I saw someone say that Heavy Metal had excellent art but awful writing. It’s true that the American-produced strips, besides those by Corben, often were quite badly written. Conversely, the French-translated strips were very well-written, but the translations did not do justice to them.
RED ONE #1 (Image, 2015) – “Welcome to America Part 1,” [W] Xavier Dorison, [A] Terry Dodson. I believe this was first published in France, under the title Red Skin, which must have been changed for the American market because it’s a racial slur. Red One is about a female Soviet secret agent who poses as an American superhero. This comic’s protatgonist looks a lot like the heroine of Adventureman. I think the best part about Red One’s story is the protagonist’s cultural shock on coming to America. This series and Animal Castle both have the same writer, Xavier Dorison, but I feel like I haven’t yet read enough French comics to tell the difference between one writer and another.
ALIENS: DEAD ORBIT #4 (Dark Horse, 2017) – untitled, [W/A] James Stokoe. One of the survivors tries to save himself at the expense of all the others, but it doesn’t work. This series has beautiful art, and I particularly love how Stokoe draws the xenomorphs. However, due to its unoriginal story, it’s not among Stokoe’s best works.
NOWHERE #3 (Drawn & Quarterly, 1997) – “Summer of Love Part 3,” [W/A] Debbie Drechsler. Lily and Steve make out in the woods, then Lily sees her sister kissing another girl, which was not okay since this was 1967. And maybe it won’t be okay in 2027 either, given today’s Supreme Court decision, but I digress. The issue ends with Lily making out with another boy who seems like a real creep. On the letters page, there’s a debate about the effectiveness of the duotone coloring. Personally I like it a lot.
ADVENTURE COMICS #342 (DC, 1966) – “The Legionnaire Who Killed!”, [W] Edmond Hamilton, [A] Curt Swan. This story is a classic, and I’ve already read it in reprinted form. While visiting his parents, Star Boy is attacked by Kenz Nuhor, a jealous ex-lover of his girlfriend Dream Girl. Star Boy is forced to kill Nuhor in self-defense, and is expelled from the Legion for violating its rule against killing. This story is full of goofy moments, especially the game where the computer decides which Legionnaires would have the most fun kissing each other (which is probably the origin of Chameleon and Spark’s romance in postboot continuity). But the central drama is pretty gripping. It’s weird how Brainiac 5 is so vehement about convicting Star Boy, and LSH v3 #51, in which Brainy himself is tried for a similar crime, is probably an intentional throwback to this issue. I honestly think Star Boy deserved to be acquitted, even if he could hypothetically have saved himself some other way. The problem with this era of the Legion is that the characters were wooden. I had a conversation with Jim Shooter at Heroes Con, and one question I asked him was when he started to give the Legionnaires individual personalities. He said he started doing this from the very beginning, and he was inspired by Marvel’s style of characterization.
MERRY MEN #2 (Oni, 2016) – untitled, [W] Robert Rodi, [A] Jackie Lewis. A queer Robin Hood story in which Robin and King Richard I are lovers, and the Merry Men are fighting for both political and sexual freedom. This series was controversial at the time, but it successfully integrates the queer angle with the Robin Hood myth, and it’s not that obscene (though there is a joke about what Much the Miller’s Son’s name refers to). What should have been controversial about this series is its uncritical use of the Merrie England myth, which says that England was a paradise until it was ruined by the cruel Normans. There were supposed to be five issues of this miniseries, but I believe issues 4 and 5 were only published as part of the trade paperback. I think Jackie Lewis was at Heroes Con, but I didn’t realize until just now that she drew this series.
SUPERMAN #255 (DC, 1972) – “The Sun of Superman!”, [W] Cary Bates, [A] Curt Swan. Earth’s solar system is invaded by a second sun filled with star-dwelling aliens. Superman defeats the creature that’s been menacing the sun-dwellers, and creates a new home planet for the aliens, which he calls Krypton 2. The aliens predict that Krypton 2 is going to blow up, just like the original Krypton did, and in Superman #323, we learn that this has indeed happened. I don’t know if Krypton 2 was ever mentioned anywhere else. The backup story, by Friedrich and Giordano, is a Kryptonian version of Romeo and Juliet.
SHADE THE CHANGING MAN #42 (Vertigo, 1993) – “History Lesson Part 1: Pregnant for the First Time,” [W] Peter Milligan, [A] Steve Yeowell & Chris Bachalo. Kathy discovers she’s pregnant. She wants an abortion, but Slade tries to shame her into keeping the baby. Lenny argues that it should be Kathy’s choice, and the writer seems to agree with Lenny, because he lets her have the last word. Then a guest at the hotel causes time to go backward, and the 1979 version of John Constantine shows up, and he’s furious that Margaret Thatcher is about to be prime minister for five years (and in fact it was eleven years, followed by seven years of John Major). To understand what’s happpening, Slade and his friends have to go back in time even further, and they find themselves in the midst of a witch trial.
INCREDIBLE HULK #107 (Marvel, 2007) – “Warbound Part II,” [W] Greg Pak, [A] Gary Frank. The Hulk and the Warbound continue their mission of vengeance against Earth’s heroes. Hercules, Angel and Namora all agree to fight on Hulk’s side, though Namor refuses to help. The centerpiece of the issue is a slugfest between Hulk and Hercules, who subsequently replaced the Hulk as the series’ protagonist.
VELVET #8 (Image, 2014) – “The Secret Lives of Dead Men Part 3,” [W] Ed Brubaker, [A] Steve Epting. Velvet infiltrates her own former agency’s headquarters in an attempt to uncover a conspiracy against her. Velvet is probably a better Black Widow comic than any that Marvel has actually published, though Kelly Thompson’s recent Black Widow run comes close. Steve Epting is yet another person who was at Heroes Con but who I didn’t get to talk to.
HEAVY METAL VOL. 7 #6 (HM, 1983) – [E] Julie Simmons-Lynch. In this issue: The last chapter of The Town That Didn’t Exist. Ranxerox by Liberatore and Tamburini. This is a fascinating series, although it would be condemned today for its depictions of underage sex. Ranx and Lubna’s relationship also reminds me of that of Axel Pressbutton and Laser Eraser. I ordered the complete Ranx collection from Previews, but I haven’t gotten it yet. I think it’s called “Ranx” because the original name violated Xerox’s copyright. Tamburini is only known in America as the writer of Ranx, but he was also a notable avant-garde cartoonist in his own right. Also: Arno and Jodorowsky’s Alef-Thau, a fantsay series whose protagonist is an armless, legless boy. Arno’s artwork and coloring are gorgeous, and it’s a pity that only the first album of Alef Thau was ever translated in English, and even that album was never collected after being serialized in Heavy Metal. Arno is no relation to Peter Arno, and neither of them was really named Arno. Also in this issue are Navarro and Sauri’s Odyssey adaptation, in which Odysseus is imprisoned by Calypso and fathers two children with her, and Fernando Fernandez’s Zora. Homer doesn’t mention any of Odysseus’s children besides Telemachus, but other sources claim he had children with both Circe and Calypso. Other features in this issue include a list of music video awards, a portfolio of Rowena Morrill’s art, and a Francis Ford Coppola interview, conducted by future comics writer Robert Morales.
ELFQUEST #14 (Marvel, 1986) – “The Lodestone,” [W/A] Wendy Pini, [W] Richard Pini. Cutter and Skywise have befriended the humans Nonna and Adair, who are based on Wendy and Richard themselves. Nonna and Adair introduce the elves to their tribe, but the tribal chief’s rivals try to assassinate the elves. In the subplot, Leetah and the kids go looking for Cutter.
OLIVIER RAMEAU V3 (Le Lombard, 1972) – “Le Chateau des 4 Lunes,” [W] Michel Greg, [A] Dany. My copy says “Olivier Rameau 6” on the spine, but this is now considered volume 3. Olivier Rameau and his fiancee Colombe Tiredaille live in Rêverose, a magical, dreamlike realm where only people of a poetic and absurd spirit are welcome. A poet and an artist are invited to Rêverose, but two con men, La Candeur and Fourbignol, are mistaken for them and are admitted in their place. La Candeur and Fourbignol proceed to infect Rêverose with the evils of capitalism. Olivier and Colombe get rid of the con men, with the aid of a wizard who lives in a castle full of living furniture. This last part reminds me of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, but the similarity is probably a coincidence. I frankly loved this comic. It’s charming and playful but also exciting, and just a bit anti-capitalist. Dany makes the two protagonists look gorgeous, and it’s worth noting here that his first work translated into English is an erotic comic, Grin and Bare It! His artwork is also full of sight gags and chicken fat. I enjoyed this comic more than Philémon, which has a similar absurdist, dreamlike aesthetic. I want to read more French comics like this one.
MARVEL SPOTLIGHT #27 (Marvel, 1976) – “Death is the Symbionic Man!”, [W] Bill Mantlo, [A] Jim Mooney. Namor fights Simon Ryker and the artificial man Ryker has created. The Symbionic Man dies at the end. This is a boring comic and I can’t remember much of anything about it. A footnote mentions that Ryker previously appeared in Deathlok, but this was not him, but his counterpart from a different universe. The Symbionic Man only appeared in one other comic, Super-Villain Team-Up #4.
BROTHERS OF THE SPEAR #14 (Gold Key, 1975) – “Return to Thunder Mountain,” [W] Gaylord Du Bois, [A] Dan Spiegle. With Dan-El and Natongo accompanying her, Nandi travels back to her native kingdom to save it from an invasion. Nandi is the sole heir to the kingdom, even though she would rather stay in Aba-Zulu instead. In the end, Nandi’s kingdom is saved, and its original rulers are freed from suspended animation and reassume the throne, allowing Nandi to go back to Aba-Zulu. The idea that Nandi would prefer to “be just Queen Tavane’s little maid”, rather than rule as a queen in her own right, has some unfortunate implications.
On my next trip to Heroes, there was a relatively small stack of comics waiting for me. I’m trying to exercise more, so after having lunch, I walked all the way from Heroes to the 7th Street train station.
NIGHTWING #104 (DC, 2023) – “Rise of the Underworld Finale,” [W] Tom Taylor, [A] Travis Moore. Neron has given Dick superpowers, which Dick has to use to protect Olivia from an army of demons and supervillains. When Neron offers to let Dick keep his powers in exchange for surrendering Olivia, Dick obviously refuses, and he defeats Neron by using the secret weapon that Nite-Mite gave him in #98. I had honestly forgotten about that. Olivia, aka Nightbuster, becomes an honorary Titan and is taken in by the Amazons. Raven takes Neron’s underworld away from him and gives it to Blaze (and this may be connected with events in Superman #5). Neron is a really loathsome villain. The sight of this all-powerful demon sending an entire army against a preteen girl is rather disgraceful. In the backup story, Dick and Jon uncover the real culprit, a disgruntled former circus employee.
VANISH #7 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Ryan Stegman, [A] Donny Cates. Elyn summons Dustin’s spirit to help Oliver, even though she’s resolved to leave him. Dustin summons a demon to save Oliver, but he has to resign himself to eternal damnation in order to win the demon’s aid. Even with this extra help, Oliver is still getting his ass kicked. An impressive moment in this issue is when Dustin is thinking that he doesn’t need to take the demon’s deal, because he’s already done enough, and then the caption box with Oliver’s thoughts is connected to the demon’s thought balloon, and the demon starts repeating what Oliver is saying. As in Sacrament, the demon corrupts Dustin by parroting his own thoughts back to him, saying things to him that are an exaggeration of what he might say to himself in his bad moods.
SUPERMASSIVE 2023 (Image, 2023) – [W] Kyle Higgins et al., [A] Daniele Di Nicuolo. Radiant Black, Rogue Sun and Dead Lucky team up to defend the Holy Grail from a villain. I didn’t like this Supermassive as much as the first one. The Rogue Sun in this issue is Caleb, who’s even more of an asshole than Dylan, and I hated Dead Lucky’s own comic, so I’m not happy to see her again. Therefore, of the three protagonists, there’s only one that I actually like. I do hope there will be a Supermassive 2024.
LOCAL MAN #4 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Tim Seeley, [A] Tony Fleecs. While fleeing from the police chief, Crossjack discovers Camo Crusader’s secret lair, and then the Crusader himself appears. It quickly becomes clear that the Crusader is a religious fanatic and that he has some sort of plot to conquer the world, and Crossjack is forced to kill him in self-defense. Then some kind of teleporting murderer arrives in town. In the backup story, it’s suggested that Crossjack slept with Camo Crusader’s wife at the latter’s behest, because the Crusader’s powers made him impotent.
KAYA #8 (Image, 2023) – “In the Poison Lands Chapter 2,” [W/A] Wes Craig. The monsters who kidnapped Jin negotiate with the robot who destroyed Jin and Kaya’s village. Jin befriends one of the monsters. While pursuing Jin, Kaya and her companions rappel down a cliff and are attacked by giant bats. One of the best things about this series is its creature designs.
W0RLDTR33 #2 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] James Tynion IV, [A] Fernando Blanco. A series of vignettes, each focusing on different characters who are involved with the W0rldtr33 murders. This is a well-written issue, but nothing about it particularly stood out to me. I like how when a person is corrupted by the computer virus, their image becomes blurred, as if they were being played on a VCR with poor tracking.
EDGE OF SPIDER-VERSE #2 (Marvel, 2023) – “Home is Where Your Heart is Cut Out by a Huntsman,” [W] David Hein, [A] Luciano Vecchio. A Spinstress story that’s inspired by a bunch of different Disney movies. This story’s version of Kraven the Hunter is based on Gaston from Beauty and the Beast, and having just read Plautus’s play Miles Gloriosus, I now understand where Gaston came from. I love Spinstress, and this is an incredibly fun story, even if some of the song lyrics don’t scan. The backup story is about Sky-Spider, who is sort of a dark-fantasy Spider-Man with echoes of Tarzan, but it’s hard to tell just what sort of effect this story is designed to evoke.
THE NEIGHBORS #3 (Boom!, 2023) – untitled, [W] Jude Ellison S. Doyle, [A] Letizia Cadonici. This issue is narrated from the perspective of the mother, Janet. Her older daughter, Casey, is acting increasingly weird, and her marriage to Oliver is under strain due to Oliver’s severe mental health issues. This issue is okay, but Oliver has dominated the previous two issues to such an extent that the rest of the family has been underexposed.
TERRORWAR #2 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Saladin Ahmed, [A] Dave Acosta. The protagonists fight the other bounty hunters and lose, but some kind strangers give them some money to replace the bounty that was stolen from them. With that money, the protagonists go out to a nightclub, but the club is attacked by fire demons, and the protagonists and antagonists have to team up to fight them. One of the antagonists is killed, and then all the characters are arrested for unsanctioned use of their powers. This is kind of a boring issue, and so far there’s nothing particularly original about this series. I trust Saladin, but I hope he takes this series in a more interesting direction.
CAT FIGHT #1 (IDW, 2023) – “Among the Pigeons,” [W] Andrew Wheeler, [A] Ilias Kyriazis. Our protagonist, Felix, comes from a lineage of thieves. When another thief named Schrödinger tries to browbeat Felix into working for him, Felix refuses, and in revenge, Schrödinger murders Felix’s grandmother Kitty Midnight. I’m sad that this comic is about cat burglars and not actual cats, but it’s full of cat references, as well as a couple beautiful drawings of cats, and we’re clearly supposed to think of the characters as cats in human form.
CITY BOY #1 (DC, 2023) – untitled, [W] Greg Pak, [A] Minkyu Jung. This is the third of the three new DC titles with Asian protagonists. Our protagonist, Cameron, is an orphaned youth with some sort of city-related superpowers. On arriving in a new city, he’s forcibly recruited in a gang run by a sleazy crimelord, Boss Chung. This comic is interesting both for its theme of urbanism, and for its references to Korean culture. A key word in this issue is hyung, which seems to mean older brother.
SILVER SURFER: GHOST LIGHT #4 (Marvel, 2023) – “Demolition Man,” [W] John Jennings, [A] Valentine De Landro. The two factions of the Stranger’s personalities continue their battle. This series’s cast of characters has grown too large, and I had trouble following this issue’s plot or remembering who was on which side. However, I love the scene where the old lady asks the Surfer his name, and he says it’s the Silver Surfer, and she says “What’d your mama name you?” and he replies “Norrin… ma’am.” When this series was announced, I didn’t see how it was possible to write a Silver Surfer comic that was primarily about black people, but John Jennings has succeeded at this.
BULLS OF BEACON HILL #5 (Aftershock, 2023) – “You’ve Got Another Thing Coming,” [W] Steve Orlando, [A] Andy Macdonald. This comic’s title is a grammatical pet peeve of mine – it should be “another think coming”, because “another thing coming” makes no sense. Chris finally fights his dad, who, despite his aura of invincibility, was so unsure of his victory that he brought along some guys with guns. Chris wins the fight and then publicly identifies himself as Orin’s son. This issue was a fairly satisfying conclusion to the series, although when Chris defeats Orin by beating him up, this seems like an endorsement rather than a rejection of Orin’s toxic masculinity. Sadly, Bulls of Beacon Hill #5 might be the last Aftershock comic ever. It was their only new comic solicited in the May 2023 Previews, and in both the June and July 2023 Previews, they had no new comics solicited at all.
BLUE BOOK #4 (Dark Horse, 2023) – untitled, [W] James Tynion IV, [A] Michael Avon Oeming. Under hypnosis, Betty remembers what happened when the aliens abducted her. Then there’s a backup story about spontaneous human combustion, and it mentions the most famous literary example of this phenomenon – Krook in Dickens’s Bleak House. Blue Book still feels like a plot summary rather than an actual story, and overall it’s the worst James Tynion comic I’ve read. I would have dropped it by now if it were written by anyone else.
THE EXPANSE: DRAGON TOOTH #2 (Boom!, 2023) – untitled, [W] Andy Diggle, [A] Rubine. War is brewing between Earth, Mars and the Belters. The political maneuvering in this comic feels intense and well-written, although I don’t quite understand what’s going on. I like how some of the dialogue in this series is written in an imaginary space patois. Perhaps the best thing about this series is the beautiful Christian Ward covers. Along with Simone Di Meo, he’s the best space opera artist in the industry.
HARROWER #4 (Boom!, 2023) – untitled, [W] Justin Jordan, [A] Brahm Revel. The final girl is browbeaten into killing the old Harrower and becoming the new one, and the adults use her as a tool to enforce their control over the community. This ending reminds me of that of Where Monsters Lie. This comic is a good example of the slasher genre, but I’m not a big fan of that genre. I said hi to Justin Jordan at Heroes Con, but did not talk to him at length.
RADIANT PINK #5 (Image, 2023) – “A Tale of Most Woe,” [W] Meghan Camarena & Melissa Flores, [A] Emma Kubert. Eva discovers that Kelly was conspiring against her, so she maroons Kelly on a deserted planet. Then Eva gives up streaming to preserve her mental health. This issue is a reasonably good resolution to the series, but I wish the series had focused more on Eva’s character arc, rather than wasting so much space on irrelevant comedy (though I did like the giant cats). The Radiant Red miniseries was better because it was much more focused on the theme of the story that introduced Radiant Red; it felt more like a logical expansion of Radiant Red’s first appearance. In summary, Radiant Pink was the second worst Massiveverse title, after The Dead Lucky, with which it shared a writer, and I’ll be hesitant to read any more comics by Melissa Flores.
ORDINARY GODS #12 (Image, 2023) – “The Beginning,” [W] Kyle Higgins & Joe Clark, [A] Daniel HDR. The gods almost manage to destroy the God Machine, or whatever they were trying to do, but Brianna gets shot, and Christopher abandons his quest and leaves to take care of Brianna. This is an anticlimactic and unsatisfying conclusion. Also, this whole series was trying to do way too much. Because it was only twelve issues, none of the characters got sufficient development, and the epic, multiverse-spanning plot was compressed into far too small a space. Ordinary Gods had some good ideas, but ultimately failed to fulfill its potential.
EXORCISTS NEVER DIE #2 (Mad Cave, 2023) – untitled, [W] Steve Orlando, [A] Sebastian Piriz. The two exorcists defeat Lust, which attacks them by inflaming their sexual tensions. This comic has some nice body horror and sexual undertones (or overtones really), but so far this miniseries is just okay. I find Steve Orlando’s work to be a mixed bag.
SANTOS SISTERS #4 (Floating World, 2023) – “Dude! Where is My Car?”, [W/A] Greg and Fake. (This Fake doesn’t seem to be the same as Edie Fake.) Another superhero comic with Archie-inspired art. Santos Sisters is funny and has high production values, but I’m not sure if I quite get the joke behind it, and it doesn’t seem like a major work of art.
SANDMAN UNIVERSE: DEAD BOY DETECTIVE #6 (Vertigo, 2023) – untitled, [W] Pornsak Pichetshote, [A] Jeff Stokely. The kids defeat the villains, and the series ends with a cameo appearance by Thessaly, who seems to be the unifying figure across all these Sandman Universe comics. I liked this series’s exploration of Thai mythology, but, like Good Asian, it was severely hampered by a confusing plot.
DEEP CUTS #2 (Image, 2023) – “Sorry, But I Can’t Take You,” [W] Kyle Higgins & Joe Clark, [A] Helena Masellis. This issue is not related to the previous issue except thematically, and I think there might be a cameo appearance by the protagonist of issue 1. Gail Geldstein, a young woman living in Chicago in 1928, wants to be a famous singer. But just as her career is taking off, it’s derailed by the Great Depression, and she ends up totally forgotten except for one song, which no one realizes she even wrote. This is a depressing and sadly realistic story. Gail is a parallel to all the creators who were forgotten and excluded by the comics industry. But I’m not sure what the overall point of Deep Cuts is.
POWER GIRL SPECIAL #1 (DC, 2023) – “Dark Knight of the Soul,” [W] Leah Williams, [A] Marguerite Sauvage. I bought this because it’s a rare full-length comic drawn by Marguerite Sauvage. Her art is beautiful, and I particularly liked her drawings of Streaky the super-cat. However, it was hard to concentrate on this comic’s art because its story is unreadable. It’s not interesting to begin with, and it makes no sense if the reader isn’t also reading Action Comics. For instance, Power Girl is now named Paige for some reason, and the reader is never told this, so it took me a while to figure out who “Paige” was. The fundamental problem with Power Girl is that she’s been retconned in so many different ways that she’s barely a character at all. She started out as a replacement for Supergirl, which made her redundant after the original Supergirl came back, and later writers have struggled to give her any consistent identity or reason to exist. The only creator who succeeded at doing this was Amanda Conner, and Leah Williams seems to have abandoned Conner’s take on the character.
THE FORGED #3 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Greg Rucka & Eric Trautmann, [A] Mike Henderson. The fighting continues, and the Cassandra drives everyone crazy with her constant micromanaging and predictions. Then the team finds themselves in the empress’s palace. This series is an impressive piece of military SF, but I still have the same concerns about it that I expressed in previous reviews – namely, an awkward format and too many infodumps.
After finishing this week’s comics, I tried to read as many back issues as I could before Heroes Con:
DONALD DUCK #2/369 (IDW, 2015) – “Shellfish Motives Part 2,” [W/A] Romano Scarpa. Donald and the nephews investigate a mysterious conspiracy in which a master chef is kidnapped, and the kidnappers demand half a million servings of shrimp in lobster sauce as a ransom. This reminds me of Gottfredson’s Mickey Mouse story about a crime wave where the only items stolen were hair and red flannel underwear. Romano Scarpa is one of the best European Disney creators, and this story has some impressive depth. In a backup story by Al Taliaferro, Donald and the nephews suspect that their new neighbor is a spy, but he turns out to be their previous neighbor’s landlord in disguise. The landlord is named Mister Legree, though he doesn’t seem as bad as his namesake, Simon Legree from Uncle Tom’s Cabin.
DENNIS THE MENACE #33 (Hallden/Fawcett, 1959) – “Dennis’s New Kick… Get Rich Quick!” etc., [W] Fred Toole, [A] Al Wiseman. A series of short stories, including one where Dennis tries to become an inventor, and another where a tiger rug is mistaken for a real tiger. My copy is in such bad condition that I hesitate to take it out of its bag.
2000 AD #1835 (Rebellion, 2013) – Dredd: “The Forsaken Part 6: Falcon,” [W] Mike Carroll, [A] P.J. Holden. Dredd apprehends the last two missing cadets, and discovers that one of them is pregnant. The story ends with a group photo of all the cadets smiling. Cadet Anderson: “One in Ten Part 3,” [W] Alan Grant, [A] Carlos Ezquerra. Anderson investigates some more, then has a nightmare about terrified babies. Sinister Dexter: “Witness Protection: Malone Again, Part 4,” [W] Dan Abnett, [A] John Burns. Sinister manages to save his witness protection officer and escape. Stickleback: “Number of the Beast Part 12,” [W] Ian Edginton, [A] D’Israeli. Stickleback defeats the lizards, and we’re introduced to a new villain. This is the last chapter of Number of the Beast, and that’s a relief because I was getting sick of its art style. The black-and-white art with no outlines was very striking, but also very difficult to read.
KONG THE UNTAMED #5 (DC, 1976) – “Bones of the Martyr,” [W] Gerry Conway, [A] Dave Wenzel & Bill Draut. Kong meets a matriarchal tribe that hates men. The high priestess’s daughter Sharra is in love with a man named Rolen, but he’s sick of being ruled by women, and he tries to upset the tribe’s matriarchal religion. In a surprising twist, Sharra sides with her mother and knocks Rolen out with a rock, and he’s sacrificed by being burnt alive. This comic is an interesting treatment of gender politics, but like other Marvel and DC comics of this time, it confuses feminism with bra-burning and misandry. Also, Rolen seems to be an advocate of patriarchy, rather than gender equality. This was the last issue of Kong the Untamed. It’s not a surprise that the series was cancelled, because its main draw was Alfredo Alcala’s art, and he left after issue 3.
LEGION LOST #7 (DC, 2000) – “Singularity,” [W] Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning, [A] Olivier Coipel. The Legion fight the Singularity, and at the end of the issue they encounter four of the Legionnaires who remained on Earth, but it’s obvious that they’re all fake. Abnett and Lanning’s Legion run was very popular, but I had consistent problems with it. I thought it was too Marvelesque and it paid too much attention to some characters rather than others. However, it was a lot better than no Legion comic at all (or Bendis’s Legion, which is worse than nothing). Shadow Lass is my second favorite Legionnaire after Phantom Girl, but the postboot Shadow Lass, who appears prominently in this issue, was the worst version of this character ever. She was prickly and rude for no reason. In this issue she acts even worse than usual, and I was a bit surprised to realize she was being mind-controlled, because her cruel behavior seemed consistent with this version of her character.
ACTION COMICS #522 (DC, 1981) – “The Time-Tornado of the Clockwork Man,” [W] Gerry Conway, [A] Curt Swan. A scientist builds a clockwork robot, inspired by Tik-Tok from the Oz books. In another Oz reference, this issue also depicts a tornado in Kansas. The robot causes the flow of time to break down, and Superman has to destroy it. There’s also a typically boring Atom backup story by Rozakis and Saviuk. In this story it’s mentioned that Detective Comics #463 to #468 each depicted a battle between the Calculator and a different superhero. I never noticed that.
SWORD OF AGES #4 (IDW, 2018) – “Gates of Chaos” etc., [W/A] Gabriel Rodriguez. An issue full of gorgeous artwork, which is unfortunately wasted on a generic high fantasy plot. There are too many characters and none of them are interesting, and it’s impossible to figure out what’s going on if the reader didn’t pay careful attention to issues 1 to 3. Gabriel Rodriguez is a phenomenal artist, but he’s worked on a lot of bad comics.
NOW #3 (Fantagraphics, 2018) – [E] Eric Reynolds. A highlight of this issue is a series of interrelated stories by Anne Simon. Her style is a bizarre mix of fairy tales and Greek myths and anthropomorphism. I’m not sure it’s to my taste, but it’s interesting. Anna Haifisch’s story about a flea market has some beautiful page layouts and coloring. Roberta Scomparsa’s ”The Jellyfish” is a queer-themed story set on a beach. Eleanor Davis’s “March of the Penguins” is about a man who cleans up after a crime scene. Marcello Quintanilha’s “Sweet Daddy” is about a dying old man remembering his life. Quintanilha’s draftsmanship and black-and-white technique are beautiful. I just bought his graphic novel Listen, Beautiful Marcia, which won the Fauve d’Or at Angouleme, but I haven’t read it yet. Other contributors include Al Columbia, Dash Shaw, Ben Passmore and Noah Van Sciver. At Heroes Con I had the great honor of moderating a panel on autobiographical comics where Noah was one of the panelists.
PROPELLER MAN #1 (Dark Horse, 1993) – untitled, [W/A] Matthias Schultheiss. A sort of superhero story set in a near-future world. This comic has a somewhat overly complicated plot, and it’s hard to tell just what its point is, or even which of the characters is the titular Propeller Man. The best thing about this comic is Schultheiss’s style of art and coloring. He uses very vivid neon colors, with lots of lens flares to indicate depth. Schultheiss is German, but he seems to be most famous in France, particularly because of his series Bell’s Theorem, which was translated into English by Catalan. I have one volume of Bell’s Theorem, but I read it while in high school or college, and I hardly remember anything about it.
WASTELAND #8 (DC, 1988) – “Heebie Jeebies,” [W] John Ostrander, [A] Tom Artis. A marriage falls apart because the wife suspects the husband is a child murderer. A strange and ambiguous story. “The Dead Detective,” [W] Ostrander, [A] William Messner-Loebs. A film noir parody in which a detective gets beaten up repeatedly for no reason. “The Eye, Like Some Strange Balloon…”, [W] Del Close & Ostrander, [A] Don Simpson. Del Close has to appear for a film shoot even though his cat has just scratched him across the eye. This is probably the best of the three stories. Overall this is a very unusual and intriguing comic. I have a few more issues of Wasteland, and I want to read them soon. Del Close was best known as an actor and a teacher of actors. I believe all his comics work was done in collaboration with Ostrander, who he met when they were both cast in a Chicago production of A Christmas Carol (source).
JUST A PILGRIM: GARDEN OF EDEN #1 (Black Bull, 2002) – “Marianas,” [W] Garth Ennis, [A] Carlos Ezquerra. I’m sure it was a dream come true for Garth Ennis to work with Carlos Ezquerra, since Ezquerra must have been a major influence on Ennis. But the results of their collaboration are disappointing. The main character in Just a Pilgrim is very similar to the Saint of Killers from Preacher, and in this miniseries he gets involved in a plot whose similarity to the Garden of Eden story is excessively obvious. The miniseries is even called Garden of Eden, so the reader doesn’t even need to decipher the symbolism on their own.
AQUAMAN #40 (DC, 1996) – “Doctor in the House,” [W] Peter David, [A] Jim Calafiore & Vince Giarrano. Dr. Polaris visits Atlantis and messes with Aquaman, since he can control Aquaman’s metal hand. Also, a red-haired woman is pursuing Aquaman, claiming to be his queen, and we’re meant to think that she’s Mera, but the last page reveals her to be Maxima. It seems like PAD was getting kind of tired of Aquaman by this point. Of the two artists in this issue, Calafiore’s art is far more impressive than Giarrano’s. Jim Calafiore was at Heroes Con, and I think I spoke to him briefly.
THE SPECTRE #15 (DC, 1994) – “Old Blood,” [W] John Ostrander, [A] Tom Mandrake. A Palestinian activist Kemal Saad (presumably based on Yasser Arafat) arrives in Cairo for a peace summit with Israel. The Spectre wants revenge on Saad for his history of terrorist acts, and the Hayoth, the Israeli superheroes introduced in Suicide Squad, are forced to defend Saad, much against their will. And Eclipso is trying to meddle with this already explosive situation. This issue is a rather gloomy depiction of the Israel-Palestine conflict, but at least in 1994 it seemed like the conflict was potentially resolvable. Thirty years later, the conflict seems more intractable than ever. The Hayoth are really compelling characters, and in particular, their leader, Ramban, is one of the best Jewish superheroes created by a non-Jew.
2000 AD #1836 (Rebellion, 2013) – Dredd: “Skulls,” [W] Rob Williams, [A] Trevor Hairsine. Dredd fights some “Bug Boyz,” gangsters who murder Judges and wear their helmets. An SJS agent named Gerhard saves Dredd from the Bug Boyz, but despite saving him, Gerhard is determined to prove Dredd responsible for Day of Chaos. Cadet Anderson: as above. The cadet judges learn that they were all sharing the same nightmare, but they insist on continuing the investigation anyway. Defoe: “The Damned Part 1,” [W] Pat Mills, [A] Leigh Gallagher. Defoe has a flashback to the apparent deaths of his family. Sinister Dexter: as above except the story title is now “Witness Protection: In Plain Shite.” Sinister tries to get himself smuggled out of Generica so he can look for Dexter. Terror Tales: “The Death Magnetic,” [W] David Baillie, [A] Will Morris. A cursed cassette tape drives its listeners crazy.
DARK KNIGHTS OF STEEL #6 (DC, 2022) – “Drums of War,” [W] Tom Taylor, [A] Yasmine Putri. This series’ overarching theme is that it’s the DC universe turned into a medieval epic fantasy. The one really cute thing in this issue is that Harley Quinn is a court jester, but besides that, this issue made little impact on me, because I’m not sufficiently familiar with the series’s plot. I’m collecting this series anyway because it’s written by Tom Taylor.
TONY STARK: IRON MAN #12 (Marvel, 2019) – “Thou Covetous Wyrm,” [W] Gail Simone, [A] Paolo Villanelli. In a War of the Realms crossover, Malekith summons a dragon to attack Tony’s company. Tony fights it alongside a Hulk robot and a talking cat wearing a battlesuit. Gail was obviously having a lot of fun with this issue, though she was only a guest writer.
TINTIN V10 (Casterman, 1942) – “The Shooting Star,” [W/A] Hergé. There’s a good case to be made that Tintin is the greatest comic in the world. That seems kind of strange, because it’s just an adventure comic with a somewhat vapid protagonist, and it also has an unfortunate history of colonialism and racism. Among the things that make it great are, first, the beautiful Clear Line art; second, the intricate complexity of the plots; and third, Hergé’s masterful visual storytelling and comic timing. In The Shooting Star, Tintin and Captain Haddock race to find a mysterious meteorite before some unscrupulous businessmen beat them to it. The opening pages of this album are full of events that make no sense at first, but once the chase sequence gets going, it becomes thrilling, with plot twists and reversals on almost every page. Hergé’s visual humor is also a highlight of the album – for example, when the ship departs, Captain Haddock is presented a bouquet by the Society of Sober Sailors, and then while he’s still holding the bouquet, a workman asks him where to put his crates of whisky. I love the scene in Tintin in Tibet where Tintin sees a rotten fruit that’s fallen from a tree, then looks up to see where it came from, and gets hit by the next fruit that falls. The Shooting Star is full of moments like that. I feel guilty that I still haven’t read all of Tintin. Besides this one, I have four or five more Tintin albums that I haven’t read, and I want to get to them soon. This album includes a brief cameo appearance by Quick and Flupke, the protagonists of another of Hergé’s series.
WHAT’S THE FURTHEST PLACE FROM HERE? #7 (Image, 2022) – untitled, [W] Matthew Rosenberg & Tyler Boss, [A] Josh Hixson. I bought this on a whim, and read it because of Charles Hatfield’s recommendation. In a flashback sequence, some children are taken from a wartorn city and are abandoned in an old movie theater. Their new life seems to be a paradise, but at night, their city becomes the scene of a conflict between masked men and characters. I don’t know what’s the larger context for any of this, but this issue’s plot and artwork are both very moody and frightening, and I’d like to read more of this series.
SNARF #11 (Kitchen Sink, 1989) – “Basement Man in Latex Love,” [W/A] Rand Holmes. A man buys a blow-up doll, but when he uses it for its intended purpose, he causes some ridiculous chaos. This is easily the highlight of the issue. The only other really worthwhile thing in the issue is a set of one-page strips by Joe Matt, although as in issue 15, these strips are very cumbersome to read due to their tiny lettering and their large number of panels. There’s also a one-pager by Howard Cruse. As for the rest of the issue, the stories by Mark Landman and P.S. Mueller are just ugly, and Dennis Worden’s story seems as if it’s promoting creationism. Perhaps Worden’s (fallacious) critique of evolution is meant to be ironic, but if so, I can’t tell.
RIP OFF COMIX #4 (Rip Off, 1978) – “The 4th Freak Brother,” [W/A] Gilbert Shelton & Paul Mavrides. The title character is a former cop named O’Mullet. This is extremely funny, like most Freak Brothers strips. In the other Shelton story in this issue, Wonder Wart-Hog becomes a professional football player, resulting in massive chaos and violence. This issue also includes the following: Some Griffith Observatory strips by Bill Griffith. One of these strips mentions New York’s air quality problem, which has been in the news again in recent weeks. A “Mom Squad” strip by R. Diggs, who was really named Harry Driggs. He has an appealing art style. A Dealer McDope story by Dave Sheridan. “Dorman’s Doggie” by Frank Stack, a humorous story about a dog. Frank Stack later published a comic book consisting entirely of strips about this character. I have this comic, but have not gotten around to it yet. At Heroes Con I saw a couple copies of Frank Stack’s Jesus Meets the Armed Services, but they were beyond my price range.
LASER ERASER AND PRESSBUTTON #6 (Eclipse, 1986) – “World Killer,” [W] Steve Moore, [A] Mike Collins. Axel and Mysta get involved in a space war, and Zirk makes a cameo appearance. This story includes a same-sex kiss, and Axel and Mysta’s client, Melanie, is explicitly stated to be gay. The other feature is a barbarian story by Steve Moore and Cam Kennedy. As I noted above, Axel Pressbutton is a bit like Ranxerox because he’s a cyborg with berserker rages and a female sidekick/sexual partner. I don’t know if either character was influenced by the other.
JUDGE DREDD: LEGENDS OF THE LAW #8 (DC, 1995) – “Fall from Grace,” [W] John Byrne, [A] Tommy Lee Edwards. I think I got this comic for free at last year’s Heroes Con. It was in a box of comics that were just being given away – they weren’t even considered to be worth 25 cents. This issue’s plot is that Dredd inexplicably starts brutalizing suspects and engaging in corruption, and in the next two issues, he goes on the lam and becomes a criminal. I get the impression that Byrne didn’t quite understand Dredd; he just writes this issue as a standard cop story, with none of the science-fictional or political aspects of the original Dredd comics.
SAVAGE DRAGON #23 (Image, 1995) – untitled, [W/A] Erik Larsen. Dragon has mysteriously vanished, and She-Dragon tries to take his place on the police force, but she and Rapture get into a catfight. It’s implied that Peter Klaptin sleeps with Rapture in exchange for her promise to not reveal that he’s Star. Dragon himself finally reappears at the end of the issue. Savage Dragon has the unusual property that the earliest issues are far easier to find than the later ones, because the earlier issues had far larger print runs. On mycomicshop, Savage Dragon (1993) #1 costs $2.50, while most of the issues from 150 onward are not available at all.
CUD COMICS #4 (Dark Horse, 1996) – “Spring Fever” etc., [W/A] Terry LaBan. In the lead story, Eno suffers from spring fever and tries some ineffective remedies. The second story, “Ben Dordia’s Confession,” is an adaptation of a Talmudic legend about Rabbi Eliazer ben Dordia, of whom “it was said… that there was no whore in the world he could hear of and not visit.” Eventually he realizes that he needs repentance, and he can only gain it through his own efforts, and for this he earns eternal life. This story really is in the Talmud (Avodah Zarah 17a) and I’d never heard of it before. But the best of the three stories is “Bundle of Joy.” Plum realizes she’s pregnant, and tries to get an abortion, but changes her mind after seeing a state-mandated “Before You Murder Your Baby” video. Eno and Plum decide to raise the baby together, but it turns out the baby is the result of artificial insemination by aliens, and the aliens return and take it back. This story has a funny ending, but it’s also a serious take on the abortion issue, which is sadly in the news again.
STEEL, THE INDESTRUCTIBLE MAN #2 (DC, 1978) – “The Monster Who Mined Miracles,” [W] Gerry Conway, [A] Don Heck. A World War II-era superhero fights a Nazi supervillain. This series was cancelled after five issues due to the DC Implosion, and judging from this issue, its cancellation was no great loss.
MISTY #6 (Marvel, 1986) – “Too Many Brides,” [W/A] Trina Robbins. Misty and Darlene are appearing on a soap opera, and they get in a rivalry over which of their characters will marry the leading man. Misty and Darlene have a similar relationship to Millie the Model and Chili. In the backup story, Misty temporarily acquires superpowers. One of the costumes in this issue was designed by Joshua Quagmire, creator of Cutey Bunny, who recently passed away.
2000 AD #1837 (Rebellion, 2013) – Dredd: “Wastelands Part 1,” [W] John Wagner, [A] Dave Taylor. Some prospective tenants for a new apartment building are attacked by bandits. This is another story that deals with the fallout from Day of Chaos. Dave Taylor is an excellent draftsman. Defoe: as above. Defoe dreams about confronting the people who killed his family, then he and his companions proceed to fight some zombies. This story mentions cock ale, which was ale made with rooster meat. Cadet Anderson: as above. The cadets raid a restaurant that’s serving human meat. Sinister Dexter: as above. Sinister’s finds a crimelord who’s willing to transport him to Dexter’s location, but in exchange, Sinister has to kill all of the crimelord’s enemies. Future Shocks: “Time is the Only Enemy,” [W] David Baillie, [A] Graeme Neil Reid. In a metatextual story, a comics writer encounters some aliens who are using his own stories as a blueprint for invading Earth. The aliens cause him to die from premature aging, so that he can’t come up with a way to beat them.
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #693 (Marvel, 2012) – “Alpha Male,” [W] Dan Slott, [A] Humberto Ramos. Spider-Man becomes a mentor/babysitter to Alpha, a new teenage superhero. Spidey gets increasingly tired of Alpha’s “bad boy” personality and his need for constant supervision, and starts working on a way to remove Alpha’s powers. Alpha is a funny character because he’s so much like a young version of Peter himself, as well as other later teen white male superheroes characters like Nova and Darkhawk – and that’s exactly the problem, since Alpha’s personality type is no longer considered cute or funny. I bought either issue 692 or 694 at Heroes Con, and I want to read it ASAP.
JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #188 (DC, 1981) – “The Metamorph War,” [W] Gerry Conway, [A] Don Heck. A villain named Proteus (not to be confused with the more famous Marvel villain of that name) swaps the JLA’s minds with those of six ordinary people. Of course it doesn’t last. The story ends by suggesting a romance between Flash and Zatanna, who was a favorite character of Gerry’s, but this romance was short-lived because Barry was dating Fiona Webb in his own title. The backup story, drawn by Rich Buckler in a Neal-Adams-esque style, is a Hanukkah-themed story starring Hawkman and Hawkgirl. Gerry Conway is not Jewish, but has described himself as an honorary Jew by virtue of living in New York.
ROBIN HOOD #10 (IW, 1956/1963) – “The Magic Harp” etc., [W] unknown, [A] Frank Bolle. This issue has a beautiful John Severin cover, but that’s the only good thing about it. All the stories in this issue are reprinted from Robin Hood #53, published by Magazine Enterprises in 1956. They’re all straightforward Robin Hood pastiches (and one King Arthur pastiche), with boring art and unoriginal writing. In general, these IW comics tend to be quite bad.
INCREDIBLE HULK #606 (Marvel, 2010) – “Father’s Day,” [W] Greg Pak & Paul Pelletier. Bruce and his son Skaar team up against Dr. Doom. Skaar is a mildly interesting character, a sort of blend of the Hulk and a young Conan, and maybe I should read more of his solo series. There’s also a dumb backup story in which the red and green She-Hulks fight each other. It’s written by Harrison Wilcox, who I’ve never heard of.
SEA HUNT #8 (Gold Key, 1961) – “Treasure from the Past,” [W] Eric Freiwald & Robert Schaefer, [A] Russ Manning. Mike Nelson recovers an underwater dinosaur fossil, despite interference from crooks. In the backup story, Mike fights some jewel thieves and recovers their stolen loot, which they threw into the ocean. There’s also a short non-Sea Hunt story with art by Warren Tufts, a rare example of a creator who moved from comic strips to comic books. Sea Hunt is an obscure title, but it contains some beautiful Manning artwork.
ACCIDENT MAN #3 (Dark Horse, 1993) – untitled, [W] Pat Mills & Tony Skinner, [A] Duke Mighten. A crime comic with good jokes, but a confusing plot and rather ugly artwork. I remember I enjoyed the first issue of this miniseries, but issue 3 left no impression on me. When I find issue 2, I should reread the series in order. This miniseries was a continuation of a British comic strip that appeared in Toxic, and there’s a collection published by Titan that includes both the British and American Accident Man stories.
SHE-HULK #22 (Marvel, 1990) – “Blondes & Bombshells!”, [W] Steve Gerber & Buzz Dixon, [A] Tom Artis. Some racist terrorists are trying to steal an atomic bomb. In order to recover it, She-Hulk has to travel back in time to the 1940s. There (then?) she encounters the Invaders and the original Blonde Phantom. This issue is full of Gerber’s usual wacky writing, but I don’t remember much about it specifically.
BOOKS OF MAGIC #35 (Vertigo, 1997) – “Rites of Passage Part 9: Appearances,” [W] John Ney Rieber, [A] Peter Snejbjerg. Molly travels with a fairy prince whose name I didn’t catch. I’ve collected a lot of Books of Magic, and it’s a pretty good series, but I’m not passionate about it. My main issues with it is that the plot makes little sense and never seems to go in any particular direction.
CREEPY #33 (Warren, 1970) – [E] Bill Parente. This is from Warren’s awful period, which lasted approximately from Archie Goodwin’s departure in 1967, to the arrival of the Spanish artists in 1971. During this period, Warren lost almost all the talents responsible for its original glory days. Most of the stories in this issue are barely stories at all, just vignettes that don’t go anywhere. The highlight of the issue is the beautifully drawn mummy story by Reed Crandall, but R. Michael Rosen’s writing doesn’t do justice to Crandall’s art. Perhaps the best-written story is the one by Tom Sutton, in which some children play a prank that results in another child being drowned. The only other good artist in this issue is Pat Boyette. The other contributors to the issue are all nonentities.
TUROK, SON OF STONE #47 (Gold Key, 1965) – “Outcasts of the Flood,” [W] Paul Newman, [A] Giovanni Ticci. Turok and Andar decide to build a permanent shelter in a tree, but they’re troubled by dinosaurs, hostile natives, and flooding, until they decide to return to their former nomadic lifestyle. I wasn’t familiar with Giovanni Ticci before, but his artwork in this story is very impressive. He draws scary dinosaurs, exciting action scenes, and gloomy swamps. He’s best known as a longtime artist on the Italian comic Tex. In the backup story, by the same creators, Turok and Andar get trapped in the desert. There’s also a four-pager by Newman and Rex Maxon. Scott Edelman has posted a rare personal reflection by Paul S. Newman, although I think the date on this interview should be 1997, not 1977, based on Newman’s statement as to his age at the time.
TARZAN #165 (Gold Key, 1967) – “The Thundering Doom,” [W] Gaylord Du Bois, [A] Dan Spiegle. This story is adapted from the 1966 TV series, in which Tarzan’s supporting characters were Jai, an orphaned boy, and Rao Behta, a zookeeper. Jai seems like essentially the same character as Boy from earlier Tarzan adaptations. In this issue, Jai and a visiting senator’s daughter try to observe a tribal ritual which is strictly forbidden to outsiders. The tribespeople catch them and put them in a boat that’s heading over a waterfall, and Tarzan has to save them. Dan Spiegle was a less distinguished Tarzan artist than Jesse Marsh or Russ Manning, but he wasn’t bad.
DARK HORSE PRESENTS 100.3 (Dark Horse, 1995) – Concrete: “The Artistic Impulse,” [W/A] Paul Chadwick. Concrete meets the now-grown Andre, the birthday boy from the very first Concrete story in Dark Horse Presents #1. This is the story where Concrete is tricked into appearing at a birthday party, and in revenge, he lifts the family’s car onto the top of their garage. Then Concrete somehow agrees to draw a woman in the nude, except he can’t hold a pencil, so he has to hire a professional artist to do the drawing for him in secret. The artist is named Stephen Davies, and appears to be based on Dave Stevens. This is a fun story, though its plot requires Concrete to act really stupid. Then there’s a five-page American Splendor story by Pekar and Sacco, which is partly about gentrification, a term that was not yet a household word. There’s also a Savage Love story by Dan Savage and Jason Waskey, about the experience of being called a f*gg*t. The issue ends with a short piece by Megan Kelso, whose work I have never read, and I ought to remedy that omission. All five issues of Dark Horse Presents #100.3 were very impressive – I’m not even sure if this issue had the best lineup of talent among the five.
CAPTAIN AMERICA: WHITE #3 (Marvel, 2015) – “A Hole in the Head,” [W] Jeph Loeb, [A] Tim Sale. Cap, Bucky and their comrades fight some Nazis, then they make contact with a group of resistance fighters, two of whom resemble the Scarlet Witch and Batroc the Leaper. Then they discover that the Red Skull is in Paris, where they’re headed. The artwork in this issue is more interesting than the writing.
HARDWARE #35 (DC/Milestone, 1996) – “The Old Ways,” [W] John Rozum, [A] Eric Battle. For some reason Hardware is in Peru, and he travels with a native guide into the jungle, where he finds himself battling a native deity called the Huanta Aires. Huanta is a real Peruvian placename, but “Huanta Aires” sounds like a made-up name. There’s nothing else particualrly interesting about this issue, and Rozum missed an opportunity to tie this story in to the actual Sendero Luminoso rebellion in Peru. Rozum and Milestone founder Michael Davis recently got into a public feud due to Davis’s comments about a recent Milestone documentary.
DARK HORSE PRESENTS #54 (Dark Horse, 1991) – [E] Randy Stradley. This issue starts with a crime story by John Arcudi and Gray Morrow. The art and black-and-white technique are impressive, but the main character has a bizarre-looking face, though this seems to be deliberate. Then there’s a Next Men chapter, with better art than in most of Byrne’s post-1980s work. Next there are some one-pagers by Rick Geary, and finally a Sin City chapter by Frank Miller. I like Sin City’s dramatic page layouts and beautiful spotting of blacks, but I am not fond of its story.
KA-ZAR #8 (Marvel, 1997) – “Urban Jungle Part 1: Bright Lights, Big Jungle,” [W] Mark Waid, [A] Andy Kubert. Ka-Zar visits New York and confronts his brother the Plunderer, who is secretly conspiring with Thanos. The Plunderer activates a machine that turns New York into a prehistoric jungle. Also, Ka-Zar realizes that his current midlife crisis is happening because he doesn’t feel ready to be a father. The explicit theme of Mark Waid’s Ka-Zar was that Kevin Plunder was a big overgrown baby who had trouble adjusting to adult responsibility, and in this he probably resembled many of the series’ readers.
SANDMAN MYSTERY THEATRE #60 (Vertigo, 1998) – “The Cannon Final Act,” [W] Steven T. Seagle w/ Matt Wagner, [A] Michael Lark. Wesley defeats a Nazi conspiracy to steal American double eagle coins. I think this story is a reference to the 1933 double eagle coin, of which the entire run was supposed to be destroyed, but twenty of them were stolen and sold on the black market. Meanwhile, Dian deals with her guilt over her recent abortion. The problem with Sandman Mystery Theatre is that because I’ve been buying issues at random, I rarely get to read an entire four-issue storyline in order.
THE BOOKS OF MAGIC #52 (Vertigo, 1998) – “Homecoming,” [W] Peter Gross, [A] Temujin. Tim’s dad forces him to attend school again – and worse, he has to attend the same school as his stepbrother Cyril. Tim revisits his old neighborhood and gets in a fight with Molly’s male relatives. There’s also a subplot where a balding man with a monocle is searching for Tim. This issue is as confusing and difficult as most issues of Books of Magic.
THE SEVEN-PER-CENT SOLUTION #5 (IDW, 2015) – untitled, [W] David Tipton & Scott Tipton, [A] Ron Joseph. An adaptation of Nicholas Meyer’s novel in which Sherlock Holmes is cured of his cocaine addiction by Sigmund Freud, and then the two of them team up to prevent World War I from breaking out earlier than it did. I love Meyer’s original novel, but this adaptation doesn’t add anything new or original to its source material. Also, the climactic scene – in which Freud hypnotizes Holmes and learns that Holmes’s father murdered his mother – is covered in just a couple pages.
FANTASTIC FOUR #212 (Marvel, 1979) – “The Battle of the Titans!”, [W] Marv Wolfman, [A] John Byrne. Galactus battles the Sphinx, who, in a flashback sequence, is identified as one of Pharaoh’s wizards from the book of Exodus. Also, the FF continue their fight with Exodus. A flaw with Marv Wolfman’s Marvel superhero comics is his overreliance on his own characters, like Nova, the Sphinx, Veritas, and the Champions of Xandar. These characters have rarely been used by anyone else, though Fabian Nicieza brought some of them back in New Warriors.
BATMAN #48 (DC, 2016) – “Superheavy Part 8,” [W] Scott Snyder, [A] Greg Capullo. A villain named Mister Bloom tries to destroy Gotham with carnivorous plants. I assume this character is somehow connected to Poison Ivy and the Floronic Man, but I don’t know how. Batman doesn’t seem to appear in costume in this issue, but there’s a subplot where Bruce Wayne talks to a man on a park bench. According to this review, this character was actually be the Joker.
HAXTUR V1 (Trinca, 1970) – untitled, [W/A] Victor de la Fuente. A modern Latin American man, visually based on Che Guevara, is transported to a fantasy world where he has a series of sword-and-sorcery adventures. Haxtur is considered one of the classic Spanish comics, and even gave its name to a comics award. However, I was not all that impressed with this book, and I find it hard to see why it’s such a classic. De la Fuente’s draftsmanship is impressive, particularly his immersive backgrounds. But Haxtur’s stories just seem like generic sword-and-sorcery material. Each story is only about seven pages, with no continuity between them, so the stories don’t have time to develop much narrative complexity. Haxtur was reprinted in two volumes, and I also have the other one, but I haven’t read it yet.
THORGAL V7 (Donning Company, 1984/1986) – “Child of the Stars,” [W] Jean Van Hamme, [A] Grzegorz Rosinski. Thorgal is one of my favorite French comics, though I’ve only read a little bit of it in print – I first encountered it when I downloaded some of the albums and skimmed through them. Thorgal is a fantasy series set in a realistically depicted Viking society, but it also has significant SF elements. This is the seventh volume, but in the 1986 English translation, which is the one I have, it was numbered 1 because of chronological order. It consists of three flashbacks to the hero’s younger days. In the first story, some Vikings go to sea and discover a spacecraft with an abandoned baby in it. They name the child Thorgal Aegirsson, the latter name indicating that he’s the son of the god of the sea. In “The Metal That Did Not Exist,” an approximately six-year-old Thorgal has a whimiscal adventure where he has to help some dwarves defeat the serpent Nidhogg. The story ends with Thorgal learning of the birth of Aaricia, his future wife. In the third story, the ten-year-old Thorgal meets an old man who shows him a vision of events before his birth. Thorgal thus learns that he’s the last survivor of a group of spacefaring humans who left Earth in the distant past. The 1986 English version of Thorgal is hampered by poor translation and lettering, but Rosinski draws brilliant action sequences and settings, and Van Hamme’s storytelling and characterization are compelling. As a reader I get the sense that he truly cares about his characters. Thorgal is kind of like a European Prince Valiant because of its medieval fantasy themes and its emphasis on the main character’s family. I’d like to make a more serious effort to read this series, so while writing this review, I ordered the second Cinebook volume.
HEROES FOR HIRE #17 (Marvel, 1998) – “Power Play!”, [W] John Ostrander, [A] Marty Egeland. She-Hulk and Luke Cage save some hostages from a cult, then they go on a date, which is interrupted by the Absorbing Man and Titania. This comic is intended to be funny, but the jokes mostly don’t succeed. Also, Ostrander sets up Luke and Jen as a couple, but that never went anywhere. It’s weird to see Ostrander writing Marvel characters, since he’s so associated with DC Comics and with his own original characters.
BLOODSHOT: SALVATION #4 (Valiant, 2017) – untitled, [W] Jeff Lemire, [A] Mico Suayan. This comic is mostly about two boys who are abused by their father, until they finally get sick of it and murder him. Much later, the two brothers encounter each other as old men. The connection to Bloodshot is not clear. On Facebook, in response to the news of Valiant’s characters being licensed to another company, Richard Pace pointed out that Valiant’s characters weren’t much good to begin with (I assume it’s okay to cite him since it was a public post). TBH, he’s not wrong. With the exception of Faith, Quantum & Woody, Jeff Lemire’s Bloodshot, and BWS’s Archer & Armstrong, most Valiant comics are pretty bad.
STRANGE EMBRACE #7 (Image, 2007) – untitled, [W/A] David Hine. I read issue 6 in 2020, but somehow I never went on to finish the series, even though I already had issues 7 and 8 by then. I guess I was worried that issues 7 and 8 wouldn’t make sense after such a long gap. But I was mostly able to understand this issue. Sarah discovers Anthony’s mother in an insane asylum, and she reveals the horrifying measures she took to “cure” Anthony of masturbation. Besides whipping him, she put him in a chastity belt which only she could remove, and she never did. Sarah then realizes that she’s pregnant by Anthony’s father Edward, and that Edward has syphillis. There’s also a backup story about tapeworms. Strange Embrace is one of the creepiest horror comics I know of.
MARVEL TWO-IN-ONE #59 (Marvel, 1980) – “Trial and Error!”, [W] Marv Wolfman & Ralph Macchio, [A] Chic Stone. Ben Grimm and Johnny Storm encounter a man named Norm who’s about to get married, but the wedding day is his 30th birthday, and he has four goals he wants to accomplish before that date. Unfortunately, the first three goals are to become a firefighter, a cowboy, and a detective, and Ben and Johnny have to stop him from getting himself killed while doing any of those things. Norm’s fiancee, Deena, somehow stands by him through all of this, even while Norm risks his own life and breaks the law. Luckily, the fourth item on Norm’s list is to become a husband, and Deena is still willing to marry him despite all his antics. So the story ends “happily,” but not really, because Norm’s actions prove that he’s far too immature to get married, and Deena should have dumped him and looked for a more responsible man to marry.
JOHN CARTER, WARLORD OF MARS #16 (Marvel, 1978) – “John Carter is Dead!”, [W] Chris Claremont, [A] Ernie Colón. John Carter is murdered by a female assassin, and in a fun sequence, Dejah Thoris and the assassin fight each other. Claremont turned Dejah Thoris into more of an action girl than she was in the original books. Of course John comes back to life because he wasn’t really dead, but by then, Dejah Thoris has gone off in pursuit of the assassins’ guild, and John has to rescue her. Marvel’s John Carter series had some good creators associated with it, but I’m not a huge Barsoom fan. I find the John Carter stories to be repetitive, and I can’t get into the characters or the setting. Though somehow I don’t have the same problem with Tarzan.
NEW MUTANTS #65 (Marvel, 1988) – “Demons!”, [W] Louise Simonson, [A] Bret Blevins. The X-Men have just been (seemingly) killed during Fall of the Mutants. Illyana somehow thinks Forge is solely to blame for this, and she decides to kill him. The other New Mutants are unable to talk Illyana out of her unthinking rage, and she leads them into a pointless fight with Freedom Force. Weezie’s writing is notable for her characters’ extreme and sometimes excessive emotions, which are appropriate since her protagonists are often children or young teenagers. A notable moment in this issue is when Kitty and Illyana commisserate over the X-Men’s deaths, and Kitty says that they were fighting a war, and that people die in war. This might have been the only story that depicted Kitty’s immediate reaction to the X-Men’s “deaths”. A weird historical anomaly is that we never got to see Kitty and Kurt’s reaction when they learned that the X-Men were still alive, and Kitty and Kurt’s reunion with the X-Men was mostly depicted off-panel.
GREEN LANTERN #46 (DC, 1993) – “Death City,” [W] Gerard Jones, [A] M.D. Bright. Due to Gerard Jones’s conviction for child pornography, all of his work is now tainted. It’s impossible to read any of his comics without a feeling of disgust. I only read this one because I was trying t get through some unread comics I’ve had for a while. Even taking Jones’s crimes out of the equation, Green Lantern #46 isn’t a very good comic. It’s full of ‘90s ultraviolence, and it subjects Hal to the horrible trauma of having his city destroyed, simply to make Mongul seem more legitimate as the villain of Reign of the Supermen. I read this comic when it came out, and I do still remember the line “You shattered my arm… you shattered my knee… but my will is something you’ll never touch.” But besides that, this comic is perhaps best left forgotten. The next issue after #47 was a standard Green Lantern-Green Arrow teamup, and it depicted Hal reacting with equanimity to the destruction of Coast City. But then issue #48 was the start of the Emerald Twilight arc, in which Hal went completely insane and massacred the Green Lantern Corps, and it took another decade to repair the damage that this story did to Hal’s character. According to Brian Cronin, Emerald Twilight was not part of DC’s original plans. It was cobbled together hastily, with disastrous results.
ELFQUEST #12 (Marvel, 1986) – “Hands of the Symbol Maker,” [W/A] Wendy Pini, [W] Richard Pini. While Cutter and Skywise are traveling, Cutter gets sick from an infected squirrel bite, and Nonna and Adair find him and nurse him back to health. But Skywise mistakenly thinks the humans have kidnapped Cutter, and when he finds the humans, he attacks them. Leetah and the kids only make a brief appearance.
JLA #31 (DC, 1999) – “Crisis Times Five Part 4: Gods and Monsters,” [W] Grant Morrison, [A] Howard Porter. Some of the Justice Leaguers battle Triumph, while others travel to the Fifth Dimension to resolve a battle between two genies, Yz and Lkz. (Their names are backwards spellings of “say you” and “so cool,” Johnny and Jakeem Thunder’s magic words.) During all of this, Wildcat is killed, but he comes back to life because he has nine lives. This story achieves the difficult task of creating a single consistent explanation for DC’s mass of fifth-dimensional imp and genie characters – the Thunderbolt, Mxyzptlk, Quisp, etc.
STRANGE EMBRACE #8 (Image, 2007) – as above. Unable to obtain an abortion, and afraid that her child will be a monster, Sarah commits suicide. Many years later, Alex learns Anthony’s story and decides to get revenge on him. Anthony’s house burns down, killing a couple of people, but Anthony escapes. Alex plans to frame Anthony for murdering Sarah and the people who were killed in the fire. To help with this plan, Alex also murders Sukumar, the narratee, in order to use him as another of Anthony’s alleged victims. Anthony then commits suicide himself, and the story ends by showing Anthony and Sukumar’s ghosts appearing to each other. This is a surprising and grim conclusion, but I’m confused about just who Alex is. Could he somehow be Sarah and Edward’s aborted child? Why does he hate Anthony so much? Perhaps I would understand if I reread the entire series.
SPACE GHOST #1 (Comico, 1987) – “The Sinister Spectre,” [W] Mark Evanier, [A] Steve Rude. A team of villains try to defeat Space Ghost by creating an evil duplicate of him. This is perhaps the only good comic starring Space Ghost as its sole protagonist. Space Ghost has been around since 1966, was created by a legendary comic book artist, and seems perfect for comic books, but he’s had very few comic books of his own – just three one-shots, published in three decades by different publishers, plus a 2004 miniseries. His other comic book appearances have been in anthology or crossover titles. Of the very few solo Space Ghost comics, this 1987 one-shot is the only one with a top-tier creative team. Steve Rude draws this comic in a sedate style, with none of his usual creative page layouts or camera angles. Also, he draws the characters to look like cartoon drawings, while the backgrounds look more like matte paintings. All of this is deliberate: the point of this comic is that it looks and feels like an expanded version of a ‘60s TV cartoon. Also, there are no solid outlines around the panel borders, and the effect of this is to make the frames look like television screens, and also to create a resemblance to ‘60s Gold Key comics, which also had borderless panels. Mark Evanier’s script is exciting and clever, but again, it feels like a longer-form version of a TV cartoon. Overall this comic has lower ambitions than some of its creators’ other work, but that’s fine. It’s an attempt to translate the aesthetic of ‘60s kids’ cartoons into comics, and I think it succeeds at that.
THE SPIRIT #40 (Kitchen Sink, 1949/1988) – [W/A] Will Eisner. “Thorne Strand and… the Spirit” is another of Eisner’s femme fatale stories. The title character is similar to Sand Saref or P’Gell, although in the commentary Eisner explains how they’re all different. “A Slow Ship to Shanghai” is inspired by the contmporary song “On a Slow Boat to China.” I’ve heard that phrase before but I didn’t know it came from a song. This might be Eisner’s ultimate femme fatale story, because it includes a female-crewed pirate ship, a trope which is now standard (see for example Raven from Princeless, or the Flying She-Devils from Atomic Robo). “The Big Sneeze Caper” is a film noir parody starring Ebony. This story is uncomfortable to read because Ebony is an offensive stereotype, regardless of Eisner’s efforts to defend or apologize for him. In the last story, “Visitor,” the Spirit meets a woman who claimed to be from Mars. I know I’ve read this story before, probably in Eisner’s book Comics and Sequential Art. It made an impression on me because of the line about how Martians are “flesh and blood automatons.” Another effective moment in this story is the silent sequence where Mr. Nimbus, the other Martian agent, opens a window and flies away on his jetpack. The Spirit is clearly one of the great monuments of American comics. I feel reluctant to read these Kitchen Sink Spirit comics just because of the extreme complexity and narrative compression of the stories. Because Eisner had only eight pages to work with, he had to convey the maximum of narrative impression in the minimum of space, and each panel had to do multiple things at once. Reading the Spirit is an intellectual exercise.
SHOCKROCKETS #4 (Image, 2000) – “Rocket Science,” [W] Kurt Busiek, [A] Stuart Immonen. Shockrockets is kind of a science-fictional version of Arrowsmith, another series that Kurt created around the same time. The Shockrockets are pilots who have a mental link to their planes, and they protect the earth from both an alien invasion and human collaborators. I’ve now read most or all of Shockrockets, which only lasted six issues, but I’ve never gotten into it. Neither the protagonist nor the premise appealed to me. But Stuart Immonen draws some beautiful machinery.
NEW MUTANTS #77 (Marvel, 1989) – “Strange!”, [W] Louise Simonson, [A] Rich Buckler & Roy Richardson. In the aftermath of Inferno, Illyana has been de-aged back to a child, and the New Mutants drop her off with her parents. On the way back, Dani collapses, and since her problem is magical, the New Mutants consult Dr. Strange for advice. At this point in continuity, Strange is pretending to be dead for some reason. But he still has to intervene when Dani’s powers drive her insane and turn her into a public menace. In this issue the New Mutants suddenly have four new members, Rictor, Boom-Boom, Rusty and Skids, all of whom were introduced in X-Factor. The only one of these characters I ever much liked was Rictor, and I find Boom-Boom very annoying.
DETECTIVE COMICS #1023 (DC, 2020) – “Prelude to Joker War: Joker Hears a Who?”, [W] Peter Tomasi, [A] Brad Walker. The Joker enlists Lincoln March, from the Court of Owls, in his service, and Batman goes looking for Two-Face. This issue was a very quick and unmemorable read. Also, I’ve previously explained at length why I hate reading about the Joker.
MICKEY AND DONALD #8 (Gladstone, 1988) – “The Blot’s Double Mystery,” [W] Guido Martina, [A] Romano Scarpa. Mickey and Eega Beeva (pwhose pspeech pattern pis preally pannoying) defeat the Phantom Blot. This story, published in 1955, was the Phantom Blot’s first appearance since the Gottfredson story that introduced him. “The Blot’s Double Mystery” ends with the Blot being unmasked, which makes him seem less threatening. Besides that, this is an exciting adventure story. This issue also includes a Barks ten-pager where Donald and his nephews try to fool each other with magic tricks. The covers for this series always showed Mickey and Donald together, but that was a bit of false advertising; each issue usually included at least one Mickey story and one Donald story, but no stories where they both appeared.
AMERICAN VAMPIRE #2 (Vertigo, 2010) – “Morning Star,” [W] Scott Snyder, [A] Rafael Albuquerque. In Los Angeles in 1925, a young woman is turned into a vampire. The backup story, written by Stephen King, explains how the protagonist, Skinner Sweet, came back to life after being trapped in a coffin that sunk in a reservoir. I’ve read a fair amount of American Vampire, but I still can’t tell how it’s different from any other generic vampire story. However, Rafael Albuquerque’s art is really good, and Scott Snyder’s depiction of 1920s America seems historically accurate.
CONAN: SCARLET SWORD #2 (Marvel, 1999) – “Curse in Crimson,” [W] Roy Thomas, [A] Stefano Raffaele. Conan fights a warrior named Kaanga who’s been possessed by a cursed sword, causing him (Kaanga) to transform into a duplicate of the ancient warrior Thun’da. Conan defeats Kaanga but is then possessed by Thun’da himself. Thun’da and Kaanga are both named after Golden Age Tarzanesque comics. Scarlet Sword is one of several Conan miniseries that Marvel published between 1997 and 2000, just before they lost the Conan license. After Conan the Barbarian was cancelled, Marvel replaced it with two short-lived ongoing titles, then with a series of three-issue miniseries. There were eight of these miniseries in all, and they’re all rather tough to find.
ANIMAL MAN #30 (DC, 1990) – “A Nice Day for a Weird Wedding,” [W] Peter Milligan, [A] Chas Truog. This is part four of a six-parter, known as “The Coma Kid” after its first part. Buddy imagines he’s marrying a chimpanzee, then he gets chased by a sabretooth tiger, then his estranged wife throws him out of the house, and then, while protecting the president from an assassination attempt, he gets stabbed to death by broken glass. At least some of these events only happen in Buddy’s mind, thanks to the influence of a psychic child named Lucinda. I believe it was later revealed that Buddy was in a coma for the entire storyline. The last issue of “The Coma Kid” was the first Animal Man comic I ever read. It was a good introduction to Peter Milligan’s writing, and it was also the first place where I heard of Schrodinger’s cat.
MARVEL TEAM-UP ANNUAL #2 (Marvel, 1979) – “Murder in Cathedral Canyon!”, [W] Chris Claremont, [A] Sal Buscema & Alan Kupperberg. Peter has a new girlfriend named Cissy Ironwood, probably named after cat yronwode. The Soviet Super Soldiers kidnap Cissy because her father is a physicist who’s developing a new type of anti-matter bomb. Spider-Man and the Hulk rescue Cissy and her father, but her father is murdered in cold blood by a Soviet agent, who fears that his invention will lead to nuclear escalation. The story ends with the Soviet agent saying that nuclear tensions will continue until people decide to say “no more bombs” and live in peace, and “I don’t think we have that kind of courage.” This story is an example of a common superhero comics trope: a scientist creates a new and dangerous invention, then has to burn his notes and/or kill himself in order to prevent the invention from being misused. I don’t think this has ever happened in real life, because science doesn’t work like that. Scientific progress is usually the product of teams of collaborators, not of isolated geniuses, and scientific discoveries are often made by multiple people or groups at the same time.
TUROK, SON OF STONE #41 (Gold Key, 1964) – “The Phantom Honker,” [W] Paul S. Newman, [A] Giovanni Ticci. A tribe is forced to make sacrifices to a glowing tyrannosaur. Turok and Andar prove that the dinosaur is a hoax created by a failed candidate for the tribe’s leadership. This is basically a Scooby-Doo story, though Scooby-Doo wasn’t created until 1969. In the backup story, Turok and Andar get caught in a feud between two tribes. As in #47, Ticci’s artwork is amazing. This issue also includes a four-pager with art by Rex Maxon.
DIRTY PLOTTE #10 (Drawn & Quarterly, 1996) – “Do You Trust Me?” etc., [W/A] Julie Doucet. This issue begins with accounts of two of Julie’s dreams. In the first one, Julie attends a Nick Cave concert, and Nick Cave chooses a life partner for her, who turns out to be a fat, balding, ugly dude. In the second one, Julie becomes a cowboy. The second half of the issue is the first half of “My New York Diary,” in which Julie moves from Montreal to New York to live with a man she’s barely met. This decision had disastrous results, as we’ll find out later. A key feature of Julie Doucet’s work is its extremely cluttered, hyperactive quality. Her comics feel like the product of a mind that’s moving at a breakneck pace and that can’t concentrate on one thing at a time. That makes them both fascinating and difficult to read.
CLEAN ROOM #8 (Vertigo, 2016) – “A Critical Event,” [W] Gail Simone, [A] Jon Davis-Hunt. While giving a public lecture, the cult leader Astrid Mueller is shot. This is great news, because Astrid is a horrible person. Unfortunately she survives, and the other protagonist, Chloe Pierce, is called in to try to save her. This gives Chloe an opportunity to bring a demon named Spark inside Astrid’s compound. I don’t always understand Clean Room’s plot, but it’s a very creepy horror comic with strong characterization, and it’s probably my favorite of Gail’s creator-owned works.
THE ABYSS #2 (Dark Horse, 1989) – untitled, [W] Randy Stradley, [A] Michael Wm. Kaluta. An adaptation of a movie in which a submarine crew discovers an underwater alien ship. The trope of submarines encountering underwater aliens has been used in other media, like Michael Crichton’s Sphere or Aquaman: Andromeda, but The Abyss may have been the first example of it. Kaluta’s adaptation of The Abyss is perhaps not his best work. Most of the issue is set inside a submarine, and Kaluta has nothing to draw except for people talking or fighting, so he doesn’t get to exercise his skill at drawing fantasy or science-fictional settings. He does include some impressive drawings of machinery and aliens, but because this comic is an adaptation, he has to borrow other people’s machine and creature designs, rather than creating his own. However, full-length comics by Kaluta are quite rare, so this comic is worth owning.
MOTHER PANIC: GOTHAM AD #4 (DC, 2018) – “Different Bat Channel Part 4,” [W] Jody Houser, [A] Ibrahim Moustafa. This issue’s pllot involves a little kid dressed up as the Joker. I don’t know what Mother Panic is about, I don’t understand why DC published it at all, and I’m ashamed that I bought it.
STAR-SPANGLED WAR STORIES #199 (DC, 1976) – “The Crime of Sgt. Schepke,” [W] David Michelinie, [A] Gerry Talaoc. The Unknown Soldier disguises himself as a Nazi officer, but becomes the target of Mlle. Marie, who mistakes him for an actual Nazi. The main story is intercut with a silent sequence in which a different Nazi soldier, Sgt. Schepke, commits suicide, which is inconvenient because Schepke was the only person who could prove the Unknown Soldier’s true loyalties. The backup story, by Michelinie, Steve Skeates and Tenny Henson, is about robot tanks manned by human minds. It has a predictable twist ending. The main character is named David Mitchell, after Michelinie himself. Steve Skeates unfortunately just passed away. I used to see his Facebook posts often, but I hadn’t heard from him in a long time.
MEASLES #8 (Fantagraphics, 2001) – [E] Gilbert Hernandez. This issue starts with “Los Supersonicos” by Jaime Hernandez, which I would have called a Latin American version of The Incredibles, except it predates The Incredibles by three years. Then there’s a silly story by Steven Weissman, whose work I’ve never liked. The high point of the issue is a Coton and Piston story by Joost Swarte, retitled Hector and Dexter. It has a frivolous plot about selling newspapers, but Swarte’s art and lettering are absolutely flawless. I regret that I didn’t buy Is That All There Is?, the Fantagraphics collection of Swarte’s work, when it came out, because at the moment, the lowest price for it on eBay is $55. The issue ends with a Venus story that includes cameo appearances by a bunch of Fantagraphics writers and editors.
TRANSFORMERS #11 (Marvel, 1985) – “Brainstorm!,” [W] Bob Budiansky, [A] Herb Trimpe. This is the worst Transformers comic I’ve ever read. It has a boring, generic story, and while Herb Trimpe was a great artist, he wasn’t much good at drawing giant robots. But worst of all, this issue is mostly about Spike Witwicky, a character I’ve always hated, even when I was a little kid. Spike was transparently intended as a surrogate for the reader – as a way for readers to imagine themselves hanging out with the Autobots. And that seems like an insult to the reader’s intelligence; it’s as if they thought that kids wouldn’t be interested in a story about giant transforming robots, unless the robots had a kid sidekick. As a kid, I also found it strange that Spike had different names across different Transformers media; he was alternately called Butch, Buddy and Buster, but all these names clearly referred to the same character. Of course there were complicated behind-the-scenes reasons for Spike’s different names, and in some versions of the franchise, they tried to explain Spike’s inconsistent naming by claiming that Spike, Buster and Butch were three different people.
LONE RANGER #71 (Dell, 1954) – “The Lone Ranger and the Peace Powwow” etc., [W] Paul S. Newman, [A] Tom Gill. This issue’s first story is ruined by its offensive portrayal of Native Americans. It draws a distinction between “good” and “bad” Indians, in which the latter are Indians who fight for their people’s survival, rather than peacefully accepting the destruction of their culture. Also, I don’t know if Tom Gill’s depiction of Plains Apache people is accurate, but I doubt it. As usual the highlight of this issue is the Young Hawk backup story, in which Young Hawk and Little Buck rescue a Shoshone girl and incur the jealousy of the tribe’s leading warrior. This story is notable for the lack of romantic sparks between the heroes and the girl. Gaylord DuBois’s Young Hawk and Korak stories, or at least the ones I’ve read, were completely devoid of romance, whereas in Brothers of the Spear, the protagonists were already married.
Heroes Con this year was from June 16 to 18. Heroes Con has become one of the highlights of my year, and this was another great one. A high point of the con for me was the two panels I moderated on Saturday – one on autobio comics, with Noah Van Sciver, Zoe Thorogood, Kayla E, and Sarah Myer, and another on kids’ comics, with Shadia Amin, Mike Kunkel, Asiah Fulmore, Cara McGee and Mike Maihack. Of course I bought a lot of comics. One of the dealers told me that Heroes Con has the most comics on sale of any convention in America, and I believe him. Some of the comics I bought:
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #91 (Marvel, 1970) – “To Smash the Spider!”, [W] Stan Lee, [A] Gil Kane. Captain Stacy is laid to rest, and Gwen, distraught over her father’s death, decides to work for Sam Bullitt’s law-and-order mayoral campaign. Of course Bullitt is both unscrupulous and a fascist, and he uses Gwen as part of his bid to take control of the city. This is a classic issue with beautiful art and lots of great characterization. John Romita, who inked this issue, just passed away, and with him we lost one of the few remaining links to Marvel’s Silver Age. At Heroes Con there was an impromptu panel in his honor, although I was not able to attend.
USAGI YOJIMBO #11 (Fantagraphics, 1988) – “The Tea Cup,” [W/A] Stan Sakai. This issue is Stan’s tribute to Groo. It begins with a poem, in which every line rhymes with Groo except the last line, which ends “his name was Usagi.” There are references to mulch, “slow of mind,” “did I err” and “Gen does what Gen does best.” On the last page, there’s a moral, and Sergio, Mark, Tom and Stan himself all make cameo appearances. The running joke is that Gen keeps behaving like Groo, although Groo himself even appears in one panel as a silhouette. The plot is that Usagi helps Gen deliver a valuable tea cup, but while they’re doing that, they get stuck with two helpless orphans. There’s also a backup story by Sergio, a wordless piece in which a samurai carries messages back and forth through a battlefield, only to discover that the messages were moves in a tic-tac-toe game.
BATMAN/SUPERMAN #22 (DC, 2021) – “Little Boxes,” [W] Gene Luen Yang, [A] Paul Pelletier. I spent the whole weekend looking for this, and finally found it. I was interested in it because it has a brilliant metatextual gimmick. Calendar Man loves calendars because they “organize time into little numbered boxes.” So Mr. Mxyzptlk visits the Calendar Man in prison and shows him that the entire universe is organized in this exact way, because Calendar Man exists within a comic book. And Mxy gives Calendar Man the ability to perceive and interact with neighboring panels. Calendar Man uses this ability to discover Batman’s identity and defeat both him and Superman. Mxy then gives Calendar a bonus gift: a pen, which can rewrite the structure of reality. But Calendar Man accidentally cuts his own arm off with the pen, and Mxy decides the situation has gone far enough, and restores the status quo. This issue has a similar premise to Pascal Jousselin’s Mister Invincible – a character who can interact with neighboring panels – and Jousselin even mentioned this resemblance in a public Facebook post. However, Yang’s story is not just a ripoff (intentional or not) of Jousselin’s, because Yang comes up with a clever and logical justification for why this particular villain should gain this power. And even if the metatextual trick in “Little Boxes” isn’t original, it’s a brilliant trick, and it’s worth reusing.
TITS & CLITS #1 (Nanny Goat, 1972) – “The Menses is the Massage” etc., [W/A] Joyce Farmer & Lyn Chevli. The number on this issue’s cover looks like a sideways 2, but I think it’s actually a lowercase alpha. This is confirmed by a number of Greek references in the comic. Tits & Clits was one of the two major feminist underground comics series, along with Wimmen’s Comix. As its title indicates, Tits & Clits seems to have had a stronger focus on sex than Wimmen’s Comix. The only contributors to this first issue are the two founders, Joyce Farmer – then using her married name Joyce Sutton – and Lyn Chevli. The latter’s stories are very amateurish-looking, and is only of interest for its feminist themes. But Farmer’s stories are both beautifully drawn and fascinating. The main ones are about Mary Multipary, whose surname means a woman who has given birth multiple times, as she struggles with finding the right period products, and then imagines penises growing out of her urine. These are disturbing but compelling stories that had little in common with male-authored underground comics. Farmer’s major work is her graphic novel Special Exits, published almost 40 years after Tits & Clits #1. I haven’t read that book, but I’d like to.
SCOOBY-DOO #6 (Marvel, 1978) – “Fester and the Jester,” [W] Mark Evanier, [A] Dan Spiegle. Fester Finch, an old silent movie actor, has opened a theater that only shows silent films. He’s harassed by a ghost, which of course is a phony. The ghost’s motivation is to steal Fester’s old movie collection because of the silver in the film stock. It actually is possible to recover silver from old film stock. Sadly, a story like this one was plausible in 1978, but not anymore, as all the former silent film actors have died. The backup story is about a man who fakes a gold rush in order to sell land at exorbitant prices. It’s a shame that there isn’t a complete collection of Evanier’s Scooby-Doo.
SILVER SURFER #8 (DC, 1969) – “Now Strikes the Ghost!”, [W] Stan Lee, [A] John Buscema. Mephisto enlists the Flying Dutchman to battle the Surfer. This is the only issue of Silver Surfer volume 1 in my collection. Stan Lee’s story in this issue is just average, and it gives more space to Mephisto and the Flying Dutchman than the Surfer. But Buscema’s artwork is incredible. The peak of his career was in the early ‘70s, when he was allowed to draw like himself, rather than like Kirby. Silver Surfer #4, in particular, is probably his masterpiece. As a kid I never quite got why Buscema was such a revered artist, and in a way I still don’t, but his Silver Surfer run is an excellent display of his artistic greatness. I just read Goethe’s Faust, and Marvel’s Mephisto has little in common with either Marlowe’s or Goethe’s version.
2000 AD #524 (IPC, 1987) – One of my better finds at Heroes Con was about twenty 2000 ADs, from the #500s and #600s, for about a dollar each. Anderson: “Hour of the Wolf,” [W] John Wagner & Alan Grant, [A] Barry Kitson. Two Sov agents try to carry out a psychic attack on the sleeping Anderson, but they’re distracted by some hoodlums. Future Shocks: “His Name Was Janus,” [W] John Soanes, [A] Dave D’Antiquis. Two parallel stories about a human and a werewolf. Rogue Trooper: “Hit One,” [W] Simon Geller, [A] Steve Dillon. Rogue thinks he’s killed General Yuan-Toh, but the general turns up alive. Dredd: “Pit Rat Part 2,” [W] John Wagner & Alan Grant, [A] Brett Ewins. Dredd fights some giant rats in the sewers. He brings some of the rats back to the surface, and Justice Department discovers that they can be made into hamburgers. Nemesis: “Torquemada the God,” [W] Pat Mills, [A] Kevin O’Neill. Torquemada remembers some of his past lives, in which he was Hitler, Colonel Chivington, Mathew Hopkins, and the original Spanish Torquemada. Strontium Dog: “Bitch Part 20,” [W] Alan Grant, [A] Carlos Ezquerra. Johnny Alpha, Durham Red, and Ronald Reagan are stalked by assassins. Durham Red imagines sucking Reagan’s blood.
ACTION COMICS #378 (DC, 1969) – Superman: “The Devil’s Partner!”, [W] Jim Shooter, [A] Curt Swan. Superman fights the devil, who turns out to be his Kryptonian godfather Rol-Nac. The story ends by saying that we’ll be seeing more of Rol-Nac soon, but this story was his only appearance. Legion of Super-Heroes: “The Forbidden Fruit!”, [W] Jim Shooter, [A] Win Mortimer. A criminal gets Brin Londo (Timber Wolf) addicted to drugs so that he can force Brin to commit crimes on his behalf. Brin’s girlfriend, Light Lass, breaks Brin’s addiction by forcing him to choose between the drugs and her life. This is one of the only Shooter Legion stories I hadn’t read, and it’s a good one. It has the sort of strong characterization and heightened emotions that Shooter was so good at. As mentioned in a previous review, I got to talk to Shooter at Heroes Con. Of the many people who were inducted into the Eisner Awards Hall of Fame this year, there are only two I disagree with, and one of them is Win Mortimer. I’ll mention the other one later. Win Mortimer he had a very long career, but he was a boring artist, and inducting him lowers the standards of the Hall of Fame. If they’re going to induct him, they should also induct Bob Brown, Irv Novick, Dick Dillin, Al Milgrom, and countless others.
FLASH #775 (DC, 2021) – “Beacon of Fate,” [W] Jeremy Adams, [A] Fernando Pasarin. Wally discovers a mysterious pokearm – or “glaive” – embedded in the ground of Keystone City. No one can remove the glaive from the ground, not even Superman, and it causes everyone in town to get angry for no reason. Finally an old villain, Starbreaker, appears and lifts the glaive, only to be possessed by Eclipso. The issue ends with Dr. Fate enlisting Wally’s help to resolve this mess. This issue didn’t have enough of Linda or the kids, but it was fun. I only need eight more issues to have Jeremy Adams’s complete Flash run.
KORAK, SON OF TARZAN #1 (Gold Key, 1964) – “Korak, Son of Tarzan,” [W] Gaylord Du Bois, [A] Russ Manning. Korak and his ape sidekick Pahkut save a European child from being kidnapped by native Africans. In the backup story, Korak saves some African natives from being enslaved by a European mine operator. Both these stories are unfortunately racist, though in opposite directions: the first story depicts Africans as savages, while the second story depicts them as victims in need of a white savior. However, Manning’s art is spectacular. He was a terrific action artist, and he also drew impressive jungle settings. I’m guessing that Korak #1 is the hardest issue of the series to find, so now that I have it, I can try to collect the whole series.
CORN FED COMICS #1 (Honeywell & Todd, 1972) – “Madam Fatal Pursues the Cryonic Kidnappers,” [W/A] Kim Deitch. I’ve been looking for this one for a while. I believe it’s Deitch’s first solo comic book, although he maintains the pretense that he’s just the artist, and that the writer is the fictitious Fowlton Means. Corn Fed Comics #1 is thematically similar to all of Deitch’s work, although his mature style of draftsmanship isn’t developed yet, and his recurring characters like Al Ledicker and Waldo do not appear. They’re very bleak and disturbing stories set in a much earlier America, and they have disturbing fantasy and horror elements. One of them even appears to depict sex with a child, though the child turns out to be a little person. Deitch’s world looks whimsical, but this conceals its grim, sordid nature. I’m still looking for Corn Fed Comics #2, and I think I’m also missing some Zero Zero issues that Deitch contributed to.
CAPTAIN AMERICA #134 (Marvel, 1971) – “They Call Him – Stone-Face!”, [W] Stan Lee, [A] Gene Colan. Sam Wilson’s nephew Jody Casper becomes a numbers runner for a Harlem gangster named Stone-Face. Cap and the Falcon have to save Jody and defeat the crimelord. This issue has excellent artwork and a socially progressive message, though its depiction of black people might be considered patronizing. Jody Casper only made a few more appearances after this issue. He is not to be confused with the Falcon’s other, much better-known nephew, Jim Wilson. According to Wikipedia, Jim being Sam Wilson’s nephew was a retcon introduced in 1979, almost a decade after Jim’s first appearance.
SHOWCASE #58 (DC, 1965) – Enemy Ace: “The Hunters and the Hunted!”, [W/A] Joe Kubert. Enemy Ace fights a series of aerial battles, while philosophizing about war and its effects on men. This is sort of a basic Enemy Ace story, with no particular plot twists, but it helps the reader understand Hans von Hammer’s character. Enemy Ace is perhaps the best American war comic other than Frontline Combat, Two-Fisted Tales or Blazing Combat, and it may also be Kubert’s masterwork. His aerial combat scenes are particularly beautiful.
WATCHMEN #5 (DC, 1986) – “Fearful Symmetry,” [W] Alan Moore, [A] Dave Gibbons. I’m trying to collect this series in its original form, even though I’ve already read it more than once. It may be the most rereadable of all comics, and the original issues offer a somewhat different experience than the trade paperback. Watchmen #5 is perhaps the most carefully constructed comic book ever published. The well-known gimmick of the issue is that the first half of the issue is a mirror reflection of the second. Pages 14 and 15 include the series’s only panel that spans more than one page, and the pages on either side of this panel are mirrors of each other, both visually and thematically. For instance, pages 10 and 19 both depict Dan and Laurie talking, and they both have identical panel grids, with a large panel in the middle showing both characters reflected in a mirror. The mirror gimmick is easier to appreciate when you’re reading the original comic book, because you can actually look at each pair of mirrored pages at the same time, and you can feel their relationship to each other. It is disappointing, though, that pages 14 and 15 are the two pages before the centerfold, so the point of reflection is not at the exact center of the comic. Major plot points in this issue include Moloch’s death, Rorschach’s capture, and Ozymandias’s fake assassination attempt on himself. Perhaps my favorite moment in this issue is when the one cop gets an anonymous tip and says “Raw shark? Why should I want to know where to find…”, and then in the next panel he just says “raw shark,” and the other cop stares wide-eyed at the reader. As my dad pointed out to me once, “raw shark” is also what the protagonist eats in the inset Tales of the Black Freighter story. Which, again, is an example of the meticulous craftsmanship of this comic, and the interconnectedness of everything in it.
THE CAT #2 (Marvel, 1973) – “The Owl and the Pussycat!!”, [W] Linda Fite, [A] Marie Severin. Now here’s something much less cerebral. Greer Grant Nelson, now known as the Cat, fights the Owl, while her mentor Dr. Tumolo languishes in hospital. This issue is mostly interesting as an early Tigra appearance, and it’s not particularly well-written or well-drawn. The Cat was part of a group of three Marvel titles launched in late 1972, along with Shanna the She-Devil and Night Nurse. All three titles had female protagonists and female writers, probably in order to cash in on second-wave feminism. However, none of the series’ writers – Linda Fite, Carol Seuling and Jean Thomas – had much previous comics writing experience, before or since (and all were married to prominent men in the industry, though Linda Fite didn’t marry Herb Trimpe until after The Cat began). The Cat only lasted four issues. Greer Nelson later became a more prominent character under the name Tigra, but she’s still never had a successful solo title, and that’s too bad because as a cat person, I really like her.
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #674 (Marvel, 2012) – “Great Heights Part 1: Trust Issues”, [W] Dan Slott, [A] Giuseppe Camuncoli. In the aftermath of Spider-Island, Spidey investigates a wave of murders in which people are being dropped from the sky. At the end of the issue, we learn that the murderers are working for the Vulture. The last page shows the Vulture feeding raw pork to his pet vulture, perhaps in homage to the Spirit villain Mr. Carrion. There’s also a subplot about Mary Jane. A cute moment in this issue is when Peter runs into his ex-girlfriend Carlie Cooper at the Coffee Bean, and they discover they’re both investigating the same case.
SUPERMAN’S GIRL FRIEND LOIS LANE #42 (DC, 1963) – “The Girl Who Destroyed Atlantis!”, [W] Leo Dorfman, [A] Kurt Schaffenberger. Lois travels back in time to Atlantis, where she falls in love with a man who resembles Luthor, while a man who resembles Clark Kent becomes her enemy. This is a pretty stupid story. Leo Dorfman was a prolific writer, but he’s a very obscure figure. “The Monkey’s Paw!”, [W] Jerry Siegel, [A] Schaffenberger. This story is similar to the famous prose story of the same name by W.W. Jacobs, though with less gruesome results. “The Romance of Superbaby and Baby Lois!”, [W] Dorfman, [A] Schaffenberger. Lois goes temporarily insane and blackmails Superman into marrying her. Superman tricks Lois (or rather, she tricks herself) into spraying herself with a spray that causes reverse aging. When Lois figures out what’s happened, she uses the same spray on Superman. So Superman and Lois both get steadily younger, until by the time of the wedding, they’ve become babies, and they’re not capable of saying “I do.” (Also they’re below the age of consent, but no one mentions that.) This story has been reprinted in two different anthologies, Superman in the Sixties and Lois Lane: A Celebration of 75 Years. This is probably because it’s such a ridiculous story; it’s the ultimate example of the bizarreness of Silver Age Lois Lane comics.
2000 AD #525 (IPC, 1987) – Anderson: as above. After a car chase, the two Sov agents are killed, but Anderson continues to dream about a wolf, suggesting that the threat isn’t over. Tales from Mega-City One: “Marriage Guidance,” [W] John Wagner & Alan Grant, [A] Will Simpson. Dredd catches a married couple fighting for the sixth time this year. He forcibly divorces them, then flips a coin to decide which of them has to move out. This is just a one-pager, but it’s funny. Rogue Trooper: “Hit One,” [W] Simon Geller, [A] Steve Dillon. Rogue tries to kill Yuan-Toh (again), but is caught and has to escape. Dredd: “The Raggedy Man,” [W] John Wagner & Alan Grant, [A] John Ridgway. Some Helltrekkers find Judge Dredd’s unconscious body in the Cursed Earth. The title character, a homicidally insane drifter, decides to murder the Helltrekkers. This story is narrated in fairy-tale prose, as if it’s intended for children, and that makes it all the scarier. Mean Team: “They’re Back!”, [W] Alan Hebden, [A] Massimo Belardinelli. A revival of a series whose previous appearance was in prog 447. The original Mean Team saga was a sports story, similar to Harlem Heroes, but the revival version is a fantasy story. Its villains are two conjoined twins named Bloo and Baloo, whose lines of dialogue always rhyme with their names. Mean Team has a fairly incoherent plot, and its artwork exhibits both Belardinelli’s best and worst qualities – his gorgeous backgrounds and monsters, and his unrealistic-looking people. Strontium Dog: as above. Reagan dreams about riding a giant missile to Moscow, then wakes to find Durham Red about to bite him. Then Reagan and the SDs are attacked by their enemies. This issue’s back cover includes the first installment of “DR & Quinch’s Agony Page,” by Jamie Delano and Alan Davis, in which DR and Quinch respond to readers’ requests for advice. They were the final stories with these characters, except for one story in 2018. These pages are hilarious, though not as much so as the original Alan Moore stories. I talked to Alan Davis a couple times at Heroes Con, and I told him that I’d read some of Harry Twenty on the High Rock.
TWO-FISTED TALES #2 (EC, 1951/1993) – “War Story!”, [W] Harvey Kurtzman, [A] John Severin. In WWII, a soldier tries to murder a Japanese POW, but murders his own brother instead. This is a powerful twist, but the story suffers from too much irrelevant material. “Jivaro Death!”, [W/A] Kurtzman. Two men are captured by Jivaro Indians, one of them is tortured to death, and the other tricks them into giving him a quick death. Wikipedia says that the word jíbaro is considered offensive when referring to Amazonian people, although it’s been reappropriated as a positive term by Puerto Ricans. “Flight Danger!”, [W/A] Johnny Craig. In World War II, an American spy rescues a German scientist’s daughter from Berlin, but can’t save her father. Even though the scientist dies, this story is far more upbeat than most EC comics. “Brutal Capt. Bull!”, [W] Harvey Kurtzman, [A] Wally Wood. An upper-class British man is impressed into service by a cruel captain. After his term of service is over, he beats the crap out of the captain. Overall this issue wasn’t as good as later issues of Two-Fisted Tales.
MARVEL FEATURE #4 (Marvel, 1972) – “The Incredible Shrinking Doom!”, [W] Mike Friedrich, [A] Herb Trimpe. Some crooks kidnap Billy Connors and hold him for ransom, and Ant-Man has to team up with Spider-Man to rescue the boy. They succeed at this, but Hank is trapped at tiny size. Mike Friedrich was not Marvel’s best writer, but his Ant-Man run was entertaining, and Herb Trimpe’s art on this issue is excellent. Throughout this issue, Billy is called by two different names, Bobby and Timmy, both of which are wrong.
FOUR COLOR #423 (Dell, 1952) – “Rhubarb, Owner of the Brooklyn Ball Club,” [W] unknown, [A] Don Gunn. I had to buy this comic because it’s weird and because I’m a cat person. In an adaptation of a 1951 film based on a 1946 novel, T.J. Banner, a billionaire baseball team owner, adopts a stray cat. He dies a few years later, and in his will, the cat inherits the baseball team, with employee Eric Yeager as its legal guardian. Eric has to save the cat from being kidnapped by gangsters, while also romancing a woman who’s allergic to cats. This comic has hideous artwork and lettering, but it’s a fun curiosity. After reading this comic, I kind of want to read the novel it’s based on, but the novel is out of print. The reason the Brooklyn team appears in the comic is probably because at the time, the Brooklyn Dodgers were notorious for repeatedly winning the pennant but losing the World Series; they finally won it in 1955. (Compare the two versions of the film Angels in the Outfield, in which a terrible baseball team wins the pennant thanks to divine intervention. The 1951 version of the film was about the Pittsburgh Pirates, and the 1994 version was about the California Angels.)
AWESOME HOLIDAY SPECIAL #1 (Image, 1997) – “Fighting American,” [W/A] Rob Liefeld, [W] Jeph Loeb. I had never heard of this comic before, but when I saw it, I suspected it might include an Alan Moore story, and I was right. The Alan Moore story is an eight-pager that’s meant as an introduction to his short-lived Youngblood run. It’s only of minor interest, but it does have its moments; for example, the narrator thinks that Sylvia Plath is the lead singer of Garbage (he’s thinking of Shirley Manson). The other stories in the issue are terrible, and the Liefeld story includes a character who’s a blatant ripoff of the Hulk.
DAMAGE CONTROL #1 (Marvel, 1989) – “No Vault Insurance!”, [W] Dwayne McDuffie, [A] Ernie Colón. I read the first Damage Control miniseries a long time ago, probably when I was in high school, but I never read the other two. Now I don’t understand why not, because Damage Control is one of the funniest Marvel comics ever. It’s about the engineering firm that has to clean up after New York’s constant disasters caused by superhero fights. In this issue, Damage Control’s chief of operations leaves to take a government job, and the company is sold to a new owner who’s a complete asshole. Meanwhile, some other Damage Control employees are trapped in the Vault along with the entire Wrecking Crew. What makes this comic funny, besides the witty dialogue, is that it’s about real people who operate by real-world logic, but they’re living in a world where Thor can singlehandedly lift the Brooklyn Bridge.
THOR #180 (Marvel, 1970) – “When Gods Go Mad!”, [W] Stan Lee, [A] Neal Adams. Loki has switched bodies with Thor, and he capitalizes on this situation by making Thor-in-Loki’s body look bad. Odin sentences “Loki” to Mephisto’s realm, while he takes “Thor” into his good graces. Sif and the Warriors Three figure out the situation and head to the underworld to rescue the real Thor. This is a generic Thor story, but Neal Adams’s artwork is spectacular. I didn’t realize how much his art resembles that of Colan and John Buscema.
THE HAWK AND THE DOVE #4 (DC, 1969) – “The Sell-Out!”, [W] Steve Skeates, [A] Gil Kane. Hawk and Dove’s father’s friend, Frank Heinsite, is running a fascistic law-and-order political campaign, while also stealing valuable paintings and replacing them with forgeries. When the forger, an artist named Warren Savin – which was Skeates’s own pseudonym – discovers what’s going on, Heinsite has him killed. Hawk and Dove unmask the plot and defeat Heinsite. This issue has excellent art and great characterization. Its main focus is on the antagonism between Hawk and Dove, which was the central theme of the series. Frank Heinsite is a very similar character to Sam Bullitt in Amazing Spider-Man #91, and that’s no coincidence, because they were both based on real-life law-and-order politicians like Spiro T. Agnew.
FLASH #776 (DC, 2022) – “Belief,” [W] Jeremy Adams, [A] Fernando Pasarin. This is another metatextual story. Dr. Fate and the Flash are trying to get to Gemworld to investigate the glaive mystery, and Dr. Fate asks the reader to help them. The reader is asked to tilt the pages to change the direction of gravity, and to blow on the pages to snuff out torches. At the end, the reader has to reread the entire issue to see the order in which certain symbols appeared, and then touch the symbols in the correct order. There’s no mechanism to require the reader to do this, so the reader is free to just ignore the puzzle and continue to the last page, but that would be cheating. This was a really fun issue, though its metatextual tricks are not as brilliant as those of Batman/Superman #22.
SUBVERT COMICS #1 (Rip Off, 1970) – “Trashman Meets the Fighting She Devils,” [W/A] Spain Rodriguez. Trashman meets some female pirates, with the expected sexy and violent results. as Trashman is an obvious male power fantasy, an example of the sort of thing that Tits & Clits was a reaction against. But Trashman also had a political and socialist angle that’s missing from most underground comics. Trashman is described as an agent of the Sixth International (in real life there were only four), and his opponents are jackbooted fascists. Spain’s art in this issue is excellent; it looks crude at first glance, but in fact it’s meticulously structured and detailed. However, he doesn’t use the radical, Steranko-esque page layouts and camera angles that I associate with him.
THE MUPPET SHOW #0 (Boom!, 2009) – “Pigs in Space: The Movie,” [W] Roger Langridge, [A] Shelli Paroline. An extended version of the Star Trek parody that was a recurring feature in both The Muppet Show and its comics adaptation. This issue is full of funny jokes, though it doesn’t have any backstage scenes – the Muppets spend the entire issue in-character as Link Hogthrob and his crew. It’s also unfortunate that Langridge didn’t draw this issue himself.
2000 AD #526 (IPC, 1987) – Anderson: as above. A telepath named Glenny Mexworth discovers that the two Sov agents have died. A judge gives a pill to Orlok in his cell. Tales from Mega-City One: “Quarantine,” [W] John Wagner & Alan Grant, [A] Colin MacNeil. Some space-dwellers travel to Mega-City One for three days, only to learn that they have to spend a week in quarantine. Another funny one-pager. Rogue Trooper: as above. Rogue keeps looking for Yuan-Toh, and gets knocked unconscious by a janitor. Dredd: as above. Dredd finally defeats and kills the Raggedy Man, and they all lived happily ever after, except that the Raggedy Man and the Helltrekkers are mostly dead, and Dredd is rarely happy at all. This story was really impressive. Mean Team: as above. Again, great art (except the people) but a nonsense plot. Strontium Dog: as above. Johnny and Durham Red skirmish with Doc Death.
DETECTIVE COMICS #468 (DC, 1977) – “Battle of the Thinking Machines,” [W] Bob Rozakis, [A] Marshall Rogers. Batman teams up with the Justice League against the Calculator. This issue’s story is boring, but Marshall Rogers’s art and Terry Austin’s inking are spectacular. Marshall Rogers was the hottest artist in the industry at this time. In this story’s first page we learn that Gotham City was bought from Algonquin Indians for $24 worth of trinkets. This is a reference to the legend that Peter Minuit purchased Manhattan Island for the same amount. However, that legend is not entirely accurate.
STARLIGHT #3 (Image, 2014) – untitled, [W] Mark Millar, [A] Goran Parlov. The hero of this comic is essentially an elderly Flash Gordon, who discovers that after he defeated Ming, the situation on Mongo only got worse. Of course none of those names are used. The appeal of this comic for me is Goran Parlov’s art. His style is highly derivative of Moebius, but it’s beautiful anywya. His coloring and panel compositions (i.e. the arrangement of characters within panels) are beautiful, and his action sequences are exciting. I still don’t like Millar’s writing, and I’m displeased to see that he’s an RFK Jr supporter, which is the same as being a Trump supporter.
THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD #39 (DC, 1962) – “Prisoners of the Dinosaur Zoo!”, [W] Robert Kanigher, [A] Ross Andru. This is both the oldest Brave and the Bold in my collection, and the only comic I own that stars the original Suicide Squad. In this issue’s first story, the Squad are trapped in a spaceship full of dinosaurs, and in the second story, they fight a criminal who can encase people in gold. Both stories are rather mediocre, and this version of the Suicide Squad never appeared again until Ostrander’s 1987 revival series, which had nothing in common with the 1960s version except for the two characters Rick Flag and Karin Grace.
INTIMATE LOVE #26 (Standard, 1954) – “Lonesome for Kisses,” [W] Kim Aamodt, [A] Alex Toth. I bought this just because it was cheap, and was happy to discover that it contains a classic Alex Toth story. In “Lonesome for Kisses,” photographer Jimmy Farr accidentally takes a picture of an unknown beautiful woman, and he gets so obsessed with trying to find her that he neglects his fiancée Marilyn. When he does find the woman, she turns out to have an awful personality, and Jimmy returns to Marilyn, who, because this is a ’50s romance comic, is willing to take him back. Toth’s draftsmanship and page layouts are beautiful. This story was reprinted in the 2011 Fantagraphics collection Setting the Standard. This issue also includes two one-pagers by Toth. The two other long stories are drawn by Art Saaf and John Celardo. The Saaf story includes a rather dramatic moment: the protagonist is babysitting an infant, but her bad-boy crush convinces her to leave the house, and while she’s gone, the house catches fire with the baby asleep inside! Luckily, the protagonist’s true love arrives in time to save the baby.
THE WALKING DEAD #100 (Image, 2012) – untitled, [W] Robert Kirkman, [A] Charlie Adlard. I bought a bunch of Walking Dead back issues at Heroes Con. The Walking Dead is an appealing comic to collect because there are a lot of them, they’re quite cheap – or at least the later issues are – and I can read them very fast. This issue introduces Negan, the series’ most prominent villain. After tying up Rick and his allies, Negan makes a smug, self-congratulatory speech, and then murders Glenn in cold blood. I see why Negan became popular, because he’s such an swaggering, aggressively masculine type, but his smugness drives me nuts. He knows he’s an awful, murdering monster, and he’s utterly unrepentant about it. Which I guess makes him appealing to some readers, but it just makes me furious.
A DECADE OF DARK HORSE #3 (Dark Horse, 1999) – Nexus: “All and Sundra,” [W] Mike Baron, [A] Steve Rude. This obscure comic includes one of the only Baron/Rude Nexus stories that I hadn’t read already. It begins with Sundra telling Nexus about an idyllilc childhood memory, in which her parents took her to an amusement park. All the rides at the park are based on other Dark Horse comics. Thanks to Ursula Imada’s meddling, Nexus learns that Sundra’s parents were actually criminals, but he still loves her. It’s nice to revisit Nexus again, although my former love for Nexus has been tarnished by my disgust with Mike Baron’s politics. The other features in this issue are Aliens, The Mask, and Johji Manabe’s Outlanders.
INCREDIBLE HULK #174 (Marvel, 1974) – “Doomsday – Down Under!”, [W] Roy Thomas & Gerry Conway, [A] Herb Trimpe. The nuclear-powered Cobalt Man tries to destroy the city of Sydney, while Bruce Banner has an uncomfortable encounter with Betty, who is now married to Glenn Talbot. This story has some effective drama and emotion, but Trimpe’s artwork is not as beautiful as earlier in his run. Given that this story is set in Sydney, it’s odd that the Sydney Opera House only appears in one panel. Until I saw that panel, I actually wondered if the opera house hadn’t been built yet when this comic was published, but it opened in late 1973.
FABULOUS FURRY FREAK BROTHERS #12 (Rip Off, 1992) – “Red Hot Squat” etc., [W/A] Gilbert Shelton & Paul Mavrides. This issue mostly consists of short stories in the classic Freak Brothers vein. There’s one story where the Freak Brothers tell some young punks about how they used to hide their stash from cops, and the punks trick the brothers and steal their stash. This story acknowledges that the Freak Brothers are now a relic of an earlier cultural era, even if they haven’t aged at all. One of the longer stories is “The Treasure of the Frigo Helado,” in which Fat Freddy goes insane from eating frozen amanita mushrooms. In the last story, “Phineas’s Big Show,” Phineas tries to become a gallery artist. At least some of this story is drawn by Gerhard Seyfried, a German alternative cartoonist, and it seems to be his only work available in English, other than a couple short pieces in Anarchy Comics.
TALES FROM THE CRYPT #4 (Russ Cochran, 1950/1993) – [W] Al Feldstein. “The Thing from the Sea!”, [A] Feldstein. A ship passenger discovers that there seems to be a ghost in his stateroom. When the captain offers to help him figure out what’s going on, we discover that the ghost is that of a man who the captain killed by pushing him out the stateroom’s window. “Fatal Caper!”, [A] Jack Kamen. Some bored rich kids decide to pull a prank on their friend Jim by summoning a fake demon. To make their prank more realistic, they steal a coffin and put Jim in it. However, the prank goes wrong, and not only does the coffin get buried by accident, but they can’t get it exhumed, because the coffin previously contained a corpse that died from leprosy. “Rx… Death!”, [A] Graham Ingels. A man accidentally takes a drug that causes him to be digested alive. I don’t know if this is Ingels’s best story, but I would rank him as one of the two greatest American horror comics artists, along with Wrightson, though this list only has him at #9. “Impending Doom!”, [A] Johnny Craig. Ted Warren discovers a stonecutter, Alex Kordova, carving a tombstone with Ted’s own name and date of birth on it. The tombstone also has Ted’s date of death, which happens to be the current date. Ted decides to stay for dinner with Alex, and ends up making out with Alex’s wife, and Alex murders Ted. How Alex knew of Ted’s impending death is left as a mystery.
THE NEW AVENGERS #1 (Marvel, 2015) – “In at the Deep End,” [W] Al Ewing, [A] Gerardo Sandoval. A new Avengers team visits Paris, where the population is being turned into crystals. At the end of the issue we learn that the Maker, an evil extradimensional version of Reed Richards, is responsible for this. New Avengers #1 has somewhat unappealing art, but it’s an entertaining read, especially since Squirrel Girl and Tippy Toe are on the team, and Al Ewing has lots of fun writing them. I remember someone saying that in his Avengers run, Al Ewing had to use a rather stupid lineup of characters, and he decided to just have fun with these characters rather than trying to take them seriously. Some of the characters from Ewing’s New Avengers run reappeared in his later run on USAvengers.
THE ULTIMATES #1 (Marvel, 2002) – untitled, [W] Mark Millar, [A] Bryan Hitch. This was a historically important series because it was the high point of the “widescreen” style of comics (which is really just a term for the work of two specific artists, Hitch and John Cassaday), and it also had an influence on the MCU. However, though I didn’t buy the series when it was coming out, I had a very negative impression of it, and now that I’ve read a couple issues of it, I’ve confirmed that impression. The Ultimates #1 is mostly a flashback to Captain America’s final World War II mission. This issue doesn’t contain anything as offensive as, for example, the line “You think this A stands for France?”, but it has the same grim-and-gritty, male-chauvinist, “realistic” tone of all Millar’s work. Issue 9, reviewed below, is even worse.
THE PHANTOM #23 (King, 1967) – “Delilah,” [W] Dick Wood, [A] Bill Lignante. A female criminal poses as a kidnapped Peace Corps worker, kidnaps Guran, and tries to use him to steal the Phantom’s treasure. This isn’t a terrible story, but the American-produced Phantom stories I’ve read are generally worse than the Swedish-produced ones. The Team Fantomen stories have more narrative complexity, thanks to their slightly greater length, and they have more varied settings and premises. This issue also has a backup story by Gary Poole and Bill Ziegler, in which Mandrake the Magician saves a man from jumping off a bridge.
NIGHT BUSINESS #3 (Traditional Comics, 2010) – “Bloody Nights Part 3,” [W/A] Benjamin Marra. An ultraviolent crime/superhero story set in an unspecified city in 1983. I couldn’t follow this issue’s plot, because it consisted of multiple sequences with no clear connection to each other. However, Marra’s artwork is amazing. His style of draftsmanship is very distinctive and unusual: his characters are shaded so that they look three-dimensional, yet they also look very unnatural and awkward. The artist he reminds me of most is Spain, though I also associate him with Chuck Forsman (who I spoke with briefly at Heroes Con). Besides this issue, his only works I’ve read are All-Time Comics and Terror Assaulter: OMWOT, and I think I like Night Business better than OMWOT, which is a somewhat problematic work.
THE FLASH #777 (DC, 2022) – “Vengeance is Mine!”, [W] Jeremy Adams, [A] Fernando Pasarin. In the Gemworld, Wally teams up with Justice League Dark against Eclipso. To defeat Eclipso, Wally needs to spring Dark Opal, the Gemworld’s greatest villain, from his prison. This Flash storyline is one of the few times Amethyst and her supporting cast have appeared in any other DC comic. Back home, Jai is jealous of Irey both because she has powers and he doesn’t, and because of her friendship with Maxine Baker. Maxine convinces Irey to sneak out of the house at night, and the last page reveals that they’re about to be kidnapped by some huge guy (later identified as Mammoth). Jai and Irey are two of the most realistic child superheroes since Power Pack.
2000 AD #527 (IPC, 1987) – Rogue Trooper: as above. While Rogue is being tortured, Gunner, Helm and Bagman discover an alien conspiracy. A recurring theme in this storyline is Rogue’s tensions with his three comrades. Anderson: as above. Orlok takes the pill and dies. Glenny Mexworth mind-controls the Judges who are transporting Orlok’s body. Anderson realizes that Orlok is the woolf she’s been dreaming about. Dredd: “Simp,” [W] John Wagner & Alan Grant, [A] Cliff Robinson. Nobby Klunk shows up to his wedding dressed in a ridiculous outfit, with roller skates, a canoe around his waist, a flowerpot on his head, etc. His bride-to-be, Clovis, rejects him, but after some mayhem, she takes him back. Nobby and Clovis next appeared in prog 574. Mean Team: as above. Bad Jack Keller and Emerald Eyes encounter Bloo-Baloo, whose dialogue is really annoying. Strontium Dog: as above. Johnny and Durham defeat Doc Death’s goons, and Durham prepares to drink Doc Death’s blood.
SPIDER-MAN’S TANGLED WEB #11 (Marvel, 2002) – “Open All Night,” [W/A] Darwyn Cooke. On Valentine’s Day, Peter Parker has made two dates with two different Daily Bugle coworkers, Jillian Blythe and Kay Cohn. But he can’t keep either date, because as Spider-Man, he’s just fought the Vulture, and he’s lying unconscious in the alley between the Bugle and the Coffee Bean. This story is a masterpiece. In just a single issue, Darwyn Cooke creates multiple new characters and gives each of them a fully rendered personality, and he orchestrates a complex drama with multiple overlapping plots, each of which leads to a satisfactory resolution. The story’s plot is extremely dense, yet Cooke somehow ensures that the reader always understands exactly what’s going on. There’s one piece of comic business that’s especially impressive, where a disgruntled Bugle employee, now working at the Coffee Bean, sneaks some laxative into JJJ’s drink. Cooke’s artwork is obviously incredible, especially his visual characterization of Jillian and Kay. (These characters are very similar to Mary Jane and Gwen respectively, but Cooke had to make them different characters, because the plot requires them to work at the Daily Bugle.) This story is full of Eisneresque touches: the title of the story is spelled out by buildings and a billboard, and the plot mostly focuses on the civilian characters, with Spider-Man spending most of the issue off-panel. And this story’s plotting and characterization show that Cooke was a worthy heir to Eisner. See here for Brian Cronin’s take on this issue.
SHOWCASE ’94 #11 (DC, 1994) – “Man-Bat,” [W] Chuck Dixon, [A] Flint Henry. This issue’s lead story is well-executed, but rather grim and bleak. One reason I like Man-Bat is because of his family relationships, and this story ends by suggesting that Kirk and Francine can never get back together. Then there’s a rather pointless story starring the Black Condor, a character DC has never managed to make interesting. But the reason I bought this issue is because it ends with a rare example of a Starfire solo story written by her creator Marv Wolfman. In this issue, Kory discovers a recently widowed man holding his children hostage, and she needs to use both her compassion and her rage to resolve the situation. This is a cute story that shows Marv’s command of Kory’s character.
C.O.W.L. #1 (Image, 2014) – “Principles of Power Chapter 1: Motivation,” [W] Kyle Higgins & Alec Siegel, [A] Rod Reis. I wanted to read this because it’s referenced in Radiant Black. C.O.W.L. is a superhero story set in Chicago in 1962, focusing on a superteam called the Chicago Organized Workers’ League. C.O.W.L. is valuable for its deep knowledge of Chicago and its history. However, its plot is hard to follow. The creators seem to have forgotten that the reader doesn’t know anything yet about the comic’s premise or backstory. It took me a while even to figure out what the Chicago Organized Workers’ League was. Also, Rod Reis’s art doesn’t appeal to me; it looks like a poor imitation of Sienkiewicz.
FANTASTIC FOUR #111 (Marvel, 1971) – “The Thing – Amok!”, [W] Stan Lee, [A] John Buscema. Reed has succeeded in allowing Ben to change between his Thing and human forms at will, but the side effect is that Ben has turned evil. Johnny goes after Ben, and their resulting fight causes massive property damage, resulting in anti-FF protests. The Baxter Building’s landlord even tries to evict the FF, and Reed scares him away. This issue includes some stunning art, though not quite as stunning as in Silver Surfer #8. Sue spends most of the issue with Agatha and Franklin. It was kind of awkward how Reed and Sue basically abandoned their child for the first couple years of his life, leaving him to be raised by Agatha.
WONDER WOMAN #205 (DC, 1973) – “Target Wonder Woman!”, [W] Robert Kanigher, [A] Don Heck. After her brief feminist, no-costume period, Wonder Woman was given back to the same writer who ruined her. Kanigher didn’t much like Wonder Woman, and when he was her primary writer, he turned her into a embarrassing, silly character. Diana does get to do some fighting in this story, but there’s a dumb subplot about her obsession with Morgan Tracy, a character seemingly created as a replacement for Steve Trevor. The backup story, by the same team, is much more interesting because it’s the second appearance of Nubia. It has a bare-bones plot in which Nubia fights a native warrior, but the very idea of depicting a black woman as Wonder Woman was groundbreaking at the time.
DETECTIVE COMICS #392 (DC, 1969) – “I Died… a Thousand Deaths!”, [W] Frank Robbins, [A] Bob Brown. A criminal named Angles seems to have killed Batman, but his boss, Scap Scarpel, is haunted by what seems to be Batman’s ghost. In the end, we learn that Batman was of course not dead, and was posing as Angles in order to capture Scap. This story emphasizes the terror that Batman causes in criminals. A nice moment is when “Angles” and Scap eat at a restaurant, and the check comes back marked with a Bat-signal and the words “paid in full.” There’s also a Batgirl backup story, by Frank Robbins and Gil Kane, in which Jason Bard makes his first appearance. The Batgirl stories from this period were occasionally sexist, but they were cute and entertaining.
DAREDEVIL #32 (Marvel, 1967) – “…To Fight the Impossible Fight!”, [W] Stan Lee, [A] Gene Colan. The Cobra and Mr. Hyde have given Daredevil a potion that was supposed to make him blind, but since he was already blind, the potion instead deadens his extra senses. Daredevil turns the tables on the villains by shutting off the power to their hideout, so they’re as blind as him. Then there’s an exciting and well-choreographed sequence where Daredevil tries to avoid the Cobra and Hyde’s attacks while searching for the antidote to Hyde’s potion. A running joke throughout the story is that everyone refuses to believe Daredevil is blind. Gene Colan’s art in this issue is excellent, but John Tartaglione’s inking makes Colan’s linework appear too crisp and not painterly enough.
ANIMAL MAN #18 (DC, 2013) – “Rotworld: The Red Kingdom Epilogue,” [W] Jeff Lemire, [A] Steve Pugh. Buddy and Maxine think they’ve defeated the Rot, but just as they’re celebrating, the Rot’s avatar, young William Arcane, regains consciousness and murders Cliff. Jeff Lemire’s Animal Man had some great artwork and characterization, and for a while it was the best of the New 52 launch titles. However, it was also way too grim and depressing, and Cliff’s death was the low point of that tendency. I’ve lost track of Animal Man continuity, but I’m pretty sure Cliff is still dead. He’s not mentioned at all in Jeremy Adams’s Flash run, where Maxine is a recurring character.
CEREBUS JAM #1 (Aardvark-Vanaheim, 1985) – “The Defense of Fort Columbia” etc., [W/A] Dave Sim. A series of short stories in which Sim collaborates with various other artists. In the first story, Cerebus’s two companions argue about which of two paths is better. The two companions are based on Scott and Bo Hampton, who drew part of the story. “The First Invention of Armor” is a flashback story about how plate armor is invented. The guest artist is Murphy Anderson. Terry Austin is the collaborator on “Squinteye the Sailor,” in which a young Cerebus meets Popeye and Bluto. The highlight is “Cerebus vs. the Spirit,” a collaboration between Sim and Will Eisner. The two protagonists fight each other and wreck Dolan’s office, but then a man wearing the Octopus’s gloves intervenes to stop the fight, and in the last two panels, we see that this man is Eisner himself. All these stories are good examples of Sim’s classic style from before he went insane. Cerebus Jam was supposed to be a recurring series, but no other issues were published.
TOO MUCH COFFEE MAN #1 (Adhesive, 1993) – “TMCM vs. TMCM” etc., [W/A] Shannon Wheeler. In the first story, a coffee-addicted superhero deals with a copyright infringement claim. The other long story is partly about Shannon Wheeler’s attempts to sell his minicomics, and partly about the deterioration of a relationship. I don’t know if the man in this story is meant to be Wheeler or not. There are also several one-pagers. In one of them, TMCM is asked whether he’d rather work retail or have a nail driven into his hand, and he asks “What kind of nail?” I posted this panel on Facebook and it got a lot of likes. I always assumed Too Much Coffee Man was a dumb gimmick comic, and that was why I never read it, but this issue is surprisingly strong. It’s just as much an autobio comic than a superhero parody, and even the superhero parody parts are quite funny. I plan on looking for the rest of this series.
THUNDERBOLTS #147 (Marvel, 2010) – “Scared Straight with Avengers Academy,” [W] Jeff Parker, [A] Kev Walker. While the Avengers Academy kids are visiting the Raft, the power to the prison goes out, and the Thunderbolts have to prevent a breakout. It so happens that one of the prisoners who breaks out is the Purple Man, and Luke Cage gets the chance to beat the crap out of him. Also, Troll saves Songbird’s life. This issue’s cover suggests that it contains a guest appearance by Avengers Academy, but that’s false advertising: the Academy members only appear in a couple panels, and their part of the story is instead told in issues 3 and 4 of their own title. Still, this issue is quite fun.
2000 AD #528 (Rebellion, 1987) – Anderson: as above. Glenny brings the allegedly dead Orlok back to life, and Anderson realizes Orlok is at the center of the conspiracy. Due to a printing error, pages 2 and 3 of this chapter are printed in reverse order. Rogue Trooper: as above. Rogue kills General Yuan-Toh again, or at least he thinks he does. Dredd: “Reasons to Be Fearful,” [W] John Wagner & Alan Grant, [A] Robin Smith. Guz Hardy, a talk show host who engages in public criticism of the Justice Department, begins to suffer from terrifying hallucinations. He consults a psychiatrist, who tells him that the hallucinations are caused by his unreasonable fear of the Judges. Hardy goes on TV and publicly recants his criticism of the Judges, and his hallucinations stop. Both the hallucinations and the psychiatrist were part of a setup by the Judges, intended to produce exactly this outcome. This story emphasizes the Judges’ anti-democratic, fascistic nature, a theme which is taken up a few issues later in the story about the pro-democracy protest. Mean Team: as above. Another chapter with great art and a dumb story. This chapter introduces a new character who’s a centaur, except instead of being half man and half horse, he has a horse’s entire body with a human’s upper body attached to it. This is unintentionally disturbing. Strontium Dog: as above. Durham Red saves Doc Death from being eaten by a giant snake, but only so she can drink his blood herself.
MIGHTY SAMSON #15 (Gold Key, 1968) – “The Plot of Gold,” [W] Otto Binder, [A] Jack Sparling. Samson’s archenemy Terra is setting herself up as a queen by giving people currency with her face on it, in exchange for their promise of allegiance to her. It’s not entirely clear to me that she’s doing anything wrong. Samson defeats Terra’s plot, but decides that her introduction of currency was a good idea, so he starts producing his own currency. Again, it’s not clear that this is a positive development.
CAT CLAW #1 (Eternity, 1981/1990) – “The Night of the Cat,” [W/A] Bane Kerac. I must have seen this comic many times before, but I assumed it was some dumb bad girl comic. It’s actually a translation of a successful Serbian/Yugoslav comic, about a superheroine with cat powers. Cat Claw has some excellent draftsmanship and storytelling, and the protagonist is a compelling character. Kerac’s black-and-white art reminds me a bit of the art in Australian Phantom comics, though Wikipedia cites Romita as an influence on Kerac. I will definitely read more issues of this series if I find them.
SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN #12 (Marvel, 2013) – “No Escape Part 2: Lockdown,” [W] Dan Slott & Christos Gage, [A] Giuseppe Camuncoli. Peter/Doc Ock, Jonah and some other characters are trapped in the Raft with Alistair Smythe, who hates Peter even more than JJJ does. Also in the Raft are Smythe’s upgraded versions of the Scorpion, the Vulture and Boomerang. Spidey has to decide between fighting the villains and keeping the civilians safe. This is an entertaining issue, but it consists almost entirely of action sequences.
Next trip to Heroes, after three weeks away:
NIGHTWING #105 (DC, 2023) – “You Are Nightwing,” [W] Tom Taylor, [A] Bruno Redondo. This is one of my most anticipated comic books of 2023. It’s another gimmick issue, like #87. The gimmick this time is that the entire issue is depicted through Nightwing’s eyes, so we see everything as Dick sees it, and we never see his face unless it’s reflected in a mirror. This visual strategy was famously used in the film Lady in the Lake, and it’s been used before in comics (including in a story in this year’s Marvel Voices: Spider-Verse #1), but I don’t know of any other comic that’s used first-person perspective as extensively as this one. Taylor and Redondo execute this gimmick with great skill, and they also use this story to provide insight into Nightwing’s character, including his love of Babs and his expert knowledge of Bludhaven’s train system. The plot is that one of the two members of Double Dare is being held captive by an evil pharma bro. Overall this is a fascinating comic that deserves an Eisner nomination for Best Single Issue. My only complaint about it is that the ending is a little anticlimactic.
ONCE UPON A TIME AT THE END OF THE WORLD #6 (Boom!, 2023) – “A Beautiful Fucking World,” [W] Jason Aaron, [A] Leila Del Duca. Having grown a bit older, Maceo and Mezzy succumb to their mutual passion, and they spend most of the issue having lots and lots of sex. They also meet a few other survivors, one of whom becomes their lover as well. Finally they get to the Oasis, which they rename Golgonooza after a city in Blake’s poetry. This is a very sweet love story, although we already know that Maceo and Mezzy aren’t going to get a happily-ever-after ending.
FENCE: REDEMPTION #1 (Boom!, 2023) – untitled, [W] C.S. Pacat, [A] Johanna the Mad. Fence was cancelled as a comic book and was changed to a trade-paperback-only series, but now for some reason Boom has decided to publish it as a comic book instead. I’m glad they did this, because I find it much more convenient to read comic books than trade paperbacks. I have both of the original Fence trade paperbacks, but I’ve only read the first one. That means I’m behind on the story, but I don’t feel I’ve missed anything, because Fence’s plot never advances very much. However, Fence is still a very entertaining story with excellent queer representation, and as a bonus, this issue provides some valuable factual information about fencing, a sport that I’ve always found unwatchable because of its extremely fast pace and complex strategy.
IN HELL WE FIGHT #1 (Image, 2023) – “We All Scream”, [W] John Layman, [A] Jok. In a flashback, Xander Waterford, who hates frogs, is killed by a frog demon and goes to hell. In hell, he joins a group of two other condemned people and one annoying little demon. I asume their ultimate goal is to escape from hell, but during a heist attempt, they accidentally kidnap an angel. John Layman is a very funny writer, and this is a promising debut issue. Jok’s art is reminiscent of Rob Guillory’s, though without all the gags and hidden messages. John Layman has publicly called out Aftershock for screwing him over, and if his accusations are true, then Aftershock deserves to go out of business. I hope Image is treating him better.
TITANS #2 (Image, 2023) – “Out of the Shadows,” [W] Tom Taylor, [A] Nicola Scott. In a flashback, the original Teen Titans are about to capture Brother Blood and his church, but they discover that the Justice League have already beaten them to it. This scene is an anachronism because Brother Blood wasn’t created until after the original Teen Titans broke up, but whatever. In the pressnt, Brother Blood reinvents his cult and makes it more respectable, and he signs up Tempest as a spokesman. Meanwhile, the Titans figure out that Wally West is currently alive, but the corpse belongs to his future self, who traveled back in time to warn the Titans about whatever it was that killed him. I wish this issue had more space devoted to characterization, but I do like Donna and Kory’s conversation about Donna’s leadership role. These characters are two of my favorites, and I love to see them interacting. Besides Nightwing, Titans is the one DC title I’m most excited about, and I’m angry that I have to wait three months for the next issue.
MONEY SHOT COMES AGAIN #2 (Vault, 2023) – untitled, [W] Tim Seeley, [A] Gisele Lagacé. The Money Shot team have sex with the robot versions of Sailor Moon, Captain America, Iron Man, and (awkwardly) Mickey Mouse, and meanwhile, the main villain conspires with Cheryl Blossom. This is another fun and sexy issue. I didn’t realize until now that Tim Seeley was writing this series alone, without Sarah Beattie.
THE GREAT BRITISH BUMP-OFF #3 (Dark Horse, 2023) – “Bloodshed Berry Cheesecake,” [W] John Allison, [A] Max Sarin. Shauna’s fellow contestants accuse her of being the murderer, but she exonerates himself by saving Titus, who’s been poisoned with the same poison as in the previous murders. Also, Shauna bakes a cake based on the film Under the Skin. I enjoyed the novel that this film was based on, but I didn’t realize there was a film. In general this is a funny issue, but there’s nothing about it that especially stands out.
KAYA #9 (Image, 2023) – “In the Poison Lands Chapter 3,” [W/A] Wes Craig. Kaya prays for assistance, and the prayer is answered when one of Jin’s kidnappers, the toothless bald reptile guy, offers to help her find Jin. The monsters and the robot disagree over what to do with Jin. Seth and Muska fight some robots, then split up. This issue has some beautiful art, but it advances the plot only a little.
I HATE THIS PLACE #9 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Kyle Starks, [A] Artyom Topilin. Gabby and Trudy find the doomsday device and try to keep it away from Trudy’s dad. But despite assistance from some infants’ ghosts, they are unable to escape, and Trudy’s dad finds them and demands the device, intending to use it to end the world. He also makes Trudy throw her glasses away so she can’t follow him. Things are looking grim. I really hope Trudy’s dad dies in a painful and humiliating way. Kyle Starks was at Heroes Con as usual, but I didn’t get a chance to talk to him.
BONE ORCHARD: TENEMENT #1 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Jeff Lemire, [A] Andrea Sorrentino. This story focuses on seven different characters living in the same apartment. We’re introduced to each of them individually, but as the story goes on, we begin to see connections between them. One of them, an old man, apparently dies after giving to another of them, a young boy, a key that unlocks the building’s dark secret. The only obvious connection to the previous Bone Orchard series is that the boy is reading a book by Trish Reed, the co-protagonist of that series. In its emphasis on different people living in the same apartment, this comic reminds me of Sandman: A Doll’s House, or possibly Georges Perec’s novel Life: A User’s Manual, although I haven’t read that book.
NOCTERRA #15 (Image, 2023) – “No Brakes Part 4: Why?”, [W] Scott Snyder, [A] Tony Daniel. Emory comes up with a complicated plan to defeat Nox and Blacktop Bill and restore light to the world. It seems to work, but then Bill captures Emory. There’s also a flashback sequence, but it only occupies a few pages. I wonder if this series’ next issue will be its last.
SECOND COMING: TRINITY #3 (Ahoy, 2023) – untitled, [W] Mark Russell, [A] Richard Pace. In a flashback, the young Jesus abuses his powers by killing another child, then bringing him back to life. When Jesus’s neighbors grow terrified of him, he removes their mouths and turns them into sheep. Finally he realizes that he wants to make people love him and not fear him. This portrayal of Jesus is quite different from traditional accounts of Jesus’s childhood, which tend to show him as having been perfect from the start. Meanwhile, Sunstar has to save a fellow superhero from a supervillain, and he stops the villain from escaping by throwing the baby at him. It’s fine because the baby is invulnerable – as a further demonstration of this, he spends much of the issue playing with a sparking toaster.
ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN: JON KENT #4 (DC, 2023) – “Countdown to Injustice Chapter 4: Heightened Doubt,” [W] Tom Taylor, [A] Darick Robertson. Jon meets the underground resistance to the Justice League, which includes Batman, Luthor, Catwoman and Harley Quinn. Harley provides some comic relief, which is helpful since this series is rather grim. Jon is still not sure whether to trust the Justice League, so he consults the one person he knows he can trust: Jay Nakamura. But after Jay confirms Jon’s suspicions about the League, he’s attacked by Damien, who is fanatically devoted to Superman. This is my least favorite of Tom Taylor’s three current DC titles, but it’s still excellent.
BLACK PANTHER #1 (Marvel, 2023) – “Reign at Dusk Part 1,” [W] Eve Ewing, [A] Chris Allen. T’Challa has been exiled from Wakanda, but he remains in the country illegally. At the moment he’s hiding out in the city of Birnin T’Chaka. Here T’Challa meets a philanthropic lawyer, N’yobi Umaru, and discovers the existence of some sort of criminal underground, but it’s clear that T’Challa doesn’t quite understand what’s going on in Birnin T’Chaka, and neither does the reader. Deathlok makes an appearance at the very end. This issue explores a part of Wakanda and a social class of Wakandans that have been absent from previous Black Panther series, and it sets up a compelling story. I didn’t like either of the previous two Black Panther runs, by Ta-Nehisi Coates and Geoffrey Thorne, but this series has the potential to be much better than either of them. Chris Allen does some nice Afrofuturist art, and Eve Ewing’s writing displays her knowledge of African culture – for example, there’s a quotation from the Ugandan poet Okot p’Bitek.
WILD’S END #1 (Boom!, 2023) – “Expected Later,” [W] Dan Abnett, [A] I.N.J. Culbard. Like Fence, Wild’s End was most recently published as an original trade paperback, but now it’s back in single-issue form. This new miniseries introduces a new group of characters, the crew of a fishing boat from the village of Gullstone Harbour. While out at sea, they discover they’re not getting any communications from the shore, and they return home to find the village empty. I was kind of disappointed that this issue didn’t include any of the characters from previous story arcs, but the new characters are interesting. An especially compelling character is the fisherwoman who expects to inherit the boat, only to discover that she’s going to be passed over for the owner’s incompetent grandson.
BATGIRLS #19 (DC, 2023) – “From Hell’s Heart Finale,” [W] Becky Cloonan & Michael Conrad, [A] Robbi Rodriguez. The Batgirls defeat the snipers, who turn out to be Gunhawk and Gunbunny, except Gunbunny is really Assisi from the Saints. The injured cameraman makes a full recovery, and the series ends happily. I’m going to miss Batgirls, and I’m sad it was cancelled, but sadly, cancellation is the inevitable fate of most corporate-owned comics.
SPIDER-MAN #9 (Marvel, 2023) – “Maxed Out Part 2: Spider-Sensitivity Training,” [W] Dan Slott, [A] Mark Bagley. Norman Osborn offers to cure Peter’s heightened spider-sense, but Peter refuses his help because he has to attend a family dinner, and then he has to run out on dinner because his spider-sense is driving him nuts. Then Peter finds himself fighting Electro and his henchmen, even though he can barely concentrate. Spider-Boy only appears in a few pages. A be humorous moment is when Peter wonders why his spider-sense is warning him that Electro’s henchmen are in danger, and then he realizes it’s because the henchmen are in danger from him.
STARSIGNS #2 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Saladin Ahmed, [A] Megan Levens. Rana runs from Tatiana and meets another starsign, Clarence, who has shapeshifting powers. We also meet another Starsign, an undocumented immigrant child from Guatemala, whose powers manifest while he’s being interrogated by ICE. As noted in my review of #1, this comic is a lot like The Wicked + The Divine, but what makes it different is that most of the protagonists are marginalized people. The sequence with the Guatemalan family reminds me of the Image comic Home.
FANTASTIC FOUR #8 (Marvel, 2023) – “If Memory Serves…!”, [W] Ryan North, [A] Ivan Fiorelli. Sue and Alicia explore their new town and explore a woman named Cathy. A few hours later they discover that Cathy has vanished, and no one else remembers she existed. And on returning home, they find that the same thing has happened to Reed and Ben. Johnny thinks that the other two members of the FF are Alicia and “Flame-O,” Johnny’s flame duplicate. The solution to this mystery is that a monster named Xargorr is abducting the missing people and making them serve him. Xargorr looks like a classic Kirby or Ditko monster, but this is his first appearance. Ryan North’s FF is probably my favorite current Marvel title, other than She-Hulk, which seems headed for cancellation. It offers a completely different type of storytelling from any previous FF run, and that’s a good thing. North’s stories feel more like sitcoms or little mysteries than epic adventures. I also like this issue’s emphasis on Sue and Alicia’s friendship. These characters have been appearing together for sixty years, yet they’ve never interacted all that much. Another cool thing in this issue is its explanation of mathematical objects called scutoids. The information about scutoids in this issue is accurate, as is all the scientific information in Ryan North’s comics.
COPRA #45 (Copra, 2023) – “Mistake Theatre,” [W/A] Michel Fiffe. Copra continues its battle with Count Compota (Count Vertigo) and his hired guns, who include Roger X (Green Arrow), Skullpusher (Nightmaster?), Detention (Hawkgirl) and Mallo Grim (Firestorm?). This issue’s main action sequence is full of great art, but the graphic highlight of the issue is the psychic conversation between the Shade and Clea characters. This sequence is illustrated with a series of amorphous mental images that are close to abstract art. I talked to Michel Fiffe a couple times at Heroes Con.
PHANTOM ROAD #4 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Jeff Lemire, [A] Gabriel Hernandez Walta. While the driver, Dom, stops to rest, the passenger, Birdie, tries to smash the mysterious object in the trailer, but she only succeeds in summoning a horde of zombies. Meanwhile, Agent Weaver is interrogated by a ski-masked man, then she frees herself and discovers a file of information on something called Project Jackknife. We also learn a bit more about Dom and Birdie’s pasts, but it’s clear that they’re each concealing something.
AGAR V1 (Dargaud, 1974) – “Les Jouets Maléfiques,” [W] Claude Moliterni, [A] Robert Gigi. I hadn’t heard of this when I ordered it, but another book by the same creative team, “Orion le laveur de planètes,” was included on JM Lofficer’s list of his top 100 European comics. I no longer have access to that list, but I’ve reconstructed most of it from memory. In Agar, a planet is invaded by evil alien toys, and only one young prince manages to escape. He reaches another planet that’s been invaded by the same aliens, and there he encounters a girl his age. The two of them team up against the evil toymaker who created the toys. Agar is not at the same level as the other French comics I’ve read lately. It does have a compelling dreamlike atmosphere, as well as some great coloring, but Gigi’s draftsmanship is rather minimal, and in general this comic feels generic and forgettable. There are two other volumes of Agar, but I’m in no hurry to read them.
VOID RIVALS #1 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Robert Kirkman, [A] Lorenzo De Felici. This is one of the hottest comics of the year because it includes an unannounced Transformers appearance, and it’s therefore the first comic in Image’s new Hasbro multiverse. The specific character who appears is the Autobot Jetfire. However, Jetfire’s appearance is incidental to the plot. The main plot is about two aliens belonging to warring tribes, who land on the same planet and discover that they look nearly alike. I’m undecided on whether I want to continue reading this series. I didn’t order issue 1, but I bought it off the shelf because I was curious if the hype was justified.
ARCADE KINGS #2 (Image, 2023) – “Beef Brawl Blues!”, [W/A] Dylan Burnett. Joe visits an arcade in a run-down neighborhood, and he gets in a fight with a purple-haired girl who really hates Vic McMax. Then Joe is attacked by another of Vic’s agents, Minerva. Joe and the purple girl defeat Minerva, but she gives Joe a clue to his brother’s location. This is a really fun series with great art and coloring.
THE FLASH #800 (DC, 2023) – “Don’t Come to Central City,” [W] Jeremy Adams, [A] Fernando Pasarin, etc. In their last Flash story, Adams and Pasarin depict a conversation between various villains about why they don’t commit crimes in Central City. This story is disappointing: it tells us why Wally is a great superhero, rather than showing us, and it doesn’t include Wally’s supporting cast. Jeremy Adams’s Flash was by far the best Flash comic since Mark Waid’s first run, but it deserved a better ending. The highlight of the issue is the Impulse story by Mark Waid and Todd Nauck. It takes place between Impulse #6 and #7, and it’s a cute tribute to a comic I loved as a kid. Too bad Humberto Ramos couldn’t have drawn it. The next two stories, written by Joshua Williamson and Geoff Johns, are forgettable. The last story, by Si Spurrier, is offensively bad. Wally and Linda go out for their first date since Wade’s birth, and Wally promises not to use his powers. But every time Linda looks away for even a moment, Wally runs off to deal with an emergency. This story is an insult to Wally’s character. Spurrier tells us that Wally lies to his wife and breaks his promises to her, and that Wally is such a workaholic that he can’t give his wife his undivided attention for one lousy evening. The low point of this story is when Linda cries a tear of happiness, and Wally thinks “That’ll take at least half a second to wipe” and runs off. When did Wally become such a heartless asshole? Also, as Ray Goldfield pointed out on my Facebook wall, Spurrier portrays Linda as a stereotypical nagging wife. Spurrier’s story erases all the character development Wally and Linda received in Jeremy Adams’s run. It’s also heavily focused on horror, which is the thing Spurrier is best at, but it’s not what the Flash is supposed to be about. This story has killed my interest in Spurrier’s upcoming Flash run. I might buy it off the shelf, but I’m not going to order it.
POISON IVY #13 (DC, 2023) – untitled, [W] G. Willow Wilson, [A] Marcio Takara et al. Poison Ivy has just returned to Gotham. In three separate sequences drawn by different artists, she meets up with Catwoman, Batman and Killer Croc. In the last sequence, she promises Croc that she’ll help him stop a luxury building project, but when she gets to the construction site, she discovers a corpse with a flower on its face. I guess we’re supposed to assume the Floronic Man is the killer? This is a pretty uneventful issue.
I HATE FAIRYLAND #6 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Skottie Young, [A] Brett Bean. Back in Fairyland, Gert meets her old guide Larry and his new child companion, Tommy. On learning that Tommy is a were-poodle, Gert kills him (off-panel). The ruling council of Fairyland decide to prevent any further such antics by having Gert assassinated, but she kills all the assassins who are sent against her. In desperation, King Cloudius decides that to get rid of Gert, he’s going to hire the only person as awful as her: Gert herself, in a number of alternate versions. On the first day of Heroes Con I wore a Spider-Man/Venom T-shirt with artwork by Skottie. I got some compliments on the shirt, and I saw other people wearing the same shirt. I eventually talked to Skottie and told him that the shirt was a hit.
ROGUE SUN #13 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Ryan Parrott, [A] Abel & Marco Renna. Caleb, in Dylan’s body, deals with the aftermath of Reggie’s death. Dylan tries to get a villain, Demonika, to help him regain control of his own body from Caleb, but it doesn’t work. When Dylan promises to torture Caleb until he gets his body back, Caleb banishes Dylan to the afterlife, where he meets his own father. All three Rogue Suns – Caleb, Marcus and Dylan – are awful people in different ways, but at least Dylan is trying to be better.
GROOT #2 (Marvel, 2023) – untitled, [W] Dan Abnett, [A] Damian Couceiro. Captain So-Lar is killed by the Spoilers, and Private Mar-Vell has to promote himself to the brevet rank of captain, so he’s Captain Mar-Vell now. Also he teams up with a woman from Yondu’s race. This issue is okay, but it’s more a Captain Marvel story than a Groot story.
HAIRBALL #3 (Dark Horse, 2023) – untitled, [W] Matt Kindt, [A] Tyler Jenkins. Anna burns down her aunt’s barn to try to kill the Cat, but that doesn’t work. Then she tries to kill the cat using magic, but even that fails. Finally, Anna realizes that Bestie was trying to help her rather than torture her, and she decides to find Bestie again using the cat’s microchip. Hairball is my favorite of Matt Kindt’s recent projects, though its use of photostatted panels is unfortunate. I don’t think I got to talk to Matt Kindt at Heroes Con. Sheesh, next year I need to do a better job of making sure I at least say hi to people.
THE VIGIL #2 (DC, 2023) – “Weather Warning,” [W] Ram V, [A] Lalit Kumar Sharma. Another generic story about secret-agent superheroes, with an unmemorable plot. Again, the fact that this story is set in India has no real impact on the plot or characters, although I do like how the narrator mentions “Raag Malhar” without explaining what it is. So far, this is the worst of the three current Asian-themed DC titles.
THE FLASH #781 (DC, 2022) – “All Pedal, No Brakes,” [W] Jeremy Adams, [A] Fernando Pasarin. While Ace is in class at Titans Academy, Wally signs him out because of an emergency, but the “emergency” is that Wally’s favorite ice cream shop in Argentina is closing. Ace is lonesome for Barry, who’s vanished for some reason, and Wally comforts Ace by telling him about his own relationship with Barry. Then Wally and Ace have some more adventures, and the issue ends as they’re about to fight Girder. Ace was originally supposed to be the New 52 version of Wally, so when the original Wally came back, Ace became redundant. However, Jeremy Adams made him an interesting character in his own right. The ice cream shop sequence seems like it must be an in-joke from one of the creators, but neither Adams nor Pasarin is from Argentina.
NINJAK #2 (Valiant, 2021) – “Daylight Part 2,” [W] Jeff Parker, [A] Javier Pulido. Ninjak and his friend Gale fight three supervillains. This issue’s plot isn’t particularly memorable, but its artwork is beautiful. Javier Pulido’s linework is so sparse that his pages look like they’re from a coloring book, but his page layouts are dynamic and groundbreaking. This Ninjak miniseries was the final good comic published by the current incarnation of Valiant. It’s a pity that Valiant ruined Javier Pulido’s last issue by getting someone else to redraw it. Also, this issue includes eight pages of unnecessary bonus material that are inserted between the two halves of a two-page splash, interrupting a number of panels.
THE WALKING DEAD #109 (Image, 2013) – untitled, [W] Robert Kirkman, [A] Charlie Adlard. Glenn’s pregnant girlfriend Maggie mourns at his grave. Rick tries to get the other people in Ezekiel’s community to join him in an attack on Negan, but then Maggie realizes that Rick has already been betrayed by one of Negan’s spies. This issue is mostly about the internal politics of Rick and Ezekiel’s groups, and Negan doesn’t appear in it.
HELL TO PAY #5 (Image, 2023) – “The Shrouded College Book 1,” [W] Charles Soule, [A] Will Sliney. Somehow I missed issue 4. At this point Sebastian is still in captivity, and the Shrouded College refuses to give Maia any further help in saving him. Maia frees Alexander the Great and gets his reluctant assistance. In a flashback, we see how the Qurrakh were used to help De Beers control the diamond market. I’ve often heard that diamonds are inherently worthless, and what this means is that the available supply of diamonds is far greater than the demand, so the price of diamonds is kept high by limiting production. However, I also learned in school that De Beers had a monopoly on diamonds, and this stopped being true around 2000.
SUPERMAN #5 (DC, 2023) – “The Power of Love,” [W] Joshua Williamson, [A] Jamal Campbell. Superman battles Silver Banshee, only to discover that Jimmy has fallen in love with her. Also, Luthor is murdered in prison, and we encounter two other villains who I assume are Blaze and Lord Satanis. I was on the verge of dropping this series, but after this issue I’ve decided to continue reading it. Jimmy and Silver Banshee’s romance is cute, and this issue, unlike the first four, is actually fun. However, this series’s art is still too dark, and there are still too many scenes set at night. Superman is supposed to operate in daylight.
DAREDEVIL #12 (DC, 2023) – “The Red Fist Saga Part 12,” [W] Chip Zdarsky, [A] Marco Checchetto. Matt decides he can only destroy the Beast by committing suicide and going to hell. Elektra tries to stop him, but fails. Matt dies and goes to hell, where his guide is his father, Jack Murdock. Over the course of this volume Matt has become a steadily less sympathetic character, and by now he’s more of a villain than a hero. I’m glad Chip’s run is ending, because it’s hard to see where he could go from here.
SHAZAM! #2 (DC, 2023) – “Meet the Captain! Chapter 2,” [W] Mark Waid, [A] Dan Mora. The Psycho-Pirate appears in town and tries to steal the Mona Lisa. Billy captures the Psycho-Pirate, but in the process he causes massive property damage and destroys some valuable paintings. Also, he discovers that the Psycho-Pirate was not to blame for his erratic behavior, as he had assumed. I’ve lost some confidence in Mark Waid’s writing, but Shazam! is perfectly suited to his talents. I especially love this issue’s opening scene, where a monocled, top-hatted dinosaur knocks on Billy’s door and gives him a stack of paperwork to fill out. Such a deadpan depiction of an absurd situation is very much in the vein of the classic Captain Marvel stories.
TRAVELING TO MARS #6 (Ablaze, 2023) – untitled, [W] Mark Russell, [A] Roberto Dakar Meli. In a flashback, Roy meets his future wife when they’re both working at a pet store, and she quits rather than murder some unwanted rabbits. In the present, Roy defeats the other pursuing spaceships in an outer space battle. This is not as exciting as it sounds, as all Roy needs to do to win is change the other spaceships’ trajectories, since they have only the bare minimum amount of fuel. I like Traveling to Mars, but it seems like it could have been completed in half the number of issues. Also, I hate the ten-page previews at the end of each issue. They’re just a pointless waste of space.
GREEN LANTERN #2 (DC, 2023) – “Nice Guys Finish First,” [W] Jeremy Adams, [A] Xermanico. Hal fights the Demolition Team, hangs out with Kilowog, and meddles with Carol’s current relationship. Adams’s version of Hal is a rather unappealing character. He doesn’t know how to do anything except fly planes, and his behavior toward Carol constitutes sexual harassment and stalking. The John Stewart backup stories are potentially more interesting, but they’re not written by Adams. I’m close to dropping this series.
EDGE OF SPIDER-VERSE #3 (Marvel, 2023) – Spider-Boy: “Nobody Knows Who You Are,” [W] Dan Slott, [A] Humberto Ramos. In his first solo story, Spider-Boy reveals his real face and his real name, Barry Briggs. He also visits the FEAST center and befriends a girl named Christina, who has incurred the enmity of Mr. Negative and his ninjas. This is a cute story. Spider-Smasher: “Hermanita,” [W] David Betancourt, [A] Julian Shaw. Spider-Smasher is the older version of Billie, from Saladin Ahmed’s last Miles Morales storyline. In this issue she teams up with Cardiac and a new character named Gata Negra. This story heavily emphasizes Billie’s Dominican ancestry. David Betancourt is himself of Puerto Rican descent.
ANIMAL CASTLE VOL. 2 #2 (Ablaze, 2023) – untitled, [W] Xavier Dorison, [A] Felix Delep. The animals are now using daisies as a symbol for their nonviolent protest, but Silvio starts imprisoning any animal who wears a daisy. In response, the animals start training in the same tactics used by the American civil rights movement. The subplot in this issue is that Miss Bengalore is gradually becoming alienated from her children, now that Caesar is babysitting them full-time. Animal Castle might be the single best comic currently being published in the American comic book format, but I’m always reluctant to read it because it’s such a brutal depiction of tyranny. Ironically, while I’m not well informed about the current French protests, it seems like the protesters are complaining about the same type of police brutality that Silvio’s dogs represent.
TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES #140 (IDW, 2023) – untitled, [W] Sophie Campbell, [A] Gavin Smith. After Armageddon Game, Mutant Town is no longer walled off from the rest of New York, and the Turtles are unsure if they have a purpose anymore. Also, a serial killer has been going around murdering mutants. When Raphael (it’s no surprise that it’s him) storms off after an argument with his brothers, he finds the corpse of the serial killer’s latest victim and is mistaken for the killer. This is a strong issue that’s mostly focused on characterization. Now that Armageddon Game is over, I hope we will get more issues like this, and fewer issues that are wasted on irrelevant crossover plots.
SPIDER-MAN: INDIA #1 (Marvel, 2023) – “Seva Part 1,” [W] Nikesh Shukla, [A] Abhishek Malsuni. Pavitr Prabhakar is subjected to an experiment by Dr. Kumar, the Indian version of the Lizard. The other plot is that Giri Sahib, who appears to be based on the Kingpin, is trying to demolish Pavitr’s neighborhood. This feels like a much more Indian-focused comic than Vigil – not in the sense that it’s pandering to Indian readers or promoting stereotypes of India, but in the sense that its story and characterization wouldn’t be the same without its Indian setting. A high point of this issue is the panel where Peter, Miles and Pavitr are eating dosas. Dosas are perhaps my favorite Indian food, although I’ve stopped eating them lately because I’m trying to cut back on carbs. Seva is the Hindu and Sikh value of altruistic service without a reward.
MISS TRUESDALE AND THE FALL OF HYPERBOREA #2 (Dark Horse, 2023) – untitled, [W] Mike Mignola, [A] Jesse Lonergan. I can’t follow this comic’s plot; I feel like you have to have read all the Hellboyverse comics to understand any of them. Also, this comic feels like a generic Hellboy story, and it doesn’t allow Jesse Lonergan to truly showcase his talents. I’m only going to finish reading it because I love Jesse Lonergan’s work.
OLD DOG #5 (Image, 2023) – “Leviathan,” [W/A] Declan Shalvey. Old Dog discovers that his daughter, Rottweiler, has been trained as a replacement for him. Meanwhile, Rottweiler fights some sort of giant amorphous monster. The depictions of the monster are beautifully gruesome. This entire issue seems to be composed of two-page compositions, where each panel tier goes across both the left- and the right-hand page. Sometimes this is hard to detect, and I found myself reading some pages in the wrong order. It looks like I never got Old Dog #4.
SPIRIT WORLD #2 (DC, 2023) – “Remembrance,” [W] Alyssa Wong, [A] Haining. Xanthe is reunited with their estranged family, but their relatives insist on deadnaming them. Xanthe’s mother tries to use a binding talisman on them, but it doesn’t work because it has their old name on it. This sequence seems very authentic, though I can’t tell if it is or not. Also, Cassandra Cain visits a spirit neighborhood that looks a bit like the bathhouse in Spirited Away. I really like the characters in this series, but its plot is hard to remember.
FIRE POWER #3 (Image, 2020) – untitled, [W] Robert Kirkman, [A] Chris Samnee. This series is a guilty pleasure for me. It has excellent action sequences and reasonably good characterization, but as I complain every time I review it, it’s also culturally appropriative. In this issue, the protagonist works at a furniture store and tells a client a made-up story about how vases can be identified. Also he trains his kids in kung fu. One unusual thing about this series, like Jeremy Adams’s Flash, is that the protagonist is already married with a family.
THOR #189 (Marvel, 1971) – “The Icy Touch of Death!”, [W] Stan Lee, [A] John Buscema. Hela has condemned Thor to die, and in order to save himself, Thor has to remain in his Donald Blake form. Odin sends Volstagg to Earth – perhaps the only time anyone has ever needed Volstagg for anything – in order to tell Thor what’s going on. But Hela manifests on Earth, wearing a very stylish coat and fur hat, and puts some innocent people in danger, forcing Thor to resume his Asgardian form. This story feels generic and repetitive, like much of Stan’s Thor run, but Buscema’s art is quite good.
DAMAGE CONTROL #3 (Marvel, 1990) – “If You Picket, It’ll Never Heal!”, [W] Dwayne McDuffie, [A] Ernie Colón. Damage Control’s staff are on strike, probably due to the corporate takeover in issue 1. The protagonists have to cross the picket line because they’re management, and their awful new boss orders them to use scab workers to move Avengers Mansion to a new location. In a separate plot, She-Hulk has to repair the damaged Daily Bugle building despite harassment from some robots or battlesuits. The robots turn out to have been created by a disgruntled Damage Control employee. This was during the period when She-Hulk knew she was in a comic book, so her scenes are full of fourth-wall-breaking moments, and there’s an awesome joke that involves a lot of setup, about how when you break the fourth wall, the whole structure collapses.
BLOOD TREE #5 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W] Peter Tomasi, [A] Maxim Simic. The killer visits a prison and murders a number of visitors by poisoning the water cooler. Then he forces other murderers’ relatives to jump off the Empire State Building’s observation deck. Then he proceeds to the hotel where all the other potential victims are being held. Gee, what could possibly go wrong with putting all the possible murder victims in the same place? Blood Tree is an excellent piece of psychological horror, but Maxim Simic’s artwork is unexciting.
SANDMAN UNIVERSE: NIGHTMARE COUNTRY – THE GLASS HOUSE #3 (Vertigo, 2023) – untitled, [W] James Tynion IV, [A] Lisandro Estherren. Lucien gives the Corinthian the book that Max hasn’t yet written. Max meets the Corinthian and Madison, who’s still a cat. Azazel tries to tempt the Corinthian into betraying Morpheus. Max goes to work carrying Madison in a backpack, but he’s kidnapped and held in a room along with Jamie Tyler, who’s actually Thessaly. This series is less appealing than Tynion’s other current works because of its overly complicated plot.
BLACK’S MYTH: THE KEY TO HIS HEART #1 (Ahoy, 2023) – untitled, [W] Eric Palicki, [A] Wendell Cavalcanti. The subtitle does not appear in the indicia. Strummer’s new relationship is getting serious. A woman hires Strummer to find her missing daughter Claire, who ran away with her loser boyfriend so she could lose her V-card. Strummer finds Claire and shows her the power of her virginity by demonstrating that Claire can see unicorns. In order to avoid connotations of slut-shaming or purity culture, the writer has Strummer say that virginity is a mental state rather than a physical condition. Strummer also discovers that Claire is a half-demon, and hires Claire as her new intern. The issue ends with Strummer getting a letter from Rainsford Black, the villain of the previous series. I liked the first volume of Black’s Myth, and this sequel seems like a strong follow-up.
WONDER WOMAN #800 (DC, 2023) – “Whatever Happened to the Warrior of Truth? Part 2,” [W] Becky Cloonan & Michael W. Conrad, [A] various. Several different characters dream about Diana, including Yara Flor, Donna Troy, Cassie Sandsmark, Artemis, Batman, and Superman. (Let me point out here that Diana and Donna’s relationship has always been awkward, because Donna and Diana were originally supposed to be the same character at different ages, and there was never really a period of time when Wonder Girl was Wonder Woman’s sidekick. But this is a complicated topic.) This story has some excellent guest artwork, especially in the sequence by Jen Bartel. However, this story barely has a plot at all, and the fact that it’s named after “Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?” is an insult to Moore and Swan’s story. The backup feature in Wonder Woman #800 is the first appearance of Trinity, Wonder Woman’s daughter, who will appear in Tom King’s upcoming run. I’ve been steadily losing interest in Tom King’s work, and his story in this issue doesn’t do anything to convince me to read his Wonder Woman.
BATMAN #136 (DC, 2023) – “Dusk to Dawn,” [W] Chip Zdarsky, [A] Belén Ortega. Having returned from the other dimension, Batman checks out what’s been going on with his enemies, particularly the Penguin Twins. He also has an uncomfortable meeting with Catwoman. At 5 AM, Batman goes to Wayne Manor to investigate an alarm, only to discover that the Robins and Batgirls are throwing him a surprise party. This is an adorable moment, perhaps the high point of Zdarsky’s run so far. There’s also a Zur-En-Arrh backup story with art by Jorge Corona, who’s gotten really good.
NEW MUTANTS: LETHAL LEGION #4 (Marvel, 2023) – “When I Was a Lad,” [W] Charlie Jane Anders, [A Enid Balám. I received both #3 and #4 of this series at the same time, and I read them in the wrong order. That’s why #4 was rather confusing. As of the end of #3, the New Mutants are being chased by Count Nefaria and Moonstone, and Shela and Morgan are having a fallout. This issue includes some funny moments, such as Moonstone singing “When I Was a Lad” from HMS Pinafore. For overall thoughts on this series, see my review of #3 below.
CAPTAIN MARVEL #50 (Marvel, 2023) – “Marvelous,” [W] Kelly Thompson, [A] Javier Pina & David Lopez. Carol deals with her grief for Binary by battling some aliens, and then there’s a huge party at her house. Kamala Khan attends the party, even though she’s supposed to be dead. At the end of the issue, Dr. Strange takes Carol to the Bar with No Doors so she can visit Scarlet Witch. This scene is a callback to the earlier trial storyline. I think Kelly Thompson has written more Carol Danvers stories than any other writer, and her run was generally successful, but it had both an unpromising start and an anticlimactic finish. I didn’t care enough about Binary to feel any grief for her, and she was also very similar to Singularity. In addition, I’m disappointed that we didn’t get to see the Snats and Snatmen one last time.
LOVE EVERLASTING #8 (Image, 2023) – “Too Hip for Love,” [W] Tom King, [A] Elsa Charretier. Joan gets out of the insane asylum and returns to her normal, boring life, in which it’s always 1963. She considers suicide, but decides against it. Nothing much happens in this issue, but that’s kind of the point.
YOUNG ROMANCE #167 (Dc, 1970) – “A Million Laughs in Every Kiss,” [W] Jack Miller, [A] Tony DeZuñiga. Nan agrees to marry Tom on one condition: that he stop playing cruel pranks on her. Tom breaks this boundary, but he finally tells Nan why he’s compelled to play pranks, and she forgives him. Tony DeZuniga’s art on this story is dynamic and modern-looking, and certainly much better than the rest of the art in this issue. However, DeZuniga is the second of the two 2023 Hall of Fame inductees who I disagree with. Number one, he was notorious for exploiting his fellow Filipino artists, and number two, Alfredo Alcala and Nestor Redondo ought to go into the Hall of Fame first (Alex Niño is already in). This issue’s other stories are generic, although one of them is part of an ongoing story arc, something which is rare in romance comics. What really infuriated me about this issue is the advice column, in which “B. Roscoe” complains that a classmate is sexually harassing her. “Laura Penn” (actually Carol Fein) says that she sounds conceited, and that she should go out with him once and give him a chance. It’s appalling that in 1970, when second-wave feminism was already a thing, girls were still being given such awful advice. And fifty years later, girls are still being taught that they shouldn’t complain about sexual harassment, or even that they should be flattered by it.
THE WALKING DEAD #112 (Image, 2013) – untitled, [W] Robert Kirkman, [A] Charlie Adlard. Negan murders a man named Spencer, in violation of his agreement with Rick. When Rick complains about this, Negan makes another smug, unrepentant speech. Rick arranges an assassination attempt on Negan, only to discover that Negan has anticipated this and has planned around it. As stated in my review of #100, Negan is such an infuriating, horrible man that it’s kind of unfun to read about him. It’s also disappointing that he’s still alive at the end of both the comic book and the TV show.
2000 AD #529 (IPC, 1987) – Anderson: “Hour of the Wolf,” [W] John Wagner & Alan Grant, [A] Barry Kitson. Glenny and Orlok escape from Justice Department. Anderson wakes up and tries to locate Orlok, but Glenny is blocking her telepathy. Rogue Trooper: “Hit One,” [W] Simon Geller, [A] Steve Dillon. Rogue discovers that the most recent Yuan-Toh he killed was yet another double. Dredd: “Fairlyhyperman!”, [W] Wagner & Grant, [A] Mike Collins. Fairlyhyperman, a Superman parody, arrives in Mega-City One and tries to take over for Dredd as the local superhero. Dredd is not happy with this idea. This is a very funny story. Mean Team: untitled, [W] Alan Hebden, [A] Massimo Belardinelli. Jack is told that he and Emerald Eyes are not human. Strontium Dog: “Bitch Part 25,” [W] Alan Grant, [A] Carlos Ezquerra. Johnny Alpha drugs Durham Red so she can’t steal his half of the bounty, then returns Reagan to 1987. Reagan promptly falls asleep. This whole storyline was very funny. It’s an even better Reagan parody than Captain America #344.
IRON MAN #1 facsimile (Marvel, 1968/2023) – “Alone Against A.I.M.!”, [W] Archie Goodwin, [A] Gene Colan. Iron Man fights AIM and their leader Mordius, not to be confused with Morbius. Mordius dies at the end of the story, and has never appeared again. This story is mostly action scenes, though there is a brief subplot with Jasper Sitwell and Whitney Frost. The backup story is a retelling of Iron Man’s origin. Overall this is an adequate first issue, but it’s rather generic.
DEAD SEAS 6 (IDW, 2023) – untitled, [W] Cavan Scott, [A] Nick Brokenshire. The bad ghost reveals itself as Isa’s mother. The ghosts of the dead crew members intervene to save Isa and the other good guys, but the brown-haired bearded guy is killed. Afterward, Isa visits the guy’s daughter, and his ghost manifests to say goodbye to her. This issue’s ending is too upbeat and happy for such a grim horror comic. Also, Dead Seas had way too many characters, and as this review demonstrates, I couldn’t remember any of their names. I only know the name Isa because I mentioned it in my review of #5.
FLASH #789 (DC, 2023) – “Ordered Mind,” [W] Jeremy Adams, [A] Fernando Pasarin. Wally and his family are reunited with their old friend Piper Hartley. Wally, Piper and the family investigate why the mayor has been working with the Rogues. After some fighting, Wally figures out that the mayor is possessed by a Lord of Order, and convinces the Lord of Order to back off. This is another very cute story. Jeremy Adams got to write the Flash for thirty issues, which is a long run these days, but he should have been allowed to keep going as long as he wanted.
IMMORTAL X-MEN #12 (Marvel, 2023) – “Steel Yourself,” [W] Kieron Gillen, [A] Lucas Werneck. This issue’s POV character is Colossus. Peter is somehow enslaved by a telepathic “writer,” who is in turn enslaved by Peter’s brother Mikhail. The writer forces Peter to collaborate in Sebastian Shaw’s plot, which involves voting Selene onto the Quiet Council. Also, Mystique is somehow manipulated into murdering Destiny, though Irene comes right back to life. This issue is depressing to read because it depicts the complete breakdown of trust between the Quiet Council members. Also, Peter can’t do anything to reveal his mind control to anyone else, even his “big sister” Storm.
THE X-CELLENT #3 (Marvel, 2023) – “Unsocial Media Part 3,” [W] Peter Milligan, [A] Mike Allred. The X-Cellent’s reputation continues to deteriorate. Toodle Pip and Mirror Girl conspire with Dox to assassinate Zeitgeist, but he seduces Mirror Girl and murders Toodle Pip. This issue is okay, but I’ve always found it hard to care about the characters in Milligan’s X-Force/X-Statix/X-Cellent. They tend to be unsympathetic, and they also keep getting killed left and right.
THE X-CELLENT #4 – as above. As he nears the magic number of one billion followers, Zeitgeist starts to turn into a god. He also murders Dox, now that he no longer needs him. I really want to see Zeitgeist die. He’s a complete monster.
XIMO #1 (Oni, 2023) – “Hue,” [W] Melissa Flores, [A] Daniel Irizarri, etc. A blind man gets experimental ocular implants, but they cause him to see monsters that no one else can see. I haven’t heard of this artist, but his art and coloring on this story are very good. “Rabbit Trap,” [W] Jordan Thomas, [A] Shaky Kane. A xenophobic man thinks his neighbors are Communists, but discovers that they’re actually aliens. “She Took the Air,” [W/A] Phil Hester. This story compresses so much information into such a short space that it’s impossible to understand. “The Chip,” [W] Chris Condon, [A] Nick Cagnetti. A professional video gamer is implanted with a virtual reality chip. It causes him to murder several people, and finally he fatally injures himself while trying to take the chip out. None of these stories really stood out in terms of its writing, but all the artwork was quite good. I got to meet Nick Cagnetti at Heroes Con.
NEW MUTANTS: LETHAL LEGION #3 – as above. The mutants infiltrate Count Nefaria’s compound for some reason, and they get away with a McGuffin device called the Weird Engine. But then the Lethal Legion arrive, accompanied by their new member Moonstone, and demand it back. It’s weird how some of the original Thunderbolts are still known by their Thunderbolt codenames – for example, Songbird is always called that and not Screaming Mimi – but Moonstone is always referred to by her original name and not as Meteorite. The humorous moments in this series are very funny, but Anders seems to have difficulty deciding on the proper balance between humor and more serious themes, such as Shela and Morgan’s relationship. Anders’s transitions between funny and serious scenes are sometimes rather abrupt.
X-MEN RED #12 (Marvel, 2023) – “Genesis is Here,” [W] Al Ewing, [A] Jacopo Camagni. This issue is full of a lot of confusing nonsense about Arakko and Okkara and Genesis. It has no connection to the rest of the series, except that Storm and Nova appear briefly in it. This lack of a clear theme or story arc is a recurring problem with this series.
GODFELL #4 (Vault, 2023) – unttiled, [W] Christopher Sebela, [A] Ben Hennessy. Zanzi and Neth are captured by nonhuman creatures called the Legato, but they manage to escape. Neth reveals that she has her own history of trauma: her village’s entire population had to hide underground to escape from the war, and the war went on so long that they were reduced to cannibalism. Godfell is an anti-war story, though it’s also several other things.
JUNK RABBIT #3 (Image, 2023) – untitled, [W/A] Jimmie Robinson. A flashback sequence reveals how the world got into this awful state. The corporate troops invade the protagonists’ village and threaten to kill everyone unless they get information about Junk Rabbit. The girl, Ashleen, claims she knows the Junk Rabbit’s secret, to the surprise of the two boys who each suspect the other of being Junk Rabbit. The art in this series looks kind of outdated, as if it were produced with 2000s technology.
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #685 (Marvel, 2012) – “Ends of the Earth Part 4: Global Menace,” [W] Dan Slott, [A] Humberto Ramos. A dying Dr. Octopus is holding the world for ransom, and the world is mostly prepared to pay his ransom, but Spider-Man doesn’t trust him. Spidey teams up with Silver Sable and Black Widow to defeat Doc Ock’s plans, even though he feels ambivalent about going against the will of the entire world. Spidey calls upon various international heroes for assistance, but at the end, Doc Ock seemingly executes his threat to destroy the world. This is not Dan Slott’s best issue, though it does help lead into Superior Spider-Man, which was the best Spider-Man story in recent memory.
THE ULTIMATES #9 (Marvel, 2003) – untitled, [W] Mark Millar, [A] Bryan Hitch. Janet van Dyne is lying in a hospital bed after being brutally beaten by Hank Pym. Captain America tracks down Hank, who shows no regret over his actions. The other Avengers prepare for battle with the Chitauri. The trouble with this series, and with Millar’s work in general, is that the supposed heroes are awful people. Millar takes each character’s worst aspect – Tony’s alcoholism, Cap’s nationalist chauvinism, Hank’s spousal abuse – and turns it into the character’s entire personality. It’s deliberately impossible to sympathize with his protagonists, and I wonder if this is because of Millar’s own cynical outlook on life. One thing that does surprise me is the number of elements from this series that made it into the MCU, including the black Nick Fury, the Chitauri, and Hawkeye’s wife and three children. It’s typical of Millar’s writing that Hawkeye’s children only appeared on-panel in two issues, and in the second of those issues, they were all murdered. I kind of want to collect the rest of this series, just so I can hate-read it.
CAPTAIN MARVEL #6 (Marvel, 1968) – “In the Path of Solam!”, [W] Arnold Drake, [A] Don Heck. Mar-Vell imagines he’s fighting an undersea monster, and then he fights an actual monster called Solam. Carol Danvers appears in this issue, but has no well-defined personality yet. The early issues of Captain Marvel were hampered by a revolving door of creators and by the lack of a consistent premise. It’s surprising that the series lasted until #17, in which Roy Thomas created the definitive version of the character by making him share a body with Rick Jones.
THE GOON #31 (Dark Horse, 2008) – untitled, [W/A] Eric Powell. I bought a bunch of these at Heroes Con, but this is the only one I’ve read so far. It’s hard to understand because it appears to be the conclusion of an extended story arc. But Eric Powell’s artwork is beautiful. The Goon is constantly oscillating between humor and horror, and this issue is more horrific than humorous.
ADVENTURE COMICS #393 (DC, 1970) – “The Unwanted Supergirl!”, [W] Robert Kanigher, [A] Win Mortimer. A “crime computer” predicts a number of crimes that are about to occur. Supergirl fails to prevent either of the first two crimes, and thus becomes a public pariah. In the ending, we learn that the computer was a hoax created by Mxyzptlk, and that the two crimes never happened. That’s a relief, because both crimes were utterly ridiculous. The first crime was the assassination of a princess, and Supergirl could have stopped it if the princess’s parents hadn’t inexplicably prevented her. And the second “crime” was that an actress won an Oscar, but while she was still on stage, the award was revoked when her past criminal record was discovered. Overall this story is a typical example of Kanigher’s lack of respect for his readers’ intelligence. In the backup story, Supergirl’s roommate seems to have discovered Linda’s secret identity. This story also has a pretty stupid plot, but it’s marginally less stupid, and the art is by Kurt Schaffenberger, who would have been a better choice for the Hall of Fame than Win Mortimer.
THE WALKING DEAD #116 (Image, 2013) – “All Out War” part ???, [W] Robert Kirkman, [A] Charlie Adlard. Rick and Negan’s factions engage in open battle. Rick’s side wins, but it’s only the first battle in a bigger conflict. This issue is mostly just a long action scene.
2000 AD #530 (IPC, 1987) – My copy has a serious printing error where some pages are printed so light that they’re illegible. Anderson: as above. The Judges hunt down Glenny Mexworth, but Orlok has already escaped. Future Shocks: “Fair’s Fare,” [W] Jamie Delano, [A] Massimo Belardinelli. A barfly tells stories about the Drex, a lizard bounty hunter with a bowler hat, goes around capturing debtors and sucking them into a vacuum cleaner. At the end of the story, the Drex shows up to collect on the barfly’s debt to the bar. Because of the aforementioned printing error, half of this story’s second page was illegible. Dredd: as above. Fairlyhyperman saves lots of lives, but commits lots of crimes in the process. Dredd defeats him by shooting him with Kapokite, made of debris from Fairlyhyperman’s home planet. Dredd explains that Justice Department had half a ton of Kapokite in its vaults, precisely for this scenario. Fairlyhyperman protests that this seems unlikely, and Dredd replies “You’re pretty unlikely yourself.” This was a hilarious story. Mean Team: as above. Another well-drawn but nonsensical story. Rogue Trooper: as above. Rogue recruits some allies to help him defeat Yuan-Toh for the third time.
THE DEEP #5 (Boom!, 2017) – untitled, [W] Tom Taylor, [A] James Brouwer. I thought this was an adaptation of a TV show, but it’s the other way around. The comic was created before the TV show, but was previously published only in Australia. The Deep is a somewhat generic undersea adventure story, but it’s notable because its protagonists are a biracial family of four, and all four characters are depicted lovingly. James Brouwer’s renderings of the characters are excellent, but his artwork relies too much on CGI.
DETECTIVE COMICS #648 (DC, 1992) – “Let the Puzzlement Fit the Crime,” [W] Chuck Dixon, [A] Tom Lyle. This issue is Spoiler’s first appearance in costume, though she appeared in the previous issue in her secret identity. This issue also depicts Spoiler’s first meeting with Tim Drake, the character she’s always been associated with. There’s an additional subplot about Gotham’s upcoming mayoral election. Spoiler was one of Chuck Dixon’s two major contributions to the Batman mythos, along with Bane, and I like Spoiler a lot better than Bane.
INTERTWINED: THE LAST JEWISH DAUGHTER OF KAIFENG (FairSquare, 2023) – untitled, [W] Fabrice Sapolsky, [A] Fei Chen & Ho Seng Hui. This is a sequel to some other comic I didn’t read. I bought it because of its unique theme. Its protagonist, Leah Ai Tian, has to return from New York to her hometown of Kaifeng, in order to deal with threats to her elderly mother. This comic includes some exciting martial arts scenes, but what’s really compelling about it is its depiction of the Kaifeng Jews. I barely knew anything about this particular Jewish community, so this comic is enlightening. Kaifeng Jews are an example of the internal diversity of Judaism. There used to be Jewish communities all over the Old World, but after the Holocaust and World War II, most of these communities migrated to Israel. The Kaifeng Jews are somewhat unique because they lived in isolation from other Jews for so long that they completely assimilated. I’d like to see more stories with this sort of diverse Jewish representation. I think Fabrice Sapolsky was at Heroes Con, but I didn’t see him.
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #694 (Marvel, 2012) – “Alpha Part 3: Final Grade,” [W] Dan Slott, [A] Humberto Ramos. Alpha continues to get drunk on his own fame. He intervenes in a fight between the Avengers and Terminus (the bargain-basement version of Galactus) and only succeeds in making things worse. During this fight, there’s a hilarious moment where Spidey is trying to save Aunt May’s plane from crashing, and May calls Peter to leave him a message in case she dies, and Spider-Man’s phone automatically picks up. After all this, Peter has had enough of Alpha, and he tricks Alpha and removes most of his powers. Overall, “Alpha” was an excellent and very funny storyline. This issue’s cover is an homage to the 1976 Superman vs. Spider-Man special, and that reference is appropriate, given Alpha’s powers.
MARVEL’S VOICES: PRIDE #1 (Marvel, 2023) – [E] Angélique Roché. This comic has good intentions, but it’s tediously long, and none of its stories are genuinely exciting. At least one of them barely even qualifies as a story, and some of the others are built around new characters who are unlikely to ever appear again. I keep buying these Marvel Voices comics out of a sense of social obligation, but they’ve been consistently unimpressive. I think it’s time I quit buying them, as I keep threatening to do.
INCREDIBLE HULK #135 (Marvel, 1971) – “Descent into the Time-Storm!”, [W] Roy Thomas, [A] Herb Trimpe. Kang decides to defeat the Avengers by preventing Bruce Banner from ever being born, since the Avengers were formed to defeat the Hulk. As instruments in this plot, Kang recruits the Hulk himself as well as the Phantom Eagle, a character who only appeared once before. This issue’s plot is rather silly, but Herb Trimpe’s artwork is some of his best. His page layouts are dynamic and unconventional, and he draws beautiful machinery of both the futuristic and World War I varieties. I have the Marvel Super-Heroes reprint of this issue, but it’s been a long time since I read it.
LORDS OF MISRULE #1 (Dark Horse, 1997) – “The Callow Heart,” [W] John Tomlinson et al., [A] Peter Snejbjerg. This miniseries is continued from a one-shot published by Tundra UK. I have that comic, but I don’t think I’ve read it. Lords of Misrule focuses on three friends living in an English village. One of them, Jack Goodfellow, visits a man in prison who tells him an urban legend about a murderous hitchhiker. Later, another of the three, Jo Hanlon, is murdered by the same method described in the legend. This is a frightening horror comic with excellent black-and-white art, strong characterization, and an immersive setting. Jo’s death is particularly shocking because by the time she dies, the creators have already gone to some length to develop her character. I need to read the rest of this miniseries.
HOUSE OF PENANCE #3 (Dark Horse, 2016) – untitled, [W] Peter J. Tomasi, [A] Ian Bertram. A horror story about the building of the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, California. It took me a while to understand what this comic was about, and I still can’t quite follow its plot, but Ian Bertram’s art is gorgeous. His linework is beautifully detailed, and his page designs are innovative. He’s a major talent. I just wonder what’s happened to him. Precious Metal, his sequel to Little Bird, was supposed to come out in 2021, but I haven’t heard anything about it lately.
STARGIRL: THE LOST CHILDREN #2 (DC, 2023) – untitled, [W] Geoff Johns, [A] Todd Nauck. I considered buying this when it came out, but I’m hesitant to buy any new DC comics from Geoff Johns. It’s just as well that I didn’t pay cover price for this comic, but it’s interesting. The premise is that Stargirl and Emiko Queen, the second Red Arrow, are trying to track down some vanished Golden Age sidekicks. Stargirl is based on Geoff Johns’s late sister, and she seems to be his favorite character. Therefore, his stories about her have a passion that’s missing from much of his other work, which is often wantonly cruel. Todd Nauck’s art in this issue is extremely detailed, and he’s an ideal artist for this series because of his run on Young Justice.
TARZAN #205 (Gold Key, 1971) – “Warriors’ Bounty,” [W] Gaylord Du Bois, [A] Paul Norris. A tribal queen promises her hand in marriage to whoever can kill a man-eating lion. A young warrior kills the lion, only to discover that a different warrior has already brought the queen the corpse of an identical lion. It turns out the queen and the second warrior were conspiring with each other. They both die of the plague, and the first warrior falls in love with the queen’s sister, a healer. This was the second to last issue before DC took over the Tarzan license. Paul Norris’s art in this story is fairly generic. I believe I attended at least one convention where he was a guest, but I never got to meet him.
ARCHIE AND ME #37 (Archie, 1970) – “Togethermess,” [W/A] Joe Edwards. Archie and Veronica go on vacation to the Tokyo world’s fair, where they unexpectedly run into Mr. Weatherbee. This issue is only of interest because of its depiction of Tokyo. I was afraid this issue would be full of Japanese stereotypes, but it mostly focuses on the installations at the fair, and there are few references to Japanese people or culture.
2000 AD #531 (IPC, 1987) – Anderson: as above. Orlok escapes Mega-City One aboard a spaceship called the Spirit of Eisner (a pun that’s so obvious I almost didn’t get it). Glenny Mexworth’s execution is ordered, and I don’t think she ever appeared again. Mean Team: as above. Jack Keller and Emerald Eyes’s contrived and convoluted origin is explained. By this point Mean Team had completely drifted away from its roots as a sports story. Dredd: “Revolution! Part 1,” [W] John Wagner & Alan Grant, [A] John Higgins. This story is a sequel to the classic “Letter from a Democrat” (#460), which I’ve never actually read. That story depicted the death of pro-democracy protester Hester Hyman. This issue, Hester’s widower, Gort, becomes the figurehead of a new pro-democracy movement with millions of supporters. Justice Department resolves to crush the movement, and they decide to start by discrediting its leaders. Rogue Trooper: as above. Rogue finally kills Yuan-Toh for real, then proceeds to his next target. Future Shocks: “Some One is Watching Me,” [W] Alan McKenzie, [A] Liam Sharp. Philo Fachs’s life is ruined by a prankster. He decides to electrocute himself, but the electric current passes through his body and into the prankster’s devices, killing the prankster. This was Liam Sharp’s first work for 2000 AD. He signs it Liam McCormack-Sharp. McCormack seems to be his wife’s name.
SAVAGE DRAGON/TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES #1 (Mirage, 1993) – “Enter the Savage Dragon!”, [W/A] Michael Dooney, [W] Erik Larsen. Like every Savage Dragon story not written by Erik, this issue is disappointing. Michael Dooney had a lot of experience writing the Turtles, but he shows little understanding of the Savage Dragon. Also, it’s impossible to tell the Turtles apart because they all wear headbands of the same color.
HIT-GIRL #5 (Image, 2018) – “Canada Part 1,” [W] Jeff Lemire, [A] Eduardo Risso. This is a unique collaboration between two world-class creators, though it’s not a top-tier work of eitehr of them. In this issue Hit-Girl goes to Toronto to look for a certain criminal. She discovers that he’s gone to Kashechewan, which is so far north that its only land access is by a seasonal ice road. Once she finally gets there, she gets caught in a bear trap. The thing I find strange about Canada is its sheer amount of empty space: it’s a huge country, but most of the population lives south of the US border, and most of the rest of Canada is an inaccessible wilderness with little or no population. I’ve been to Toronto, and it’s strange to think that in the same province as this major modern city, there are enormous barren tracts where no one lives.
SUB-MARINER #40 (Marvel, 1971) – “…Under the Name of Ritual…”, [W] Gerry Conway, [A] Stan Lee. Namor and Spider-Man visit the city of the Black Sea People, and Namor has to fight their champion, Turalla, on behalf of their princess, Tuvia. This issue is kind of boring, and neither Turalla nor Tuvia have ever appeared again. Also, Spider-Man plays no necessary role in this issue’s plot. However, Colan’s art is quite good, and Conway includes some effective characterization. At this point in continuity, Namor is mourning the death of his fiancee Dorma, while Peter is similarly grieved over Captain Stacy’s death, and they both seem to find comfort in their friendship.
METAL MEN #29 (DC, 1968) – “The Robot Eater from Metalas 5!”, [W] John Braillard, [A] Ross Andru. I’ve never heard of this writer before, and he has only one other credit in the GCD. In this issue the Metal Men fight a giant metal-eating robot with the help of another similar robot. This issue’s plot is overly complicated and confusing, but Andru’s artwork is subtly effective. Metal Men was one of the few DC titles of its time that included any significant characterization, although most of the characters had just one notable personality trait at most – for example, Tin’s shyness, or Platinum’s obsession with Doc Magnus.
SHOCK SUSPENSTORIES #5 (EC, 1952/1993) – “Well-Traveled!”, [W] Al Feldstein, [A] Jack Kamen. Horace Wheems has a beautiful model train set in his basement, but no trains. Every time he saves enough money to buy one, his wife takes the money to go traveling. Finally he’s had enough of this, and he buys some model trains, then murders his wife, dismembers her, and puts her body parts inside the trains. This gruesome ending is reminiscent of the notorious story “Foul Play.” “Hate!”, [W] Al Feldstein, [A] Wally Wood. A Jewish couple, the Golds, move nto John Smith’s neighborhood. Smith and his anti-Semitic friends commit a series of hate crimes against the Golds, and finally they set the Golds’ house on fire, killing them both. By coincidence, whle John is discussing the crime with one of his friends, his mother shows up and reveals that John is in fact the adopted child of Jewish parents. John’s former “friends” now hate him, and they treat him the same way John himself treated the Golds. My sense is that this sort of extreme anti-Semitic violence was rare in postwar America, and I wonder if the Jews in this story are meant to represent black people. Qiana Whitted discusses this story in her book on EC, which I own but have not read. “What Fur?”, [W] Feldstein, [A] Joe Orlando. A spaceship captain’s wife loves to wear expensive furs, which she buys from a spacefaring furrier. Despite his distaste for the fur industry, the captain agrees to take the furrier to an alien planet. Ironically, this planet is inhabited by aliens who wear human skins. This story has some of the best art I’ve seen from Orlando. “Cold Cuts!”, [W] Feldstein, [A] Jack Davis. Vic Benson has just murdered his wife. Inconveniently, a realtor is about to come to his house to show it to some prospective buyers, so Vic has no choice but to chop up his wife’s corpse and hide it in the meat locker. By happenstance, Vic has to leave town before he can dispose of the corpse. When he gets back, the realtor invites him to dinner… but the butcher was closed, and the realtor had a key to Vic’s house, so he decided to serve the meat that was in Vic’s freezer! Another brilliant twist ending.
DOCTOR WHO: THE THIRD DOCTOR #2 (Titan, 2014) – “The Heralds of Destruction Part 3,” [W] Paul Cornell, [A] Christopher Jones. The Third Doctor, Jo Grant, and Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart confront the Master and a villain who’s disguised as the Second Doctor. I find the idea of Doctor Who fascinating, but I’m much more willing to read Doctor Who comics than to watch the actual TV show. Perhaps I’ll watch the show when the new season begins.
KONA, MONARCH OF MONSTER ISLE #14 (Dell, 1965) – “Polar Peril,” [W] Paul S. Newman, [A] Sam Glanzman, My copy of this issue is missing its centerfold, so I’ll have to find a replacement copy. This issue is clearly not written by Lionel Ziprin or whoever the mystery writer was; it has a much more sedate writing style and a more generic plot. Kona is still obsessed with survival, but not to the same extent. The one notable thing about of this issue is that Newman allows the two kid characters to play an active role in the plot, while in the mystery writer’s run, they were usually just hostages who Kona had to protect.
WARLOCK #6 (Marvel, 1973) – “The Brute!”, [W] Mike Friedrich, [A] Bob Brown. On Counter-Earth, Warlock teams up with a good version of Dr. Doom against the Brute, an evil version of Reed Richards. The first eight issues of Warlock were very strange. They had three different writers, and they depicted the character quite differently from his later appearances. After Warlock was cancelled with #8, Jim Starlin created the definitive version of the character in Strange Tales #178-181, and Warlock was then revived for six more issues.
DOCTOR STRANGE: THE OATH #1 (Marvel, 2006) – untitled, [W] Brian K. Vaughan, [A] Marcos Martín. While Iron Fist and Araña are waiting in Night Nurse’s office, Wong comes in dragging Dr. Strange’s nearly dead body. Strange manifests in his astral form and reveals how he got hurt. In the flashback, Strange discovers that Wong has an incurable brain tumor. Strange travels to another dimension to find an elixir that can cure Wong. To get the elixir he had to defeat a giant cat demon that looks like Lying Cat, and then he discovers that the elixir can cure any kind of cancer. BKV’s writing here is exciting, and he emphasizes the often-forgotten fact that Strange used to be a medical doctor himself. Marcos Martín’s page layouts and panel compositions are spectacular, although his draftsmanship is not his best. I need to find the rest of this series.
2000 AD #532 (IPC, 1987) – Ro-Jaws’ Robo-Tales: “The Killer in the Cab,” [W] Alan Moore, [A] John Richardson. A space trucker is stranded on a desolate planet when his computer malfunctions. He manages to fix the computer with help from a fellow trucker. The twist is that the other trucker is a robot. This story isn’t Alan’s best. I’m not sure if this John Richardson is the same man as the American artist John Adkins Richardson. Tales from Mega-City One: “Taxi Driver Part 1,” [W] Alan Grant, [A] Paul Hardy. A traveler is stranded in the Cursed Earth. He’s picked up by the Cursed Earth’s only taxi driver, who happens to have a suitcase full of mob money in his cab. The taxi driver mentions how it’s extremely difficult to get a taxi license in Mega-City One, and it seems like Justice Department doesn’t want people to work. Dredd: as above. The Judges discredit the democracy movement’s leaders by accusing them of trivial or made-up crimes. They can’t find any dirt on Gort Hyman, so instead, Dredd threatens to forcibly induct his two sons into the Judges’ Academy. Faced with this threat, Gort denounces the movement, but the planned 16-million-person march goes forward anyway. Future Shocks: “The Junkyard Shift,” [W] Murdoch McKenzie, [A] Simon Harrison. A pointless story featuring some well-drawn robots. Strontium Dog: “The Royal Affair Part 1,” [W] Grant, [A] Carlos Ezquerra. England’s king, Clarkie II, visits the Milton Keynes mutant ghetto and proposes marriage to a mutant girl, but Clarkie’s own assistant tries to murder the girl. As an overarching point, when I look at “Taxi Driver” and “Revolution” together, I notice that Mega-City One is a failed state. It suffers from extreme poverty and unemployment and a high crime rate, and the Judges’ repressive policies never seem to solve anything. All the Judges ever manage to do is prevent things from deteriorating more quickly. Why don’t they ever try anything different? Either because they’re afraid it’ll be worse than the status quo, or because all they care about is maintaining their own power.
CHARLTON BULLSEYE #6 (Charlton, 1982) – “The Sound of Thunder,” [W] Marty Greim, [A] Mike Machlan. Young comics fan Bobby Caswell is transformed into a superpowered rabbit. Thunderbunny previously appeared in fanzines, but this was his first appearance in a professionally published comic. This story is cute, though unlike later Thunderbunny comics, it has few in-jokes about comics fandom. The next story is a three-pager by Alan Hanley, who was unfortunately killed in a car accident while the issue was win press. He had a frenetic style that was influenced by both Barks and underground comics. He was a talented fan artist, and it’s a shame that he died just as he was making it into the pros. The issue ends with a Mike Mauser story which is unfortunately neither written by Nick Cuti nor drawn by Joe Staton.
BATMAN: THE DETECTIVE #2 (DC, 2021) – untitled, [W] Tom Taylor, [A] Andy Kubert. Batman visits London, where he meets Knight and Squire. Batman also fights some criminals who are murdering people whose lives he previously saved. One of the criminals’ victims is Batman’s old mentor Henri Ducard. This is a very entertaining story, and I’m sorry I didn’t buy this miniseries when it came out. A funny moment is when Squire gives Batman a lollipop, and later we see him sucking on it.
VENOM #8 (Marvel, 2022) – “Time and the Conqueror,” [W] Al Ewing, [A] Bryan Hitch. To my surprise, this is not really a Spider-Man story; rather, it’s a cosmic story in the same vein as Ewing’s S.W.O.R.D. or Guardians of the Galaxy. In this issue Venom encounters Kang, and then at the end of the issue we meet a villain who I don’t recognize. I like Al Ewing’s writing, but this issue is just average.
Finally we come to the end of this enormous stack:
ACTION COMICS #690 (DC, 1993) – “Lies & Revelations,” [W] Roger Stern, [A] Jackson Guice. Maggie Sawyer breaks up a fight between two different Superman-worshipping cults. The Cyborg Superman and Mongul hold Superboy captive, and they use his recorded image to lead the JLA on a wild goose chase. The wounded Eradicator is healed by the robots in Superman’s fortress, but the real Superman, who has returned to life, is traveling back to Metropolis inside a Kryptonian battlesuit. I must have read this comic when it came out, but I don’t remember it well.