What If... Essential Champions volume 1?

Another look at a series as if it had been collected in an Essential volume, including all the additional issues included in other collections. This one is otherwise found in Champions Classic volumes 1 and 2.

Essential Champions volume 1 would contain all seventeen issues of the 1970s series plus the crossover issue Super-Villain Team-Up #14, the guest appearances in Iron Man annual #4 and Avengers #163, and also the epilogue in Peter Parker the Spectacular Spider-Man #17 to #18. (This is also the combination of the forthcoming Masterworks edition.) That would be a slim volume but there are some Essentials this thin. Bonus material, if it were needed, could include some unused covers - the Classics include one for issue #7 that had only minor changes - and also entries from the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe. The writing on the main series is initially by creator Tony Isabella who is succeeded by Bill Mantlo with one issue by Chris Claremont. The art on the main series is by Don Heck, George Tuska, Bob Hall and John Byrne with most making at least one return during the run. The Iron Man annual is written by Mantlo and drawn by Tuska, the Avengers issue is written by Jim Shooter and drawn by Tuska, the Super-Villain Team-Up one is written by Mantlo and drawn by Hall, and the Peter Parker the Spectacular Spider-Man issues are written by Mantlo and drawn by Sal Buscema.

1975 was a big year for team titles at Marvel. As well as the ongoing exploits of the Avengers, Defenders and Fantastic Four it also saw the launch of the All New All Different X-Men, the debut of the Invaders and the start of the Champions. But whereas all the other titles would last for several years, Champions would limp along for just over two years, confined to the odd eight-issues-a-year format that would make multi-part stories take ages to resolve and never really breaking out into a big hit. In the years since there has been little in the way of revivals bar a one-off reunion to work with X-Force in one of the 1998 team-up annuals. Otherwise the team has been mostly forgotten and treated as a joke when remembered, with Iceman once bemoaning "Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a major super-villain in Los Angeles?" (We'll find out in this review.) The nadir must surely have been when the right to use the name was won in a poker game by the team usually known as the Great Lakes Avengers but even they didn't make much of a mark with it before finding yet another name. And so the Champions have languished in obscurity.

Part of the problem may be the sheer difficulty of getting the original team back together under the title "Champions" - after the original series ended a different comic company adapted a role playing game property by the same name and at least twice Marvel has been rebuffed in attempts to reobtain the trademark. (The X-Force/Champions '98 annual was probably part of one of these attempts.) But also the team members are a pretty disparate bunch normally found spread across very distinctive parts of the Marvel universe and it can't be the easiest task to obtain the whole set for even a one-off reunion.

The team itself is initially comprised of five heroes, with another joining midway through. Leading the group is the Black Widow, who has recently left Daredevil and is developing ever more into a strong independent character in her own right. She's also one of the first women leaders of a Marvel team and also brings to the team both her adoptive father Ivan Petrovich and demons from their past in the Soviet Union. Bankrolling the team is the Angel, fresh out of the X-Men, now that newer members have taken over, heavily enriched through inheritance and ditching his secret identity in favour of being open and free with the world. Also recently having left the X-Men, but maintaining his secret identity for now, is Iceman. The youngest team member, he initially feels he wants to get on with his life and plans on dropping aside as soon as the team is fully established, but finds himself staying around to the point that this plan gets forgotten, especially under a new writer. The team's muscle is provided by Hercules, who proves to be the catalyst around which the group is initially drawn together, and he stays around for the adventure. The most distant is all the five is the Ghost Rider, seen here in the early years of his career when Johnny Blaze had full control over his flaming alter ego, who often feels distrusted and out of place amongst his teammates. Midway through the run the team is joined by Darkstar, a new hero from the Soviet Union with dark energy powers and a mysterious past. The main supporting cast member is Richard Feinster, a recently sacked lecture agent at UCLA who becomes the team's business manager.

The Champions are based in Los Angeles and have as their aims to help the "common man" with more down to earth problems, in contrast to the more global and intergalactic threats faced by other teams. It's a worthy aim, as is setting the series away from the New York norm of the Marvel universe. But in practice the team wind up facing quite a number of established larger than life super-villains and take on global and even universal threats. It looks harder to escape the conventions than it seems.

With very little pre-existing ties to bring the team together the series starts by creating a set of coincidences to get all of them to the campus of UCLA in order to get caught up in the same menace. Iceman is starting studies there and is visited by the Angel whilst Hercules has been appointed a visiting lecturer on the reality behind Greek myths. The Black Widow is applying for a post as a Russian language teacher and the Ghost Rider's alter-ego of Johnny Blaze happens to be motorcycling through the campus. The initial menace is the arrival of Pluto the Greek god of death who seeks to force Hercules and Greek god turned little remembering Atlas era hero turned new lecturer in humanities Venus to marry his allies, Hippolyta, queen of the Amazons, and Ares, god of war, so that they will be unable to battle against Pluto's planned take-over of Olympus. The opening adventure takes up the first three issues with a journey to Olympus itself thrown in and results in the five working together and realising how well they mesh as a team. It's hard to disguise that most superhero teams have had awkward origins precisely because they rely on cautious loner heroes suddenly discovering how well they work together, but the Champions seem especially forced given the ongoing distrust of Ghost Rider and the initial reluctance of Iceman. It's as though they were thrown together by dictat rather than emerging as a natural combination.

The team takes a few more issues before it's fully constituted, complete with its own transport in the form of the Champscraft and a headquarters in a Los Angeles skyscraper. However both get assembled by dodgy contractors and a minor recurring theme are the problems with equipment failure though it doesn't come to the forefront until the epilogue in Peter Parker the Spectacular Spider-Man. The team's public relations are also a bit of a mess, with their official launch coinciding with an adventure such that only the Angel and Hercules are available for the press conference which gets attacked by the Crimson Dynamo, the Griffin, and the Titanium Man, whilst a photoshoot of the dissolution of the team is an equal damp squib with only the Angel still around when Peter Parker arrives.

When one looks at the foes encountered by the Champions it rapidly becomes clear just how easy it is to find supervillains in Los Angeles including some quite major ones. As well as the initial clash with Pluto there are encounters with a group of Soviet foes including the Titanium Man, a new Crimson Dynamo whose real identity is a shocker for the Black Widow and Ivan, and the Griffin. This group also includes the first appearance of Darkstar but she soon defects. Then there's an encounter with Warlord Kaa of the shadow-people with guest appearances by Hawkeye and the time-displaced Two-Gun Kid. The team's most wide-ranging adventure initially seems to be up against the Stranger but he is in fact looking to save Earth and the real threat comes from Kamo Tharnn (later better known as the Possessor) who seeks to recapture the Runestaff that can save the day. The Avengers appearance sees conflict with the Greek Titan Typhon who forces battle between the two whilst the Iron Man annual brings them up against Modok and AIM. The crossover with Super-Villain Team-Up involves a strange contest between Doctor Doom and Magneto in which the latter must find a way to stop the ruler of Latveria from taking over the world with a special neurogas, forcing the Master of Magnetism to seek out allies, finding them in the form of first the Beast and then the Champions. The final issue sees an attack by the Vanisher, utilising both the Sentinels and the mutants the Blob, Lorelei and Unus the Untouchable. The biggest new foe introduced here is Swarm, a collective sentient hive of bees with the mind and skeleton core of a Nazi scientist. There are a few lesser foes such as new ones like Dr Edward Lansing, a scientist abusing a care home in order to perform experiments, or Rampage, an inventor hurt by the economic downturn who dons an exo-skeleton to initially rob banks. Rampage is the most recurring of the team's foes, being used by the Soviet foes in an action that leaves him paralysed and then coming back for an act of revenge at the very end. There's also an encounter with Stilt-Man that's so forgettable he's left in the hands of the guest-starring Black Goliath whilst the Champions deal with the Stranger's problem.

The series ultimately lasted only seventeen issues and ends on a mini-cliffhanger as the Champions wonder about Darkstar's true nature. But this goes unresolved and the team is unceremoniously disbanded in a flashback in the pages of Peter Parker the Spectacular Spider-Man which otherwise serves as a straightforward team-up with the Angel (in fact it's a surprise this story wasn't told in the pages of Marvel-Team-Up) as they face down against the Champions' old foes Rampage and the shoddily constructed building. And that was the end of the Champions' story, bar one very brief reunion many years later.

So is Champions a title that should have had an Essential collected edition? The existence of the Classic reprints is the most obvious argument against but there are certainly other titles in the Essentials that have been collected elsewhere in colour. And the bar for inclusion in the Essentials was not actually that high - several short-lived 1970s series such as Godzilla, Ms. Marvel and Super-Villain Team-Up all qualified for a single Essential volume so not lasting long was clearly no barrier. Nor is the series anywhere near as mediocre as some material included in the Essentials. It may not be the most memorable of titles and the team suffers from feeling like it was assembled to fit arbitrary criteria, but there's a sense of trying and purpose to these tales that hold together reasonably well. A single collected edition would be thin without much obvious extra stuff to include - very maybe the X-Force/Champions '98 annual but that would be a much later pick and otherwise that's pretty much it as a contemporary appearance in Godzilla would be a monster of a rights issue. But there's just about enough already. This is a series that certainly does deserve reappraising as whilst it's not the greatest team title ever it's certainly a lot more credible than the dismissive comments and jokes of later years would suggest. I don't know how the trademark situation would have been an issue, though it clearly didn't stop the Classics doing two volumes. All in all the Champions is a good little series that would certainly have earned a place amongst the Essentials.

Essential Avengers volume 9

Essential Avengers volume 9 consists of issues #185 to #206 and Annual #9 plus a rare original story from the second Tales to Astonish series #12. Bonus material includes the covers of the collections Avengers: The Yesterday Quest and Avengers Visionaries: George Pérez. The writing is mainly by David Michelinie with various plots and/or scripts by Mark Gruenwald, Steven Grant, Jim Shooter, Bill Mantlo, Roger Stern, Bob Layton and Bob Budiansky with the annual by Bill Mantlo. The art is mainly by John Byrne and George Pérez, with other issues by Arvell Jones, Sal Buscema, Carmine Infantino, Don Newton, Alan Kupperberg and Gene Colan. The annual is drawn by Don Newton. The Tales to Astonish story is written by Tom DeFalco and drawn by John Fuller. And yes, there's a separate labels post.

The cover to this volume is an understandable but unfortunate choice. Originally produced for issue #200 it was structured around a big "200" which has here been removed with the Vision and Wasp moved slightly. But the result looks a little odd, especially as the Beast is now hovering mid air. It may be the main cover to show all the active Avengers in a non-story specific image but it just doesn't work here. And of course, it's the cover to one of the most notorious of all Avengers issues.

Leaving aside its most notorious element for a moment, issue #200 is extremely lacklustre for such an important number, with the main action being a set of time rifts that bring dinosaurs, knights, cavaliers and other generic historic foes to the present day, rather than any substantial battle with an old foe. It's hardly a grand moment worthy of the big anniversary double-sized issue. And that's especially annoying as the next story sees the return of Ultron. Marcus may be the son of old Avengers foe Immortus but it makes no real difference and he could just as easily have been a new character's offspring. And then there's the whole mess with Ms. Marvel's sudden accelerated pregnancy that lasts just a few days, resulting in the birth of a baby that rapidly grows to adulthood and explains he's manipulated the whole thing in order to escape from the realm of Limbo. A flashback narrated by Marcus explains how Ms. Marvel was kidnapped to Limbo, wooed with poetry, music and clothes and then seduced "after relative weeks of such efforts -- and admittedly, with a subtle boost from Immortus' machines". And she is shown accepting this to the point that she opts to accompany back to Limbo the man who has used mind control devices on her when his efforts to stay on Earth are thwarted. It's astonishing how this was not realised to be a tale of rape when it was thought up; but it was famously called out soon afterwards, first in Carol Strickland's essay "The Rape of Ms. Marvel". More recently I tested a quick synopsis on a friend with no interest in or knowledge of Avengers comics and he came to the same conclusion. The issue stands as a black mark on the whole of Marvel and is easily the worst in the entire volume.

Marcus isn't the only character who is revealed to be the child of a major villain, though in order to put all the pieces together one would have to either read contemporary issues of X-Men or see through the asterisks on issue #192's letterspage which is reproduced here. Issues #185 through to #187 constitute "The Yesterday Quest" storyline as the Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver journey to Transia to sort out the competing and contradictory information about their origins. In the process Wanda is attacked by Modred the Mystic and then possessed by the demon Ch'thon. Meanwhile Pietro meets Bova, the cow woman who served as midwife to the twins and who now reveals the truth about them and the three competing sets of parents. We now learn that the Whizzer and Miss America were not the parents after all, merely a couple that Bova and the High Evolutionary tried to trick into believing otherwise, and that Django Maximoff was actually their adoptive father who along with his wife raised them after their own twin children died. Their actual mother was a woman called Magda, fleeing her powerful husband and determined to protect the children from them. Joining up the dots reveals that the father was none other than Magneto.

It's worth noting that this story predates the revelations about fathers and siblings in the original Star Wars trilogy so is not as derivative as it may now seem. But it's still a dubious and ultimately unnecessary retcon. The motivation for the story is explained on the letterspage as a desire to sort out a load of contradictory moments over the years that didn't fit the previous revelation. There also seems to have been a motivation from the way Magneto and Quicksilver are often drawn looking very similar. But a lot of Marvel characters closely resemble one another without anything ever being said - nobody has yet come up with a story that reveals Captain America is the father or, as time goes by, grandfather of Hawkeye or Yellowjacket or any other clean-shaven blonde man drawn in the Marvel house style. There is simply no need to retroactively make Wanda and Pietro's parents anyone of significance. It's true that they had previously been made the children of Golden Age heroes the Whizzer and Miss America, but the mess would have been best just left alone. It's also somewhat pointless as Wanda and Pietro themselves don't find out who their actual father is at this point and nothing is done with this revelation at all at this stage.

The Avengers begin this volume in a state of restriction due to the controls imposed by Henry Peter Gyrich of the National Security Agency, who at times seems to be the main obstacle to saving the day. Things are made worse by the changing line-up as some of the members Gyrich has selected take leave, to his annoyance. The team quickly find ways to circumvent him where necessary, including a memorable moment when Captain America rings up the US President and gets him to overrule Gyrich, but eventually Gyrich threatens to shut the team down for good. The matter ends up in the hands of a Senate committee when an attack by the Grey Gargoyle proves fortuitous in proving the Avengers' worth and the restrictions are lifted. Not long afterwards the Falcon departs, having felt like an ineffective token member imposed upon the team who hasn't really contributed. It's hard to disagree with the latter half of his assessment, which seems to stem in part from the large number of writers on the series since he joined, making it harder to develop this part of the plot. The team settles back in a more expanded form with Wonder Man returning full time and the likes of Hawkeye, Yellowjacket and Thor passing through for an extended period. The new Ant-Man also appears but as a guest star for now.

Making their first appearance are the Elements of Doom, a group of creatures mutated from humans into beings with the qualities and powers of particular elements. There's also a poignant confrontation with Inferno, a steel worker who is thrown into molten slag with a fragment of Thor's hammer that turns him into a rampaging monster bent on revenge on the criminals who chucked him. Another monster created by industrial sabotage is Pyron, a saboteur who is turned into a ferocious fire wielder. But the big new foe is the Taskmaster. A man with the ability to reproduce any move he has ever seen without any practice at all, he has established a series of academies to supply henchmen to other villains. His unique abilities make it exceptionally hard for the Avengers to counter him until he encounters Jocasta, who he has no knowledge of. Older foes seen included Red Ronin from the pages of Godzilla, Ultron and the Yellow Claw.

The annual is a sequel to an issue of Iron Man not included here and sees an attack by the robot Arsenal, a secret weapon left over from the Second World War and now guided by a computer called Mistress. The whole thing is a tame affair but for some brief character moments for Iron Man as he realises who built the robot and computer and just who the latter's thinking is based on. The special Vision story included here sees the android dealing with terrorists who aim to assassinate a Latin American dictator arriving at an airport and sees him faced with the dilemma of having to either save the dictator or an innocent man suffering a heart attack. His solution does not win him cheers. It's also an odd piece as it unquestionably presents the dictator as a force for good stability and order and the revolutionaries as bad in spite of crying about liberty. A six page guest story is rarely the place to debate whether stable dictatorships or revolutions are better for a country but equally it's not the best place to be so blasé about it all.

There are rather a lot of issues focusing on the team off duty, whether it's Hawkeye taking a job as head of security at a technical company and fighting Deathbird, Wonder Man getting a job as the sidekick on a children's entertainment show, the Beast and Wonder Man on a double blind date, Jarvis dealing with a bully in his mother's neighbourhood, Wonder Man and the Beast finding mutated creatures in the sewers (years before the Turtles), or even the Elevator Incident when the whole team gets stuck in a lift shaft. Looking through it's clear that the partnership of the Beast and Wonder Man has appealed strongly to the writers but the two characters often don't rise far enough beyond mere comedy moments.

Overall this is something of a slight volume most notable for the notorious issue #200, the retcon about the Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver's parents and the introduction of the Taskmaster - and that's about it. Otherwise the foes and battles are mainly forgettable and there's just too much time devoted to the Avengers off duty to the point that the issues don't feel as special as they are billed. Without one particular issue this would be a relatively dull and disappointing period for the series but issue #200 makes this a particularly bad volume.

Some Fantastic Four previews

As is standard upon completing a full set of Essential volumes for a particular series, I now take a look at any later issues reprinted in other volumes. For the Fantastic Four there are actually quite a few such issues.


Fantastic Four #218 written by Bill Mantlo and drawn by John Byrne, reprinted in Essential Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man volume 2

This is the second part of a crossover with Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man involving the Frightful Four, who on this occasion have recruited Electro as their fourth member. They have already captured Spider-Man and now the Trapster impersonates him in order to infiltrate the Baxter Building so the Frightful Four can take out the Fantastic Four one by one.

This is a fairly traditional plot but it was part of a brief fill-in run on the title. The Frightful Four have long offered potential for development but have always been somewhat constrained by the lack of a permanent fourth member. Electro may not be female but otherwise he fills the role quite well and has some history with the Sandman so more could have been done. However Spider-Man's presence in the story is almost needless as the Frightful Four are operating at night and could easily have impersonated him without his noticing it. The story is also noticeable for an attempt by Sue to evade capture by turning invisible away only to find her dressing gown doesn't disappear with her. Stories over the years have been rather inconsistent on how her powers affect her clothes when not made of unstable molecules. This issue is serviceable but very much a reworking of past stories.


Fantastic Four #286 written and drawn by "You Know Who" aka John Byrne, reprinted in Essential X-Factor volume 1

This is the second part of a mini-crossover with Avengers in order to set-up part of the new title X-Factor. The Fantastic Four (during this period the Thing had been replaced by She-Hulk) return to Earth where they temporarily staying with the Avengers and get caught up in the mystery of a capsule discovered in the harbour. Inside they find none other than Jean Grey, but with memories that stop several years earlier. Reed, Sue, Captain America and Hercules set out to try to find out what went wrong.

This is one of the most controversial issues in Marvel history, starting from an editorial rewrite that led to John Byrne taking his name off the issue and the controversy spread further due to a retcon rewriting one of Marvel's most famous stories, the "Dark Phoenix Saga". Adding to the mess was a conscious desire to keep X-Factor separate from the Uncanny X-Men for at least its first year and so the job of doing the heavy lifting to set up the new title fell upon other series. As a result an extra-long issue with no adverts feels less like a special issue of Fantastic Four and more of an intruder from another series; a point reinforced by the way both the Fantastic Four and Avengers know very little about the X-Men's adventures in recent years. There's the odd good moment such as Sue standing up to Reed in disagreement about taking Jean to her parents' home or using her invisible shield to neutralise Jean's telekinetic abilities without regard for those around her but overall this isn't really a Fantastic Four story. Its significance and controversy lies elsewhere.


Fantastic Four Vs the X-Men #1 to #4 written by Chris Claremont and drawn by Jon Bogdanove, reprinted in Essential X-Men volume 7

The Fantastic Four find themselves shaken to the core by the discovery of a journal suggesting Reed engineered the original cosmic rays accident to empower them by design. Reed suffers a major crisis of confidence and rejects the X-Men's pleas for help to save Shadowcat's life. Then Doctor Doom steps up and offers to perform the task.

This is very much the Fantastic Four's story with the X-Men largely serving a role that could have been performed by any group of heroes. We get a strong character focus that zooms in on one of the biggest holes in the four's origin, namely how could someone as smart as Reed fail to foresee the danger of cosmic rays and suggests it was all a plan, as well as exploration of Doctor Doom's ultimate goals. Reed's self-doubt and the others' uncertainties make for strong moments as the Four, including She-Hulk who tags along despite being in the Avengers these days, come to realise just how strong their bonds our. Franklin is used to maximum effect as his powers show a fear of what is to come whilst his innocence cuts through the suspicion and anger that rages amongst the adults. The story strains a little to credibly include She-Hulk, suggesting it originated in a period when it wasn't too clear just which four of the five regulars would be around for the long run, but otherwise it's a strong character study of Reed and, to a lesser extent, Doom. It's surprising that it took over a decade before Chris Claremont took on a regular run on Fantastic Four.


Fantastic Four Annual #23 (main story only) written by Walter Simonson and drawn by Jackson Guice, reprinted in Essential X-Factor volume 4 and also in Essential X-Men volume 10

This is the opening chapter of the "Days of Future Present" crossover that ran in the 1990 annuals for X-Factor, New Mutants and Uncanny X-Men, and serves as a sequel to one of the best known X-Men stories. The present day is visited by an adult Franklin Richards who is clearly undergoing some trauma and taking refuge in bringing happy childhood memories to life, including an earlier version of the Four living in the Baxter Building. After a confrontation with the alternate incarnation, plus an attack by robots from the future, the current Four track down the adult Franklin as he continues reliving his childhood. Meanwhile a mysterious robot is activated by his presence.

Here the focus is on establishing the adult Franklin and setting up the mysteries to be resolved in the later chapters so there's not too much plot advancement and a chunk of the chapter seems more concerned with contrasting the present day Four with the 1960s incarnation. The decision to do smaller annual crossovers was undoubtedly a good move for readers' wallets but a side effect is that the stories are now much tighter and so individual chapters are insubstantial on their own. This is very much the case here.

Essential Fantastic Four volume 9

Essential Fantastic Four volume 9 consists of issues #184 to #207 (#189 is a reprint with only the cover included here) plus Annuals #12 & #13. The writing sees the end of Len Wein's run and the start of Marv Wolfman's with other contributions by Roger Slifer and Bill Mantlo and the annuals are by Wolfman and Mantlo. The art sees the end of George Pérez's run and the start of Keith Pollard's with other issues by Sal Buscema and John Buscema and the annuals by Bob Hall and Sal Buscema.

This is a volume with quite epic ambitions but also one which seeks to explore just what the four's purpose is in sticking together and doing all that they do. It's a lofty approach that only grows once Marv Wolfman takes over from Len Wein but it reflects the problem this series has traditionally had in that too many creators can't find much to do and so retreat to the safety of rehashing things from the Lee-Kirby run. But a series has to look forwards not back and this one well and truly succeeds.

It's not always smooth sailing though. The series is hit by some especially bad schedule problems such that issue #188 ends on a dramatic moment and isn't properly continued until issue #191. In the meantime we get first a reprint (not actually included here) and then an "Album Issue" as Ben recalls some key moments in the four's history, including several past break-ups. Given the situation the four is currently in this retrospective feels more appropriate than the average recap fill-in issue but it's still treading water at a critical moment. Moreover, a two issue delay would have been extremely unhelpful when these were originally released but even here they contribute to a slowing of critical momentum. However once this problem is passed the series experiences an extremely smooth changeover of writers with Wolfman almost effortlessly carrying on from Wein and taking the four from a difficult break-up to an eventual reunion that feels natural and not at all forced.

The annuals are a sea of calm amidst the changes all around them though their placing does create a few small problems. Both are put between issues #201 and #202 but the first annual is presumably set earlier on during calmer times for the four - but there isn't an obvious place to put it despite it being written by the series's regular writer. The second annual is by another writer and so can be more forgiven for not quite fitting into the regular events - it does its best to explicitly set itself directly after the four reforms in issue #200 but issue #201 starts out in Latveria before bringing the four home and there isn't an obvious moment to detour into the events of the annual. It's an early example of the problems of a policy that tries to rigidly place all issues in publication order clashing with the aim of ongoing storylines in the regular titles. The annuals themselves are an interesting mix. The first one sees an adventure with the Inhumans where astonishingly the villain of the piece isn't Maximus for once. Instead the Inhuman antagonist is Thraxon, who has been given temporary powers by the Sphinx. What seems like a typical piece of annual inconsequentialness, although reasonably well written, will turn out to be more significant later on in the volume. The second annual is a more typical piece that almost could have come from file but for scenes showing the four getting themselves back into business. Otherwise we get a tame tale of the Mole Man kidnapping blind and ugly people and giving them an alternative life underground where they are accepted, a life that some actually accept. It's a reminder of how not everyone finds it easy in life but the option of just dropping out and setting up an alternate civilisation isn't a terribly enviable alternative.

Over in the regular series much of the first half of the volume is driven by events stemming from Reed's loss of his stretching powers and Franklin's & Agatha Harkness's kidnapping, both at the end of the last volume. It's quite a character arc for Reed as he faces up to situations in which he feels helpless but still has to find a solution, starting with an attack by the Eliminator, an armoured being who shows up at Agatha Harkness's mansion with the task of eliminating all traces of her time in the outside world. The search takes the four to New Salem, a settlement hidden in the mountains ruled by witches led by the fearsome Nicholas Scratch. Scratch has assembled a team of warriors known as Salem's Seven, made up of Brutacus, Gazelle, Hydron, Reptilla, Thornn, Vakume and Vertigo. Upon returning to New York we get another invasion of the Baxter Building, this time by Klaw and the Molecule Man, the latter trying to obtain a body of his own. In the process he possesses Reed's, to terrifying effect. Reed fights for control but afterwards feels that without his powers he has become a weak and inefficient member of the four who is vulnerable to being used by villains so opts to resign. Sue declares she will go with him and with no obvious replacements the four are dissolved.

As the album issue reminds us, this is not the first time one or more of the four have quit. But rather than someone storming off in a moment of anger or a misunderstanding driving people apart, this fracture has been steadily built upon. For all the apparent weaknesses of other team members, Reed's stretching powers have often seemed the least important part of the four with his intelligence being a much more significant role. Having him drop aside immediately upon being depowered would have felt odd and he does initially try to use science to compensate, reactivating his old metallic extensions from a previous time when he lost his powers. But overall he finds himself weakened in mind as well as body and ultimately chooses to not be a burden to the others. And critically the four don't formally reassemble as a group for many issues to come. A reunion is teased in what was clearly intended to be the next issue when Ka-Zar's old foe the Plunderer tries to steal the four's equipment when the Baxter Building is shut down, but despite everyone responding to Reed's flare it's only a temporary respite.

We then get a series of solo~ish tales of individual members of the team who gradually find themselves drawn back together. So Johnny goes car racing in the desert and catches up with Wyatt Wingfoot again, only to face off against the Texas Twister who has been hired to kidnap him by an unnamed person. Ben returns to space piloting, taking up a job with Nasa where the space shuttle programme suffers sabotage and interference by Diablo, who is using Darkoth, an old friend of Ben's who was framed and then mutated by Doctor Doom. Sue goes back to acting, getting a role in a Hollywood picture but finds the studio is still owned by Namor the Sub-Mariner, who has left Atlantis in horror at the way his people have virtually deified him but his kingdom deploys a group of robots called the Retrievers of Atlantis to take him home and the incident makes him reconsider his position. Reed takes up scientific work for the government without realising which one and that he's helping a foe with a plan to take over the world.

These tales allow each member of the four to shine some more without having to share too much space with the others, a particular useful period as the main focus of the storyline falls upon Reed. The others find themselves getting ever strong and more powerful, particularly Sue who is now really using her forcefields to maximum effect. It's all good character building in the run up to the anniversary issue. There are various humorous asides throughout the run, with the Impossible Man prominent at first as he pops up (sometimes literally) in a succession of issues as he tries to understand the world around him, most notably movies. Most of the time these are comical asides but they do reach a more serious point when confronting Klaw as the Impossible Man duplicates the villain's sonic horn and the use of the two weapons causes a sonic feedback boom. Otherwise the Impossible Man is generally an irritation and eventually he takes the hint, only to reappear in Hollywood and pester everyone until Sue reads him the Riot Act.

Reunion eventually comes but surprisingly it's staggered and facilitated by Doctor Doom. Capturing first Reed and then the others, he proceeds to demonstrate his perceived superiority by finding a way to restore Reed's stretching powers, but the inadvertent resurrection of the Red Ghost puts a spanner in the works. However the process allows for a minor modification to the four's origin to explain why only they and the Red Ghost have gained powers from cosmic rays and not the countless others who have now flown into space. Meanwhile Doom is planning a master plan to simultaneously gain Latveria greater diplomatic acceptance, take control of the United Nations and seemingly step away from ruling Latveria, leaving it to his previously unseen son whom he plans to transfer the four's powers to. With the other three captured, Reed embarks on a bold solo mission into Latveria where he joins with rebels following Zorba, the legitimist pretender to the throne, where they attack and discover the truth about Doom's son.

This all builds up to issue #200, one of the first anniversary issues to be double-sized. And appropriately it has a showdown between Reed and Doctor Doom, with the former demonstrating that stretching is no silly throwaway power that can't make a difference. It's a strong battle, augmented by the other three rushing to stop the rest of Doom's plan, and really gets into the heart of the hatred between the two men, showing Reed in all his glory. This issue set a marker for double-sized anniversary specials that contain big moments and by having the formal reunification of the four, a triumph over their arch enemy and the conclusion of a long-running storyline it certainly sets a high standard for everything that was to follow.

The remaining issues in the volume start off as something of an anti-climax, beginning with another attack in the Baxter Building almost as soon as they've reoccupied it, followed by a team-up with Iron Man as they confront the cause of the attack, Quasimodo. Then there's an encounter with a young mutant whose powers create twisted doppelgangers of the four but also showing how they help with the small problems as well as the galactic ones. Then the final few issues see an interesting split in the team as Reed, Sue and Ben go off into space but Johnny stays on Earth. Given the timing it's tempting to wonder if this was a reaction to the late 1970s cartoon that used the first three but replaced Johnny with a robot called Herbie as the rights to Johnny had been sold elsewhere. Herbie doesn't appear in these issues but otherwise it seems the most likely reason for the split. The first three go off into space to help Adora, ruler of Xander, to see off an attack by the Skrulls. It's a different angle to the same storyline from the last issues of Nova and once again an Essential volume ends partway through the storyline, with the three's spacecraft suddenly meeting that containing Nova, the Sphinx and other characters. Meanwhile on Earth Johnny feels he should complete his education but finds he no longer impresses women around him and is too much of a celebrity. Soon he is invited to study at Security College, apparently an institution for the children of the famous and important. However Johnny and a guest-starring Spider-Man soon discover sinister operations are being undertaken by the Monocle, using the students as tools.

This volume is slightly weakened by being open-ended at both ends, especially as it is now the final Essential Fantastic Four volume, but it shows both respect for what has come before and imagination to build upon the foundations for strong new tales. The build-up to issue #200 is carefully handled and allows the series to delve into the four both as individuals and as a group, reaffirming what holds them together. This is a generally good volume but let down by ending midway through a big storyline with seemingly no resolution.

Essential Thor volume 6

Essential Thor volume 6 reprints issues #221 to #247. The writing sees the end of Gerry Conway's run and the start of Len Wein's with the transition covered by Roy Thomas and Bill Mantlo. The art is mainly by John Buscema with individual issues by Rich Buckler and Sal Buscema.

This volume shows the series caught in its ongoing dilemma over just how far it should stray from the Lee-Kirby era. There are some attempts to create new characters and chart new ground but at other times the series retreats to not just the set-up of the 1960s but even that of a particular part of the 1960s. One attempt at moving forward is to provide Thor with a regular sidekick and there are two in this set of issues. The first is Hercules who, after a fight due to an impersonation, rapidly sides with Thor as they set off to tackle Pluto and Ares in order to rescue Krista the Valkyrie. It's almost the archetypal adventure story as two friendly heroes set off together on a great quest, watching out for one another as they go. Hercules is often a difficult character to handle because he's presented as the character of legend with all his incredible tales taken as part of his actual history (whereas Thor strays more from the recorded legend, as noted on panel by a messenger from UCLA) and this can create a man who is too strong and ridiculous to work in stories. But here he comes across well, a loyal dependable friend of Thor's who can be relied on at all times, at least until he accepts an offer to go off to Los Angeles and lecture at UCLA on the truth behind Greek myths, and who never enters into serious rivalry between the Norse and Greek gods. The contradictions between the two sets of legends go unspoken and soon a third is added to the equation.

The biggest developments come with the introduction of deities from the Egyptian pantheon as we see the arrival of Osiris, Isis and their son Horus as a prelude to a battle with Horus's brother, Seth the god of death. In the process, Odin is transformed into Atum-Re, the forebearer of the Egyptian gods with a hint that this is actually a restoration to an earlier incarnation. Marvel has generally been rather coy about having so many different sets of gods running around the universe and yet there are clear contradictions between their myths about the creation and growth of the Earth and much overlap between the different responsibilities of the gods. And there are a number of common themes across pantheons - Horus may have a much friendlier relationship with his father than Thor with Odin or Hercules with Zeus, but once again the biggest rivalry within the pantheon is between the (comparatively) young prince and his brother, as with Thor and Loki. And the greatest villain in the pantheon is the god of death, as with the Greek pantheon and even the Norse has used Hela as one of the more recurring foes within the pantheon after Loki. The result is that the introduction of the Egyptian pantheon offers some diversity of characters but continues to follow structures already established with the Norse and Greek gods rather than offering up much that's truly diverse. Even the hint that Odin may somehow also be the founding entity of another pantheon is rather swept over in favour of implying that Osiris, Isis and Horus have merely transformed him into believing he is Atum-Re. Were he the actual Atum-Re it could have made for some interesting tales exploring the various connections and common foes between the different deities, providing a wealth of original ideas for years to come. But instead it's all brushed over for now.

There are a handful of other new foes and situations introduced in this volume but few make much of an impact. Little can be said about Armak the First Man whose spirit possesses a modern day man during a seance, whilst the first encounter with Kamo Tharnn, now better known as the Possessor, is more notable for the successful taking of his powerful Runestaff that offers hope of a cure for Jane Foster than for this strange man in space himself. Right at the end of the volume there is a trip to the Latin American country of Costa Verde where a revolution is underway with the help of Firelord, under the control of the mysterious Gypsy, mistress to the revolution's leader El Lobo. Meanwhile in Asgard, Odin is turning into a tyrant, now advised by the malevolent Igron, but this story thread is not resolved within this volume. Odin has previously spent some time wandering Earth as an amnesiac elderly man called Orrin, supposedly to improve his understanding but it doesn't last long before the Egyptians show up. More earthly moments come from ongoing run-ins with Detective Sergeant, later Lieutenant, Blumkenn, who supplies Thor and Hercules with information about ongoing problems but gets somewhat frustrated with all the action and damage in the area.

The other major introduction in this volume is Firelord, a new herald of Galactus who earns his freedom at the end of his initial adventure when together with Thor and Hercules they have successfully dealt with Ego the Living Planet. Thor is charged with finding a replacement herald and produces the Destroyer armour, with which he and Hercules have battled once more in these pages. As for the Living Planet, we get an origin for Ego but it's rather convoluted as we learn how his people tried to survive a supernova by entering suspended animation, only for the supernova to come early and fuse the last man standing to the planet, consuming all the other lives on it. The clear intention is to make him similar to and a contrast from Galactus, casting both as tragic figures who were once ordinary men now turned into cosmic nightmares, but it's hard to feel much sympathy for Ego at all.

There's a clear liking for Firelord in spite of the cosmic herald feeling somewhat out of place in a series based on Norse mythology as he keeps reappearing, often being used by other malevolent forces such as the Gypsy with her hereditary mind-jewel that allows her to take control of men's wills or by Loki, who makes yet another attempt to conquer Asgard and then Earth, this time with the direct force of an army, but it's one of the most forgettable of battles. The same can be said of the confrontation with the Dweller in Darkness, though the encounter with the Absorbing Man has a wonderful scene where Thor runs away into a toy department only to trick the Absorbing Man into absorbing the properties of a cardboard copy of Mjolnir. For once there truly is someone who can't punch their way out of a paper bag. There's a battle amongst the Trolls, with Ulik kidnapping Jane to force Thor to help in the battle against Ulik's rival Geirrodur and his minion Zotarr but neither side's motivations are entirely altruistic.

One of the more advanced epics comes towards the end of the volume as Zarrko the Tomorrow Man returns, accompanied by his giant Servitor robot. Now the ruler of a land in the 50th century, he comes seeking Thor and the Warriors Three's help to tackle the Time-Twister, a strange group of aliens moving backwards through time and bringing death and destruction wherever they go. The ultimate showdown comes at the Temple at the End of Time where they all encounter the mysterious He Who Remains at the end of it all. It's a strong piece that takes time travel, which can often be a confused concept when used for anything other than to bring characters and situations together, and weaves a tale in which existence is threatened by seemingly unstoppable foes. It also has a strong comeuppance as Zarrko returns to his realm only to discover that his successful conflict has had side effects upon the timeline.

Towards the last third of the volume Hercules drops aside as an interim writer quickly phases him out. But there's a clear successor waiting in the wings who rapidly becomes Thor's new sidekick, getting involved in all his remaining adventures whether intentionally or not. Jane Foster returns but has been one of a number of people who attempt suicide under the influence of the Dweller in Darkness, though this is only discovered after Thor has defeated him, and the attempt has left her in a seemingly incurable condition. Despite not having seen her for years Thor is deeply upset over this and spends a succession of issues in near mourning. Jane is only saved when Sif and Hercules obtain Kamo Tharnn's Runestaff. But in order to restore Jane's spirit Sif transfers her own life force into her. Thus at a stroke all the years of building up Sif as Thor's romantic interest are swept aside and we're back to the old days of Jane, reinforced by Thor making a much greater use than in recent years of his Donald Blake identity as he resumes his regular medical practice. Jane even resumes part of her old role of being a regular damsel in distress to be captured by various foes as a prelude to drawing Thor into the action. This is very much a step back to the old days, albeit with Jane now aware of Thor's dual identity, and it doesn't always feel like a reversion for the better.

But in one regard there has been some development with Jane presented as a much stronger and tougher character than before. At times there are hints that she is channelling the power of Sif, in particular the little-seen power to bypass time and space, but at others it seems as though she's strengthened up on her own accord. She insists on going off on adventures with Thor and won't take no for an answer, holds her own against foes to the point where she's overpowering revolutionaries and besting the Gypsy in physical conflict, standing up to Geirrodur with a spear and more. A lot of time has passed since she was last a regular in the series and this was now an era when portrayals of female characters were moving beyond the old fawning wallflowers. Odin still orders Thor to reject her, an order that is refused, but this may be as much down to Odin's sudden shift in behaviour as anything else. Otherwise Jane is being presented more and more as a strong match for Thor, even to the point of freeing him from mental control. But simply rehashing the 1960s adventures with more modern sensibilities isn't enough and ultimately Jane's return to replace Sif is a major retrograde step.

Overall this volume is so so. It does try to introduce some new elements but doesn't really succeed in finding strong ones that stick, whether because they feel out of touch with the basis of the series or because of a reluctance to explore them in full or because they're just not up to much. Otherwise we get yet more reuses of the same old foes and the return of Jane literally in place of Sif. Some of the individual stories are good but in general this is a series that doesn't know just how to get out of its traditional comfort zone.

Omitted material: Marvel Two-in-One 99

Left out of Essential Marvel Two-in-One volume 4 is issue #99, which features a team-up with the licensed character Rom (previously seen in Power Man and Iron Fist #73 so I won't describe him again here). The issue is written by Bill Mantlo and drawn by Bob Hall.

This is a relatively straightforward action piece in which Rom crashes on the roof of the Baxter Building after an initial fight with a coven of Dire Wraith witches who have animated the armour of his deceased fellow Space Knight Firefall. Ben already knows Rom from adventures in the latter's own title and the two set off to deal with the Coven. During the fight Ben is bewitched by the Wraiths, forcing Rom to deploy his neutraliser weapon which dispatches all the Wraiths and also turns Ben human again. To Rom's surprise, Ben is upset at regaining his "humanity" - this is because Ben fears Alicia is drawn to the Thing not the man and is scared of losing her. Then the effects of the neutraliser wear off, restoring Ben to his Thing form.

This issue is somewhat slight due to telling two extended action sequences, one in flashback, but does show the problems with telling Rom stories because he comes with a powerful weapon that can permanently dispatch his foes and only his foes with ease. (And as the weapon came with the toy it can't be simply abandoned.) But it's also surprising to see yet another temporary cure for Ben and what I think is the first time he directly acknowledges the possibility that he really prefers being the Thing because of Alicia and implicitly this may be why no cure has ever lasted. It puts the final issue of the series into greater perspective and so is more key than it first seems, even though the main issue is nothing to write home about.

Essential Avengers volume 8 - creator labels

Another volume with lots of creators so here's a post for some of the labels.

Deathlok the Demolisher: Origins

Another look at a series that is not touched by the Essentials.

Deathlok the Demolisher: Origins is a Panini pocketbook that reprints Astonishing Tales #25 to #28 & #30 to #35. The writing credits vary a bit but are mainly Rich Buckler with Doug Moench or Bill Mantlo scripting and/or co-plotting at times. The art on all issues is mainly by Buckler with additional contributions variously by Keith Pollard, Arvell Jones, Bob McLeod and "the whole blame Bullpen". Bonus material includes a two-page humour strip from issue #25 that was George Pérez's first published pencil work and various pencils and a 1976 watercolour by Buckler.

This is a strip with an interesting combination of themes that were prevalent back in the mid 1970s. There's a dystopian future in which familiar cities have become rundown hellholes whilst war has driven the military into an ever more powerful position. There are cyborgs as humans are reconstructed to be part machine and even more effective warriors than before. And there's the zombie fad adapted into science fiction with the lead character being a reanimated corpse.

Often an era's general cultural outlook is best reflected in the prevalent visions of the future. When the future is portrayed as a bold, pioneering vision of harmony it usually reflects on a present that may have big problems in the here and now but is confident of solving them. But there are times when such optimism is in rather short supply. The 1970s was a decade of cynicism in which many of the previous confidences had been dramatically shaken. It's unsurprising to find this future set strip takes place in such a grim and pessimistic environment. What is a shock though is the time. It's set in 1990, suggesting that nobody expected it to be still be read by that year or beyond. No doubt the pessimism about the future extended to the US comic industry, though 1990 would see it not only still going and in strong health at that, but also launching a new Deathlok series.

The fusion of cyborg and zombie produces a lead character with some unique characteristics. A dead soldier whose corpse has been kept in storage for five years, Luther Manning finds himself unexpectedly sentient again in a form that's part decayed corpse, part cybernetic addition. With a built in computer that he often converses with in private, Deathlok is set on a search to recover his humanity and seek revenge on Simon Ryker, the major who has yanked him from a noble death and brought him into this living hell as part of a wider scheme. Ryker is the main villain throughout the book though we also see the rise of his rival Hellinger amidst a wider development of cyborgs, military attacks on Deathlok and the cannibals who roam the streets of New York. Deathlok has some good character moments, especially when he turns up at his old home only for his wife and child to recoil in horror. Later he finds out that his best friend has married his wife.

But whilst the series may have some good concepts, the whole thing is let down by bad pacing. It suffers from "decompression" decades before the term was coined, with a rather simple storyline of Deathlok going rogue and seeking revenge on Ryker who in turn tries to neutralise him. This drags out over ten issues and although the individual chapters may generally hold up well the overall storyline feels excessive and somewhat dull. The series suffers a reprint fill-in, a truncated issue and an issue drawn by multiple hands, all signs of a series suffering troubles. Being very much an artist's pet project one might expect it to be all flashy art at the expense of plot but instead it's more character moments and smaller incidents that drag the whole thing out. The art is, however, quite good and does an especially effective job at portraying horror through reaction shots rather than showing it on panel. This is also notably a series without any interaction with the rest of the Marvel universe, instead taking place in its own time and thus a greater degree of creative freedom than was normally available in this era.

This edition lacks the final issue of Astonishing Tales but promises another Deathlok book is coming soon. It has yet to appear on Panini's schedules leaving the series on a slight cliffhanger though the main story of the struggle with Simon Ryker is completed here. Overall this edition shows a series that's very strong on ideas and individual moments but rather weak when collected together as a whole.

Essential Fantastic Four volume 8

Essential Fantastic Four volume 8 contains issues #160 to #183 (#180 is a reprint with only the cover included here) plus Annual #11 and the crossover issues Marvel Two-in-One #20 and Annual #1. Most of the writing, including the annual and the Marvel Two-in-One issues, is by Roy Thomas with one issue co-written with Gerry Conway and another scripted by Bill Mantlo. The penultimate issue is co-plotted by Len Wein, Jim Shooter and Archie Goodwin, and scripted by Mantlo who writes the final issue. The art is by a mixture of John Buscema, Rich Buckler and George Pérez, with Ron Wilson and Sal Buscema each contributing a couple of issues at the end. John Buscema draws the annual and Sal Buscema both the Marvel Two-in-One issues.

This volume covers a period in which the Thing now had almost a solo series in the form of Marvel Two-in-One, yet apart from the odd mention of one or other of his team-ups it's barely noticeable in the regular series. Instead the series operates as though this is the only place where significant developments happen to him. This is most noticeable when a succession of issues see Ben first temporarily ally with the Hulk against the rest of the team and then the result of prolonged exposure to the Hulk's gamma radiation causes Ben to revert to human form. Ben's loss of powers leads to his temporary replacement by perhaps the shortest lasting official membership of the team ever as Luke Cage, Power Man is taken on. Cage is around for such a short period of time, part of which is spent under the control of the Puppet Master and the rest with Ben still hanging around on the scene as the Four battle the Wrecker, making it impossible to assess either the new member's potential or the overall dynamic of the team. It's tempting to see this as just an extended advert for Power Man's own series, which often showed signs of being in danger saleswise. Meanwhile Ben finds being fully human again is not all he was expecting, with reduced strength and many people only interested in his monstrous form. However he is soon restored to active duty courtesy of a special exo-skeleton designed to mimic his rocky form, finally giving him a way to have both forms when he needs them without the awkward mental side-effects. Sadly for Ben this doesn't last too long with Galactus blasting him with a special energy that turns him fully into a monster once more. The only long term side-effect is that Ben's strength has been enhanced, as part of a general upscaling of the powers of some of the Four. He does start thinking about marrying Alicia, and there are hints that she wants children, but it doesn't come to much.

The main area where Marvel Two-in-One makes its presence known is in a crossover between both titles' annuals, even spilling over into an issue of the regular series. The whole piece is a convoluted epic built around time travel as a canister of adamantium is accidentally sent back in time to the Second World War, resulting in changes to history as the Germans win and conquer the United States. The canister gets cut in half by a time wedge, resulting in the whole Four first going back in time to team up with the Invaders and then Ben travelling back solo where he allies with the less well-known Liberty Legion. Both adventures present a variety of foes from the 1940s set titles, including a clash with Baron Zemo as we see how he was stuck under his hood whilst the Liberty Legion bring conflict with Master Man, U-Man and Brain Drain plus new foes Skyshark and Slicer. It's a good idea in principle and allows each half of the saga to stand more or less on its own. But the whole thing is let down by an ability to explain or understand just how time travel works with some of the saga implying that the events of the adventure has changed actual history albeit temporarily, other moments suggesting that it depicts part of what was always in the original history and other moments still suggesting that the 1940s elements actually took place in an alternate timeline and so explain why Captain America and Namor the Sub-Mariner in the present day have never remembered what happened. Any one of these approaches to time travel would be fine but when all three are thrown together it creates an incoherent mess that undermines a good attempt to bring together the heroes of different eras.

The other tale to noticeably indulge Roy Thomas's enthusiasm for pre-Silver Age Marvel characters is a curious two-parter in which the Four take on the Crusader, who turns out to be the grown up version of the early 1950s hero, Marvel Boy. But rather than a straightforward revival of the character to allow him to be used as a hero in the modern day, we instead get a strange story that instead turns him into a zealot driven by anger and revenge upon a bank that denied him a loan when the Uranians needed medication, thus preventing him from returning to Uranus in time to either save the civilisation from natural destruction or else to die with it. It seems that Thomas was aiming for a tale to contrast the black and white simplistic morality of the Golden and Atlas Ages with the more complicated superhero ethics that were developing strongly by the mid 1970s, as well as a more general look at fanaticism in the name of one's "father". But the problem is that he has never been one of the best polemical writers and so all the subtleties about the Crusader's approach to fighting crime in contrast to the Fantastic Four's (and they're far from the best heroes to use for such a contrast anyway, being more adventurers) are completely lost in favour of a tale of a seemingly indestructible fanatical foe. Marvel Boy's original adventures were only published for about a year, though were reprinted in the late 1960s and so he's not a hero whom it's easy to get excited about making it odd that he gets brought back this way only to be immediately killed off. It's also surprising that no effort is made to reconcile the civilisation on Uranus with the greater scientific knowledge of the planet that had developed in the intervening quarter of a century since the original tales. In 1950 it was possible to present other planets in the Solar System as being inhabited but by 1975 this was no longer credible.

One recurring theme in this volume is alternate Earths of one kind or another. At the start of the volume is a convoluted tale of Earth and two separate alternate dimensions that are all being pushed into a three-way conflict with each other by Arkon. One world is the Fifth Dimension, allowing Johnny to meet with Valeria once more, the other is the world where Reed became the Thing instead of Ben. It's a rather convoluted piece more notable for characterisation than for the conflicts, and presents a clear attempt to create a new Silver Surfer when Ben is travelling through space and encounters Gaard, an intergalactic ice hockey player complete with skates, stick and a puck, who serves as guardian of an interdimensional portal. The revelation that he is actually the Johnny Storm of the Reed-Thing's dimension, albeit unaware of his own identity, is an attempt at adding tragedy and familiarity but the character as a whole feels half-baked and it's easy to see why he is quickly forgotten.

A more substantial epic comes with an unusual starting point as a highly articulate golden gorilla called Gorr lands on Earth and lures the Four onto his spaceship to take them away. We soon learn he has solicited their aid because Galactus is seeking to consume Counter-Earth on the other side of the Sun, with only the High Evolutionary offering any meaningful resistance. Battling both Galactus himself and his current herald the Destroyer yields no ground until he accepts an offer to find an alternate populated world to consume providing that either its inhabitants voluntarily offer themselves up or the Four will select it for destruction. This leads to exploration of three possible alternate worlds, one being inhabited by a race of robots led by Torgo, the Thing's sparing partner from the world where the Skrulls operated like a 1920s gangster movie. Another world appears to be a parallel to medieval Earth as knights battle dragons but it turns out to be the Skrulls again, this time driving out the last of the indigenous population. Finally the third world appears barren and deserted but instead turns out to be Poppup, the home of the Impossible Man and his people with a single group mind, thus making the rest of the race willing to offer themselves up. But all is not well and Galactus suffers indigestion, and is then accelerated evolved into an energy form that no longer needs to eat. It's a curious twist to end the epic with but it shows an attempt to move forwards.

The return of the Impossible Man is the big surprise, since the original story had been exceptionally silly and it seemed as if all were trying to forget it. But now we get a somewhat slapstick issue as "Impy" roams through New York, eventually invading the Marvel Comics bullpen in the hope of starring in his own comic. It's a wonderfully anarchic piece that allows a tongue in cheek look at the Marvel office. However the Impossible Man then hangs around the Four for the rest of the volume in a tale that also sees both Thundra and Tigra show up and never really depart. The Impossible Man is best kept for one-off stories rather than an ongoing element.

The last issues in the volume put the team through multiple wringers as the Baxter Building gets taken over by the Frightful Four who are trying to recruit a new fourth member. They eventually find one in the form of the Brute - the Reed Richards of Counter-Earth who has inadvertently stowed away on the Fantastic Four's journey home. The rest of the Frightful Four are soon defeated but the Brute takes Reed's place and confines the real Reed to the Negative Zone. Reed's stretching power has been weakening before vanishing completely and so he is forced to survive by his wits and make a deal with Annihilus against a giant android controlled by the Mad Thinker, who has bizarrely found the ability to extend his power into the Negative Zone. Meanwhile the other Reed is trying to keep up the pretence on Earth but Sue has her doubts and they're confirmed by the different way this Reed kisses her. Sue has been growing ever stronger as a character, learning to use her forcefields for effective offensive action and seeing her power steadily increase in strength. It is thus a surprise only to the Brute that she proves the hardest of the Four to subdue. Reed's own nobility also triumphs through in the climax, impressing even his counterpart.

In general Johnny is the least used of the Four throughout this volume. After seeing Valeria a final time he tries updating his hair style and fashion sense in order to hit the singles bars, but the results are almost painfully comic. A long running though occasional thread sees him dating new character Frankie Raye but she is fearful of flame and panics whenever he flames on to go into action. There are hints at some great reason for this but she appears so infrequently that it becomes an irritation and with Thomas leaving just before the end there's a strong possibility it will not be resolved at all.

Apart from a few slips towards the end, this volume is quite strong. It demonstrates that it is possible to find new ways to handle the characters and their large ensemble cast whilst also adapting to the spirit of the times. This is the series at its best so far since the later Lee-Kirby years.

Essential Avengers volume 7

Essential Avengers volume 7 consists of issues #141 to #163 and Annual #6 plus Super-Villain Team-Up #9. The writing see Steve Englehart finish his run to be followed by Gerry Conway and then Jim Shooter, with a few issues seeing overlaps and #150 incorporating part of issue #16 scripted by Stan Lee. The main story in the annual is by Englehart and a back-up by Scott Edelman whilst the Super-Villain Team-Up is written by Bill Mantlo. The bulk of the art, including the main story in the annual, is by George Pérez with other issues by Don Heck, Keith Pollard, John Buscema and Sal Buscema, with issue #150 reusing part of the Jack Kirby drawn #16, the annual back-up by Herb Trimpe and the Super-Villain Team-Up by Jim Shooter.

I don't normally comment on the other credits in a volume but there's a notable disjoint in this volume and it appears to come right around the period of Editor-in-Chiefship that can be dubbed "The Conway Weeks". I say "appears" because until the late 1970s, after the end of this volume, Marvel was rather loose with the credit "editor", sometimes giving it to a series's regular writer (even on fill-in issues by other writers), sometimes to another staff member who now appears on the canonical list of Editors-in-Chief which seems to involve some retroactive determination, and sometimes to someone else altogether. As a result it's difficult to determine at a glance just when one Editor-in-Chief replaced another, particularly in the period from 1972 to 1978 when there were no less than seven in post and one could be credited for a few months on material all basically approved under their predecessor. But here there seems to be a clear point of changeover with consequences engulfing the series as a long-term regular writer suddenly drops out to be replaced by the incoming then outgoing Editor-in-Chief who then lasts barely half a year, to be succeeded by another staffer who would go on to be Editor-in-Chief when the music finally stopped. The result is an example of an all too common situation in comics whereby big ideas and plans from one writer get taken up by another with minimal interest in them, grand storylines get finished by different hands and in different ways from those intended by those who started them, and there's fill-ins and reprints at completely the worst moments. All this contributes to a volume that is trying to live up to the levels of its predecessor, admittedly quite a daunting task in itself, but which instead winds up plodding along.

The worst moments are the aforementioned fill-ins. Issue #144 is part of the Serpent Crown saga and ends on a critical moment as the Avengers set off for the Squadron Supreme's home dimension. Yet this cliffhanger is not continued until issue #147 and in the meantime we get a two-part fill-in that openly leaves the question of its place in chronology up to the readers as they endure a two-part fill-in as the mysterious Assassin seeks to take the team down one by one. Given its length it may have been prepared for Giant-Size Avengers before that series switched to all reprints or else for an annual, but its presence here is just an irritating interruption. Also suffering is issue #150, where the cover promises "A Spectacular 150th Anniversary Special" but inside what was clearly structured as an extended meeting to refine the active team membership interspersed with a news reporter taking us through the history of the team in bite-sized chunks is instead paused after just six pages and the rest of the issue is padded out with sixteen pages lifted from Avengers #16, reliving the first major change in the membership. There's no denying the significance of that issue, and in later years of giant-sized anniversary issues with some reprints it would have been an obvious candidate for inclusion, but here it just shows itself up as being used as padding in what must have been one of the most eagerly anticipated issues at the time. Issue #151 has the rest of the issue with some drawn out bits to make up the extra pages but overall the whole thing is a very disappointing end to Steve Englehart's run on the series.

Englehart's last issues are not as well known as his earlier ones, and are dominated by the first part of the Serpent Crown saga. Building upon a plot device from other series we get an interdimensional tale in which the Serpent Crown is linked to its counterparts across other dimensions, leading to an encounter with the Squadron Supreme under the most obvious of titles - "Crisis on Other Earth", though the following issue's "20,000 Leagues under Justice" is also less than subtle. The Squadron Supreme's role as a pastiche of the Justice League of America has never been more obvious than here, with a further team member introduced in the form of the Amphibian, clearly the counterpart of Aquaman. Also show is the Squadron's base, a satellite orbiting the Earth. More surprising are the main agents the crowns operate through. On the normal Earth the crown is worn by Hugh Jones, of the Brand Corporation, but on the Squadron's Earth the crown is worn by the President of the United States, who here is none other than Nelson Rockefeller - this world apparently never having experienced Richard Nixon. What the real Rockefeller, then Vice President, thought of this is not known but it was a kind of success after three failed bids for the Presidency. I wonder who would be placed in the role if the story were created today? Next year may show who the perennial also ran candidate is. The story also allows for some polemicism as the Beast lectures the Squadron on blindly accepting orders from politicians and businessmen, to the point that when the Avengers return home the Squadron declines to pursue them. Thus it's only the Avengers who face down Brand in the initial climax, in which the corporation deploys Namor's old foe Orca the Killer Whale.

The earliest issues also contain a coda to the Kang saga. Hawkeye's attempts to recover the Black Knight have led him to travel through time where he gets knocked off course and arrives in the American West in 1873. He is followed by Thor and Moondragon for a final battle with Kang in which the time travelling warlord's weaponry overloads, destroying him. Just to confirm his fate, Kang's future self Immortus sends a projection to explain his role in his younger self's downfall and then to fade out, confirming he has now never existed. It's a rather low key ending for someone who had been arguably the Avengers' greatest foe and it also raises the whole question of how time travel works and just what has and hasn't been changed by Kang's death. With the Serpent Crown storyline also running through these issues it feels rather underwhelming, as though it was an after thought.

More surprising is the team-up with five of Marvel's western heroes, the Two-Gun Kid, the Rawhide Kid, Kid Colt, the Ringo Kid and the Night Rider (who was published under the name "Ghost Rider" but has since been renamed multiple times). It's a bold move to fully incorporate them into the Marvel superhero universe. At the end of the adventure the Two-Gun Kid successfully petitions to be allowed to visit the Avengers' own time where he and Hawkeye settle for adventures and work out on the western ranches. There may have been big plans for the Two-Gun Kid's adventures in the present day but very little seems to have come of them and he's reduced to an occasional humorous side moment such as when the telephone rings at a time of great crisis but the Kid just casually shoots it as he doesn't understand what the device does. Still it's good to see that no Marvel character will ever be truly abandoned.

Also not abandoned is Patsy Walker who shows up at the mansion to demand the Beast repay the debt he owes her and she gets caught up in a raid on the Brand Corporation. There she discovers the discarded costume of the Cat, now Tigra, and dons it, becoming the superhero Hellcat. Her story is one of contrasts, with now ex-husband Buzz Baxter now a jaded cynic after his experiences in Vietnam and working for Brand whilst Patsy retains the optimism of her teenage years. She's clearly being built up as the next member of the Avengers but when it comes to finalising the line-up she's whisked away by Moondragon for a period of intense training, no doubt at the behest of incoming writer Conway. It's a pity as Hellcat shows a lot of promise, but fortunately she would soon reappear in another series.

The change of writers coincides with a revised line-up. Moondragon departs, taking Hellcat with her, but not before she's sewn doubts in Thor's mind about being a god working alongside mortals and he too drops out. Hawkeye has already stepped aside and so the team we get is made up of Iron Man, the Wasp, Yellowjacket, Captain America, the Scarlet Witch, the Vision and the Beast. But they are soon joined by a surprise return - the resurrection of Wonder Man.

The second half of the volume meanders through a string of forgettable encounters with old and new foes. If there's one clear theme it's of the Vision's extended family with storylines focusing upon his "brother", his "brother"'s brother, his father-in-law & brother-in-law, his father and his "grandfather". Wonder Man is revived as a "zuvembie" by a new Black Talon but gains full revival thanks to the effects of the Serpent Crown worn by the Living Laser and then the Golden Age Whizzer shows up once more seeking help in dealing with his son Nuklo, with the adventure concluded in the annual which also shows the Vision facing off against Whirlwind. Later Avengers mansion is invaded by the Grim Reaper who has come to determine which of the Vision or Wonder Man is truly his brother. Then Ultron embarks on a strange scheme to create a female android with the mind of the Wasp to be his mate in a display of a classic Oedipus complex, with his "father" Yellowjacket abused and brainwashed into thinking he's Ant-Man in the early years so as to help his creation without knowing it. The female android is not fully brought to life but would go on to become the appropriately named Jocasta.

There's also a forgettable crossover with Super-Villain Team-Up as the Avengers get caught up in the battle between Doctor Doom and Attuma, but it has all the feel of wandering into another series by mistake without ever really explaining things and leaving no real impression here. Worse still it takes up no less than three issues of Avengers. Then there's an encounter with the possessed stone body of the Black Knight in what feels like another filler. The most notable new foe is Graviton, a man who has acquired power over gravity until it goes awry. There's also the beginning of what feels like a greater use for Jarvis as he takes initiative and rescues one of Graviton's victims. Finally there's a clash with the Champions at the behest of Hercules's old foe Typhon.

It would be wrong to imply the first half of the volume is truly spectacular when it actually feels like it's only marking time and tying up loose ends, with the next big thing to come later. But it nevertheless keeps up enough momentum from the previous volume to maintain the promise. However it all gets derailed by reprints, fill-ins and a change of writer, leaving the series stumbling around with a few good ideas such as the resurrection of Wonder Man and a lot of dull ones like the crossover. Only towards the end does it start to get exciting again. Overall the whole volume feels rather disappointing.

Rocket Raccoon: Guardian of the Keystone Quadrant

Another look at a series that is not touched by the Essentials.

Rocket Raccoon: Guardian of the Keystone Quadrant is a Panini pocket book that reprints the four part Rocket Raccoon limited series from the 1980s plus the story introducing Groot from Tales to Astonish #13, Rocket's first appearance from Marvel Preview #7 and another Rocket tale from Incredible Hulk #271. Everything is written by Bill Mantlo bar the Tales to Astonish story, which is written by Larry Lieber. The limited series is drawn by Mike Mignola, the Tales to Astonish story by Jack Kirby, the Marvel Preview tale by Keith Giffen and the Incredible Hulk issue by Sal Buscema.

I first encountered the limited series as a back-up strip in back issus of Marvel UK's Transformers. There it suffered the fate of a lot of strips that when broken down into five or six pages an issue the flow can be jarring and I dismissed it as a piece of silliness. Reading it altogether brings a very different perspective. It's quite a good take on one of the traditional themes of science fiction - the long isolated planet that has evolved from its mission without really understanding it. Halfworld in the Keystone Quadrant is a strange planet, half a lush paradise occupied by anthropomorphic animals looking after the mentally ill, half a technological dystopia occupied by robots who manufacture toys the aforesaid mentally ill whilst also perpetually building a giant spaceship to breach the "Galacian Wall" barrier surrounding the system.

How this state of affairs came about is a mystery that is only slowly resolved when the inventor and scholar Pyko steals and deciphers the Halfworld Bible. In the meantime Ranger Rocket Raccoon gets caught in a power struggle between rival toy manufacturers Lord Dyvyne and Judson Jakes, the latter being the guardian of Rocket's girlfriend Lylla and proprietor of her firm, Mayhem Mekaniks. Dyvyne seeks to kidnap and marry Lylla as part of a hostile take-over, but his agent Blackjack O'Hare proves uncontrollable with ideas of his own. Rocket and his first mate Wal Russ, who is also Lylla's uncle, set out to rescue her aboard the ship Rakk 'N Ruin.

This is a tale that works well on two very different levels. On one, it's a simple adventure tale that uses animals instead of humans as its characters but otherwise presents a classic story of rescuing the girl and saving the world with Rocket himself as the hero. On another, it's a strong piece of social commentary, both about the intense rivalry and take-over business culture but also a plea for the plight of the mentally ill. Here they have been abandoned and left to be indulged for many generations, yet it's thanks to Rocket and Pyko that a true cure is found. The use of the term "loonies" may now seem insensitive but otherwise this is a strong plea for understanding the mentally ill and not writing them off. All in all this is quite a good little tale that would have been overlooked but for Rocket's later incorporation into the Guardians of the Galaxy.

Three additional stories are included as well. Groot's first appearance is a simple monster tale of its era where the hero is an intellectual who shows to his wife there's more to being a hero than being physically strong. Groot himself is just a strange alien that grows his body by absorbing wood and the main mystery is why a monarch is personally collecting specimens for examination. Rocket’s own debut in the pages of Marvel Preview is equally unmemorable bar for the very different location from what is to come. This black and white tale of Prince Wayfinder, "a modern Ulysses", sees a space wanderer come to Witch-World, a forest planet of wild trees and strange creatures, ruled by its own Kirke. On the planet he encounters a hunter in the form of Rocket, a talking racoon. It's very hard to fit this appearance with what's revealed in the limited series.

Also difficult to fit is Incredible Hulk #271, which sees the Hulk land on Halfworld and meet many of the characters in their first appearance but it's a slightly different set-up from the later limited series. There are no mentally ill on the planet and many of the item and company names are different. As a one-off tale of a strange planet visited by the Hulk it works but it's easy to see why more had to be added for the limited series to tell a mini-epic.

Despite exposing the continuity differences, this is a nice little collection that was released to tie in with the sudden new popularity of Rocket Raccoon and Groot when the Guardians of the Galaxy movie came out. It's a nice showcase of their early adventures and nearly thirty years after Marvel UK's split printing it's nice to see the limited series now reprinted here in one go.

Essential Iron Man volume 5

Essential Iron Man volume 5 contains issues #62 to #75 & #77 to #87 plus annual #3. Bonus material includes the covers of the reprint issues #76, annuals #1 & #2 and Giant-Size Iron Man #1. Most of the writing is by Mike Friedrich with other issues by Bill Mantlo and Len Wein, with one plot by Barry Alfonso and a couple of scripts by Roger Slifer. The annual is written by Steve Gerber. The main artist is George Tuska with other contributions by P. Craig Russell, Arvell Jones, Keith Pollard, Chic Stone and Herb Trimpe with the annual drawn by Sal Buscema.

This volume sees a couple of changes to the costume, one of which is rather better known than the other, as well as the more general ongoing modifications to the weaponry to meet the latest threat. At one stage Tony replaces the collapsible set in his attaché case with a version that can become an ultra thin form worn beneath his clothing until a wrist gesture triggers it to expand out and cover the remaining portions of his body. There may be some attached technobabble but the whole process feels a little too close to a magic or fantastical costume better suited to less scientific heroes. The introduction of this mechanism is used as an opportunity to remove one of the more notorious changes made. This covers the entire period when Tony adds a nose to the helmet "to allow more expression to show". Although it does allow for the art to show more variety in the portrayal of his face, it does also look a bit silly and it's easy to see why it gets ditched as soon as a spurious explanation (that the new method of donning the costume requires the helmet to be symmetrical).

The major storyline in this volume is the "war of the super-villains" which runs from issue #68 until #81 in which the mysterious Black Llama manipulates a succession of super-villains into battling one another in order to obtain a special golden globe of power as the prize in their contest. The saga kicks off with a battle with Sunfire and the Mandarin, who now escapes the Unicorn's body, before the contest really gets going as the Mandarin battles the Yellow Claw in the first confrontation between Marvel's two biggest oriental masterminds with both deploying robots such as Ultimo. Other foes get drawn in as the saga continues, including Modok, the Mad Thinker, the Man-Bull, Melter and Whiplash but not all villains are attracted to an object that offers inner harmony as a precursor to success and we see a montage of big names like Doctor Doom, the Red Skull and Fu Manchu turn it down whilst others like Magneto are missing in action. There is also a trip to Vietnam as both Tony and Roxanne search for Eddie March's brother Marty, encountering both the Crimson Dynamo and a hidden civilisation. Eventually the final battle sees Iron Man overcome the Claw but then all to Firebrand, whom the Llama declares the victor and takes him to his own dimension with Iron Man in pursuit.

Issue #72 has an unusual setting as Tony finds himself with time to kill in San Diego and so opts to attend Comic-Con, using his own armour as a costume. It may be only 1974 but the fandom portrayed show all the familiar signs of people obsessing over first issues, arguing about who did what, arguing about the merits of certain costume changes, parading in fancy dress (the word "cosplay" wasn't in use back then) and generally having a good time with fellow fans. There are fans of other science fiction and fantasy present as well with some Star Trek fans petitioning for a revival. In addition, there are creators who are behind schedule (Roy Thomas, in his last issue credited as editor, is even handing over a pink slip to Mike Friedrich but saying it's just a formality) but still taking time to meet the fans. All in all it's a good affectionate portrayal of the early years of organised fandom. Amidst all this the clash at the convention with the Man-Bull, Melter and Whiplash, as part of the Black Llama's machinations, is very much of lesser interest.

Just as the war of the super-villains is approaching its ultimate climax, we get one of the worst cases of delays seen in any Marvel title of the era. In the space of four issues (#76 to #79) there are no less than three fill-ins, including a reprint and a flashback adventure that normally could be easily inserted into the ongoing sequence with minimal fuss but here it appears as Iron Man is travelling between dimensions and thus it's impossible to make it a sudden spurious flashback, particularly as it's already structured as a flashback to drive a decision in the present day. The tale sees Tony as both himself and Iron Man in Vietnam during the war, testing a satellite guided canon that inflicts devastation in a village in a clandestine operation that's in violation of international law. The result of the canon and the counter attack result in widespread devastation and very few survivors, leading Iron Man to blast "Why" atop a mass grave. It's a piece questioning the whole basis of the Vietnam War, albeit somewhat late in the day as it arrived on the newstands a couple of months after the Fall of Saigon that ended the war and a couple of years after the US had withdrawn its active troop presence. The other fill-in was more timely, being a classic house of horrors story as Tony rescues a couple whose car has broken down and they take refuge in a creepy isolated house occupied by strange beings including a scientist with a funny name who performs life changing experiments. This would have been on the shelves just as The Rocky Horror Picture Show was released though Doctor Kurakill isn't as memorable a character as Doctor Frank N. Furter. Still her henchman, Quasar the mutated ape, does feel like an appropriate homage to the ape obsession of the 1950s. But in general, even allowing for the fact that issue #76 is only represented by the cover and so not interrupting the flow in this edition, these issues show a massive letdown as the momentum on the main story slams to a halt. It should not be surprising that after all these fill-ins Friedrich writes only two further issues. The end of issue #81 may try to present it as a writer bowing out at the natural end of a good run, and I don't know how the contemporary letterspages presented it, but here it feels like a writer missing one deadline too many and consequently being deliberately let go of.

When the series eventually resumes the war of the super-villains story it takes a decidedly odd turn as the Black Llama, Firebrand and Iron Man arrive in a parallel universe in which the United States is covered by a patchwork of independent states and the Llama is the king of one of them. The Llama's actions are explained away as the consequence of madness brought about by a cosmic imbalance when people cross between dimensions and he's actually the rightful ruler who has returned just in time to face a revolt by his daughter & regent's main advisor and wife, who deploy a mechanical dragon. Although there's some good character work as Iron Man nearly succumbs to the madness of the cosmic imbalance, the whole thing is such a jarring contrast with the earlier issues that it feels like it was conceived for another series altogether. It's a very disappointing end to both a lengthy storyline and Friedrich's run, made worse by the extra delays and fill-ins.

There are other foes who show up over the course of the volume including an inconclusive battle with the villainous Doctor Spectrum, the Marvel homage of Green Lantern. Iron Man has at times been matched with Green Lantern in comparisons of Marvel's Avengers and DC's Justice League of America, but it's never been the easiest fit and feels more like a default of picking the most prominent male heroes after Captain America & Batman and Thor & Superman have been lined up. Consequently such a fight seems a mismatch and this one drags on over several issues, even dragging in Thor to battle Iron Man who's been possessed by the Power Prism that gives Spectrum his powers. The story also sees Tony's friend Eddie March don the armour only to be severely injured. His life is saved but at the cost of his ability to walk and in the process he's temporarily transformed into the monstrous Freak, a fate previously shared by Happy Hogan when undergoing special energy treatment.

One theme that pops up again and again throughout the volume are the different expectations of men and women in relationships. Happy Hogan takes some time to accept that Pepper is now a high flying corporate assistant and is not going to meekly head to the kitchen to play housewife; this causes some strain on their marriage and at one point Pepper turns to Tony. However the marriage is soon restored and they remain friends even after Happy impersonates Iron Man at a party and gets injured by being drawn into action when Tony is kidnapped. Whiplash also has expectations of his fiancée Vicki Snow who is the manager of a Stark Industries plant when the villain is working undercover as head of research. Tony's own attitude to Roxanne Gilbert is more respectful but her relationship with Tony is increasingly forgettable.

The last six issues see a quick succession of writers as the series tries to find its direction. There's a forgettable encounter with the Red Ghost and his super apes in which Happy is injured; the treatment sees him become the Freak once more but this is getting overused. An ongoing subplot involves police officer Michael O'Brien investigating the death of his brother Kevin back in issue #46, convinced that Tony has arranged a cover-up, but it's been so long since the death that it becomes hard to find the subplot that compelling. There's also a move to toughen up and make more serious one of Iron Man's earliest foes as Jack Frost returns but now using the name Blizzard.

The annual follows the formula of teaming up two heroes to fight a villain more usually associated with a third in a sequel to one of the last's stories. Here we get a meeting between Iron Man and the Man-Thing in the Florida swamps that follows up on an early Marvel Two-in-One story as the Molecule Man returns from the dead, along with further social commentary as the people of Citrusville react with suspicion and hostility as Stark International (renamed in the regular issues from Stark Industries in acknowledgement at diversification of holdings) sets about rebuilding Omegaville. However the latter thread doesn't really go anywhere and just feels like a jibe at small towns for the sake of it. The Molecule Man's resurrection may have seemed like exciting fantasy and psychological thriller in 1976, but today this tale of a grown man possessing the body of a nine year old girl feels extremely dodgey even though there's no overt hint of anything sexual in the situation. Beyond that the story suffers the problem that afflicts so many Man-Thing tales in that interaction between the monster and other characters is rather limited, resulting in him stumbling through the story including a needless encounter with Iron Man on the road before turning up at the climax to provide the ultimate containment for Molecule Man. All in all this annual is a fairly typical example of the forgettable tales that were commonplace in original 1970s annuals. It also feels more like a Man-Thing tale than an Iron Man one, with Gerber taking the opportunity to return to the character after his run and the original series had ended.

It's telling that the main thing anyone remembers about this era of Iron Man is the nose, a short-lived modification to the armour that doesn't last very long. Otherwise this is a very average volume with occasional bursts of momentum that get squandered amidst excessive fill-ins and bizarre conclusions. The foes are mainly so so and there's sometimes too much reuse of ideas such as one of Tony's friends donning the Iron Man armour, getting injured and then the treatment accidentally transforms him into the Freak. Little in this volume really stands out.