Showcase Presents DC Comics Presents Superman Team-Ups volume 1

For a special Christmas post it's time for another look at things over at the Distinguished Competition.

Although I had already encountered many US comic stories reprinted for the British market, about the first ever actual US comic I can remember seeing was an old issue of the Superman team-up series DC Comics Presents. It was issue #75 in which he teamed up with Arion, Lord of Atlantis in a tale spanning many thousands of years. Having looked at the first volume of Batman's team-ups last year it's natural to now turn to Superman's.

Showcase Presents DC Comics Presents Superman Team-Ups volume 1 does as it says on the tin and reprints the team-ups from the first twenty-six issues of the title, originally published between 1978 and 1980. Just as Showcase Presents The Brave and the Bold Batman Team-Ups volume 1 covers the era of Batman's popularity surge with the TV series, this volume covers the period in which the first Superman movie came out and reaches almost the release of the second.

There's quite a lot of creators on this volume with issues written by the likes of Martin Pasko, David Michelinie, Len Wein, Paul Levitz, Steve Englehart, Cary Bates, Denny O'Neil, Gerry Conway, Mike W. Barr, Marv Wolfman and Jim Starlin. The art is a mixture of Starlin, Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez, Murphy Anderson, Curt Swan, Dick Dillin, Joe Staton and Rich Buckler. That's a pretty impressive set of names suggesting this wasn't considered a throwaway title even if the lack of a continuing creative team is a worrying sign. (And yes, there's a separate post for some of the labels.)

Looking back it's surprising how long it took for Superman to get a regular rotating team-up title. For a couple of years at the start of the 1970s World's Finest had switched from the regular Superman/Batman team-up to Superman and rotating guest-stars but even in that short run Batman and/or Robin showed up quite a bit anyway. Otherwise the late arrival of such a book is surprising when Batman and, over at Marvel, both Spider-Man and the Thing had all had team-up books for some years. The imminent arrival of the first Superman movie was clearly the driving force behind the book finally appearing and, presumably, surviving the DC Implosion of 1978 which hit the company just a couple of months after the series launched. But the movie itself doesn't seem to have influenced the content of the series which instead sticks to the standard comic portrayal of Superman. For that matter Wonder Woman is also clearly based on her comic portrayal rather than that of the TV series, which was then in its final year.

As is standard for a team-up title, here's the list of guest-stars:

1. Flash
2. Flash
3. Adam Strange
4. Metal Men
5. Aquaman
6. Green Lantern
7. Red Tornado
8. Swamp Thing
9. Wonder Woman
10. Sgt. Rock
11. Hawkman
12. Mister Miracle
13. Legion of Super-Heroes
14. Superboy
15. Atom
16. Black Lightning
17. Firestorm
18. Zatanna
19. Batgirl
20. Green Arrow
21. Elongated Man
22. Captain Comet
23. Doctor Fate
24. Deadman
25. Phantom Stranger
26. Green Lantern

With the exception of Doctor Fate all the characters are the Earth 1 versions. This selection of guests is drawn very much from the better known end of the DC Multiverse with most of the big name Justice League members represented. With Batman accommodated by the regular team-up in World's Finest the most obvious absentee on the list is the Martian Manhunter. Although time travel appears a lot in the volume the stories and guest stars are rooted in the present day apart from Sgt. Rock who only appears when Superman is thrown back in time to 1944. Also appearing in issue #11, though not billed on the cover, is Marc Teichman, the fictional winner of a Daily Planet prize to spend time with Superman and based on a reader who won a prize on the letters page to be depicted fictionally. There are some cameos by various Justice League members but otherwise the only notable guest-star who doesn't get headlined is Krypto the Superdog, making a rare appearance in Kal-El's adulthood.

There's little in the way of ongoing development in this volume, not least because no writer does more than three issues consecutively. At this stage Clark Kent was working for both the Daily Planet and the WGBS TV station, and we see most of his supporting cast including Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, Perry White, Lana Lang and Steve Lombard. However they are all primarily used as part of the general background rather than actually driving any of the stories. The first two issues form a single story and a few of the later issues are linked with Superman following up on foes in a second issue even though the first's guest star doesn't come with him. One of the few long term consequences comes in issue #17 when at the end of their adventure together Superman suggests Firestorm should join the Justice League; however this proposal is not followed up here and is presumably continued in the contemporary Justice League of America.

The foes themselves are a mixture of original one-off characters to serve an individual tale and longstanding foes, often key parts of the guest star's rogues' gallery. New foes used here include the Volkir and Zelkot, two alien races who evolved from the same common ancestor but who have now been at war for thousands of years, the Skrynians, an alien race from a dying planet seeking a new world with a suitably cold climate, Frank Rayles, a rich crook and brother of an astronomer, the Sabromians, a set of alien invaders, Hugh Bryant, a lonely alien who has been trapped on Earth for millions of years evolving into the planet's dominant life form at any given moment but now devolving backwards into those forms, Caligro the Great, a failed magician embittered by the success and fame of the heroes, Doctor Horus, an anthropologist whose mind has drawn in both his house and people visiting, Bo Force, a crooked oil magnate, the Masters, an alien race who use an infection to turn humans into their own kind, Starstriker, a mutant seeking to activate his own mental powers, El Muchacho, a mischievous imp, Mr. Genarian, a mobster seeking to prolong his life, and N'Gon, an alien seeking extra power to destroy its duplicate counterpart. Note just how many different alien races are used in this volume. Existing foes seen here include Kaskor, Adam Strange's longstanding enemy, Chemo, the Metal Men's old foe, I.Q., an old Hawkman foe but here appearing against the Metal Men, Ocean Master, half-brother of Aquaman, Star Sapphire, the alien warrior possessing Green Lantern's girlfriend Carol Ferris, the Weaponers of Qward, old foes of Green Lantern, Solomon Grundy, the lesser known Earth 1 version of the swamp monster, Killer Frost, Firestorm's recurrent foe, and Tala, the soul seeking demoness enemy of the Phantom Stranger. And there are the generic foes such as the German soldiers in the team-up with Sgt. Rock. Superman's recurring foes seen here are limited to Intergang, the Metropolis based criminal organisation. There's also a brief appearance by the Reverse-Flash, who in black and white looks almost identical to the Flash bar the background colour on their chest symbols.

The one recurring storyline involves Clark's old friend from his Smallville days, Pete Ross and his son Jon. Pete has known of Clark's identity for many years but concealed his knowledge. Now he turns to Superman for help when Jon is kidnapped by aliens and taken to an alien world. Superman promises to rescue Jon but the Legion of Super-Heroes intervene because Jon's kidnap and separation from his father is a crucial moment in history. This creates a terrible dilemma for Superman and his decision to leave Jon there is one that sits uneasily with him for some time. It also leads to a rupture in his friendship with Pete as the latter turns on him and seeks vengeance then succumbs to madness. Later on in the volume Tala seeks to possess Superman's soul, digging at this incident as it is his greatest failure; however Superman resolves to put things right by bringing Jon home whilst the Phantom Stranger battles Tala. Seeing his son again cures Pete's madness and anger, a little too instantly, and there's a reconciliation between the old friends. It's a pity that this storyline is wrapped up so quickly as Pete could have made for quite an interesting recurring adversary who knows Superman's identity and has a strong personal history of friendship with the Kryptonian that not even the Lex Luthor of this era had. And unlike Luthor his motivation would be a lot more sophisticated than an accident that made him bald.

One of the general rules in these stories (and indeed much of DC in this era) is that it is not possible to time travel to a moment in time when one is already present and so it's not possible to meet one's own self. In general this rule is followed even though it can cause problems but there are two times when Superman encounters Superboy. On the first occasion the space-time continuum is temporarily disrupted, suspending the natural law until the two Kal-Els make physical contact and restore the normal order. Later Pete Ross switches his mind with Superboy's and consequently both the mind and body of Superboy are able to co-exist in the present day with Superman, being able to interact and make physical contact. In general the rule can work to put a restraint upon time travel powers and also constrain the excesses of writers, but it's a little unsatisfactory when it can be circumvented so easily.

In general Superman and his guest stars work well together. Either the guest star has sufficiently comparable power that they contribute strongly to the action or else the situation requires other skills such as detection. The one guest star who feels underused is Black Lightning as his appearance involves dealing with Hugh, whose devolution makes him ever stronger and so by the end of the tale it seems as though Black Lightning is just a bystander as Superman resolves the menace. This may be a consequence of the team-up being seemingly written quickly to meet fan demand on the letters page. On several occasions Superman's powers are temporarily weakened or suspended by events, adding to the tension but also helping to level the playing field. With most of the heroes it's clear that Superman has a long history of working with them, though for the Metal Men this is their first meeting with him.

The page lengths of issues vary a bit, ranging from seventeen to twenty-five pages. It's most notable in the first few issues, clearly due to the title almost immediately getting caught up in DC's expansion plans to only for the DC Implosion to suddenly come along and cut them back. This also sees the series, and DC in general, go through exactly the same cycle as Marvel did earlier in the decade whereby the price and page count both rise for a brief period only to fall back but with the price for the shorter issues higher than before. One sign of overall coherence is that despite the rapid turnover of writers and artists, there are no major mistakes or announcements of forthcoming guest stars who either show up late or not at all.

A team-up book from this era is never going to be the best place to sample a company's overall story structure. However this volume does give a strong glimpse at both the characters and talent at DC at this time. It may have taken Superman a long time to get a team-up title but once established it presents a generally coherent set of adventures that don't lag or descend into excessive formula. All in all this is a good sampler of the DC universe in this period and an example of a title that managed to get things right pretty quickly.

Essential Power Man and Iron Fist volume 2 - creator labels

We have yet another volume with lots of creators so here's a separate post to carry the labels for them.

Essential Moon Knight volume 2

Essential Moon Knight volume 2 carries issues #11-30 of his first series. Most of the issues are written by Doug Moench with some back-ups and/or fill-ins by Jack C. Harris, Alan Zelenetz, Denny O'Neil and Steven Grant. The art is mainly by Bill Sienkiewicz with other contributions, mainly on back-ups, by Denys Cowan, Jimmy Janes, Vicente Alcazar, Greg LaRocque, Keith Pollard, Joe Brozowski and Kevin Nowlan.

Issue #15 represents a minor landmark in US comics history as it saw the series shifted to become a direct market only title, also receiving an increase in both pages and price. Together with Ka-Zar and Micronauts, the title had experienced strong sales in comic shops but poor returns on the newsstands and this move allowed each series to survive and even specialise without the restrictions of the newsstands - for one thing the Comics Code Authority stamp disappears after issue #15. However it also made the title inaccessible to those without easy access to a comic shop (and there were several reasons why subscriptions weren't a viable solution for all) and it effectively marked the beginning of a slow market retreat to the ghettos of the comic shops. In cases where a book appealed primarily to the niche of buyers that had already moved over to the direct market it doubtlessly made more sense to do this than try to raise newsstand sales but in the long term it contributed to much of the industry deserting a broader market and making it harder to recruit new readers to keep up overall interest.

However the direct market switch brings with it a much more experimental approach. Story lengths now vary considerably, ranging from lengthy multi-part epics to stories that only take up part of a single issue. The rear of the issues are sometimes enhanced by features such as editorials, commentary by creators, guides to equipment, galleries of images and so forth. Even the covers experiment a bit including a striking black and white cover on issue #24, reproduced as the volume's cover. Only two guest stars appear in the direct market only issues and one is the Werewolf, appropriately returning after the conclusion of his own series to now encounter its breakout character. The character's intervening time is explained by having been on the run from a cult. The other is Brother Voodoo, stepping out of a similar limbo to appear in a story set in Haiti complete with zombies. Daredevil and his foe the Jester appear in one of the last issues also available on newsstands, and the Thing makes a two-page cameo billed on the cover of one of the first direct market only issues (an appearance probably planned when the series was still on general release) but otherwise the series keeps very much to itself. Again this makes sense given the direct market only format as it could needlessly annoy newsstand fans of other characters to deny them the chance to see a guest appearance. And the Micronauts and Ka-Zar, the only other characters for whom this would not be an issue, are not exactly naturals to appear in the grim and gritty world Moon Knight inhabits.

In contrast to the turmoil of the first volume, this one shows a remarkable degree of stability with a firm focus of the character's crime fighting side, with occasional dipping into his mercenary past but with the Egyptian deity elements largely confined to statues that may have powers or it may just be the beliefs of those around them. The supporting cast is primarily that already established albeit with the addition of Detective Flint, a police officer who regularly supplies Moon Knight with information. For the most part the supporting characters remain on the sidelines though the very first issue here deals with Frenchie's revenge when an ex-girlfriend reappears only to be murdered for failing to deliver a supply of cocaine.

Marlene is the main exception, with some prominent roles throughout the run and her continuing displeasure with the way Moon Knights various identities are becoming personas in their own right, feeling that she has helped create a monster. One storyline sees her brother Peter, a doctor, suffering at the hands of his patients who has been twisted by drugs into Morpheus, a being who cannot voluntarily sleep and who can project nightmares into others via a mental link with Peter. At first it seems that Morpheus could be a recurring foe but his powers are neutralised in his return appearance when Peter exploits the link to feedback psionic energy, dying in the process. Marlene's grief is wisely not dwelt on but it adds to her growing dissatisfaction with Moon Knight's approach and identities to the point where she decides to leave him. When new foe the Black Spectre turns out to be an outside candidate for Mayor, Marlene agrees to go under cover but comes to believe in Carson Knowles and sees Moon Knight's public accusations as persecution. She subsequently discovers the truth and returns to him but it's a reminder of how strong and independent she can be. In another storyline she winds up taking the job of bodyguard for a terrorist and the series all but shows her sleeping with him as part of her mission. The character is a far cry from the average superhero girlfriend.

And Moon Knight is not the average superhero. His identity crisis continues to bubble away, with ever increasing - and sometimes contradictory - insistence that he is any particular persona at a precise moment, to the confusion of those around him. During his second encounter with Morpheus he experiences a nightmare in which Steven Grant, Jake Lockley and Marc Spector all attack him, showing up his worst nightmare. Later on Grant is sitting at home when he witnesses a vision of Marc Spector angrily lashing out at others but unable to finish himself off, with Grant commenting that through Moon Knight they are all paying for Spector's sins. Of all his identities it's Marc Spector that he tries to avoid the most, yet Spector is his original persona. For the most part Moon Knight seems able to keep on top of the confusion but there are indications that he may eventually break down into a mess of contradictory and warring selves. Otherwise the character continues in what appears to be a Batman mould but coming out some years before Frank Miller reached Gotham City it seems the flow of inspiration was not all one way. Moon Knight continues to be put through a variety of problems both at home and abroad, including facing the loss of everything he has, but he manages to come through thanks to his guile and gadgets.

His Marc Spector persona is not completely sidelined as a number of issues carry back-up stories highlighting aspects of his career, including some set during his days as a mercenary - there's a particularly dark story where he's commissioned to steal a box from one sculptor for another and it turns out to contain the head of the Gorgon Medusa. In a reversal of the traditional myth Spector uses a mirror to turn the head's back on itself and upon its wielder. Other back-up stories range from present day tales by alternate creators, some of them perhaps auditioning to take over the series if needs be, to tales of the statue of Khonshu and how the statue scared a crook in a museum into locking himself in a sarcophagus or how it seemingly used its power to clear a minefield and help a bunch of stereotypical British soldiers in American uniforms to win the battle of El Alamein. Such tales wouldn't appear in most Marvel series but here they help to enhance the background to the series and were doubtlessly a welcome change from adverts when the series's price increased.

Although a lot of the issues have single part stories mainly dealing with one-off urban villains, there are some that take the series in different directions and introduce potential recurring adversaries, though not all survive. As noted above the threat of Morpheus is neutralised early on, but in the opposite direction the character of Stained Glass Scarlet seemingly starts out as a one-off, a sorrowful nun turned mother turned recluse living in an abandoned church who finds herself shooting her gangster son dead. But subsequently she becomes a crossbow-wielding vigilante, declaring war on mobsters in general and Moon Knight finds himself ultimate missing on purpose and letting her escape. The difference between Moon Knight, operating outside the police but usually with their tacit approval and individual support as he generally seeks to bring crooks to justice, and Scarlet, operating completely on her own as she seeks to execute them, may seem a hair split at first but it's a core dividing line as to how vigilantes are usually portrayed in comics and the source of much philosophical debate. Elsewhere the Black Spectre explicitly models himself on Moon Knight but his failed venture into politics somewhat restrains his potential for reuse. Elsewhere the foes are one-offs - various mobster types and terrorists but also corrupt police officers and those who seek to purge the force of them as well as a man driven mad by childhood abuse seeking vengeance on his just deceased father.

The longest story in the volume is an epic adventure that pits Moon Knight, Marlene and Frenchie against a group of terrorists hell-bent on the destruction of the west. The Third World Army is a coalition of terrorist groups from across the political spectrum, headed by the anarchist Nimrod Strange. Privately disavowing their public political goals, they are fanatics who will take aid from right and left wing dictatorships only to play them off against one another to bring the world to its knees. Few take them seriously but the Mossad has realised their true threat. When Benjamin Abramov, Marc's oldest friend, is gunned down in the mansion by the organisations top assassin the Master Sniper, it begins a journey that takes Moon Knight to Switzerland, Israel, Lebanon, the Indian Ocean and finally back to New York. Along the way Moon Knight, Marlene and Frenchie have to infiltrate the organisation, with Marlene becoming one of Strange's elite female bodyguards and harem. Strange himself adopts armour to become Arsenal and almost kills Moon Knight before departing to hijack multiple oil tankers and use them to destroy Manhattan, in a plan lifted directly from US anti-terrorism planning. The pace of the story is relentless and it doesn't pull its punches either with a number of atrocities depicted including the gunning down of a congregation at a synagogue. Arsenal becomes another foe whose long term potential is sacrificed on the altar of a dramatic resolution to the story but it works. It's a tough storyline that combines the global threat with the personal element as Moon Knight seeks to complete Ben's work as well as repay Arsenal for his slights. At a guess this storyline (in issues #17 to #20) was the first to be prepared for the direct market and it shows a willingness to stretch beyond the confines of the Comics Code authority without being gratuitous simply for its own sake. It's a good example of how the series adapts to changed conditions and sets out to offer something truly unique.

In general this is a series that does well to rise to the challenges set, continuing to offer a hero with a very unusual identity situation whilst also adapting well to its changed market position and experimenting within the format and outlet. There are some themes handled here that are more adult than those found in the Comics Code Authority books on the newsstand, but never once does it feel like its being puerile or gratuitous just to show off its freedom. Instead it continues to build a solid and distinctive series, using the expanded page count to explore multiple stories and features and allow other creators onto the characters without feeling like quick fill-ins. Sienkiewicz's art looks amazing in black and white and Moench's scripts remain strong, producing quite a solid volume.

Essential Defenders volume 2 - creator labels

Yet again we have a volume with a lot of creators, so here's a separate post to carry the labels for some of them.

Essential Classic X-Men volume 3 - creator labels

Yet again we have a volume with a lot of creators, so here's a separate post to carry the labels for some of them.

Essential Doctor Strange volume 1

We come now to the other great creation of Steve Ditko and Stan Lee, Doctor Strange. (Unfortunately there's never been a great deal of consistency over whether it's "Doctor" or "Dr." so I'm taking my cue from the volume's cover.)

Essential Doctor Strange volume 1 contains the Doctor Strange strips from Strange Tales #110, #111 & #114-168 - i.e. the full run before he received his own title for the first time. As previously discussed, Strange Tales was one of Marvel's anthology series and the good doctor shared the title first with the Human Torch’s solo tales and then with Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. The artwork on this volume is by Ditko all the way until issue #146 then Bill Everett, Marie Severin, Dan Adkins and George Tuska. The writing is initially by Lee with Ditko co-plotting, officially credited as such from issue #135 onwards, then the remaining strips are scripted or fully written by the likes of Roy Thomas, Denny O’Neil, Raymond Marais and Jim Lawrence. It's worth noting that Ditko's last four issues are not scripted by Lee.

In so far as there is a paper trail, the written evidence suggests that the idea for Doctor Strange was first thought up by Steve Ditko and only then fleshed out in collaboration with Stan Lee. There hasn't been as much debate over the character's creation as there has been with other characters, and I suspect Marvel hasn't given the issue as much time as Spider-Man's. (For example in the introduction to one collection they reproduced a contemporary letter from Lee to a fan in which Lee stated the magician was Ditko's idea. This reproduction probably did not go through endless corporate discussion.) It's interesting to note that Lee's (or Marvel corporate's?) stated definition of who the "creator" is excludes him on this occasion. Perhaps this is a sign of how it's the visuals rather than the script which gives the strip its greatest lure. A far cry from the hard edged urban grittiness of Spider-Man, Ditko's work on Doctor Strange is truly a voyage into the fantastic.

Unfortunately black and white can have its disadvantages and they are prominent here. Doctor Strange was one of the most psychedelic of strips put out by Marvel in the 1960s but some of that effect came from the colours and when viewed in black and white it seems more subdued. Never the less the exotic is still there, seen most graphically with the design of Eternity, whose body almost entirely consists of a starscape, perhaps the ultimate in psychedelia. On its original run the strip acquired a cult following amongst university students who wondered just what Steve Ditko was on. I doubt they ever guessed it was the philosophy of Ayn Rand. Nor do I think they spotted Ditko's attitude to hippies and student protesters, as expressed in his final issue of Amazing Spider-Man.

In all the speculation and discussion about Ditko's departure from Marvel, his work on Doctor Strange often gets overlooked. Perhaps it's because the magician has never achieved the levels of popularity that the wallcrawler has (although he's quite popular amongst creators). Perhaps it's because the departure came immediately after grand developments instead of just before them, and thus there's no creative decision to speculate on. Perhaps it's because Stan Lee was already off the strip, and it's harder to focus on his replacements. (Roy Thomas and Denny O'Neill may have both gone on to do great things, but in 1966 they were each starting out and not yet in great positions of authority. And when Ditko went, Lee immediately returned for the initial issues.) But whatever the reason, the result is that a key part of the puzzle is ignored. The strip climaxes with issue #146, entitled "The End -- At Last!", concluding the seventeen issue "Eternity saga" (although the "Dormammu saga" would be a more accurate description) and wrapping up many threads. It's a suitable ending for a long journey.

But every journey has a beginning, even if it's full of slips and omissions. Unfortunately the earliest Doctor Strange tales leave two matters out, both of which can affect subsequent stories. No origin is given for the good doctor until his fourth appearance in issue #115, in spite of several earlier stories involving the Ancient One and/or Baron Mordo. This omission is all the more surprising given that nearly every other Silver Age Marvel hero began with their origin being retold - was Doctor Strange originally intended to be a one-off feature? However whilst the origin omission is soon rectified, the other is left dangling and we never get a very clear sense of the full extent of Doctor Strange's powers, with the result that at times his escape from or triumph over his foes can seem all too easy. Without knowing his full limits, we are limited to statements that foes such as Dormammu and Umar are far more powerful than him, but it's not always clear why he can easily triumph over some foes yet others take far more skill.

As is often the case, this volume introduces quite a number of foes who would plague Doctor Strange again over the years. Given the importance of the artist, I'm going to split the list of débuts in two. In the Ditko issues we get the first appearances of, variously, Nightmare, Baron Mordo, Aggamon, the House of Shadows, Zota, Dormammu, Demonicus, Tiboro, Kaecilius and Shazana. There are also the Possessors, the strip's version of the alien race invading Earth that just about all Silver Age Marvel heroes faced. There is at least an attempt to make them relevant to Doctor Strange's series by having them come from another dimension and giving them the power to possess people. Visitors form other series are rare, but Loki from Thor's strip in Journey Into Mystery does show up. Just as standard are the various allies and other supporting cast members who début, and Ditko's issues introduce us to the Ancient One, Wong, Victoria Bentley, Clea (although she's not named for twenty issues), Hamir (the Ancient One's servant), Orini and the Aged Genghis. And standing above everything is the mysterious Eternity. The post-Ditko issues introduce yet more villains who would appear again, including Kaluu, Umar and Yandroth. There's also the one-off foe Nebulos, who I'm surprised nobody has yet brought back. Not that he's a particularly memorable foe but so many others have returned. Otherwise the only other significant débuts are two more powerful beings that defy easy description, Zom and the Living Tribunal.

These are reasonably impressive lists but they disguise the over-use of Baron Mordo in these issues, with Nightmare also popping up quite a bit before Dormammu becomes established as the other great foe. After Dormammu is seemingly destroyed, it's not long before a replacement is found in the form of his sister Umar. What lists also hide is the relatively weak use of the supporting cast. The Ancient One turns up a number of times to provide guidance and extra power, but otherwise most of the characters appear only occasionally and are weakly developed. Clea is initially presented as a potential romantic interest, but she and Doctor Strange are repeatedly kept apart, until the point where the Ancient One effectively banishes her for her own protection. Towards the end of the volume Victoria Bentley is dusted off to play the role of damsel in distress, but despite having some magic powers she's given little to do beyond being captured and rescued. There are also few attempts to give Doctor Strange many day to day problems, even though on more than one occasion we hear of problems with both money and the stability of his house, but in a later issue the money problems are literally magicked away when Doctor Strange produces the money necessary. Nor do we ever meet anyone from Strange's former life as an arrogant surgeon, or even get much exploration of how his character has changed beyond the origin story. This strip is a far cry from the soap operas being developed elsewhere at Marvel at the time, and is much more a fantasy piece with the art front and centre.

That's not to say the writing is inherently bad, and indeed the dialogue is often good, particularly the many spells Doctor Strange comes up with. But it really is the art that stands out. On the basis of these stories alone there is only one definitive Doctor Strange artist - Steve Ditko. None of his replacements succeeds in offering a boldly different style to get successive generations of fans debating, the way that Spider-Man fans do over Ditko and John Romita. And also in contrast to Spider-Man, there is a real sense of conclusion with Ditko's final issue. Many of the plotlines are resolved in the space of ten pages, the villain meets his comeuppance, the girl is freed and the hero walks away to rest. This is a very clear conclusion to the story and strongly suggests Ditko had reached the end of all he wished to do with the character. Whether this was indeed the case or not, I'm not sure, as there are reports that he had prepared two further issues when he left Marvel. But nevertheless it does provide a strong sense of closure.

(Yet from a modern perspective it's surprising to see the way Eternity is treated, with many believing him destroyed in battle with Dormammu, and for that matter the same surprise comes later with the Living Tribunal when each is here treated merely as a very powerful, mysterious being and not as one of the most powerful entities of all in the multiverse. It would take many years before Marvel took steps to arrange its many powerful cosmic beings into a coherent hierarchy, with the Living Tribunal invariably the single most powerful being shown, and Eternity the embodiment of the universe. Here they're just very powerful entities but without a hint as to their place in the greater scheme of things.)

After Ditko's departure the strip meanders somewhat, trying to maintain the sense of grandeur and excitement but a succession of writers and repetitive ideas mean that it doesn't quite succeed. What we get is a succession of mini-epics that are generally good in their own right (bar the last one with Yandroth that tries to combine science and the realm of dreams, not to very great success) but just don't compare at all well to the earlier majesty. Still they keep some pace going and do add a bit to Doctor Strange's world.

As can be seen, this is very much a volume of two halves and it seems clear from comparisons with the issues they didn't collaborate on that Steve Ditko rather than Stan Lee was the key driving force in the first few years. As a result the strip is driven more by the visuals over the writing than is usually the case. The writing may have its occasional repetition and omission, but combined with the art there's a great deal of imagination that produces a truly spectacular experience. Black and white may remove some of the psychedelic nature of the strip but the various spells and realms remain extraordinary, and a far cry from the rest of the comics world of its generation. Ditko's successors may not be as good, but they all try to follow the same path. The only possible additional strip I would have included is Amazing Spider-Man Annual #2 (otherwise available in Essential Spider-Man volume 2), which teamed up the wallcrawler with Doctor Strange with the latter really dominating proceedings in another tale drawn by Ditko. But when this volume was first released it was already the single longest Essential at the time (and only about a dozen since have been any longer), and back then it wasn't standard to include guest appearances as well. Otherwise this volume is a near perfect collection with the complete Ditko run the true jewel and the remaining issues a bonus.

Essential Daredevil volume 1

Essential Daredevil volume 1 contains the first twenty-five issues from the series. Almost all issues are written by Stan Lee, bar one where Denny O’Neil scripts a Lee plot and another by Wallace Wood. The art was very unstable. The first issue is by Bill Everett, but due to time constraints he had assistance from Steve Ditko and the cover, recycled as a splash page, is by Jack Kirby. Then we get a succession of Joe Orlando, Wallace Wood, Bob Powell, Jack Kirby and John Romita, before issue #20 sees the arrival of Gene Colan who is initially announced as filling in for Romita but actually wound up holding the pencil for all but about five of the next eighty-one issues.

(The creation of Daredevil is also a little unclear though it hasn’t received the same level of attention as Spider-Man. Again there's scope for disagreement over what constitutes “creating” – the initial idea by Stan Lee or the fleshed out concept worked up in collaboration with Bill Everett - plus Jack Kirby contributed to the development but it’s unclear just how far, although Everett recalled Kirby came up with the billy club. I can’t recall if Daredevil was on the list of characters Kirby’s heirs unsuccessfully tried to claim the copyright on in recent years but even if he was the case didn’t get far enough to determine “creation”. Fortunately, to the best of my knowledge, there isn’t a claim of an alternative source for the idea.)

The début issue is somewhat mixed, probably because of the limited link between the two strands of Matt Murdock gaining his enhanced senses and his father’s murder for failing to take a dive in a fixed wrestling match. This isn’t so much a tale of a lesson in responsibility or vengeance driving an ordinary person to do extraordinary things. Rather it’s a tale of a man’s murder that coincides with the son happening to have gained special abilities independently that he puts to use in seeking justice for his father. However, unlike Spider-Man’s origin, there isn’t a direct reason given at this point for why Daredevil continues to fight crime even after he’s dealt with the killers. (Although much later on in issue #25 Matt Murdock does comment to himself “I never realized Daredevil was so much a part of me! It’s like DD is my real identity – and I’m just play-acting as Matt Murdock!” It’s one of the earliest comics I can think of that even touches on the question of which identity is the “real” person and which is just a front.) Also unaddressed in the first issue and indeed through the volume is the seeming contradiction of a lawyer dedicated to the system of law and justice having a dual identity as a vigilante working outside the law – and on this occasion trying obtain a confession under duress. Some elements of the origin do still hold up quite well and have barely dated – match fixing remains an issue in wrestling to this day, whilst many children are under pressure to study hard from parents who want them to succeed. And even the chemical accident holds up quite well – the transportation of hazardous chemicals is often less than ideal and spillages can and do occur, permanently disabling people. Okay the idea of a radioactive chemical giving a person enhanced senses is a piece of comic book science, but it’s one simple leap of absurdity that we accept. In fact about the only point where the basic origin story now seems dated is the lack of any ambulance chasing injury lawyers.

Once past the first issue the series goes through a bit of a turbulent period before it really gets a clear idea of where its going. The situation is not helped by the early art being a bit of a mess and it’s not until John Romita arrives, doing finishes over Kirby’s layouts on issues #12 & #13 before doing full pencils from #14 onwards, that things start to settle. However no sooner had Romita settled in than he was whisked away over to the Amazing Spider-Man. Both he and Colan thought they were just doing fill-in assignments but each wound up staying on their respective books for quite some time. Perhaps most symbolic of all the changing artists are the alterations to Daredevil’s costume. There are a few minor changes made throughout the first six issues, most notably the chest initially sporting a “D” then a “DD”, or the brief use of a hood to carry his civilian clothes or the changing number of straps attaching the billy club holder to his leg. Then from issue #7 onwards Daredevil sports the all red outfit he’s best known for. It’s rare for a new costume to last but Daredevil pulls it off (to the point that there was a period when Marvel reprints of early Daredevil appearances were colour-“corrected” to change his yellow & black costume to the all-red version). It’s also astonishing that the new costume is introduced in a single panel that takes up about one twelfth of a page with a brief thought bubble to tell us Daredevil has worked on making it more comfortable and distinctive. In later years, entire issues would have been given over to such a change, but here the narrative flows relentlessly on.

Another area of inconsistency are Daredevil’s abilities and gadgets. The origin establishes that other than his senses he doesn’t actually have any super powers and has to rely entirely on his training and skills. Yet there’s nothing to indicate he has anything other than self-training but despite this his fighting skills are phenomenal. His billy club also gets all manner of gadgets installed in it, ranging from a very practical cable launcher to a mini-cassette recorder to a bizarre super powerful microphone with which he can use his enhanced hearing to listen to the entire city. It’s a strange addition that is only rarely used. Daredevil’s actual sense powers are also somewhat variable, serving the needs of the story at hand, with his power of hearing at times seeming almost overwhelming whereas at other times it seems little more than a normal blind person who has standard hearing but pays more attention to it than a sighted person. There are also times when it seems the radar sense might as well be sight as Daredevil is seemingly able to do just about everything a sighted person can without restraint. It reaches its silliest moment when he’s able to pilot a fighter plane by the vibrations on the read-outs and his radar sense.

The supporting cast is limited to just Matt’s law partner Foggy Nelson and their secretary Karen Page. There are strong bonds between all three, enhanced by a love triangle with Matt unable to realise Karen’s feelings for him and scared to make a move because of his blindness. In several ways the Karen-Matt situation is a mirror of the Donald Blake-Jane Foster situation over in Thor, albeit with an explicit rival thrown in to reinforce the tensions. Beyond romantic entanglements this set up does somewhat limit Matt’s world, with no supporting characters from outside his office let alone from beyond the legal profession. This limits the potential for situations and also for a proper exploration of questions relating to how lawyers operate. Consequently when the Owl seeks a lawyer in issue #3, this raises the question of whether lawyers should represent those they know to be guilty. It was a few years before comics would start exploring such ethical dilemmas so instead we get a “this is how it works” explanation from Daredevil as he rushes across town after taking the case despite Foggy’s initial rejection. Unfortunately with no non-legal workers in the cast, the task of raising this question is given over to Foggy and the way Daredevil summarises the issue doesn’t help to enhance his partner’s gravitas. Instead, Foggy is all too often treated as a figure of fun, especially when he tries to build himself up with Karen by pretending Spider-Man’s hunch is right and he really is “secretly” Daredevil, to the point of obtaining a costume and agreeing to what he thinks will be a staged fight with the Gladiator.

Karen is treated with more dignity and respect, but at this stage she is unable to escape the limitations of so many early Silver Age romantic interests. The Marvel ones seem to nearly all fall into one of two categories – either Daddy’s Girls largely defined by their fathers (e.g. Janet van Dyne, Betty Banner or Doris Evans) or young working women in jobs subordinate to men and infatuated with one of the men around their office (e.g. Pepper Potts, Betty Brant or Jane Foster). Karen fits the pattern of the second so neatly she might have been designed by computer. Just to add to the dismissive approach to women, she is frequently defined by her looks in ways that would be unthinkable barely a few years later. Was there a reluctance to be bolder with the character? Was it inconceivable to instead make her a partner in the firm and thus more of an equal to Matt? Alternatively, once the series got going, perhaps to have her training on the side to become a lawyer herself? But instead throughout this run she remains a disappointing cipher whose main developments revolve around being courted by Foggy but having feelings for the reluctant Matt.

Being the last of Marvel’s early Silver Age series to be launched, it was inevitable that there’d be guest appearances early on. The Thing shows up in the second issue but only to get Matt to check a lease. Ka-Zar pops up twice but on both occasions the series is stepping heavily beyond its basis in New York crime and instead briefly making Matt/Daredevil a travelling adventurer, a role that at this stage he just doesn’t seem suited for. But the most significant guest appearance is by Spider-Man. I’ve looked at his appearance in issue #16 & #17 once already, so won’t repeat myself too much other than to note that the plot follows what was fast becoming an overused formula of one hero being falsely accused, leading to the other fighting him until realising the truth and the two then team up against the real foe. But Spider-Man has a wider impact on the series, first by turning up at the office after using his Spider-Sense to track down Daredevil, and assuming he’s Foggy (leading to the latter playing along with this for a brief while in order to impress Karen before it all goes wrong), but also later on in issue #24. Spider-Man himself doesn’t appear in the issue, but he sends Matt Murdock a letter saying he knows the lawyer is Daredevil but won’t reveal the secret; however because Matt is missing Karen opens it. For Spider-Man it’s an utterly bizarre move to commit another hero’s identity to paper, and there’s also no indication as to how he’s reached this conclusion nor why he feels the need to do this. (The issue came out the same month as Amazing Spider-Man #45 but there’s nothing in that title from around that period that even mentions this, let alone explains it. Daredevil’s most recent appearance there had been Annual #3, where he gave a reference for Spidey to the Avengers, but didn’t actually meet the wallcrawler himself.) And without Spider-Man actually appearing, could the letter in fact have been sent by someone else? It’s a possibility that isn’t explored here. However the accusation forces Matt into a convoluted situation whereby he tells Karen and Foggy that Daredevil is in fact his previously never mentioned twin brother Mike Murdock and then once in the hole digs deeper by having to pose as said brother. Given the comic conventions of the era meant that even the flimsiest of disguises could fool one’s best friends and co-workers, it’s perhaps a little harsh to dismiss Foggy and Karen for not immediately seeing through this – indeed Foggy does at first doubt Matt’s claim. But it means the volume ends with a rather convoluted situation in which Matt has to juggle three separate identities and somehow undo the mess.

The other major development set down in the issues in this volume is the introduction of the core of Daredevil’s Rogues Gallery (although there are some big names on it who don’t show up until much later). A sizeable number of new villains are introduced in this run and they include: the Fixer, the Owl, the Purple Man, the Matador, Mr Fear, Stilt Man, Klaus Kruger, the Organizer and his Organization (no that really is what it’s called) including Cat Man, Ape Man, Bird Man and Frog Man (no relation to others who’ve gone by those names), the Plunderer (Parnival Plunder), Dr Karl Stragg, the Masked Marauder, the Gladiator, the Tri-Android (made up of the Brain, the Dancer and the Mangler) and finally the Leap Frog. There are also some villains from other series including Electro, the Ox, the Eel, Namor the Sub-Mariner and the Maggia. Whilst the first couple of issues are an inauspicious start, with his first foe, the Fixer, dying in their single encounter and the second issue seeing a clash with a Spider-Man foe breaking into the Fantastic Four’s headquarters, the series soon starts getting some on the bigger names set down. Daredevil is often accused of having a poor set of villains, especially when compared to Spider-Man, but there’s strong potential in many of them here, especially the Owl and the Masked Marauder who both bring strong levels of cunning and gravitas that make them credible as crime lords, or Mr Fear, the Purple Man or the Gladiator who in their very different ways each make credible solo threats. But it’s also true that some of them are very much products of their era and have not aged well, such as the Matador. There are also those who were probably good ideas but don’t quite work in practice – Stilt Man for instance is not the most manoeuvrable of villains when his stilts are extended. To the series’ credit Leap Frog is presented as being slightly silly from the outset. But there are some others who come out bizarre, particularly the Ox and Dr Karl Stragg who in one issue swap bodies only for each to find the other’s nature is slowly taking them over. The Ox hadn’t been a particularly well developed character up to this point and so any brutish mind in that body would have worked, but it’s still an awkward development that ultimately doesn’t offer much. It’s also one of the earliest cases of a foe established in one hero’s series (in this case Spider-Man’s) having major developments in another’s. When a character is permanently adopted by a new series (such as Hawkeye, Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch joining the Avengers around this time) then it’s reasonable, but when they make a one-off appearance then such bold changes feel more illegitimate.

There are no real long term mystery villains in these twenty-five issues. The Masked Marauder may live up to his name, but there’s no teasing about his identity. The one mystery is in a two-part story that sees what I think is the earliest Marvel example of another often used plotline – politicians staging attacks on them to boost their crime fighting credentials. A two-part story sees Foggy recruited as a candidate for the Reform Party (nothing to do with the real life one created three decades later) which comes under attack from the mysterious “Organizer” who arranges a string of attacks to help poll ratings. There’s supposed to be a mystery over which of the candidates is the Organizer but it’s really quite obvious – so obvious in fact that when first reading it I assumed it was a double bluff but they didn’t do that sort of thing back then.

A core feature of Daredevil is his blindness, but even in the 1960s there were some successful cures. In the early issues of the series Karen repeatedly tries to persuade Matt to undergo surgery but he’s reluctant to, as he’s scared it will deprive him of his enhanced other senses. Issue #9 finally addresses the issue with the bizarre development that Klaus Kruger , a university contemporary of Matt and Foggy, is now the ruler of the small state of “Lichtenbad” who offers to arrange for Matt’s treatment by the leading eye specialist who now resides there, but it’s all a trick. In fact Kruger is a harsh ruler who has lured experts in many fields to build a robot army to conquer the world. Exactly why eye surgeons and lawyers are necessary for this is never explained, but the story serves its purpose in cutting off the prospect of Matt’s sight being restored and thus preserving the basis of the series. It was quite a bold move to have a superhero with a disability, even if the series in practice sometimes acts as though his radar sense is just as good as sight, and undoing that would have been a major mistake.

Overall this first volume of Daredevil is a mixed bag, with a number of good stories and developments, but also some weak stories, particularly all of the ones that take him away from New York. The art in the first half is also poor due to the rapid turnover of artists and some rush jobs, though the second half more than makes up for it. But it’s not the most ground breaking of series – by the time it came out many of the bold developments that the Marvel Silver Age brought had already come, and Daredevil was largely a consolidation of such practices. When compared to the equivalent issues of Amazing Spider-Man these ones seem significantly weaker, with the writing much more inconsistent and a reluctance to do too much bold stuff beyond the basic idea of the character. Daredevil has often suffered from being branded a second-tier character, both in his own stories and in the real world, and unfortunately his early issues do little to dispel that notion.

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