Showing posts with label Steve Gerber. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Steve Gerber. Show all posts

Thursday, 21 October 2021

Web of Spider-Man Annual 4 - The Evolutionary War

Spider-Man finds a book tour takes him into chaos in the Everglades.

Web of Spider-Man Annual #4

1st story: Sweet Poison
Writer: Steve Gerber
Artist: Cynthia Martin
Letterer: Rick Parker
Colorist: Janet Jackson
Editor: Jim Salicrup
Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

Peter Parker is on a tour promoting his book of Spider-Man photographs and gets caught up in the attempts by the Slug's men to secure a reserve supply of drugs for New York, following up on the supply problems established in the Punisher and Amazing Spider-Man chapters of The Evolutionary War. Meanwhile the High Evolutionary has sent his Eliminators and Purifiers to the Everglades to find the Nexus of All Realities in order to locate alien genetic pollutants that make it through and bond with human hosts, seeking the eliminate both the host and its offspring. The host turns out to be Cecilia, a maid at Peter's motel who has a double life as the being Poison with a second entity inside her. Poison confronts and destroys the Purifiers when they come to her home to eliminate her and her son, then the alien inside her separates off to return home. Meanwhile Spider-Man finds a hidden reserve supply of cocaine in the swamp which leads to a battle between him, the Slug's men, the Eliminators and the Man-Thing.

If this sounds chaotic it's because it is. The cover promises Spider-Man will be battling the Slug (an existing foe previously seen in Captain America) but the Miami drug lord only actually appears on a couple of pages in phone conversations with the Kingpin and demonstrating his ability to use his own fat to asphyxiate a man and he never encounters Spider-Man directly. It's a sign of the problems with this annual as it doesn't really know what it's about.

This story sees the return of Steve Gerber to mainstream Marvel books after many years (and an abortive lawsuit) and a few strips in Marvel Comics Presents but it's not a particular triumph. Far too many elements have been thrown into this story and they don't all meet up. Gerber was never the most conventional of writers but sometimes this could work against him. Web of Spider-Man was a title that still had a reputation for an inability to get a lasting permanent creative team and frequently functioned as little more than a set of fill-in issues though Alex Saviuk was now half a year into what would turn out to be nearly a seven year run so it's unsurprising that the annual wound up being written by an irregular writer. However Gerber doesn't seem to be especially interested in Spider-Man who is used only sparingly with a lot of attention instead devoted to his own new creation Poison, of whom more in the second story. All in all this is easily the worst chapter in The Evolutionary War so far.


2nd story: Night Stalking
Writer: Steve Gerber
Artist: Alex Saviuk
Letterer: Rick Parker
Colorist: Janet Jackson
Editor: Jim Salicrup
Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

This is the origin story for Poison, telling how Cecilia was one of the Cubans who came to the US in the Mariel boatlift. A university student who got pregnant by Vassily, a Soviet diplomatic attaché, she found her world crumbling around her when she was discovered and Vassily blamed her. Then when giving birth she was visited by the extra dimensional being Ylandris who merged with her and gave her power that remains even now they are separated. Poison is now hunting Vassily for revenge and searching the streets for him.

If this story was setting out to make Poison a viable recurring character to use it fails heavily. Already succumbing to the cliche of an immigrant Hispanic maid and giving her a costume that makes her look like a prostitute, she is now shown walking the streets on a mission of vengeance. There's very little to this story to open the character up for a viable ongoing use and so it's unsurprising that for many years her only other use was a multi-part story in Marvel Comics Presents by Gerber. The origin does make her sympathetic but does nothing to explain why she expects to find Vassily on the streets of Miami.


3rd story: The High Evolutionary: All My Children
Story: Mark Gruenwald
Pencils: Ron Lim
Finishes: Tony DeZuniga
Letters: Ken Lopez
Colors: Gregory Wright
Editor: Ralph Macchio
Editor in Chief: Tom DeFalco

This is a relatively sedate chapter, focusing upon the aftermath of the battle with Cthon as the High Evolutionary finally accepts the existence of the supernatural and that his partner really is possessed by a sixth century sorcerer. But the main focus comes with various children around the mountain. Jessica Drew is released after decades in suspended animation to be raised by the New Man Bova with no real mention of where her father is now that his body has been restored to him. But it's the twins Pietro and Wanda who get the highest turnover of parents. Their birth mother Magda disappears without an explanation given here and so the Evolutionary commissions an aid to find a couple to raise them. The first candidates are Robert and Madeline Frank, whose thoughts touch on their heroic past but they are not explicitly identified here. Madeline is pregnant and the plan is to present all three children as hers which seems a little fanciful. However she dies in childbirth with her own baby stillborn. The twins are presented to Robert as his own but upon news of his wife's death he runs away at super speed. Eventually the twins are given to a Romani couple Django and Marya Maximoff who lost their children in the Second World War with a caption telling us they will grow up to be Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch.

If this seems convoluted it's because there had already been two retcons of their parentage over their years, first to make them the children of the Golden Age heroes the Whizzer and Miss America and then to make them the children of Magneto. The original stories had sought to explain why each set of parents had been absent from their childhood whether through death, desertion, ignorance or a desire to hide the children's existence from their father out of fear of him (this version predated Star Wars). As a result each version wrote one explanation on top of another and now this saga recounts it all. This is also one of the chapters that could do with more narrative captions to establish the context, particularly of just who the Franks are. It also highlights an inadvertent theme of absent parents as no explanation is given as to where Jonathan Drew now is when his daughter is finally revived even though his possessed body has only recently been at the mountain.

This chapter does its best with what was already a huge continuity mess (and which has been since changed yet again) and manages to present a coherent narrative out of the order of events but can't hide the difficult nature of it. Normally Mark Gruenwald can be given a pass in this saga as he was working with what others had come up with but he was one of the co-plotters of the Avengers issue that introduced Magda to the story and so bore at least some responsibility for what he was working with. What's also surprising is the way that the Maximoff's own children are explicitly identified as having died in the Second World War. Although no date is given for when this chapter is set (beyond Magnus having been there for a decade) even in 1988 chronological problems with linking characters' personal histories to the war were clear and also the original telling of these events didn't mention it. Fortunately the chapter works to present everything in an understandable order but it can't hide the mess it's working with.


Other material includes "The Year in Review!" which is a series of pin-ups by artists including Arthur Adams, John Romita Sr & John Romita Jr, Mike Zeck & Bob McLeod, Cynthia Martin and others not explicitly credited. It's hard to escape the sense that at least some of these are from inventory and were intended as covers and/or promotional pieces rather than being specifically drawn for this annual. Still it's handy to have a catch-up on one of the most intense years in Spider-Man's life which included his wedding, the introduction of one of his most popular foes, the abandonment of his black costume and one of the contenders for his most popular story of all. However this might have been better placed in the first of the three Spider-Man annuals to come out that year instead of the second.

Web of Spider-Man was a title that was still struggling even in its fourth year, having not yet found a writer that would last more than half a dozen issues or so and this annual was at the point where its longest lasting artist had only just reached that particular milestone. So it's natural to expect this annual to be a forgettable tale by a fill-in writer even before coming to the contents. However the main story is just utterly unfocused in trying to balance numerous different elements and the needs of the title character against the desire of the author to push his own creation. The second story doesn't redeem it being the origin of a new character instead of a tale from the regular series's world whilst the saga chapter is a recounting of what was already one of the most convoluted parts of the whole origin. This is a highly disappointing entry in the event.

Friday, 8 May 2015

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.

Friday, 10 April 2015

Essential Iron Man volume 4

Essential Iron Man volume 4 consists of issues #39 to #61 including a back-up in issue #44 featuring Ant-Man. The writing sees runs by Gerry Conway and Mike Friedrich plus other issues by Robert Kanigher, Gary Friedrich, Roy Thomas, Jim Starlin and Steve Gerber. Most of the art is by George Tuska with other contributions by Herb Trimpe, Barry Windsor-Smith and Jim Starlin. The Ant-Man tale is written by Roy Thomas and drawn by Ross Andru.

This volume comes from the early 1970s and sees a slow attempt to update the character at a time when real life events had made arms manufacturers not particularly popular in the States. At the same time it also tries to modernise the portrayal of some of the characters and roles, with the most notable success being Pepper Hogan who returns to her old job position but is now much more a strong executive assistant rather than the simple typist, telephone answerer and diary keeper she had been in earlier years. On multiple occasions the factory is surrounded by protestors, whether students protesting the manufacturing of weapons or the workers out on strike due to devious propaganda, and eventually this leads Tony to start diversifying the output. However it takes a while to assert full control.

The early issues see Tony facing a challenge in the boardroom as Simon Gilbert, the chairperson of the board of Stark Industries, tries to have Tony removed as president of the company, only to be threatened with his own removal as chairperson by Tony. The problem with this kind of corporate drama is that it relies on the reader having a clear knowledge of the basics of corporate governance in order to understand how such power is wielded when Tony holds the majority of shares. Boardroom drama can be exciting when the threat is obvious and the resolution dramatic but here it descends into two men in suits each trying to remove the other through the exercise of some undefined power or other. Eventually Tony succeeds in the boardroom leading to Gilbert hiring the Firebrand to blow up a munitions plant, only to die in the explosion himself. The Firebrand is revealed to be Gilbert's son, adding a new level to his enmity with Iron Man.

There's a protracted storyline involving Tony's engineer and friend Kevin O'Brien who adopts the Guardsman armour to protect Stark Industries but inexperience and paranoia overwhelm him, not helped by his jealousy of Tony over Marianne Rodgers. Partially egged on by Gilbert and other board members, Kevin winds up facing a group of students protesting over arms manufacturing and deploys his repulsors on them, apparently killing four of them. (We're subsequently told they were only injured but as it comes solely via dialogue and captions it feels like emergency editing to tone down the storyline.) This leads to a confrontation between Iron Man and the Guardsman over their respective methods and ends in tragedy when Kevin is caught in a tank explosion. The funeral leads to soul-searching on Tony's part and triggers an issue mainly devoted to recounting the origin, which also supplies the cover, used for the volume as a whole.

Marianne Rodgers is probably the best woman that Tony's yet been involved with. She has a degree of Extra Sensory Perception that leads her to heightened concern for Tony, and also leads her to realise that he and Iron Man are one and the same, but contrary to his long standing fears she doesn't reject them. Instead they grow ever closer, to Kevin's disappointment, and soon get engaged. However her ESP leads her to visions of Iron Man's doom if she stays with him and after a battle with the Super-Adaptoid that leaves Tony desperate for help in recharging his power, Marianne instead deserts him. When the final confrontation comes with the Adaptoid in its new form of the Cyborg Sinister, rebuilt by Tyrr and Jarr from a microworld called Bast, Iron Man ultimately defeats the prophecy by overwhelming it with acid and then destroying it but trust has broken down between Tony and Marianne, leading them to call off the engagement. Marianne goes off to work but finds her ESP wreaks havoc in the workplace and she is subsequently hospitalised. Meanwhile Pepper Hogan returns to Tony's life when she accepts once more the job of his personal secretary but amidst the jet setting it becomes clear Tony still has feelings for her even though she is now married. Meanwhile Happy Hogan is getting more and more jealous of the situation, especially when the newspapers start assuming Tony and Pepper are an item, and soon announces he is leaving by means of a telegram.

The early part of the volume sees a string of incredibly forgettable foes, whether introduced here or reused from another series. Those in the former category include the White Dragon, a Chinese scientist and inventor with troops who feels all too like a Mandarin knock off, the Slasher and Demitrius, a pair in silly costumes, Mikas the Soulfather, an android with ESP powers who believes himself to be an all powerful mutant, a robot copy of the Night Phantom, Raga, the "Son of Fire", a cult leader with the ability to control flames, and his teacher, the Black Lama. There's also an encounter with Princess Python, temporarily solo from the Circus of Crime, and her pet snake Precious. All in all it's a very dull set, made worse by several being agents of the mysterious "Mr Kline", who also appears in the contemporary Daredevil. Unfortunately that seems to be the main place for explaining and dealing with him, with the result that in this volume he's just a shadowy figure responsible for some events but ultimately left unexplained.

Towards the end we get two issues that have the biggest impact on long term Marvel continuity although their impact on Iron Man is rather less. Issue #54 sees the introduction of the space travelling Madame MacEvil, later better known as Moondragon, who takes control of Iron Man's armour remotely and pits him against Sub-Mariner as part of scientific investigations into human hybrids. She's the kind of character who appears to have a large unrevealed backstory that explains her actions but all we get here is an amoral scientist who swears vengeance when her plans come to nothing. The following issue is much better known as it sees the introduction of both Thanos and Drax the Destroyer. And also of the Blood Brothers but they don't get talked about so much. The issue debuts a powerful alien conqueror foe with a strong backstory and a pre-existing nemesis, making for a memorable confrontation and it's hard to deny the significance of this issue given that Thanos has been incredibly successful for Marvel in the long run. The tale as a single piece is quite strong and leaves the reader wanting more. But, as is often the case with big cosmic events and particular those involving Thanos, the host title can wind up feeling a rather odd place for the event. Iron Man does not generally get caught up in interplanetary conflict and this story would probably be more at home in Fantastic Four or Thor or Avengers. And when read with the issues around it, it feels like part of a general ream of randomness near the end of this volume as the writers struggle to find a new direction and purpose for the title.

As they search we get an odd confrontation with the "menace" of Rasputin, a magician with poor powers who brings a statue to life. Then we get a strange tale that starts off with the Mandarin in disguise fomenting unrest amongst the Stark Industries workforce but which diverts into a tale of a search for new power rings and sees the Mandarin and Unicorn temporarily swap bodies. There's a return by a vengeance seeking Firebrand and then finally a clash with Daredevil's old foe the Masked Marauder. None of these tales feels in any way spectacular and the result is just a drudge through the end of the volume.

There are some signs of further developments for Tony with the situation of him crawling away from a successful fight in search of a power recharge now starting to get tired (though read in an era of fast draining smartphones it feels even more familiar now than over forty years ago), and towards the end there are signs that he is increasingly able to survive for periods without a functioning chest plate pacemaker, suggesting that his transplanted heart is finally being accepted by his body. I have no idea how scientifically plausible this scenario is, but the signs are encouraging that Tony is finally conquering his main physical weakness and showing hope for the future in spite of the stunted series around him.

One possibility for diversifying things up a bit would have been to introduce a back-up strip featuring a second hero, as happened in a number of other comics at this time, though mainly over at DC. Issues #43 & #44 contain first an Ant-Man reprint and then an original tale respectively at a time when Marvel expanded the size and cost of the comics, only to contract them back after a couple of months. The original tale is included here but it's a rather forgettable piece of a sweet shop owner attempting an insurance scam through arson whilst Hank Pym encounters the intelligent Scarlet Beetle once more, with his foe coming to an extremely undignified end. It doesn't leave the reader desperate for a regular series of Ant-Man back-ups and suggests the subsequent reversion to normal sized issues was wise and Marvel heroes don't generally prosper when hiding in the back of others' titles.

In general this is a rather slight and disappointing volume. In spite of the ongoing threads involving Marianne Rodgers, Simon Gilbert, Kevin O'Brien or Mr Kline, overall the whole thing feels slow and disjointed. The first half or so of the volume does make an effort to find a direction and stick with it even though it's not the most exciting thing, but the latter half shows a series just floundering about and trying all manner of situations and foes in the hope that something will eventually stick. This is not the series at its best.

Friday, 3 April 2015

Essential Captain America volume 6

Essential Captain America volume 6 consists of Captain America and the Falcon #206 to #230 ("and the Falcon" is dropped from #223 onwards) plus Annual #4 and the crossover issue Incredible Hulk #232. The early part of the volume, including the annual, is written and drawn by Jack Kirby. The rest of the run sees a lot of creators including writers Roy Thomas, Don Glut, Steve Gerber, David Anthony Kraft, Peter Gillis, Roger McKenzie and Roger Stern plus a couple of back-ups by Scott Edelman. The most persistent artist after Kirby is Sal Buscema; others include George Tuska, Dave Cockrum, John Buscema and Mike Zeck plus Bob Budiansky and Steve Leialoha on the back-ups. One issue also contains a framed reprint of a Human Torch story from Strange Tales #113 drawn by Jack Kirby and scripted by Stan Lee. The Incredible Hulk issue is plotted by Roger Stern, scripted by David Michelinie and drawn by Sal Buscema. And with so many creators, invariably there's a separate labels post.

The early part of this volume contains the tail end of Jack Kirby's 1970s return to the title. And whilst the art remains as powerful as ever, the writing still doesn't feel terribly spectacular with the only long term addition of note being the geneticist Arnim Zola. Truly an artist's creation he has replaced his original body with a new one that has the brain in the more protected chest, with a camera in place of a head and a video screen to display a face on his chest. Zola has created all manner of creatures that he deploys, of which the most notable is Doughboy, an organism that can adjust its entire body to form itself into the equipment Zola needs to hand. Zola is certainly a bold creation but some of his impact is limited by the revelation that he's working for the Red Skull and undertaking a project to give Hitler's brain a new body. Hitler surviving by some strange scientific means was a common trope in 1960s and 1970s science fiction but today it feels cliched. It's also a sign of Kirby's habit of ignoring Marvel continuity where it suited him and it would eventually fall to the final issues of Super-Villain Team-Up to tidy the various Marvel accounts of the last days of Hitler.

Issue #207 contains a scene that has caused quite some debate, especially due to the panel on the right. As Steve changes costume in the Latin America jungle, he thinks about his experiences and the sadistic prison commandant:
Whoever runs that banana jail seems to get his kicks out of kicking the inmates! This man they call "The Swine" must be typical of the kind of bully that flourishes in these two-bit dictatorships. But this is not my country and not my place to fight for causes I know nothing about. My immediate problem is to beat this jungle -- find my way to a fair-sized town and... home!
This triggered off some debate in the blogosphere a few years ago - see Scott Edelman: Shame on you, Captain America!, Kirby Dynamics: "Shame on you, Captain America?" Part 1 and Kirby Dynamics: "Shame on You Captain America" Part 2 for the main posts on this (although be warned they drift into the different matter of 1970s Marvel staffers' attitudes about and actions to Kirby). On its own though this feels like a very clumsy attempt both to move beyond the simplistic morality of Golden Age and early Silver Age comics and also to reflect the changed outlook on US foreign policy in the post-Vietnam era. The idea that every situation has clear-cut goodies and baddies and that heroes should jump aboard every rebellion going was now being challenged, not just in the comics themselves but also in the wider world as once heroes of liberation and independence had become authoritarian dictators. The problem is the dialogue isn't terribly nuanced and the situation up to now hasn't really been presented as such. Instead the Swine has been portrayed as a latter day Nazi, right down to the uniform (but not insignia) and even drawn to resemble Himmler whilst dealing out sadistic torture. Nor is Captain America acknowledging the complexities of the situation. Instead he's just turning his back on the matter and looking to flee the land. This is not a man weighing up the difficulties of what is worse out of the current situation or the potential chaos that can be unleashed by simply overthrowing a regime without a clear successor infrastructure. Nor is he declining to back an ambiguous group of unknown rebels because they may contain even worse elements. Rather this comes across as a "None of my business" dismissal even if such cack-handedness was never the intention. And indeed the story doesn't see Cap take on the dictator but instead the Swine is killed by one of Zola's creatures, with Zola himself taking Cap back to a castle in Switzerland for the rest of the story.

There's some improvement on Kirby's earlier issues in regards the treatment of women with both Leila (who has had a massive quick recovery from her brainwashing at the end of the previous volume) and Sharon showing greater boldness and intelligence. In particular Sharon holds her own with the Red Skull. However it's also clear that Kirby had little time for the Falcon, keeping him largely out of the picture during most issues. The final two see a temporarily blinded Cap in hospital where the shady Corporation sends the Night Flyer to assassinate a patient known as "the Defector". The Falcon has a run-in with the Night Flyer but it's Cap who ultimately triumphs despite his temporary blindness. The final piece of 1970s Kirby work in the volume is the annual which sees Cap battling Magneto for the fate of a strange mutant with two separate bodies. It feels rather run of the mill with Magneto a rather generic cackling villain who wants the smaller body to investigate a tiny spaceship. All in all the Kirby run on the title has been so-so and not the return to the greatest ever days of Cap that it was hyped as.

Kirby's departure leaves a hole in the series and its not really filled for the remaining sixteen issues in this volume. Instead we get all the hallmarks of a series in creative chaos as no less than seven writers (not including the reprint or the Incredible Hulk issue) struggle with key storylines without really knowing where they're going or how long they'll last for. (The art is, however, more stable from issue #218 onwards with Sal Buscema providing at least breakdowns on all but one issue.) There are fill-ins, although efforts are made to actually include them in the ongoing narrative, and two other staples of a series in a rush - a retelling of the origin and a reprint.

These both come at the start of a run in which Captain America is slowly exploring his past to find out just who he is and who Steve Rogers is, The reasons behind this level of introspection are never made totally clear; nor is it explained just why Cap appears to have amnesia about his life before he received the Super Soldier Serum. But the result is an exploration that doubles as an exercise in retroactive continuity as new elements are added and some of what we were told before is shown to be questionable at least. The origin retelling in issue #215 runs through all the basics but for the first time in the series the two replacement Captain Americas of the late 1940s are included, following a What If? story that reinstated to continuity the Cap stories published in 1945 to 1950 as well as the All-Star Squadron. Also recapped is the previously seen Captain America of the 1950s. Following this we get a single new page as the real Cap sets out to discover about the one other Captain America, but we never learn if he does and instead enjoy a reprint of the Strange Tales story where the Human Torch battled a fake Captain America who was actually the Acrobat in disguise, complete with a floating helicopter platform including a rocket ship & launcher plus an asbestos lined lorry. It's reprinted as in the original with no attempt to explain away some of the early Silver Age silliness or just how Cap could maintain a secret identity when it was published in comics the Torch read as a child.

Back in the present, Cap's quest for his past brings up the notion that his childhood in New York was an invention and he was actually from a small town in Maryland. Through returning memories and a chat with a local he learns how Steve Rogers was a weak younger brother, more interested in art than in following in his elder brother's footsteps as first a sports star and then a soldier, much to his father's disapproval. However news reports from Europe and his brother's death at Pearl Harbour led him to attempt to enlist but he was rejected on medical grounds until a government agent identified him as suitable for a project. Although Steve's weak physique had long been an established part of the character, his family background feels like an attempt to increase his identifiability with the presumed readership of this era. It also feels like an attempt to root him in a stereotypical small town America rather than the exceptional urban New York, though with his family all dead it seems hard to build much on this at this stage and it's not followed up on in this volume.

More bizarre is another adventure told in flashback as the series sets out to explain how, in looking back at the end of the Second World War, Cap could recall falling off a missile launched from the coast of the English Channel and land in waters off Newfoundland. This could have been explained away as a confusion caused by a disoriented man just revived from suspended animation or a case of poor geographic knowledge, or just become a lettering error to be corrected in reprints. But instead we learn how Cap was picked up by a submarine commanded by renegade Nazi scientist Lyle Dekker, then taken to a base on Newfoundland before escaping in a plane carrying nerve gas , only to be shot down with the gas interacting with the Super Soldier Serum to put Cap in suspended animation with amnesia of his last battle.

There was simply no need to complicate the wonderful resurrection story by adding on this interim adventure. Nor is Dekker a particularly memorable foe even after he transfers his consciousness into the oversized artificial body dubbed the Ameridroid, who soon realises he has sacrificed his humanity for no great gain. This is retroactive continuity for the sheer heck of it and adds no more than another flashback tale in which Cap plays himself in a wartime movie serial of his life. Ultimately the search for Cap and Steve Rogers's past just rings hollow and seems to make no significant addition to the character or the series at all.

Making an addition of a rather different nature is the Corporation storyline. Picking up a thread from the last of Kirby's issues the battle with this sinister organisation runs through the second half of the volume, and also in the contemporary issues of the Incredible Hulk, before climaxing in the crossover at the end. There are a number of long-term changes in the series in the interim, including the ending of the team-up between Cap and the Falcon. Sam has been largely relegated to a bit part in many adventures here before he accepts the role of leading the Super-Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., a short-lived team of new and obscure super powered beings including Marvel Man (later Quasar), the Texas Twister, the Vamp and Blue Streak. The team doesn't last long with the last two members revealed as agents of the Corporation whilst the Texas Twister leaves in disgust at the Vamp's brutal killing of Blue Streak (in fact to silence her fellow agent). Another Corporation agent is Veda, supposedly the daughter of a wartime agent present when Cap first received the Super Soldier Serum. She briefly becomes Cap's new romantic interest, with Sharon running away in pain, only to be killed off in internal power struggles within the Corporation without Cap even realising it. Other Corporation agents include the Hulk's past foes the Constrictor and Moonstone, plus the alien Animus who turns out to be the real form of the Vamp. There's also a separate attack on Cap and S.H.I.E.L.D. by the Red Skull. Tensions between Cap and Nick Fury are increasing ever more, with the former sick of being used by the agency so often.

The crossover at the end is a rare one that builds on events in both series, bringing a climax to the separate struggles with the Corporation as well as establishing the Falcon as the uncle of the Hulk's sidekick Jim Wilson. All the plot threads are tidied up which is no small achievement given the high turnover of writers. However some of the characters and events from the Incredible Hulk are not really introduced for readers of Captain America only. Consequently the whole thing can be a little confusing when read on its own.

Overall this is frankly a dull pedestrian volume. Neither Kirby nor those who followed him have been able to lift the series to new heights and instead we've had a mix of rather slow and dull adventures plus some needless retcons that try to fix things that frankly weren't broke in the first place. Captain America is a difficult series to do well and needs good long-term writers to have a real impact. This volume fails to find them.

Friday, 28 November 2014

Essential Defenders volume 3

Essential Defenders volume 3 reprints issues #31-60 and Annual #1. Bonus material consists of Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe entries for Doctor Strange, Hellcat and Valkyrie and the team entries for the Defenders and Zodiac. Most of the writing is by Steve Gerber, who also does the annual, and David Anthony Kraft with contributions Gerry Conway, Roger Slifer, John Warner and Chris Claremont and back-ups by Naomi Basner and Scott Edelman. The art is mainly by Sal Buscema, who also does the annual, and Keith Giffen with other work by Dave Cockrum, Michael Golden, Carmine Infantino, George Tuska and Ed Hannigan with the back-ups by Sandy Plunkett and Juan Ortiz. Inevitably there's a separate post for some of the labels.

It's amazing that this is volume 3 of a series and yet it begins as early as issue #31 without a preceding substantial run under another title. This been mainly been down to a combination of the Giant-Sizes and the crossover with Avengers, but it has also meant that previous progress has been slow for the team. Now we get a run of thirty issues with only an annual for additional material and so the team can develop more quickly. And it's increasingly clear that the Defenders aren't really a "non-team". It's clear who's a member and who is a guest star, with Devil Slayer's arrival having some trappings of a formal initiation with welcomes and handshakes, putting lie to the idea that any hero who hangs around for even a single adventure is a Defender. There may not be a formal constitution or salary scheme - Nighthawk finds himself covering just about all expenses from damages to Power Man's fees - but there's a recognised post of leader, which changes hands in this volume, and a flow of recruits.

Of the new or returning members, Power Man has the weakest ties and soon leaves, feeling he's more of a loner and just not suited to being on a team. As he was initially called in by Jack Norriss as reinforcements to protect Nighthawk in his hospital bed from Plantman whilst the other Defenders are overwhelmed or busy elsewhere, his attachment to the team was never that strong. Devil Slayer joins right near the end and so it's not possible to see here how he will last. The new Red Guardian seems to have more staying power but is soon blackmailed into returning to the Soviet Union where she is captured and subject to experiments by the Presence who is seeking to enhance his own power with nuclear energy and has selected her to be his mate. After this she remains under Soviet custody. An interesting hero who combines a day job as a top neurosurgeon and a secret role as a street champion of the ordinary people who has taken up the identity previously used by an Avengers foe, Tania Belinsky offers some potential but falls into the same problems so many female heroes have of having her powers changed fairly early on whilst her identity isn't original. Consequently her departure isn't that big an impact on the series, especially as other women are coming to the forefront with Doctor Strange's girlfriend Clea now playing a role in several adventures and even getting her own solo story when the series briefly switches to a two story format, allowing her to defeat the sorcerer Nicodemus.

But by far the most significant new recruit is Hellcat. She actually opts to hang around with the Defenders instead of taking up a longstanding offer to join the Avengers, and offers a delightful approach to heroing. She has a light hearted, fun loving adventurous approach and talks like - well maybe not a normal person in the real world of the late 1970s but certainly much less formal than many a hero. She is a welcome addition to the team and it's already easy to see she will become one of the core Defenders in the long run. Not acknowledged at all is her past as Patsy Walker, star of multiple teen soap comics that were Marvel's answer to Archie, bar references to her ex-husband Buzz's attitudes, but that doesn't seem to matter at the moment. Appearing as clear guest stars are the likes of Moon Knight and Ms. Marvel, whilst the Sub-Mariner returns but very much in guest star mode.

The first third of the volume is taken up with a length saga involving the Headmen - who have recruited a fourth member, the female Ruby Thursday with an artificial shape changing head - and Nebulon, now operating through a strange cult devoted to "Celestial Mind Control". The early issues have the pretty outlandish idea of the Headmen capturing Nighthawk and replacing his brain with that of Chondu of the Headmen in order to infiltrate the Defenders. It gets more complex when Jack Norriss's spirit is put into Nighthawk's body whilst Chondu's spirit is displaced to "Bambi", a young deer the Hulk has befriended. Whilst a disembodied brain Nighthawk relives his past and we learn about how he grew up monetarily rich but emotionally poor, sadly an all-too common combination, and see a succession of tragedies that made him the man he now is. Eventually Jack's spirit and Nighthawk's brain are restored to their own bodies, albeit with Nighthawk experiencing a crisis of awareness as he wonders just what is and isn't real, but Chondu ends up in a new composite body at the cost of "Bambi". Elsewhere Valkyrie is arrested and sent to a women's prison, with the other Defenders unaware of her fate. Inside the jail she faces bullying from other inmates, made worse by her inability to harm another woman, and a warden who tries to rape her. However she grows in popularity with other prisoners to the point that a riot starts for better conditions and her work in diffusing it helps to get her released with all charges dropped. Meanwhile Nebulon, leading a race of fish-like lizards called Luberdites, has set up the Celestial Mind Control cult to take over and "liberate" the world through advancing humanity. Amongst those drawn in are the old Marvel foes the Eel and the Porcupine. The CMC movement seeks presidential endorsement and a United Nations posting but the Headmen try to take it over for their own scheme. In the end the Defenders beat the Headmen and show Nebulon how his movement would undermine humanity's will. It's a complex story that lasts nearly a year, with the climax placed in the annual; one of the first times Marvel resorted to such a method in the superhero titles. It's also almost the last story by Steve Gerber on the series though he does one further issue with Doctor Strange's old foe Shazana reappearing; this feels like a fill-in idea being used up in a hurry.

In general Gerber's issues don't show much of his often used overt social commentary beyond the contemporary fad for cults that took an alternative mental approach, and whilst Tania's presence is used for occasional contrasts between the way things are in the United States and the Soviet Union but it's more of an aside to reinforce her outsider character rather than either propaganda about the superiority of the west or an exploration of alternatives. Instead the focus primarily on weird action, bar a brief use of a female presidential candidate as an alias for the Headmen's activities. However there's a brief scene in the annual that is set in New Delhi and the captions feel highly polemical, portraying India as a backward, illiterate and superstitious country, criticising the capital as primitive and expressing outrage that such a country can be a nuclear power. This is beyond a critic of nuclear weapons in general and feels very much a piece of American superiority pouring scorn on other countries for daring to raise themselves to a similar level of defence and independence. And nothing in these captions is remotely relevant to the story at hand.

Gerber's departure leaves one particular subplot still unexplained - the mysterious Elf with a gun who pops up at random to kill random people. And the new writers don't explain why. Instead issue #46 sees the Elf about to shoot the paper boy at the Richmond Riding Academy when suddenly a lorry thunders down the road and runs over the Elf. Consequently we're left with an unexplained and somewhat random chain of events that show that in life not everything has an explanation and instead we sometimes only get to glimpse a bigger pattern without ever knowing the reason why. It's a good little metaphor for life though it's the kind of approach that doesn't satisfy all comic readers so it remains to be seen if any later writers will instead seek to explain the Elf. All in all Gerber's run on Defenders has been solid though not spectacular and he has made the series quite distinct.

Some of the distinctiveness remains with successive writers as the threats remain a mixture of the unusual and off the wall but there are some stock ideas in use, especially in the middle of the volume when it takes some time to settle a new writer.  Egghead founds a team of existing villains called the Emissaries of Evil, including the Rhino, Solarr and the Cobalt Man, but it doesn't last and is ultimately consumed by infighting. Then Doctor Strange succumbs to the control of the Star of Capistan and assumes the villainous identity of Red Rajah. After his defeat he opts to leave the team for the time being with Nighthawk taking over as leader and the team's de facto base shifting to the Richmond Riding Academy on Long Island. Both Doctor Strange and his Sanctum Sanctorum return within this volume but it's a sign of how the series has grown strong enough to no longer rely on the good doctor and his villains as the core of the series.

Nighthawk's leadership faces a baptism of fire in another mini-epic as the villain Scorpio - actually Jake Fury, the S.H.I.E.L.D. director's brother - tries to create a new Zodiac society, this time with the other eleven as artificial lifeforms. However not all are "born" successfully and he's especially distraught at the "still birth" of Virgo. Feeling lonely, old, unachieving and depressed he opts to take his life. Suicide should always be handled carefully in media and reasons never casually given, making this downbeat ending a rather dubious move. After this we get a string of new foes in short tales, such as the Ringer, a fighter who can expand and throw constraining rings, Lunatik, a vigilante attacking people on the university campus, and a cult worshipping the demon Belathauzer. The main extended foe in this period is the aforementioned Presence. There's a guest appearance by Ms. Marvel as the Defenders go against AIM in a sequel to one of her solo adventures and it feels as though the issue was written as a potential fill-in that could be dropped into either series as and when necessary.

The other main character developments come with Valkyrie as she continues to adapt to the unfamiliar world. Jack Norriss remains devoted to her but she is increasingly unable to return the emotion and has to forcibly explain she just isn't his wife despite occupying her body. Her unfamiliarity with the world around her shows, especially during her time in prison, and on Nighthawk's suggestion that she enrol at a local university under Barbara Norriss's name, enduring the mess of bureaucracy and bringing further culture clashes whilst she proves rather bad at keeping her identity a secret. Jack proves unable to stay away, even when Nighthawk tries to buy him off, though near the end he accepts an offer to join S.H.I.E.L.D. and goes looking for the spy organisation.

The supporting cast has a few additions, including the first appearance of Kris Keating, a police lieutenant who would go on to be a recurring pain in the Spider-Man titles. (Well actually it may not be afterall but that's for another time.) Valkyrie's enrolment at university brings her into contact with fellow students "Ledge" and "Dollar Bill"; the latter is a film buff who starts hanging around the Defenders and taking over Jack Norriss's role as non-powered helper. Bill even brings along a film camera only to curse the shots he can get. Otherwise he provides a degree of comic relief.

 In general this volume shows a series that's trying hard to offer up a distinctive approach that combines seriousness, alternative looks and comedy. The problem is that a lot of it feels rather flat and just going through motions rather than really setting things on fire. Apart from Scorpio's suicide there are no moments that feel especially badly handled but something seems to be keeping the volume just a few steps above mediocre.

Friday, 17 October 2014

Essential Man-Thing volume 2

Okay let's deal with the usual laughter straight away. This volume contains more Giant-Size Man-Things. Pause for laughter.

[Lengthy pause.]

Essential Man-Thing volume 2 contains issues #15 to #22 of the character's first series, the complete #1 to #11 of his second, Giant-Size Man-Thing #3 to #5, plus what may be a leftover issue from the first series run in Rampaging Hulk #7, wilderness years appearances from Marvel Team-Up #68 and Marvel Two-in-One #43 and a crossover from Doctor Strange #41. That's a lot of issues so here go the credits. All the issues from the first series are written by Steve Gerber and drawn mainly by Jim Mooney with individual issues by John Buscema and Rico Rival. The Giant-Sizes are from this period and all are written by Gerber and drawn by Alfredo Alcala, Ed Hannigan and Ron Wilson. The Rampaging Hulk issue is written by Gerber and drawn by Jim Starlin. The second series is written first by Michael Fleisher and then by Chris Claremont, with one issue by Dickie McKenzie and a short back-up story in another by J.M. DeMatteis. The art is mainly by Jim Mooney then Don Perlin with individual issues by Larry Hama and Val Mayerik and the back-up by Ed Hannigan. The Marvel Team-Up is written by Claremont and drawn by John Byrne, the Marvel Two-in-One is written by Ralph Macchio and drawn by Byrne "& Friends", and the Doctor Strange issue is written by Claremont and drawn by Gene Colan. That's an awful lot of labels so naturally some have been put in a separate post.

The first series ends with leaps between the sword and sorcery fantasy that the title has often experimented with to the down to earth social commentary that Steve Gerber is more normally associated with. I've never really felt the former style is a good match with the Man-Thing and the material here continues to confirm that view, though it's less of a struggle to get through compared to the first volume. This one kicks off with a Giant-Size Man-Thing with a battle to liberate the homeworld of Korrek the barbarian from the sorcerer Klonus. In the process Dakimh is killed but the world is liberated.

The sword and sorcery is then put aside for a number of issues that instead deal with social commentary about changes in society and those who seek to resist them, starting with a tale of Sainte-Cloud, an ex-girlfriend of Ted Sallis's who persuaded him to move into more values based research. Using a hallucinogenic candle carved in the shape of the Man-Thing she seeks inspiration for her writing, leading to events becoming more real than they seem. Then there's the introduction of the Mad Viking, a forcibly retired man disgusted at what he sees as a decline in masculinity so he adopts a costume in commemoration of their perceived manliness and launches a crusade against modern "wussy" men, including slaughtering a rock singer and many of his groupies. Meanwhile a school pupil has died and his friend is about to publish his diary, revealing his loneliness and misery at the hands of bullies both at school, including on the staff, and in his family for being different and fat. The Man-Thing gets caught in the confrontations and burns the school coach to death. These events spark terror in Citrusville and a house wife decides the problem is rooted in what is taught in schools, having glanced at a text book and panicking that it discusses Communism and sex education. The result is a book burning riot outside the school where the Mad Viking is so blinded that when his granddaughter tries to stand up for the freedom of the young to make their own choices in life, he hits her so hard she falls and cracks her head, dying.

Rory has been a rare voice of reason in the town, for which he gets the sack from his radio station job, and he leaves in disgust, taking with him Carol Selby, the daughter of the town's Mary Whitehouse, and the Man-Thing, who thanks to an extended dip in chemicals is now able to move away from the swamp. The last few issues see a move to Atlanta for a more magical storyline, with Rory written out when he discovers Carol is underage, making him legally a kidnapper. She is injured in a car accident and returned home whilst Rory is arrested, leaving the Man-Thing alone for the end of the run.

Issue #22 marks the end of Steve Gerber's run on the title, a point acknowledged in the strip, and also for the series itself, which is not acknowledged in the strip, which was cancelled and revived only four years later. This was just a few months before the launch of Howard the Duck so it's not hard to see why the writer was moving on but was this also a very early example of a publisher linking a series so heavily to an individual creator that they opted to end it when that creator left rather than replace them? It was a practice that happened more commonly in later decades but I'm surprised that it could be even considered at this early stage. And it's particularly ironic given the disputes Gerber would later have with Marvel that included his removal from the Howard the Duck series and comic strip. Of course Marvel was notoriously disorganised at this stage in its history so it may be overreading the situation to assume the end of the series was linked to the end of the run. Nevertheless it's a sign of how prominent creators were becoming, with appearances moving beyond the odd scene as a nod and wink to the audience to a much greater point of participation.

The issue is not as well known as one of Gerber's Howard the Ducks but it deploys an interesting narrative approach, presumably suggested and approved as a way to economically incorporate more events than usual in order to wrap up existing storylines whilst the writer was still on the book, rather than leaving them for another writer to take on, usually at very short notice and without any real idea as to what had been planned. But it also seeks to establish the authenticity of the stories through the appearance of Gerber himself, with much of the issue an illustrated letter to Len Wein. Jim Mooney's depiction confirms what many had suspected, namely that Richard Rory is based on Gerber himself. Within the letter Gerber explains how he wrote the series at the instigation of Dakimh, and how this continued even after the sorcerer’s apparent death. There's a summary of most of the incidents from Gerber's run and then an extended explanation of Thog's plans and methods before a final showdown in which the fate of the universe hangs in the balance. Finally Dakimh gives his blessing to the writer's departure. As an exercise in concluding the storyline in a limited space this issue works. As a comic less so, with three of the eighteen pages resorting to prose text with illustrations, a format I've never liked to see in Marvel comics. It's also not really a Man-Thing issue with the monster only coming into the action near the end, and again suggests that the writer's priorities were elsewhere. Still as an experiment that both pushes at the barriers of convention whilst also harking back to the conceit of the Lee-Kirby days, it's a sign of a willingness to do things differently and expand the frontiers of the medium.

The only non-Gerber authored issue from this period is the final issue of Giant-Size Man-Thing, in which a young Ted Sallis and his wife Ellen visit a carnival fortune teller and witness three visions of the future, all of which involve horror and despair including a cult trying to sacrifice a baby, a young couple coming to grief because of their families' disapproval and mercenaries in the swamp turning on each other. It's an interesting way to showcase what are ultimately fill-in pieces from a variety of creators but overall the issue doesn't add much.

The second series shows a title setting out to be a bit different from its predecessor but rapidly retreating into some of the old tried and tested methods and then ending in a similar way. Although the social commentary is notably almost completely absent, there's once again a book that starts off as a reasonably conventional monster series but which steadily dips into the world of magic and swords - although this time it's cutlasses. Also there's an early attempt to enhance the Man-Thing but it's largely gone by the second issue.

At the start there's a short-lived effort to stick to science and monsters, starting off with a tale as a scientist is recruited by what claims to be the CIA to restore the Man-Thing's mind in the hope of recovering the Super Soldier Serum. However before the monster can be coaxed to adulthood the FBI attack, accidentally killing the scientist in the process. At first it seems the Man-Thing has retained his rudimentary intelligence but by the second issue the effects have worn off. What's also surprising is that the nature of the group representing itself as the CIA is never explored beyond the FBI statement that they're "enemy agents". Could this in fact be a squabble between agencies? Or was that idea too radical in 1979? We then get a change of location when another scientist accidentally teleports the Man-Thing to the Himalayas, where we find the old stereotype of a party of two men and a woman with one of the men sending the other to his death and making moves on the grieving widow. Add in an encounter with a tribe of Yeti - here established as an offshoot of Cro-Magnon Man who have survived in the mountains - plus a high priest figure foretelling doom and the clichés are complete.

A crossover with Doctor Strange brings a new writer to the series and another round of magic as the Man-Thing and Elaine, the woman from the Himalayas, get swept back to the Florida swamp to find Baron Mordo's latest scheme. After this we finally get a recurring supportive cast in the form of Barbie Bannister, a spoilt rich girl who finds she has to fend for herself when her parents are killed by modern day drug smuggling pirates, and John Daltry, the local sheriff. After Daltry and the Man-Thing deal with a bunch of college students trying to destroy the monster for kicks and fame, we get the first and only epic of the series as Captain Fate returns with his sky pirates. Fate is ultimately freed from the curse of immortality but instead the curse engulfs Daltry and nobody seems able to break it leading to Barbie searching for anything to do it. After a couple of one-off tales of the Man-Things encounters with those who find themselves in the swamp, including a tragic young couple who flee their parents and give birth to a child, only to die of poisoned water whilst the grandparents confront the Man-Thing, and a isolated boy who joined a cult and then got "deprogrammed" by his parents. The latter is a short story by J.M. DeMatteis and in its take of the obessiveness of some religions it's about the only sign of social comment in the run. The main plot gears up with the arrival in the swamp of John Kowalski, a mysterious man who is the personification of Death and who offers to free Daltry if Barbie will join him.

The final issue is once again told in flashback by a writer to his editor, although this time it's done in the pub and we see not just editor Louise Jones but also assistant editor Danny Fingeroth and editor-in-chief Jim Shooter. Chris Claremont relates how he got taken away to a realm for a final battle with the force behind Daltry's curse, Thog. Once more Thog is destroyed and everyone returns home with Barbie freed from her Death obligations but the Man-Thing proves impossible to cure. Claremont announces his resignation as writer and Shooter agrees to cancel the series. As they leave we discover that once more Dakimh has been directing the writer.

This second series is brief and ultimately unsatisfying. There was clearly an attempt to do something different early on but it fizzled out and we're left with a relatively mundane series that eventually winds up wallowing in the memory of the first, as shown most notably in the final issue. It feels like it was being written by numbers and just didn't know where to go. The end of the first series included here has the reverse problem - it's trying to go to almost too many places, riding waves of fantasy and realism at the same time. But it does at least try to say something. All in all this volume and the series as a whole is rather inessential. The central problem is that very little can ever be done with the main character and most of the events around him don't easily fit the genre. This is not one to search high and low for.

Friday, 18 July 2014

Essential Man-Thing volume 1

Hoh boy. This is the one that brings out all the sniggering.

So let's take this slowly. Essential Man-Thing volume 1 contains material from multiple titles including issues of Giant-Size Man-Thing.

Let's just pause for a moment to let everyone get the sniggering out of their system.

[Lengthy pause.]

All done? Because there won't be another break.

(But on an aside, did the term "man-thing" actually have such connotations in early 1970s America, or are the sniggers all down to latter-day use of the term or even transatlantic differences? A quick Google search is unhelpful, being dominated by the comic character, but then the term is far from the most common name for the... well you know.)

Now down to business.

Essential Man-Thing volume 1 contains the eponymous creature's earliest appearances and issues, consisting of material from Savage Tales #1, Ka-Zar's feature in Astonishing Tales #12-13, Adventure into Fear #10-19, Man-Thing #1-14, Giant-Size Man-Thing #1-2 and Monsters Unleashed #5 & #8-9. Most of these series were anthologies in either comic or magazine format, the latter not falling under the Comics Code Authority and allowing for less censored material. Adventures into Fear was previously a reprint series and then became another long-run try-out title before successful characters received a title in their own right. Bonus material includes Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe entries for both the Man-Thing and Jennifer Kale. One notable omission is the cover to Savage Tales #1 but on investigation it seems that this is because the cover spotlights Conan the Barbarian and so presumably having lost the Conan licence Marvel are unable to reprint it even when accompanying a non-Conan story.

The Man-Thing's debut in the magazine Savage Tales is written by Roy Thomas and Gerry Conway and drawn by Gray Morrow. All contribute to subsequent tales which are written mainly by Steve Gerber, with contributions by Len Wein and Tony Isabella. The art is mostly by Val Mayerik and Mike Ploog with contributions by John Buscema, Neal Adams, Rich Buckler, Howard Chaykin, Jim Starlin, Alfredo Alcala, Vincente Alcazar and Pat Broderick. As this produces many labels, some have been placed in a separate post.

Reading through this volume I've felt as though I was stuck in a swamp myself. It has been a very long and slow read and, although a variety of real world events have intervened to contribute to that, the series itself has not proved very inspiring at times. At the heart of it the series suffers two major problems. One is the complete mindlessness of the title creature, resulting in no dialogue or character development at all and making it hard to get interested in what happens to him. The other is the swamp environment not lending itself to many obvious story types and the ones that are do get used fall into a mixture of stiltedness or just plain weirdness.

There's a long tradition of swamp monsters and it's now unknown just whether the inspiration for the Man-Thing or the Swamp Thing came first. But it takes more than just a walking mound of slime to create excitement. For the Man-Thing there's an attempt to create some tragedy through his origin as we see scientist Ted Sallis betrayed to spies by his assistant/girlfriend and having to take a serum to survive, only for it to interact with the swamp and turn him into a shambling monster. As origins go it's nice and self-contained but with openings that could be used to spin off multiple further adventures. Unfortunately not too much is done in this volume with that. The monster seemingly has no coherent thoughts or memories so can neither embark on a quest for vengeance nor try to find a cure for his condition. Ellen appears again only in a special story from Monsters Unleashed as she recovers from her burns and returns to the swamp to deal with the memories. In doing so she comes face to face with what Ted has become, leading to a memorable moment as she demonstrates no fear, but in the regular series she is forgotten. The organisation Ellen works for, later revealed as AIM, don't catch on to what has really happened to Ted and come after the monster again and again. And so all we're left with is the stumbling monster wandering the swamps and influenced by the emotions of those around it.

That said the Man-Thing does demonstrate some interesting ideas such as the ability to literally ooze through any small opening and a touch that burns whenever the recipient demonstrates fear. Visually he's also a good design, even in black and white, and so makes for a series of strong images though I generally prefer Val Mayerik's depiction to Mike Ploog's. However I'm not sure how he displayed in colour - the front cover shows some very similar shades of green being used for both the monster himself and the background swamp. Fortunately the back cover has found some more distinguishing variations of green.

The character took a while to take off, not helped by Savage Tales only publishing one issue for some years. But the following year, after an appearance in Ka-Zar's strip in Astonishing Tales, which isn't particularly memorable in its own right but which does serve to thrash out some of the details of the character, the Man-Thing soon got an ongoing title in the pre-existing Fear, albeit with the title expanded to Adventure into Fear. This series had previously reprinted many monster stories from Marvel's pre-superheroes era, and the choice of this title helped to place the Man-Thing within the sense of a restoration of the non-superhero monsters. This is also reflected in the guest stars that appear or rather don't.

Once we get past the guest appearance in Ka-Zar's strip, there are no further substantial guest appearances included in this volume (although there are some cameos). This is despite the period covering guest appearances in Avengers, Daredevil and Marvel Two-in-One which show that the Man-Thing wasn't completely isolated from the wider Marvel universe. Such a limited interaction as presented here can allow a character to strive and thrive on their own two feet without interruptions, but it can also leave their deficiencies heavily exposed with precious little to fall back on. It's very much the latter effect here and I feel the series could have seriously benefited from either some appearances by familiar faces or else a fully developed supporting cast who actually hang around long enough to make a big enough impact.

The swamp is located in the Everglades in Florida and comes with all the traditional contents of a swamp from fierce crocodiles to hillbillies, as well as being the site for a proposed airport. But it also contains some decidedly fantastical elements. There is a hidden civilisation based around a Fountain of Youth. And the swamp is the site of the Nexus of All Realities, a gateway that links it to many dimensions containing all manner of weird oddities. The Man-Thing has become the guardian of the Nexus, offering the ironic spectacle of such a great responsibility falling upon such a mindless beast.

There's a tendency for the supporting cast to only appear briefly before disappearing. The first notable case is Jennifer Kale, a young amateur witch who develops a psychic link with the Man-Thing but it is subsequently broken. Her brother Andy and their grandfather Joshua, the head of a cult that seek to defend the Earth from the demons found in the Nexus, also appear, as does Jennifer's boyfriend Jaxon, offering some broader mythology but it's not really developed here. However the Kale family would go on to be tied into the continuity of another of Marvel's horror heroes but when I last tried to read a summary of the family history all I could grasp was just how much my head hurt. Elsewhere are two distinctly strange beings who come through the Nexus - Korrek, a barbarian who arrives through a jar of peanut butter, and Howard the Duck. To my surprise Howard is killed off early on and doesn't come back within this volume but his popularity would take him to great heights elsewhere. Later on we meet Richard Rory, a perpetual loser who repeatedly finds himself in the swamp. More than once he seems to hit it off with a woman who is also lost there, only for things to go wrong. However he does land a spot as a night-time radio DJ. The first such woman is Ruth Hart, on the run from a gang, and it at first seems as though she may have staying power but it comes to nothing.

Villains range from the earthly to the fantastic. At the grounded level the Man-Thing's most persistent nemesis is F. A. Schist, an industrialist intent on building an airport in the swamp, which brings him into recurrent conflict with the Man-Thing, including bringing in the scientist Professor Slaughter. Eventually Schist's greed consumes him when he finds the Fountain of Youth and is destroyed by the Man-Thing, but his vengeance seeking widow later comes after the monster. Elsewhere is the first appearance of the serial killer called the Foolkiller, who is seemingly killed off in his first appearance but would later come back. There are also a string of one-off criminals who pass through the swamp and usually come to grief at the hands of the Man-Thing, though things aren't always great for the victims. There's an especially nasty case of this in a two-part text story from Monsters Unleashed where an unsuccessful writer flees after his girlfriend was killed by a mugger only to get caught between a mad father trying to kill his daughter. But things are not always as they seem, as shown early on when the Man-Thing encounters a black man on the run from a racist and jealous sheriff, only to discover disputing claims between them. The more fantastical foes include various magical beings from the Nexus such as Thog the Nether-Spawn, Dakimh the Enchanter and various one-off named and unnamed demons. Or there's the first appearance of the alien Wundarr, a parody of Superman and his origin. A rare trip away from the swamp bring an encounter with ghost pirates led by Captain Fate, doomed to never reach port due to a curse inflicted by a crewmember they abandoned.

Giant-Size Man-Thing may have a title that everyone laughs at, but the first two issues are straightforward serious content, with the only change from the regular series being an increased use of characters from the wider Marvel universe. The first issue sees the Man-Thing battle the Glob, previously seen in the Incredible Hulk, due to the influence of the Cult of Entropy. The second sees a bunch of cameos, most notably from Mister Fantastic, as the Man-Thing gets briefly transported to New York in a partial parody of King Kong. But otherwise these bigger issues are just expanded versions of the normal sort of story for the series, which has now settled into a pattern of some edginess and social commentary wrapped up around monster and magic tales.

Overall this volume may have some imagination to it but it's the execution that is the problem. Ultimately the central character just isn't sufficiently exciting and there's not enough going on around him to make this compelling stuff. Steve Gerber's issues do include a degree of commentary and satire, but this approach can either date all too easily or else sink if the reader does not have the cultural background to spot the targets. What we're left with is a title that begins as a latter-day monster story in the vein of an earlier generation of Marvel that gets crossed with fantasy and absurdity in the hope that something in this mix will congeal. But the result just doesn't work for me.

Friday, 11 April 2014

Essential Hulk volume 4

Essential Hulk volume 4 is made up of the Incredible Hulk #143-170. The writing is in a period of transition with the end of Roy Thomas's run, then runs by Archie Goodwin and Steve Englehart, with other issues plotted and/or scripted by Gary Friedrich, Len Wein, Gerry Conway, Steve Gerber and Chris Claremont. The art is mostly by Herb Trimpe with some contributions by Dick Ayers. Bonus material includes the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe entry for the Shaper of Worlds.

Whilst the art throughout this volume continues to be strong, cementing Trimpe's reputation as one of the greatest Hulk artists, if not the greatest of all. However the writing meanders a lot, not helped by the high turnover of scripters, and the result is a somewhat turgid volume even though there are some developments. A key strand in the early issues is the Hulk's quest to be reunited with Jarella and they do briefly achieve it twice, first when she's transported to the full-size world and later when the Hulk journeys back to her world with the help of both an experimental version of Ant-Man's shrinking formula and the mysterious Shaper. This in turn helps drive a final wedge between Bruce Banner and Betty Ross, with the result she turns fully to Glenn Talbot and marries him. Betty and Talbot's wedding is a rare one in superhero comics in that it's not interrupted by villains and monsters. Instead it proceeds smoothly whilst the Hulk is on Counter-Earth, where his counterpart is married to Betty and they have a son. It's a glimpse at what might have been had Bruce made the trench and not been exposed to the gamma rays all those years ago.

Counter-Earth and Jarella's world are two of a number of locations visited by the Hulk on his travels throughout the volume. Others include the depths of the ocean, a city in the sky and Canada. The latter is depicted primarily as a wilderness in which a monstrous beast roams. Curiously it takes the strip a while to realise that sur Québec, la principale langue parlée est le français ni l'anglais. So the Mounties all speak English mais un groupe de bûcherons parlent français. Still it helps to emphasise that the Hulk is abroad.

Meanwhile back in the States there are a variety of developments surrounding Thunderbolt Ross and the military. A dedicated military base and unit is established for the purpose of tackling the Hulk. Initially named "Project: Greenskin" it is subsequently renamed "Hulkbuster". General Ross is generally a subdued rational man throughout the volume but can succumb to his own anger at times. But at other points he's realistic enough to realise the Hulk isn't always the greatest threat. Indeed at one point when both he and Bruce are captured it's Ross who realises that the only way to escape is for Banner to become the Hulk. However the plan only partially works as the Hulk hates Ross too much to stop to free him. As a consequence Ross is subsequently transported to the Soviet Union and only subsequently freed by a covert operation. However in the process Major Talbot is shot and assumed dead, though actually survives as a prisoner behind the Iron Curtain. His assumed death has a devastating impact on Betty, who believes she's gone from being a bride to a widow in the space of a mere month, and she succumbs to anger and more.

There's less material for Jim Wilson beyond a scene where his girlfriend confronts him about trying to hide the Hulk at her house and makes it clear she expects to be married to Jim, a level of commitment that he wasn't prepared for. It seems to be a way of phasing Jim out of the series but it does succumb to the cliché of depicting young women as just waiting to be married and only giving them independence in so far as they force the issue. Of the other supporting cast, Doc Samson is also phased out as loses the gamma radiation that has enhanced his body and strength. However another recurring character is introduced in the form of Colonel Armbruster, who takes over the command of Project: Greenskin during first the absence and then enforced vacation of Ross.

There are a number of new foes encountered in these pages but few have had much lasting impact. Amongst the less remembered are the Horusians, aliens who have replaced with champion conflict by giant creations on Earth and their creations include the Sphinx and a stone Colossus. Then there's Fialan, an assassin from Jarella's world sent after her to Earth by Visis, or the Inheritor, another of the High Evolutionary's creatures, this one having evolved from a cockroach. In an initially more human form is Senator Morton Clegstead, the main political backer of Project: Greenskin, who believes the Hulk's blood can cure his cancer but it instead mutates him into a gigantic blob. There's a surprising for its time (and writer) use of Soviets as enemies, although the strip does take subsequent steps to establish the main villains as rogue elements with the regular authorities only acting once their hands have been forced. The main rogue element is the Gremlin, the revenge-seeking son of the Hulk's very first foe, the Gargoyle. Out at sea the Hulk comes across Captain Omen and his gigantic submarine that is a self-contained world. The homage to Captain Nemo and the Nautilus in the Jules Verne novel Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea is all too obvious. But there's an element of horror, both in the form of the half-man half-fish monster Aquon who has been created by Omen, but also in the fate of the second generation crew who have evolved to work at the deep pressures of the oceans' depths and who find their bodies exploding at the surface pressures. Elsewhere the Hulk fights Zzzax, a living energy being whilst a visit to Sky Island, the former home of the Bird People, leads to a clash with the Bi-Beast, a living monument left to commemorate the race now it has passed on. The final issue sees the Hulk and Betty on a strange island inhabited by giant aliens.

Amongst the foes who would have a more lasting impact is the Shaper (of Worlds), a being with the power to alter reality but without the imagination to create for itself who has instead given reality to the dreams of Nazi scientist Otto Kronsteig, giving a glimpse of a New York overrun by Nazis and where Kronsteig is eventually transformed into the Nazi ubermensch "Captain Axis". On another level is the Wendigo, the first fictional use of the beast from Algonquian legend who will go on to be a regular feature of many Marvel stories set in the Canadian wilderness. But by far the nastiest of foes is the Harpy, the mutated form of Betty Banner Talbot after she succumbs to anger at the apparent death of her husband, blaming both her father and Bruce Banner for the Major's death. She succumbs to the suggestions of Modok and is exposed to gamma radiation, transforming her into a vicious creature resembling the harpies of Greek legend. I forget just how many times the main romantic interest in a series has been transformed into a monster to fight the lead character, but here there's a real sense of hurt and pain driving the fight, and Bruce finds he has no choice but to sacrifice a chance to rid himself of the Hulk once and for all in favour of curing Betty.

There are also a few first appearances in this series by foes from elsewhere, most notably Doctor Doom who encounters the Hulk for the first time in the opening issue. Later the Hulk makes his first visit to Counter-Earth where he clashes with Kohbra, another of the High Evolutionary's creatures previously seen in the pages of Warlock. Back on Earth, he fights with Tiger Shark from the pages of Sub-Mariner. The series also sees return appearances by familiar foes such as the Leader, the Abomination, the Rhino, the Chameleon, Hydra, Visis, Modok and A.I.M.

There also a number of appearances by other heroes, including the aforementioned Ant-Man. When the Hulk is captured in New York, by a combination of Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D., Captain America and the Fantastic Four, he is soon put on trial with his lawyer none other than Matt Murdock (Daredevil), with various Avengers called as witnesses and Mr Fantastic supplying what seems to be a way to turn the Hulk back into Bruce Banner so as to give evidence but which actually empowers the Hulk enough to escape. Issues #150 & #161 continue the practice of using the series to tie up loose ends from cancelled titles. The former issue spotlights Havok and Lorna Dane from X-Men as Havok discovers the hard way he needs more training for his powers whilst the romantic triangle between the pair and Ice-Man is seemingly settled in Havok's favour. It's a brief tale that manages to tie into the ongoing storyline as the Hulk's search for Jarella draws him to Lorna as a green-haired woman. Later on issue #161 is part of the Hulk's adventures in Canada and ties in with the conclusion to the Beast's exploits from Amazing Adventures, as the latter's journey northwards concludes with an encounter with the Mimic, whose powers are getting out of control.

But whilst other adventures are being wrapped up, the Hulk's are ongoing and the pattern for them has now been largely settled as he wanders the Earth, and occasionally the rest of the universe, in search of peace and tranquillity, whilst Bruce Banner searches for a way to cure his other self. The military search for the Hulk in an attempt to restrain or destroy him whilst various villains seek to use him for their own purposes. Looking at this more and more, I think the basic core problem is the over-simplistic nature of the Hulk's personality that results in some rather stilted interaction with those around him, whilst Bruce Banner's role is often minimalised either by the short period between transformations or by the limited resources around him. Consequently the series is often weak when it's unable to get much great action out of the Hulk himself. The problem is further compounded by the changing writers with the results that the character's motivation can change at times - he's willing to help save a woman's brother from the Wendigo because he doesn't want to be blamed for things he hasn't done, yet at other times he just doesn't care what the world around him thinks so long as he's left alone. His memory is weak such that he can't always recall the details of his past encounters with various foes. Add in the very child-like dialogue and the result is a character that's hard to enjoy at times. It would be much better to give the Hulk a strong degree of intelligence and memory, allowing for much greater character interaction and development, or else to shift the focus to the Hulkbusters' pursuit of him and present events through their eyes. Alternatively a sidekick who actually goes all over the place with him would allow for development to take place in another way. But the approach here of focusing on the Hulk in such an oversimplistic depictment just hampers the character and at times makes the series tough to wade through.

So in spite of having some developments amongst the Hulk's supporting cast, this volume is a return to what has been all too typical of the series so far - a great idea squandered by inconsistency and uncertainty as to how to depict and develop it in practice. And it's surprising just how easy it is to pinpoint the problem. There have been times when this can be made to work - so far the best has come under Roy Thomas - but it requires a dedicated writer who lasts for a good while. When left to a fast turnover of writers the result is all often too formulaic adventures that expose the problems inherent in the formula. This is not one of the best Essential volumes.