Power Pack Origin Album


By Louise Simonson, June Brigman & Bob Wiacek (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-385-7             ISBN13: 978-0-87135-385-6

By the mid 1980s Marvel was far down a corporate growth-path and headed towards a period of truly dire product; lackluster, unimaginative, uninspired and woefully “safe”, but there was still some spirit of creative adventure to be found – and supported. A perfect example is this is the incredibly appetizing “fun-book” Power Pack which gave a bunch of super-powered kids a brief chance to shine in a world dominated by adults and where every super-powered kid had a grown-up somewhere calling the shots and saving the day…

High above Earth a sentient spaceship and its benevolent alien pilot were shot down whilst attempting to warn the world of impending doom. The aggressors were lizard-like marauders called Snarks determined to steal a new scientific principle discovered by physicist Dr. James Power, whilst the noble Kymellian Aefyre Whitemane sought to quash a secret that had nearly eradicated his own race…

At their isolated Virginia beach-house Power and his wife Margaret are kidnapped by the Snarks, but their four kids Alex, Julie, Jack and Katie, who had seen the Kymellian ship crash, were absent when the lizards attacked, and sheltered by the heroic Whitemane. He reveals that their father’s Anti-Matter energy converter can destroy worlds, but before he can save their parents he dies of his wounds.

The distraught and horrified kids discover they have inherited his fantastic abilities (one each) and with the assistance of Friday, the Kymellian’s “Smart-ship” the now super-powered pre-teens set out to save their parents – as well as the galaxy – and all before bed-time!

‘Power Play’, ‘Butterfingers’, ‘Kidnapped!‘ and ‘Rescue’, the first four issues of the monthly comic book (cover-dated August to November 1984) form a perfect modern fairytale, with classic goodies and baddies, rollicking thrills and adventure and most importantly brave and competent heroes who are still recognizably, perfectly realized children, not adults in all-but-name…

This charming thriller, first collected in 1988 was a rare, creatively unique high point in the company’s output (although it wasn’t long before the kids were subsumed into the greater mutant-teen morass of the X-Men franchise) and it still stands as a sensitive and positive example of plucky kids overcoming all odds to match Peter Pan, Swallows and Amazons, Huckleberry Finn or the very best of Baum’s Oz books.

Superbly observed, magically scripted and beautifully drawn this is a book that every comic loving parent will want their kids to read…
© 1988 Marvel Entertainment Group Inc. All Rights Reserved.