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O Josephine!


By Jason (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-68396-210-6 (HB/digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content included for dramatic, comedic and ironic effect.

Born in 1965 in Molde, Norway, John Arne Sæterøy is known globally by his enigmatic, utilitarian nom de plume Jason. The shy & retiring auteur started on the path to international cartoon superstardom in 1995, once first graphic novel Lomma full ay regn (Pocket Full of Rain) won Norway’s biggest comics prize: the Sproing Award.

From 1987 he had contributed to alternate/indie magazine KonK while studying graphic design and illustration at Oslo’s Art Academy. From there he went on to Norway’s National School of Arts and, after graduating in 1994, founded his own comic book Mjau Mjau. Constantly refining his style into a potent form of meaning-mined anthropomorphic minimalism, Jason cites Lewis Trondheim, Jim Woodring & Tex Avery as primary influences. Moving to Copenhagen Jason worked at Studio Gimle alongside Ole Comoll Christensen (Excreta, Mar Mysteriet Surn/Mayday Mysteries, Den Anden Praesident, Det Tredje Ojet) & Peter Snejbjerg (Den skjulte protocol/The Hidden Protocol, World War X, Tarzan, Books of Magic, Starman, Batman: Detective 27).

His efforts were internationally noticed, making waves in France, The Netherlands, Slovenia, Spain, Germany and other Scandinavian countries as well as the Americas. He won another Sproing in 2001 – for self-published series Mjau Mjau – and in 2002 turned nigh-exclusively to producing graphic novels. He won even more major awards.

Jason’s breadth of interest is wide and deep: comics, movies, animated cartoons, music, literature and pulp fiction all feature equally with no sense of rank or hierarchy. This puckish and egalitarian mixing and matching of inspirational sources always and inevitably produces picture-treatises well worth a reader’s time. Over a succession of tales Jason built and constantly re-employed a repertory company of stock characters to explore deceptively simplistic milieux based on classic archetypes distilled from movies, childhood entertainments, historical and literary favourites. These all role-play in deliciously absurd and surreal sagas centred on his preferred themes of relationships and loneliness. Latterly, Jason returned to such “found” players as he built his own highly esoteric universe, and even has a whole bizarre bunch of them “team-up” or clash…

As always, visual/verbal bon mots unfold in beguiling, sparse-dialogued, or even as here silently pantomimic progressions, with compellingly formal page layouts rendered in a pared back stripped-down interpretation of Hergé’s Claire Ligne style: solid blacks, and thick outlines dominating settings of seductive monochrome simplicity augmented by a beguiling palette of stark pastels and muted primary colours.

The majority of his tales brim with bleak isolation, swamped by a signature surreality: largely populated with cinematically-inspired, darkly comic, charmingly macabre animal people ruminating on those inescapable concerns whilst re-enacting bizarrely cast, bestial movie tributes.

A master of short-form illustrated tales, many Jason yarns were released as snappy little albums perfect for later inclusion in longer anthology collections like this one which gathers a quartet of his very best.

Here the stream of subtle wonderment opens with a suitably understated autobiographical jaunt to the land of Erin and an uneventful but truly mind-blowing progression along ‘The Wicklow Way’. The vacation hikes might be scenic and uneventful, but you’re never alone as long as you’re stuck inside your own head…

With the addition of a jaundiced inky outlook (and employing “yellow journalism” of the most literal kind) ‘L. Cohen: A Life’ then outlines the experiences and times of the poet, musician and philosopher, with a strong emphasis on whimsical inaccuracy and factual one-upmanship, whilst cinematic classicism underpins ‘The Diamonds’ wherein a pair of softened and barely-boiled detectives lose all objectivity after their scrupulous surveillance of a simple family affects their own hidden lives…

The low-key dramatics slip back into monochrome and into the twilight zone after weary world traveller Napoleon Bonaparte returns to Paris and falls head over shiny heels for infamous exotic dancer Josephine Baker. As with all doomed romances, the path to happiness is rocky, dangerous, and potentially insurmountable, but… c’est l’amour!

These comic tales are strictly for adults but allow us all to look at the world through wide-open childish eyes, exploring love, loss, life, death, boredom and all aspects of relationship politics without ever descending into mawkishness or simple, easy buffoonery. His buffoonery is always slick and deftly designed for maximum effect.

Jason remains a taste instantly acquired: a creator any true fan of the medium should move to the top of their “Must-Have” list.
All characters, stories, and artwork © 2019 Jason. This edition © Fantagraphics Books, Inc. All rights reserved.

Today in 1913 comics legend Joe Simon was born. I’m sure you’ve read all those great books he & Jack Kirby co-created, but if you haven’t, why not try The Sandman by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby?

In 1957 French comics genius Edmond-François Calvo died. You can not until you read his masterwork La Bête Est Mort which we reviewed as The Beast is Dead: World War II Among the Animals and will probably do again real soon.

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Bram Stoker’s Dracula


By Bram Stoker & Fernando Fernández (Catalan Communications/Del Rey Books)
ISBN: 978-0-34548-312-6 (Del Rey)
DLB: 18118-1984 (Catalan)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times

Here a gloriously OTT example of Anglo-European collaboration long overdue for reconsideration and another go-round…

Multi-disciplinary Spanish artist Fernando Fernández began working to help support his family at age 13 whilst still at High School. He graduated in 1956 and immediately began working for British and French comics publishers. In 1958 his family relocated to Argentina and whilst there he added strips for El Gorrión, Tótem and Puño Fuerte to his ongoing European and British assignments for Valentina, Roxy and Marilyn.

In 1959 he returned to Spain and began a long association with Fleetway Publications in London, generating mostly war and girls’ romance stories. By the mid-1960’s he was experimenting with painting: selling book covers and illustrations to a number of clients. He resumed comics work in 1970, creating a variety of strips (many of which found their way into US horror magazine Vampirella), the successful comedy feature ‘Mosca’ for Diario de Barcelona and educational strips for the publishing house Afha.

Increasingly expressive and experimental as the decade passed, Fernández crafted ‘Cuba, 1898’ and ‘Círculos’ before, in 1980, beginning his science fiction spectacular Zora y los Hibernautas for the Spanish iteration of US fantasy magazine 1984. It eventually made it into English via Heavy Metal magazine as Zora and the Hibernauts.

He then adapted this moody, Hammer Films-influenced version of Dracula for the Spanish iteration of Creepy, before (working with Carlos Trillo) moving on to mediaeval fantasy thriller La Leyenda de las Cuatro Sombras. That done, he created illustration series Galería de Personajes Fantásticos, Argón, el Salvaje and a number of adaptations of Isaac Asimov tales in Firmado por: Isaac Asimov and Lucky Starr – Los Océanos de Venus.

His last comics work was Zodíaco, begun in 1989, before mounting heart problems curtailed the series and he returned to painting and illustration. He died in August 2010, aged 70.

For his interpretation of the gothic masterpiece under review here, Fernández sidelined the expansive, experimental layouts and lavish page design that had worked so effectively in Zora and the Hibernauts, opting for a moodily classical and oppressively claustrophobic, traditional page construction: trusting to his staggering mastery of colour and form to carry his luxuriously mesmeric message of mystery, seduction and terror.

The story is undoubtedly a familiar one and the set pieces are all executed with astounding skill and confident aplomb as, in May 1897, English lawyer Jonathan Harker is lured to the wilds of Transylvania and horror beyond imagining wherein an ancient bloodsucking horror prepares to move to the pulsing heart of the modern world. Leaving Harker to the tender mercies of his vampiric harem, Dracula voyages by schooner to England, slaughtering every seaman aboard the S.S. Demeter and unleashing a reign of terror throughout the sedate, complacent British countryside.

Meanwhile, in the seat of Empire, Harker’s fiancée Mina Murray finds her flighty friend Lucy Westenra fading from troublesome dreams and an uncanny lethargy which none of her determined suitors, Dr. Jack Seward, Texan Quincy P. Morris and Arthur Holmwood – the future Lord Godalming – seem capable of dispelling…

As Harker struggles to survive in the Carpathians, in Britain, Seward’s deranged but impotent patient Renfield confesses to horrifying visions and becomes greatly agitated. Freshly arrived in England, the Count is already causing chaos and disaster, as well as constantly returning to rapidly declining Lucy. His bestial bloodletting prompts her three beaux to summon famed Dutch physician Abraham Van Helsing to save her life and cure her increasing mania.

Harker survived his Transylvanian ordeal, and when nuns summoned Mina she rushed to Romania where she married him in a hasty ceremony to save his health and wits…

In London, Dracula renews his assaults and Lucy dies, only to be reborn as a predatory child-killing monster. After dispatching her to eternal rest, Van Helsing, Holmwood, Seward & Morris – joined by recently returned and much-altered Harker and his new bride – resolve to hunt down and destroy the ancient evil in their midst, following a chance encounter in a London street between the newlyweds and the astoundingly rejuvenated Count…

Dracula, however, has incredible forces and centuries of experience on his side and having tainted Mina with his blood-drinking curse flees back to his ancestral lands. Frantically, the mortal champions give chase, battling the elements, Dracula’s enslaved “gypsy army” and the monster’s horrific eldritch power in a race against time lest Mina finally succumb forever to his unholy influence…

Although translation to English in the Catalan version is a little slapdash in places – a fact happily addressed in a 2005 re-release from Del Rey – the original does have the subtly enhanced benefit of richer colours, sturdier paper stock and a slightly larger page size (285 x 219mm as opposed to 274 x 211mm) which somehow makes the 1984 edition feel more substantial. Of course, this would all be irrelevant if a digital edition were available.

This breathtaking take on the oft-retold yarn delivers fast paced, action-packed, staggeringly beautiful and astoundingly exciting thrills and chills in a most beguiling manner. Being Spanish, however, there’s perhaps the slightest hint of brooding machismo, if not subverted sexism, on display and – of course – plenty of heaving, gauze-filtered female nudity which might challenge modern sensibilities.

Nevertheless, what predominates in this Dracula is an overwhelming impression of unstoppable evil and impending doom. There’s no sympathy for the devil here – this is a monster from Hell all good men must oppose to their last breath and final drop of blood and sweat…

With an emphatic introduction (‘Dracula Lives!’) from comics historian Maurice Horn, this is a sublime treatment by a master craftsman all dark-fearing, red-blooded fans will want to track down and savour.
© 1984, 2005 Fernando Fernández. All rights reserved.

Today in 1894 letterer Ira Schnapp was born. I haven’t even listed most of his work on Now Read This!, but you’ve appreciated some of it every time you saw a golden age Superman logo.

Simultaneously culturally significant and insensitive, today in 1953 saw the first appearance of Leo Baxendale’s Little Plum in The Beano. You can weigh his pros and cons for yourself with Dandy and Beano Present The Comics at Christmas or any 20th century Beano Annual we’ve reviewed.

In 1957 Rumiko Takahashi was born. We covered Mermaid Forest so long ago it’s probably time for a revisit, and we should probably do Ranma ½ while we’re at it…

In 1959 the last episode of Norman Pett’s Jane was published. It had begun in 1932, but once you’ve seen The Misadventures of Jane you’ll probably agree it was best to let her go.

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DC Finest Blue Beetle – Blue Beetle Challenges The Red Knight


By Joe Gill, Roy Thomas, Gary Friedrich, Benjamin Smith, Bill Fraccio, Tony Tallarico, Dick Giordano, Steve Ditko, Dan Reed & Bob McLeod, Albert Val, Bill Black & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-79950-248-7 (TPB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times

This absorbing yet inarguably eccentric DC Finest compilation offers some of the rarest material ever aquired by the company and probably owes its existence solely to the screen success of the ever-changing titular star. I honestly never expected to see such seminal material in a modern collection and I hope the dated nature of the material finds an appreciative audience and rewards DC for their boldness… 

Sadly as ever, it’s not yet available digitally, but we live in hope…

The Blue Beetle premiered in Mystery Men Comics #1, released by Fox Comics and cover-dated August 1939. The pulp-inspired star was created by Charles Nicholas and possibly initially scripted by Will Eisner. “Charles Nicholas” was a shared pseudonym used by Chuck Cuidera (Blackhawk), Jack Kirby (everything) and Charles Wojtkowski (Blonde Phantom, Young Allies, Nyoka, Iron Corporal) with the last one generally attributed with actually inventing our remarkably resilient Azure Adventurer.

A mystery man in every sense of the term, the Cobalt Crimecrusher was inexplicably popular from the start: translating his comics venues into merchandise, a radio show and even a newspaper comic strip. Constantly acquired and traded by numerous publishers, BB survived the extinction of most of them: blithely undergoing many revisions to his origins and powers. By the mid-1950s he had ended up at Charlton Comics, appearing sporadically in a few long-inventoried tales before seemingly fading away. However, that was only until the early 1960s superhero resurgence when Joe Gill, Bill Fraccio, Tony Tallarico and, latterly, neophyte scripter/devoted Golden Age acolyte Roy Thomas revised and revived the character. It led to a unique 10-issue run spanning June 1964 to March 1966 (technically, two separate 5-issue runs), but you’ll see that it wasn’t quite that simple…

Pulling together many disparate strands from previous incarnations, former cop and valiant troubleshooter Dan Garrett was reshaped into an archaeologist gifted with a mysterious, magical ancient Egyptian scarab. This trinket would transform him into a lightning-throwing, super-sensed flying superman whenever he touched the scarab and uttered trigger phrase “Khaji Dha!”

After another brief sojourn in comic book limbo, Garrett resurfaced when Steve Ditko took on the concept, tweaking it to construct a fresh retooled hero for the gadget-conscious, superhero-savvy society perfect to continually confront a crimeridden culture.

Ditko accepted and acknowledged but sagely set aside all that prior history to utterly recreate a hero he could understand. Ted Kord is an earnest and proudly decent young scientist with a secret tragedy in his past, which Ditko and scripter Gary Friedrich sagely forbore revealing in deference to intrigue and action. The result was a taut, captivating noir thriller that opened the neopgyte’s azure casebook – which we’ll get to in the fullness of time…

Here, though, we open with the venerable veteran bursting back onto newstands courtesy of Gill, Fraccio, & Tallarico.

Cover-dated June 1964 the revival began in Blue Beetle (vol. 1, #1) with the disinterrment of ‘The Giant Mummy Who Was Not Dead’ as prominent visitor Dr. Dan Garrett and comely local egyptologist Professor Luri Hoshid fall foul of a rapidly changing political crisis whilst excavating an ancient site. The tomb of Kha-Ef-Re holds untold discoveries but resident strongman-with-despotic-aspirations – and a private nuclear arsenal – General Amenhotep may well end their dig out of sheer spite. Threatened but perservering, the duo unearth vile Kha-Ef-Re’s remains and a fantastic blue scarab that seemingly acts as a means of imprisoning his mummy.

On touching the gem, Garrett experiences an astounding vision as another ancient Egyptian – “The Great Pharoah” – reveals the scarab is a portal to fantastic power to be used in the service of good…

Transformed, Garrett immediately gets a chance to test it as a nuclear strike by Amenhotep’s forces awakens the mummy which grows to fantastic size and rampages across the nation. Thankfully the powers and abilities of The Blue Beetle are sufficient to defeat and re-entomb the monster and deal with the military maniac who thought to exploit him…

Relentlessly formulaic but somehow ly kitsch and bizarrely appealing, the stage was set for a succession of the same as BB #2’s ‘Hot War in the Arctic’ finds Garrett and sexy accomplice du jour Captain Elaine Norr (USAF) investigating peril in the far north. Here they clash with Red Chinese forces building secret airbases as well as cavemen, lost Goths, extinct big beasts and even dinosaurs from the sanctuary of a lost land… until more hastily applied atomics trigger a disaster…

Alien invasion was the theme of the third adventure as supersonic transport and possibly even the space program were threatened by a man who talked to lightning. ‘Mr. Thunderbolt and the Superstar’ led to a sustained war of nerves and powers narrowly won for humanity before a traditional supervillain arrived in the bright green form of ‘The Praying Mantis-Man’. Aided by Mexican entymologist firecracker Juanita Rivera, Garrett and his alter ego barely survive the efforts of self-mutating chlorophyl addict Hunter Mann to replace humanity with giant bugs. The macabre yarn is supplemented by a pinup of the Cobalt Crusader by Pat Masulli, before #5 finds Gill, Fracchio & Tallarico disclosing how and why ‘Blue Beetle Challenges the Red Knight’

This eerie yarn sees Garrett come to the aid of his friend Lewis Coll after the astrophysicist returns from a space mission strangely altered. Now obsessive and cruel, Coll shuns his fiancee Regina White and transforms himself into a invulnerable crimson armoured tyrant seeking to destroy all aircraft. So tough is his opposition that Blue Beetle must seek aid from the The Great Pharoah himself to end the threat…

The series went on a brief hiatus and returned with a new numbering system as, cover-dated July 1965, Blue Beetle #50 pitted the hero against ‘The Scorpion’ as villainous Mister Crabb sought to control the oil industry with thugs and giant robots, whilst in # 51 deranged incel Dr. Jeremiah Clugg sought to offset his self-perceived physical flaws and failings with women by placing his personality and mentality inside a super-srobot dubbed ‘Mentor the Magnificent’. Unable to reason, the Beetle had to quell his increasing instability with force…

Gill & Tallarico handled #52 as ‘Magno, the Man Who Shakes the World’ finds disgraced anthropologist Louis Forte targeting Garrett for revenge that escalates into shattering the entire planet as tectonic terrorist Magno-Man, after which Praying Mantis-Man returns to bedevil humanity in ‘The People Theives’, with the mantid maniac snatching humans as lab fodder until the Azure Avenger steps in and stomps him…

The last hurrah of the old guard saw aspiring junior Roy Thomas script for Fracchio & Tallarico a deft return to Egypt in final foray (Blue Beetle #54 February/March 1966) as Garrett and Luri Hoshid reunite after her latest find is co-opted by a rival who knows its true power. Sadly even Professor Philipps is unaware of the full force and malign sentience of ‘The Eye of Horus’ Soon the ancient device is enslaving and transforming humans in its quest for dominance, but the Great Pharoah has a plan to aid his new agent defeat it. All the hero has to do is visit the gods in the Land of the Dead and return with a certain weapon…

Despite it being the height of superhero madness in popular culture, Blue Beetle folded then and was left fallow until the end of the year. As stated above, he returned much changed in the back of Captain Atom (#83 November 1966) with Charlton Comics’ biggest gun in the process of his own refit and renewal again courtesy of Ditko.

The remodelling of the Atomic Ace left room for expansion and experimentation so Ditko plunged right in, introducing an acrobatic, technologically armed swashbuckler taking care of business without any extraneous exposition or explanation… and using one of the oldest names in the business.

Here ‘The New Blue Beetle’ displays his modus operandi by stopping a vicious crime-spree by the Killer Koke Gang. The untitled yarn has all classic elements of a Ditko masterpiece: outlandish, intense fight scenes, compact, claustrophobic yet dynamic layouts, innovative gimmickry and a clear-cut battle between Right and Wrong. It’s one of the very best introductory stories of a new hero anywhere in comics – and it’s only 7 pages long…

With a definite feeling of no safety or status quo, next instalment ‘Wanted for Murder’ – scripted by Mike Friedrich with full art from Ditko – pits the new kid against a mysterious Masked Marauder who has invaded ghis own home. However, the real kicker is a bombshell revelation that Homicide Detective Fisher, investigating the disappearance of Garrett, suspects a possible connection to Kord…

Next in the imaginatively entitled ‘Blue Beetle Fights a Submarine’ the vigour and vitality of the hero is again undeniable as a mid-air hijack is foiled before a spy sub and giant killer octopus are given short shrift by the indomitable rookie crusader. Then CA #86 sees the return of ‘The Masked Marauder’ as the cobalt crimebuster confronts a ruthless scientist/industrial spy he’s convinced he has battled before…

This is all preamble to the main event as – cover-dated June 1967 – Blue Beetle (volume 2) #1 launched.with lead tale ‘Blue Beetle Bugs the Squids’; an all-Ditko masterpiece (even scripting it as “D.C. Glanzman”) with the hero in astounding action against a deadly gang of bandits. ‘Blue Beetle… Bugs the Squids’ is crammed with the eccentric vitality that made Amazing Spider-Man such a monster hit, with justice-dispensing joie de vivre balanced by the moody, claustrophobic introduction of Ditko’s most challenging mainstream superhero creation. Sadly, you’ll need a different book to meet this version of The Question…

Another all-Ditko affair, Blue Beetle #2 shows the master at his peak. ‘The End is a Beginning!’ at last reveals the origin of the hero as well as the fate of Dan Garrett, and even advances Kord’s relationship with his long-suffering ever-pining assistant Tracey. #3 is another superbly satisfying read, as the troubled warrior routs malevolent, picturesque thugs ‘The Madmen’ in a sharp parable about paranoia and misperception.

Blue Beetle #4 is visually the best of the bunch as Kord follows a somehow-returned Garrett to an Asian backwater in pursuit of lost treasure and a death cult. ‘The Men of the Mask’ is pure strip poetry and bombastic action, cunningly counterbalanced by final outing ‘Blue Beetle Faces the Destroyer of Heroes’ (Blue Beetle #5). It remains a decidedly quirky tale featuring a notional team-up of the azure avenger and The Question wherein a frustrated artist defaces heroic and uplifting paintings and statues. Ditko’s committed if reactionary views of youth culture, which so worried Stan Lee, are fully on view in this charged, absorbing tale…

The Ditko Beetle was sublime but short-lived: an early casualty when the Sixties Superhero boom reversed and horror again ruled the newsstands, Charlton’s “Action Hero” experiment was gone by the close of 1968, preceding a long line of costumed champions into limbo and clearing the decks for a horror renaissance.

Time passed and reading tastes changed again. After the cosmos-consuming Crisis on Infinite Earths re-sculpted DC’s universes in 1986, a host of stars and even second stringers got floor-up rebuilds to fit them for a tougher, uncompromising, straight-shooting, no-nonsense New American readership of the Reagan era. In the intervening years, DC had pursued an old policy: gobbling up the characters and properties of defunct publishers. A handful of Charlton buy-outs had already appeared in Crisis, and now Captain Atom, The Question and two separate Blue Beetles seamlessly slotted into the new DCU, ahead of the rest of the lost contingent…

Before that moment though, there was a final flurry of the old guard.

This collection ends with the rare one-off Charlton Bullseye #1 (June 1981), released as Charlton was finally winding down its business. Written by Bejamin Smith and illustrated by Dan Reed, Albert Val & Bill Black ‘The Enigma’ sees Blue Beetle and The Question officially meet for the first time as someone they just don’t know targets them both for vengeance and assassination. He doesn’t succeed this time but does get away and threaten to return…

With covers by Fraccio, Frank McLaughlin, Vince Colletta, Masulli, Dick Giordano, Tallarico, Ditko, Rocke Mastroserio, Reed & Bob McLeod this a book that is both sublime and ridiculous, but one any lover of Fights ‘n’ Tights fiction just must have.
© 1964, 1965, 1966, 1967, 1968, 1969, 1981, 2025 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

Today in 1913 utterly unique UK cartoonist and raconteur Bill Tidy was born. We last bowed before T’ Mastuh with our coverage of The Fosdyke Saga volume 1. In 1949 Jim Starlin entered this world, and you can check out the bajillions he’s created since by using our search box. Ditto for Matt Wagner, who is so much more than just Grendel, Mage, Batman and Sandman Mystery Theatre. He joined us right about…. NOW! back in 1961.

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Secret of San Saba: A Tale of Phantoms and Greed in the Spanish Southwest


By Jack Jackson (Kitchen Sink Press)
ISBN: 978-0-87816-080-8 (HB) 978-0-87816-081-5 (Album TPB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times. This book also includes Discriminatory Content included for dramatic effect.

I’m reading most of my graphic novels digitally these days, and it’s clear how much superb classic material – especially genre works with war and western themes – still isn’t much of a priority to content providers yet.

You try tracking down Sam Glanzman’s The Haunted Tank or Joe Kubert Sgt. Rock compilations, or even a relatively well-exposed screen property like Jonah Hex (other than the admittedly superb Justin Grey/Jimmy Palmiotti books of recent vintage) and see what joy you get…

One of the most cruelly digitally excluded omissions is this stunningly impressive western horror mash-up from the inimitable Jack Jackson, still tragically only available in the original oversized (277 x 201 mm) monochrome softcover and hardback album editions, as originally published by Kitchen Sink as part of their Death Rattle Series.

Known as ‘Jaxon’ since his Underground Commix heyday, Jackson’s infectious fascination with the history of Texas is a signature of much of his work even from the earliest days. Here he expertly combines a love of historical documentary with the fabulous Lovecraftian horrors of the cosmic void, resulting in a breathtaking and wonderful period supernatural thriller, skillfully woven into the fabric and lore of the Southwest desert lands…

When a silvery entity crashes to Earth in a blazing fireball, it galvanises the fading dreams of Xotl, a young Faraone warrior who has lost faith in his gods.

As years pass, native worship of the fearsomely fulgent power exhibited by the star-fallen thing grows, and when the mighty Apaches conquer the Faraone, the twice-defeated tribe turn to the newly arrived Europeans for help. This is a tragic, fatal mistake, albeit revealed too late… after the tribe finds that Priests and Colonists might speak of God but only truly worship wealth…

Crucially, when the newcomers learn of the Cosmic Slug that fell from the stars, all they can see is the overwhelming wealth its silver mantle represents…

The decades-long battle between Apaches and Missionaries to control the slimy silver wellspring makes for a powerful – if cynical – tale; one full of the intoxicating artistry, spellbinding storytelling, and the mesmerising aura of authenticity that is Jackson’s most telling narrative tool. It’s all based on the ancient Texas stories and legends of ‘Blanco’ and ‘Negro Bultos’ (supernatural treasure mounds): a most fantastic story which should be, has to be true, if only because Jackson has drawn it. Moreover, it has inexplicably dropped out of print and has never been picked up for a movie. That alone is something really strange and sinister…

Superbly compelling, this is a must-read item for any serious fan of both comics and horror fiction, so let’s have it back and out in every format possible, pretty please?
© 1989 Jack Jackson. All rights reserved.

Today in 1897 Enid Blyton’s Noddy illustrator was born. Sadly we’ve got nothing on Dutch master Harmsen van der Beek so you’ll need to buy one of the books if you can. We can however recommend a bunch of stuff by Harvey Pekar, who was born today in 1939: gems like American Splendor: The Life and Times of Harvey Pekar. Contemporary graphic novelist James Sturm was born today in 1965; he authored The Golem’s Mighty Swing and other stuff like The Revival, Fantastic Four: Unstable Molecules and Hundreds of Feet Below Daylight which I’ll get around to one day.

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Showcase Presents Dial H for Hero


By Dave Wood, Jim Mooney, George Roussos, Frank Springer, Sal Trapani, Jack Sparling & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-2648-0 (TPB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

In the mid-Sixties the entire world went crazy for costumed crusaders and every comic book publisher (and some who weren’t) frantically sought new ways to repackage an extremely exciting yet intrinsically limited concept. Perhaps its ultimate expression – for Americans at least as UK comics were always skewing the curves – came with the creation of a teen-aged everyman champion who battled crime and disaster in his little town with the aid of a fantastic wonder-tool…

This slim monochrome paperback compendium collects the entire eclectic run from House of Mystery (#156, January 1966 to #173, March-April 1968), after which the title vanished for a few months, only to re-emerge as DC’s first new anthological supernatural mystery title and next big publishing sensation…

Created by Dave Wood & Jim Mooney, Dial H For Hero detailed the incredible adventures of lonely boy genius Robby Reed who lived with his grandfather in idyllic Littleville: a genial small town where nothing ever happened…

Born in Arlington, Massachusetts on September 5th 1926, Dave Silva worked prodigiously in comics as Dave Wood, as did his brothers Bob Wood and Dick Wood. Their father was a doctor who blotted his copybook so badly that the family had their surname legally changed sometime after 1932.

Dave’s brothers got into making comics early – founding a studio shop with Charles (Airboy, Crime Does Not Pay, The Little Wise Guys) Biro – and Dave joined them before his war service as an army reporter in 1944. He returned and blossomed into a go-to writer in many genres. His prolific output really began in the post-superhero days of AUS comic books and includes such seminal classics – often with artistic legends Jack Kirby and Wally (no-relation) Wood) – as Challengers of the Unknown and seminal Space Race newspaper strip Sky Masters. A skilled jobbing writer, Wood frequently and closely collaborated with brother Dick. They bounced around the industry, scripting mystery, war, science fiction and he-man adventure yarns. Amongst his/their vast credits are stints on Danger Trail, Our Army at War, most Superman family titles, Batman, Detective Comics, World’s Finest Comics, Green Arrow, Rex the Wonder Dog, Tomahawk, Blackhawk, Martian Manhunter and so many more. As well as Dial H For Hero Dave Wood created bizarre sleeper hit Animal Man and the esoteric but fondly regarded Ultra, the Multi-Alien. He was Bob Kane’s ghost writer and co-created eccentric villains Mister Zero/Mr Freeze, Doctor Double X and the Terrible Trio/The Fox, the Shark and the Vulture. He died far, far too young on July 7th 1974

The majority of the illustration was left to capable, unflappable, slick James Noel Mooney. He started his comics career in 1940, aged 21, working for the Eisner & Eiger production shop, and at Fiction House on The Moth, Camilla, Suicide Smith and other B-features. By the end of that year he was a mainstay of Timely Comic’s vast funny animal/animated cartoon tie-in department.

In 1946, he migrated to National/DC to ghost Batman for Bob Kane & Dick Sprang. He stayed until 1968, a regular on a host of key features including Superman, Superboy, Legion of Super-Heroes, World’s Finest Comics and Tommy Tomorrow, as well as many genre short stories for the company’s assorted anthology titles like Tales of the Unexpected and House of Mystery. He famously drew Supergirl from her series debut in Action Comics #253 to #373. He returned to Marvel in the late 1960s, delivering stellar runs on Spider-Man, Marvel Team-up, Omega the Unknown, Man-Thing, Ghost Rider and a host of other features including early adults-only feature Pussycat as both penciller and inker. Prior to that move he was illustrating Dial H For Hero; the only original DC feature he co-created.

Big things were clearly expected of the new feature, which was parachuted in as lead and cover feature, demoting the venerable Martian Manhunter J’onn J’onzz to a back-up role at the rear of each issue. Cover dated January 1966 (and on sale from November 18th 1965) House of Mystery #156 kicked off the strange adventures with an untitled tale that opens in an attack on the local chemical works by super-scientific criminal organisation Thunderbolt. This occurs just as young Robby and his pals are playing in the hills above the site. As they flee, the plucky kid is caught in a landslide and falls into an ancient cave where lies hidden an obviously alien artefact… that looks like an outlandish rotary telephone dial. If these words mean nothing to you, feel free to investigate on-line…

After finding his way out of the cavern Robby becomes obsessed with the device and spends all his time attempting to translate the arcane hieroglyphs on it. Eventually he determines that they are instructions to dial the dial symbols which roughly translate to “H”, “E”, “R” and “O”…

Ever curious, Robby complies and is suddenly transformed into a colossal super-powered Giantboy, just in time to save a crashing airliner and quash another Thunderbolt raid. On returning home, he simply reverses the dialling process and goes to bed…

These were and still are perfect wish-fulfilment stories: uncluttered, uncomplicated yarns concealing no grand messages or themes: just straight entertainment expertly undertaken by experienced and gifted craftsmen who knew how to reach their young-at-heart audiences. After all, what right minded child wouldn’t rush out and DO GOOD if they got superpowers?

Thus, no-one is surprised at the ease with which Robby adapts to his new situation. When Thunderbolt strikes again next morning Robby grabs his dial but is startled to become a different hero – high-energy being The Cometeer. Streaking to the rescue Robby is overcome by the raider’s super weapon and forced dial back into being a boy again. Undeterred, he later tries again and as The Mole finally tracks the villains to their base and crushes them. The leader escapes, however, to become the series’ only returning villain…

Mr. Thunder was back in the next issue as Robby became The Human, Bullet, bestial energy-being Super-Charge and eerie alien Radar-Sonar Man to combat ‘The Marauders from Thunderbolt Island’ after which criminal scientist Daffy Dagan steals the H-Dial after defeating the boy’s next temporary alter ego Quake-Master. Dagan becomes a horrifying multi-powered monster when he learns to ‘Dial… V… For Villain’ but after the defeated hero takes back the artefact, Robby redials into techno-warrior The Squid and belatedly saves the day. Clearly the Mystery in House of… was related to where the Dial came from, what its unknown parameters were and especially who or what Robby would transform into next…

HoM #159 pitted The Human Starfish, Hypno-Man and super-powered toddler Mighty Moppet (wielding weaponised baby bottles) in single combats with a shape-shifting bandit gang dubbed ‘The Clay-Creep Clan’ whilst ‘The Wizard of Light’ played with the format by introducing a potential love-interest for Robby in his best friend’s cousin Suzy. It also saw the return of Giant-Boy, introduction of sugar-based sentinel of justice King Candy and the lad’s only transformation into an already established hero – Golden Age legend Plastic Man.

Cynical me suspects the move was a tester to see if the Pliable Paladin – who had been an inert resource since the company had bought out original publisher Quality Comics in 1956 – was ripe for a relaunch in the new, superhero-hungry environment.

DC’s Plastic Man #1 was released five months later…

House of Mystery #161 featured awesome ancient Egyptian menace ‘The Mummy with Six Heads’ who proved too much for Robby as Magneto (same powers but so very not a certain Marvel villain) and Hornet-Man, but not intangible avenger Shadow-Man who eventually triumphed, whilst in the next issue ‘The Monster-Maker of Littleville’ is proved by Mr. Echo and Future-Man to be less mad scientist than greedy entrepreneur. Then, ‘Baron Bug and his Insect Army’ almost ends Robby’s clandestine career when the boy turns into two heroes at once. However, even though celestial twins Castor and Pollux are overmatched, animated slinky-toy King Coil proves sufficient to stamp out the Baron’s giant mini-beasts. Human wave Zip Tide, living star Super Nova and Robby the Super-Robot are then increasingly hard-pressed to stop the rampages of ‘Dr. Cyclops – the Villain with the Doomsday Stare’, but eventually overcome the outrageous odds – and oddness…

Things got decidedly peculiar in #165 when a clearly malfunctioning H-Dial called up ‘The Freak Super-Heroes’ – Whoozis, Whatsis and Howzis – to battle Dr. Rigoro Mortis and his artificial thug Super-Hood in a bizarrely captivating romp with what looks like some unacknowledged inking assistance from veteran brush-meister George Roussos (who popped in a couple more times until Mooney’s departure).

Suzy became a fixture and moved into the house next door with ‘The King of the Curses!’ He found his schemes to plunder the city thwarted by The Yankee-Doodle Kid and Chief Mighty Arrow, a war-bonneted “Indian brave” on a winged horse, before in HoM #167, ‘The Fantastic Rainbow Raider’ easily defeated Balloon Boy and Muscle Man but had no defence against returning Radar-Sonar Man. Next ‘The Marauding Moon Man’ easily overmatched Robby as The Hoopster, but had no defence when another glitch turned old incarnations The Mole and Cometeer into a single heroic composite imaginatively christened Mole-Cometeer. The biggest shock of all came when ‘The Terrible Toymaster’ defeats Robby – AKA Velocity Kid – and Suzy cajoles the fallen hero into dialling her into the scintillating Gem Girl to finish the mission.

Of course, as it was the 1960s, plucky Suzy didn’t quite manage on her own, but after Robby transforms into psionically potent Astro, Man of Space they soon closed the case – and toybox – for good. This one was all Mooney and so was the next, which turned out to be the artist’s last hurrah with the Kid of a Thousand Capes. ‘Thunderbolt’s Secret Weapon’ saw the crooks cartel seek to steal a supercomputer, only to be stopped dead by Baron Buzz-Saw, Don Juan (and his magic sword!) and the imposing Sphinx-Man. With House of Mystery #171 a radical new look emerged, as well as a darker tone. The writing was clearly on the wall for exuberant, angst-free adventurers…

‘The Micro-Monsters!’ was illustrated by Frank Springer and saw Robby dial up King Viking – Super Norseman, Go-Go (a fab hipster who utilised the incredible powers of popular disco dances… and how long have I waited to type that line?) and multi-powered Whirl-I-Gig to defeat bio-terrorist Doc Morhar and his belligerent invaders from a sub-atomic dimension. Springer also drew ‘The Monsters from the H-Dial’, wherein the again on-the-fritz gear simultaneously turns Reed’s friend Jim into assorted ravening horrors every time Robby dials up. Luckily the unnamed animated Pendulum, Chief Mighty Arrow and the Human Solar Mirror our hero successively turns into prove just enough to stop the beasts until the canny boy can apply his trusty screwdriver to the incredible artefact once again.

In those distant days series ended abruptly, without fanfare and often in the middle of something… and such was the fate of Robby Reed. HoM #173, by Wood & Sal Trapani, saw the lad solve a mystery in ‘The Revolt of the H-Dial’, wherein the process reshapes him into water-breathing Gill-Man and a literal Icicle Man: beings not only unsuitable for life on Earth but also compelled to commit crimes. Happily by the time Robby dials into Strata Man he’s deduced what outside force is affecting his dangerously double-edged device…

And that was that. The series was gone, the market was again abandoning Fights ‘n’ Tights fantasy and on the immediate horizon lay a host of war, western, barbarian and horror comics…

Exciting, fun, inspirational, imaginatively engaging and silly in equal amounts (heck, even I couldn’t resist a jibe or too and I genuinely revere these daft, nostalgia-soaked gems), Dial H For Hero has been re-imagined many times since these innocent odysseys first ran, but never with the clear-cut, unsophisticated, welcoming charm displayed here.

This was Ben-10 (remember him?) for your granddad’s generation and perhaps your kid’s delectation: and only if they’re at just that certain age. Certainly you’re too grown up to enjoy these glorious classics. Surely you couldn’t be that lucky; could you?
© 1966, 1967, 1968, 2010 DC Comics. All rights reserved.

Today in 1950 comics iconoclast and creative pioneer Howard Chaykin was born. You should track down American Flagg! and his interpretation of The Shadow but don’t miss Ironwolf: Fires of the Revolution. One year later international comics legend Enki Bilal did likewise, before going on to create masterpieces such as Century’s End: The Black Order Brigade & The Hunting Party.

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Fantastic Four Marvel Masterworks volume


By Doug Moench & Bill Sienkiewicz, John Byrne, Roger Stern, Joe Sinnott, Al Milgrom, George Pérez, Tom Sutton, Jerome Moore, Chic Stone, Jon D’Agostino, Mike Esposito, Pablo Marcos, Frank Giacoia, George Roussos, Jim Novak, Irving Watanabe & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-1027-3 (TPB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

For Marvel everything started with The Fantastic Four.

Monolithic modern Marvel truly began with eccentric monster ‘n’ alien filled adventures of a compact superteam as much squabbling family as coolly capable costumed champions. All that Modern Marvel is, company and brand, stems from that quirky quartet and the inspired, inspirational, groundbreaking efforts of Stan Lee & Jack Kirby…

Cautiously bi-monthly and cover-dated November 1961, Fantastic Four #1 – by Stan, Jack, George Klein and/or Christopher Rule – was raw and crude even by the ailing publisher’s standards; but it seethed with rough, passionate, uncontrolled excitement. Thrill-hungry kids pounced on its dynamic storytelling and caught a wave of change beginning to build in America. It and every succeeding issue changed comics a little bit more… and forever. As revealed in that premier issue, maverick scientist Reed Richards, fiancée Sue Storm, close friend Ben Grimm and Sue’s bratty teen brother survived an ill-starred private spaceshot after cosmic rays penetrated their ship’s inadequate shielding.

All were permanently mutated: Richards’ body became elastic, diffident Sue became (even more) invisible, Johnny Storm burst into living flame and tragic Ben shockingly devolved into a shambling, rocky freak. After the initial revulsion and trauma passed, they solemnly agreed to use their abilities to benefit mankind. Throughout the 1960s The Fantastic Four was indisputably the key title and most consistently groundbreaking series of Marvel’s ever-unfolding web of cosmic creation: a forge for new concepts and characters.

Kirby was approaching his creative peak: unleashing his vast imagination on plot after spectacular plot, and intense, incredible new characters whilst Lee scripted some of the most passionate superhero sagas ever seen. Both were on an unstoppable roll, at the height of their powers and full of the confidence only success brings, with The King particularly eager to see how far the genre and the medium could be pushed… which is rather ironic since it was the company’s reticence to give the artist more creative freedom that led to Kirby’s moving to National/DC in the 1970s.

Without Kirby’s soaring imagination the rollercoaster of mindbending High Concepts lost out to traditional tales of characters in conflict, with soap opera leanings and supervillain-heavy Fights ‘n’ Tights forays abounding. With Lee & Kirby long gone but their mark very much still stamped onto every page of the still-prestigious title, this full-colour luxury compendium collects Fantastic Four #219-231 and Annual #15, spanning June 1980-June 1981, wherein editor Jim Salicrup sanctioned a bold new look and direction for the Hallowed team. The call for and upshot of all that is discussed by incoming writer Doug Moench who recalls fan-fright paralysis and jumping in full throttle in his Introduction ‘The Big-Kid Stuff Cold Turkey Fail’ prior to a distinctly spookily toned and frequently supernaturally themed change of pace commencing.

What You Should Know: After being rejuvenated and repowered in an extended space-spanning saga, the Family FF are getting used to being back on earth even with supervillains all over the place. Now Read On…

Penciller John Byrne, having served out his first term of duty on the series he was to soon make his alone was officially and ostensibly only temporarily replaced for FF #219. Ably augmented by Joe Sinnott, stalwart “Guest-Team” Doug Moench & Bill Sienkiewicz were parachuted in for monster mash-up ‘Leviathans’, on the back of huge success and acclaim for their vigilante thriller Moon Knight, bringing with them a whole new look and sensibility, as well as far faster pace to the stories.

Here, modern day pirate Cap’n Barracuda steal the fabled Horn of Proteus from Atlantis and unleashes a wave of giant monsters on New York City. Thankfully, this is a subject the mighty Sub-Mariner and Mr. Fantastic can agree on and their combined forces are soon stomping beasties and taking names (like Giganto!) to restore order and stop a piratical plunder ploy without peer…

Byrne was back writing & pencilling in #220 as ‘…And the Lights Went Out All Over the World!’ sees the Avengers call in Reed and his team when all of Earth suffers a catastrophic power-outage. Science! soon sends the explorers to the arctic where they encounter an astounding and unbelievable obelisk being constructed by beings of utterly alien appearance…

The story includes an updated origin for the quartet and guest shot for Canada’s finest (that’s Vindicator of Alpha Flight in case you were wondering) and the issue halts with a pinup/possible rejected cover by inker Sinnott (the Torch battling a flaming Skrull) before #221’s concluding chapter ‘Tower of Glass… Dreams of Glass!’ – after the usual misconceptions and rash clashes reveal three aliens shipwrecked for half a million years who just need their myriad mobile mechanisms to reverse the planet’s magnetic poles so that they can return home at last. Thankfully, Reed has a less end of human civilisation-y solution that leaves everyone involved happy and safe…

Now officially the latest regular creative team, Moench & Sienkiewicz return to prep for Halloween in FF #222’s ‘The Possession of Franklin Richards!’ as the kid is targeted from beyond the unknown by the exiled soul of Nicholas Scratch, son of Agatha Harkness and the kind of warlock who gives witchcraft a bad name. Having made the boy his conduit back to reality, Scratch terrorises and tortures his hated enemies, who with Doctor Strange unavailable, must call on the dubious gifts of self-doubting failed horror hero Gabriel the Devil Hunter and his sexy morally ambiguous familiar Desadia (as mostly seen in the Marvel monochrome magazine line such as Haunt of Horror and Monsters Unleashed).

Apparently acquiescing, the team agree to liberate the dead diabolist’s minions of magical cult Salem’s Seven in ‘That a Child May Live…’ but their instant assaults on humanity are an acceptable risk and consequence in a long plan that sets the worlds to rights for all but the defeated devil…

Fantastic Four Annual #15 swiftly follows, wherein Moench & George Pérez, abetted by Chic Stone, Jon D’Agostino & Mike Esposito, renew hostilities between the FF and the Skrull empire when the shapeshifters target Reed’s latest energy-casting breakthrough in ‘Time for the Prime Ten!’ Infiltrating the Baxter Building, negating his teammates and almost banishing Mr. Fantastic to the tender mercies of Annihilus in the Negative Zone, the sneaky killers are actually seeking to end their millennial war against stellar rivals The Kree, but have underestimated Reed’s brilliance, his team’s tenacity and the sheer power and cosmic awareness of Earth-loving Kree Exile Captain Mar-Vell…

A back-up tale by Moench & Tom Sutton takes us to recently liberated Latveria for the opening of proposed series ‘The Return of Doctor Doom!’ with only episode ‘The Power of the People!’ showing how restored monarch King Zorba failing to live up to his democratic promise and discovering how excessive taxation really upsets subjects, at around the same moment crazed and catatonic Victor von Doom goes missing from the most secure dungeon in Doomstadt…

Sadly, the impending crisis never materialised and was only addressed by John Byrne in Fantastic Four #247…

Over in FF #224 & 225, fresh calamity unfolds in Moench, Sienkiewicz & Pablo Marcos’ ‘The Darkfield Illumination’ as an eerie radioactive red mist blankets Manhattan and plays hob with the team’s powers. Tracing the cloud’s origin point to an icy dome in the Arctic, the FF discover a lost colony of technologically advanced Vikings utterly dependent upon a mutated immortal giant. ‘The Blind God’s Tears’ supply heat, light, food materials from the outside world and immortality, but now Korgon is dying and demands the explorers save him and the people who worship him…

Always eager to help, the team strive hard and succeed in saving the God, only to see him betrayed by his most trusted ally. As Korgon rages madly in response, the situation escalates as Thor arrives to investigate Viking worshippers who have abandoned their true god for a false one…

Bruce Patterson joins Marcos inking Sienkiewicz as Moench takes the opportunity to bring closure to fans of his old Shogun Warriors series next. In their own title the former pilots of monster-fighting mega-mecha Dangard Ace, Raydeen and Combatra had been recruited by an ancient order to defend humanity, but had ultimately retired when their machines were destroyed. That epic sacrifice had come when evil enemy Maur-Kon had targeted the Fantastic Four and attempted to kill Reed.

Now a new giant mecha rampages and robs and the teams reunite with Ilongo Savage, Richard Carson and Genji Odashu aiding the battle against ‘The Samurai Destroyer’ and the unworthy soul exploiting its power for profit….

Movie-toned terror in the heartland follows as a meteor crashes in rural Pennsylvania resort Lost Lake just as the FF head out to the Boonies for a break. Their encounter with ‘The Brain Parasites’ infesting hosts and reverting them to earlier evolutionary forms is by-the-books horror fun from Moench, Sienkiewicz & Patterson, and readily fixed by little Franklin’s unreliable mental powers. This sets the scene for the next issue where further tests by professional head shrinkers and brain benders only unleash uncontrollable chaos, possessing bystanders and an adult super-powered version of the lad. Thankfully loving parents and uncles allow Franklin to exorcise his deadly ‘Ego-Spawn’ (Sinnott inks)…

The experiment in alternative tale-telling ends on a 3-part saga that opens with #229’s ‘The Thing From the Black Hole’. After it homes in on Reed’s latest invention, Earth soon totters on the edge of destruction as a living, sentient singularity made of antimatter disrupts physical laws. Desperate Richards makes contact with its cosmic equivalent and uncovers a tale of love lost in service to scientific exploration. The mobile extinction event was once a sentient being whose love for a fellow astronaut turned them both into creatures of uncanny forces. Thankfully ‘Firefrost and the Ebon Seeker’ reach an understanding that saves the world, but as a consequence a section of Manhattan – including the Baxter Building – is marooned inside the Negative Zone.

With panic amongst the hordes of abducted New Yorkers barely suppressed, the FF search for a solution ‘In All the Gathered Gloom!’ (by Moench & Roger Stern with art from Sienkienwisz, Jerome Moore, Sinnott, & Frank Giacoia) even as new antimatter menace Stygorr zeroes in on the intruding enclave. The last thing the FF need is bullying big business plutocrat Lew Shiner telling everyone his money puts him in charge. After his posturing triggers a riot, tragedy is guaranteed, and the heroes barely beat the alien invader in time to return everyone surviving back home…

With covers by Sienkienwicz, Byrne Sinnott & Bob McLeod, the extras here include a Sinnott Thing pinup from FF #219, Sienkievich’s rejected cover-turned-pinup as printed in #224 original art pages/covers inked by Marcos, Bruce Patterson, Sinnott, and original colour-guides painted by George Roussos.

Although never quite returning to the stratospheric heights of the Kirby era, this truly different collection represents a closing of the First Act for the “World’s Greatest Comics Magazine”, and palate cleansing preparation for the second groundbreaking run by an inspired John Byrne. These extremely capable efforts are probably most welcome to dedicated superhero fans and continuity freaks like me, but will still thrill and delight casual browsers looking for an undemanding slice of graphic narrative excitement – especially if this time the movie continues to deliver on its promise…
© 2018 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

To Be Continued…

Today in 1918 artist John Forte was born. He’s most fondly remembered for costumed charm, as best seen in Legion of Super-Heroes: The Silver Age volume 1 . We don’t have nearly enough collected material for UK visionary comics stalwart Ron Embleton who was born today in 1930. If you think you’re old enough, you could look at Oh, Wicked Wanda!.

Indomitable weekly anthology Valiant began its stellar 712 issue run today in 1962. Inside was the magnificent Steel Claw whom we comprehensively covered in The Steel Claw: Invisible Man. Yes. Well done, the modern invisible man could be seen from the start…

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Adam Eterno book 2: Grunn the Grim


By E. George Cowan, Chris Lowder, Tom Tully, Francisco Solano López, John Catchpole, Eric Bradbury, with Jack Le Grand, Geoff Kemp, Tom Kerr & various (Rebellion)
ISBN: 978-1-83786-470-6 (TPB/Digital edition) 978-1-83786-480-5 (Exclusive edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: History in the Unmaking… 9/10

British comics had a strange and extended love affair with what can only be described as “unconventional” (for which feel free to substitute “creepy”) heroes. So many of the stars and potential role models of our serials and strips were just plain “off”: self-righteous, moody voyeurs-turned vigilantes like Jason Hyde, sinister masterminds like The Dwarf, deranged geniuses like Eric Dolmann, so many reformed criminals like The Spider or just outright racist supermen like Captain Hurricane…

… And don’t get me started on our legion of lethally anarchic comedy icons or that our most successful symbol of justice is the Eagle-bedecked jack-booted poster boy for a fascist state. Perhaps that explains why these days we can’t even imagine or envision what a proper leader looks like and keep on electing clowns, crooks and oblivious privileged simpletons…

All joking aside, British comics are unlike any other kind and simply have to be seen to be believed and enjoyed. One of the most revered stars of the medium has finally begun to be collected in archival editions, and perfectly encapsulates our odd relationship with heroism, villainy and particularly the murky grey area bridging them…

Until the 1980s, comics in the UK were based on an anthological model, offering variety of genre, theme and character on a weekly – or sometimes fortnightly – basis. Humorous periodicals like The Beano were leavened by thrillers like Billy the Cat or General Jumbo and adventure papers like Lion or Valiant always included gag strips such as The Nutts, Grimly Feendish, Mowser and a wealth of similar quick laugh treats. Thunder and Jet were amongst the last of this fading model. Fleetway particularly was shifting to themed anthologies like Shoot, Action and Battle, whilst venerable veterans like Lion, Valiant and Buster hung on and stayed fresh by absorbing failing titles.

Thunder ran for 22 weeks before being absorbed by a stronger title to become Lion & Thunder. The merger/acquisition brought Black Max, The Steel Commando, The Spooks of Saint Luke’s and Adam Eterno to the new combined roster. With Steel Commando, time travelling tramp Adam would survive and thrive, as the periodical later merged into Valiant & Lion (June 1974) until the ultimate end in 1976. He also appeared in numerous Annuals and Specials thereafter.

Eterno was initially devised by Thunder assistant editor Chris Lowder – AKA “Jack Adrian” – and editor Jack Le Grand, with top flight artist Tom Kerr (Monty Carstairs, Rip Kerrigan, Kelly’s Eye, Charlie Peace, Captain Hurricane, Steel Claw, Kraken, Mary-Jo, Tara King/The Avengers, Billy’s Boots) initially designing and visualising the frankly spooky antihero. He also drew the scene-setting first episode. The feature was scripted by equally adept and astoundingly prolific old hand Tom Tully (Roy of the Rovers, Heros the Spartan, Janus Stark, The Wild Wonders, Dan Dare, Johnny Red, The Leopard from Lime Street), who only finally left it in 1976. Kerr, Donne Avenell, Scott Goddall &Ted Cowan would also write subsequent adventures. In fact, Tully might have scripted some of the material in this collection including the first instalment here: a handy recap/catchup limned by Francisco Solano López (and his family studio) that swiftly shifts to a gripping tale of “Conquistadore” atrocity…

Thanks to spotty record keeping, like so much in life and comics, it’s all a big mystery…

Gathering episodes from weekly Lion & Thunder spanning March 20th through August 28th 1971, plus pertinent material from Lion & Thunder Holiday Special 1971 & 1972, the chronal calamities and dark doings resume following Chris Lowder’s informative flashback essay ‘A Writer’s Trip Through Time’.

What you need to know: Delivered in stark, moody monochrome, the saga tales of tragic immortal chronal castaway Adam Eterno began life in the 16th century. He was an ambitious apprentice and less than sterling moral character, indentured to alchemist Erasmus Hemlock. When Adam’s master perfected an immortality serum, the headstrong, impatient acolyte sampled the potion against the sage’s express command. This precipitated the ancient’s death and a fiery conflagration that gutted the house. Hemlock’s last act was to curse his faithless student to live forever and “wander the world through the labyrinths of time”. Surcease would come from a mortal blow struck by a weapon of gold…

The curse was truly effective and as centuries passed, Adam became a recluse: his never-changing appearance driving him away from superstitious mortals and perpetually denying him simple contact with humanity. He fought in all of Britain’s wars, but hard-earned combat comradeships always ended whenever a seemingly fatal blow or wound left him unharmed…

Everything changed and the second part of the alchemist’s curse came true in 1970 when the traumatised, barely sane 421-year-old tramp staggered into a bullion robbery. He was shot by the thieves who rapidly realised that their victim was invulnerable, and attempted to use him in a raid on the Bank of England. When that went sideways too, Adam was struck by a fully-gold-plated limousine of a speeding millionaire…

The impact would be fatal for any other being, but for Adam Eterno it was the beginning of redemption as the shock hurled him into the timestream to land over and again in different eras…

The drama continues in that opening recap as Adam drops out of the timestream and is immediately cut down and hurled into quicksand by rapacious Spaniard Don Morto and his pitiless mercenarios, seeking the Incas fabled City of Gold. Dragging himself out of the mire, soon Adam is sought out by an Inca shaman and undergoes outrageous trials (many involving bonds and weapons of gold!) to become their champion in defeating the merciless invaders and liberating hostage king Tazuma Capa…

The resistance is long and bloody but ultimately triumphal after Eterno introduces and mass-produces a weapon from the future that turns the tables on the armour, powder and shot of the invaders…

The bittersweet victory – after all, the traveller already knows more invaders will follow and ultimately succeed – sees Adam returned to chronal limbo only to rematerialise for the first time in the far future: a totalitarian dictatorship policed by brutes and thugs in armour of gold led by a monstrous tyrant: Grunn the Grim. The extended war to liberate tomorrow ends successfully but with the wanderer again returned to falling through eras, with the first hints that the penitent troubleshooter is not randomly drawn to rising manifestations of evil and crossroad moments of menace…

The latest stopover is Dark Ages Eastern Europe where a struggle for the throne sees an evil yet trusted relative seeking to usurp Duke Ctharmis of Carathia, after abducting the prince and true heir. Now as a local wild-child terrorises the populace, and packs of (were?)wolves congregate everywhere, a tatty stranger arrives and starts making trouble. Nobody knows Adam has been recruited by local wizard Mageis to set destiny aright and end the schemes of wicked Baron Draxa, before being deposited in far more familiar territory: England during the Civil War…

Obsessive anti-royalist Captain Raker ravages the locality searching for Lord Benham and the funds he holds in the King’s name. His brutal acts draw the immortal man into the pointless conflict, despite persistent, prophetic visions of doom hampering the antihero… until a final face-to-face duel ends matters and catapults Adam into the New World and a new kind of wickedness. In 1920s New York City, money not power motivates mobster Rikki Delgano, but his tactics are just as cruel and just as ineffectual against an enemy who will not die…

The crook’s hash soon settled, Eterno next appears in the skies over London amidst a storm of ack-ack fire and Luftwaffe planes. Furious and fighting mad, the traveller captures a Nazi bomber and follows the raiders back to their base, delivering a deadly dose of “how do you like it?” before ghosting on to land in the wild west and exonerate unjustly accused drifter the Durango Kid when both are charged with stagecoach robbery. Dodging gunplay and lynchings, Apache tortures and worse, Adam deftly exposes the real bandit before moving on to save all of humanity…

Lost in the early years of the stone age over 35,000 years before his own birth, Eterno roams amidst mammoths, neanderthals and dawn men, but must battle beast men armed with ray guns to foil a plan by alien colonisers. They seek to eradicate emerging humankind and take the world for their own, but Adam is greatly aided by prescient sage Kathon-the-Wise, who seems to see all his past and future secrets… and bears a remarkable resemblance to so many other wizards and mages the nomad of the ages has met…

After a cataclysmic pitched battle, humanity is saved and the spacers defeated, but there’s no rest for the (gradually redeeming) wicked and Eterno lands in shark-filled waters just in time to become the latest target of pirate lord Blackbeard. On foiling that felon, the winds of time waft him to a Viking raid in Anglo-Saxon England where pitiless reiver Geflin One-Eye seems set on taking the kingdom, unless some brave soul can retrieve the fabled Gold Sword of Wulfric from the abbey where it lies and lead the counterattack. Obviously, Adam is not keen on getting that close to his metal nemesis but if the situation demands it…

Bombastic, blood-soaked, inspirational and creepier than you’d imagine possible or permissible in a kids’ comic. the exploits of Adam Eterno are dark delights impossible to put down, so it’s fortunate that there are two more longer complete yarns still to come here.

Taken from Lion & Thunder Holiday Special 1971, the first sadly uncredited yarn (as regards the writer at least) was illuminated by veteran comics illustrator John Catchpole. He was the first to draw Kelly’s Eye – in 1962 for Knock-Out – and limned The Shadow of the Snake & sequel serial Master of Menace between 1972-1974 in Lion where he was part of a rotating team crafting Adam Eterno. As well as Annuals material like Black Bedlam (1975) he inked Jack (Charlie Peace) Pamby on The Potters from Poole Street in Valiant (1976) and was also a book illustrator.

Here all that skill and aplomb is used to detail a moody Victorian mystery as the immortal nomad helps the last of the Calcott line locate a lost family fortune and avoid murder by a monster…

Wrapping up proceedings on a true high (and also lacking a writer credit) the 1972 Adam Eterno special tale was illustrated by the magnificent and prolific Eric Bradbury (1921-2001) began in 1949 in Knockout.

Frequently working with studio mate Mike Western, Bradbury drew strips like Our Ernie, Blossom, Lucky Logan, Buffalo Bill, No Hiding Place, The Black Crow and Biggles. He was an “in-demand” illustrator well into the 1990s, on landmark strips such as The Avenger, Cursitor Doom, Phantom Force 5, Maxwell Hawke, Joe Two Beans, Mytek the Mighty, Death Squad, Doomlord, Darkie’s Mob, Crazy Keller, Hook Jaw, The Sarge, Invasion 1984, Invasion (the unrelated 2000 AD strip), Mean Arena, The Fists of Jimmy Chang, The Dracula Files, Rogue Trooper, Future Shocks, Tharg the Mighty and much more…

All that imagination and experience are seen here, when Adam appears in ancient Atlantis: a dinosaur-infested paragon of human ingenuity and political depravity where a tyrannical queen and audacious space shot lead to the destruction of Earth’s first human civilisation…

Closing with biographies on the creators featured herein and ads for other British lost wonders Adam Eterno – Grunn the Grim is enthralling astonishment awaiting your gaze: a riotously rewarding rollercoaster ride to delight readers who like their protagonists dark and conflicted and their history in bite-sized bursts.
© 1971, 1972, & 2025 Rebellion Publishing IP Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Today in 1952 the last weekly instalment of Will Eisner’s Spirit Comics Section was published, whilst in 1974 the final Shiver and Shake entertained diehard UK readers.

In 1994, comics and animation giant Doug Wildey went to the final roundup. Remembered for Tarzan, The Saint newspaper strip and Jonny Quest, he’d prefer you read his elegiac westerns like Doug Wildey’s Rio: The Complete Saga.

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Love Me Please – The Story of Janis Joplin (1943-1970)


By Nicolas Finet, Christopher & Degreff: translated by Montana Kane (NBM)
ISBN: 978-1-681122-76-2 (HB) eISBN: 978-1-681122-77-9

Gosh, aren’t real people interesting… especially in comics?

The list of people who lived hard, died young and changed the world is small but still, somehow, painfully overcrowded. Possibly the most tragic, influential, yet these days largely unknown was a born rule-breaking rebel who defied all conventions to become almost inevitably THE icon of doomed youth-with-big-dreams everywhere…

Author, filmmaker, journalist, publisher, educator and music documentarian Nicolas Finet has worked in comics for more than three decades – generating a bucketload of reference works like Mississippi Ramblin’ and Forever Woodstock. His collaborator on that last one was veteran author, journalist and illustrator Christopher (The Long and Winding Road; many other music-centred tomes and adaptor of the wonderful Bob Dylan). Their compelling treatise on misunderstood and self-destructive Janis – just like her music, poetry and art – is something to experience, not read about, but I’ll do my best to convince you anyway…

After a quick dip into early life and influences, the story proper opens in Texas in 1947 as ‘Forget Port Arthur’ zeroes in on key childhood traumas and revelations around the homelife and schooling of little Janis Lyn Joplin (January 19th 1943 – October 4th 1970) at the start of the most culturally chaotic and transformative period in American history…

Brilliant, multi-talented, sexually ambiguous, starved for love and desperately directionless, her metamorphosis through Blues music mirrors that of many contemporaries (a fair few of whom comprise the infamous “27 Club” of stars who died young). However, as this book shows, although something indefinable was always just out of Joplin’s reach, her response was never to passively accept or ever surrender…

Barely surviving her wildly rebellious teen years, an uncomfortable educational life, brief brush with conventional conformity and near-fatal counter-culture encounter in San Francisco – as all detailed in ‘The Temptation of Disaster’ – her meteoric rise in the era of flower power, liberal love and drug experimentation and record company exploitation lead to her return to sunny California and triumphant breakthrough in 1966, all carried along by ‘Spells and Charms’…

Stardom with hot band Big Brother and the Holding Company, and a host of legendary encounters affording even greater personal dissipation, makes wild child into living myth at Monterey and other landmarks of the Summer of Love, before success and acceptance prove to be her darkest nightmare in ‘Lost and Distraught’…

Global stardom and media glorification are balanced by heartbreak, betrayal and too many brushes with death. As Woodstock confirms her status and talent to the world, the landscape inside her head turns against Janis. Endless exhausting tours and brief amorous encounters further destabilise the girl within and the end – when it comes – is no surprise to anyone…

With a moving Preface from comics legend and childhood friend Gilbert Shelton, a huge, star-studded Character Gallery and suggested Further Reading and Viewing, this forthright, no-nonsense, extremely imaginative interpretation of the too-short flowering of “the Rose” offers insight but never judgement into a quintessentially complex, contradictory and uncompromised life…

NBM’s library of graphic biographies are swiftly becoming the crucial guide to the key figures of modern history and popular culture. If you haven’t found the answers you’re seeking yet, then you’re clearly not looking in the right place. Just remember that, as you gear up for what might well be the last Christmas you’ll spend with loved ones…
© Hatchette Livre (Marabout) 2020. © 2021 NBM for the English translation. All rights reserved.

Most NBM books are also available in digital formats. For more information and other great reads see NBM.

Today in 1931 comics changed forever with the first published episode of Chester Gould’s detective innovation. We last saw his impact in The Dick Tracy Casebook – Favourite Adventures 1931-1990 but there are loads and they’re all great. The same holds true for Walt Kelly’s scathing, sweetly savage political satire which debuted today in 1948. If you’re as yet unconverted why not check out Pogo: The Complete Syndicated Comics Strips volume 1 – Through the Wild Blue Wonder?

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Planet of Science – The Universal Encyclopedia of Scientists


By Antonio Fischetti & Bouzard, translated by James Hogan (Europe Comics)
No ISBN: digital only

Comics and graphic novels have an inconceivable power to deliver information in readily accessible form, and – like all the best teachers – can do so in ways that are fascinating, fun and therefore unforgettable.

A prime example is 2019’s La Planète des sciences – Encyclopédie universelle des scientifiques – which is available digitally in English if STILL not yet as a solidly reassuring tome. A bright and breezy introduction to a number of researchers and discoverers, famed and not, it combines a page of personal history, biography and unflinching commentary on 37 notable personages who have added to global scientific knowledge, each accompanied by a smart, punchy and pertinent gag strip by underground cartoonist Guillaume Bouzard (Caca bemol, Je veux travailler pour le Canard enchaîné, Lucky Luke).

Presenting the facts is Dr Antonio Fischetti, author (Cats and Dogs under the scientist’s magnifying glass, Idiotic and Relevant Questions about Mankind); science journalist; educator (at the National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts, National Conservatory of Music and Dance in Paris, Louis Lumière School and La Femis); and author of a science column for illustrious truth-seeking organ Charlie Hebdo.

The Continent is happily, gloriously awash with factual albums and graphic novels – and not just biographies – and this is one of the most entertaining I’ve ever seen, opening with Dr. Fischetti’s explanatory postulate on why these particular 37 candidates and his cognitive methodology, before the visual revelations begin. Sub-divided into rough, often overlapping time frames it all starts in Ancient Greece with the lowdown and high points of Thales, Pythagoras, Hippocrates and Archimedes, before jumping to 780-850CE for the story of Al-Khwarizmi.

Traversing the 15th – 16th Century, we meet Leonardo da Vinci, Nicolaus Copernicus, Ambroise Paré, Giordano Bruno & Galileo, before 17th – 18th Century pioneers Rene Decartes, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, Isaac Newton, Carl Linnaeus and Antoine Lavoisier get their moment in history’s hindsight and spotlight. As big, deep thinking becomes more widespread, representing the 19th Century are Charles Darwin, Claud Bernard, Gregor Mendel, Louis Pasteur, Alfred Nobel (suck it, Donny-baby!) and Dmitri Mendeleev, after which the revolutionary 19th – 20th Century hones in on Ivan Pavlov, Max Planck, Marie Curie, Albert Einstein, Alfred Wegener, Alexander Fleming, Erwin Schrödinger and Trofim Lysenko. By now it’s probably clear to most of you that this is no simple hagiography: some of the folk here are included because of their effect on scientific progress and it’s not all smiles, acclaim and awards…

The procession of progress pauses with the 20th – 21st Century (because, as of this writing, time travel has not been satisfactorily confirmed or reproduced under laboratory conditions) with controversial and occasionally still-living paragons Konrad Lorenz, Alan Turing, Alexander Grothendieck, James Watson, Peter Higgs, Yves Coppens, Emmanuelle Charpentier and the recently lost and already hugely missed Jane Goodall. Sure, you could Google them, but this book is a far more satisfying alternative…

The very fact that you probably haven’t heard of some of these latter savants – or even a few of the more ancient ones – only proves without doubt that you need this book. QED: What more can one say?
© 2020 DARGAUD – Fischetti & Bouzard. All rights reserved.

Today in 1913, comic book pioneer, cover artist and co-creator of Zatara Fred Guardineer was born, whilst in 1924 the legendary Harvey Kurtzman took his first peep at reality and probably started taking critical notes. We last spotlighted the inventor of Mad Magazine in Harvey Kurtzman’s Marley’s Ghost.

And today in 1982 the world was lessened by the passing of wondrous Noel Sickles, whom we loved most for such astounding strip work as Scorchy Smith: Partners in Danger.

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The Complete Peanuts volume 1: 1950-1952


By Charles Schulz (Canongate Books/Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-56097-589-2 (Fantagraphics HB) 978-1-60699-763-5 (Fantagraphics TPB) 978-1-84767-031-1 (Canongate)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: All that’s great about cartoon strips… 10/10

Peanuts is unequivocally the most important comics strip in the history of graphic narrative. It is also the most deeply personal. Today in 1950 it all began, and cartoonist Charles M Schulz went on crafting his moodily hilarious, hysterically introspective, shockingly surreal philosophical epic for half a century: 17,897 strips spanning October 2nd 1950 to February 13th 2000.

He died from complications of cancer the day before his last strip was printed.

At its height, Peanuts ran in 2,600 newspapers, in 21 languages and in 75 countries. Many of those venues still run it as perpetual reprints, and have ever since his death. During Schulz’s lifetime, book collections, a merchandising mountain and television spin-offs had made the publicity-shy doodler an actual billionaire at a time when that really meant something…

None of that matters. Peanuts – a title Schulz loathed, but one the syndicate forced upon him – changed the way comics strips were received and perceived: proving cartoon comedy could have edges and nuance and meaning as well as soon-forgotten pratfalls and punchlines.

Following a typically garrulous, charming and informative Introduction from fellow Minnesotan Garrison Keillor, this mammoth (218 x 33x 172 mm) landscape compendium offers the first two and a bit years. Here a prototypical, rather outgoing and jolly Charlie Brown and high-maintenance mutt Snoopy joined with bombastic Shermy and mercurial Patty in hanging out doing kid things.

These include playing, playing pranks, playing sports such as tennis, golf and baseball, playing musical instruments, teasing each other, making baffled observations and occasionally acting a bit too much like grown-ups. Fans of Bill Watterson’s Calvin and Hobbes will feel eerie familiarity with much of the hijinks and larks of these episodes.

As new characters Violet, infant prodigy Schroeder, and Lucy and her strange baby brother Linus were added to the mix, the boisterous rush of the series began to imperceptibly settle into a more contemplative pace. Charlie Brown began to adopt and embrace his eternal loser, singled-out-by-fate persona and the sheer diabolical wilfulness of Lucy began to sharpen itself on everyone around her…

The first Sunday page debuted on January 6th 1952; a standard half-page slot offering more measured fare than the daily. Both thwarted ambition and explosive frustration became part of the strip’s signature denouements…

By the end of 1952, all those the rapid-fire gags had evolved from raucous slapstick to surreal, edgy, psychologically barbed introspection, garnished by crushing judgements and deep rumination in a world where kids – and certain animals – were the only actors. The relationships, however, were increasingly deep, complex and absorbing even though “Sparky” Schulz never deviated from his core message: entertain…

David Michaelis then celebrates and deconstructs ‘The Life and Times of Charles M. Schulz’ after which Gary Groth & Rick Marschall conduct ‘An Interview with Charles M. Schulz’, rounding out our glimpse of the dolorous graphic genius with intimate revelations and reminiscences whilst a copious ‘Index’ offers instant access to favourite scenes you’d like to see again.

Readily available in hardcover, paperback and digital editions, this initial volume offers a rare example of a masterpiece in motion: comedy gold and social glue gradually metamorphosing in an epic of spellbinding graphic mastery which became part of the fabric of billions of lives, and which continues to do so long after its maker’s passing.

Happy ever afters, kids.
The Complete Peanuts: 1950-1952 (volume 1) © 2004 Peanuts Worldwide, LLC. Introduction © 2004 Garrison Keillor. “The Life and Times of Charles M. Schulz” © 2000 David Michaelis. “Interview with Charles M. Schulz” © 2004 Gary Groth and Richard Marschall. All other material copyright its respective owners. All rights reserved.

Today in 1909 Alex Raymond was born. You’ll know him best for stuff like Flash Gordon on the Planet Mongo volume 1: Sundays 1934-1937 (The Complete Flash Gordon Library. In 1916 Bob Powell, was born. He went on to do things like Bob Powell’s Complete Jet Powers.

Ramona Fradon was born in 1926, and Spirou stalwart Janry arrived in Belgium in 1957, whilst Maltese docu-comics journalist Joe Sacco was born in 1960. You can find dozens of books by the first two just by using a search box here, and I’ve almost summoned enough nerve to review Sacco’s Palestine despite – or because of – these febrile times…