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January 4, 2013January 5, 2013

Batman: Streets of Gotham volume 1 – Hush Money

By Paul Dini, Dustin Nguyen & Derek Fridolfs (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-0-85768-853-8

With all the furore and hype surrounding the epic death and inevitable resurrection of Batman cunningly orchestrated by Grant Morrison, everybody seemed so concerned with what was going to happen next that they apparently ignored what was actually occurring in the monthly comicbooks in their hands. Now with the dust long settled let’s take a look at one of the better sidebar-series to come out of the braided Batman R.I.P./Final Crisis/Last Rites/Batman Reborn/Return of Bruce Wayne publishing eventsâ€¦

In the aftermath of the epochal loss of the Gotham Guardian, a sustained and epic Battle for the Cowl ensued amongst the fallen hero’s closest allies. Eventually Dick Grayson succeeded his lost mentor, carrying on the tradition of the Dark Knight with Bruce Wayne’s assassin-trained son Damian continuing as the headstrong and potentially lethal latest iteration of Robin, the Boy Wonderâ€¦

This volume collects the contents of Detective Comics #852, Batman #685 (both March 2009), before re-presenting the first four tension-drenched issues of Batman: Streets of Gotham spanning June to September of that portentous year, and deals with the strange fact that although most of the masked hero community knew the tragic truth, the general populace was blithely unaware that the true Batman had been replacedâ€¦

As if all that complex crossover-ry wasn’t enough, also working hard to ensure that no reader would dare miss a single issue was a project dubbed ‘Faces of Evil’ in which DC villains took centre stage in every comicbook that month. Thus, in the aforementioned Detective #852 and Batman #685, one of the hero’s most pernicious and obsessive foes reappeared to rebuild his empire of evil after the last crushing defeat at the gauntleted hands of Batmanâ€¦

Sublimely illustrated by Dustin Nguyen & Derek Fridolfs, the saga was another triumph for award-winning animator and director Paul Dini who once again proved himself the very best of contemporary Batman writers with a chilling, suspenseful epic of revenge and obsession featuring Bruce Wayne’s ultimate adversary Dr. Tommy Elliot, a beloved boyhood friend as warped by his own mother’s malign influence as the boy Bruce was transformed by the murder of his beloved parents Thomas and Martha Wayne.

Eminent surgeon Elliot became the twisted, sadistic and obsessive Hush to obtain vengeance on his only friend and childhood companion: one who had been perpetually held up to him as a perfect example of a son by Elliot’s disabled and deranged mother. Tommy even divined the billionaire’s greatest secret – the true identity of the Dark Knightâ€¦

After many deeply personal and lethally psychotic attacks on Wayne’s legacy and Batman’s friends, Hush took the ultimate step in his psychological war against his oldest pal by surgically transforming himself into Bruce’s doppelganger – attempting to entirely usurp his life.

After nearly killing Selina Kyle by literally stealing her heart, the faux-Bruce was only narrowly defeated and the captive Catwoman restored to some semblance of her former self (see Batman: Heart of Hush)â€¦

Now in ‘Reconstruction’ a broken Elliot wanders the snowy shady docks ofGotham before tumbling into the freezing river. Everything is over: his best efforts to destroy the Wayne myth have all failed and, in revenge for his attack on her, Catwoman has tracked down all his hidden bank accounts and stolen every penny he had – $200 million dollars – giving it all away to bleeding-heart charitiesâ€¦

Expecting to die, Elliot awakes on a boat, saved by hard-working stiffs who believe they’ve rescued wild-partying playboy Wayne from a drunken accident. Inspired, Elliot doesn’t disabuse them and begins to trade on his stolen looks to rebuild his fortune and take another stab at revengeâ€¦

Luck is with him: for some reason no one has seen either Bruce Wayne or Batman for weeks. Using the playboy’s reputation, Hush makes his way to the Caribbean, leaving a well-concealed trail of bodies and empty wallets behind him. By the time he reaches Australia he’s feeling pretty cocky but after being spotted by shapeshifting local hero Tasmanian Devil, Elliot heads for Vietnam, eager to put more miles and far less friendly borders between him and his inevitable pursuers. It’s a near-fatal mistakeâ€¦

The tale concludes in ‘Catspaw’ as â€œBruce Wayneâ€ is kidnapped by bandits from an animal poaching ring and finds himself face-to-stolen-face with Catwoman who has taken over the pet traders to actually save endangered species. Always willing to bear a grudge, she is delighted with the opportunity to put her former tormentor at the top of that listâ€¦

However the cat burglar has gotten in too deep and her greedily impatient gang are fed up with their animal-loving leader. Sensing a coup, Selina agrees to a truce with Elliot until they can escape the jungles and the bandits. To that end, she despatches her two most faithful henchmen to bring Hush to safety, but unfortunately nobody could leave a trail like Elliot’s and not be noticed by the well-schooled heirs of the World’s Greatest Detectiveâ€¦

Streets of Gotham debuted scant months later with Elliot an utterly isolated prisoner of the new Batman and Robinâ€¦

In ‘Ignition!’ a fresh era began with a reformed Harley Quinn making a nuisance of herself and distracting the Dark Dynamic Duo’s attention from a real threat. In the power vacuum following all the concatenating crises, many of Arkham Asylum’s inmates had absconded and were loose in the city, and flamboyant gangster Black Mask was celebrating his victory over rivals Two-Face and the Penguin – and subsequent elevation to supreme boss of the underworld – by recruiting the more biddable escaped maniacs to his teamâ€¦

With a mysterious new vigilante called Abuse adding to the general atmosphere of tension, one of Black Mask’s wildest employees finally slipped into total psychosis. Third-rate arsonist Garfield Lynns suddenly stopped torching buildings as Firefly and began turning random civilians into spontaneously combusting human torchesâ€¦

Taking full advantage of the situation in ‘City on Fire’, Hush then broke out of his velvet-lined cage whilst Batman and Robin tackled the utterly demented arsonist and again used his perfect imposture of Bruce Wayne to outmanoeuvre his foes.

Before Grayson, Damian and former Robin Tim Drake could react, Elliot made a very public appearance on TV and offered to bankrupt â€œhimselfâ€ to rebuild Gotham’s shattered infrastructure and decimated industriesâ€¦

The Batman Family had never accepted that their mentor was dead and all their actions were predicated upon the premise that he would eventually return to reclaim his mantle. Thus as ‘Hush Money’ opened, they were all forced to publicly accept and even join the returned â€œBruce Wayneâ€ as he effectively dismantled the lost hero’s life’s work to popular adulationâ€¦

Simultaneously in the city’s darkest nooks and crannies Black Mask’s disciples began to chafe under his increasingly oppressive and unpredictable yoke. The mobster’s most radical action was to give free rein to knife-wielding serial killer Victor Zsasz, offering to bankroll the butcher’s scheme to industrialise and mass-produce his particular brand of bloodlettingâ€¦

As the new Batman finally finds a way to neutralise Hush’s bold imposture, this initial volume concludes with a dark and nasty tale following Zsasz’s escalation of terror and slaughter by focussing on the tightrope-thin line career criminals must walk in Gotham. ‘Business’ invades the personal space of illicit fixer the Broker as the premier â€œgo-to guyâ€ in the city at last discovers to his surprise that there some things he won’t – can’t – do, no matter how big the pay-off might beâ€¦

With astounding covers by Andrew Robinson, Alex Ross, J. G. Jones & Dustin Nguyen, this visceral, imaginative and deliciously off-balance frantic psycho-thriller sets the scene for even darker strides down the darkest avenues in all of comicsâ€¦

January 3, 2013January 2, 2013

Cable volume 3: Stranded

By Duane Swierczynski, Paul Gulacy, Gabriel Guzman, Mariano Taibo & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 979-0-7851-4167-9

The son of X-Man Scott Summers and a clone of Jean Grey, Nathan Christopher Summers was infected with a techno-organic virus as a baby. He was only saved by being sent through time, subsequently spending his formative years in the far future where he became an unlikely and largely unwilling saviour of assorted humankinds against mutant overlord Apocalypse and his vile minions such as the clone-warrior Stryfe.

Afflicted with a stubborn certainty that he always knew best – probably due to his hard-earned foreknowledge and weary experience of how bad the days to come would be – Nathan evolved into time-travelling super-soldier Cable and gradually inserted himself into the lives of key figures in mutant history: figures such as Professor Charles Xavier and his own father Cyclops – the Moses and King David of mutant-kindâ€¦

Using his phenomenal psionic abilities to hold at bay the incurable, progressive condition inexorably consuming his flesh and only held in check by the victim’s indomitable force of will, the mysterious grizzled veteran slowly began interacting with and reshaping the pastâ€¦

Hope Spalding-Summers was the first Homo Superior born on Earth after M-Day, when the temporarily insane mutant Avenger Scarlet Witch used her reality-warping powers to eradicate almost all fellow members of her terrifying sub-species from existence.

Considered by many to be some sort of mutant messiah, the newborn girl was â€œappropriatedâ€ by militant warrior Cable – no stranger to the role of Sole Saviour – who raised her in the furious future, training her in all manner of lethal survival skills before she inevitably found her way back to the present where she was adopted by X-Men supremo Scott Summers AKA Cyclops.

Hers was a horrifically memorable childhood as this slim, satisfying collection (gathering issues #16-20 of the monthly Cable comicbook from July-November 2009) will surely attestâ€¦

From the start Hope had implacable foes hunting her. The most resourceful was another time-tossed former X-Man, Lucas Bishop, who was convinced the child would cause the diabolically dystopian alternate reality he originated in. To prevent such horror ever occurring, Bishop determined to kill her before she could become a mutant anti-Christ and not even Cable’s frequent temporal relocations would deter himâ€¦

With the entire time-busting saga scripted by Duane Swierczynski, the action here begins with the 2-part ‘Too Late for Tears’ – illustrated by legendary comics icon Paul Gulacy – as Cable and nine-year-old Hope prepare to again jump into the safely camouflaging corridors of chronality after a particularly contentious battle.

However, the increasingly rebellious girl strikes out at her protector during a fateful moment and the time-shift goes wrongâ€¦

Hope materialises in the same post-apocalyptic location but two years earlier in time and, with no further information to go on, endeavours to make herself secure until Cable finds her. Stuck in her future, Cable patiently waits for her to â€œcatch upâ€ but his techno-viral contagion flares up and threatens to end his appalling life before she gets thenâ€¦

And 127 years prior to Cable’s latest crisis Bishop activates his own time-machine and remorselessly continues his pursuit of Hopeâ€¦

Stuck, but not without resources, the girl explores a dying Earth where only two warring cities are still inhabited. Soon she is approached by a young boy named Emil who is instantly smitten by the lethally self-sufficient waifâ€¦

Just as Cable forces back his latest bout of all-consuming transmogrification by invasive code, Bishop arrives and a deadly destructive but ultimately inconclusive battle breaks out. The follower’s plan is obsessively simple: as soon as he sees Hope he will end her by detonating a nuclear device inside his body.

But she isn’t with Cable any longerâ€¦

In another era, Emil has gradually broken Hope’s wall of distrust but, just as she feels she can finally relax, the girl discovers that the revered spiritual head of the boy’s band of survivors is her very familiar foe. The â€œArch-Bishopâ€ has been so patiently waiting for his time-bending bÃªte-noir to resurfaceâ€¦

The seemingly benevolent holy man has no problems wiping out his entire flock to finish her for good but Hope perpetually avoids him and Bishop just can’t trigger the nuke until he’s absolutely certain.

And two long years later, Cable moves into one of the two cities, makings plans, winning allies and waiting, waiting, waitingâ€¦

When at last 11-year old Hope is reunited with Cable, it’s as both cities are on the verge of mutual destruction and the mutant has no time for her protests. He has spent his time constructing a working space ship and after forcibly dragging his furious charge aboard takes off for the safety of space leaving a heartbroken Emil behind. Happily for the lovesick lad the wonderful Archbishop can also construct star-craft. Very soon they will all be reunitedâ€¦

Artists Gabriel Guzman & Mariano Taibo take over for the eerie alien encounter ‘Brood’ beginning with ‘Bishop Takes Pawn’ wherein Bishop and Emil lead their people into a final battle with Cable’s ship and crew on the edges of the solar system. Thankfully the boy finds Hope before the mutant hunter does and she convinces her long-lost paramour of the deranged cleric’s true intentions before falling to Bishop’s murderous rage.

With nuclear obliteration seconds away events overtake all the manic participants as both ships – locked together in the vacuum of deep space – are invaded by creatures even more ferociously dangerousâ€¦

The Brood are ghastly alien parasites and rapacious intelligent body-stealers who lay eggs in hosts and use the victims’ genetic material to augment their unborn generations. For uncounted centuries they have greedily hungered for the exceptional advantages gained by infecting mutants and metahumansâ€¦

In ‘Queen Takes Bishop’ the disgusting matriarch of the invading beasts specifically targets Hope as her overwhelming spawn decimate the last remnants of humanity aboard both ships. However, the little lass has met Brood before and knows just how to deal with them. Elsewhere Bishop and Cable also manage to survive the appalling assault, both obsessed with finding Hope for their drastically opposing reasonsâ€¦

As an entire space fleet of the noxious beasts zero in on the last humans alive, Bishop utterly succumbs to his obsession by allying himself with the Brood Queen to ensure the final fate of Hope, but has completely underestimated the child’s resiliency, Cable’s compulsive dutiful determination, and the unmatchable power of young love in the blazing conclusion ‘Checkmate’â€¦

Time-travel tales often disappoint and frequently make people’s heads hurt, but this bombastic romp (augmented by covers and variants by Dave Wilkins & Rob Liefeld) manages to always stick to the point, offering sly tributes – and some not so much – to Les Miserables and Alien whilst following the pain-wracked consumption of Cable by of his own non-fleshly invaders through a clever and poignant Fights ‘n’ Tights sci fi horror drama that will impress and delight older fans of the genre(s).

January 2, 2013January 5, 2013

R.E.B.E.L.S. volume 1: the Coming of Starro

By Tony Bedard, Andy Clarke, Claude St. Aubin, Scott Hanna & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 987-1-4012-2589-6

Once upon a time, DC’s vast pantheon of characters was sensibly scattered, segregated and wholly distinct: separated and situated on a variety of alternate Earths which comprised Golden Age hold-overs, contemporaneous Silver Age stars and later-created heroes. Further Earths were subsequently introduced for every superhero stable the company scooped up in a voracious and protracted campaign of acquisition over the decades. Charlton, Fawcett, Quality Comics and others characters resided upon their own globes, occasionally meeting in trans-dimensional alliances and apparently deterring new readers from getting on with DC.

Latterly, when DC retconned their entire ponderous continuity following Crisis on Infinite Earths in 1985-1986, ejecting the entire concept of a multiverse and re-knitting time so that there had only been one world literally festooned with heroes and villains, many of their greatest characters got a unique restart, with the conceit being that the characters had been around for years and the readership were simply tuning in on just another working day.

Of course now the multiverse concept is back and not confusing at all (no! seriously?) but whatever the original reasons, that dramatic 1980s refit did provide for some utterly astounding and cleverly cohesive storiesâ€¦

In the aftermath of that event, the hero-packed planet Earth was targeted by a coalition of alien races and endured a full-on Invasion which was repulsed by the indomitable resistance of the World’s assembled heroes and villains and a few selected extraterrestrial allies. When the cosmic dust settled a few of these stayed together and formed cops-for-profit outfit dubbed L.E.G.I.O.N., led by a lying, scheming, manipulative obsessive super-genius bastard named Vril Dox: notional son of the villainous super-villain Brainiac of Colu and one of the most superciliously smug creatures in creation.

Overcoming all odds and the general distaste of his own chief lieutenants, Dox moulded his organisation into a force for justice and peace in the universe, with over 80 client worlds happily prospering, until his own son Lyrl – whilst still a baby – usurped control of the organisation: hunting Vril and his core agent team across the universe as desperate R.E.B.E.L.S. ruthlessly pursued by their own intergalactic commercial police force.

By the end of that run of comicbooks in 1996, order and the status quo were fully restored and the Licensed Extra-Governmental Interstellar Operatives Network went back to scrupulously and competently doling out all the peace and security solvent worlds could affordâ€¦

All that background is largely superfluous to the enjoyment of this latest iteration of the splendidly wry and cynical sci fi adventure series as history repeated itself in 2008, and another cosmic event forced DC’s assorted space sentinels into action again. Adam Strange, the Omega Men, Captain Comet and Dox’s L.E.G.I.O.N. again came to the fore and their intergalactic exploits again began to impinge on the fate of this island Earthâ€¦

Collecting the first six issues of the revived R.E.B.E.L.S. comicbook series concocted by scripter Tony Bedard, the superbly intoxicating action begins in ‘The Future is Now’ (illustrated by Andy Clarke) as a fugitive Vril Dox crashes on Earth fleeing from a team of bounty hunters.

To ensure no further insurrections by greedy – or worse yet, moralistic – employees, the 10^th Level Intellect had largely replaced all his annoyingly autonomous agents with robotic units, but that had simply enabled some bright spark to co-opt his entire intergalactic army – again! – and Dox was now a target for assassination by L.E.G.I.O.N.’s new owner, as well as many of the criminals and warlords the Coluan had previously antagonisedâ€¦

Within mere moments of reaching our embattled world Dox, hotly pursued by monstrous alien powerhouse Tribulus, its cyborg controller Getorix, super-psychic Skwaul and former elite L.E.G.I.O.N.-ary Amon Hakk, is confronted by Supergirl, keen on stopping the sheer carnage caused by the invaders’ battles.

Freshly returned from an extended stay in the 31^st century, the teenaged Kryptonian had been turned into the unwitting receptacle of a message from Dox’s distant descendent Brainiac 5, conveying data and specifications for Vril to construct a precursor brigade of the Legion of Super-Heroes to combat an imminent threat to the universeâ€¦

Dox, contrary as ever, was more impressed with the files on the LSH’s terrifying enemiesâ€¦

Elsewhere the outlaw warriors dubbed the Omega Men had learned of Dox’s predicament and become aware what a powerful, if untrustworthy, ally he would makeâ€¦

The action resumed at the South Pole as the ousted Coluan cop and the Girl of Tomorrow defeated the alien hunters and turned the nigh-mindless Tribulus into ‘The First Recruit’. Dox then fled Earth in search of fresh cannon-fodder for his future-foretold team and exploited rather than allied himself with the Omega Men before heading to a lost colony of Amerindian ex-slaves for his next target.

Nearly a millennium before, an entire tribe of Native Americans had been stolen and dumped on the distant world Starhaven where they had evolved into the Anasazi, winged trackers of immense power and sensitivity. Now Dox arrived and offered to give a weak and feeble outcast the gifts fate and feeble genetics had denied her. However, even though he kept his word, the thing that Wildstar became had good reason to regret her devil’s bargainâ€¦

‘A World of Hurt’ saw the new R.E.B.E.L.S. take the battle to the usurped L.E.G.I.O.N. hierarchy; along the way picking up old comrade and dedicated Dox-hater Strata – a woman of living stone and high moral standards – plus energetic new recruit Bounder.

Just as the robotic forces now commanded by artificial life-form and ambulatory computer server Silica begin mercilessly eradicating anybody connected with the Coluan’s old organisation, the utterly dispensible Omega Men attack L.E.G.I.O.N.’s HQ on Maltus and destroy the traitorous living computer which had taken over the organisation.

Covertly despatched by the manipulative Dox, the Omegans have inadvertently handed back control of the rent-a-cops to Dox, but in the digital woman’s corpse the victors find the first clues as to the real threat: an eerie starfish creature capable of controlling anything it possesses. Tragically, before they can react another Starro beast arrives – wearing the body of a brutal alien war goddess named Astrid Storm-Daughterâ€¦

With Claude St. Aubin & Scott Hanna taking over the art chores, ‘From Beyond’ kicks the already fast-paced thriller into maximum overdrive as Amon Hakk, Getorix and Skwaul are rescued from earthly imprisonment by Durlan shapeshifter Ciji, unaware that Dox is no longer the problemâ€¦

On Maltus, the surviving Omega Men narrowly escape the new threat but discover the entire planet – the most populous in the galaxy – has been taken: each citizen wearing a Starro seed and contributing their enslaved psychic resources to a hidden masterâ€¦

Meanwhile in another part of space the aggressive space faring hive-culture known as the Dominators are also under attack by the Starro slaves. However this is unlike any previous incursion by the frequently occurring stellar starfish: there’s an implacable devouring consciousness behind the assaults. Even the inimical, scientifically sadistic Psions are scared – as evidenced by their rescuing of their greatest enemies the Omega Men â€“ and propose an alliance to defeat a threat that is pouring into our galaxy from a cosmic hole into another existenceâ€¦

As ‘The Stars We Are’ opens, in the strategically crucial Xylon Expanse a vast subspace rift is disgorging a host of ships and super-powered slaves into one of the most populous areas of the galaxy – and a centre of L.E.G.I.O.N. influence. Even as the Dominator’s mighty empire falls in hours, Astrid Storm-Daughter attacks Dox’s ship just as Ciji’s forces arrive. With all sentient life threatened, this initial collection concludes with the superb ‘Dominator’ as Dox again pulls an intellectual rabbit out of his hat and traps the entire invasion force – and their space rift – behind an impenetrable, quadrant-wide force field. Locked within an inescapable, parsecs-wide box of force, the terrifying humanoid master of the Starros is safely contained in a relatively small buffer zone and prevented from all further expansion.

Of course stuck on the wrong side of the fence with him are Dox, his unwilling newfound enemies-turned-allies and billions of potential slave-sentients on hundreds of sitting-duck worldsâ€¦

To Be Continuedâ€¦

With a spectacular cover gallery by Andy Clark, Ed Benes, Rob Hunter, Kalman Andrasofszky, this slim tome offers a deliciously intoxicating blend of space opera and cosmic Fights ‘n’ Tights action that will push every button for fans of staggering science fiction thrills, cut with sharp, mature dialogue and sublimely beautiful artwork. Plain and simple rip-roaring, rollercoaster rocket riding fun that no devotee of the genres should missâ€¦

January 1, 2013January 5, 2013

Pogo: the Complete Syndicated Comic Strips volume 2: Bona Fide Balderdash

By Walt Kelly, edited by Carolyn Kelly (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-584-6

Tragically this review copy didn’t reach me in time for a Christmas recommendation, but that’s okay as books of this calibre are worth buying and reading at every moment of every day, and rather than waste your valuable time with my purely extraneous blather, you should just hit the shops or the online emporia of your choice and grab this terrific tome nowâ€¦

If you still need more though, and aren’t put off by me yet, I’m happy to elucidate at some lengthâ€¦

Walter Crawford Kelly Jr. was born in 1913 and started his cartooning career whilst still in High School, as artist and reporter for the Bridgeport Post. In 1935, he moved to California and joined the Disney Studio, working on short cartoon films and such features as Dumbo, Fantasia and Pinocchio until the infamous animator’s strike in 1941.

Refusing to take sides, Kelly moved back East and into comicbooks – primarily for Dell who held the Disney funnybook license amongst others at that time.

Despite his glorious work on such popular people-based classics as the Our Gang movie spin-off, Kelly preferred and particularly excelled with anthropomorphic animal and children’s fantasy material. For the December 1942-released Animal Comics #1 he created Albert the Alligator and Pogo Possum, wisely retaining the copyrights in the ongoing saga of two affable Bayou critters and their young African-American pal Bumbazine. Although the black kid soon disappeared, the animal actors stayed on as stars until 1948 when Kelly moved into journalism, becoming art editor and cartoonist for hard hitting, left-leaning liberal newspaper The New York Star.

On October 4^th 1948, Pogo, Albert and an ever-expanding cast of gloriously addictive characters began their funny pages careers, appearing in the paper six days a week until the periodical folded in January 1949.

Although ostensibly a gently humorous kids feature, by the end of its run (reprinted in full at the back of Pogo: the Complete Syndicated Comic Strips volume 1) the first glimmers of the increasingly barbed, boldly satirical masterpiece of velvet-pawed social commentary began to emergeâ€¦

When The Star closed Pogo was picked up for mass distribution by the Post-Hall Syndicate and launched on May 16^th 1949 in selected outlets. A colour Sunday page debuted January 29^th 1950 and both were produced simultaneously by Kelly until his death in 1973 (and even beyond, courtesy of his talented wife and family).

At its height the strip appeared in 500 papers throughout 14 countries and the book collections – which began in 1951 – eventually numbered nearly 50, collectively selling over 30 million copies, and all that before this Fantagraphics series beganâ€¦

In this second of a proposed full dozen volumes reprinting the entire canon of the Okefenokee Swamp citizenry, possibly the main aspect of interest is the personable Possum’s first innocently adorable attempts to run for Public Office – a ritual which inevitably and coincidentally reoccurred every four years whenever the merely human inhabitants of America got together for raucous caucuses and exuberant electioneering – but it’s also remarkable to note that by the close of this two-year period Kelly had increased his count of uniquely Vaudevillian returning characters to over one hundred. The likes of Solid MacHogany, Tammanany Tiger, Willow McWisper, Goldie Lox, Sarcophagus MacAbre, the sloganeering P.T. Bridgeport, bull moose Uncle Antler and a trio of brilliantly scene-stealing bats named Bewitched, Bothered and Bemildred, amongst so many others would pop up with varying frequency and impact over the next twenty yearsâ€¦

This colossal and comfortingly sturdy landscape compilation (three-hundred-and fifty-six 184x267mm pages) includes the monochrome Dailies from January 1^st 1951 to December 31^st 1952, and the Sundays – in their own full-colour section – from January 7^th 1951 to December 28^th 1952 – all faithfully annotated and listed in a copious, expansive and informative Table of Contents. Supplemental features comprise a Foreword from pioneering comedy legend Stan Freberg, delightful unpublished illustrations and working drawings by Kelly, more invaluable context and historical notes in the amazing R.C. Harvey’s ‘Swamp Talk’ by and a biographical feature ‘About Walt Kelly’ by Mark Evanier.

In his time the satirical mastermind unleashed his bestial spokes-cast on such innocent, innocuous sweethearts as Senator Joe McCarthy, J.Edgar Hoover, the John Birch Society, Richard Nixon and the Ku Klux Clan, as well as the likes of Hubert Humphrey, Lyndon B. Johnson and – with eerie perspicacity – George W. Romney, U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Governor of Michigan and Pa of some guy named Mittâ€¦

This particular monument to madcap mirth and sublime drollery of course includes the usual cast: gently bemused Pogo, boisterous, happily ignorant alligator Albert, dolorous Porkypine, obnoxious turtle Churchy La Femme, lugubrious hound Beauregard Bugleboy, carpet-bagging Seminole Sam Fox, pompous (doesn’t) know-it-all Howland Owl and all the rest, covering not only day to day topics and travails like love, marriage, weather, fishing, the problem with kids, the innocent joys of sport, making a living and why neighbours shouldn’t eat each other, but also includes epic sagas: the stress of Poetry Contests, hunting – from a variety ofÂ points of view – Christmas and other Public Holidays, incipient invasion, war and even cross-dressing to name but a fewâ€¦

As Kelly spent a good deal of 1952 spoofing the electoral race, this tome offers a magical, magnificent treatment of all the problems associated with grass (and moss) roots politics: dubious campaign tactics, loony lobbying, fun with photo ops, impractical tactical alliances, glad-handing, a proliferation of political promos and ephemera, how to build clockwork voters – and candidates – and of course, life after a failed run for the Presidencyâ€¦

As the delicious Miz Ma’m’selle Hepzibah would no doubt say: plus Ã§a change, plus c’est la mÃªme choseâ€¦

Kelly’s uncontested genius lay in his seemingly effortless ability to lyrically, vivaciously portray through anthropomorphic affectation comedic, tragic, pompous, infinitely sympathetic characters of any shape or breed, all whilst making them undeniably human, and he used that gift to blend hard-hitting observation of our crimes, foibles and peccadilloes with rampaging whimsy, poesy and sheer exuberant joie de vivre.

The hairy, scaly, feathered slimy folk of the surreal swamp lands are, of course, inescapably us, elevated by burlesque, slapstick, absurdism and all the glorious joys of wordplay from puns to malapropisms to raucous accent humour into a multi-layered hodgepodge of all-ages delight – and we’ve never looked or behaved betterâ€¦

This stuff will certainly make you laugh; it will probably provoke a sentimental tear or ten and will certainly satisfy your every entertainment requirement. Timeless and magical, Pogo is a giant not simply of comics, but of world literature and this magnificent second edition should be the pride of every home’s bookshelf, right beside the first one.

â€¦Or, in the popular campaign parlance of the critters involved: â€œI Go Pogo!â€ and so should you.

December 31, 2012January 5, 2013

Barack Hussein Obama

By Steven Weissman (Fantagraphics Books International)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-623-2

Steven Weissman was born in California in 1968 and grew up to be an exceptionally fine and imaginative cartoonist. He has worked for Alternative Comics, Last Gasp, Dark Horse, Marvel, DC, Vice and Nickelodeon Magazine among others, and his artistic sensibilities have been influenced and shaped by such disparate forces as Super-Deformed manga, â€œOur Gangâ€ comedies, Abbott and Costello, Dan Clowes, Mike Allred and Peanuts – the strip, not the foodstuff.

Much of his groundbreaking, award-winning early work, dating from the mid-1990s, offered a post-modern, skewed and alternative view of friendship, childhood, world weirdness and people’s meanness and can all be enjoyed over and over again in such stunning compilations as Tykes, Yikes!, Lemon Kids, Don’t Call Me Stupid, Mean, Chewing Gum in Church, White Flower Day, Chocolate Cheeks and others. The French and Japanese – who really know quality comics – love him lots.

In 2012 Weissman literally went back to the drawing board, un-and-recreating himself and his aesthetic methodology for a weekly online strip entitled Barack Hussein Obama which has since been collected into a stunning and unbelievably enchanting hardcover cartoon book about the unsuspected nature of modern America.

Spiky, acerbic, tellingly mundane and captivatingly absurdist, it follows the day to day tribulations of this ordinary shmoe who just happens to be the President of the USA as he distractedly fails to deal with that persistently annoying old Joe Biden guy, the pushy, overly excitable Rodham Clinton dame and that obnoxious oaf Newt all whilst trying to placate his testily disappointed wife and their terminally trendy kids Malia and Sasha.

It’s a full, if confusing life, always filled with minor crises. When he’s not being accidentally racist at Press Conferences or making jokes journalists don’t get, Barack is happily sharing old family recipes or chatting with foreign dignitaries he can’t understand, even if Joe is always butting in, telling him off and acting hurt whilst the Secret Service guy is constantly hanging around looking meanâ€¦

â€¦And then there’s that bad-tempered Clinton lady sneaking off to get cosy with sex-bomb Muammar el-Qaddafi, the recurring stiff-necked, stuck-up ghost of long-dead President James Garfield peddling advice, the ongoing hunt for Osama Bin Laden and the old lady who managed to steal Barack’s identity and bought all that pet food and piano lessons…

No wonder the President needs to occasionally slip away now and then to get totally bakedâ€¦

All in all though Barack thought it was going pretty well until the bird started talking to him. It wasn’t long before Mr. President transformed into a gigantic parakeet on Air-force One and headed for the peacefully deep blue skiesâ€¦

With guest appearances – sort of – by Truman Capote, Nicholas SarkÃ¶zy, Alfred E. Neuman, The Punisher’s War Journal and more, this is a look inside the Oval Office like none you’ve ever seen, but no matter how much Tea Party Republicans would like it to be, it certainly isn’t another searing expose of dubious shenanigans from the pretender to a stolen throne.

It is, though, a generous, gentle and spectacularly surreal trip into the head of a very special and oddly observant US citizen who has creatively concocted a world that all rulers and/or prospective despots should visit at least once.

This isn’t the real Obama, but it might well be the one the average American deservesâ€¦

A lot of very smart people are saying a lot of very deep, very clever and appreciative things about this deliciously winning book, so I won’t waste my time competing with them. I will however tell you that Barack Hussein Obama is one of the most enticing, intriguing and sheerly delightful reads of the last year and anybody with half a brain – or even more: more is always better – would be crazy not to pick up a copy.

December 30, 2012December 27, 2012

Golden Age Spectre Archives volume 1

By Jerry Siegel & Bernard Baily with various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-56389-955-3

The Spectre is one of the oldest characters in DC’s vast stable of characters, created by Jerry Siegel and Bernard Baily in 1940 and debuting with a 2-part origin epic in More Fun Comics #52 and 53 where he was the first superhero to star in the previously all-genres adventure anthology. For a few years the Ghostly Guardian reigned supreme in the title with flamboyant and eerily eccentric supernatural thrillers, but gradually slipped from popularity as firstly Dr. Fate and successively Johnny Quick, Aquaman, Green Arrow and finally Superboy turned up to steal the show. By the time of his last appearance the Spectre had been reduced to a foil for his own comedic sidekick Percival Popp, the Super-Copâ€¦

Just like Siegel’s other iconic creation, the Dark Man suffered from a basic design flaw: he was just too darn powerful. Unlike the vigorously vital and earthy early Superman however, the ethereal champion of justice was already dead, so he couldn’t be logically or dramatically imperilled. Of course in those far-off early days that wasn’t nearly as important as sheer spectacle: grabbing the reader’s utter attention and keeping it stoked to a fantastic fever pitch. This the Grim Ghost could do with ease and always-increasing intensity.

Re-presenting the first 19 eerie episodes and following a fulsome Foreword from pre-eminent Comics historian Dr. Jerry Bails, detailing the state of play within the budding marketplace during those last months of the 1930s, the arcane action commences in this stunning full-colour deluxe hardback with ‘The Spectre: Introduction’ from More Fun Comics #52 (February 1940).

This wasn’t the actual title: like so many strips of those early days, most stories didn’t have individual titles and many have been only retroactively designated for collections such as this.

The Ghostly Guardian was only barely glimpsed in this initial instalment. Instead the action rested upon Jim Corrigan, a hard-bitten police detective, who was about to marry rich heiress Clarice Winston when they were abducted by mobster Gat Benson. Stuffed into a barrel of cement and pitched off a pier, Corrigan died and went to his eternal reward. Almostâ€¦

Rather than finding Paradise and peace, Corrigan’s spirit was accosted by a glowing light and disembodied voice which, over his strident protests, ordered him return to Earth to fight crime and evil until all vestiges of them were goneâ€¦

Standing on the seabed and looking at his own corpse, Corrigan began his mission by going after his own killersâ€¦

In #53 ‘The Spectre Strikes’ found the furious revenant swiftly, mercilessly and horrifically ending his murderers and saving Clarice, before calling off the engagement and moving out of the digs he shared with fellow cop and best friend Wayne Grant. After all, a cold, dead man has no need for the livingâ€¦

The origin ends with Corrigan implausibly sewing himself a green and white costume and swearing to eradicate all crimeâ€¦

Splendidly daft, this two-part yarn is one of the darkest and most memorable origins in comicbook history and the feature only got better with each issue as the bitter, increasingly isolated lawman swiftly grew into most overwhelmingly powerful hero of the Golden Age.

In MFC #54 the Supernatural Sentinel tackled ‘The Spiritualist’, a murderous medium and unscrupulous charlatan who almost killed Clarice and forever ended the Spectre’s hopes for eternal rest, after which #55 introduced ‘Zor’: a ghost of far greater vintage and power, dedicated to promulgating evil on Earth. He too menaced Clarice and only the intervention of the Heavenly Voice and a quick upgrade in phantasmal power enabled The Spectre to overcome the malign menace.

More Fun Comics #56 was the first to feature Howard Sherman’s Dr. Fate on the cover but the Spectre was still the big attraction even ifÂ the merely mundane bandits and blackmailers instigating ‘Terror at Lytell’s’ were no match for the ever-inventive wrathful wraith. Far more serious was ‘The Return of Zor’ in #57, as the horrific haunt returned from beyond to frame Corrigan for murder and again endanger the girl Jim dared not loveâ€¦

An embezzler turned to murder as ‘The Arsonist’ in #58, but was no match for the cop – let alone his eldritch alter ego – whilst ‘The Fur Hi-Jackers’ actually succeeded in killing the cop yet were still brought to the Spectre’s unique brand of justice.

In #60 ‘The Menace of Xnon’ found a super-scientist using incredible inventions to frame the ghost and even menace his ethereal existence, prompting The Voice to again increase its servant’s power – this time by giving The Spectre the all-powerful Ring of Life – but not before the Ghostly Guardian had been branded Public Enemy No. 1.

With Corrigan now ordered to arrest his spectral other self on sight, #61 (another Dr. Fate cover) featured ‘The Golden Curse Deaths’ wherein prominent citizens were dying from a scientific terror with a deadly Midas Touch, after which ‘The Mad Creation of Professor Fenton’ pitted the Phantom Protector against a roving, ravaging disembodied mutant super-brainâ€¦

In #63 a kill-crazy racketeer got his just deserts in the electric chair only to return and personally execute ‘Trigger Daniels’ Death Curse’ on all who had opposed him in life. Happily The Spectre proved to be more than his match but ‘The Ghost of Elmer Watson’ was a far harder foe to face. Murdered by mobsters who had also nearly killed Corrigan’s only friend Wayne Grant, the remnant of the vengeful dead man refused to listen to The Spectre’s brand of reason and its dreadful depredations had to be dealt with in fearsome fashionâ€¦

‘Dr. Mephisto’ was a spiritualist who utilised an uncanny blue flame for crime in #65, after which the Ghostly Guardian battled horrendous monsters called forth from ‘The World Within the Paintings’ probably written by the series’ first guest writer – Gardner Fox – before Siegel returned with ‘The Incredible Robberies’ which found the phantom policeman battling deadly mystic Deeja Kathoon to the death and beyondâ€¦

With MFC #68 The Spectre finally lost his protracted cover battle to Dr. Fate even though, inside, the ‘Menace of the Dark Planet’ featured a fabulously telling tale of Earthbound Spirit against alien invasion by life-leeching Little Green Men, before in #69 ‘The Strangler’ murders led Corrigan into an improbable case with an impossible killerâ€¦

This first fearful tome terminates with issue #70 and ‘The Crimson Circle Mystery Society’ in which a sinister cult employed a merciless phantasmal psychic agent named Bandar to carry out its deadly schemesâ€¦

Still a mighty force of fun and fearful entertainment, The Spectre’s Glory Days – and Nights â€“ were waning and more credible champions were coming to the fore. He would be one of the first casualties of the post-War decline in mystery men and not be seen again until the Silver Age 1960’sâ€¦

Moreover, when he did return to comics, the previously omnipotent ghost was given strict limits and as he continued to evolve through various returns, refits and reboots The Spectre was finally transmogrified into a tormented mortal soul bonded inescapably to the actual embodiment of the biblical Wrath of God. Revamped and revived in perpetuity, revealed to be the Spirit of Vengeance wedded to a human conscience, Jim Corrigan was finally laid to rest in the 1990s and Hal (Green Lantern) Jordan replaced him. Returning to basics in recent years, the latest host is murdered Gotham City cop Crispus Allen.

They’re all worth tracking down and exhuming: spooky comic champions who have never failed to deliver an enthralling, haunted hero rollercoaster â€“ or is that Ghost Train? â€“ of thrills and chills.
Â© 1940, 1941, 2003 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

December 29, 2012December 27, 2012

Thor: Latverian Prometheus

By Kieron Gillen, Kelly Sue DeConnick, Stan Lee, Billy Tan, Ryan Stegman, David Aja & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-4372-7

In the middle of 1962, Stan Lee and Jack Kirby launched their latest offbeat superhero creation in anthology monsters-and-mysteries title Journey into Mystery #83. The taleÂ Â introduced crippled American doctor Donald Blake who took a vacation in Norway only to encounter the vanguard of an alien invasion. Fleeing in terror he was trapped in a cave wherein lay an old, gnarled walking stick. When, in helplessness and frustration, the puny human smashed the cane into a huge boulder obstructing his escape, his insignificant frame was transformed into the hulking and brawny Norse God of Thunder, Thor!

The series grew from formulaic beginnings battling aliens, commies and cheap thugs into a vast, breathtaking cosmic playground for Kirby’s burgeoning imagination with Journey into Mystery inevitably becoming the Mighty Thor where, after years of bombastic adventuring, the peculiarities and inconsistencies of the Don Blake/Thor relationship were re-examined and finally clarified to explain how the immortal godling could also be locked within frail Don Blake.

The epic saga took the immortal hero back to his long-distant youth and finally revealed that the mortal surgeon was no more than an Odinian construct designed to teach the Thunder God humility and compassionâ€¦

Time passed; Kirby left and the Thunderer’s fortunes waxed and waned. During the troubled mid-1990’s the title vanished, culled with the Avengers, Iron Man, Captain America and Fantastic Four and subcontracted out to Image creators Jim Lee and Rob Liefield during 1996-1997 in a desperate attempt to improve sales after Marvel’s apocalyptic Onslaught publishing event.

In 1998 Heroes Return and Heroes Reborn saw those properties rejoin the greater Marvel Universe, relaunched with brand new first issues with the Thunder God reappearing a few weeks later. After many phenomenal adventures the second volume concluded with issues #84-85 (November-December 2004) which once-and-for-all depicted the Really, Truly, We Mean It End of the Gods and Day of Ragnarok as Thor himself instigated the final fall to end an ceaseless cycle of suffering and destruction, ultimately defeating the ruthless beings who had manipulated the inhabitants of Asgard since time beganâ€¦

You can’t keep a profitable property down or a great comics character unresurrected, so he was reborn again as a mysterious voice summoned Thor back to life – and Earth (us fans call it Midgard) – in a crack of spectacular thunder. Revived for an unspecified purpose the solitary Lord of Asgard swiftly set about retrieving the souls of his fellow godlings, all scattered and hidden inside human hosts and set up Asgard on Earth a few paltry feet above the ground ofBroxton,Oklahomaâ€¦

As this small, simple community with some intriguing neighbours increasingly became the focus of cosmic events, newly arrived big city doctor Don Blake was corporeally merged with Thor and became the mortal host for the God of Thunderâ€¦

What you need to know: when wicked trickster god Loki orchestrated his half-brother Thor’s exile from Asgard, Balder the Brave became the latest leader of the displaced deities. However the real power was always the skulking schemer who slowly convinced the new king to relocate the population of the floating kingdom to Latveria: absolute fiefdom of malign technological tyrant Doctor Doom.

No one knew then that the trickster had long been Doom’s ally in a cabal of ultimate evilâ€¦

The Iron Dictator, adept in science and sorcery, had always been gripped by a voracious lust for power and quickly began to kidnap and vivisect his Asgardian guests, determined to divine the secrets of their immortality and powers. The clandestine campaign of terror was only exposed by Bill Junior, the mortal beloved of goddess Kelda Stormrider, who sacrificed his life to tell Balder the truth about their unctuous host.

Meanwhile in Broxton, ravening Doombots attacked and almost killed Don Blake in an attempt to destroy his Thunderous alter egoâ€¦

Collecting issues #604-606 of Thor from 2009, this grim fairytale also includes a solo story of the Prince of Asgard’s sometime paramour from the Sif one-shot and portions of the anniversary Thor #600.

The tale (by Kieron Gillen, Billy Tan & Batt) resumes here with the vengeance-crazed Kelda invading Doom’s fortress only to become his latest victim and test subject. In the Asgardian camp Balder marshals his forces to rescue his stolen subjects, unaware that Loki has prevented Thor from heeding the clarion summons. In Broxton, however, the maimed Blake has already pieced together evidence and deduced where his attackers originated with a little help from his friends in the metahuman communityâ€¦

The God of Mischief has been arrested by Balder but still schemes to save his neck and cause further hurt where he can. Dragged along as the enraged Asgardians assault Castle Doom, he witnesses the horrors the Master of Latveria has wrought when hideous technologically augmented corpses attack the besiegers at the Doctor’s imperious command. The shocking abominations swiftly gain the upper hand until a furious Thor appears and directly engages with Doom, but the battle is halted when the villain produces Kelda’s ravaged corpse and Loki gleans a way to restore her to life.

All Thor has to do is defeat Doom, invade his citadel and recover her still beating heart from the monster’s laboratoryâ€¦

Unfortunately standing in the way is the ultimate expression of the Devil Doctor’s Asgardian researches: a new and deadly iteration of science and sorcery patterned on Odin’s ultimate weaponâ€¦ the Destroyer.

As Thor battles furiously for his immortal life, Balder takes advantage of the distraction to enter Doom’s lair and grant tragic final rest to the abused remains of the subjects he so grievously failed before rescuing and restoring Keldaâ€¦

Even after the heroes have won their most inconclusive victory the diabolical duo of Loki and Doom are still at large, still unpunished and still plottingâ€¦ against each other as much as their heroic Asgardian enemiesâ€¦

This dark and brutal tome continues with ‘I am the Lady Sif’, a solo tale starring the warrior goddess Sif crafted by Kelly Sue DeConnick, Ryan Stegman, Tom Palmer & Victor Olazaba.

The war-maiden is in Broxton, recuperating and taking stock of her interminable life after an age of shame wherein Loki possessed her body and locked her soul in the withered frame of a dying mortal. The shame he brought to her reputation still burns and chokes even after she finally escaped his curseâ€¦

Although the Oklahomans are doing their best to raise her spirits, she remains downcast until old comrade Beta Ray Bill storms through the pub doors looking for Asgardian assistanceâ€¦

Bill first gained his own measure of Asgardian might when magic hammer Mjolnir deemed the Korbinite worthy and transformed the alien refugee into a warped duplicate of Thor, enabling him to save his space-faring race from a horde of demons who erased their civilisation and were implacably hunting them to extinctionâ€¦

Even after Bill, Thor, Sif and sentient starship Skuttlebutt defeated the threat and the homeless aliens voyaged on through the depths of space to some eventual Promised Land, a new insidious menace manifested and their once-trusty vessel has been possessed. Bill and his comely companion Ti Asha Ra desperately need a mighty non-Korbinite to scour the ship of its inimical infernal infestation and return hope to the remains of his race.

Just the job to perk up an ailing, down-in the-dumps sword-maidenâ€¦

Also included in this eclectic mix is a slight but pretty elegiac appreciation of the Thor canon by Stan Lee & David Aja celebrating the character’s stellar history in the manner of a lovely info-mercial, and the tome is topped off with a comedic cartoon â€œMini-Marvelsâ€ spoof ‘Welcome Back Thor’ by Chris Giarusso.

Dark, brooding and ferocious, this is a cosmic Costumed Drama that will enthral and delight fans of both comicbook and filmic iterations.
Â© 2009, 2010 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

December 28, 2012December 27, 2012

Showcase Presents Superman Family volume 2

By Otto Binder, Curt Swan, Kurt Schaffenberger & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-84576-812-4

During the 1950s and early 1960s in America, being different was a bad thing. Conformity was sacrosanct, even in comicbooks, and everybody and thing was meant to keep to its assigned and intended role.

For the Superman family and cast that meant a highly strictured code of conduct and parameters: Daily Planet Editor Perry White was a stern, shouty elder statesman with a heart of gold, Cub Reporter Jimmy Olsen was a brave and impulsive, unseasoned fool â€“ with a heart of gold – and plucky News-hen Lois Lane was brash, nosy, impetuous and unscrupulous in her obsession to marry Superman although she too was – deep down – another possessor of an Auric aorta.

Yet somehow even with these mandates in place the talented writers and artists assigned to detail their wholesomely uncanny exploits managed to craft tales both beguiling and breathtakingly memorable and usually as funny as they were exciting.

This second cunningly combined chronologically complete compendium collects the affable, all-ages tales from Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen #23-34 (September 1957-January 1959), Lois’s second tryout issueÂ from Showcase #10 (September/October 1957) as well as Superman’s Girlfriend Lois Lane #1-7 (March/April 1958-February 1959) and promptly commences with the Man of Steel’s Go-To Guy and the three tales which comprised issue #23 of his solo title, illustrated as almost always by the wonderful Curt Swan & Ray Burnley. ‘Jimmy Olsen’s Two Super-Pals’ was the first of three scripts by the irrepressible Otto Binder and described how our lad gained an other-dimensional Genie as another faithful Super-Friend. Of course with sinister radium bandits plaguing Metropolis there was more to the cosmic companion than met the eyeâ€¦

This was followed by ‘Jimmy Olsen, the Bearded Boy’ wherein boastful hubris and a magic potion inflicted runaway whiskers on many Daily Planet staff â€“ even ClarkKent â€“ prompting many face-saving secret feats from the identity conscious Man of Tomorrow. As Jimmy’s series progressed, one of the most popular plot-themes (and most fondly remembered and referenced today by most Baby-Boomer fans) was the unlucky lad’s appalling talent for being warped, mutated and physically manipulated by fate, aliens, magic, mad science and even his friendsâ€¦ a fate which frequently befell Lois too although Jimmy got a lot less marriage proposals from aliens, murderers of monstersâ€¦

The boy’s bits then concluded with ‘The Adventures of Private Olsen’ wherein the Cub Reporter was assigned to write articles on Army life and – with Superman’s assistance – taught an unscrupulous drill sergeant a much-needed lessonâ€¦

When Lois Lane – arguably the oldest supporting character/star in the Superman mythology if not DC universe – finally received her own shot at a solo title, it was very much on the terms of the times. I must shamefacedly admit to a deep, nostalgic affection for her bright and breezy, fantastically fun adventures, but as a free-thinking, (nominally) adult liberal of the 21^st century I’m often simultaneously shocked nowadays at the jolly, patronising, patriarchally misogynistic attitudes underpinning too many of the stories.

Yes, I’m fully aware that the series was intended for young readers at a time when â€œdizzy damesâ€ like Lucille Ball or Doris Day played to the popular American gestalt stereotype of Woman as jealous minx, silly goose, diffident wife and brood-hungry nester, but to ask kids to seriously accept that intelligent, courageous, ambitious, ethical and highly capable females would drop everything they’d worked hard for to lie, cheat, inveigle, manipulate and entrap a man just so that they could cook pot-roast and change super-diapers is just plain crazy and tantamount to child abuse. They’re great, great comics but stillâ€¦

I’m just sayingâ€¦

Showcase #10 (September/October 1957) was the second and final try-out appearance – all illustrated by Wayne Boring & Stan Kaye – for Superman’s Girlfriend, Lois Lane and opened with ‘The Jilting of Superman’ by Binder, wherein the Action Ace almost fell for a most ancient ploy when Lois pretended to marry another man to make the alien oaf realise what she meant to himâ€¦

‘The Sightless Lois Lane’ written by Jerry Coleman told how a nuclear accident temporarily blinded the journalist, and how her sudden, unexpected recovery almost exposed Clark Kent‘s secret when he callously changed to Superman in front of the â€œsightlessâ€ lass, after which Binder delightfully detailed the contents of ‘The Forbidden Box from Krypton’: a cache of devices dug up by a Smallville archaeologist originally packed by Jor-El and intended to aid the infant Superbaby on Earth. Of course when Lois opened the chest all she saw was a way to become as powerful as the Man of Steel and soon became addicted to being a super-champion in her own rightâ€¦

The Jaded Journo launched into her own title scant months later, clearly offering exactly what the reading public wantedâ€¦

Jimmy Olsen #24 featured another trio of top tales from Binder, Swan & Burnley beginning with ‘The Superman Hall of Trophies’ which found a Kryptonite-paralysed Metropolis Marvel trapped in a museum and rescued by the brave boy reporter, whilst ‘The Gorilla Reporter’ saw the poor sap briefly brain-swapped with a mighty (confused) Great Ape before Superman again had to divert attention from his exposure-threatened alter ego by convincing the world at large that Jimmy was ‘The Luckiest Boy in the World’â€¦

Issue #25 as ever by Binder, Swan & Burnley, featured ‘The Secret of the Superman Dummies’ wherein a trip to a magic show resulted in Jimmy being inescapably handcuffed to the last man in the world Superman dared to approach, ‘The Second Superboy’ saw the poor kid accidentally rocketed to an alien world where he gained incredible abilities – courtesy of resident absent-minded genius Professor Potter – and ‘The Day There Was No Jimmy Olsen’ offered a tantalising hoax and mystery which ended with an unexpected promotion for the pluckily ingenious boyâ€¦

He began #26 subjected to inexplicable bouts of deadly mass fluctuations as ‘The World’s ‘Heavyweight’ Champ’ before the newly appointed ‘Jimmy Olsen, Foreign Correspondent’ uncovered a sinister scheme to defraud the Ruritanian Kingdom of Hoxana.Â Back home however he had to again undergo a well-intentioned con from his best pal after he saw Clark flying and subsequently – inadvertently – himself became ‘The Birdboy of Metropolis’â€¦

Superman’s Girlfriend Lois Lane #1 (March/April #1958) at last arrived sporting three stunning yarns illustrated by sleek, slick Kurt Schaffenberger whose distinctive art-style would quickly become synonymous with the reporter. Everything kicked off with ‘The Bombshell of the Boulevards’ (scripted by Leo Dorfman) wherein she donned a blonde wig to deceitfully secure aHollywood interview and soon provoked a death-duel between rival enflamed suitors. Of course it was only another scheme by Superman and Jimmy to teach her a lesson in journalistic ethics. Good thing reporters are so much less unscrupulous these daysâ€¦

During this Silver Age period with Superman a solid gold sensation of the newly ascendant television phenomenon, many stories were draped in the wholesome trappings of Tinseltown – even more so than most of celebrity-obsessed America. It didn’t hurt that editor Whitney Ellsworth was a part-time screenwriter, script editor and producer as well as National DC’sHollywood point man.

Otto Binder then reunited with his old Captain Marvel collaborator for ‘Lois Lane, Super-Chef’ as Lois disastrously tried to master home cooking in her latest scheme to get the Man of Steel to propose, whilst in ‘The Witch of Metropolis’ a science assignment went horrifically awry and transformed her into a wizened old hag every time the sun setâ€¦

JO #27 opened with ‘The Boy from Mars’ wherein the reporter got his own lesson in integrity after trying to create a circulation-boosting hoax, and another in the perils of pride and over-confidence after messing up ‘A Date with Miss Metropolis’ before the issue ended with a riotous battle with his own evil duplicate after Professor Potter accidentally created ‘The Outlaw Jimmy Olsen’: all courtesy of Binder, Swan & Burnley.

Ever so slowly a more mature tone was developing in the Cub’s adventures. In #28’s ‘The Spendthrift and the Miser’ an alien gift from Superman caused wildly manic mood swings whilst an accidental time-trip impossibly revealed that Jimmy was destined to become ‘The Boy who Killed Superman’ whilst in ‘The Human Skyscraper’ another botched Potter product enlarged the kid to monumental, city-endangering size.

In the second Lois Lanecomicbook she was apparently appalled to uncover ‘Superman’s Secret Sweetheart’ (uncredited here but possibly Bill Finger?), but was in fact on her very best mettle helping a bullied college girl fight back against her mean sorority sisters, after which Binder recounted how Tinseltown improbably called and the reporter became â€“ eventually – an extremely high maintenance actress in ‘Lois Lane in Hollywood’â€¦

‘Superman’s Forbidden Room’ then closed proceedings with a cruel hoax playing on her well-publicised infatuation, but this time it wasn’t the Man of Tomorrow doing the fooling and the stakes had never been higher in a moody thriller illustrated by Boring & Kaye and probably written by Jerry Coleman.

In Jimmy Olsen #29 the usually adept reporter hit a monumental writer’s block whilst working on a novel, but ‘The Superman Book that Couldn’t be Finished’ eventually was – with a little hands-on Kryptonian help – whilst in ‘Jimmy Olsen’s Super-Pet’ the Cub Reporter was adopted by super-hound Krypto in his twilight years – and was instrumental in rejuvenating the Dog of Steel for a new generation. ‘The Amazing Spectacles of Doctor X’ then ended the issue with a clever thriller as Jimmy appropriated goggles which could see the future and glimpsed something he wished he hadn’tâ€¦

‘The Rainbow Superman’ by Binder & Schaffenberger, opened Lois Lane #3 and saw the News-hen at her very worst as a cosmic accident made the Man of Tomorrow an ambulatory spectrum and she set about trying to see if Clark too glowed, whilst ‘The Man who was Clark Kent’s Double’ (scripted by Coleman, as was the final tale here) broke her heart after she again proved too nosy for her own good. ‘Lois Lane and the Babe of Steel’ then gave her a terrifying glimpse of her dreams come true when Superman traded temporal places with his toddler self and caused all manner of problems for the capable bacheloretteâ€¦

In JO #30 ‘The Son of Superman’, Binder, Swan & Burnley jerked our tears when an attempt by the Kryptonian to adopt the reporter went tragically wrong after which they proved equally adept at creating mystery and tension as criminals schemed to destroy Jimmy by making him ‘The Cub who Cried Wolf’. ‘Superman’s Greatest Enemy’ – with Dick Sprang standing in for Curt Swan – then revealed how the naÃ¯ve lad fell for a crook’s scam but had enough smarts to turn the tablesâ€¦

Binder & Schaffenberger opened LL #4 with a well-meaning Jimmy using hypnotism to get Clark to propose to Lois, utterly unaware who he was actually using those gimmicks on, catastrophically leading to ‘The Super-Courtship of Lois Lane’â€¦

Times have changed, but when Coleman scripted ‘Lois Lane, Working Girl’ he was simply referring to her being challenged to undertake a job in manual labour, so shame on you. Alvin Schwartz then crafted a canny conundrum in ‘Annie Oakley Gets her (Super)man’ for Boring & Kaye to illustrate, as a riding accident out West caused Lois to believe she was the legendary cowgirl sharpshooter whilst hunting some very nasty gangsters with very real gunsâ€¦

Jimmy Olsen #31 highlighted the now mythic tale of ‘The E-L-A-S-T-I-C Lad’ (Binder, Swan & Burnley) wherein Superman was ultimately responsible for the reporter gaining stretching powers after leaving a chest of alien artefacts with the nosy, accident-prone kid, whilst in ‘The Mad Hatter of Metropolis’ the power of suggestion convinced the kid that he could imitate the feats of famous folks simply by donning their characteristic chapeaus before ‘The Boy who Hoaxed Superman’ saw the lad attempt to get a pay raise by pretending to leave for the future. It didn’t work, and everybody seemed to prefer the replacement Perry hired who was, of course, Jimmy in disguiseâ€¦

In #32 Professor Potter’s latest chemical concoction made Jimmy look like Pinocchio but did give him ‘The Super Nose for News’ whilst an uncanny concatenation of crazy circumstances turned the sensibly staid Man of Tomorrow into ‘The Rock ‘n’ Roll Superman’ every time the reporter masquerading as a pop star twanged his old guitar, and ‘The Jimmy Olsen from Jupiter’ (by Alvin Schwartz) revealed how aliens mutated the Cub Reporter into one of their scaly selves, complete with extremely useful mind-reading abilities, much to Superman’s chagrinâ€¦

‘Superman’s Greatest Sacrifice’ by Robert Bernstein & Schaffenberger led in Lois Lane #5, as the journalist met her millionaire double and seemingly lost her beloved Metropolis Marvel to her, whilst in ‘The Girl of 100 Costumes’ the canny lass tried to use a myriad of new looks to catch his attention, in an uncredited story drawn by Al Plastino. It was back to silly usual in Binder & Schaffenberger’s ‘The Fattest Girl in Metropolis’; Â a plant growth ray accidentally super-sized the vain but valiant reporter. Imagine her reaction when she found out that Superman had deliberately expanded her dimensionsâ€¦ for good and solid reasons, of courseâ€¦

Binder, Swan & Burnley were in sparkling form in JO #33, starting with ‘Legends that Came to Life’, wherein a nuclear accident animated the strangest foes from fairytales and only Jimmy, not his mighty mentor, could save the day, whilst in ‘The Lady-Killer from Metropolis’ a classic case of boyish arrogance and girlish gossip led to the boy reporter briefly becoming the sexiest thing in Hollywood. The horror and hilarity was capped with ‘The Human Flame-Thrower!’ as Potter’s latest experiment caused Jimmy the worst case of high-octane halitosis in historyâ€¦

Coleman, Boring & Kaye opened LL #6 with ‘The Amazing Superman Junior’ as yet another attempt to teach Lois a lesson backfired on the pompous Man of Steel and she brought in a mysterious kid to show the Kryptonian what it felt likeâ€¦

This was followed by a brace of tales by Bill Finger & Schaffenberger, starting with ‘Lois Laneâ€¦ Convict’ which saw seemingly saw the reporter take a bribe from gangster Baldy Pate and pay a terrible price, whilst in ‘Lieutenant Lois Lane, U.S. Army’ she and Clark joined the military for a story only to have the – temporary – rank turn her into a man-hating bully. Surely some mistake, noâ€¦?

‘Superman’s Pal of Steel’ by Binder, Swan & Burnley, opened the last Jimmy Olsen issue in this marvellous monochrome collection as another secret identity-preserving scheme took a bizarre turn after the boy reporter genuinely gained an incredible power. Alvin Schwartz then wrote ‘The Underworld Journal’ which saw the kid inherit his own newspaper and swiftly go off the journalistic rails before Potter’s newest invention turned Jimmy’s clunky old kit into ‘The Most Amazing Camera in the World’ (Binder) â€“ and a deadly danger to Superman’s greatest secretâ€¦

Superman’s Girlfriend Lois Lane #7 closes out this volume with three more mixed-message masterpieces beginning with ‘Lois Lane’s Kiss of Death’ (by Bernstein & Schaffenberger), wherein a canny conman tried to fool the reporter into botching her biggest crime exposÃ©. Schwartz then had Lois use hypnotism to wash her heroic obsession out of her mind in ‘When Lois Lane Forgot Superman’.

Illustrated by Boring & Kaye, the tale took an unlikely turn when she then turned her passionate, unfulfilled attentions on poor Clark, after which Lana Lang fully entered the Man of Steel’s modern mythology. When Lois took in the destitute, down-at-heel lass who once held the Boy of Steel’s heart, she seemingly allowed her to also become ‘The Girl who Stole Superman’ in a tense and clever tale from Coleman and Schaffenbergerâ€¦

These spin-off support series were highly popular top-sellers for more than two decades; blending action, adventure, broad, wacky comedy, fantasy and science fiction in the gently addictive manner scripter Binder and artist Schaffenberger had perfected at Fawcett Comics on the magnificent Marvel Family.

As well as containing some of the most delightful episodes of the pre angst-drenched, cosmically catastrophic DC, these fun, thrilling and yes, occasionally deeply moving, all-ages stories also perfectly depict the changing mores and tastes which reshaped comics from the safe 1950s to the seditious, rebellious 1970s, all the while keeping to the prime directive of the industry – â€œkeep them entertained and keep them wanting moreâ€.

December 27, 2012December 24, 2012

Avengers Academy: Arcade â€“ Death Game

By Paul Tobin, Terry Kavanagh, Chris Claremont, David Baldeon, Chris Marrinan, Michael Nasser, Rich Buckler & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-5630-7

Whilst acting as America’s Chief of Metahuman Affairs Norman Osborn grotesquely abused his position. One of his various nefarious projects was locating and conditioning young ultra-empowered individuals with the intention of creating an army of lethal freaks utterly subservient to his will.

When the former Green Goblin was finally brought to book this most secret initiative was exposed and the kidnapped, psychologically warped, technologically abused kids were taken into safekeeping by The Avengers.

The traumatised and potentially lethal teens became their responsibility and the weary warriors decided to teach the surviving lab rats how to be heroes before they could fall into being monsters and villainsâ€¦

Arcade, on the other hand, was a spoiled trust-fund brat who discovered a talent for invention and a psychotic passion for flamboyant assassination when his unfortunate father cut him off. The malignant patricide then turned his new hobby into an obsessive life-long game of death for profitâ€¦

Arcade – Death Game collects the story from Avengers Academy King Size #1 and also offers two earlier appearances of the mirthful Master of Mechanistic Mayhem from Spider-Man #25 and Marvel Team-Up volume 1 #89.

When Avengers-in-training Humberto Lopez AKA Reptil, Madeline â€œVeilâ€ Berry, Jeanne Foucault, the polymath phenomenon dubbed Finesse, and human dynamo Striker – who much prefers his stage name and persona to being ordinary Brandon Sharpe – were given a rare day off. Temporarily freed from crushing classes, the kids are let loose in New York City but are quickly targeted by the baroque bad guy, desperate to reclaim his formerly fearsome reputation by killing a few superheroes. Always ambitious,Arcade has simultaneously set up to assassinate not only the proto-Avengers but also another squad of kid crusadersâ€¦

The Young Allies are Spider-Girl (Latina Anya Sofia Corazon, formerly arachnoid avenger AraÃ±a), super-strong Toro AKA bovine metamorph Benito Serrano and relative child-hero veteran Firestar. Â This trio of unsupervised titanic teens also fall into Arcade’s Machiavellian clutches when the maniac unleashes a deceptively devilish division of robot duplicates to deliver the meta kids to his latest deadly theme-park of terrorâ€¦

Happily the crazed contract killer had completely underestimated the intelligence of Reptil and sheer bloody determination of Spider-Girl, so it wasn’t long before all the junior heroes were loose and really, really peevedâ€¦

This fun and furious frolic from Paul Tobin, David Baldeon & Jordi Tarragona is then followed by ‘Why Me?’ (Spider-Man #25, August 1992) by Terry Kavanagh, Chris Marrinan & Chris Stegbauer: a rather slight interlude in which the Wondrous Wall-crawler scurries over to England to meet with old pal Captain Britain and gets suckered into a virtual reality war against mutant superteam Excalibur – all courtesy of the malevolently manipulative Arcade â€“ who had once again bitten off far more than he could chewâ€¦

‘Shootout over Centre Ring’ by Chris Claremont, Michael Nasser, Rich Buckler & Josef Rubinstein is a far better tale, first seen in Marvel Team-Up #89 (January 1980) and revealing how the web-spinner and X-Man Nightcrawler were propelled into an acrobatic alliance after an unscrupulous Texan millionaire showman from the mutant’s circus past resurfaces with a plan to assassinate Spider-Man as a publicity stunt.

Amos Jardine had originally hired Arcade but later went with a lower bid from hitman Cutthroat, consequently discovering that the only thing the Grinning Gamesman hated more than costumed crusaders was a welcherâ€¦

Classic Fights ‘n’ Tights action and lots of bizarre laughs distinguish this engaging piece of all-action eye-candy, and this collection also includes a cover gallery by Ed McGuinness, Chris Samnee, Matthew Wilson, Mark Bagley, Al Milgrom, Buckler & Rubinstein, plus pencils, layouts and sketches by McGuinness, Samnee and Baldeon and a handy prose profile of the eponymous assassin himselfâ€¦
Â© 1980, 1992, 2011 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

December 26, 2012December 23, 2012

Fantastic Annuals 1968, 1969, 1970

By various (Odhams)
No ISBNs

Fantastic was the flagship of the â€œPower Comicsâ€ sub-brand used by Odhams to differentiate those periodicals which contained reprinted American superhero material from the company’s regular blend of sports, war, western and adventure comics. During the mid-1960s these captivating ubiquitous British weeklies did much to popularise the budding Marvel characters and universe in this country. With its sister paper Terrific the comic was notable for not reformatting or resizing the original artwork. In Wham!, Pow! and Smash! an entire 24 page adventure could be squeezed into 10 or 11 pages over two weeksâ€¦

However, although the all-action comic featured Thor, Iron Man and the X-Men in chronological tales (with a few gags and a UK generated adventure feature), the annuals were a far more exotic and intriguing mixed bag…

The 1968 book – released in December 1967 – opens with the full-colour Thor thriller ‘When Magneto Strikes!’ (by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby & Chic Stone from Journey into Mystery #109, October 1964) recounting a blistering battle beneath the sea between the Thunder God and mutant master of Magnetism before plunging on after with the home-produced fantasy adventure ‘The Temple of Zentaca’ wherein a two explorer pals, their dog and a handy super-rifle foil a plot by a manic mad scientist in a cunning, anonymous yarn probably illustrated by the great Luis Bermejo Rojo.

After a rather bland and uncredited science fiction prose vignette ‘The Fugitives’ the Annual lapses into traditional two tone mode (red and black) and offers a Marvel monster yarn ‘The Man Who Hated Monstro!’ (from Journey into Mystery #92, May 1963 by Stan Lee, Larry Lieber & Paul Reinman) before launching into the bombastic ‘Beware of the Blob!’ (X-Men #3 1963, Lee, Kirby & Reinman) wherein the mutant teens tackle an immovable human mountain and his evil carnival, followed by a magical Stan Lee/Steve Ditko sci fi yarn ‘I Used to beâ€¦ Human!’ â€¦also taken from JiM #92.

‘Colossus!’ is another British weird mystery saga illustrated by European master JosÃ© Ortiz Moya, with a young man obtaining ultimate vengeance for the murder of his father by animating a giant stone statueâ€¦

Full colour is restored for the prose short ‘The Invaders’ and the book closes with the captivating Lee/Robert Bernstein/Kirby classic ‘Iron Man vs Doctor Strange!’ (or ‘The Stronghold of Doctor Strange!’ as it originally was: a mad scientist who paved the way for the later Master of the Mystic Arts and whose one-and-only appearance was in Tales of Suspense #41, May 1963).

This fabulous collection blew me away Christmas morning and still makes my weary pulse race todayâ€¦

One year later the magic resumed with Fantastic Annual 1969, which began with a beautiful double-page painted frontispiece featuring the entire heroic pantheon contained therein before the X-Men battled artificially enhanced giant insects in ‘The Plague of the Locust!’ (from X-Men #24, September 1966, by Roy Thomas, Werner Roth & Dick Ayers) after which ‘Miniman the Incredible Crusader’ debuted in a spectacular clash with insane roboticist Dr. Tome; another uncredited fantasy thriller illustrated by a tantalisingly familiar artist tragically unknown to meâ€¦

With talk of moonshots in the air the ‘Conquest of Space’ was an inevitable but endearing text feature, followed by the red and black section which kicked off with folksy fantasy masterpiece ‘Humans Keep Out!’ (Journey into Mystery #86, November 1962) by Stan Lee and the marvellous Don Heck, who also illustrated the untitled Iron Man thriller which followed, pitting the Armoured Avenger against the wicked Count Nefaria and invaders from the Moon.

(For your peace of mind the story was originally entitled ‘If a Man be Mad!’, scripted by Al Hartley and inked by Mike Esposito from Tales of Suspense #68, August 1965).

After another ‘Conquest of Space’ page ‘All About Iron Man’ reprinted a selection of fact pages and pin-ups disclosing the technical secrets of old Shellhead, whilst ‘The Mighty Thor Battles the Incredible Hulk!’ (Lee, Kirby & Chic Stone from Journey into Mystery #112, January 1965) gave us one of the very best frantic fight-fests in Marvel’s entire history before Lee & Ditko leavened the mood with a classy time travel thriller ‘Prophet of Doom!’ (from Tales of Suspense #40, April 1963) whilst Lee & Sol Brodsky shone light on the incredible unknown with ‘Mr. Flubb’s Torch’ (originally the more euphonius â€œFlashlightâ€ in the October 1963 ToS #46)â€¦

After one final ‘Conquest of Space’ full colour was restablished and this year’s model concluded with a magnificent adventure of home-grown superman Johnny Future who travelled to the end of the universe to defeat the invincible Disastro in a stunning tale probably scripted by Alf Wallace and illustrated by the inimitable Luis Bermejo.

Fantastic Annual 1970 saw the end of the era. Interest in superheroes and fantasy in general were on the wane and British weeklies were gradually switching back to war and sports stories. This was one of the last Odhams Christmas compendiums to feature imported Marvel material: from then on the Americans would handle their own Seasonal books rather than franchise out their classics to mingle with the Empire’s motley, anarchic rabble.

The frantic fun started in full colour with the contents of X-Men #40, January 1968, by Roy Thomas, Don Heck & Dick Ayers, wherein the merry mutants tracked down an alien robot Frankenstein in ‘The Mark of the Monster!’ after which the switch to red and black synchronised with ‘The Fantastic Origin of Doctor Doom!’ – a genuine Marvel Masterwork by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby & Chic Stone from Fantastic Four Annual #2, September 1964, which revealed the pride and folly which shaped one of the greatest villains in comics.

‘The Haunted House!’ (or ‘I Speak of the Haunted House’ from Tales of Suspense #42, June 1963) is a splendid example of Lee and Ditko at their light-hearted best, whilst Thor displayed his warrior acumen battling ‘The Evil of Loki!’ in a severely edited, almost truncated reprint of ‘The Day Loki Stole Thor’s Magic Hammer!’ (Lee, Robert Bernstein & Joe Sinnott from Journey into Mystery #92, May 1963). At least it was in full colour, as was the group pin-up page featuring the Thunder God, the X-Men and Iron Man traced off by a Power Comics art junior – possible Steve Parkhouse or Barry (Windsor) Smith – after which the two colour printing returns as the Armoured Avenger is ‘Suspected of Murder!’

The supposed victim was, of course, his own alter-ego Tony Stark in this tense, guest-star studded yarn by Lee, Heck & Dick Ayers (from Tales of Suspense #60, December 1964) after which ‘The March of the Steelmen’ offered another excellent but uncredited science fiction thriller, pitting a brace of upstanding British researchers against an uncanny invasion of unstoppable metallic warriors from a sub-atomic worldâ€¦

The final tale, in full colour, introduces another indomitable domestic hero as ‘Matt Marvel – Lawman of the Future’ pitted all his incredible resources against maddest of scientists Doctor Merlin in a mind-boggling battle of wits and wiles with the world at stake…

These stunningly more-ish collections are mostly tasty treats for we backward-looking baby-boomers, but even though the Marvel material has been reprinted ad infinitum, there’s still a wealth of excellent and intriguing home-made heroic action going begging here, and it’s long past due for some enterprising publisher to gather all that quirky British invention into a modern compendium of weird warriors and wonders.

Anybody here tempted by a new/old UK Action Forceâ€¦?
Â© 1969 Hamlyn Publishing Group Limited. Selected material Â© Marvel Comics Group (1963, 1964) 1969.

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