Author: NowReadThis

Posted on

Modesty Blaise: The Green Eyed Monster


By Peter O’Donnell & Enrique “Enric” Badía Romero (Titan Books)
ISBN: 978-1840238662 (Album PB)

Spanish artist Romero was a familiar presence for generations of British comics and newspaper strip readers. He died on February 15th this year with most of his work out of print and nigh forgotten. Here are two reasons why that’s not right and should be rectified as soon as possible.

Infallible super-criminals Modesty Blaise and her lethally charming, compulsively platonic, equally adept partner Willie Garvin gained fearsome reputations whilst heading underworld gang The Network. At the height of their power, they retired young, rich and still healthy. With honour intact and hands relatively clean, they cut themselves off completely from careers where they made all the money they would ever need and far too many enemies: a situation exacerbated by their heartfelt and – for their calling – controversial conviction that killing was only ever to be used as a last resort.

When devious British Spymaster Sir Gerald Tarrant sought them out, they were slowly dying of boredom in England. That wily old bird offered them a chance to get back into harness, have fun and do some good in the world. They jumped at his offer and began cleaning up society’s dregs in their own unique manner. That self-appointed crusade took decades…

From that tenuous beginning the dynamite duo went on to crush the world’s vilest villains and most macabre monsters in a succession of tensely suspenseful, inspirational action thrillers over more than half a century. The inseparable associates debuted in The Evening Standard on 13th May 1963 and, over passing decades, starred in some of the world’s most memorable crime fiction, in approximately three panels a day.

Creators Peter O’Donnell & Jim Holdaway (who previously collaborated on Romeo Brown – another lost strip classic equally as deserving of its own archive albums) crafted a timeless treasure trove of potent pictorial escapades until the illustrator’s tragic early death in 1970, whereupon Spanish artist Enrique “Enric” Badía Romero (and also occasionally John Burns, Neville Colvin & Pat Wright) assumed art duties, taking the partners-in-peril to even greater heights.

The series was syndicated world-wide and Modesty starred in prose novels and short-story collections, several films, a TV pilot, radio play, original American graphic novel from DC, an audio serial on BBC Radio 4 as well as nearly 100 comic adventures. The strip’s conclusion came on 11th April 2001 in The Evening Standard. Many papers around the world immediately began running reprints and further new cases were conceived, but British newspaper readers never saw them. We’re still waiting…

The pair’s astounding exploits comprise a broad blend of hip adventuring, glamorous lifestyle and cool capers: a melange of international espionage, crime and even plausibly intriguing sci fi/supernaturally-tinged horror fare, with ever-unflappable Modesty & Willie canny, deadly, yet all-too-fallibly-human defenders of the helpless and avengers of the wronged…

We have Titan Books to thank for collecting the saga of Britain’s Greatest Action Hero (Women’s Division), although they haven’t done so for a while now…

This volume was the first to feature Romero as sole artistic hand, following the unexpected death of Holdaway partway through ‘The Warlords of Phoenix’. To ease him into the job author O’Donnell was asked to write a lighter tale to follow up the epic. ‘Willie the Djinn’ plays well to the new artist’s strengths, and although there are echoes of a previous O’Donnell &Holdaway Romeo Brown romp, this tale of kidnapped dancing girls, oil sheikhs and military coups is a short, sweet treat, and change of pace to the usual storm of murder, intrigue and revenge.

Those elements return in ‘Green-Eyed Monster’ as the spoiled and obnoxious daughter of a British ambassador is kidnapped by South American rebels. Modesty & Willie must use all their skills to get her out of the terrorists’ clutches, escape deadly jungles and resist the overwhelming temptation to kill her themselves….

‘Death of a Jester’ closes out the volume as our antiheroes stumble across a bizarre murder that leads to another job for British spymaster Sir Gerald Tarrant. A man in Jester’s garb is impaled by a knight’s lance and thrown to lions in a caper revolving around Mediaeval Re-enactments, a band of bored and dangerous British ex-commandos and the impossible theft of the Navy’s latest super torpedo.

The infectious whimsy of the early 1970s was becoming increasingly present but under the strictly controlled conditions of prolific, ingenious O’Donnell and sleek slick Romero, Blaise & Garvin grew in stature and accomplishments to carve out a well-deserved reputation for excellence in these magnificent tales of modern adventure. Certified Gold. So bring them back please…
© 2005 Associated Newspapers/Solo Syndication.

Posted on

Marie Curie – The Radium Fairy


By Chantal Montellier & Renaud Huynh translated by Lara Vergnaud (Europe Comics)
No ISBN: digital-only publication

I’ve waited ages (well, since March 2017, but I’m old and joyless and my days are clearly pretty limited now) for this superb book to be picked up by a print publisher, but now I’m just going to plug it again it anyway and assume that as you’re reading this on a computer, you can make the leap to seeing comics that way too.

And yes, I know all about the smell and feel of proper books. I feel that way too, but we’re killing more trees than we need to. Just think of it as portable fun you can’t crumple or rip…

Originally released across Europe in 2011, Marie Curie La Fée du Radium was produced in collaboration with the Curie Museum and the Cité des sciences et del ’industrie (part of Universcience), with educator, illustrator and bande dessinée creator Chantal Montellier (Odile et les crocodiles, Les Damnés de Nantes).

The book summarises and dramatizes via graphic narrative a most astounding life, prior to research scientist, educator and museum curator Renaud Huynh’s (La fantastique histoire du radium) extensive and copious Timeline which traces the triumphs, tribulations and legacy of Marie Sklodowska-Curie (1867-1934): thus far the only woman to win two Nobel Prizes.

The critical comics component kicks off in Stockholm on September 4th as aging Marie Curie works on a speech; preparing to receive that second cherished accolade. Thinking back, she pictures her departed husband Pierre Curie. Their joint isolation of the element they named Polonium after her place of birth was a grand achievement but doesn’t make up for her years of struggle for acceptance or his tragic accidental death so early in their marriage…

And so, briefly, concisely and sans fanfare unfolds a true tale of brilliance applied, adversity overcome and persistence rewarded. Today, Curie is credited with adding two elements to the Periodic Table – Radium was the other one – and venerated for her unceasing researches. She was also the first woman allowed to teach at the prestigious Sorbonne, but for much of her life had to overcome entrenched patriarchal attitudes and oppression whilst being vilified in the media and by wider society for her “scandalous” personal life… and generally just for being an uppity female who didn’t know her place.

Isn’t it great how much everything has changed since then? (I am of course waiting for my own Nobel for the isolation of Sarcastium…)

This small but powerful digital-only tome concludes with that large and detailed Timeline. Huynh’s pictorial essay is packed with photographic illustrations, cartoons and clippings combining to encapsulate and clarify Curie’s life and achievements. It is all deconstructed and précised in chapters entitled ‘1867/1895 Warsaw-Paris’, ‘1896/1905 A Scientific Dream’, ‘1906/1911 Hardships and Success’, ‘1912/1921 The Radium Institute’ and ‘1922/1934: An International Figure’, before concluding with an ‘Epilogue’ revealing how 60 years after her death, Marie Curie’s ashes were transferred to the Pantheon (resting place of the nation’s greatest citizens). She was the first woman to be accorded this honour based solely on her own merits…

Making learning fun, Marie Curie – The Radium Fairy is a potent and powerful inspiration, venerating one of history’s most dedicated scientists: one every youngster of any age should know.
© 2016 – DUPUIS – Chantal Montellier & Renaud Huynh. All rights reserved.

Posted on

Supergirl: The Silver Age volume 1


By Otto Binder, Al Plastino, Jerry Seigel, Jim Mooney & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-7292-0 (TPB/Digital edition)

Superhero comics seldom do sweet or charming anymore. Narrative focus nowadays concentrates on turmoil, angst and spectacle and – although there’s nothing intrinsically wrong with that – sometimes the palate just craves a different flavour.

Such was not always the case as this superb compendium of the early career of Superman’s cousin Kara Zor-El of Argo City – gathering material from Action Comics #252-284 and spanning May 1959-January 1962 – joyously proves. Also included to kick off proceedings is the delightful DC House Ad advertising the imminent arrival of a new “Girl of Steel”. Sadly missing, however, is the try-out story ‘The Three Magic Wishes’ – written by Otto Binder and illustrated by Dick Sprang & Stan Kaye from Superman #123, August 1958 – which told how a mystic totem briefly conjured up a young girl with super powers as one of three wishes made by Jimmy Olsen. Such was the reaction to the plucky distaff hero that within a year a new version was introduced to the Superman Family…

Here, then, the drama commences with ‘The Supergirl from Krypton!’, the third story from Action Comics #252 introducing Superman’s cousin Kara, who had been born on a city-sized fragment of Krypton, which was somehow hurled intact into space when the planet exploded. Eventually Argo City turned to Kryptonite like the rest of the giant world’s debris, and Kara’s dying parents, having observed Earth through their scanners and scopes, sent their daughter to safety as they perished.

Crashing on Earth, she is met by Superman who creates the cover-identity of Linda Lee whilst hiding her in an orphanage in small town Midvale allowing her to learn about her new world and powers in secrecy and safety. This groundbreaking tale was also written by Binder and drawn by the hugely talented Al Plastino.

Once the formula was established Supergirl became a regular feature in Action Comics (starting with #253), a residency that lasted until 1969 when she graduated to the lead spot in Adventure Comics. In ‘The Secret of the Super-Orphan!’, at her new orphanage home she makes the acquaintance of fellow orphan Dick Wilson (eventually Malverne) who would become her personal gadfly (much as the early Lois Lane was to Superman), a recurring romantic entanglement who suspects she has a secret. As a young girl in far less egalitarian times, romance featured heavily in our neophyte star’s thoughts and she frequently met other potential boyfriends: including alien heroes and even a Merboy from Atlantis.

Many early tales involved keeping her presence concealed, even whilst performing super-feats. Jim Mooney became regular artist as Binder remained chief scripter for the early run. In Action #254’s ‘Supergirl’s Foster-Parents!’ sees an unscrupulous couple of con-artists easily foiled, after which Linda meets a mystery DC hero when ‘Supergirl Visits the 21st Century!’ in #255. Her secret is nearly exposed in ‘The Great Supergirl Mirage!’ before she grants ‘The Three Magic Wishes!’ to despondent youngsters and teaches a mean bully a much-needed lesson.

The Man of Steel often came off rather poorly when dealing with women in those far less enlightened days, always under the guise of “teaching a much-needed lesson” or “testing” someone. When she ignores his secrecy decree by playing with super dog Krypto, cousin Kal-El banishes the lonely young heroine to an asteroid in ‘Supergirl’s Farewell to Earth!’ but of course there’s paternalistic method in the madness…

‘The Cave-Girl of Steel!’ sees her voyage to Earth’s ancient past and become a legend of the Stone Age before AC #260 finds her transformed by the mystical Fountain of Youth into ‘The Girl Superbaby!’ The next tale introduced feline fan-favourite Streaky the Super-Cat in ‘Supergirl’s Super Pet!’ after which ‘Supergirl’s Greatest Victory!’ supplies a salutary lesson in humility to the Girl of Steel. Binder moved on after scripting ‘Supergirl’s Darkest Day!’ in which the Maid of Might rescues an alien prince before incoming Jerry Siegel began his own tenure by scripting ‘Supergirl Gets Adopted!’: a traumatic yet sentimental tale which ends with the lonely lass back at Midvale orphanage.

I’ve restrained myself so please do likewise when I say the next adventure isn’t what you think. ‘When Supergirl Revealed Herself!’ (Siegel & Mooney, Action #265) is another story about nearly finding a family, after which Streaky returns in ‘The World’s Mightiest Cat!’ as prelude to Supergirl finding fantastic fellow super-kids in Action #267’s ‘The Three Super-Heroes!’ She narrowly fails to qualify for the Legion of Super Heroes through the cruellest quirk of fortune, but – after picking herself up – exposes ‘The Mystery Supergirl!’ prior to Siegel & Mooney introducing fish-tailed Mer-boy Jerro as ‘Supergirl’s First Romance!’

Packed with cameos like Batman & Robin, Krypto and Atlantean Lori Lemaris, ‘Supergirl’s Busiest Day!’ sees her celebrating a very special occasion, after which Streaky enjoys another bombastic appearance as the wonder child builds ‘Supergirl’s Fortress of Solitude!’ before Binder wrote ‘The Second Supergirl!’ – an alternate world tale too big for one issue. Sequel ‘The Supergirl of Two Worlds!’ appeared in Action #273 – as did a novel piece of market research. ‘Pick a New Hairstyle for Linda (Supergirl) Lee!’ involved eager readers in the actual physical appearance of their heroine and provided editors valuable input into who was actually reading the series…

Siegel & Mooney soundly demonstrated DC dictum that “history cannot be changed” in ‘Supergirl’s Three Time Trips!’ before ‘Ma and Pa Kent Adopt Supergirl!’ offered a truly nightmarish scenario: rapidly followed by a return visit to the Legion of Super Heroes in ‘Supergirl’s Three Super Girl-Friends!’, whilst Action #277 featured an amazing animal epic in ‘The Battle of the Super-Pets!’

The next five tales form an extended saga, taking the Girl of Steel in totally new directions. On the eve of Superman announcing her existence to the world, Supergirl loses her powers and – resigned to a normal life – is adopted by the childless Fred and Edna Danvers. Sadly, it’s all a cruel and deadly plot by wicked Lesla-Lar, Kara’s identical double from the Bottle City of Kandor. This evil genius wants to replace Supergirl and conquer Earth…

This mini-epic – ‘The Unknown Supergirl!’, ‘Supergirl’s Secret Enemy!’, ‘Trapped in Kandor!’, ‘The Secret of the Time-Barrier!’ and (following the results of the Hair Style competition) ‘The Supergirl of Tomorrow!’ ran in Action #278-282: solidly repositioning the character for a more positive, effective and fully public role in the DC universe. The saga also hinted of a more dramatic, less paternalistic, parochial and even reduced-sexist future for the most powerful girl in the world, over the months to come; although the young hero is still very much a student-in-training, her existence still kept from the general public as she lives with adoptive parents who are completely unaware the orphan they have adopted is a Kryptonian super-being.

The accent on these stories generally revolves around problem-solving, identity-saving and loneliness, with both good taste and the Comics Code ensuring readers weren’t traumatised by unsavoury or excessively violent tales. Plots akin to situation comedies often pertained, as in ‘The Six Red “K” Perils of Supergirl!’ Peculiar transformations were a mainstay of Silver Age comics, and although a post-modern interpretation might discern some metaphor for puberty or girls “becoming” women, I rather suspect the true answer can be found in author Seigel’s love of comedy and an editorial belief that fighting was simply unladylike…

Red Kryptonite, a cosmically-altered isotope of the radioactive element left when Krypton exploded, caused temporary physical and sometimes mental mutations in the survivors of that doomed world. It was a godsend to writers in need of a challenging visual element when writing characters with the power to drop-kick planets. Here the wonder-stuff generates a circus of horrors, transforming Supergirl into a werewolf, shrinking her to microscopic size and making her fat. I’m not going to say a single bloody word…

The drama continues and concludes – like this initial Silver Age compilation – with ‘The Strange Bodies of Supergirl!’ wherein Linda Lee Danvers’ travails escalate after she grows a second head, gains death-ray vision (ostensibly!) and morphs into a mermaid. This daffy holdover to simpler times presaged a major change in the Girl of Steel’s status… but that’s a volume for another day.

Throughout her formative years Kara of Krypton underwent more changes than most of her confreres did in 20 years, as editors struggled to find a niche the buying public would appreciate, but for all that, these yarns remain exciting, ingenious and utterly bemusing.

Possibly the very last time a female super-character’s sexual allure wasn’t equated to sales potential and freely and gratuitously exploited, these tales are a link and window to a far less crass time, displaying one of the few truly strong and resilient female characters parents can still happily share with even their youngest children.
© 1959, 1960, 1961, 1962, 2017 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

Posted on

Trish Trash Rollergirl of Mars – The Collected Edition


By Jessica Abel, with Lydia Roberts & Walter various (Super Genius/Papercutz)
ISBN: 978-1-5458-0167-3 (TPB/Digital edition) 978-1-5458-0166-6 (HB)

Our fascination with Mars has never faltered and now that we’re almost within touching distance, the Red Planet’s allure and presence in our fiction has never been more broad-based and healthily imaginative. Amidst all the recent TV, movie and literary product, one of the most engaging treatments was an enthralling comics serial detailing the life of an extraordinary young woman in exceedingly trying times.

After Earth collapses in an ecological and economic meltdown, recently arrived first settlers on Mars were trapped under an increasingly burdensome fixed economic structure and oppressive corporate plutocracy. Two centuries later, an entire class of indentured servants eke out a fraught existence, harvesting water and food with machines rented from Arex (“we’re the air that you breathe”). The air they don’t breathe is meagre, toxic, dust-filled and a bit radioactive…

On Mars, everything belongs to The Company, and people usually live from cradle to grave in crippling debt. There is, ostensibly, a chance to escape: mandatory offworld mining missions to the asteroid belt. These Temporary Labor Assignments, however, are regarded as a quick ticket to certain death.

All tyrannies need bread and circuses though. On Mars that’s Hoverderby…

Based on an ancient Earth entertainment, teams of women race around a hover track in flying boots, scoring points by beating each other up. It’s the planet’s most popular spectator sport and Arex own that too…

Trish Nupindu is seven-and-a-half (on Mars. In Earth terms she’s 15): a smart, recently-orphaned kid who’s really good with engines and most mechanical systems. Stuck on her aunt’s water farm, Trish dreams of becoming a Hoverderby star and is utterly discontented with the state of her existence. All “Marty” reel from the force of crushing, inescapable poverty and Trish totally believes her only chance of getting out from under a system stacked from the get-go against ordinary people is to become a media star of the great game.

Bold and impatient, one day she sneaks off to join the local team and is suckered into a binding intern’s contract, even though she’s under-age…

Trish doesn’t even get to play: the team manager wants her because she’s good at fixing the hoverboots continually malfunctioning due to the all-pervasive dust. Her world turns upside down after she and avowed-revolutionary/pal Marq discover a native Martian. Recalled from near-death, the mythical creature opens their eyes to a whole new world, and “her” secrets will change forever not just the way Hoverderby is played but also the very economic balance of power on the Red Planet – if the ruthless upper echelons of Arex don’t stop them first…

The inspirational drama is backed up by extensive supplemental features such as the rules of Hoverderby; Derby Gear: Then and Now; illustrated specifications for Radsuits; fact-features on The Homestead Debate, Native Martians, Ares Collective Statement of Debt (ACSOD), TLAs and Asteroid Mining all delivered in the manner of wiki pages. Also on show are data bursts on legendary water miner Ismail Khan, faux kids’ comics “True Tales of the Early Colonists” and a complete Timeline of Mars Colonization.

Jessica Abel has been wowing readers and winning prizes since 1997 when she took both the Harvey and Lulu awards for Best New Talent. Previous graphic delights include the fabulous Artbabe, Growing Gills, Life Sucks, Drawing Words & Writing Pictures, collections Soundtrack and Mirror, Window plus the Harvey-winning La Perdida.

Trish Trash began gradually unfolding in 2016: a sublime blend of subversive human drama and hard science fiction thriller with a supremely human and believable lead taking charge and changing the world. After three album releases, the entire saga was made available in this oversized (218 x 284 mm) hardback, plus paperback and eBook editions, at least one of which you really must see ASAP.
© Jessica Abel and Dargaud. All rights reserved. All other editorial material © 2018 by Super Genius.

Posted on

The Cabbie volume 1


By Marti, with an introduction by Art Spiegelman (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-4504 (HB/Fantagraphics) 978-0874160420 (Album PB Catalan Communications)

Although out of print since 1987, in 2011 Fantagraphics rescued from relative obscurity one of the darkest yet most grimly illuminating classics of European cartooning in this remastered and augmented reissue of The Cabbie: a stylish, nightmarish psycho-sexual noir thriller that has as much seedy kick now as it had when first translated by Catalan Communications…

Now as the macabre maestro has died, my conscience prompts me to pay for neglecting such wonderful comics and it’s only right we should pause to revisit his greatest achievement. Maybe some publisher will endeavour to bring some of his other dark wonders – like Doctor Vertigo, Propaganda Moderna, crime fantasy-thriller Calvario Hills, Cien dibujos por la libertad de Prensa or Terrorista – to a wider international audience.

Marti Riera Ferrer (1955 – 19th January 2024) was born in Barcelona during the heyday of fascist rule. He studied at the Massana School of Arts and Crafts where his efforts coincided with the Generalissimo’s death, and from 1975 to 1979 a liberalisation saw “Marti” creating comics for alterative magazines like Rock COMIC and Star.

From its launch in 1979 he also began contributing to apocalyptic iconoclast El Vibora: short stories and series such as Tony Nuevaola and – with Rodolfo – Lola Lista contra los Nada. These efforts brought international interest and Marti began appearing in Raw and Drawn & Quarterly. Il Taxista – The Cabbie – began in 1982 and he episodically added to the canon over succeeding years, and although semi-retired from the early Nineties he continued generating other material at his own pace for the magazine Makoki and Tobalina. These tales varied from erotic fiction to general illustrated fare.

Dick Tracy is one of the most well-known strips on Earth and the super-cop’s contributions to the art form are many and indisputable. They occurred over many decades and the medium of graphic narrative grew up with it. Imagine the effect instant exposure – or overexposure – to such an uncompromising, bombastic, iconic property on the artists of a nation where free-expression and creative autonomy was suppressed for generations. That’s what happened when the death of General Franco (who had held Spain in a fascistic time-warp from his victory in April 1939 until his death in November 1975) opened up and liberalised all aspects of Spanish life. When Marti saw the strip he was changed for life…

As Art Spiegelman says in his introduction, “decades of political and social repression gave way to a glorious eruption of creativity that allowed a full-fledged counterculture to come to life at just about the same time that America’s “Love Generation” gave way to what Tom Wolfe labelled the “Me Generation.””

How odd yet fitting then that an American symbol of “The Establishment” so enchanted and captivated young cartoonist Marti Riera that he assimilated every line and nuance to create a bleak, stripped-down and extremely angry homage detailing the tribulations of a seedy, desperate taxi-driver trapped in an abruptly vanished past and prey to a world at once free and dangerous, ungoverned and chaotic…

Driving around the seediest part of town our hero picks up a high-rolling gambler who’s just won big, but the driver’s night goes horribly wrong when a knife-wielding thief hijacks the cab and robs his passenger. Luckily, the Cabbie can handle himself and he quickly, brutally subdues the thug.

Our protagonist is a decent, hard-working man who lives with his ailing mother, humouring her talk of a mysterious inheritance, and allowing her to keep the embalmed cadaver of his father in the spare bedroom, but he’s tragically unaware that his citizen’s arrest will have terrible repercussions for them both. When the son of the thief he captured is released from prison, the ingrate immediately begins a grim campaign of retribution against the Cabbie that creates a maelstrom of tragedy, degradation and despair.

This is a harsh, uncompromising tale of escalating crime and uncaring punishments: blackly cynical, existentially scary and populated with a cast of battered, desolate characters of increasingly degenerate desperation. Even the monsters are victims, but for all that The Cabbie is an incredibly compelling drama with strong allegorical overtones and brutally mesmerizing visuals.

Any mature devotee of comics should be conversant with Marti’s superb work, and with a second volume out there and the hope of digital editions (One bloody Day!), hopefully we soon all will be…
The Cabbie (Taxista) © 2011 Marti. Introduction © 2011 Art Spiegelman. This edition © 2011 Fantagraphics Books.

Posted on

The Lincoln Brigade


By Pablo Durá, Carles Esquembre & Ester Salguero, translated/edited by Andrea Lorenzo Molinari (Caliber Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-63529-822-2 (TPB/Digital edition)

I’m glad my parents are dead.

Their generation thought that they had dealt with fascism so their children wouldn’t have to, but every day it looks like that kind of intolerance is hardwired in some of us and never goes away. Maybe we simply need to be as ruthless and unforgiving as the foe if we want the insanity to finally end.

At least there are still plenty of people willing to fight and keen to share warnings from the past in books like this digital clarion call.

Preceded by an contextualising Introduction by Josephine Nelson – Commander of the Veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and daughter of Abraham Lincoln Brigade leader Steve Nelson – The Lincoln Brigade is a brief but powerful account ruminating on what 3,015 mostly white, largely second-generation European American, passionately Communist volunteers of the 17th (latterly 58th) battalion of the XV International Brigade experienced during the heroic but doomed struggle to defend Republican Spain from Franco and his Nazi allies in the Spanish Civil War (17th July 1936 -1st April 1939). That skilfully managed proxy conflict is now considered by many historians as a test run for World War II: something certain Russian asshats know very well…

The struggle is seen through the eyes of Oliver Law – one of the few black comrades of the “Lincoln Brigade”. Texas born Law (October 23rd 1900 – July 9th 1937) served in the 24th Infantry Regiment, US Army: a professional soldier in a “coloured unit” stationed on the Mexican border. He served efficiently and with honour from 1919-1925 and on mustering out moved gradually north via Indiana and Chicago, finding jobs as a cement worker, taxi driver, restaurateur and dock worker.

Law’s experiences led to him becoming a labour organiser and member of the American Communist Party. As the Great Depression progressed, he was a member of the International Labor Defense movement employed by the Works Project Administration. Moments of early activism are observed as he meets legendary, inspirational African American freedoms fighter Harry Haywood (February 4th 1898 – January 4th 1985) and faces strike-breaking cops beside equally fervent allies of all colours.

In 1936, Benito Mussolini ordered an invasion of Ethiopia in one of the first overt acts of fascist expansionist colonialism and Law realised – as did so many others across the world – that he would have to fight the rise of a tyranny even greater than that he and his kind faced at home. When Spain erupted into chaos with Generalissimo Francisco Franco Bahamonde leading the army (supported by Nazi/Italian National Fascist Parties) in revolt against the democratically elected government, Law and thousands like him volunteered to fight for the embattled Republic.

In this fictionalised account of events by Pablo Durá (Original Sins, Tales of Rogues) illustrated by Carles Esquembre (Lorca – un poeta en Neueva York) and colourist Esther Salguero we see how Law – like so many others – had to sneak across neutral Europe into Spain by pretending to be a tourist or else face arrest by his own government. Like most nations the USA and Britain had signed a non-intervention treaty Italy and Germany were happy to flout…

What comes next is grim, tragic, stupid and shameful as the daily grind of driven idealists betrayed by their own supposed allies and cut down as much by indifference and ineptitude as enemy action lead to Law’s swift rise as a soldier and untimely death. In the course of his duties the Texan advances to Commander of the Machine Gun Company and before his death was for a brief moment the official Commander of the whole Abraham Lincoln Brigade. Of the approximately 3000 Americans he so briefly led, 681 were killed in action or died of wounds or sickness…

Oliver Law commanded the first fully-integrated unit of American soldiers in combat 10 years before white and black US soldiers were in 1948 forcibly made to serve together by Presidential decree of Harry S. Truman…

It’s all here for you to see and you really should, as it’s delivered with coldly emphatic understatement and clinically clear authenticity: blurring fact with myth and history with extrapolation in the same compelling, upsetting manner as Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia, or in graphic novels like Paco Roca, Rodrigo Terrasa & Astiberri’s El abismo del olvido (The Abyss of Forgetting), Mónica Montanés’ Different: A Story of the Spanish Civil War Picture Book or Vittorio Giardino’s epic No Pasaran! trilogy.

Like all those, this too is a book anyone unhappy with the way things are should peruse and ponder upon.
© 2020 Pablo Durá and Carles Esquembre. All Rights Reserved.

Posted on

Deathlok: The Living Nightmare of Michael Collins


By Dwayne McDuffie, Gregory Wright, Jackson Guice, Denys Cowan, Scott Williams, Rick Magyar, Kyle Baker, Mike DeCarlo & Friends, Paul Mounts, Brad Vancata, Richard Starkings, Joe Rosen & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-5988-9 (HB/Digital edition)

As created by Rich Buckler and originally scripted by Doug Moench in 1974, Deathlok the Demolisher was an honourable soldier condemned to an horrific fate in a dystopian alternate future. It’s his 50th anniversary this year and we’ll get around to the time-tossed travails of Manning another day. This book is not about him.

As you’d expect of a character who was designed as a bio-mechanised weapon, Deathlok is a complex concept with a lot of backstory and many later models. Most of that and those also belong in different reviews. Here we’re concentrating on the most successful iteration of the cyborg: a black man enduring living hell, subjugation and slavery to merciless masters who fights for his dignity and liberty with everything he has left to him…

Bookshelf format limited series Deathlok #1-4 was first released July through October 1990, and its success prompted a cheaper newsprint reprint run – as Deathlok Special #1-4 – less than a year later. Tragic champion Michael Collins sprang from this epic tale of deception and malfeasance into his own monthly series: 34 issues and 2 Annuals spanning July 1991 to April 1994, plus guest shots (across Marvel’s US and UK branches) in the nineties.

It begins in an 8-page prequel story from Marvel Comics Presents #62 (cover dated November 1990 but on sale in late summer) wherein Dwayne McDuffie, Gregory Wright & Jackson “Butch” Guice took Deathlok on a ‘Test Run’. The vignette saw soldier Colonel John Kelly – or at least his brain and assorted organic leftovers attached to a biomechanical body of intriguingly unknown origins – ruthlessly despatch a dozen mercenaries who had no idea what they were really facing; until a computer glitch ends the exercise and almost project leader Harlan Ryker.

Kelly would later be eventually resurrected as cyborg antihero Siege but the failed test left the Cybertek Systems Inc. team (cybernetics division of Marvel’s corporate villain organization Roxxon) in need of a new brain donor…

The story of this Deathlok really begins with the first solo issue as Dwayne McDuffie, (co-writer and colourist) Gregory Wright, Jackson Guice, Scott Williams & hard-pressed, overworked letterer Richard Starkings introduce readers to ‘The Brains of the Outfit’. Cybertek is dirty. It uses subterfuge to achieve its ends. When programmer, engineer, pacifist and devoted family man Michael Collins discovers his innovations are going into advanced weapons systems and not medical equipment he rebels and quits, inadvertently making himself the next candidate for the organic wetware of Deathlok. The enigmatic war frame requires a human brain to operate, but it doesn’t have to be alive…

Mere days after a tragic “accident”, good friend Harlan Ryker tries to comfort widow Tracy Collins and Michael’s son Nick, even as a new Deathlok is unleashed in Amazon rainforest republic Estrella. Here, future Roxxon profits require a change of environment, a new dam and an end to eco-guerilla resistance. However, once again the onboard systems malfunction mid fire-fight and the presumed expired personality of Michael Collins takes control of the body whilst striking a détente with the murderously efficient semi-sentient programmed systems.

In charge and very angry, Collins wants Ryker, Cybertek and Roxxon to pay, but cannot abandoned his principles. His first action is to institute a “no-kill” command in the super-soldier body he shares with a computer he must negotiate every action with. This does not hamper his combat efficiency in the slightest…

It proves a perfectly workable arrangement as Deathlok when he returns to the New Jersey Cybertek facility and violently confronts the “friends” who betrayed him. Ryker and his team desperately launch their other project – a cybernetically-controlled all-terrain super-tank piloted by ruthless paraplegic co-worker and barely suppressed psychopath Ben Jacobs. After wrecking the project, Deathlok flees but finds no solace. Now the embodiment of everything he loathes, he doesn’t even know if he’s truly still alive.

An attempt to reach out to Tracy and Nick results in disaster and only anonymous contact with his boy via a computer game stays him from self-termination. Lost and alone, he decides to use his situation to help others…

Second issue ‘Jesus Saves’ sees Deathlok operating as vigilante in New York’s Coney Island, defending the dregs of society – generally from themselves. After stopping a mugging he is befriended by the elderly victim Jesus who offers “Mike” shelter. Elsewhere, the event at Cybertek has reached the attention of S.H.I.E.L.D. director Nick Fury (the white one), but Ryker is more concerned by pressure his Roxxon superiors are exerting on him. In response to a deadly deadline, he commissions a mercenary “fixer” called Wajler – AKA Mainframe – to eradicate Deathlok whilst Ryker unctuously probes Tracy and Nick for possible intel and warns them that a rogue robot might be stalking them. Nick is not fooled…

Wracked by human memories and doubts, Deathlok uses the ability to access computer files and enter a communal cyber-scape to look for ways to stop Ryker, but his reaching out endangers his few remaining friends. It also makes him a target and Mainframe’s mech-enhanced team zero in on Coney Island and explosively attack, uncaring of the innocent crowds enjoying themselves there. The resultant chaos makes headlines everywhere and as S.H.I.E.L.D. steps in Deathlok decides it’s time to go back to Estrella and fix what he inadvertently started as a slave of Cybertek…

Artists Denys Cowan & Rick Magyar joined McDuffie & Wright, in #3 as ‘Dam if He Don’t’ sees the cyborg hero subject to intense S.H.I.E.L.D. scrutiny even as Collins joins the remaining eco-guerillas in wrecking Roxxon’s scheme to build a super dam and make the entire region easier to mine. Even after convincing the resistors he’s on their side – this time – there’s still an army of soldiers and regiment of giant robot ants controlled by revenge hungry Ben Jacobs to deal with.

The unstoppable Deathlok’s crusade is greatly assisted by a late-in-the-day alliance with Nick Fury, setting up a final face-off with Ryker, but the malign master manipulator has one last card to play and offers to reinsert Collins’ brain in the body he removed it from and has been judiciously keeping alive “just in case”…

The clash of wills and Collins brief ethical “wobble” culminates in catastrophic combat that draws in naive Japanese ultra-nationalist/part-time X-Man Sunfire, his cunningly controlling sensei Yoritomo and a secret army of ninjas on ‘Ryker’s Island’ (McDuffie & Wright, Cowan, Kyle Baker, Mike DeCarlo & Friends). Despite at first being pacified by Harlan’s promises of restoring him alive to his family, Deathlok recovers his moral compass in time for S.H.I.E.L.D. to assist him in averting a nuclear armageddon Ryker thought he could profit from, but in the confusion everyone loses sight of Michal Collins’ bottled body…

The least Fury can do is lie to Tracy and Nick for him: telling them the pacifist is on a secret mission for S.H.I.E.L.D. as Deathlok hides, facing an uncertain future as a hero in waiting…

With covers by Joe Jusko, Bill Sienkiewicz, Kent Williams, Cowan & Tom Smith, plus frontispiece/inside cover art by Guice, an historical essay on ‘Deathlok’ by Peter Sanderson and covers for reprint series Deathlok Special #1-4 (Guice & Cowan), the origin of Marvel’s most conflicted champion is a challenging but rewarding romp for older readers.
© 2016 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

Posted on

The Art of Ramona Fradon


By Ramona Fradon; interviewed by Howard Chaykin (Dynamite Entertainment)
ISBN: 978-1-60690-140-3 (HB/Digital edition)

In a matter of mere weeks that have taken many accomplished, acclaimed and beloved comics luminaries (including Paul Neary, Enrique Badía Romero, José Delbo, Marti (Riera), John G. Miller and Keith Giffen) – we are particularly saddened to learn that pioneering cartoonist Ramona Fradon died on February 24th. At the age of 97 she had only just officially retired a month previously. Her incomparable works will keep her with us through characters and titles such as Super Friends, Aquaman and Metamorpho (slated to appear in the next Superman film). Until then, here’s another tome you should own…

Although present in comic books from the start, women – like so many other non-white/male “minorities” – have been largely written out of history. One of the very few to have weathered that inexplicable exclusion was Ramona Fradon. This excellent commemorative art collection celebrates not only her life and contribution, but thanks to its format – a free, unexpurgated extended interview with iconoclastic creator Howard Chaykin – shares the artist’s frank and forthright views on everything from work practise to the power of fans…

It begins with an Introduction from Walt Simonson who proclaims ‘Meet your Idol… and discover They’re even Cooler than you Thought!’, before early days are revealed in ‘Part One: Setting the Scene’ and ‘Part Two: In the Beginning’…

Ramona Dom was born on October 2nd 1926 to an affluent Chicago family with many ties to commercial creative arts. Her father was a respected artisan, letterer and calligrapher who had designed the logos for Camel cigarettes, Elizabeth Arden and other major brands, and also formulated the fonts Dom Casual and Dom Bold. He had plans for his daughter, urging her to become a fashion designer…

The family moved to (outer) New York when Ramona was five. Ramona initially attended The Parsons School of Design, and discovered she had absolutely no interest in creating clothes. Although she’d never read comic books, she had voraciously read illustrated books like John Barton Gruelle’s Raggedy Anne and Andy series, and was a devoted fan of newspaper strips. Favourites included Dick Tracy, Bringing Up Father, The Phantom, Alley Oop, Flash Gordon, Terry and the Pirates and Li’l Abner (all herein represented by 1930s examples).

Ramona soon transferred to the New York Art Students League – a hotbed of cartooning – where she met and married Arthur Dana Fradon. He became a prolific illustrator, author and cartoonist and a regular contributor to The New Yorker between 1948-1992. They wed in 1948 and he actively encouraged her to seek work in the still young funnybook biz…

‘Part Three: Gingerly Breaking into Comics’ reveals how her first forays at Timely Comics led to DC/National Comics and a Shining Knight yarn published in Adventure Comics #165 (cover-dated June 1951), 10 months later taking over the veteran Aquaman feature in #167. Fradon was one of the first women to conspicuously and regularly illustrate comic books, drawing the strip throughout the 1950s and shepherding the Sea King from B-lister to solo star and Saturday morning TV pioneer.

In the first of a series of incisive, informative mini biographies, ‘Sidebar: Murray Boltinoff’ reveals the influence of that much-neglected and under-appreciated editor. ‘Part Four: Queen of the Seven Seas’ and ‘Part Five: Man of 1000 Elements’ show how occasional stints on The Brave and the Bold team-ups led to her co-creation of Sixties sensation Metamorpho, the Element Man. However in 1965 – at the pinnacle of success – she abruptly retired to raise a daughter, only returning to comics in 1972 for another stellar run of landmark work.

‘Sidebar: George Kashdan’ tells all about the multi-talented scripter before ‘Part Six: Ramona Returns to Comics… At Marvel???’ details how the House of Ideas lured the artist back to her board and highlights her difficulties working “Marvel-style” on assorted horror shorts, The Claws of the Cat and Fantastic Four, all presaging a return to DC…

‘Sidebar: Joseph Patterson’ looks into the astounding strip Svengali who green lit Dick Tracy, Little Orphan Annie, Gasoline Alley and more before ‘Part Seven: Back Home at DC Comics’ where she was busier than ever. As well as horror and humour shorts, Fradon drew a new Metamorpho try-out, superhero spinoff Freedom Fighters and her twin magnum opuses: revived comedy superhero Plastic Man and TV sensation Super Friends. These revelations are bolstered by ‘Sidebar: E. Nelson Bridwell’, exploring the life of the man who knew everything about everything…

In 1980, Fradon took over Dale Messick’s long-running newspaper strip Brenda Starr, drawing it for 15 years. ‘Part Eight: Leaping From Books to Strips’ explores that painful and unpleasant chore in sharp detail, supplemented by ‘Sidebar: Brenda Starr’ outlining the feature’s history and reprinting those episodes when the ageless reporter met a certain cop, allowing Fradon to finally draw childhood idol Dick Tracy…

The most fascinating stuff is left until last as ‘Part Nine: Ramona the Author’ discusses her career post-Brenda: drawing for Bart Simpson and Spongebob Squarepants comics, returning to higher education and writing a philosophical historical mystery novel – The Gnostic Faustus: The Secret Teachings Behind the Classic Text – as well as illustrated kids book The Dinosaur That Got Tired of Being Extinct.

Packed throughout with candid photos, and stunning pencil sketches, painted pictures and privately commissioned works – like Aquaman, assorted Super Friends, Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Robin; Metal Men, Aqualad, Brenda Starr, Black Canary, Shazam/Captain Marvel, Shining Knight, The Atom, The Spirit, Metamorpho & cast, Marvel Girl, Miss America, Power Girl, Catwoman, Hawkman, numerous illustrations from The Story of Superman book plus convention sketches, this celebration concludes with even more fabulous sleek super art images in ‘Part Nine: Ramona Today’ and ‘Part Eleven: Bibliography’…

This is an amazing confirmation of an incredible career and any fan’s dream package. Amongst gems unearthed here are complete Aquaman stories ‘The Kid from Atlantis!’ (Adventure Comics #269, 1960), ‘A World Without Water’ (Adventure#251, 1958) and ‘How Aquaman Got his Powers!’ (Adventure #260, 1959), plus tales from Star Spangled War Stories (#184, 1975) and ‘The Invisible Bank Robbers!’ (Gangbusters #30, 1952).

Also on show are unpublished sample strips by Dana & Ramona Fradon and a monumental cover gallery of unforgettable images from Super Friends #3, 5-8, 10, 11, 13, 17, 19, 21, 22, 24-27, 31, 33, 36-39 & 41; Plastic Man #16-20; The Brave and the Bold #55, 57, 58, Showcase #30 & 33, Metamorpho, the Element Man #1-5, Namora #1 (2010), Fantastic Four #133 and Freedom Fighters #3.

These are supported by selected interior pages in full colour or monochrome from Star Spangled War Stories #8; Adventure Comics #190; Metamorpho, the Element Man #1; 1st Issue Special #3; Fantastic Four #133; The Brave and the Bold #57; House of Secrets #116 & 136; Secrets of Haunted House #3 & 14; House of Mystery #232 & 273; Plop! #5; Freedom Fighters #3 & 5; Plastic Man #14; Super Friends #6-8, 10, 13, 16, 19, 21, 23 & 25 and the Super DC Calendar 1977.

A truly definitive appreciation of the Comic Book Hall of Fame inductee 2006, this oversized (229 x 305 mm) hardback reproduces hundreds of pages and covers, plus a wealth of out-industry artwork and commissioned wonders, as accompaniment to an astonishingly forthright testament and career retrospective of a phenomenal and groundbreaking talent.

The Art of Ramona Fradon will delight everyone by showing everybody how comics should be done….
Marvel Characters © and ™ 1941-2013 Marvel Characters, Inc. DC Comics Characters © and ™ DC Comics. Brenda Starr™ © 2013 Tribune Media Services. All Rights Reserved.

Posted on

Steel: A Celebration of 30 Years


By Louise Simonson, Jon Bogdanove, Christopher Priest, Grant Morrison, Mark Schultz, Mateo Casali, Steve Lyons, Scholly Fisch, Matt Kindt, Chris Batista, Denys Cowan, Arnie Jorgensen, Doug Mahnke, Darryl Banks, Scott Cohn, Ed Benes, Rags Morales, Brad Walker, Patrick Zircher, June Brigman & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-7795-2173-6 (HB/Digital edition)

All superhero sagas seek to forge fresh legends and mythologies for and around their protagonists and antagonists. A select few (like Thor, Wonder Woman, Hercules, Fables or Robin Hood) can shortcut the process by borrowing from already established communal story traditions. Steel always leaned into the latter: adapting and reiterating the folklore of actual historical personage John Henry: a 19th century African American Freedman known as the “steel-driving man” who worked building railroads and died proving human superiority and tenacity over technological innovation.

This epic compilation – part of a dedicated series reintroducing and exploiting the comics pedigree of DC icons – offers snapshots of a modern black Thomas Edison (or more accurately Tony Stark) who is equal parts impassioned justice seeker, dynamic defender and modern Hephaestus. Through groundbreaking appearances as part of the Superman Family, and standing on his own two jet-booted feet in the ever expanding DCU, it features material from Adventures of Superman #500, Superman: The Man of Steel #22, 100, 122, Steel (volume 1) #1, 34, JLA #17, Justice League Unlimited #35, Steel (volume 2) #1, Action Comics #4, Suicide Squad #24, and The Death of Superman 30th Anniversary Special #1, and like all these curated collections offers introductory essays preceding time-themed selections. We open with Part I: 1993-1998 – The Forging of a Hero by Steel co-creator Louise Simonson prior to her, Jon Bogdanove & Dennis Janke’s tantalising teaser ‘First Sighting’ as seen in Adventures of Superman #500. In the aftermath of catastrophe a new threat imperils the streets of Metropolis and a battered but mighty figure stirs from the rubble muttering “Doomsday”…

Steel’s story began with landmark publishing event The Death of Superman: a 3-pronged story-arc depicting the martyrdom, loss, replacement and resurrection of the World’s Greatest Superhero in a stellar saga which broke all records and proved that a jaded general public still cared about the venerable, veteran icon of Truth, Justice and the American Way. After a brutal rampage across Middle America, a mysterious marauding monster had only been stopped in the heart of Metropolis by an overwhelming and fatal effort on Superman’s part. Dying at the scene, the fallen hero’s body was subject of many legal battles before it was ostensibly laid to rest in a tomb in Metropolis’ Centennial Park. As Earth adjusted to a World Without a Superman, rumours began to circulate that, like Elvis, the Man of Tomorrow was not dead. The aforementioned ‘First Sightings’ revealed how across America four very different individuals appearing, saving lives and performing good deeds as only the departed defender could…

In Superman: The Man of Steel #22 (July 1993), Simonson, Bogdanove, Chris Batista & Rich Faber introduced construction worker Henry Johnson – who had been saved by Superman in the past – who felt compelled to carry on the hero’s mission. After witnessing first-hand street kids murdered by super weapons in the hands of “gangbangers” he built a high-tech suit of armour to facilitate his crusade as. Whilst outraged urban inventor attended disasters and began cleaning up the streets of Metropolis as ‘Steel’, he relentlessly searched for those who used deadly new “toastmasters”: a weapon Irons had designed in another life…

Tracking the munitions enabled him to save the life of a fortune-teller and brought him into savage conflict with White Rabbit – a new criminal major player in the city challenging the secret control of Lex Luthor – but his life only got more complicated the morning after, when Psychic Rosie went on TV claiming Steel was possessed by the unquiet soul of Superman…

To see how that  situation was resolved check out Reign of The Supermen collections but here – following the defeat of the Cyborg-Superman – our ironclad iconoclast underwent a partial refit in Steel (volume 1) #1, as writers Simonson & Bogdanove and artists Batista & Rich Fabee ‘Wrought Iron’ with Johnson resuming his previous identity as John Henry Irons and returning to his hometown and family in Washington D.C. ready to settle the problems he had originally fled from.

Welcomed back by niece Natasha, he and she are almost killed in another gang war and toastmaster crossfire, so John Henry begins a sustained and convoluted campaign against his former corporate employers Amertek, White Rabbit and the lying SOBs who allowed his junked superweapons program (AKA the BG60) to be sold to criminals. His first task is to upgrade and reforge his briefly retired armoured identity…

After an epic career as a reluctant superhero, John Henry and Natasha relocate to Jersey City as Christopher Priest, Denys Cowan & Tom Palmer reboot proceedings. In ‘Bang’ he reinvents himself as a maker of medical hardware and prosthetics working for a barely disguised supervillain. With all concerned leaning heavily into the perceived notion of Steel as a second-rate substitute, Priest consequently crafted one of the funniest and most thrilling superhero series of the decade and one long overdue to be featured in its own collection.

Steel was becoming increasingly popular and was rewarded with membership in the new sensation-series – the reconstituted Justice League. Here in his April 1998 induction from JLA #17, Grant Morrison, Arnie Jorgensen, David Meikis & Marl Pennington show ‘Prometheus Unbound’ as the ambitious neophyte supervillain attacks the entire League in their moon base Watchtower. As recent recruits Huntress, Plastic Man, fallen angel Zauriel and covert information resource Oracle join the regular team invite the world’s press to their lunar base, this unwise courtesy inadvertently allows the insidious seemingly unstoppable mastermind to infiltrate and almost destroy them.

The heroes – despite initially succumbing to Prometheus’ blitz-attack – strike back, aided by unlikely surprise guest-star Catwoman and the last-minute appearance of New Gods Orion and Big Barda proffering yet more hints of the greater threat to come. Although playing a significant part in the win, Steel is not really a star here but at least proves he can play well with the big dogs…

Priest then provides fascinating insight to his take on Dr. Irons and his tenure’s overt concentration of racism and comedy in an essay segueing neatly into Part II: 2000-2011 – Forging the Future prior to adventures in a new millennium.

In Superman: The Man of Steel #100 (May 2000), Mark Schultz, Doug Mahnke & Tom Nguyen offer a ‘Creation Story’ as John Henry and Natasha set up shop in Metropolis with their (she’s a SuperGenius too and ultimately also became an mecha-outfitted superhero) “Steelworks” facility, helping Superman reconstruct his Fortress of Solitude from recovered Kryptonian and Phantom Zone raw materials. The artificers are unaware that an old enemy is sending new menace Luna and her Cybermoths to plunder their achievements…

Despite their always being the best of friends, Superman: The Man of Steel #122 (March 2002) notionally succumbs to the inevitable in Superman v Steel’ by Schultz, Darryl Banks & Kevin Conrad as Irons battles crippling anxieties after accepting a potential trojan horse weapon – the Entropy Aegis – from Darkseid and using it as the basis of new armour. With monsters trying to reclaim it and Superman begging him not to use it, frayed tempers snap…

As well as an ill-received – and unjustly derided – cinema iteration (really! – check it out with more forgiving modern eyes), Steel made the jump to television numerous times. The best was his tenure in the Cartoon Network Justice League/Justice League Unlimited animated shows and the comic books they spawned. Next up here is Mateo Casali, Scott Cohn & Al Nickerson’s all-ages romp ‘The Cycle’ (Justice League Unlimited #35, September 2007), with John Henry and Natasha in the Watchtower before leading the team against reawakened elder gods The Millennium Giants…

Having grown overlarge and unwieldy once more, DC took a draconian leap as its continuity was again pruned and repatterned. In October 2011, publishing event Flashpoint led to a “New 52”: radical yet mostly cosmetic changes that barely affected the properties reimagined. Just before that kicked off, John Henry got a stirring “hail and farewell” in Steel (volume 2, 2011) #1. ‘Reign of Doomsday, Part 1: Full Circle’ by Steve (Doctor Who) Lyons & Ed Benes opened a Superman Family mass-crossover as the marauding monster returned to crush all S-Sheild superstars, starting with John Henry before moving on to The Outsiders and others…

Concluding chapter Part III: 2012-Present – The First Black Superman opens with a treatise and career appraisal of “DC’s Iron Man” by Bogdanove, after which the techno-warrior is reimagined by Morrison, Rags Morales, Rick Bryant & Sean Parsons in Action Comics (volume 2) #4, January 2012. ‘Superman and the Men of Steel’ sees a young Man of Tomorrow starting out as a vigilante, pursued by Military Consultant Lex Luthor and losing to the latter’s Kryptonite fuelled cyborg Metallo until a technologist working on the Steel Soldier program dons the armour he’s building to save the embattled young hero…

From the same issue, ‘Hearts of Steel’ – by Scholly Fisch, Brad Walker & Jay David Ramos – concludes the 3-way war and provides insight into the valiant newcomer, before Suicide Squad #24 (volume 4, December 2013) taps into publishing event Forever Evil with ‘Excuse the Mess…’ by Matt Kindt, Patrick Zircher & Jason Keith. As Earth is infiltrated by invaders from an alternate reality, conscripts of Amanda Waller’s penal unit (Thinker, King Shark, Captain Boomerang, Deadshot and Harley Quinn) rebel when the world’s supervillain community unites to crush the heroes. Opposing the rebellion and fighting to keep a living WMD from them are an Unknown Soldier, vigilante Warrant, Power Girl and Steel…

In 2015, as the New 52 experiment staggered to a conclusion, a series of company-wide events offered speculative glimpses at what might have been. Following 2014’s Futures End came Convergence in April 2015: a series of character-derived micro-series referencing key periods in the amalgamated history of DC heroes. Crafted by Simonson, June Brigman, Roy Richardson & John Rauch, Convergence: Superman: Man of Steel #1-2 depicted ‘Divided We Fall’ & ‘United We Stand’ as assorted cities from varied publishing epochs of continuity are imprisoned under domes by Telos, slave of Brainiac and ordered to fight each other until only one survives. Referencing their 1990s iteration, Irons, Natasha and nephew Jemahl armour up beside maniacal villain The Parasite to battle the abrasive superteens of Gen 13…

We end by turning full circle as Louise Simonson, Jon Bogdanove & colourist Glenn Whitmore share undisclosed secrets from the first appearance of Steel, as finally revealed in The Death of Superman 30th Anniversary Special #1 (November 2022).‘Time’ expands on ‘First Sightings’, taking readers back to the moments Doomsday ripped through Metropolis and showing how “Henry Johnson” saved lives as he ran towards the life or death battle to aid Superman however he can…

With covers by Bogdanove & Janke, Dave Johnson, Howard Porter & John Dell, Doug Mahnke & Tom Nguyen, John Cassaday & Richard Horie, Zach Howard, Alex Garner, Morales & Brad Anderson, Steve Skroce & Jason Keith, Walter Simonson & Dave McCaig, these tales span cover-dates January 1993 to November 2022; a period where black heroes finally became acceptable comics currency – at least for most people – and this too brief collation of groundbreaking yarns only begs the question: why isn’t more of this wonderful stuff already available?
© 1993, 1994, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2002, 2007, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2022, 2023 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

Posted on

Shaft volume 2: Imitation of Life


By David F. Walker, Dietrich Smith & various (Dynamite Entertainment)
ISBN: 978-1-52410-260-9 (TPB/Digital edition)

For most of modern history black consumers of popular entertainments in what used to be called the “Free West” have found far too few fictive role models. In the English-speaking world that began changing in the turbulent 1960s as America’s Civil Rights Movement gained traction and truly took hold during the decade that followed. Many characters stemming from those days come from a commercially-led cultural phenomenon called Blaxploitation.

Although criticised for seedy antecedents, stereotypical situations and extreme violence, the films, books, music and art were the first mass-market examples of minority characters in charge and in leading roles, rather than as fodder, flunkies or flamboyant villains. One of the earliest movie icons of the genre was the man called Shaft. His filmic debut in 1971 was scripted by journalist and screenwriter Ernest Tidyman (The French Connection; High Plains Drifter; A Force of One) adapting his own 1970 novel. Tidyman authored six more between 1972 and 1975, with his urbane urban warrior simultaneously starring in numerous films and a (far, far tamer) TV series. He even had in his own retro-themed, adults-only comic book.

An eighth prose novel – Shaft’s Revenge – was released in 2016, written by David F. Walker. Amongst his many talents – you should hunt down his online culture-crunching ’zine BadAzzMoFo and you won’t be sorry – Walker numbers writing intriguing, hard-edged comics (Occupy Avengers, Cyborg, Red Sonja, Tarzan on the Planet of the Apes and many more), so in 2014 it was probably inevitable he be invited to write that long-overdue comics iteration…

Blockbusting premier miniseries Shaft: A Complicated Man – relating the lone wolf’s origins – led to this sequel, illustrated by Dietrich Smith and coloured by Alex Guimarães, with Walker himself lettering the series. Whereas that comic book took its look, settings and tone from the novels more than the Richard Roundtree (whom we tragically lost in October last year) films, this one carefully refocuses and aims for a satisfactory blending of prose and film iterations.

Originally released as a 4-issue miniseries, Imitation of Life finds the detective ‘Before and After’, regretting his life choices, successes and recent notoriety as the highly publicised rescue of an abducted girl suddenly make him a famous – if not actually notorious – man. It’s nothing he wanted: Shaft was literally forced to take the job by a major mobster no one in their right mind ever refuses, and now, after sorting the problem in his inimitably pitiless manner, the gumshoe is slowly drinking himself to death on the huge fee he also couldn’t safely turn down…

Eventually guilt and boredom compel him to get back in the game and, free of money worries, he can pick and choose from a big list of inquiries. That said, Shaft can’t explain just why he takes on the pointless problems of the Prossers: a hick white couple desperate to find their son. Mike is 18; a good-looking homosexual kid (we say “gay” today, apparently) swallowed up by the sleaze-peddlers of 1970s Times Square. The kid’s legal and not even a real missing person, but there’s something Shaft can’t get out of his head about this particular runaway…

Convinced it’s all pointless, Big John hits appropriate bars and clubs but no one knows anything: they never do. And then a kid named Tito recognizes him and just like that, the violence starts coming.

Surviving a homophobic attack – and teaching a few bigots the cost of intolerance – Shaft finds his case abruptly stalled just as shady wannabe filmmakers seeks to hire him to consult on their new (blaxsploitation) flick “The Black Dick”. It promises to be an easy gig, but they never are…

Before long, Shaft is writhing in discomfort as the script ludicrously bastardises his career and reputation, but when Tito turns up and bamboozles the detective into facing off with a Mafia pornographer just as the secret moneyman behind his own filmic fiasco starts demanding an early return on his investment, it all stops being a laugh and becomes deadly serious again. Once more, he remembers there’s no such thing as ‘Easy Money’…

As fictional and real worlds increasingly intersect, Vice cops contact Shaft and he sees that somehow all his irons seem to be stacked in the same fire. When the ludicrous leading man is abducted and troublemaking Tito pops up again with some very perilous photographs from his own incessant snooping, Shaft discovers in penultimate chapter ‘Love & Loss’ just what happened to Mike Prosser before tooling up to rescue one bad actor while invading a film set where pornos and snuff films are the preferred hot product…

The strands all pull together in a typically cathartic climax as ‘All the World’s a Stage’ sees order restored, bad guys righteously dealt with and even sets up a delicious funny ending to usher us out…

Revisiting a legendarily foetid cesspool of civic corruption, warring mobsters and get-rich-quick chancers, this tour of a mythic milieu is another wry and intoxicating crime thriller no fan of the genre should miss.
Shaft is ™ & © 2016 Ernest Tidyman. All rights reserved.