Author: NowReadThis

Posted on

The Great Anti War Cartoons


By many & various, edited by Craig Yoe (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-150-3 (TPB)

After watching far too much news again, I dug this book off my shelves again. It seemed somehow appropriate. Again.

You’ll hear a lot about the pen being mightier than the sword regarding The Great Anti-War Cartoons, but sadly it’s just not true. Nothing seems able to deter determined governments, or stop outraged religions and/or rich, greedy – and apparently duly elected – raving mad ruthless bastards from sending the young and idealistic to their mass-produced deaths, especially those innocents still afflicted with the slightest modicum of patriotism or sense of adventure. It’s even worse when the sods at the top turn away or claim it’s self-defence whilst killing bystanders but not the ACTUAL other equally mad bastards really responsible.

Our own currently escalating and deteriorating global situation (but isn’t it always?) proves mankind is always far too ready to take up arms, and far too reluctant to give peace a chance, especially when a well-oiled publicity machine and vested media interests gang up on the men and women in the street going “yeah, but…” and “stop killing us…!”

We’re all susceptible to the power of a marching beat played on fife and drum, but at least here amongst these 220+ cartoons and graphic statements, we see that rationalism or conscientious objectivity – or pacifism or even simple self-interested isolationism – are as versed in the art of pictorial seduction as the power and passion of jingoism and war-fever.

All art – and most especially cartooning – has the primitive power to bore deep into the soul, just as James Montgomery Flagg’s iconic Uncle Sam poster “Your Country Needs You” and our own Lord Kitchener version by Alfred Leete in 1914 so effectively did for millions of young men during the Great War.

How satisfying then to see Flagg’s is the very first anti-war cartoon in this incredible compilation of images focusing on the impassioned pleas of visual communicators trying to avoid body-counts or at least reduce bloodshed. The Great Anti-War Cartoons gathers a host of incredibly moving, thought-provoking, terrifying, but – I’m gutted to say – ultimately ineffective warnings, scoldings and pleas which may have moved millions of people, but never stopped or even gave pause to one single conflict…

Editor Craig Yeo divides these potently unforgettable images into a broad variety of categories and I should make it clear that not all the reasons for their creation are necessarily pacifistic: some of the most evocative renderings here are from creators who didn’t think War was Bad per se, but rather felt that a specific clash in question was none of their homeland’s business.

However with such chapters as Planet War, Man’s Inhumanity to Man, The Gods of War, Profiteers, Recruitment and Conscription, The Brass, The Grunts, Weapons of War, The Battle Rages On, The Long March, Famine, The Anthems of War, The Horrors of War, The Suffering, The Families and Children of War, The Aftermath, Victory Celebration, Medals, Disarmament, Resistance and Peace, we witness immensely talented people of varying and even conflicting beliefs responding on their own unique terms to organised slaughter. For every tut-tut of the Stay-at-Homers, there are a dozen from genuinely desperate and appalled artists who just wanted the horror to end.

With incisive examinations of shared symbology and recurring themes, these monochrome penmen utilised their brains and talents in urgent strivings to win their point (there is also a fascinating section highlighting the impact and energy of the Colors of War), but the most intriguing aspect of this superb collection is the sheer renown and worth of the contributors.

Among the 119 artists include (120 if you count Syd Hoff and his nom-de-plume “Redfield” as two separate artists) are Sir John Tenniel, Caran d’Ache, Bruce Bairnsfather, Herbert Block, Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Ron Cobb, “Ding” Darling, Billy DeBeck, Jerry Robinson, Albrecht Dürer, Art Spiegelman, Robert Crumb, Rube Goldberg, Honore Daumier, Goya, George Grosz, Bill Mauldin, Gerald Scarfe, Ralph Steadman, Thomas Nast and most especially the incredibly driven Winsor McCay.

I’ve scandalously assumed that many of the older European draughtsmen won’t be that well known, despite their works being some of the most harrowing, and their efforts – although perhaps wasted on people willing to listen to reason anyway – are cruel and beautiful enough to make old cynics like me believe that maybe this time, THIS TIME, somebody in power will actually do something to stop the madness.

A harsh, evocative and painfully lovely book: seek it out in the hope that perhaps one day Peace will be the Final Solution.

The time has never been more right for cynics like me to be proved wrong.

The Great Anti-War Cartoons and the digitally remastered public domain material are © 2009 Gussoni-Yoe Studio, Inc. All rights reserved.

Posted on

Doug Wildey’s Rio: The Complete Saga


By Doug Wildey (IDW)
ISBN: 978-1-61377-210-2  eISBN: 978-1-62302-476-5

There have been many Western comics over many years created by Americans and other nations. Most were banged out as commercial fodder to feed fashion during periods when mainstream media celebrated a periodic re-emergence of the genre. Rio most definitely ain’t one of those.

Working at his own pace for his own pleasure over long years and virtually isolated from the mainstream comics world, the late Doug Wildey – famed animator (Johnny Quest) and comic strip artist (Outlaw Kid) – produced an iconic and elegiac immortal character.

After a meandering trail of appearances at Eclipse, Comico and Marvel, the wanderer most recently settled at IDW resulting in this glorious collection: far more serious art book than collection of wondrous comics stories.

Almost the entirety of this stupendous compendium is shot from Wildey’s immaculate multi-media original art with corrections, amendments and every instance and evidence of the creator’s interaction with the page left for aficionados to enjoy. No flattening bowdlerisation by the print process here: Think of it as a gallery visit in your hands.

The content comprises all Wildey’s published stories, one entire unpublished tale and a final almost-complete saga he was working on when he died. As he was a rather mercurial cove Wildey skipped about a job, wrapping up pages as whim took him, so the missing parts are there in spirit too: as roughs, sketches, pencils or script and layout designs. It’s a fascinating glimpse of a born raconteur and relentless perfectionist plying his trade. Also included are dozens of sketches, pin-ups and other associated images given weight and context through a loving appreciation by Mark Evanier in his Introduction. What more can a fan want?

Well, obviously, a damned fine read…

An old gunfighter and badman in the heydays of the Wild West, Rio is a rangy loner wandering the country just ahead of creeping civilisation, trying to live the rest of his life as best he can as the end draws near.

The saga began as a serial in early 1980s experiment Eclipse Monthly, during the days of American Comics’ Direct Market revolution. Then it was collected into an album-sized compilation and assorted reprints many times since.

In ‘The Hide Butchers’, the iconically world-weary “tall rider” is engrossed on a tricky and dangerous mission. Offered a full pardon by President Ulysses S. Grant in return for stopping the decimation of the Buffalo herds by “Sporting Special”, Rio is in Wyoming Territory vainly attempting to reason with Railway boss Dorsey. These train excursions – wherein customers could slaughter the animals from the comfort of their seats – nearly wiped out the animals, consequently almost starving to their own extinction Indians who lived off them.

Deemed a threat to profits, Rio is framed for murder by the bigwig’s hirelings – the Grady Parrish gang – and must down a small army of gunmen before he can know any real peace…

His hunt begins in ‘Satan’s Doorstep’ as the trail leads into Apache country and a doomed clash with a cavalry troop led by a glory-obsessed fool who thinks he’s the next Napoleon Bonaparte…

Sole survivor of that desert confrontation, Rio picks up his quarry’s trail in Endsville, Wyoming, before crossing the border to an enslaved Mexican town turned into a ‘Robber’s Roost’ by the bandits he’s chasing. To pass the time, the sadistic brutes play a murderous game with the citizens, but when Rio is captured he deftly turn the tables against them…

Wildey was a master storyteller and a Western Historian of some note. His art graced many galleries and museums, but his greatest achievements are here, where his artistry brings a lost and fabled world briefly back to vibrant life, in spirit as well as look.

Wildey switched over to colour in his own unique style and a more luscious and painterly colour palette, transferring his iconic lone rider from the wilderness to the very borders of the creeping Civilisation he so patently abhorred in a sequel to his original tale of ‘Mr. Howard’s Son’…

Finally pardoned by President Grant, Rio is invited to become sheriff of Limestone City, a burgeoning metropolis less than 100 miles from Kansas City yet somehow a town with no crime! Whilst pondering the offer, he finds old friends already living there; two of the most infamous outlaws in history who – with their families – are living quietly as respectable, albeit incognito, citizens of the progressive paradise.

However, after a botched kidnapping and speculative bank raid exposes the retired outlaws, human nature and petty spite lead to disastrous chaos and a spiral of bloody tragedy which the new lawman is ill-equipped and much disinclined to help with…

In ‘Hot Lead for Johnny Hardluck’, Rio meets a young Dutch kid hardened by exploitative mine work who has chanced upon a fortune. After winning a huge diamond at poker the boy heads for San Francisco, unaware the sore loser has hired thieves to restore what he lost at all costs. Happily, Rio is working as stagecoach guard on the route the kid follows, but even after the fireworks are over, the danger and bloodshed isn’t…

Another brush with famous gunmen informs ‘Red Dust in Tombstone’ as Rio meets up with Doc Holliday and his pals the Earp brothers. Trouble is brewing in town and tensions are high, but Wildey smartly shows us a telling side of all concerned that movies have not…

Wrapping the narratives up with a tantalising promise of what might have been, ‘Reprisal’ is an unfinished masterpiece of cowboy lore as the lone rider saunters into a brewing border crisis. Bandits are raiding ranches, but when the wanderer uncovers a scam with soldiers selling gunpowder to outlaws, the situation explosively escalates into savage tragedy…

This wagon train of wonders wraps with an epic visual treat as ‘Doug Wildey’s Rio Gallery’ re-presents covers, evocative colour illustrations, sketches and model sheets to delight every fan of the genre or just great illustration.

Gripping, authentic, and satisfyingly mythic, these tales from a lost master of his subject and his craft are some of the best westerns America has ever produced and some of the most sublime sequential art every set to paper. Go see why pilgrim…
© 2012 Ellen Wildey. All Rights Reserved. Introduction © 2012 Mark Evanier.

Posted on

Mighty Marvel Masterworks Doctor Strange volume 2: The Eternity War


By Stan Lee & Steve Ditko, Art Simek, Sam Rosen & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-4887-0 (PB/Digital edition)

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Magical Marvel Unleashed… 10/10

When the emergent House of Ideas introduced a warrior wizard to their burgeoning pantheon in the summer of 1963 it was a bold and curious move. Bizarre adventures and menacing monsters were still incredibly popular, but most mention of magic or the supernatural (especially vampires, werewolves and their eldritch ilk) were harshly proscribed by a censorship panel dictating almost all aspects of story content. Almost a decade after a public witch-hunt led to Senate hearings on the malign influences of words and pictures in sequence, comics were ferociously monitored and adjudicated by the draconian Comics Code Authority. Even though some of the small company’s strongest sellers were still mystery and monster mags, their underlying themes and premises were almost universally mad science and alien wonders, not necromantic or thaumaturgic terrors.

Companies like ACG, Charlton and DC – and Atlas/Marvel – got around edicts against mystic thrills and chills by making all reference to magic benign or even humorous; the same tone adopted by TV series Bewitched about a year after Doctor Strange debuted. That eldritch embargo probably explains writer/editor Stan Lee’s low-key introduction of Steve Ditko’s mystic adventurer: an exotic, twilight troubleshooter inhabiting the shadowy outer fringes of society…

Prior to being Marvel, the company had already published a quasi-mystic precursor: balding, trench-coated savant. Doctor Droom – later rechristened (or is that re-pagan-ed?) Dr. Druid – had an inconspicuous short run in Amazing Adventures (volume 1 #1-4 & #6: June-November 1961).

He was a psychiatrist, sage and paranormal investigator tackling everything from alien invaders to Atlanteans (albeit not the ones Sub-Mariner rules). Droom was subsequently retro-written into Marvel continuity as an alternative candidate and precursor for Stephen Strange‘s ultimate role as Sorcerer Supreme.

After a shaky start, the Master of the Mystic Arts became an unmissable icon of the cool counter-culture kids who saw, in Ditko’s increasingly psychedelic art, echoes and overtones of their own trippy explorations of other worlds. That might not have been the creators’ intention but it certainly helped keep the mage at the forefront of Lee’s efforts to break comics out of the “kids-stuff” ghetto…

This enchanting full colour paperback compilation – also available as a digital download – gathers the spectral sections of Strange Tales #130-146 and Amazing Spider-Man Annual #2: spanning cover-dates March 1965 to July 1966. With no fuss or muss, a classic extended saga opens with ‘The Defeat of Dr. Strange’ as an enigmatic outer-dimensional sponsor enters into a pact with arch-foe Baron Mordo. He will be supplied with infinite power and ethereal minions in return for the death of Earth’s magical guardian. With the Ancient One assaulted and in a deathly coma, Strange is forced to go on the run: a fugitive hiding in the most exotic corners of the globe as remorseless, irresistible forces close in all around him…

A claustrophobic close shave trapped aboard a jetliner in in #131’s ‘The Hunter and the Hunted!’ expands into cosmic high gear a month later as Strange doubles back to his sanctum and defeats the returning foe The Demon only to come ‘Face-to-Face at Last with Baron Mordo!’ Crumbling into weary defeat as the villain’s godly sponsor is revealed, the hero is hurled headlong out of reality to materialise in ‘A Nameless Land, A Timeless Time!’ before confronting tyrannical witch-queen Shazana.

Upon liberating her benighted realm, Strange resumes being the target of relentless pursuit: recrossing hostile dimensions and taking the fight to his foes in ‘Earth Be My Battleground’.

Returning to the enclave hiding his ailing master, Strange gleans a hint of a solution in the mumbled enigmatic word “Eternity” and begins searching for more information as, in the Dark Dimension, a terrified girl seeks to sabotage Dread Dormammu’s efforts to empower Mordo…

As the world went superscience spy-crazy and Nick Fury Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. took over the lead spot with Strange Tales #135, the Sixties also saw a blossoming of alternative thought and rebellion. Doctor Strange apparently became a confirmed favourite of the blossoming Counterculture Movement and its recreational drug experimentation subculture. With Ditko truly hitting his imaginative stride, it’s not hard to see why. His weirdly authentic otherworlds and demonstrably adjacent dimensions were utterly unlike anything anyone had ever seen or depicted before…

‘Eternity Beckons!’ as Strange is lured to an ancient castle where an old ally betrays him and, after again narrowly escaping Mordo’s minions, the Mage desperately consults the aged senile Genghis in #136: a grave error in judgement. Once more catapulted into a dimension of deadly danger, Strange barely escapes a soul-stealing horror after discovering ‘What Lurks Beneath the Mask?’

Back on Earth and out of options, the Doctor is must test his strength against the Ancient One’s formidable psychic defences to learn the secret of Eternity in ‘When Meet the Mystic Minds!’ Barely surviving the terrible trial, he uses newfound knowledge to translates himself to a place beyond reality and meet the embodiment of creation in ‘If Eternity Should Fail!’

His quest for solutions or extra might failed, he despondently returns to Earth to find his mentor gone and his unnamed female friend prisoners of his worst enemies in anticipation of a deadly showdown…

Strange Tales #139 warns ‘Beware…! Dormammu is Watching!’, but as Mordo – despite being super-charged with the Dark Lord’s infinite energies – fails over and again to kill the Good Doctor, the Overlord of Evil loses all patience, dragging all concerned into his domain.

Intent on making a show of destroying his mortal nemesis, Dormammu convenes a great gathering before whom he will smash Strange in a duel using nothing but ‘The Pincers of Power!’ He is again bathed in ultimate humiliation as the mortal mage’s wit and determination score a stunning triumph in concluding episode ‘Let There Be Victory!’

As the universes tremble, Doctor Strange wearily heads home, blithely unaware his enemies have laid one last trap. The weary victor returns to his Sanctum Sanctorum; unaware his foes have boobytrapped with mundane explosives.

Scripted by Lee and plotted and illustrated by Ditko, Strange Tales #142 reveals ‘Those Who Would Destroy Me!’ as Mordo’s unnamed disciples prepare one final stab at the Master of the Mystic Arts. They would remain anonymous for decades, only gaining names of their own – Kaecillius, Demonicus and The Witch – upon their return in the mid-1980s.

Here, however, they easily entrap the exhausted wizard warrior, imprisoning him with a view to plundering all his secrets. It’s a big mistake as – in the Roy Thomas dialogued sequel ‘With None Beside Me!’ – Strange outwits and subdues his captors…

In #144 Ditko & Thomas take the heartsick hero ‘Where Man Hath Never Trod!’ Although Dormammu was soundly defeated and humiliated before his peers and vassals, the demonic tyrant takes a measure of revenge by exiling Strange’s anonymous female collaborator to realms unknown. Now, as the Earthling seeks to rescue her while searching myriad mystic planes, he stumbles into a trap laid by the Dark One and executed by devilish collector of souls Tazza…

On defeating the scheme, Strange returns to Earth and almost dies at the hands of far weaker, but sneakier, wizard Mister Rasputin in a yarn scripted by Dennis O’Neil. The spy and swindler uses meagre mystic gifts for material gain but happily resorts to base brutality ‘To Catch a Magician!’

All previous covers had been Kirby S.H.I.E.L.D. affairs but finally, with Strange Tales #146, Strange and Ditko won their moment in the sun. Although the artist would soon be gone, the Good Doctor remained, alternating with Fury’s team until the title ended.

Ditko & O’Neil presided over ‘The End …At Last!’ as deranged Dormammu abducts Strange before suicidally attacking the omnipotent embodiment of the cosmos called Eternity.

The cataclysmic chaos ruptures the heavens over infinite dimensions and when the universe is calm again both supra-deities are gone. Rescued from the resultant tumult, however, is the valiant girl Strange had loved and lost. She introduces herself as Clea, and although Stephen despondently leaves her, we all know she will be back…

This sideral swansong was Ditko’s last hurrah. Issue #147 saw a fresh start as Strange went back to his Greenwich Village abode under the auspices of co-scripters Lee & O’Neil, with comics veteran Bill Everett suddenly and surprisingly limning the arcane adventures. More of that next time.

Before that though there are still treats in store, beginning with a pinup published in 1967’s Marvel Collectors’ Item Classics #10 before we revel in one last Lee/Ditko yarn to enthral and beguile: Although a little chronologically askew, it is very much a case of the best left until last.

In October 1965 ‘The Wondrous World of Dr. Strange!’ (from Amazing Spider-Man Annual #2) was the astonishing lead feature in an otherwise vintage reprint Spidey comic book. The entrancing fable unforgettably introduced the webslinger to arcane adventuring and otherworldly realities as he unwillingly teams up with the Master of the Mystic Arts to battle power-crazed wizard Xandu: a phantasmagorical, dimension-hopping masterpiece involving ensorcelled zombie thugs and the purloined Wand of Watoomb…

After this story it was clear Spider-Man worked in any milieu and nothing could hold him back – and the cross-fertilisation probably introduced many fans to Lee & Ditko’s other breakthrough series.

But wait, there’s even more! Wrapping up the proceeding is a contemporary T-shirt design by Ditko, and the briefest selection of original art.

Doctor Strange has always been the coolest of outsiders and most accessible fringe star of the Marvel firmament. This glorious grimoire is a magical method for old fans to enjoy his world once more and the perfect introduction for recent acolytes or converts created by the movie iteration to enjoy the groundbreaking work of two thirds of the Marvel Empire’s founding triumvirate at their most imaginative.
© 2023 MARVEL.

Posted on

Doctor Who Graphic Novel 24: Emperor of the Daleks


By Dan Abnett, Paul Cornell, Warwick Gray, Richard Alan, John Ridgway, Lee Sullivan, Colin Andrew & various (Panini Books)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-807-0 (TPB)

Somewhere in time, it’s always that moment just before the TV got turned on and the Time Lord was born. This year is the 60th Anniversary of Doctor Who. Here’s another Timey-Wimey treat to celebrate a unique TV and comics institution in a periodical manner …

We Brits love comic strips, adore “characters” and are addicted to celebrity. The history of our comics includes an astounding number of comedians, Variety stars and television actors: such disparate legends as Charlie Chaplin, Arthur Askey, Charlie Drake and so many more I’ve long forgotten and you’ve likely never heard of.

As much adored and adapted were actual shows like Ace of Wands, Timeslip, Supercar, The Clangers and countless more. If we watched or listened, an enterprising publisher made printed spectacles of them. Hugely popular anthology comics like Radio/Film Fun/TV Fun, Look-In, TV Comic, TV Tornado, and Countdown regularly translated light entertainment favourites into pictorial joy. It was a pretty poor star or show that couldn’t parley the day job into a licensed strip property…

Doctor Who debuted on black-&-white televisions across Britain on November 23rd 1963 with episode 1 of ‘An Unearthly Child’. Months later in 1964, TV Comic began its decades-long association, as issue #674 began ‘The Klepton Parasites’ – by an unknown author with the art attributed to illustrator Neville Main.

On 11th October 1979, Marvel’s UK subsidiary launched Doctor Who Weekly. Turning monthly in September 1980 (#44) it’s been with us – via various iterations – ever since: proving the Time Lord is a comic star of impressive pedigree, not to be trifled with.

Panini’s UK division ensured his comics immortality by collecting all strips of every Time Lord Regeneration in a series of graphic albums – although we’re still waiting for digital versions. Each time tome focused on a particular incarnation of the deathless wanderer, with this one gathering stories plucked from the annals of history and the Terran recording dates November 1992 and July 1995. These yarns all feature Seventh Doctor Sylvester McCoy in a collection offering both monochrome and full-colour episodes. It all kicks off with sinister espionage thriller ‘Pureblood’ (from Doctor Who Magazine #193-196: November 1992 to January 1993) by writer Dan Abnett & artist Colin Andrew. Here the devious Time Lord and his formidable companion Benny save the last survivors of the Sontaran race from extinction at the hands of their immortal enemies the Rutan – despite hostage humans and a spy in the embattled clone-warriors’ midst. Why save a deadly enemy? Ah well, The Doctor has a rather convoluted plan…

The epic yarn leads directly into the ‘Flashback’ (Doctor Who Winter Special 1992, by Warwick Gray & John Ridgway) as we glimpse First Doctor (William Hartnell, keep up, keep up!) having a potentially universe- shattering falling out with his best friend: a proudly arrogant young Gallifreyan called Magnus (any guesses who he regenerates into?)

The main meat of this massive collection is eponymous epic ‘Emperor of the Daleks’ (DWM #197-202) reuniting the time meddler with his deadliest foe and their deadliest foe: Abslom Daak, a deranged maniac in love with a dead woman and determined to die gloriously exterminating Daleks…

Written by Paul Cornell and John Freeman with art from Lee Sullivan (and a chapter in full-colour courtesy of Marina Graham), the sprawling saga shows civil war between the murderous pepperpots’ creator Davros and their current supreme commander, with the Doctor (two of them, in fact) and a motley crew of allies stirring the bubbling mix and nudging the feuding megalomaniacs in a certain direction…

When the dust settles, Richard Alan & Sullivan provide a salutary epilogue in ‘Up Above the Gods’ (DWM#227, July 1995) as The Doctor explains his actions to Davros – or so, at least, the deluded devil believes…

Warwick Gray & Colin Andrew introduce a universe where The Doctor perished in his Third Regeneration: leading to a cross dimensional incursion by ours – plus Benny and Ace – to foil the ‘Final Genesis’ of Silurian/Sea Devil renegade Mortakk (from DWM #203-206) before full-colour fun returns in ‘Time & Time Again’ (#207, Cornell, Ridgway and hues-smith Paul Vyse) with all seven incarnations of the Gallivanting Gallifreyan in action to retrieve the Key to Time and stop the Black Guardian recreating the universe in his own vile image…

Abnett & Ridgeway return to the black & white days of 1840s Kent for ‘Cuckoo’ (#208-210) as Ace and Benny understandably revolt when The Doctor seeks to steal the limelight from the first woman palaeontologist Mary Anne Wesley. His motives are quite pure: what the young scientist has found is not a missing link in human evolution but something alien that its descendants are prepared to kill for…

The dramas conclude in fine style as Gray & Ridgway expose the ferocious spleen of the Doctor in full indignant mode when he is an ‘Uninvited Guest’ (DWM #211) delivering judgement and punishment to a soiree of indolent and callous timeless beings who enjoyed making sport and playing games with “lesser” creatures. They soon painfully learn that such valuations are all a matter of perspective…

Supplemented with commentaries by the original creators, this is a splendid book for casual readers, a fine shelf addition for dedicated fans of the show and a perfect opportunity to cross-promote our particular art-form to anyone minded to give comics another go…
All Doctor Who material © BBCtv 2014. Doctor Who, the Tardis and all logos are trademarks of the British Broadcasting Corporation and are used under licence. All other material © 2017 its individual creators and owners. Published 2017 by Panini. All rights reserved.

Posted on

Showcase Presents Superman volume 4


By Edmond Hamilton, Robert Bernstein, Jerry Siegel, Leo Dorfman, Al Plastino, Curt Swan, George Klein & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-1847-8 (TPB)

By the time of the stories in this fabulous fourth monochrome compendium Superman was a truly global household name, with the burgeoning mythology of lost Krypton, modern Metropolis and the core cast familiar to most children and many adults.

The Man of Tomorrow was just beginning a media-led burst of revived interest. In the immediate future, television exposure, a rampant merchandising wave thanks to the Batman-led boom in superheroes generally, highly efficient world-wide comics, cartoon, bubble gum cards and especially toy licensing deals would all feed a growing mythology. Everything was in place to keep the Last Son of Krypton a vibrant yet comfortably familiar icon of modern, Space-Age America: particularly constantly evolving, ever-more dramatic and imaginative comicbook stories.

Spanning October 1962 to February 1964 and taken from Action Comics #293-309 and Superman #157-166, here the Man of Tomorrow faces evermore fantastic physical threats and critical personal and social challenges.

AC #293 gets things off to a fine start with Edmond Hamilton & Al Plastino’s ‘The Feud Between Superman and Clark Kent!’ as another exposure to randomly metamorphic Red Kryptonite divides the Metropolis Marvel into a rational but powerless mortal and an aggressive, out of control superhero, determined to continue his existence at all costs…

Superman #157 (November 1962) opens with fresh additions to mythology as ‘The Super-Revenge of the Phantom Zone Prisoner!’ – Hamilton, Curt Swan & George Klein – introduces permanently power-neutralising Gold Kryptonite and Superman’s Zone-o-phone – allowing him to monitor and communicate with the incarcerated inhabitants in a stirring tale of injustice and redemption. Convicted felon Quex-Ul uses it to petition Superman for release since his sentence has been served, and despite reservations our fair-minded hero agrees. However, further investigation reveals Quex-Ul was framed and innocent of any crime, but before Superman can make amends, he must survive a deadly trap the embittered (and partially mind-controlled) parolee had laid for the son of the Zone’s discoverer…

The issue also carried a light-hearted espionage yarn as the Action Ace becomes ‘The Super-Genie of Metropolis!’ (Robert Bernstein & Plastino) as well as ‘Superman’s Day of Doom!’ from Jerry Siegel, Swan & Klein, wherein a little kid saves the hero from a deadly ambush set during a parade in his honour.

Action #294 contains a classic duel between Superman and Lex Luthor in Hamilton & Plastino’s ‘The Kryptonite Killer!’ wherein the sinister scientist makes elemental humanoids to destroy his hated foe, whilst #295’s ‘Superman Goes Wild!’ (Bernstein, Swan & Klein) features an insidious plot by the Superman Revenge Squad to drive him murderously insane.

Issue #158 of his solo title hosted full-length epic ‘Superman in Kandor!’ (Hamilton, Swan & Klein) as raiders from the preserved Kryptonian enclave attack the Man of Steel in ‘Invasion of the Mystery Supermen’, describing him as a traitor to his people. Baffled, Action Ace and Jimmy Olsen infiltrate the Bottle City: creating costumed alter egos Nightwing and Flamebird to become ‘The Dynamic Duo of Kandor!’ By solving the enigma, they save the colony from utter destruction in ‘The City of Super-People!’

Action #296 seemingly offers a man vs. monster saga in ‘The Invasion of the Super-Ants!’ (Hamilton & Plastino) but the gripping yarn has a sharp plot twist and timely warning about nuclear proliferation, before in #297’s ‘The Man Who Betrayed Superman’s Identity!’ (Leo Dorfman, Swan & Klein), veteran newsman Perry White is gulled into solving the world’s greatest mystery after a head injury induces amnesia.

Editor Mort Weisinger was expanding the series’ continuity and building the legend, and realised each new tale was an event adding to a nigh-sacred canon: what he printed was deeply important to the readers. However, as an ideas man he wasn’t going to let that aggregated “history” stifle a good plot, nor would he allow his eager yet sophisticated audience to endure clichéd Deus ex Machina cop-outs which might mar the sheer enjoyment of a captivating concept. Thus “Imaginary Stories” were conceived as a way of exploring non-continuity plots and scenarios, devised at a time when editors felt that entertainment trumped consistency and fervently believed that every comic read was somebody’s first and – unless they were very careful – their last…

Taken from Superman #159, this book’s first Imaginary Novel follows, as ‘Lois Lane, the Super-Maid of Krypton!’ (Hamilton, Swan & Klein) sees a baby girl escape Earth’s destruction by rocketing to another world in ‘Lois Lane’s Flight from Earth!’ Befriending young Kal-El, she grows to become a mighty champion of justice. Clashing with ‘The Female Luthor of Krypton!’ and repeatedly saving the world, Lois tragically endures ‘The Doom of Super-Maid!’ at a time when attitudes apparently couldn’t allow a woman to be stronger than Superman – even in an alternate fictionality…

Dorfman, Swan & Klein’s ‘Clark Kent, Coward!’ leads Action #298 wherein a balloon excursion dumps Jimmy, Lois and the clandestine crusader in a lost kingdom whose queen finds the timid buffoon irresistible. Unfortunately the husky hunks of the hidden land take extreme umbrage at her latest dalliance…

In #160 of his eponymous publication, our hero temporarily loses his powers in ‘The Mortal Superman!’ (Dorfman & Plastino), almost dying in ‘The Cage of Doom!’ before his merely human wits prove sufficient to outsmart a merciless crime syndicate, after which the mood lightens as – fully restored – he becomes ‘The Super-Cop of Metropolis!’ to outwit spies in a classy “why-dunnit” from Siegel, Swan & Klein.

Action #299 reveals the outlandish motives behind ‘The Story of Superman’s Experimental Robots!’ in a truly bizarre tale by Siegel & Plastino, whilst Superman #161 offers an untold tale revealing how he tragically learned the limitations of his powers. In ‘The Last Days of Ma and Pa Kent!’ (Dorfman & Plastino) a vacation time-travel trip led to his foster parents’ demise and only too late did the heartbroken hero learn his actions were not the cause of their deaths. It’s supplemented by ‘Superman Goes to War’ (Hamilton, Swan & Klein) lightening the mood as a war game covered by Daily Planet staff devolves into the real thing after Clark discovers some participants are actually aliens.

Action Comics reached #300 with the May1963 issue ,and to celebrate Hamilton & Plastino crafted brilliantly ingenious ‘Superman Under the Red Sun!’ wherein the Man of Tomorrow is trapped in the far, far future where Earth’s sun has cooled to crimson and his powers fade. The valiant chronal castaway suffers incredible hardship and danger before devising a way home, just in time for #301 and ‘The Trial of Superman!’ – by the same creative team – as the Man of Steel allows himself to be prosecuted for Clark Kent’s murder to save America from a terrible threat.

Dorfman, Swan & Klein’s ‘The Amazing Story of Superman-Red and Superman-Blue!’ (Superman #162) is possibly the most ambitious and influential tale of the entire “Imaginary Tale” sub-genre: a startling utopian classic so well-received that decades later it influenced and flavoured the post-Crisis on Infinite Earths Superman continuity for months. It still does today. The Metropolis Marvel permanently divides into two equal beings in ‘The Titanic Twins!’, who promptly solve all Earth’s problems with ‘The Anti-Evil Ray!’ and similar scientific breakthroughs before both retiring with pride and the girls of their dreams, Lois Lane and Lana Lang (one each, of course) in ‘The End of Superman’s Career!’…

There’s no record of who scripted Action #302’s ‘The Amazing Confession of Super-Perry White!’ but Plastino’s slick, beefy art lends great animation to a convoluted tale with the Man of Steel replacing the aging editor to thwart an assassination plot, accidentally giving the impression that podgy Perry is his actual alter ego…

Superman #163 offered crafty mystery in ‘Wonder-Man, the New Hero of Metropolis!’ (Hamilton, Swan & Klein) who almost replaces the Man of Steel, were it not for his tragic foredoomed secret, before ‘The Goofy Superman!’ (Bernstein & Plastino) sees Red K deprive the hero of powers and sanity, resulting in a fortuitous stay in the local Home for the Perpetually Bewildered – since that’s where a cunning mad bomber is secretly hiding out…

In Action #303 Hamilton, Swan & Klein have the infernal mineral transform Superman into ‘The Monster from Krypton!’, almost dying at the hands of the army and a vengeful Supergirl who believes her cousin has been eaten by the dragon he’s become, and #304 hosted ‘The Interplanetary Olympics!’ (Dorfman, Swan & Klein), as Superman deliberately throws the contest and shames Earth…  but only for the best possible reasons!

Courtesy of Hamilton, Swan & Klein in Superman #164 (October 1963) comes classic clash ‘The Showdown Between Luthor and Superman’, pitting the lifelong foes in an unforgettable confrontation on post-apocalyptic planet Lexor – a dead world of lost science and fantastic beasts. ‘The Super-Duel!’ offers a new side to Superman’s previously 2-dimensional arch-enemy and the issue also includes ‘The Fugitive from the Phantom Zone!’ (Siegel & Plastino): a smart vignette with Superman outwitting a foe he can’t beat by playing on his psychological foibles…

Action #305 featured Imaginary Story ‘Why Superman Needs a Secret Identity!’ (Dorfman, Swan & Klein) detailing personal tragedies and disasters following Ma & Pa Kent’s proud and foolish public announcement that their son is an alien Superboy, whilst Superman #165’s ‘Beauty and the Super-Beast!’ and conclusion ‘Circe’s Super-Slave’ (Bernstein, Swan & Klein), see the Man of Steel seemingly helpless against the ancient sorceress. In fact, the whole thing is an elaborate hoax to foil alien invaders of the Superman Revenge Squad. The issue’s third tale, ‘The Sweetheart Superman Forgot!’ (Siegel & Plastino) offers heartbreaking forbidden romance wherein powerless, amnesiac and disabled Superman meets, loves and loses a good woman who wants him purely for himself. When memory and powers return, Clark has no recollection of Sally Selwyn, who’s probably still pining faithfully for him…

Action #306 sees Bernstein & Plastino tweak the Prince and the Pauper in ‘The Great Superman Impersonation!’ as Kent is hired to protect a South American President because he looks enough like Superman to fool potential assassins. Of course it’s all a byzantine con, but by the end who’s conning who?

The reporter’s crime exposés make ‘Clark Kent – Target for Murder!’ in Action #307 (by an unattributed scripter with Swan & Klein) but villainous King Kobra makes the mistake of his life when the hitman he hires turns out to be the intended victim in disguise, after which #308 concentrates on all-out fantasy as ‘Superman Meets the Goliath-Hercules!’ (anonymous & Plastino) after crossing into a parallel universe. Before returning, the Action Ace helps a colossal demigod perform “the Six Labours of King Thebes” in a yarn clearly cobbled together in far too much haste.

Superman #166 (January 1964) features ‘The Fantastic Story of Superman’s Sons’ by Hamilton, Swan & Klein: an Imaginary Tale/solid thriller built on a painful premise – what if only one of Superman’s children inherits his powers? (Sounds a bit familiar now, no?) The saga starts with ‘Jor-El II and Kal-El II’ and the discovery that Kal junior takes after his Earth-born mother. He subsequently grows into a teenager with real emotional problems and, hoping to boost his confidence, dad packs both boys off to Kandor so they’ll be physically equal. Soon the twins find adventure as ‘The new Nightwing and Flamebird!’

However, when a Kandorian menace escapes to the outer world, it’s up to the human son to save Earth following ‘Kal-El II’s Mission to Krypton!’ which wraps everything up in a neat and tidy bundle of escapist fun.

This volume closes with a strange TV tie-in tale from Action Comics #309 as an analogue of This Is Your Life honours Superman by inviting all his friends – even the Legion of Super-Heroes and especially Clark Kent – to ‘The Superman Super-Spectacular!’ (Hamilton, Swan & Klein). With no other option, the hero must share his secret identity with someone new so that they can impersonate him. Although there must be less convoluted ways to allay Lois’ suspicions, this yarn includes perhaps the oddest guest star appearance in comics’ history…

These tales are the comic book equivalent of bubble gum pop music: perfectly constructed, always entertaining, occasionally challenging and never unwelcome. As well as containing some of the most delightful episodes of a pre angst-drenched, cosmically catastrophic DC, these fun, thrilling, mind-boggling and yes, frequently moving all-ages stories also perfectly depict changing mores and tastes that reshaped comics between the safely anodyne 1950s to the seditious, rebellious 1970s, all the while keeping to the prime directive of the industry – “keep them entertained and keep them wanting more”.

I know I certainly do…
© 1962-1964, 2008 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

Posted on

Follow Me In


By Katriona Chapman (Avery Hill Publishing)
ISBN: 978-1-910395-38-7 (HB/Digital edition)

Katriona Chapman is a story-maker who has been crafting superb tales in Small Press titles like Tiny Pencil (which she-cofounded), Comic Book Slumber Party, Ink & Paper, Save Our Souls, Deep Space Canine and her own award-winning Katzine. She draws beautifully and knows how to quietly sneak up, grab your undivided attention and never let go – and she hasn’t spent all her life sat at a desk either.

Follow Me In was her first novel-length tale (go look up Breakwater when you’re done here), combining recollections of a particularly troubling time in her life with clearly the most life-affirming and inspirational events one could hope to experience.

At the railway station, a young woman meets up with an old boyfriend. He’s a writer and she draws. It’s been years and they’re still awkward and uncomfortable in each other’s presence. They talk about the time in 2003 when they decided to trek the entire country of Mexico, north to south-east to west. Back then they were looking for themselves. As her mind goes back, she realizes she’s a lot closer to answers than he is…

This hefty yet pocket-sized (165 x 216 mm) hardcover traces that voyage with exquisite detail, relating history, culture, the sights, and most especially the actual, non-screaming headlines and bad-movie images of a young nation with thousands of years of history, architecture and archaeology: a nation that proudly boasts dozens of indigenous cultures living in relative harmony, speaking at least 68 legally recognised languages and constantly being reshaped by political turmoil. Moreover, no traveller should miss this tome – if only for the advice on bugs, minibeasts and illnesses…

Follow Me In is deftly lyrical and enchantingly enticing; a moving and intoxicating graphic assessment of a crucial time in the illustrator’s life, filled with facts, warmth and conflict, offering fascinating data on such varied topic as ‘A Selection of Mexican Foods’, ‘Learning Spanish’, ‘Travel Sketching’, ‘What’s in our Bags?’ and ‘The Conquests’, all equally compelling and useful to know. And through it all, you’ll want to know what happened to our travellers as they transition from kids to grown-ups as much as what they’ll see next in this magnetic story within a story.

Refreshing, redemptive and rewarding, this is a read to chase away all winter blues and existential glums and an experience you must not deprive yourself of.
© Katriona Chapman 2018. All rights reserved.

Posted on

El Diablo


By Brian Azzarello, Danijel Zezelj & various (Vertigo)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-1625-2 (TPB) 978-1-84576-777-8 (TPB Titan Books edition)

This extra-adult all-Vertigo interpretation of the classic DC Western avenger dates from a 2001 4-issue miniseries, and is an early precursor to the superb Loveless. None of these – as far as I’m aware – are available digitally yet, but they bloody well should be.

Moses Stone is a gunman turned sheriff in frontier town Bollas Raton. His fearsome reputation, as much as his actions, serves to keep the town peaceful, and he’s perfectly content not shooting anybody.

One night, the awesome and terrifying El Diablo comes to town: exacting his signature brand of gruesome vengeance on a band of outlaws, he inexplicably refuses to kill Stone when the lawman tries to halt the carnage.

Unable to understand or let it lie, sheriff and posse trail the vigilante to Halo, New Mexico where the bloodshed continues and a ghastly secret is revealed.

Although he is still a deep, brooding mystery tainted by supernatural overtones, fans of the original western avenger created by Robert Kanigher & Gray Morrow (who debuted in All-Star Western #2, October1970) will be disappointed to find that tragic Lazarus Lane – brutalised by thieves, struck by lightning and only able to wake from his permanent coma at the behest of Indian shaman White Owl – is all but absent from this darkly philosophical drama.

DC’s demonically-infested agent of vengeance is long, long overdue for a comprehensive reappraisal and definitive curated collection. The original occasional series of short tales from All-Star and Weird Western was illustrated by Morrow, Joe Kubert, Alan Weiss, Dick Giordano, Neal Adams, Alfredo Alcala and Bernie Wrightson, and the scripters included Sergio Aragonés, Cary Bates & Len Wein… And that’s not even counting the Sagebrush Satan’s many team-ups with the likes of Jonah Hex in various iterations of the bounty killer’s own titles.

In this moody epic, however, the phantom of the plains is more presence than personality.

There’s an awful lot of talking and suspense-building, but thanks to the moody graphics of Danijel Zezelj tension and horror remain intensely paramount and when the action comes it is powerful and unforgettable.

The dark star is a force but not a presence in El Diablo, but the tale of Moses Stone is nonetheless a gripping thriller to chill and intrigue all but the most devoutly traditional cowboy fans.

So can we PLEASE be having a proper compilation soon, yes?
© 2001, 2008 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved

Posted on

Deadman Tells the Spooky Tales


By Franco and a few of his Fiendish Friends! – Sara Richard, Andy Price, Derek Charm, Mike Hartigan, Christopher Uminga, Abigail Larson, Morgan Beem, Justin Castaneda, Tressina Bowling, Boatwright Artwork, Scoot McMahon, Isaac Goodhart, and Agnes Garbowska with Silvana Brys – & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-7795-0384-8 (TPB/Digital edition)

Here’s a little post-Halloween treat for youngsters of every vintage to ease our communal dark awaiting us at the end of all things. Never to soon early to start traumatising preschoolers, right?

As the 1960s ended, the massive superhero boom resolved into a slow but certain bust, with formerly major successes unable to find enough readers to keep them alive. The taste for superheroes was diminishing in favour of traditional genres, and one rational editorial response reshaping costumed characters to fit evolving contemporary tastes.

Publishers swiftly changed gears and even staid, cautious DC reacted rapidly: redesigning masked mystery men to fit the new landscape. Newly revised and revived costumed features included roving mystic troubleshooter The Phantom Stranger and golden age colossus The Spectre, whilst resurgent genres spawned atrocity-faced WWII spy Unknown Soldier and cowboy bounty hunter Jonah Hex, spectral westerner El Diablo and game-changing monster hero Swamp Thing, spearheading a torrent of new formats, anthologies and concepts.

The earliest of that dark bunch was assassinated trapeze artist Boston Brand who began his career by dying in Strange Adventures #205 (cover-dated October/November 1967). An ordinary man in a brutal, cynical world, Brand was a soul in balance until killed as part of a pointless initiation for a trainee assassin.

When the unlucky aerialist died, instead of going to whatever reward awaited him, he was given the chance to solve his own murder by conniving spirit of the universe Rama Kushna. That opportunity evolved into an unending mission to balance the scales between good and evil in the world. The ghost is intangible and invisible to all mortals, but has the ability to “walk into” living beings, possessing and briefly piloting them.

You should read all his stories because they are really good; all the previous has no real bearing on what follows. I just love showing off my wasted youth.

Here he holds the hallowed position of quirky narrator and curator to a collection of terror tales entirely scripted by Franco (Aureliani) and lettered by Wes Abbott, and drawn by a host of artists…

The eerie soirée and each following vignette are preceded by our supernatural star offering ‘A Die-er Warning’ (all limned by Sara Richard). Commencing in ‘The House of Madame Pyka’ – rendered by Andy Price in tones of blue – wilful Brooke moves into an expired spiritualist’s house…

Deadman interjects between tales to test our resolve but undaunted, we see Derek Charm illuminate in living colour the shocking result of Mr. Smith’s visit to the optician in ‘Eyes’, before Mike Hartigan exposes the spook in the ‘Litter Box’ and Christopher Uminga & Silvana Brys silently show the downside of too many ‘Neighborhood Cats’…

Abigail Larson provides the art for an exceptionally effective argument for why kids should stay out of ‘The Cemetery’ and Morgan Beem captures the mordant gloom and imminent immolation of ‘Fall’ before Justin Castaneda homes in on little kids and playground bullies to expose ‘A Boy and His Skull’…

Tressina Bowling renders tall tales painfully real in ‘The Fisherman’ whilst Boatwright Artwork take a long last look at ‘Mannequins’, before Scoot McMahon peeks ‘On the Inside’ of Batman’s most tragic foe.

Franco gets artistic with ‘The Fly’ prior to Isaac Goodhart exploiting DC’s monstrous back-catalogue for fearful film show ‘Inattentive Blindness’ before Agnes Garbowska & Silvana Brys confirm that the end is near and that bright shiny colours have no bearing on safety and security in ‘The Box’.

Silly and chilling, this splendidly glitzy grimoire shows that our love of scaring ourselves and each other starts early and never stops. Fearful fun for all: get some now!
© 2022 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

Posted on

Hellboy in Mexico


By Mike Mignola, Richard Corben, Mick McMahon, Fábio Moon, Gabriel Bá, Dave Stewart & Clem Robins (Dark Horse Books)
ISBN: 978-1-61655-897-0 (TPB) eISBN: 978-1-63008-217-8

Happy Dia de los Muertos!

Let’s wind down our own Halloween celebrations and enjoy the more life-affirming Day of the Dead with a fabulously appropriate tome, formatted for your edification in both trade paperback and digital editions…

Towards the end of World War II an uncanny otherworldly baby was confiscated from Nazi cultists by American superhero The Torch of Liberty and a squad of US Rangers moments after his eldritch nativity on Earth. The good guys had interrupted a satanic ritual predicted by British parapsychologist Professor Trevor Bruttenholm and his associates who were waiting for Hell to literally come to Earth.

The heroic assemblage was stationed at a ruined church in East Bromwich, England when the abominable infant with a huge stone right hand materialised in an infernal fireball. “Hellboy” was subsequently raised by Bruttenholm, and grew into a mighty warrior fighting a never-ending secret war against the uncanny and supernaturally hostile. The Prof assiduously schooled and trained his happy-go-lucky foundling whilst forming and consolidating an organisation to destroy arcane and occult threats: the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense.

After years of such devoted intervention, education and warm human interactions, in 1952 the neophyte hero began hunting down agents of the malign unknown, from phantoms to monsters as lead field operative for the BPRD. Hellboy rapidly became its top operative; the world’s most successful paranormal investigator.

As decades passed, Hellboy uncovered snatches of his origins and antecedents, learning he was a supposedly corrupted beast of dark portent: a demonic messiah destined to destroy the world and bring back ancient powers of evil.

It is a fate he despised and utterly rejected…

This eerily esoteric collection of tales concocted by Mike Mignola and friends re-presents a selection of short stories as originally published Hellboy In Mexico, Dark Horse Presents volume 2 #7, 31-32, Hellboy 20th Anniversary Sampler, Dark Horse Presents volume 3 #7, and Hellboy: House of the Living Dead, which collectively span 2010 to 2015. The premise is that in 1956 Hellboy was working south of the border and, thanks to booze and an unspecified crisis, went way, way, wa-aay off the reservation…

With each piece preceded by informative commentary from Mignola, the arcane action opens with ‘Hellboy in Mexico or, A Drunken Blur’ (May 2010). illustrated by Richard Corben with colourist Dave Stewart & letterer Clem Robins adding their own seamlessly fitting talents.

In 1982 Hellboy and amphibious ally Abe Sapien are winding down after a strenuous mission in Mexico. Looking for a quiet drink they amble into a ramshackle cantina and discover a sort of shrine comprising a Holy Virgin statue and hundreds of faded photos, posters and tickets for luchadors (masked wrestlers). One of them features Hellboy and three grinning, hooded grapplers…

Shocked and stunned, Hellboy’s mind drifts back to a barely-recalled drunken binge three decades ago…

Thus is revealed an untold tale of sterling comradeship and collaborative chaos-crushing, as the Demon Detective joins a trio of fun-loving masked brothers who combine their travels on the wrestling circuit with a spot of monster-hunting and devil-destroying. Sadly, Hellboy also remembers how it all fell apart after young Esteban succumbed to the deadly embrace of vampiric bat-god Camazotz…

When the golden times ended, Hellboy indulged in an epic, memory-eradicating booze-bender until – months later – BPRD agents found, dried out and brought home their errant top gun. Of course, since he was missing for months, there might be other exploits still unrecalled…

Fully crafted by Mignola, in Dark Horse Presents volume 2 #7 (December 2011) ‘Hellboy versus the Aztec Mummy’ returns to that lost time and place as the powerfully pixilated paranormal paragon hunts down a devil-bat, only to find himself overmatched in a clash with godly Quetzalcoatl, after which marvellous Mick McMahon picks up the illustrator’s brushes to render Mignola’s outrageous drunken tall tale ‘Hellboy Gets Married’ (DHP #31-32, December 2013 to January 2014).

This time, demon drink led to the infernal gladiator falling into an unlikely matrimonial match with a ghostly shapeshifter. Their wedding night was the stuff of nightmares…

Relentlessly following, ‘The Coffin Man’ (by Mignola and Fábio Moon from March 2014’s Hellboy 20th Anniversary Sampler) revisits another cantina night which was interrupted by a little girl whose recently interred uncle was being pilfered by a sinister Brujo (witchman). Hellboy’s best attempts to take back the beloved cadaver were insultingly inadequate…

The sequel ‘The Coffin Man 2: The Rematch’ was illustrated by Moon’s twin brother Gabriel Bá, having first appeared in Dark Horse Presents volume 3 #7 (February 2015). It happened a fortnight after that initial encounter, when the still smarting AWOL B.P.R.D. agent went looking for the corpse-stealer and yet again came off embarrassingly second-best.

‘House of the Living Dead’ originally emerged as an eponymous original graphic novel crafted by Mignola, Corben, Stewart & Robins. It was devised as loving tribute to the golden age of Universal monster movies, their Hammer Films descendants and legendary actors Boris Karloff, Glenn Strange, John Carradine & Lon Chaney Jr.

The saga starts during that hazy sun-drenched fugue season as Hellboy still revels in the heady thrills of the travelling wrestling ring. That only makes him a target for a cunning plan that starts with the offer of a lucrative private bout. Despite refusing, our soused champion is convinced to comply when the stranger shows him a photo of the girl who will be killed if he doesn’t fight…

Soon he’s reluctantly entering a dilapidated hacienda and climbing into a ring to clash with a mad doctor’s recently animated corpse-monster. And then vampires show up and the rising full moon bathes the deranged genius’ manservant…

A light-hearted romp with a potent twist and dark underpinnings, it’s no wonder Hellboy carried on drinking after all the grave dust settled…

Moderated and annotated by editor Scott Allie, a ‘Hellboy Sketchbook’ closes this festive fear fiesta, sharing story-layouts, doodles, roughs, character designs and pencilled pages, all accompanied by creator comments and garnished with a full cover gallery.

Delivered as short, sharp shockers of beguiling wit and intensity, this potent piñata of horror history is a perfect example of comics storytelling at its very best: offering astounding supernatural spectacle, amazing arcane action and momentous mystical suspense and horror-hued hilarity – something every fear fan and adventure aficionado can enjoy.
™ & © 2010, 2011, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 Mike Mignola. Hellboy is ™ Mike Mignola. All rights reserved.

Posted on

Showcase Presents The House of Mystery volume 3


By Joe Orlando, Michael Fleischer, Maxine Fabe, Jack Oleck, John Albano, Sergio Aragonés, Steve Skeates, Mark Evanier, Robert Kanigher, George Kashdan, Doug Moench, Sheldon Mayer, E. Nelson Bridwell, John Jacobson, David Micheline, Gerard Conway, David Izzo, Dennis O’Neil, Marv Wolfman, John Broome, Paul Levitz, Bob Rozakis, Mark Hanerfeld, David Kasakove, Michael J. Pellowski, Martin Pasko, Bernie Wrightson, Michael William Kaluta, John Calnan, Murphy Anderson, Ruben Yandoc, Alex N. Niño, Romy Gamboa, Adolfo Buylla, Sonny Trinidad, Nestor Redondo, Rico Rival, Gerry Talaoc, Fred Carrillo, Tony DeZuñiga, Bernard Baily, Abe Ocampo, Alfredo Alcala, Frank Thorne, Frank “Quico” Redondo, Eufronio Reyes (E.R.) Cruz, Ralph Reese, Ramona Fradon, Frank Robbins, Bill Draut, Howard Purcell, Dick Dillin, Neal Adams, Mort Meskin, George Roussos, Frank Giacoia, Mike Sekowsky, Jack Kirby, Don Heck, Joe Giella, Jack Sparling, Pat Broderick, Leonard Starr, Carmine Infantino, Bernard Sachs, Bill Ely, Jess M. Jodloman, Curt Swan & George Klein, & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-2183-6 (TPB)

American comicbooks started slowly until the creation of Superman unleashed a torrent of creative imitation and invented a new genre: superheroes. Implacably vested in the Second World War, they swept all before them until the troops came home whereupon older genres supplanted the Fights ‘n’ Tights crowd.

Although new kids kept up the buying, much of the previous generation also retained their four-colour habit but increasingly sought older themes in the reading matter. The war years altered the psychology of humanity, and as a more world-weary, cynical young public came to see that all the fighting and dying hadn’t really changed anything their chosen forms of entertainment (film and prose as well as comics) reflected this. As well as Western, War and Crime comics, madcap escapist comedy and anthropomorphic funny animal features were immediately resurgent, but gradually another periodic revival of spiritualism and interest in the supernatural led to increasingly impressive, evocative and even shocking horror comics.

There had been grisly, gory and supernatural stars before, including a pantheon of ghosts, monsters and wizards draped in mystery-man garb and trappings (the Spectre, Mr. Justice, Sgt. Spook, Frankenstein, The Heap, Zatara, Dr. Fate and dozens more), but these had been victims of circumstance: the unknown as a power source for super-heroics. Now the focus shifted to ordinary mortals thrown into a world beyond their ken with the intention of unsettling, not vicariously empowering, the reader.

Almost every publisher jumped on the increasingly popular bandwagon, with B & I (which became the magical one-man-band Richard E. Hughes’ American Comics Group) launching the first regularly published horror comic in the Autumn of 1948, although Adventures Into the Unknown was technically pipped by Avon who had released an impressive single issue entitled Eerie in January 1947 before launching a regular series in 1951, by which time Classics Illustrated had already long milked the literary end of the medium with adaptations of The Headless Horseman, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (both 1943), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1944) and Frankenstein (1945) among others.

If we’re keeping score this was also the period in which Joe Simon & Jack Kirby identified another “mature market” gap and invented Romance comics with Young Romance #1, (September 1947) but they too saw the sales potential for spooky material, resulting in the seminal Black Magic (launched in 1950) and boldly obscure psychological drama anthology Strange World of Your Dreams (1952).

The company that would become DC Comics bowed to the inevitable and launched a comparatively straight-laced anthology that nevertheless became one of their longest-running and most influential titles with the December 1951/January 1952 launch of The House of Mystery. When the hysterical censorship scandal which led to witch-hunting hearings of the Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency, April- June 1954 was curtailed by the industry adopting a castrating straitjacket of self-regulatory rules HoM and its sister title House of Secrets were dialled back into rationalistic, fantasy adventure vehicles. They even briefly became super-hero split-books (with Martian Manhunter and Dial H for Hero in HoM and Eclipso subletting with veteran mystic adventurer Mark Merlin – who latterly became Prince Ra-Man – in HoS).

However nothing combats censorship better than falling profits and as the 1960s waned the Silver Age superhero boom stalled and crashed, leading to surviving publishers agreeing to loosen their self-imposed restraints against crime and horror comics. Nobody much cared about gangster titles but as the liberalisation coincided with another bump in global interest in all aspects of the Worlds Beyond, resurrection of scary stories was a foregone conclusion and obvious “no-brainer”. Even ultra-wholesome Archie Comics re-entered the field with their Red Circle Thrillers…

Thus, with absolutely no fanfare at all issue #174, cover dated May-June 1968 presented a bold banner asking Do You Dare Enter The House of Mystery? whilst reprinting a bunch of admittedly excellent short fantastic thrillers originally seen in House of Secrets from those heady days when it was okay to scare kids.

With covers by Michael William Kaluta, Bernie Wrightson, Luis Dominguez, George Evans, Nick Cardy, Bill Draut, Alfredo Alcala & Gerry Talaoc, this second compilation reprints in moody monochrome the contents of The House of Mystery #212 to 226. The contents span cover-dates March 1973 to August/September 1974 and begin with ‘Ever After’ by unknown scribe and illustrators John Calnan & Murphy Anderson, wherein a ruthless chancer picks the wrong recently bereaved heiress to marry. Michael Fleischer, Maxine Fabe & Alex N. Niño’s ‘Oh Mom! Oh Dad! You’ve Sent Me Away to Summer Camp… and I’m So Sad!’ reveals a strange logic to why the kid in a wheelchair is being picked on by his supposed chums before the issue ends with Jack Oleck & Ruben Yandoc sharing a grim ride with a guilty passenger heading ‘Halfway to Hell!’

John Albano & Niño’s ‘Back from the Realm of the Damned’ opens #213 as a greedy son murders his stepfather and learns an eternally damning lesson. Although fear was key, fun was always the goal and the tales were interspersed with blackly comedic gag pages. Here, Sergio Aragonés delivers a bunch of sidesplitters in a ‘Cain’s Game Room’ segment. The pages – alternated with Page 13 and ‘Cain’s Gargoyles’ – provided painfully punny pranks (originally just by Aragonés but eventually supplemented by other cartoonists like John Albano, Lore Shoberg and John Costanza). The feature was popular enough to be spun off into bizarrely outrageous comic book Plop! – but that’s a subject for another day…

Here the terror is turned up after a married couple’s pleasant drive deposits them on ‘The Other Side!’ (Steve Skeates & Romy Gamboa), before Oleck & Adolfo Buylla reveal the fate of a modern day wizard who creates a slave ‘In His Own Image!’

HoM #214 leads with Oleck & Yandoc’s ‘Curse of the Werewolf’, as a trickster’s scheme founders when he picks the wrong target. Another visit with ‘Cain’s Gargoyles’ courtesy of Aragonés, brings us to Mark Evanier, Robert Kanigher & Sonny Trinidad’s tale of a daredevil and a thief who know exactly when they’re going to die thanks to ‘The Death Clock!’ A double dose of ‘Cain’s Game Room’ leads to the tale of pet-hater and her just fate in Skeates & Nestor Redondo’s ‘The Shaggy Dog.’

In #215, Fleischer, Fabe & Rico Rival’s ‘The Man Who Wanted Power over Women’ details how a lonely homely guy consults the wrong witch in his desire to be loved, and George Kashdan & Talaoc see an arrogant sculptor swear ‘Your Corpse Shall I Carve!’ in his ruthless search for the perfect muse. A fresh Aragonés ‘Cain’s Game Room’ page refreshes the palate for some ‘Brain Food’ as Fabe & Fred Carrillo detail how the dumbest kid in school becomes a supergenius…

Albano & Tony DeZuñiga’s ‘Look into My Eyes… and Kill!’ opens #216 in the saga of a paroled convict with new powers and old grudges before an anonymous writer joins veteran chill-crafter Bernard Baily visiting the ‘Graveyard Shift’ of a mean cab driver getting paid off in kind. A double bill of ‘Cain’s Game Room’ & ‘Cain’s Gargoyles’ takes us back to unhappy spouses as a weary wife makes herself a widow to run the family business herself: a very bad deal from Doug Moench & Abe Ocampo, as proven in ‘Special Sale: Canned Death ½ Off’…

HoM #217 has Sheldon Mayer & Nestor Redondo reveal the fate of an impressionable young thing who inherit a parcel of desert and learns ‘This Ghost Town is Haunted!’, and E. Nelson Bridwell & Talaoc ask carnival freaks/murders suspects ‘Hoodoo You Trust?’ before John Jacobson, Skeates & Alcala detail how wildlife in a swamp unite against encroaching humans in defence of their ‘Swamp God!’

Fleischer, Russel Carley & Talaoc open #218 with a small midwestern city and its avaricious murderous trash-handling subcontractor getting a well-deserved dose of ‘The Abominable Ivy!’ ‘Cain’s Game Room’ then ushers us into ‘An Ice Place to Visit!’ as Fleischer, Carley & Frank Thorne expose a contaminated cold store/ice-plant and what happens to the boss who hushed up the contagion’s source…

Bridwell & Bernie Wrightson launch #219 with pun-ishing intro ‘Welcome to The House of Mystery’, after which Fleischer & Alcala take us to Nazi-occupied Tunisia where the invaders systematically succumb to ‘The Curse of the Crocodile!’, whilst a ‘Pledge to Satan’ (Mayer & Nestor Redondo) sees a medieval witch-hunter romance and cheat the wrong woman…

Another ‘Welcome to The House of Mystery’ page – by Bridwell & Alcala – kicks off #220 followed by ‘They Hunt Butterflies, Don’t They?’ Fleischer & Alcala’s tale sees a greedy guide regret betraying his lepidopterist client before an Aragonés-curated visit to ‘Cain’s Game Room’ takes us to the end with exposure of ‘The Hunter!’ who stalks the infernal realms in a macabre safari by Albano & Niño…

Fleischer & Thorne reunite in #221 (January 1974) as killer clown ‘Pingo!’ fails to have the last laugh whilst – after a Cain’s Game Room’ interlude – Len Wein, Wrightson & Michael William Kaluta magnificently cap off the dread jollity with another motley yarn as ‘He Who Laughs Last…’ shows murdering conmen how close a family circus folk are…

Oleck & Frank (AKA Quico) Redondo open #222 with ‘Vengeance is Mine!’, as a resurrected vampire hunts the family of the man who staked him, making the greatest mistake of his renewed life. It’s counterbalanced by a surreal serial killer yarn as Fleischer & Alcala see justice done and foggy Victorian London relieved on ‘The Night of the Teddy Bear!’

Issue #223 (March and the last monthly issue for some time) launches with a whaling yarn by Wein & Eufronio Reyes Cruz. ‘Demon from the Deep!’ details the mutual hatred of a seaman and the kraken he hunts, and Oleck & Ralph Reese’s ‘Message From Beyond’ shows why fake spiritualists never prosper. Teamed with wonderful Ramona Fradon, Oleck then riffs on The Picture of Dorian Gray in ‘Upon Reflection’ with a tragic twist for today’s readers…

In an effort to combat rising costs The House of Mystery #224 (April/May 1974) began an experiment with format and page count. Reduced to a bi-monthly schedule but offering 100-pages (albeit many of them reprints) it started with a ‘Welcome to The House of Mystery’ by Joe Orlando, before David Micheline & Frank Robbins followed a criminal conspiracy and deadly killer in ‘Night Stalker in Sun City’. ‘Cain’s Game Room’ segued into the first reprint with a gothic chiller of forbidden knowledge. ‘The House of Endless Years’ by Gerard Conway & Bill Draut originated in House of Secrets #83 (1970).

All-new ‘The Deadman’s Lucky Scarf’ by David Izzo, Fleischer & Alcala is a weird western vignette of cheatin’ and bitin’, followed by ‘The Reluctant Sorcerer’: a Silver Age creature feature of wonderous transformations by Howard Purcell for HoS #49 (1961).

As superheroes retreated at the end of the sixties those that could retooled as horror titles. The Spectre became a narrator of anthological tales and from #9 (March/April 1969), Dennis O’Neil & Wrightson’s ‘Abraca-Doom!’ sees the Ghostly Guardian attempts to stop a greedy carnival conjurer signing a contract with the Devil. Close behind comes Marv Wolfman, Dick Dillin & Neal Adams’ ‘The One and Only, Fully Guaranteed, Super-Permanent, 100%?’ from HoS #82 (November 1969): a darkly comedic tale of domestic bliss and how to get it…

Originating in HoM #120 (March 1962), ‘The Gift That Wiped Out Time’ – illustrated by Mort Meskin & George Roussos sees a thief encounter time-bending beasts before ‘Sheer Fear!’ (Mayer & Talaoc) finds a ruthless woman go too far in ferreting out a rival’s secrets…

An Aragonés ‘Cain’s Game Room’ precedes Kashdan & Niño’s ‘The Claws of Death!’ with a career soldier paying the ultimate price for telling the truth before a classic mystery hero gets another chance to shine.

The Phantom Stranger was one of the earliest transitional heroes of the Golden Age of comics, created at the very end of the first superhero boom as readers moved from costumed crimefighters to other genres. A trench-coated, mysterious know-it-all, with shadowed eyes and hat pulled down low, he would appear, debunk a legend or foil a supernatural-seeming plot, and then vanish again.

He was coolly ambiguous, never revealing whether he was man, mystic or personally paranormal; probably created by John Broome & Carmine Infantino, who produced the first story in Phantom Stranger #1 (August/September 1952) and most of the others. The 6-issue run also boasted contributions from Jack Miller, Manny Stallman and John Giunta. The last issue was cover-dated June/July, 1953, after which the character vanished until rebooted at the dusk of the Silver Age.

Broome & Frank Giacoia’s ‘Mystery in Miniature!’ hails from that last issue as the living enigma repels invaders from time, before Skeates & Mike Sekowsky develop a fourth-wall busting ‘Photo-Finish!’ for a blackmailer in advance of a closing ‘Cain’s Game Room’.

Cover-dated June/July, HoM #225’s ‘Welcome to The House of Mystery’ is by Paul Levitz & Wrightson, heralding Oleck & Alcala taking us to Paris in 1789 for a ghostly wizard/zombie yarn about ‘The Man Who Died Twice’. Bob Rozakis drafts a ‘Mystery Maze!’ (bring your own pencil!) and ‘Cain’s Game Room’ brings us to a treat from House of Secrets #4 (May/June 1957). The ‘Master of the Unknown’ seems destined to take the big cash prize on a TV quiz show… until the producer deduces his uncanny secret…

Fleischer & Frank Thorne again expose human depravity in ‘Fireman, Burn My Child!’: a timeless attack on medicine for profit and Aragonés’ ‘Room 13’ and ‘Cain’s Game Room’ set up a classic comics novelette.

Illustrated by Don Heck in The Sinister House of Secret Love #1 (October/November 1971) ‘The Curse of the McIntyres’ was the first of a series of book-length graphic epics in the manner of gothic romances like Jane Eyre, before transforming into a more traditional anthology package as Secrets of Sinister House with #5 (June/July 1972): reducing to the traditional 36-page format with the next issue. The format remained until its cancellation with #18 in June/July 1974.

The dark love stories were extra-long affairs like this 25-page period chiller ‘The Curse of the MacIntyres’ (possibly written by Mary Skrenes?) recounting how recently-bereaved Rachel lost her scientist father and fell under the guardianship of her cousin Blair. Moving to his remote Scottish castle she befriends Blair’s son Jamie but can’t warm to physically stunted cousin Alfie.

As days and weeks pass, she becomes increasingly disturbed by the odd household and the family’s obsessive interest in “mutations”…

‘See No Evil’ by Oleck & Niño depicts the fate of a death row inmate who sells his soul before the 1950s Man in Black pops back to expose the incredible secret of ‘The Hairy Shadows’ (by Broome, Anderson & Joe Giella from Phantom Stranger #4) whilst The Spectre #9 repeats a sinister ‘Shadow Show’ by Mark Hanerfeld & Jack Sparling.

David Kasakove, Kashdan & (ER) Cruz then finish up with a tale of two very different brothers in Halloween set shocker ‘This One’ll Scare You to Death!’…

Concluding this classic chiller compendium are the cracking contents of The House of Mystery #226 (August/September) with Levitz & Pat Broderick’s ‘Welcome to The House of Mystery’ escorting us into Oleck & Alcala’s ‘Garden of Evil’, as mismatched Mace and Myra find far more welcoming worlds – and mates – inside a painting…

After a pause in ‘Room 13’ Martin Pasko & Robbins reveal why – on a teenager’s wedding day – ‘Teddy Doesn’t Seem to Smile Anymore!’ A writer unknown & Leonard Starr meddle with ‘The Devil’s Chessboard’ as logic faces magic from HoM #12 (March 1953). Phantom Stranger #5 then offers ‘The Living Nightmare!’ (Broome Infantino & Bernard Sachs).

Oleck & Nestor Redondo detail a period tale of monster children and body-swapping in ‘Monster in the House’, and Wolfman & Wrightson return with prophetic vignette ‘Scared to Life’ from HoM #180, whilst from HoM #74 we visit ‘The School for Sorcerers’ (illustrated by Bill Ely). Michael J. Pellowski, Kanigher & Jess M. Jodloman, reveal ‘The Perfect Mate’ (for Balkan nobility!) in anticipation of a factual(ish) ‘Cain’s Gargoyles’ by Levitz & Boderick and another vintage thriller. Limned by Curt Swan & George Klein from HoM #10, ‘The Wishes of Doom!’ treads in Monkey’s Paw territory whilst Ely’s ‘The Haunted Melody’ (HoM #58, January 1957) sees a street musician squander an incredible gift…

Levitz & Broderick provide plans and diagrams when asking ‘Do You Dare Enter The House of Mystery?’ and one last Aragonés ‘Cain’s Game Room’ leads to final terror tale ‘Out of This World’ as Oleck & Talaoc reaffirm the link between Devil and Rock & Roll. Finally you can regain some sedate equilibrium with Rozakis word-search ‘Hidden in the House!’.

These fright-fables captivated the reading public and comics critics alike when they first appeared and it’s no exaggeration to posit that they probably saved the company during the dire downward sales spiral of the 1970s. Now their blend of sinister mirth and classical suspense situations can most usually be seen in such series as Goosebumps, and other kid-centred fare, but if you crave beautifully realised, largely splatter-free sagas of tension and imagination, not to mention a huge supply of bad-taste, kid-friendly creepy cartooning, book into The House of Mystery…
© 1973-1974, 2009 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.