Category: Kids – All Ages

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Showcase Presents Wonder Woman volume 3


By Robert Kanigher, Ross Andru & Mike Esposito (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-84856-474-9

Wonder Woman was created by psychologist and polygraph pioneer William Moulton Marston – apparently at the behest of his formidable wife Elizabeth – and uniquely realised by Harry G. Peter just as the spectre of World War II began to affect America.

She debuted as a bonus in All Star Comics #8 (December 1941) before vaulting into her own cover-featured series in Sensation Comics a month later. An instant hit, she quickly won her own title (cover-dated Summer 1942).

Using the pen-name Charles Moulton, Marston scripted all her adventures until his death in 1947, whereupon Robert Kanigher took over the writer’s role. Venerable co-creator H. G. Peter continued on as illustrator until his death in 1958. Wonder Woman #97, in April of that year, was his last hurrah and the end of an era.

With the exception of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and a few anodyne back-up features, costumed heroes had all but died out at the end of the 1940s, replaced by merely mortal champions in a deluge of anthologised genre titles but Showcase #4 rekindled the public’s interest in costumed crime-busters with a new iteration of The Flash in 1956 and the fanciful floodgates opened wide once more…

Whilst re-inventing Golden Age Greats such as Green Lantern, Atom and Hawkman, National/DC gradually updated those hoary survivors who had weathered the backlash and the ever-resilient Amazing Amazon …

Artists Ross Andru & Mike Esposito, who illustrated every script in this all-ages compendium, had debuted as cover artists from #95, but with Wonder Woman #98 (May 1958) they took over the interiors as writer/editor Kanigher reinvented much of the original mythos, tinkering with her origins and unleashing her on an unsuspecting world in a fanciful blend of girlish whimsy, rampant sexism, strange romance, alien invasion, monster-mashing and utterly surreal (some would say-stream-of-consciousness) storytelling…

By the time of this collection, re-presenting issues #138-156 (May 1963-August 1965) of the Amazing Amazon’s adventures, the Silver Age revival of the superhero genre was in full swing and despite individual stories of stunning imagination and excellence the format and timbre of Wonder Woman was looking tired and increasingly out of step with the rest of National/DC’s gradually gelling shared continuity.

While all the other champions and defenders were getting together and teaming up at the drop of a hat – as indeed was the Princess of Power in Justice League of America – within the pages of her own title a timeless, isolated fantasy universe was carrying on much as it always had.

Increasingly however, the Amazon was being sidelined by imaginary stories starring her younger selves Wonder Tot and Wonder Girl and even her mother Hippolyta was regularly stealing the show and the limelight.

With this volume though, the tide finally began to turn back in Diana’s favour…

‘The Kite of Doom! (#138) presented another spectacular “Impossible Day” adventure starring the entire Wonder Woman Family (that would be Princess Diana at three different ages acting in concert with her mother in tales which where outside even the amorphous and negligible continuity of the series, where internal consistency and logic were always notional and extremely mutable) and found the four faces of Wonder Woman again battling nuclear nemesis Multiple Man, alien invaders and the daily blazing fireball of doom…

‘The Day Wonder Woman Revealed her Secret Identity!’ saw the goddess Aphrodite inflict the Amazon with amnesia whilst meddling in her stalled romance with pilot Steve Trevor whilst WW #140 was another Impossible Tale with Wonder Woman transformed into ‘The Human Lightning!’ as Morpheus, god of dreams tested the entire Wonder Family before ‘The Academy of Arch-Villains!’ offered a reward for the destruction of the heroine and had to face the sinister machinations of Angle Man, the Human Fireworks and the diminutive but deadly Mouse Man.

The whole family were imperilled by terrifying trans-dimensional duplicates in ‘Captives of the Mirage Giants!’ another implausible Impossible Tale whilst issue #143 offered two tales, beginning with an alien invasion which could only be foiled by a mystic sword hidden within ‘The Terror Trees of Forbidden Island’, after which Wonder Woman was reduced to helplessness by the malignant Mouse Man and locked in ‘The Amazon Mouse Trap!’

Another brace of yarns featured in #144: the impressively clever ‘Revolt of Wonder Woman!’ wherein the tireless crusader suffered a stress-related breakdown until a blind girl restored her faith and determination and ‘Mer-Boy vs. Bird-Boy!’ with Wingo, an avian rival for Wonder Girl’s affections ,complicating an already busy day as the Teen Titan tackled invading aliens, enemy atomic submarines and the ever-deadly fireball from space…

The Wonder Woman Family were impossibly back to confront bad dreams and time-plunderers in ‘The Phantom Sea-Beast!’ but only Wonder Woman and Diana Prince were on hand to fight the ‘War of the Underwater Giants!’ and win thousands of dollars – for charity, of course – from a story-obsessed millionaire…

WW #147 featured an impossible tale from the Amazon’s teenage years as ‘Bird-Girl – Fish-Girl!’ her sea and sky boyfriends were given their heart’s desire by Athena and Aphrodite and both wished for a more physically compatible inamorata, whilst ‘The Olympics of the Doomed’ celebrated the 1964 Games with a stirring action romp in which the dread Duke of Deception captured Wonder Woman and compelled her to compete in a sudden-death competition on Mars…

In ‘The Last Day of the Amazons!’ the impossible Wonder Family almost triggered the destruction of Paradise Island when Queen Hippolyta’s passion for her long-lost lover causes his statue to come to life in a land where the presence of all males is severely proscribed by the goddesses…

Wonder Woman #150 offered ‘The Phantom Fisher-Bird!’ – a strange but thrilling yarn wherein the Wonder Family were hunted by giant man-birds from another plane of existence and ‘Wonder Girl vs. the Teenage Monster!’ (#151, January 1965) saw the Daring Damsel dogged and desired by a cosmic Glop which absorbed and mimicked anything: machinery, atomic weapons, Rock ‘n Roll records, juvenile delinquency…

With #152 the lass even took cover billing becoming Wonder Woman Presents Wonder Girl and featured another Impossible Tale with the young heroine resisting dinosaurs, mythological demons, invaders from Mars, disastrous weather and the importunate advances of Mer-boy and Bird-Boy in ‘Wonder Girl’s Decision of Doom!’ and found herself adopted by a deranged and traumatised trapeze artist who just knew that he was ‘Wonder Girl’s Mysterious Father!’

A far darker delusion haunted her in #153 as the Duke of Deception engineered ‘Wonder Girl’s Stolen Face!’ and turned her into an uncontrollable beast until Wonder Tot, Hippolyta and Wonder Woman found a face-saving solution…

‘Battle of the Boiling Man!’ in #154 saw the title revert to the mature iteration of the Female Fury in the penultimate Impossible Tale wherein wilful deities, mythical beasts and an ambulatory volcano all conspired to test the Amazons to destruction…

‘I Married a Monster!’ was a take on Beauty and the Beast wherein Wonder Woman, fed up with the constant badgering, bickering and marriage proposals of Steve Trevor, Manno and Wingo, swore off men for good and promptly fell in love with a brooding bad-boy brute trapped in a floating castle…

Just when it seemed the series could sink no lower Wonder Woman #156 changed everything with ‘The Brain Pirate of the Inner World!’ – a stylish adventure written and drawn in an effective and charming pastiche of Moulton & Peter’s glorious Golden Age Amazon.

When Wonder Woman visited the comics emporium of the Dream Merchant she was totally immersed and drawn into one of her past cases: “re-experiencing” a battle with other-dimensional buccaneers who had stolen the mentalities and enslaved the bodies of Steve and her old sidekicks the Holliday Girls…

Wild, bold, action-packed and thrilling, with all that mushy multi-species romance stuff dropped and her younger selves forgotten, a new kind of Wonder Woman was coming…

But not in this eclectic, eccentric collection which ends on this welcome high note.

Always delightful yet often mind-boggling and practically incomprehensible by modern narrative standards, these exuberant, effulgent fantasies are usually illogical and occasionally just plain bonkers, but in those days adventure in the moment was paramount and if you could put rationality and consistency aside for a moment these utterly infectious romps simply sparkled then and now with fun, thrills and sheer spectacle.

Wonder Woman is rightly revered as a focus of female strength, independence and empowerment, but the welcoming nostalgia and easy familiarity of such innocuous imaginative fairytales must be a magical escape for open-minded readers, whilst the true, incomparable value of these stories is the incredible quality entertainment they still offer.

© 1963, 1964, 1965, 2009 DC Comics, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Asterix in Switzerland, The Mansions of the Gods & Asterix and the Laurel Wreath


By Goscinny & Uderzo, translated by Anthea Bell & Derek Hockridge (Orion Books)
ISBNs: 978-075286-628-4, 978-0-75286-630-7 and 978-0-75286-632-1

One of the most-read comics strips in the world, the collected chronicles of Asterix the Gaul have been translated into more than 100 languages since his debut in 1959, with animated and live-action movies, TV series, assorted games, toys and even a theme park outside Paris (Parc Astérix, unsurprisingly…) all stemming from his glorious exploits.

More than 325 million copies of 34 Asterix books have sold worldwide, making his joint creators France’s bestselling international authors.

The diminutive, doughty, potion-powered paragon of Gallic Pride was created by two of the industry’s greatest masters, René Goscinny & Albert Uderzo. Although their inspirational collaborations ended in 1977 with the death of the prolific scripter, the creative wonderment continued until relatively recently from Uderzo and assistants – albeit at a slightly reduced rate.

The wonderment works on multiple levels: ostensibly, younger readers revel in the action-packed, lavishly illustrated comedic romps where sneaky, bullying baddies get their just deserts, whilst we more worldly readers enthuse over the dry, pun-filled, sly satire, especially as enhanced for English speakers by the brilliantly light touch of translators Anthea Bell & Derek Hockridge, who played no small part in making the indomitable Gaul and his gallant companions so palatable to the Anglo-Saxon world. (Moi, I still rejoice in a perfectly produced “Paf!” to the phizzog as much as any painfully potent procession of puns or sardonic satirical sideswipe…)

The stories were set on Uderzo’s beloved Brittany coast, where a small village of warriors and their families resisted every effort of the Roman Empire to complete the conquest of Gaul, or alternately, anywhere in the Ancient World, circa 50BC, as the Gallic Gentlemen wandered the fantastic lands of the Empire and beyond…

When the heroes were playing at home, the Romans, unable to defeat this last bastion of Gallic insouciance, resorted to a policy of containment. Thus the little seaside hamlet is permanently hemmed in by the heavily fortified garrisons of Totorum, Aquarium, Laudanum and Compendium.

The Gauls don’t care: they daily defy the world’s greatest military machine simply by going about their everyday affairs, protected by the magic potion of resident druid Getafix and the shrewd wits of the rather diminutive dynamo and his simplistic, supercharged best friend…

Firmly established as a global brand and premium French export by the mid-1960s, Asterix the Gaul continued to grow in quality as Goscinny & Uderzo toiled ever onward, crafting further fabulous sagas; building a stunning legacy of graphic excellence and storytelling gold. Moreover, following the civil unrest and nigh-revolution in French society following the Paris riots of 1968, the tales began to increasingly show signs of trenchant satire and more directed social commentary…

Asterix in Switzerland was the sixteenth saga, originally running in Pilote #557-578 throughout 1970 and first translated into English in 1973. It opens with the attempted murder of Roman official Quaestor Vexatius Sinusitus; dispatched to Gaul to audit the corrupt, embezzling and utterly decadent Governor Varius Flavus.

The poisoning only fails due to the efforts of the Druid Getafix, but to keep the Roman alive – and further thwart Flavus – the sage needs a rare flower which only grows in the mountains of neighbouring country Helvetia (and that’s Switzerland, mein kinder).

Always keen for a road-trip, Asterix and Obelix quickly volunteer to fetch the fabled “silver star” or Edelweiss …

With Sinusitus sheltered in the village of the indomitable Gauls, Flavus’ only hope is to stop the happy voyagers and to that end he sends his most unscrupulous man to warn the equally repugnant and devious Curius Odus, Governor of Helvetia, to stop the Gauls at all costs…

Although a far darker tale than most previous escapades, all the familiar gentle spoofing of national characteristics, cartoon action and hilarious lampoonery is incorporated into this splendid and beautifully rendered yarn.

Asterix and Obelix cannily avoid Roman sabotage plots, beat up many, many thugs and bullies, whilst marvelling at the quirkiness of their newfound Helvetian friends, with their mania for cleanliness, yodelling, passion for melted cheese, tidy, solicitous brand of medical treatments, cultured beverages, cultivated villages, lakes and banks and their fruit-based archery training programs for the young…

The search for the silver-star is, of course ultimately successful, despite an entire battalion of troops racing up a mountain after them, with a stunning alpine climax and an exceptionally different kind of ending…

 

Translated that same year was The Mansions of the Gods (from Pilote #591-612, in 1971) wherein Caesar, determined to eradicate the last remnant of Gaulish resistance, tries to win by social planning and cultural imperialism. To that end he plans to cut down the great forest which surrounds the village and build a new town of lavish Roman apartments in the stylish, modern Roman manner.

Whiz kid architect Squaronthehypotenus leads the project, but his immigrant army of slave labourers soon founders when boar-loving Obelix strenuously objects to having his hunting preserve torn down and paved over…

However the massed might of Rome is insurmountable and eventually many mighty oaks are felled. To counter this Getafix simply grows instant new ones whilst Asterix shares his magic potion with the increasingly fed up slaves…

This stalemate is only overcome when the wily Gauls seemingly surrender and allow the “Mansions of the Gods” to be built and stocked with middle-class colonists from Rome. After a rapid bump in trade as the villagers become tourist-trappers, the complacent property developers make their greatest mistake and rent an apartment to the Gaul’s uniquely gifted bard Cacofonix, leading to an exodus of tenants and an inevitable and breathtaking final clash with the garrison of Aquarium, who had moved into the luxurious vacant apartments…

Drenched in trenchant observation of and jibes at the industrial relations conflicts, the then runaway speculation in new developments in France and the inexorable growth of “planning blight” (still painfully relevant today anywhere in the industrialised world), this tremendously effective satire is packed with gags and action and displays artist Uderzo’s sublime gift for caricature and parody – especially in the wonderful spoofs of real estate advertising campaigns…

 

Asterix and the Laurel Wreath was serialised in issues #621-642, in 1971 and given the fabulous Bell/Hockridge treatment in 1974. It begins in Rome where Asterix and Obelix are arguing…

During a visit to Chief Vitalstatistix‘s wealthy, snobbish, city-dwelling brother-in-law Homeopathix the doughty old warrior gets too drunk and boasts that he can get something which all the merchant’s money cannot buy – a stew seasoned with Caesar’s fabled wreath of office.

Sober now and in dire danger of eternal embarrassment and the unflinching approbation of his sharp-tongued wife Impedimenta, the Chief has no option but to allow his two best men – the larger of whom had drunkenly egged him on at the family gathering and then volunteered to fetch the leafy headpiece – to travel to the heart of Caesar’s power and attempt the impossible…

At least Asterix knows it’s impossible; Obelix is quite happy to storm the Imperial Palace and just grab the wreath…

Luckily reason prevails and the wily little warrior determines their only chance is infiltration, to which end Asterix sells them both as slaves. Unfortunately they are bought by the wrong Roman…

Osseus Humerus is an innocuous Patrician with a troublesome family, but as Asterix tries every trick to get their unsuspecting owner to return them to the Slave Auctioneer, he only endears himself even more to very satisfied customer. So much so in fact, that Humerus entrusts them with a message to be delivered to Julius Caesar himself…

Jealous major-domo Goldendelicius then accuses them of planning assassination and the heroes are locked in the dungeons – leaving them complete access to the entire palace…

Before long the indomitable duo are wreaking havoc in the Imperial Court and playing hob with the usually predictable proceeding in the Arena of the Circus Maximus.

Seemingly untouchable but no nearer the Laurel Wreath, the despondent Gauls finally seize their chance when they encounter again the recently promoted Goldendelicius. Rewarded by Caesar, the major-domo now holds a position of great responsibility: holder of the triumphal floral arrangement at Caesar’s next public engagement…

Sharp and deeply intriguing this comedy of errors is spectacularly illustrated by Uderzo at the very top of his game, whilst Goscinny’s dry, wry script seamlessly rockets from slapstick set-piece to penetrating observational comedy and magnificently engaging adventure, with, as always our unlikely heroes inevitably, happily victorious in every  instance.

Asterix epics are always packed with captivating historical titbits, soupcons of healthy cynicism, singularly surreal situations and amazingly addictive but generally consequence-free action, illustrated in a magically enticing manner. These are perfect comics that everyone should read over and over again.
© 1970-1972-3 Goscinny/Uderzo. Revised English translation © 2004 Hachette. All rights reserved.

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Willowâ„¢ – A Marvel Graphic Novel


Adapted by Jo Duffy, Bob Hall & Romeo Tanghal (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-87135-367-2

In the early 1980s Marvel led the field in the development of high quality original graphic novels: mixing out-of-the-ordinary Marvel Universe tales, new series launches, creator-owned properties, movie adaptations and the occasional licensed asset, such as the adaptation of the fantasy film favourite under review here.

Released in lavishly expansive packages (a squarer page of 285 x 220mm rather than the now customary elongated 258 x 168mm) which felt and looked instantly superior to the standard flimsy comicbook no matter how good, bad or incomprehensible the contents might be. With the season upon us and in the sure and certain knowledge that this family fantasy epic will be screened somewhere, I thought I’d point some comic fans in a direction they might not have travelled otherwise…

In a fully-formed fantasy scenario where any Tolkein fan or Dungeons and Dragons player will feel completely at home, the eternal war between Light and Darkness finds a few unconventional warriors when a messianic baby is born…

The graphic adaptation opens with the demonic sorceress Bavmorda’s attempts to kill the newborn which has been dispatched Moses-like down river, fetching up in the custody of Willow Ufgood, a good-hearted Nelwyn (don’t call them Hobbits – these littluns all wear shoes) who dreams of being a great sorcerer one day…

The human baby is clearly trouble, so the callously cautious and insular villagers want rid of it as soon as possible, dispatching Willow and a few true-hearted friends on a quest to deliver her to the first human they find.

However chaos, calamity and Bavmorda’s warriors follow the child everywhere and the first man they find is Madmartigan: a mighty warrior but also a lying, shiftless, drunken womaniser hanging from a cage on a gibbet…

Bavmorda’s army, led by her conflicted daughter Sorsha, has invaded the land and all the nobler humans – or “Daikini” – are busy fighting to save their lives, so when the pixie-like Brownies steal the baby, subsequently revealing her destiny as the Chosen One Elora Danan; for reasons inexplicable even to himself, Madmartigan joins Willow in a spectacular and death-drenched quest to free her destined guardian and mentor Fin Raziel…

Ultimately they both are driven by events and their own better natures to become the unlikeliest heroes in their world’s history: crucial components in the fight to end Bavmorda’s threat forever…

The final movie release was overly concerned with fight scenes and chases at the expense of plot and character (an understandable flaw which marred all three Lord of the Rings films too, in my humble opinion) but this classy and fun-filled ensemble-cast yarn manages to rattle along full-pelt with all-out fantastic battle-action and still find some room for extra helpings comedy and romance…

The movie Willow, from a screenplay by Bob Dolman, was conceived by George Lucas, directed by Ron Howard and released on May 20th 1988 in the United States, but if you’d bought and read this canny little tome before that (it was published at the beginning of that year) you’d have seen many extra pieces of shtick that sadly didn’t make it into the final cut…

An enticing, appetising change of pace for the usual comics crowd, this enticing sorcerous saga might well win a few fans amongst the dedicated Fights ‘n’ Tights fraternity too.
Willow: ™ and © 1988 Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL). All Rights Reserved.

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Princess Knight Part 1


By Osamu Tezuka, translated by Maya Rosewood (Vertical)
ISBN: 978-1934287-27-9

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: a fairytale for all ages and types of romantic… 8/10

Osamu Tezuka utterly revolutionised the Japanese comics industry during the 1950s and 1960s. Being a devoted fan of the films of Walt Disney he also performed similar sterling service in the country’s fledgling animation industry.

Many of his earliest works were aimed at children but right from the start his expansive fairytale stylisations – so perfectly seen in this splendid romp – harboured more mature themes and held hidden treasures for older readers…

Ribon no Kishi or “Knight of the Ribbon” is a series which Tezuka returned to repeatedly during his life and one that is being continued even in the 21st century by his disciples. The simple tale has been turned into TV anime seen all over the world (generally known as some variation of “Choppy and the Princess” in places as far-flung as Canada, France and Brazil) and in 2006 a stage musical was launched.

The serial was first published in Kodansha’s Shoujo Korabu (Shōjo Club), running from January 1954 to January 1956, with a generational sequel appearing in Nakayoshi magazine between January 1958 and June 1959. The original tale was updated and revised in 1963-1966 and forms the basis of the version featured in this magnificent tome, translated from the Tezuka Osamu Manga Zenshu Edition 1977.

In 1967-1968, to tie-in with a television adaptation, Tezuka reconfigured the tale with science fiction overtones and, illustrated by Kitano Hideaki, it ran for a year in Shōjo Friend.

The series is a perennial favourite and classic of the medium and this volume forms part of a two-volume softcover English-language edition, containing the first 16 episodes.

‘Once Upon a Time’ opens in Heaven where junior angels are busy with soon to be born souls, installing either blue boy hearts or pink girl hearts to the ante-natal cherubs in their care. Unfortunately easily distractible Tink (AKA “Choppy” in many foreign iterations) cocks up and one proto-baby gets both…

Tink is dispatched to Earth to retrieve the superfluous metaphysical organ and lands in the feudal kingdom of Silverland, where a most important child is about to be born. The King and Queen desperately desire that their imminent first-born be a boy, for no female can rule the country. Should the child be a princess then vile Duke Duralumin‘s idiot and nastily maladjusted boy Plastic will become heir-apparent.

Thus, due to a concatenation of circumstances, a baby girl with a dual nature spends her formative years pretending to be a prince…

Fifteen years pass before ‘Flowers and Parades’ resumes the saga. Tink has been lax in his mission and Prince Sapphire has become the darling boy of the kingdom. Duralumin and his crafty henchman Sir Nylon have spent the intervening years certain that the gallant boy is actually a useless girl but have been unable to prove it, whilst Sapphire has grown into a dutiful, beautiful – if androgynous – specimen skilled in riding, sports and all arts martial, but passionately yearns to be allowed to openly wear the dresses and make-up which are her family’s most intimate secret. When Tink finally reveals himself and exposes the heir’s hidden nature, Nylon overhears…

‘The Carnival’ sees gorgeous Prince Franz Charming pay a royal visit from neighbouring Goldland and Sapphire, aided by her mother and nurse, dons a blonde wig and party frock and clandestinely give vent to her true nature, turning all heads and captivating her regal guest. When she returns to her public identity all Franz can talk about is the mysterious girl with flaxen hair, blind to the fact that she is sitting beside him…

In ‘The Tournament’ the evil Duke turns a fencing exhibition to his advantage, killing the King and framing Franz for the deed, after which the ‘Prisoner Prince’ is helped to escape by his Flaxen maid. Heir Sapphire accedes to the throne in ‘Coronation’ only to have it all snatched away as the Duke’s latest scheme succeeds beyond all his wildest dreams and Sapphire is publicly exposed as a girl, and her recently widowed mother is accused of betraying the nation by concealing the fact since her birth…

Reviled and shunned, mother and daughter are imprisoned with ghastly hunchback jailer Gammer in ‘Sapphire in Coffin Tower’ wherein the distraught girl befriends the vermin of the keep just as Gammer gets his orders to dispose of his charges. Meanwhile Tink has been searching high and low for Sapphire…

Narrowly escaping being murdered the princess becomes a masculine masked avenger of wrongs in ‘Phantom Knight’s Debut’, punishing the wicked men who have ruined her nation since Plastic was enthroned by his corrupt father Duralumin.

Meanwhile in the Palace the villains look for ways to control the increasingly off-kilter Plastic in ‘The Idiot King’s Bride’. Little do they know that Briar Rose, the fetching companion they’ve acquired, is Sapphire on an infiltration mission…

When she is inevitably caught Sapphire’s life takes an even more dramatic turn in ‘Devil’s Whisper’ when terrifying witch Madame Hell materialises, offering her untold wealth and power if she will sell her female heart and nature. Luckily Tink’s angelic power drives her off, but is unable to prevent the princess being sentenced to a life of penal servitude in ‘Two By the Quarry’.

Here she again meets Franz, who has long believed Sapphire responsible for his frame-up and imprisonment in Silverland’s dungeons. Nevertheless the Prince helps Sapphire escape, almost dying in the effort. Soon after the girl is transported to ‘The Witch’s Lair’ and meet’s Hell’s daughter Hecate, who is violently opposed to her mother’s scheme to marry her off to Franz.

That young worthy however, has meanwhile recovered from his wounds and is still searching for the Flaxen-haired girl, oblivious to her true identity and nature…

Hecate does not want Sapphire’s girlish heart and frees the Princess Knight by turning her into a ‘Grieving Swan’ who is captured by Franz and added to the Royal Flock. The Prince too is being pressured to marry and beget an heir, so when Madame Hell arrives with a huge bribe and a now compliant Hecate the boy’s uncle is keen to cement the nuptial alliance until the ensorcelled swan Sapphire exposes their true natures with Tink’s angelic assistance…

Just as Franz begins to finally notice the similarity of his flaxen dream girl to the freshly restored Sapphire in ‘Two Hearts’ she and Tink are fleeing – right into the clutches of Nylon who is keen to wipe out any loose ends. At the worst possible moment the angel completes his long mission and reclaims the boy-heart, leaving her helpless, but cannot betray his friend and returns it, consequently losing his place in Heaven…

Together again the pair attempt to rescue Sapphire’s mother from Coffin Tower but are too late. The Queen and Gammer have been taken to Sea Snake Island where vengeful Madame Hell’s dark magic has transformed her into a petrified ‘Stone Queen’.

This premier chronicle concludes with Sapphire and Tink adrift on the ocean where they encounter the brilliant, dashing and gloriously charismatic ‘Captain Blood, Pirate’ who instantly penetrates the princess’ manly disguise and sees a woman he wants to marry at all costs…

Princess Knight is a spectacular, riotous, rollicking adventuresome fairytale about desire, destiny and determination which practically invented the Shoujo (“Little Female” or young girl’s manga) genre in Japan and can still deliver a powerful punch and wide eyed wonder on a variety of intellectual levels. Still one of the best and most challenging kid’s comics tales ever, it’s a work that all fans and – especially parents – should know.

This black and white book is printed in the traditional ‘read-from-back-to-front’ manga format.

© 2011 by Tezuka Productions. Translation © 2011 by Mari Morimoto and Vertical, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Pogo: the Complete Syndicated Comic Strips volume 1


By Walt Kelly (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-56097-869-5

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Perfect for anybody with a brain or heart…  10/10

This is one of those once in lifetime books which reduce honest critics to nigh speechlessness so I’m offering two different reviews: the first and most fearsomely honest is freely adapted from President’s Clinton’s election catchphrase “It’s the Economy, Stupid!”

Ready?

Just buy it, Stupid!

 

If you need more though, and aren’t driven off by my unbridled brusqueness, I’ll elucidate at tedious, pointless length…

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

Refusing to take a side, Kelly moved back East and began drawing comicbooks – primarily for Dell Comics, who had the Disney funnybook license.

Despite his glorious work on such humanistic classics as the Our Gang movie spin-off, Kelly preferred anthropomorphic animal and children’s fantasy (see Walt Kelly’s Santa Claus Adventures) and created Albert the Alligator and Pogo Possum for Animal Comics #1 (December 1942) sagaciously retaining the copyrights in the ongoing tale of two Bayou critters and their young African-American pal Bumbazine. Although the black kid soon disappeared, the animal pals stayed on as stars until 1948 when Kelly became art editor and cartoonist for the hard hitting, left-leaning liberal newspaper The New York Star.

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

Although a gently humorous kids feature, by the end of its run – reprinted in full at the back of this magnificent tome – the first glimmers of the increasingly barbed, boldly satirical masterpiece of velvet-pawed social commentary began to be seen…

This much delayed – but absolutely worth it – first of twelve volumes follows the ascent of this scintillating and vastly influential strip; don’t believe me, just listen to Gary Trudeau, Berke Breathed, Bill Watterson, Jeff McNally, Bill Holbrook, Mark O’Hare, Alan Moore, Jeff Smith and even Goscinny & Uderzo and our own Maurice Dodd & Dennis Collins, whose wonderful strip The Perishers owes more than a little to the sublime antics of the Okefenokee Swamp citizenry…

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

At its peak the strip appeared in 500 papers in 14 countries and the book collections which began in 1951 numbered nearly 50, collectively selling 30 million copies.

This volume includes all the Star strips, the Dailies from inception to December 30th 1950, and the Sundays – in a full colour section – from January 29th – December 31st 1950, plus a wealth of supplementary features including a Foreword from columnist Jimmy Breslin, an introduction by biographer Steve Thompson, a week-by-week highly detailed contents section, a useful guide ‘About the Sundays’ by Mark Evanier, and an invaluable context and historical notes feature ‘Swanp Talk’ by the amazing R.C. Harvey.

Kelly’s genius was the ability to beautifully, vivaciously draw comedic, tragic, pompous, sympathetic characters of any shape or breed and make them inescapably human and he used that gift to blend hard-hitting observation of our crimes, foibles and peccadilloes with rampaging whimsy, poesy and sheer exuberant joie de vivre.

The hairy, scaly, feathered slimy folk here are inescapably us, elevated by burlesque, slapstick, absurdism and all the glorious joys of wordplay from puns to malapropisms to raucous accent humour into a multi-layered hodge-podge of all-ages accessible delight.

In volumes to come Kelly will set his bestial cast loose on such timid, defenceless victims as Senator Joe McCarthy, J.Edgar Hoover, the John Birch Society, Richard Nixon and the Ku Klux Clan, but he starts off small here, introducing the gently bemused Pogo, boisterous, happily ignorant Albert, dolorous Porkypine, obnoxious turtle Churchy La Femme, lugubrious hound Beauregard Bugleboy, carpet-bagging Seminole Sam Fox, pompous (not) know-it-all Howland Owl and a host of others in gags and extended epics ranging from assorted fishing trips, building an Adam Bomb, losing and finding other people’s children, electioneering, education, kidnapping, the evil influence of comicbooks, Baseball season, why folks shouldn’t eat each other, Western cow punchers, cows punching back, New Years Resolutions, public holidays and so much more…

The Sundays also began with one-off gags but soon evolved into convoluted and mesmeric continued sagas such as the search for the Fountain of Youth, building a school and keeping it filled, Albert being elected Queen of the Woodland by the elf-like forest fauns – and why that was ultimately a very bad thing indeed…

Timeless and magical, Pogo is a giant of world literature, not simply comics, and this magnificent edition should be the pride of every home’s bookshelf.

POGO Through the Wild Blue Wonder and all POGO images, including Walt Kelly’s signature © 2011 Okefenokee Glee & Perloo Inc. All other material © 2011 the respective creator and owner. All rights reserved.

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World’s Finest Comics Archives volume 1


Edmond Hamilton, Bill Finger, Curt Swan, Dick Sprang & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-56389-488-6

During the 1950s most superheroes of the American Golden Age faded away leaving only headliners Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman – and whoever they could carry in the back of their assorted titles – to carry on their genteel crusade against thugs, monsters and aliens.

With economics and rising costs also dictating a reduction in average page counts, the once-sumptuous World’s Finest Comics (originally 96 pages per issue), which had featured solo adventures of the flagship heroes plus a wealth of other features, simply combined the twin stars in a lead story of each issue, beginning with #71 in July-August 1954.

And so they proceeded for decades more until Crisis on Infinite Earths rewrote the DC universe in 1985 and everything was shaken up by retooling The Man of Steel and  re-examining all the Caped Kryptonian’s close relationships in a darker, more cynical light.

However, for many years Superman and Batman worked together perfectly as the “World’s Finest” team. They were friends as well as colleagues and the pairing made sound financial sense since DC’s top heroes (in effect the company’s only costumed stars) could cross-pollinate and, more importantly, cross-sell their combined readerships.

This most inevitable of Paladin Pairings first occurred on the Superman radio show in the early 1940s, whilst in comics the pair had only briefly met whilst on a Justice Society of America adventure in All-Star Comics #36 (August-September 1947) – and perhaps even there they missed each other in the gaudy hubbub…

Of course they had shared the covers on World’s Finest Comics from the outset, but never crossed paths inside; sticking firmly to their specified solo adventures within. So, after a fascinating introduction from Mark Waid, this magnificent all-ages hardback compendium begins reliving those days of wonder in fabulous full colour with their classic, official first comicbook case together which appeared in Superman #76 (issue #76, May/June 1952).

Science fiction author Edmond Hamilton was tasked with revealing how Man of Steel and Caped Crusader first met – and accidentally discovered each other’s identities – whilst sharing a cabin on an over-booked cruise liner. Although an ordinary crime-stopper yarn, it was the start of a phenomenon. The art for ‘The Mightiest Team in the World’ was by the superb Curt Swan and inkers John Fischetti & Stan Kaye. Thereafter remaining inclusions in this first volume comprise the lead stories from World’s Finest Comics #71-85.

World’s Finest Comics #71 (July-August 1954) presented the Man of Tomorrow and the Gotham Gangbuster in the first of their official shared-cases as the Caped Crusader became ‘Batman – Double For Superman!’ (by scripter Alvin Schwartz with Swan & Kaye providing pictures) as the merely mortal hero traded identities to preserve his comrade’s alter ego and latterly, his life…

‘Fort Crime!’ (Schwartz, Swan & Kaye) saw them unite to crush a highly organised mob with a seemingly impregnable hideout, after which Hamilton returned to script ‘Superman and Batman, Swamis Inc’, a clever sting-operation that almost went tragically awry before an alien invader prompted an insane rivalry which resulted in ‘The Contest of Heroes’ by Bill Finger, Swan & Kaye, from #74.

The same creative team produced ‘Superman and Robin!’ wherein a disabled Batman could only fret and fume as his erstwhile assistant seemingly dumped him for a better man, whereas ‘When Gotham City Challenged Metropolis’ (Hamilton, Swan & Charles Paris) saw the champions at odds as their hometowns over-aggressively vied for a multi-million dollar electronics convention before a landmark tale by Hamilton, Swan & Kaye invented a new sub-genre when a mad scientist’s accident temporarily removed the Caped Kryptonian’s powers and created ‘The Super-Batman!’ in WF #77.

Arguably Batman’s greatest artist joined the creative crew ‘When Superman’s Identity is Exposed!’ (by Hamilton, Dick Sprang & Kaye) as a mysterious source kept revealing the Man of Steel’s greatest secret, only to be revealed as a well-intentioned disinformation stunt, whereas the accent was on high adventure when the trio became ‘The Three Musicians of Bagdad’ – a stunning time-travel romp from Hamilton, Sprang & Kaye.

When the Gotham Gazette faced closure days before a spectacular crime-expose, Clark Kent and Lois Lane joined dilettante Bruce Wayne as pinch-hitting reporters on ‘The Super-Newspaper of Gotham City’ (Hamilton, Sprang & Charles Paris) after which ‘The True History of Superman and Batman’ (Hamilton, Sprang & Kaye, #81) saw a future historian blackmail the heroes into restaging their greatest exploits so his erroneous treatise on them would be accurate…

Hamilton also produced a magnificent and classy costumed drama when ‘The Three Super-Musketeers!’ visited 17th century France to solve the mystery of the Man in the Iron Mask whilst Bill Finger wrote a brilliant and delightful caper-without-a-crime in ‘The Case of the Mother Goose Mystery! before Hamilton provided insight on a much earlier meeting of the World’s Finest Team with ‘The Super-Mystery of Metropolis!’ in #84, all for Sprang & Kaye to enticingly illustrate.

This initial collection of tales ends on a romantic note as Hamilton, Swan, Sprang & Kaye demonstrate how a comely Ruritanian Princess inadvertently turned the level-headed heroes into ‘The Super-Rivals’ (World’s Finest Comics #85 November-December 1956) attempting to woo, wow and outdo each other – but of course they had a far nobler plan in motion all along…

As mentioned above Superman Batman and Robin appeared together on the covers of World’s Finest from the outset and this captivating chronicle includes a glorious additional section reproducing 17 of those magnificently eye-catching, irresistible lures for the young at heart, as well as a comprehensive raft of creator biographies for the dedicated fan.

These are charming, clever yet uncomplicated tales whose dazzling style has recently returned to inform if not dictate the form for much of DC’s modern television animation – especially the fabulous Batman: the Brave and the Bold series – and the contents of this tome are a veritable feast of witty, charming thrillers packing as much punch and pizzazz now as they always have.

This book is the perfect gift for the kid in your no matter what age he/she/you are…
© 1952, 1954, 1955, 1956, 1999 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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The Fires of Pele


By Hollace and Paul Davids & Sergio Aragonés, assisted by Lee Mishkin, with SFX by M.D. Wolf (Paul Davids Productions/Pictorial Legends)
ISBN: 978-0-93903-100-9

Here’s an intriguing and thoroughly fabulous photo-novel oddity from the 1980s – or as it should be known, the days before Photoshopâ„¢ – that still holds the power to enchant and delight even in an era where recordings of fan-favourite shows can be bought, bartered or downloaded at the click of a mouse.

For all you youngsters: photo-novels were paperback adaptations of movies or episodes of popular TV shows which used text and film-stills instead of drawn art to reproduce the story. Inexplicably popular in the late 1970s and early 1980s, they fell from favour with the rise of video, and latterly, laser-discs, DVD and other methods of actually owning the full-sensorium original material.

Cinema releases included Alien, Grease, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, the 1978 Lord of the Rings and many others whilst TV editions included Dr. Who, The Incredible Hulk and an even dozen episodes of the Original Star Trek.

A few photo-novels such as Star Wars and Charlie’s Angels are still produced these days.

At the end of 1986 husband and wife screen writers Hollace and Paul Davids produced this excessively impressive and clever faux-fable blending the mythology of Hawaii and the Sandwich Islands with the peripatetic but well-documented wanderings of reporter-at-large Samuel Langhorne Clemens AKA Mark Twain.

An oversized 247x305mm, glossy 56 page modern fairytale, the illustrations here are original full-colour special effects cinematic plates (no cheap computer graphics packages or Photoshop, remember?) with a cast of actors creating the scenes in the manner of Fumetti/photo picture stories, further enhanced with designs and painted illustrations by Sergio Aragonés and Lee Mishkin – and the pen and ink maestro also provides a wealth of merry monochrome “marginals” of the Great Raconteur himself…

The story is beguilingly simple: whilst reporting on the Sandwich Islands for his employers the Sacramento Union newspaper in 1866, the adventuresome author encountered a race of magical Polynesian pixies known as Melehulas and was drawn into a battle between bold heroes and spiteful gods…

The great Prince Lakekua was to wed the foundling princess Analike, but the comely warrior had caught the eye of dreadful Pele, Goddess of Fire, Lightning, Wind and Volcanoes. After first trying unsuccessfully to seduce and compel the doughty warrior, Pele sent her malign kin, such as The Shark God, Moho the steam god and Earth-giant Kona to imprison the brave girl beyond the reach of man and destroy all who tried to find her.

Luckily for Lakekua, his trusty young friend Kakipoto knew such benevolent spirit creatures as the Menehulas, bestial master craftsman Kakamora and a host of other advantageous allies such as a fast-thinking, smooth talking visiting white traveller from distant shores…

Crammed with exotic scenarios, lush, incredible scenery, mighty battles, true love, talking fish, shape-shifting wizards, Demon Owls, Lizard-Ladies and the unjust wrath of the gods this is a marvellous romp in the grand Ray Harryhausen Bank Holiday movie manner and a splendid yarn long overdue for a modern revisitation.

Until then however, the original large slim tome is still readily available should you desperately need to explore the dark side of Paradise…
© 1986 Hollace & Paul Davids. All right reserved. Menehulas Photos © 1985 The Menehunes Group. All other photos © 1983 Paul Davids and Mark Wolf.

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Lucky Star volume 1


By Kagami Yoshimizu translated by Rika Takahashi (BANDAI Entertainment)
ISBN: 978-1-60496-112-6

Japanese four-panel strips are very similar in terms and construction to modern Western newspaper strips, with a fixed cast of characters acting in brief complete gag tales, often building upon previous episodes to comprise a greater mosaic, but often the similarity ends there.

This rather peculiar (to a fat, finicky fifty-something British bloke at least) compilation confuses, delights, confounds, charms but mostly baffles as it describes the day to day to day trials and tribulations of a small group of small Japanese schoolgirls, their less than completely proper teacher and a few other older – if no wiser – influences who regularly intersect with the all-encompassing world of TV, manga, comics games, homework and dawning social advancement that is Lucky Star.

Kagami Yoshimizu’s Raki☆Suta debuted in the January 2004 issue of Japanese computer magazine Comptiq as a floating graphic end-piece and page-filler for the articles and features, but proved so popular that a reprint collection was released a year later. The strip soon began guesting in other magazines such as Shōnen Ace, Dragon Magazine, Mobile Newtype and Kadokawa Hotline and quickly spun off into video games, a drams CD, visual novels, light novels and an anime TV series, and even made the jump to American screens.

Set in Kasukabe City, Saitama Prefecture, the individual episodes are in the mild and timeless, unchallenging, nothing-ever-changes mould of Hagar or Garfield – but with far less of their stripped-down artistic and stylistic economy – and follow the daily doings and musings of young High School girls. Sporty “Otaku” games addict Konata Izumi, cute, bespectacled and dutiful know-it-all Miyuki Takara, tough-girl Kagami Hiiragi and her kind, adorable bimbo-in-training fraternal twin Tsukasa are all brought together under the second-rate, whimsical, but not-so efficient tutelage of beer-drinking history teacher Ms. Nanoko Kuroi.

This initial translated tome collects the first 25 instalments (averaging between 4 and 9 four-panel strips reading down, not across, the page, right to left and, since it’s manga, back to front), mostly in black and white but with a few full-colour examples too.

As you’d expect most of the material centres around the playing of electronic games; dutifully paying lip-service to the absorption and distraction of such upon girls who should be preparing for life and doing their homework, but as the series progressed wider issues (such as dealing with boys), interests (like films, magazine competitions and travelling on trains) and more mature characters are introduced, – most notably  grown-up and freshly newlywed cousin Yui Narumi; a strong-willed but amiably good-hearted police woman in the Traffic Rules Division who might perhaps be quite the wrong sort of role-model for the already slacking Konata.

The chapters are designated ‘Begin Activity’, ‘Older Sister’, ‘Unchanging Everyday Life’, ‘The Other Side of the Lens’, ‘Footsteps of Spring’, ‘A Season of New Beginnings… Maybe’, ‘Ideals’, ‘Various Appearances, but Contents are Still the Same’, ‘A Clever Way to Do It’, ‘The Rowdiness Before Battle’, ‘Do Your Best, Young Ones’, ‘Beginner’, ‘Relatives, No Doubt’, ‘Play, Play’, ‘Bright Season’, ‘Full of Memories’, ‘When Time Passes, Even Things you Don’t Like’, ‘The Other Side, Without the Lens’, ‘Preparations for the Cultural Festival!’, ‘The Days Until the Athletics Festival!’, ‘Personality’, ‘Game’, ‘Home Visitation’, ‘Conditions Don’t Change’ and ‘Season For Sleep’: covering a plethora of topics and situations inadvertently delivering intriguing insights into modern attitudes to school, work, women’s roles and  the culture and concerns of the nation. For example, Konata is a second-generation addict; working after school at a cosplay café, staying up all night and sharing all the games her equally electronically-enslaved single parent dad buys – even the adult ones. Kagami is a traditional swot: diligent, diffident and most concerned with best efforts and propriety at all times, but is sweet, forgiving and understanding… whilst her sister is an airhead but an excellent cook.

The strips themselves range from clever and charming to dry and witty to devastatingly funny to bittersweet to, quite often, utterly incomprehensible (at least to a fat old English bloke who doesn’t play video games) but the craft and quality of the storytelling, whilst not perhaps everyone’s cup of tea, is exceptional and indisputable.

With lots of sketches, illustrated character studies and a handy and informative annotated Translators Notes section, Lucky Star might be just the thing to spark interest from that stubborn holdout in the house who just won’t read any comics at all…

© 2005 Kagami Yoshimizu. English BANDAI Entertainment, Inc. edition May 2009.

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Asterix and the Cauldron, Asterix in Spain & Asterix and the Roman Agent


By Goscinny & Uderzo, translated by Anthea Bell & Derek Hockridge (Orion Books)
ISBNs: 978-075286-628-4, 978-0-75286-630-7 and 978-0-75286-632-1

One of the most-read comics series in the world, the collected chronicles of Asterix the Gaul have been translated into more than 100 languages since his debut in 1959, with animated and live-action movies, TV series, assorted games, toys and even a theme park outside Paris (Parc Astérix, if you’re planning a trip…) spinning off from his hilarious exploits.

More than 325 million copies of 34 Asterix books have sold worldwide, making his joint creators France’s bestselling international authors.

The diminutive, doughty potion-powered champion of Gallic Pride was created by two of the art-form’s greatest proponents, writer René Goscinny & illustrator Albert Uderzo and although their inspirational collaborations ended in 1977 with the death of the prolific scripter, the creative wonderment still continued until relatively recently from Uderzo and assistants – albeit at a slightly reduced rate.

The wonderment works on multiple levels: ostensibly, younger readers revel in the action-packed, lavishly illustrated comedic romps where sneaky, bullying baddies get their just deserts whilst we more worldly readers enthuse over the dry, pun-filled, sly satire, especially as enhanced for English speakers by the brilliantly light touch of translators Anthea Bell & Derek Hockridge, who played no small part in making the indomitable Gaul and his gallant companions so palatable to the Anglo-Saxon world. (Me, I still admire a divinely delivered “Paff!” as much as any painfully potent pun or dry cutting jibe…)

The stories were set on Uderzo’s beloved Brittany coast, where a small village of warriors and their families resisted every effort of the Roman Empire to complete the conquest of Gaul, or alternately, anywhere in the Ancient World, circa 50BC, as the Gallic Gentlemen wandered the fantastic lands of the Empire and beyond…

When the heroes were playing at home, the Romans, unable to defeat this last bastion of Gallic insouciance, resorted to a policy of containment. Thus the little seaside hamlet is permanently hemmed in by the heavily fortified garrisons of Totorum, Aquarium, Laudanum and Compendium.

The Gauls don’t care: they daily defy the world’s greatest military machine simply by going about their everyday affairs, protected by the magic potion of resident druid Getafix and the shrewd wits of the rather diminutive dynamo and his simplistic, supercharged best friend…

Firmly established as a global brand and premium French export by the mid-1960s, Asterix the Gaul continued to grow in quality as Goscinny & Uderzo toiled ever onward, crafting further fabulous sagas; building a stunning legacy of graphic excellence and storytelling gold.

Asterix and the Cauldron was the thirteenth saga, originally running in Pilote #469-491, throughout 1968 and first translated into English in 1976.

The tale is one of treachery, felony and dishonour as fellow Gaulish chieftain Whosemoralsarelastix – a cunning and conniving Roman collaborator – convinces the reluctant but big-hearted Vitalstatistix to guard the occupied cliff-top community’s treasury from Imperial tax collectors.

Despite knowing how untrustworthy the scoundrel is, Gaul must help Gaul and the rogue’s huge onion-soup cauldron, stuffed with his people’s golden Sestertii, is placed under the stewardship of the village’s greatest hero and most trustworthy warrior: Asterix.

However, that night, as a great inter-village feast is consumed, somebody cuts their way into the guard hut and steals the glittering contents of that mighty tureen. Naturally Whosemoralsarelastix wants his money back and the noble Vitalstatistix is honour bound to replace the stolen horde, Disgraced, Asterix is banished until he can refill the empty cauldron with gold…

Trusty Obelix refuses to turn away from his friend and joins the quest, which first takes them to the garrison of Compendium, where the wily warrior intends to refill the empty churn with some of the gold the occupiers have been regularly collecting from Gauls.

Unfortunately, Caesar has been experiencing some cash-flow problems and not only has he been rushing the takings to Rome, he hasn’t even paid his soldiers for months.

With disharmony, mutiny and strike action imminent among the legions Asterix and Obelix realise they must look elsewhere for their loot.

Even their old acquaintances the pirates are cash-strapped – and soon traditionally thrashed – so the doughty duo must seek their fortune at the grand market in Condatum, briefly and disastrously becoming Boar merchants, paid street boxers, actors and charioteers, before turning to crime and planning a bank robbery…

Even here our two just men fare badly. In desperation, they decide to rob Caesar’s tax collector, but Asterix discovers a strange thing. Not only has the destitute Whosemoralsarelastix somehow paid his taxes, but the coins smell of onion soup…

With realisation dawning Asterix visits the cliff-dwelling villagers for a little chat and a mighty reckoning…

Rich with slapstick action and cutting commercial satire (for example the tax collector was a caricature of France’s then Finance Minister Valéry Giscard d’Estaing), this hilarious crime caper is a glorious example of dry yet riotous adventure comedy.


Asterix in Spain promptly followed during 1969 (Pilote #498-519) in France and Astérix en Hispanie was translated into English two years later, recounting how a valiant group of Iberian warriors were similarly holding-out against Caesar’s total conquest of that proud nation.

Chief Huevos Y Bacon was the noble warrior leading the resistance but when his haughty son Pepe was captured all seemed lost. Fearing reprisal or rescue the Romans hastily despatched the hostage lad to the garrison at Totorum, under the command of brutish Spurius Brontosaurus, who has no idea what the “pacified” Gauls of the area are like and has his hands more than full contending with the appallingly behaved and inspirationally vicious young prince.

When his guards encounter Gauls in the great forest they are easily overwhelmed by playful Obelix. Asterix takes Pepe back to the village where, after an ill-advised and painful attempt by Brontosaurus and the legion to reclaim him, the heroes decide to return him to his father. Most pertinent in this decision is the spoiled brat’s obnoxious behaviour…

Brontosaurus has pragmatically decided the kid is perfectly safe with the Gauls and unaware of their planned jaunt to Hispania, smugly returns to his post. Meanwhile, after their mandatory encounter with pirates, Asterix, Obelix and faithful mutt Dogmatix make their leisurely way through the scenic countryside (offering many trenchant asides regarding the modern French passion for Spanish touring holidays) until a chance encounter in an inn reveals to the General how close they are to undoing all his plans.

Venal but no coward the Roman joins their excursion party, captures Asterix and steals the Gaul’s magic potion and plans to destroy Huevos Y Bacon’s resistance forever. However Obelix, Pepe – and Dogmatix – have a plan to spectacularly save the day…

Full of good-natured nationalistic pokes and trans-national teasing, liberally served up with raucous hi-jinks and fast-paced action, this is another magical titbit of all-ages entertainment.


Asterix and the Roman Agent was first seen 1970 in Pilote #531-552, making the jump to English in 1972, and once more featured homeland insecurity as Caesar, under attack by the Roman Senate over the indomitable, unconquerable Gauls, deploys his greatest weapon: a double-edged sword named Tortuous Convolvulus, whose every word and gesture seems to stir ill-feeling and conflict in all who meet him.

Where Force of Arms has failed perhaps this living agent of dissent might forever fracture the Gauls’ unshakable comradeship and solidarity with dose of Roman entente dis-cordiale…

On the crossing, just two minutes with the conniving Convolvulus has the brotherhood of pirates at each other’s throats, and even while discussing the plan with Aquarium’s commander Felix Platypus, the agent’s unique gift sows discord and violence, so when he finally enters the village it’s not long before the high-spirited and fractious Gauls are at war with each other…

The women are cattily sniping at each other, the traders are trading blows and even Asterix and Obelix are on the outs. But that’s not the worst of it: somehow the idea has gotten around that their sharp little champion has sold out to the Romans…

With discord rife the Romans soon have the secret of the magic potion too – or do they? -but the ingenious Convolvulus hasn’t reckoned on two things: the sheer dimness of Imperial troops and the invaluable power of true friendship, leaving Asterix and Obelix a way to overcome their differences, turn the tables and once more save the day.

At last, the agent provocateur is forced to realise that sometimes one can be too smart for one’s own good…

Brittle, barbed and devilishly sharp, this yarn was reputedly based on lingering ill-feeling following an internal power-struggle at Pilote which almost cost editor Goscinny his job. The original title for the tale was La Zizanie – “The Ill-feeling” or “The Dissension”. Seen through the lens of forty years of distance, however, all that can be seen now is stinging, clever, witty observational comedy and magnificently engaging adventure, and surely that’s what matters most?

Asterix sagas are always stuffed with captivating historical titbits, soupcons of healthy cynicism, singularly surreal situations and amazingly addictive action, illustrated in a magically enticing manner. These are perfect comics that everyone should read over and over again.

© 1968-1970 Goscinny/Uderzo. Revised English translation © 2004 Hachette. All rights reserved.

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Showcase Presents Wonder Woman volume 2


By Robert Kanigher, Ross Andru & Mike Esposito (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-1373-2

The Amazing Amazon Adventuress was created by polygraph pioneer William Moulton Marston – apparently at the behest of his remarkable wife Elizabeth – and illustrated by Harry G. Peter just as the spectre of another world-girdling global Armageddon loomed.

She debuted as an extra feature in All Star Comics #8 (December 1941) before catapulting into her own cover-starring series in Sensation Comics a month later. An instant smash-hit she also quickly won her own title in the Spring of that year (cover-dated Summer 1942).

Using the nom de plume Charles Moulton, Marston scripted all her many and fabulous adventures until his death in 1947, whereupon Robert Kanigher took over the writer’s role. The venerable co-creator H. G. Peter continued on as illustrator until his death in 1958. Wonder Woman #97, in April of that year, was his last hurrah and the discrete end of an era.

This second economical monochrome Showcase collection covers issues #118-137 from November 1960-April 1963, a period of increased fantasy frolics and wildly imaginative excess which still divides fans into violently opposing camps…

With the notable exception of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and a few anodyne back-up features, costumed heroes died out at the beginning of the 1950s, replaced by a plethora of merely mortal champions and a welter of anthologised genre titles.

Showcase #4 rekindled the public’s interest in costumed crime-busters with a new iteration of The Flash in 1956 (see Showcase Presents the Flash volume 1 or the first Flash: Archive Edition) the fanciful floodgates opened wide once more…

Whilst re-inventing a section of Golden Age Greats like Green Lantern, Atom and Hawkman, National/DC also updated all those hoary survivors who had weathered the backlash especially the Man of Steel, Caped Crusader and the ever-resilient Amazing Amazon…

Artists Ross Andru & Mike Esposito, who illustrated all Kanigher’s scripts in this all-ages compendium, had actually debuted as cover artists from #95, but with Wonder Woman #98 (May 1958) they took over the interiors as the writer/editor reinvented much of the old mythology and tinkered with her origins before letting her loose on an unsuspecting world.

The fanciful blend of girlish whimsy, rampant sexism, untrue romance, alien invasion, monster-mashing and all-out surreal (some would say-stream-of-consciousness) storytelling continues unabated here with ‘Wonder Woman’s Impossible Decision!’ (#118) and found the comely crusader constantly distracted from her mission to wipe out injustice by the antics of her savagely-sparring suitors Colonel Steve Trevor and Manno the mer-man.

Amazon science (and the unfettered imagination of Kanigher, for whom slavish continuity, consistency or rationality were never as important as a strong plot or breathtaking visual) had long enabled readers to share the adventures of Wonder Girl and latterly Wonder Tot – the Princess of Power as teen and toddler – both in their appropriate time-zones and, on occasion, teamed together on “Impossible Days”.

WW #119 opened with an adventure of the Titanic Teenager in ‘Mer-Boy’s Secret Prize!’ wherein the besotted undersea booby repeatedly risked his life to win his inamorata a flashy treasure, whilst in ‘Three Wishes of Doom!’ a capable but arrogant young girl won a competition and claimed Wonder Woman’s Bracelets, Lasso and Tiara, with the disastrous idea of using them to out-do the Amazing Amazon…

‘The Secret of Volcano Mountain!’ in #120 pitted teen and adult Amazon – a decade apart – against the same terrifying threat when an alien elemental twice attempted to conquer the world, after which an Impossible Day event had Wonder Girl, her older self and their mother Queen Hippolyta unite to defeat the monster-packed peril of ‘The Island Eater!’

‘The Skyscraper Wonder Woman’ introduced her pre-schooler incarnation when the Sinister Seer of Saturn sought to invade Earth with a colossal robot facsimile whilst de-aging the Amazon to her younger – but thankfully, no less competent – adolescent and pre-adolescent incarnations…

Wonder Woman #123 opened with a glimpse at the ‘Amazon Magic-Eye Album!’ as Hippolyta reviewed some of the crazy exploits of her daughter as Tot, Teen and adult adventuress, whilst the issue after managed to team them all together against the unfortunately named shape-shifting nuclear threat of the Multiple Man on ‘The Impossible Day!’

Steve and Manno resumed their war for the heroine’s hand in marriage in #125’s ‘Wonder Woman… Battle Prize!’ with the improbable trio ending up marooned on a beast and alien amoeba-men infested Blue Lagoon…

‘Wonder Tot and Mister Genie!’ was the first of two tales in WW #126, depicting what might happen when an imaginative super-kid is left on her own, whilst exasperated US Air Force lieutenant Diana Prince got steamed at being her own romantic rival for Steve Trevor in ‘The Unmasking of Wonder Woman!’ The next issue opened with the defeat of another extraterrestrial assault in ‘Invaders of the Topsy-Turvy Planet’ before ‘Wonder Woman’s Surprise Honeymoon!’ gave the usually incorrigible Colonel Trevor a terrifying foretaste of what married life with his Amazon Angel would be like…

WW#128 revealed the astounding and rather charming ‘Origin of the Amazing Robot Plane!’ before things turned a bit more serious when our heroine endured the deadly ‘Vengeance of the Angle Man!’

In #129 another spectacular Impossible Day adventure featured the entire Wonder Woman Family (that would be just her at three different ages with her mum alongside to save the day) in ‘The Vengeance of Multiple Man!’ whilst #130 opened with Wonder Tot discovering the ‘Secret of Mister Genie’s Magic Turban!’ and ended with an outrageous and embarrassing attack by Angle Man on her mature self in ‘The Mirage Mirrors!’

‘The Proving of Wonder Woman!’ in #131 detailed the history of her unique epithets such as “Thunderbolts of Jove”, “Neptune’s Trident” and “Great Hera” whilst the back-up tale ‘Wonder Woman’s Surprise Birthday Gift!’ saw the indefatigable Manno risk all manner of maritime monsters to find her a dazzling bauble whilst the Amazon herself was trying to find her mother a present.

‘Wonder Tot and the Flying Saucer!’ depicted how the adult Amazon turned herself into a toddler to converse with a baby and discover the secret of a devastating alien atomic attack and the second story revealed some ancient romantic encounters which occurred when ‘Wonder Queen Fights Hercules!’

Wonder Woman #133 cover-featured the Impossible Tale of ‘The Amazing Amazon Race!’ wherein Tot, Teen, Woman and Queen competed in a fraught athletic contest with deadly consequences, whilst in Man’s World Diana Prince took centre-stage to become ‘Wonder Woman’s Invincible Rival… Herself!’ when a movie-project went dangerously awry.

‘Menace of the Mirror Wonder Women!’ pitted her and Steve against the Image-Maker; a deadly other-dimensional mastermind who could animate and enslave reflections, and #134 closed with another disastrous sub-sea date for Wonder Girl when she had to prevent ‘The Capture of Mer-boy!’

It was one more time for Multiple Man as he/it returned again to battle the Wonder Woman Family in #135’s Impossible Day drama ‘Attack of the Human Iceberg!’ whilst the next issue had the Female Fury transformed into a ravenous and colossal threat to humanity after alien machine men infected with a growth-agent and she became ‘Wonder Woman… World’s Greatest Menace!’

This fabulous follow-up compendium concludes with #137’s classic duel on an ersatz Earth with mechanical replicas of the world’s populace and metal facsimiles of all the Amazons. Our foremost female defender had to overcome ‘The Robot Wonder Woman!’ if she had any hope of returning with Steve to their own sweet home…

By modern narrative standards these exuberant, effulgent fantasies are usually illogical and occasionally just plain bonkers, but in those days less attention was paid to continuity and shared universes: adventure in the moment was paramount and these utterly infectious romps simply sparkled then and now with fun, thrills and sheer spectacle.

Wonder Woman is rightly revered as a focus of female strength, independence and empowerment, but the welcoming nostalgia and easy familiarity of such innocuous costumed fairytales must be a delight for open-minded readers, whilst the true, incomparable value of these stories is the incredible quality of entertainment they still offer.

© 1960-1963, 2008 DC Comics, Inc. All Rights Reserved.