Category: Marvel Superheroes

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Marvel Two-In-One Masterworks volume 7


By Tom DeFalco, Alan Kupperberg, David Michelinie, Doug Moench, Ron Wilson, Jerry Bingham, Pablo Marcos, Chic Stone, Gene Day & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-5509-0 (HB/Digital edition)

This book includes some Discriminatory Content produced during less enlightened times.

Above all else, Marvel has always been about team-ups. The concept of team-up books – an established star pairing, or battling (often both) with less well-selling company characters – was not new when Marvel awarded their most popular hero the same deal DC had with Batman in The Brave and the Bold since the early 1960s. Although confident in their new title, they wisely left options open by allocating an occasional substitute lead in The Human Torch. In those distant days, editors were acutely conscious of potential over-exposure – and since superheroes were actually in a decline, they might well have been right.

Nevertheless, after the runaway success of Spider-Man’s guest vehicle Marvel Team-Up, the House of Ideas ran with the trend with a series starring bashful, blue-eyed Ben Grimm – the Fantastic Four’s most popular star. They began with a brace of test runs in Marvel Feature #11-12 before awarding him his own team-up title, with this 7th stirring selection gathering the contents of Marvel Two-In-One #75-82 and MTIO Annuals #5 & 6, collectively covering September 1980 – December 1981.

Preceded by a comprehensive and informative contextual reverie in editor Jim Salicrup’s Introduction ‘Hoo-Ha!’, a late-running annual event anachronistically opens the fun. Although released in summer 1980, Alan Kupperberg & Pablo Marcos’ addition to the ongoing feud between The Thing and The Hulk (Marvel Two-In-One Annual #5, cover-dated September 1980) was omitted from the last volume due to the epic continued tales therein, but sits comfortably enough here. ‘Skirmish with Death’ sees the titanic duo join ruthless extraterrestrial explorer/researcher The Stranger to stop death god Pluto destroying the universe…

Pausing only for a contemporary house ad plugging the big birthday bash, cosmic extravaganzas remain in vogue for anniversary issue Marvel Two-In-One #75 (May 1981, by Tom DeFalco, Kupperberg & Chic Stone, with Marie Severin) as Ben and The Avengers are drawn into the Negative Zone to stop a hyper-powered Super-Adaptoid, and find themselves inevitably ‘By Blastaar Betrayed!’…

Hitting mundane reality with a bump, MTIO #76 exposes ‘The Big Top Bandits’ (DeFalco, David Michelinie, Jerry Bingham & Stone) as Iceman and Ben make short work of the Circus of Evil before a double dose of action in #77 as Thing and Man-Thing nearly join in a rescue mission where ‘Only the Swamp Survives!’ (DeFalco, Ron Wilson & Stone). This tale also features a poignant, bizarre cameo from The Human Torch and Sergeant Nick Fury and his Howling Commandos…

The innate problem with team-up tales is always a lack of continuity – something Marvel always rightly prided itself upon – and which writer/editor Marv Wolfman had sought to address during his tenure through the simple expedient of having stories link-up via evolving, overarching plots which took Ben from place to place and from guest to guest. That policy remained in play until the end, and here sees the lovably lumpy lummox head to Hollywood to head-off a little copyright infringement in DeFalco, Michelinie, Wilson & Stone’s ‘Monster Man!’ The sleazy producer to blame is actually alien serial abductor Xemnu the Titan and Big Ben needs the help of budding actor Wonder Man to foil its latest subliminal mind-control scheme…

Delivered by Doug Moench, Wilson & Gene Day Marvel Two-In-One Annual #6 then introduces ‘An Eagle from America!’ as old chum Wyatt Wingfoot calls The Thing in to help in a battle between brothers involving Indian Tribal Land rights but which had grown into open warfare and attempted murder. The clash results in one sibling becoming new hardline superhero ‘The American Eagle’: hunting his erring brother and a pack of greedy white killers to the Savage Land, consequently recruiting jungle lord Ka-Zar before ‘Never Break the Chain’ sees Ben catch up to them amidst a cataclysmic final clash against old enemy Klaw, Master of Sound in ‘…The Dinosaur Graveyard!’

Monthly Marvel Two-In-One #79 and DeFalco, Wilson & Stone reveal how cosmic entity ‘Shanga, the Star-Dancer!’ visits Earth and makes a lifelong commitment to decrepit WWII superhero Blue Diamond (formerly of The Liberty Legion) whilst in #80,‘Call Him… Monster!’ sees Ben Grimm risk doom and damnation to prevent Ghost Rider Johnny Blaze from crossing the infernal line over a pair of cheap punks…

Extended subplots return in ‘No Home for Heroes!’ as Bill (Giant-Man) Foster enters the final stages of his lingering death from radiation exposure. Ben, meanwhile, has been captured by deranged science experiment M.O.D.O.K. and subjected to a new bio-weapon, only to be rescued by old sparring partner Sub-Mariner. Before long ‘The Fatal Effects of Virus X!’ lay him low and he begins to mutate into an even more hideous gargoyle…

Helping him hunt for M.O.D.O.K. and a cure are Captain America and Giant-Man, and their success leads brings us to the end of this vintage voyage.

Well, not quite as the bonus features offer Ron Wilson’s ‘Special Foom Sneak Preview: The American Eagle!’ as first seen in F.O.O.M. #21 (Spring 1978), with Ed Hannigan & Walt Simonson’s original cover art for MTIO Annual #6 and its painted colour guide. Wrapping up the extras are the covers for reprint series The Adventures of The Thing # 2 & 4 (May & July 1992 by Joe Quesada & Dan Panosian and Gary Barker & Mark Farmer respectively).

Most fans of Costumed Dramas will find little to complain about and there’s loads of fun to be found for young and old readers alike. Fiercely tied to the minutia of Marvel continuity, these stories from Marvel’s Middle Period are certainly of variable quality, but whereas a few might feel rushed and ill-considered they are balanced by other, superb adventure romps as captivating today as they ever were.
© 2024 MARVEL.

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Captain America Epic Collection volume 5: The Secret Empire 1973-1974


By Steve Englehart, Mike Friedrich, Roy Thomas, Tony Isabella, Sal Buscema, Alan Weiss, John Byrne, Vince Colletta, Frank McLaughlin, John Verpoorten, Frank Giacoia, John Tartaglione, George Roussos & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-4873-3 (TPB/Digital edition)

Please be aware this review concerns material with Discriminatory Content.

Created by Joe Simon & Jack Kirby in an era of ferocious patriotic fervour and carefully-manipulated idealism, Captain America was a dynamic and exceedingly bombastic response to the horrors of Nazism and the threat of Liberty’s loss.

He quickly lost focus and popularity once hostilities ceased: fading away as post-war reconstruction began. He briefly reappeared after the Korean War: a harder, darker sentinel ferreting out monsters, subversives and the “commies” who lurked under every American bed. Then he vanished once more until the burgeoning Marvel Age resurrected him just in time to experience the Land of the Free’s most turbulent and culturally divisive era: one where the Star-Spangled Avenger was in danger of becoming an uncomfortable symbol of a troubled, divided society, split along age lines and with many of the hero’s fans apparently rooting for the wrong side. Now into that turbulent mix crept issues of racial and gender inequality…

This resoundingly resolute full-colour Epic Collection re-presents Captain America and the Falcon #160-179 (spanning cover-dates April 1973 to December 1974) with the former patriotic symbol and full-time crimefighting partner The Falcon (Harlem-based social worker and combat acrobat Sam Wilson) confronting truly troubled times head on. The once convinced and confirmed Sentinel of Liberty was becoming a lost symbol of a divided nation, uncomfortable in his red, white & blue skin and looking to carve himself a new place in the Land of the Free. Sadly, calamitous events were about to put paid to that particular American dream…

Into an already turbulent mix of racial and gender inequality played out against standard Fights ‘n’ Tights villainy came creeping overtones of corruption and betrayal of ideals that were fuelled by shocking real-world events.

Following an informative behind-the-scenes reminiscence the drama begins courtesy of scripter Steve and artists Sal Buscema & Frank McLaughlin as ‘Enter: Solarr!’ offers an old-fashioned clash with a super-powered maniac as the main attraction. However, the real meat is the start of twin sub-plots that would shape the next half-dozen adventures, as the Star-Spangled Avenger’s newfound super-strength increasingly makes his proud partner-in-crimefighting feel like a junior and inferior hindrance, even as Steve Rogers’ long-time romantic interest Sharon Carter leaves him without a word of explanation…

Inked by John Verpoorten, CA&F #161 ramps up the tension between Steve and Sam as they search for Sharon in ‘…If he Loseth His Soul!’, and finds a connection to the girl Cap loved and lost in WWII as part of a deadly psycho-drama overseen by criminal shrink Dr. Faustus. It culminates one month later in a singular lesson in extreme therapy proving ‘This Way Lies Madness!’

CA&F #162’s ‘Beware of Serpents!’ heralded the return of super snakes Viper and Eel, who combine with The Cobra to form a vicious but ultimately unsuccessful Serpent Squad to attack the heroes. Humiliatingly defeated, former ad-exec Jordan Dixon/Viper vengefully begins a media manipulation campaign to destroy the Sentinel of Liberty with the “Big Lie”, weaponised fake news and the worst tactics of Madison Avenue. Although the instigator quickly falls, his scheme rumbles on with slow, inexorable and dire consequences…

Issue #164 offers a stunningly scary episode illustrated by Alan Lee Weiss, introducing faux-coquette mad scientist Deadly Nightshade: a ‘Queen of the Werewolves!’ who infects Sam with her chemical lycanthropy as an audition to enlist in the fearsome forces of one of the planet’s greatest menaces…

The full horror of the situation is only revealed when ‘The Yellow Claw Strikes’ (Englehart, Buscema & McLaughlin); renewing a campaign of terror begun in the 1950s, but this time attacking his former Chinese Communist sponsors and the USA indiscriminately. Giant bugs, deadly slave assassins and reanimated mummies are bad enough, but when the Arcane Immortal’s formidable mind-control dupes Cap into almost beating S.H.I.E.L.D. supremo Nick Fury to death on the ‘Night of the Lurking Dead!’, the blistering final battle results in further tragedy when an old ally perishes in the Frank Giacoia inked ‘Ashes to Ashes’…

A pause for thought: these days we comics apologists keep saying “it was a different era”, but to ignore history is to inevitably repeat it. Even before Arthur Henry Sarsfield Ward/Sax Rohmer’s ultimate embodiment of mistrust and suspicion was created, fiction has used racism as a tool for sales. However, it really took off with 1913’s The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu delivering a prime archetype for mad scientists and the remorseless “Yellow Peril” which threatened (white colonial) civilization.

The character spread to stage, screen, airwaves and comics (even appropriating the cover of Detective Comics #1, heralding an interior series that ran until #28), but most importantly, the concept became a visual affirmation and conceptual basis for countless evil “Asiatics”, “Orientals” and “Celestials” who dominated popular fiction for most of the 20th century.

Like most mass entertainment forms comics companies like Marvel employed many “Yellow Peril” knock-offs and personifications (especially after China became communist after WWII) including Wong Chu; Plan Tzu AKA the Yellow – latterly Golden – Claw; Huang Zhu; Silver Samurai; Doctor Sun, the second Viper, ad infinitum: all birds of another colour that are nastily pejorative shades of saffron. These stories, crafted by Marvel’s employees were – and remain – some of the best action comics you’ll ever encounter, but never forget what they’re actually about: distrust of the obviously other; and that needs to be foremost in young minds when reading these old stories.

Comics – Marvel foremost – has sought to sensitively address issues of race and honestly attempt to share non-Christian philosophies and thought in later years. Moreover and most importantly, they were among the first to offer potently powerful role models to kids of Asian origins, and acknowledged these past iniquities.

One of the Star-Spangled Avenger’s most durable foes sort-of resurfaces in tense, action-heavy romp ‘…And a Phoenix Shall Arise!’. Scripted by Roy Thomas & Tony Isabella with inks by John Tartaglione & George Roussos, the simple throwaway yarn has taken on major significance as the soft return of one of Marvel’s most significant villains.

With additional scripting from Mike Friedrich, Englehart’s major storyline resumes as the Viper’s long-laid plans start finally bearing bitter fruit in #169’s ‘When a Legend Dies!’. With anti-Captain America TV spots making people doubt the honesty and sanity of the nation’s greatest hero, Sam and his “Black Power” activist girlfriend Leila Taylor depart for African nation Wakanda to technologically boost The Falcon’s abilities, leaving Cap to battle third-rate villain The Tumbler. In the heat of combat the Avenger seemingly goes too far and the thug dies…

‘J’Accuse!’ (Englehart, Friedrich, Buscema & Vince Colletta) reveals Cap beaten and arrested by too-good-to-be-true neophyte crusader Moonstone, whilst in Africa Leila is kidnapped by exiled Harlem hood Stone-Face, far from home and hungry for some familiar foxy ghetto-style “companionship”…

CA&F #171’s ‘Bust-Out!’ finds Cap forcibly sprung from jail by a mysterious pack of “supporters” as The Black Panther and the newly high-flying Falcon crush Stone-Face prior to a quick dash back to the USA and a reunion with its beleaguered and tarnished American icon. ‘Believe it or Not: The Banshee!’ opens with Captain America and the Falcon beaten by – but narrowly escaping – Moonstone and his obscurely occluded masters, after which the hard-luck heroes trace a lead to Nashville, only to encounter the fugitive mutant Master of Sound and stumble into a clandestine pogrom on American soil.

For many months mutants have been disappearing unnoticed, but now the last remaining X-Men – (Cyclops, Marvel Girl and Charles Xavier – have tracked them down, only to discover Captain America’s problems also stem from ‘The Sins of the Secret Empire!’ whose ultimate goal is the conquest of the nation. Eluding capture by S.H.I.E.L.D., Steve and Sam infiltrate the evil Empire, only to be exposed and confined in ‘It’s Always Darkest!’ before abruptly turning the tables and saving the day in #175’s ‘…Before the Dawn!’, wherein a vile grand plan is revealed, the mutants liberated and the culprits captured.

In a (still) shocking final scene, the ultimate instigator is unmasked and horrifically dispatched within the White House itself…

At this time America was a nation reeling from loss of unity, solidarity and perspective as a result of a torrent of shattering blows such as losing the Vietnam war, political scandals like Watergate and the (partial) exposure of President Nixon’s lies and crimes.

The general decline of idealism and painful public revelations that politicians are generally unpleasant – even possibly ruthless, wicked exploiters – kicked the props out of most citizens who had an incomprehensibly rosy view of their leaders. Thus, a conspiracy that reached into the halls and backrooms of government was extremely controversial yet oddly attractive in those distant, simpler days…

Unable to process the betrayal of all he has held dear, the Star-Spangled Avenger cannot accept this battle has any winner: a feeling that will change his life forever.

Following an attempt by sections of the elected government to undemocratically seize control by deceit and criminal conspiracy (sounds like sheer fantasy these days, doesn’t it?) Captain America can no longer be associated with a tarnished ideal and #176 sees shocked, stunned Steve Rogers search his soul and realise he also cannot be the symbol of such a country. Despite anxious arguments and advice of his Avenging allies Steve decides ‘Captain America Must Die!’ (Englehart, Buscema & Colletta).

Unable to convince him otherwise, staunch ally Sam carries on alone, tackling in the following issue a body-snatching old X-Men foe in ‘Lucifer Be Thy Name’ before wrapping up the threat in ‘If the Falcon Should Fall…!’

Steve meanwhile settles into uncomfortable retirement, as a number of painfully unqualified amateurs try to fill the crimson boots of Captain America – with dire results. Captain America and the Falcon #179 sees unsettled civilian Rogers hunted by a mysterious Golden Archer whose ‘Slings and Arrows!’ convince the ex-hero that even if he can’t be a Star-spangled sentinel of liberty, neither can he abandon the role of do-gooder: leading to a life-changing decision… as you will see in the next volume…

Bonus material in this tome includes John Romita’s cover art for F.O.O.M. #8 (December 1974 and an all Cap special). It precedes the finished 2-tone piece and articles by Roger Stern – ‘Well Come On, All You Big Strong Men…’, ‘Manchild in a Troubled Land’, ‘He Was Only Waiting For This Moment to Rise…’, photo feature ‘Star of the Silver Screen’ and tribute ‘Joe Simon and Jack Kirby – By Their Works Shall Ye Know Them’. The package ends with a back cover from young John Byrne, who also provided the majority of illustrations accompanying the features. One last treat is a preliminary page of pencils by Weiss from CA&F #164.

Any retrospective or historical re-reading is going to turn up some cringe-worthy moments, but these tales of matchless courage and indomitable heroism are fast-paced, action-packed and still carry a knockout conceptual punch. Here Captain America was finally discovering his proper place in a new era and would once more become unmissable, controversial comicbook reading, as we shall see when I get around to reviewing the next volume…
© 2023 MARVEL.

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Mighty Marvel Masterworks Spider-Man volume 4: The Master Planner


By Stan Lee & Steve Ditko with Sam Rosen & Art Simek (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-4899-3 (TPB/Digital edition)

Today marks the 6th Anniversary of Steve Ditko’s death. Here’s a reminder of why he’s so revered, in possibly his greatest sequence of stories starring his most unforgettable character.

The Amazing Spider-Man’s founding stories are timeless and have been gathered many times before but this collection of Steve Dito’s greatest moment on the character is part of The Mighty Marvel Masterworks line: designed with economy in mind and newcomers as target audience. These new books are far cheaper, on lower quality paper and smaller, about the dimensions of a paperback book. Your eyesight might be failing and your hands too big and shaky, but at 152 x 227mm, they’re perfect for kids. If you opt for digital editions, that’s no issue at all.

Marvel is often termed “the House that Jack Built” and King Kirby’s contributions are undeniable and inescapable in the creation of a new kind of comic book storytelling. However, there was another unique visionary toiling at Atlas-Comics-as-was, one whose creativity and philosophy seemed diametrically opposed to the bludgeoning power, vast imaginative scope and clean, gleaming futurism that resulted from Kirby’s ever-expanding search for the external and infinite.

Steve Ditko was quiet and unassuming, diffident to the point of invisibility, but his work was both subtle and striking: innovative and meticulously polished. Always questing for affirming detail, he ever explored the man within. He saw heroism and humour and ultimate evil all contained within the frail but noble confines of humanity. His drawing could be oddly disquieting… and, when he wanted, decidedly creepy.

Crafting extremely well-received monster and mystery tales for and with Stan Lee, Ditko had been rewarded with his own title. Amazing Adventures/Amazing Adult Fantasy featured a subtler brand of yarn than Rampaging Aliens and Furry Underpants Monsters: an ilk which, though individually entertaining, had been slowly losing traction in the world of comics ever since National/DC had successfully reintroduced costumed heroes. Lee & Kirby had responded with The Fantastic Four and so-ahead-of-its-time Incredible Hulk, but there was no indication of the renaissance ahead when officially just-cancelled Amazing Fantasy featured a brand new and rather eerie adventure character…

This compelling compilation reprises the unstoppable climb of the wallcrawler as steered by Ditko and originally seen in Amazing Spider-Man #29-38 (spanning cover-dates October 1965-July 1966). The parable of Peter Parker began when a smart but alienated high schooler was bitten by a radioactive spider on a science trip. Discovering he’d developed arachnid abilities – which he augmented with his own ingenuity and engineering genius – Peter did what any lonely, geeky nerd would when given such a gift… he tried to cash in for girls, fame and money.

Creating a costume to hide his identity in case he made a fool of himself, Parker became a minor celebrity – and a vain, self-important one. To his eternal regret, when a thief fled past him, he didn’t lift a finger to stop the thug, and days later discovered that his Uncle Ben had been murdered by the same criminal…

Vengeance crazed, Parker stalked and captured the assailant who made his beloved Aunt May a widow and killed the only father he had ever known. Since his social irresponsibility led to the death of the man who raised him, the boy swore to always use his powers to help others…

It wasn’t a new story, but the setting was familiar to every kid reading it and the artwork was downright spooky. no gleaming high-tech world of moon-rockets, mammoth monsters and flying cars here… this stuff could happen to anyone…

Sans frills or extras – but graced with pre-edited cover art at the back – Ditko’s Spider-Man culminates herein stories plotted and rendered by the inspired artist/auteur. Although other artists have inked his narratives, Ditko handled all the art on Spider-Man and these glittering gems demonstrate his fluid mastery and just how much of the mesmerising magic came from his pens and brushes…

The potent parables are lettered throughout by unsung superstars Sam Rosen & Art Simek, allowing newcomers and veteran readers to comprehensively relive some of the greatest moments in sequential narrative.

Ditko’s preference for tales of gangersterism drove the stories, but his plots also found plenty of time and room for science fictional fun, compelling supervillain frolics and subplots involving Peter Parker’s disastrous love life and poverty-fuelled medical dramas involving always-on-the-edge-of-death Aunt May…

The wallcrawler was still the whipping boy of publicity-hungry – and eventually clinically obsessed – publisher J. Jonah Jameson, who bombarded the hero with libellous print assaults in his newspaper The Daily Bugle. “Ol’ JJ” was blithely unaware the photos Parker sold him for his scurrilous print attacks were paying Spider-Man’s bills…

In the ever-more popular monthly mag, ASM #29 warned ‘Never Step on a Scorpion!’ as the lab-made larcenous lunatic returned, seeking vengeance on not just the webspinner but also Jameson for initially paying to turn a disreputable seedy private eye into a super-powered monster. Once again, the ungrateful demagogue only lived because his despised target stepped up and stepped in…

That breathtaking Fights ‘n’ Tights clash was followed by #30’s off-beat crime-caper which cannily sowed seeds for future masterpieces. ‘The Claws of the Cat!’ grittily depicted a city-wide hunt for an extremely capable burglar (way more exciting than it sounds, trust me!), whilst introducing an organised gang of thieves working for mysterious menace The Master Planner.

Sadly, by this time of their greatest comics successes, Lee & Ditko were increasingly unable to work together on their greatest creations. Ditko’s off-beat plots and quirky art had reached an accommodation with the slickly potent superhero house-style Kirby had developed (at least as much as such a unique talent ever could). The illustration featured a marked reduction of signature line-feathering and moody backgrounds, plus a lessening of concentration on totemic villains, but – although still very much a Ditko baby – Amazing Spider-Man’s sleek pictorial gloss warred with Lee’s dialogue.

These efforts were comfortably in tune with the times if not his collaborator. Lee’s assessment of the readership was probably the correct one, and disagreements with the artist over editorial direction were still confined to the office and not the pages themselves. However, an indication of growing tensions could be seen once Ditko began being credited as plotter of the stories…

After a period where old-fashioned crime and gangsterism predominated, science fiction themes and costumed crazies returned full force. As the world went gaga for masked mystery men, the creators experimented with longer storylines and protracted subplots. When Ditko abruptly left, the company feared a drastic loss in quality and sales but it didn’t happen. John Romita (senior) considered himself a mere “safe pair of hands” keeping the momentum going until a better artist could be found, but instead blossomed into a major talent in his own right, and the wallcrawler continued his unstoppable rise at an accelerated pace.

Change was in the air everywhere. Included amongst the milestones for the ever-anxious Peter Parker collected here are graduating High School and starting college, meeting first love Gwen Stacy and tragic friend/foe Harry Osborn, plus the introduction of nemesis Norman Osborn. Old friends carried in Parker’s wake included Flash Thompson and Betty Brant who subsequently begin to drift out of his life…

‘If This Be My Destiny…!’ in #31 details a spate of high-tech robberies by the Master Planner, culminating in a spectacular confrontation with Spider-Man. Also on show is that aforementioned college debut, first sight of Harry and Gwen, with Aunt May on the edge of death due to an innocent blood transfusion from her mildly radioactive darling Peter…

This led to indisputably Ditko’s finest and most iconic moments on the series – and perhaps of his entire career. ‘Man on a Rampage!’ (ASM #32) sees Parker pushed to the edge of desperation when the Planner’s men make off with serums that could save May, resulting in an utterly driven, berserk wallcrawler ripping the town apart whilst trying to find them. At the last, trapped in an underwater fortress, pinned under tons of machinery, the hero faces his greatest failure as the clock ticks down the seconds of May’s life…

This in turn generates the most memorable visual sequence in Spidey history as the opening of ‘The Final Chapter!’ luxuriates in 5 full, glorious pages depicting the ultimate triumph of will over circumstance. Freeing himself from tons of fallen debris, Spider-Man gives his absolute all to deliver the medicine May needs, and is rewarded with a rare happy ending…

Russian exile Kraven returns in ‘The Thrill of the Hunt!’, seeking payback for past humiliations by impersonating the webspinner, after which #35 confirms that ‘The Molten Man Regrets…!’: a plot-light, astoundingly action-packed combat classic wherein the gleaming golden bandit foolishly resumes his career of pinching other people’s valuables…

Amazing Spider-Man #36 offers a deliciously off-beat, quasi-comedic turn in ‘When Falls the Meteor!’ with deranged, would-be scientist Norton G. Fester calling himself The Looter to steal extraterrestrial museum exhibits…

In retrospect, these brief, fight-oriented tales, coming after such an intricate, passionate epic as the Master Planner/Nam on a Rampage saga should have indicated something was amiss. However fans had no idea that ‘Once Upon a Time, There Was a Robot…!’ – featuring a beleaguered Norman Osborn targeted by his disgraced ex-partner Mendel Strom, and some eccentrically bizarre murder-machines in #37 and the tragic tale of ‘Just a Guy Named Joe!’ – (Amazing Spider-Man #38, July 1966 and on sale from April 12th) wherein a hapless sad-sack stumblebum boxer gains super-strength and a bad-temper – would be Ditko’s last arachnid adventures.

And thus an era ended…

Full of energy, verve, pathos and laughs, gloriously short of post-modern angst and breast-beating, these fun classics – also available in numerous formats including eBook editions – are quintessential comic book magic constituting the very foundation of everything Marvel became. This classy compendium is an unmissable opportunity for readers of all ages to celebrate the magic and myths of the modern heroic ideal: something no serious fan can be without, and an ideal gift for any curious newcomer or nostalgic aficionado.
© 2023 MARVEL.

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Spider-Man Newspaper Strips volume 1: January 3rd 1977 – January 28th 1979

4 images (2 covers + 1 illo and a spare combined covers if the preferred don’t match up)


By Stan Lee & John Romita, with Frank Giacoia & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-8561-1 (TPB/Digital edition)

It’s been a year since we lost genial giant John Romita. His work and life were inextricably woven into the Marvel canon: permeating and supporting the entire company’s output from top to tail, from before the House of Ideas even existed to the stellar Sixties to right now…

By 1977 Stan Lee had all but surrendered his role as editor and guiding light of Marvel Comics for that of a roving PR machine to hype-up the company he had turned into a powerhouse. In that year two events occurred that catapulted Marvel’s standout, signature character into the popular culture mainstream. One was the long-anticipated debut of The Amazing Spider-Man live action TV show (a mixed blessing and pyrrhic victory at best) whilst the other, and one much more in keeping with his humble origins, was the launch of a syndicated newspaper strip with the same hallowed title.

Both mass-audience outreach projects brought the character to a wider audience, but the latter offered at least a promise of editorial control – a crucial factor in keeping the wondrous wallcrawler’s identity and integrity intact. But even this closely-aligned creative medium dictated some tailoring of the Merry Marvel Madness before the hero was a suitable fit with the grown-up world of the “Funny Pages”.

Which is just my longwinded way of saying that completists, long-time fans and lovers of great artwork will absolutely enjoy this collection of periodical strips, as will any admirer of the stunning talents of the senior John Romita (latterly inked by the great Frank Giacoia) even though the stories are tame, bowdlerised and rather mediocre. Deprived of the support network of an overlapping Marvel Universe, they often struggled to find their wallcrawling feet and might feel a tad toned down and simplistic for readers familiar with the wider cast or long history. Those completists, however, might be keen on catching lost adventures featuring Wolverine, Doctor Strange and Daredevil, and it was always easier to import supervillains like Mysterio, The Kingpin and Doctor Doom into the alternate adventures of this Amazing Spider-Man.

Marvel Multiversal Continuity eventually caught up with the feature and it’s now designated Earth-77013 and a regular component of the “Spider-Verse” strand…

The strip was first posited and peddled around the papers in 1970 (Lee & Romita’s initial proposal and two weeks of trial continuities are included at the back of this book) but The Amazing Spider-Man only began on January 3rd 1977. It ran as a property of the Register and Tribune Syndicate until 1985, briefly switching to Cowles Media Company before becoming part of the King Features Syndicate in 1986. The strip went on hiatus following Lee’s death with the final new strip appearing on March 23rd 2019. Lee was still credited as writer even though Roy Thomas had been its ghost writer since 2000. It soon reappeared as reruns – until October 21st 2023 – before being replaced in syndicate packages by Flash Gordon.

One of the industry’s most polished stylists and a true cornerstone of the Marvel Comics phenomenon, the elder John Romita began his comics career in the late 1940s (ghosting for other artists) before striking out under his own colours, eventually illustrating horror and other anthology tales for Stan Lee at Timely/Atlas.

John Victor Romita was Brooklyn born and bred, entering the world on January 24th 1930. From Brooklyn Junior High School he moved to the famed if not legendary Manhattan School of Industrial Art, and graduated in 1947. After spending six months creating a medical exhibit for Manhattan General Hospital he moved into comics in 1949, working for Famous Funnies. A “day job” toiling at Forbes Lithograph was abandoned when a friend found him various inking and ghosting assignments, until he was drafted in 1951. Showing his portfolio to a US army art director, after boot camp at Fort Dix New Jersey, Romita was promoted to corporal, and stationed on Governors Island in New York Bay doing recruitment posters. He was allowed to live off-base in Brooklyn. During this period he started doing the rounds and struck up a freelancing acquaintance with Stan Lee at rapidly expanding genre factory Atlas Comics…

Romita illustrated horror, science fiction, war stories, westerns, Waku, Prince of the Bantu in Jungle Tales, a superb run of inviting cowboy adventures starring The Western Kid and was handed 1954’s abortive revival of Captain America and more, before an industry implosion derailed his – and many other – blossoming careers. He eventually found himself trapped in DC’s romance comics division – a job he hated – before – in 1965 – making a reluctant jump back to the resurgent House of Ideas. As well as steering the career of the wallcrawler and so many other Marvel stars, his greatest influence was felt when he became Art Director in July 1973 – a job he had been doing unofficially since 1968. He had a definitive hand in creating or shaping many key characters, such as Mary Jane Watson, Peggy Carter, The Kingpin, The Punisher, Luke Cage, Wolverine, Satana, ad infinitum. One story goes that it was Romita who suggested Gwen Stacy’s murder to Spidey scripter Gerry Conway…

Working from full scripts (not the acclaimed “Marvel Method”), Romita illustrated The Amazing Spider-Man newspaper strip for its first four years, after which Stan’s brother Larry Lieber (Rawhide Kid, Ant-Man, Iron Man, Thor) took on the pencilling. Unhappy with the deadline pressures, he soon left, and was replaced by Fred (Airboy, Captain Britain) Kida who soldiered on from August 1981 to July 1986. A brief interim with Dan (Flash Gordon, Airboy, Tarzan) Barry led to Leiber’s return, and he drew the feature for the next 32 years with a variety of inkers and ghosts such as Alex Saviuk.

Since 2015 the stories have also been collected in IDW’s The Library of American Comics as The Amazing Spider-Man: The Ultimate Newspaper Comics Collection with five lavish hardback volumes released to date. This collection – available in landscape paperback and digital formats – is a modified rerelease of a hardback tome from 2008, offering extra editorial and commentary as it re-presents the first two years of the strip, with traditional single tier monochrome dailies accompanied by full-colour, full page Sunday strips. If the reader is steeped in the established folklore of the comic book Spider-Man, the serials here – solidly emphasising Peter Parker‘s personal relationships in the grand manner of strip soap opera drama – begin by introducing Dr. Doom and Dr. Octopus in heavy-handed potboilers light on action but intrinsically riffing on what has gone before in comic books.

However, for the presumed millions of neophyte readers the yarns must have been a tad confusing: presented as if all participants are already fully-established, with no development or real explanation of backstory. After the full-on Marvel villains are successively trounced, serpentine new baddie The Rattler stalks the city in search of increased powers, followed in turn by the more appropriate and understandable (for strips at least) gangster The Kingpin, who combines seditious politics with gun-toting thuggery.

Only then do the creators finally get around to a retelling of the origin, albeit one now based on that aforementioned TV show rather than the classic Lee/Ditko masterpiece. It’s safe to say that in those early years television informed the strip much (too much) more than monthly comic books.

A suitably revised Kraven the Hunter debuts next, presenting an opportunity to remove glamourous but shallow good-time girl Mary Jane Watson from the strip in favour of a string of temporary girl-friends, more in line with the TV iteration. This also signalled a reining-in of super-menaces in favour of less-fantastic or far-fetched opponents such as a middle-Eastern terrorist.

The launch of a Spider-Man movie (surely the most improbable of events!) then takes photojournalist Peter Parker to Hollywood and into a clash with a new version of deranged special-effects genius Mysterio, before Dr. Doom returns, attempting to derange our hero with robot pigeons and duplicates of Parker’s associates..

This is followed by an exceptional, emotionally-stirring run of episodes as three street thugs terrorise senior citizen Aunt May for her social security money, after which Spider-Man must foil a crazed fashion-model who has discovered his identity and blackmails him…

These drama-framed and human-scaled threats are a far more fitting use of the hero in this ostensibly more grown-up milieu – which pauses here with a protection racket romp set in the (feel free to shudder) discotheque owned by young entrepreneurs Flash Thompson and Harry Osborn, courtesy of newly-returned corpulent crimelord Kingpin…

To Be Continued…

Adding to the time capsule of arachnid entertainment is that aforementioned proposal by Lee & Romita, archival interviews with both creators conducted by John Rhett Thomas and Alex Lear plus a gallery of six Sunday title panels (used to summarise events and set the tone for readers who only read the sabbath colour strips), as well as a classic Romita pin-up page starring the artist and his greatest co-creations…

Happily, although goofy stories predominate in this oddball collection, and time has not been gentle with much of the dialogue, the stunning artwork of John Romita in his prime helps to counteract the worst of the cultural excesses. Moreover, there remains a certain guilty pleasure to be derived from these tales if you don’t take your comics too seriously and are open to alternative existences…
© 1977, 1978, 2019 Marvel. All rights reserved.

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Guardians of the Galaxy by Brian Michael Bendis volume 1


By Brian Michael Bendis, with Neil Gaiman, Steve McNiven, Sara Pichelli, Michael Avon Oeming, Olivier Coipel, Valerio Schiti, Francesco Francavilla, Kevin Maguire & Mark Morales Ming Doyle, Michael Del Mundo, John Dell & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-9400-2 (HB/Digital edition)

With the final GoTG Marvel Cinematic interpretation long done and dusted, there’s little to look forward too other than the past, but at least in this anniversary year – 55 and counting! – there are still timely collection ideal for boning up on some of those blasts from futures past…

Although heralded since its launch in the early 1960s with making superheroes more realistic, Marvel Comics never forsook its close connection with outlandish and outrageous cosmic calamity (as embodied in their pre-superhero “monster-mag” days. This iteration of space crusaders maintains that delightful “Anything Goes” attitude by revisiting an impressive relaunch – then part of the MarvelNow! group reboot – that built on the movie franchise.

The Guardians of the Galaxy were created by Arnold Drake in 1968 for try-out title Marvel Super-Heroes (#18, January 1969): a group of futuristic freedom fighters dedicated to liberating star-scattered Mankind from domination by the sinister, reptilian Brotherhood of Badoon.

Initially unsuccessful, they floated in limbo until 1974 when Steve Gerber incorporated them into Marvel Two-In-One #4-5 and Giant Size Defenders #5 following up in the monthly Defenders title (#26-29, July through November 1975), wherein assorted 20th century champions travelled a millennium into the future to ensure humanity’s liberation and survival. This in turn led to the Guardians’ own short-lived series in Marvel Presents #3-12 (February 1976 – August 1977) before cancellation left them roaming the Marvel Universe as perennial guest-stars in such cosmically-tinged titles as Thor, Marvel Team-Up, Marvel Two-in-One and The Avengers. Eventually – in June 1990 – they secured a relatively successful series (#62 issues, annuals and spin-off miniseries until July 1995) before cancellation again claimed them.

This isn’t them; this is another bunch…

In 2006 a massive crossover involved most of Marvel’s 21st century space specialists in a spectacular “Annihilation” Event, leading writing team Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning to reconfigure the Guardians concept for modern times and tastes. Among the stalwarts in play were Silver Surfer, Galactus, Firelord (and other previous heralds of the world-eater), Moondragon, Quasar, Star-Lord, Thanos, Super-Skrull, Tana Nile, Gamora, Ronan the Accuser, Nova, Drax the Destroyer, a Watcher and host of alien civilisations such as the Kree, Skrulls, Xandarians, Shi’ar et al.: all falling before a invasion of rapacious negative zone bugs and beasties unleashed by insectoid horror Annihilus. The event spawned a number of specials, miniseries and new titles (subsequently collected in three volumes plus a Classics compilation that reprinted key appearances of a number of the saga’s major players), and inevitably led to a follow-up event…

Sequel Annihilation: Conquest expanded the cast, adding Adam Warlock, The Inhumans, talking dog Cosmo, Kang the Conqueror, Vance Astro/Major Victory, Maelstrom, Jack Flag, Blastaar, The Magus, Galactic Warrior Bug (from 1970’s sensation Micronauts), the current Captain Universe (ditto), Shi’ar berserker Deathcry, Celestial Madonna Mantis, anamorphic adventurer Rocket Raccoon and gloriously whacky “Kirby Kritter” Groot, a walking killer tree and one-time “Monarch of Planet X”, amongst others…

I’ve covered part of that cataclysmic clash and will get to the rest one day: suffice to say that by the conclusion of the assorted Annihilations a new pan-species Guardian group had appointed itself to defend civilisations and prevent any such wars from ever happening again.

This isn’t them either… not exactly…

A few years later and with many more cosmic crises – such as a devastating War of Kings – averted, the remnants of those many Sentinels of the Stars are here getting the band back together, still determined to make the universe a safe place.

Thus this impressive and readily accessible volume (collecting Guardians of the Galaxy: Tomorrow’s Avengers #1 Guardians of the Galaxy #0.1 & volume 2, #1-10 from February 2013 – January 2014#1-10) provides a handy jumping-on point, recapitulating the bare essentials before launching into an immensely absorbing interstellar romp tied inextricably into mainstream Marvel continuity.

Brian Michael Bendis, Steve McNiven, John Dell & Justin Ponsor set the ball rolling with the secret origin of Star-Lord, revealing how 30 years ago warrior Prince J’Son of the interstellar empire of Spartax was shot down over Colorado and had a brief fling with solitary Earther Meredith Quill. Despite his desire to remain in idyllic isolation, duty called J’Son back to battle and he left, leaving behind an unsuspected son and a unique weapon…

A decade later, the troubled boy saw his mother assassinated by alien lizard men determined on eradicating the legacy of Spartax. Peter vengefully slaughtered the Badoon with Meredith’s shotgun, before his home was explosively destroyed by a flying saucer. The orphan awoke in hospital, his only possession a “toy” ray-gun his mother had hidden from him his entire life…

Years later his destiny found him, and the half-breed scion of Spartax became Star-Lord. Rejecting both Earth and his father – now king of his distant corner of creation – Quill chose freedom, the pursuit of justice and the comradeship of disreputable aliens. The origin story concludes with Peter welcoming avid listener and neophyte spacer Tony Stark into his loose-knit fellowship of Guardians…

The series proper – by Bendis, Steve McNiven, John Dell & Justin Ponsor – opens with Peter Quill diplomatically ambushed in a seedy dive by his long-lost dad. J’Son rules Spartax but the rift between him and the Star-Lord is wide and deep and impassable. Dear old dad also has a message: he has entered into a compact with the other major powers and principalities of the universe and declared Earth off limits and quarantined from all extraterrestrial contact. He/they will act immediately to stop any alien individual or species from contaminating it.

That especially means his own wayward son…

A little later, Iron Man is playing with and in his new space armour when a Badoon starship attacks Earth. Overmatched, Stark is unexpectedly reinforced by Star-Lord, Gamora, Drax, Rocket Raccoon and Groot who devastate the monolithic vessel – but not before fighter ships break atmosphere and bombard London.

With the Home Counties under attack despite The Council of Galactic Empires’ edicts – and apparently by one of the signatory civilisations – the Guardians go to work ending the Badoon, with Peter distracted in trying to divine his duplicitous father’s actual intent.

Meanwhile, in the Negative Zone J’Son is conferring virtually with his opposite numbers from the Kree, Shi’ar, Brood, Badoon and Asgard, with a new Annihilus presiding over the fractious meeting, and indeed dirty work and dirty tricks are afoot…

In blistering battles the Badoon are beaten, but no sooner do the Guardians pause for breath than a star fleet supposedly blockading Earth arrests them for breaking the embargo. Imprisoned on Spartax, Quill and Co eventually bust out and publicly declare war on J’Son, sowing seeds of a future rebellion – but even they are unaware that the devious and double-dealing king is also being played for a sucker…

After Stark scores an amatory epic fail with Gamora (a wry episode which delivers plenty of laughs for his new comrades, who can’t let it lie for the rest of the book), she storms out to cool off and is ambushed by an alien bounty hunter. Despite her formidable prowess Gamora is only saved by the arrival of the Guardians – who have just finished trashing a bar and the squad of Spartax soldiers who walked in on their drunken carousing…

With no information on who else now wants them dead, the disparate legion of the lost head back into space and a fateful dalliance with destiny…

Still being crushingly snubbed by Gamora, Stark occupies himself learning new ways to repair his comparatively primitive armour under the guidance of an aggravatingly disparaging racoon whilst Quill takes a secret meeting in one of the universe’s many unsavoury and unwelcoming armpits.

Star-Lord’s consultation with former ally Mantis about a bizarre episode (wherein he seemed to experience an inexplicable and debilitating chronal mind quake) provides no answers and he is forced to go ask the last person in creation he ever wanted to see again…

Meanwhile, Stark and the remaining Guardians spot an unidentifiable lifeform approaching Earth and rush to incept her before she can do any damage. They reason they can’t identify her is because she’s from another universe and time. Angela (created by Neil Gaiman for Spawn #9 in 1993 and, after much legal foofaraw, brought under Marvel’s auspices in Age of Ultron) is lost and baffled: approaching a world her people have always considered a fairy tale or religious myth when still-disgruntled Gamora smashes her into the moon, grateful for an excuse to work off her pent-up hostilities. The satellite’s oldest inhabitant – Uatu the Watcher – reels from the conflict. Not because of its savage intensity but because he knows what Angela is and how she simply cannot be present in this Reality…

Quill however is pumping mad Titan Thanos for information on his own time troubles and suddenly realises he has just poked the biggest bear in existence. The Death-Lover declares humanity’s perpetual tampering with the time-stream has broken the universe and brought our pathetic mud-ball to the attention of races and powers that won’t let Mankind muck up Reality any longer…

Rushing back to his birthworld, Star-Lord finds his team faring very badly against mystery menace Angela and pitches in. When she is finally, spectacularly subdued, Uatu appears and proffers dire warnings for all Reality as – with uncharacteristic diplomacy – Quill coaxes the enigmatic intruder into relating her story. Apparently she’s a “Hunting Angel” from somewhere called Heven, fallen through a gaping crack in Everything That Is.

Drawn to Earth – a place her race reveres but considers a beautiful fiction – she was ambushed by Gamora, who cannot believe Star-Lord’s next move: freeing Angela and, after personally conducting her on a tour of the world, letting her go free…

At this time almost all of Marvel’s titles were building to a big Avengers-centric crossover event Infinity, and the next two issues (#8-9, stunningly illustrated by Francesco Francavilla) form the Guardians’ contribution to the epic, in which a double crisis afflicts our particular portion of space. As Thanos invades Earth, an ancient array of races from far beyond attack those stellar empires still recovering from the Annihilation outrages and War of Kings. It’s nothing personal: this invading alien Armada is tasked with eradicating every Earth in every dimension and the Kree, Skrulls, Badoon, Galadorians, Spartax, Shi’ar and all the rest are simply guilty of associating with humans…

With all the Avengers called into space to fight beside their former enemies, Earth is helpless when enemy E.T.’s overwhelm The Peak (the planet’s orbital defence citadel) and Abigail Brand – Director of the Sentient World Observation & Response Department – sends a desperate distress call to Star-Lord.

His affirmative answer enrages Gamora, already bristling from the knowledge that Quill has been fraternising with despised Thanos. She quits – and with Iron Man also gone, Star-Lord, Groot and Rocket sneakily infiltrate the station (Drax doesn’t do unobtrusive) but quickly fall foul of the superior forces. Only the sudden return of Angela saves the day and when Gamora and Drax join the fray the Guardians are magnificently triumphant… but at a terrible cost…

Regular programming ends with a far lighter ‘Girls Night Out-rageous’ (#10, illustrated by Kevin Maguire) as Gamora and Angela enjoy a blistering bonding session and action-comedy moment whilst visiting Badoon homeworld Moord, freeing the reptilians’ vast contingent of enslaved races and accidentally uncovering an impossible connection between the scurvy raider race and Angela’s dimensionally displaced people…

This initial volume closes with more delving into formative events as seen in anthological Tomorrow’s Avengers #1 (Bendis, individually illustrated by Michael Avon Oeming, Ming Doyle & Michael Del Mundo), revealing how Quill tracked down old friends and prospective members for his new team, detailing recent exploits of at-large and unfocused stalwarts Drax, decidedly odd couple Rocket & Groot and, of course, the Deadliest Woman in the Galaxy…

The former bane of Thanos, Drax is idling away the days in pointless fighting when Star-Lord comes calling, whilst Groot at least is still defending the weak from the wicked in a classy farmers-vs.-bandits fable.

The unique, blaster-toting peril-loving Procyonidae (look it up) was mouthing off in a bar, drinking and fighting as usual when he found tantalising evidence that there was at least one other Rocket Raccoon at large in the universe, whilst gorgeous Gamora just never stopped. She was still slaughtering her adopted dad’s minions when Star-Lord made his offer…

Bright, breezy, bombastic and immensely enjoyable, these action-packed fun and frolic fables also include a beautiful and massive gallery of covers and variants – including a lovely movie-art landscape/wraparound by Charlie Wen, and a Lego variant by Leonel Castellani. Contributors comprise McNiven, Dell & Ponsor, Doyle, Ed McGuiness, Joe Quesada, Adi Granov, Mark Brooks, Milo Manara, Terry Dodson, Mike Deodato Jr., Phil Jimenez, Mike Perkins, Joe Madureira, Skottie Young, Pichelli & Ponsor, J. Scott Campbell, Julian Totino Tedesco, Brandon Peterson, Francavilla, John Tyler Christopher, Maguire, Paul Renaud, Paolo Manuel Rivera, Adam Kubert and more.
© 2020 MARVEL.

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Deadpool Epic Comics volume 1: The Circle Chase 1991-1994


By Rob Liefeld, Fabian Nicieza, Glenn Herdling, Gregory Wright, Tom Brevoort, Mike Kanterovich, Mark Waid, Dan Slott, Pat Olliffe, Mark Pacella, Greg Capullo, Mike Gustovich, Joe Madureira, Isaac Cordova, Jerry DeCaire, Bill Wylie, Ian Churchill, Sandu Florea, Terry Shoemaker, Al Milgrom, Scot Eaton, Ariane Lenshoek, Tony DeZuñiga, Lee Weeks, Don Hudson, Ken Lashley & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-302-3205-3 (TPB/Digital edition)

With a long, LONG awaited cinematic combo clash finally headed our way this summer and in the year of a certain Canadian Canucklehead’s 50th Anniversary, expect a few cashing-in style commendations and reviews in our immediate future. Here’s a handy starter package to set the ball rolling…

Bloodthirsty killers and stylish mercenaries have long made for popular protagonists and this guy is probably one of the most popular. Deadpool is Wade Wilson: a survivor of sundry experiments that left him a scarred, grotesque bundle of scabs and physical unpleasantries – albeit functionally immortal, invulnerable and capable of regenerating from literally any wound.

Moreover, after his initial outings on the fringes of the X-Universe, his modern incarnation makes him either one of the few beings able to perceive the true nature of reality… or a total gibbering loon.

Chronologically collecting and curating cameos, guest shots and his early outrages from New Mutants #98, X-Force #2, 11 & 15, Deadpool: The Circle Chase #1-4, and Secret Defenders #15-17, as well as pertinent excerpted material from X-Force #4, 5 10, 14, 19-24; X-Force Annual #1, Nomad #4; Avengers #366 & Silver Sable & the Wild Pack #23 & 30, (spanning February 1991 to November 1994), this tome is merely the first in a series cataloguing his ever more outlandish escapades.

After Gail Simone’s joyous Foreword ‘He was always Deadpool’ justifies and confirms his fame, escalating antics and off-kilter appeal, his actual debut in New Mutants #98’s ‘The Beginning of the End, part one’ opens proceedings. The “merc with a mouth” was created as a villain du jour by Rob Liefeld & Fabian Nicieza, as that title wound down in advance of a major reboot/rebrand. He seemed a one-trick throwaway in a convoluted saga of mutant mayhem with little else to recommend it. An employee of enigmatic evildoer Mr. Tolliver, Deadpool was despatched to kill to kill future-warrior Cable and his teen acolytes… but spectacularly failed. The kids were soon after rebranded and relaunched as X-Force though, so he had a few encores and more tries…

With appropriate covers and text to precis events between excerpt moments, we learn Deadpool first popped back in September 1991’s X-Force #2’s ‘The Blood Hunters’ where he clashed with another product of Canada’s clandestine super-agent project (which had turned a mutant spy into feral, adamantium-augmented warrior Wolverine as well as unleashing so many other second-string cyborg super-doers). Gritty do-gooder Garrison Kane was dubbed Weapon X (first of many!) and the tale also included aging spymaster GW Bridge…

Still just a derivative costumed killer for hire popping up in bit part roles, the merc continued pushing Tolliver’s agenda and met Spider-Man until as seen here via snippets from X-Force Annual #1 (1991) before stumbling through Nicieza-scripted crossover Dead Man’s Hand. Illustrated by Pat Olliffe & Mark McKenna, ‘Neon Knights’ (Nomad #4, August 1992) finds Deadpool just one of a bunch of super-killers-for-hire convened by a group of lesser crime bosses seeking to fill a void created by the fall of The Kingpin. His mission is to remove troublemaking fellow hitman Bushwacker, but former super sidekick Jack “Bucky” Monroe has some objections…

Excerpts from X-Force #10 (May 1992) presage #11’s extended fight between Deadpool, the teen team, Cable and mutant luck-shaper Domino in ‘Friendly Reminders’ (Nicieza, Liefeld, Mark Pacella & Dan Panosian) before a clip from X-Force #14 (September 1992 limned by Terry Shoemaker & Al Milgrom) reveals a shocking truth about Domino and Deadpool’s relationship with her, prior to X-Force #15’s ‘To the Pain’ (October 1992 with art by Greg Capullo) wrapping up a long-running war between Cable’s kids, Tolliver and The Externals…

Excerpts from X-Force #19-23 – as first seen in 1993 – find the manic merc hunting Domino and/or Vanessa and sparking a mutant mega clash before Wade Wilson guests in Avengers #366 (September 1993 by Glenn Herdling, Mike Gustovich & Ariane Lenshoek). A tie-in to Deadpool’s first solo miniseries, ‘Swordplay³’ sees the merc and a group of meta-scavengers embroiled in battle with each other and new hero Blood Wraith with The Black Knight helpless to control the chaos…

That first taste of solo stardom came with 4-issue miniseries The Circle Chase: cover-dated August-November 1993 by Nicieza, Joe Madureira & Mark Farmer. A fast-paced but cluttered thriller, it sees Wilson doggedly pursuing an ultimate weapon: one of a large crowd of mutants and variously-enhanced ne’er-do-wells seeking the fabled legacy of arms dealer/fugitive from the future Mr. Tolliver. Among other (un)worthies bound for the boodle in ‘Ducks in a Row’, ‘Rabbit Season, Duck Season’, ‘…And Quacks Like a Duck…’ and ‘Duck Soup’ are mutant misfits Black Tom and The Juggernaut; the then-latest iteration of Weapon X; shape-shifter Copycat and a host of fashionably disposable cyborg loons with quirky media-buzzy names like Commcast and Slayback. If you can swallow any understandable nausea associated with the dreadful trappings of this low point in Marvel’s tempestuous history, there is a sharp and entertaining little thriller underneath…

A follow-up tale in Silver Sable & the Wild Pack #23 (April 1994, Gregory Wright, Isaac Cordova & Hon Hudson) pits Wilson against Daredevil and notional heroes-for-hire Paladin and Silver Sable before uniting to thwart fascist usurpers The Genesis Coalition, prior to a relatively heroic stance in Doctor Strange team-up title Secret Defenders.

Beginning in #15’s ‘Strange Changes Part the First: Strangers and Other Lovers’ (May 1994 by Tom Brevoort, Mike Kanterovich, Jerry Decaire & Tony DeZuñiga) the Sorcerer Supreme sends Doctor Druid, Shadowoman, Luke Cage and Deadpool to stop ancient life-sucking sorceress Malachi – a task fraught with peril that takes #16’s ‘Strange Changes Part the Second: Resurrection Tango’ (pencilled by Bill Wylie and debuting zombie hero Cadaver), and #17’s ‘Strange Changes Part the Third: On Borrowed Time’…

A moment from Silver Sable & the Wild Pack #30 (November 1994, by Wright, Scot Eaton & Jim Amash) depicting Wade’s reaction to his rival’s fall from grace segues into the second 4-part Deadpool miniseries (August – November 1994) which revolves around auld acquaintances Black Tom and Juggernaut. Collaboratively contrived by writer Mark Waid, pencillers Ian Churchill, Lee Weeks and Ken Lashley with inkers Jason Minor, Bob McLeod, Bub LaRosa, Tom Wegryzn, Philip Moy & W.C. Carani, ‘If Looks Could Kill!’, ‘Luck of the Irish’, ‘Deadpool, Sandwich’ and ‘Mano a Mano’ delivers a hyperkinetic race against time heavy on explosive action.

The previous miniseries revealed Irish archvillain Black Tom Cassidy was slowly turning into a tree (as you do). Desperate to save his meat-based life, the bad guy and best bud Cain “The Juggernaut” Marko manipulate Wade Wilson: exploiting the merc’s unconventional relationship with Siryn (a sonic mutant, Tom’s niece and X-Force member). Believing Deadpool’s regenerating factor holds a cure, the villains stir up a bucket-load of carnage at a time when Wade is at his lowest ebb. Packed with mutant guest stars, this is a shallow but immensely readable piece of eye-candy that reset Deadpool’s path and paved the way for a tonal change that would make the Merc with a Mouth a global superstar…

All Epic Collections offer bonus material bonanzas and here that comprises images from The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Master Edition, many cover reproductions (Deadpool Classic volume 1 by Liefeld & John Kalisz, Deadpool Classic Companion by Michael Bair & Matt Milla, Deadpool: Sins of the Past and The Circle Chase TPBs by Madureira, Farmer & Harry Canelario), pin-ups by Rob Haynes & John Lowe from X-Force Annual #2 and Annual #3 by Lashley & Matt “Batt” Banning, plus Sam Kieth’s Marvel Year-in-Review ’93 cover. That magazine’s parody ad by Dan Slott, Manny Galen, Scott Koblish & Wright, follows with Joe Quesada, Jimmy Palmiotti & Mark McNabb’s foldout cover to Wizard #22 and Liefeld’s “Marvel ‘92” variant cover for Deadpool #3 (2015).

Featuring a far darker villain evolving into an antihero in a frenetic blend of light-hearted, surreal, full-on fighting frolics these stories only hint at what is to come but remain truly compulsive reading for dyed-in-the-wool superhero fans who might be feeling just a little jaded with four-colour overload…
© 2021 MARVEL.

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Iron Man Epic Collection volume 6: The War of the Super Villains 1974 – 1976


By Mike Friedrich, Barry Alfonso, Tom Orzechowski, Bill Mantlo, Len Wein, Archie Goodwin, Roger Slifer, Jim Shooter, Steve Gerber, Gerry Conway, George Tuska, Herb Trimpe, Arvell Jones, Keith Pollard, Chic Stone, Tuska, Sal Buscema, Marie Severin & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1302948801 (TPB/Digital edition)

Arch-technocrat and supreme survivor Tony Stark has changed his profile many times since his debut in Tales of Suspense #39 (March 1963) when, whilst a VIP visitor in Vietnam observing the efficacy of the munitions he had designed, the inventor was critically wounded and captured by sinister, savage Communists.

Put to work building weapons with the dubious promise of medical assistance on completion, Stark instead created the first of many technologically augmented suits to keep himself alive and deliver him from his oppressors. From there it was a simple – transistor-powered – jump to full time superheroics as a modern Knight in Shining Armour…

First conceived in the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis at a time when Western economies were booming and “Commie-bashing” was an American national obsession, the emergence of a new and shining young Thomas Edison, using Yankee ingenuity, wealth and invention to safeguard the Land of the Free and better the World, seemed an obvious development. Combining the then-sacrosanct faith that technology and business in unison could solve any problem, with the universal imagery of noble knights battling evil, Stark –The Invincible Iron Man – seemed an infallibly successful proposition.

Of course, whilst he was the acceptable face of 1960s Capitalism – a glamorous millionaire industrialist/scientist and a benevolent all-conquering hero when clad in the super-scientific armour of his alter-ego – the turbulent tone of the 1970s soon relegated his suave, “can-do” image to the dustbin of history. With ecological disaster and social catastrophe from the myriad abuses of big business the new zeitgeists of the young, the Golden Avenger and Stark International were soon confronting a few tricky questions from the increasingly politically savvy readership.

As glamour, money and fancy gadgetry lost its chic and grew evermore tarnished, questing voices of a new generation of writers began posing uncomfortable questions in the pages of a series that was once the bastion of militarised America

This chronological compendium concludes that transitional period: reprinting Iron Man #68-91 and Annual #3 (June 1974 – October 1976) and opens without fanfare on an ambitious action epic. IM #68-71 comprised the opening sortie in a multi-part epic which saw mystic menace The Black Lama foment a covert clash amongst the world’s greatest villains, with ultimate power, inner peace and a magical Golden Globe as the promised prizes.

Written by Mike Friedrich and illustrated by George Tuska & Mike Esposito, it begins in Vietnam on the ‘Night of the Rising Sun!’ where The Mandarin struggles to free his consciousness – currently locked within the dying body of Russian super-villain The Unicorn. This is probably the ideal moment to remind potential new readers that these stories were crafted in far less accepting times with racial and gender stereotypes used as narrative shorthand and occasionally so on the nose that they could make a caveman chuck up. If you can’t look past that historically accurate accounting it might be best to seek your fun elsewhere…

Stark’s ardently pacifist love interest Roxie Gilbert had dragged the inventor to the recently “liberated” People’s Republic in search of (part-time Iron Man) Eddie March’s lost brother. Marty March was a POW missing since the last days of the war. Before long, however, the Americans are separated after Japanese ultra-nationalist, ambulatory atomic inferno and occasional X-Man Sunfire is tricked into attacking the intrusive Yankee Imperialists…

The assault abruptly ends once Mandarin shanghaies the Solar Samurai and uses his mutant energies to power a mind-transfer back into his own body. Reinstated to his original form, the Chinese Conqueror-in-waiting commences his own campaign of combat in earnest, eager to regain his castle from rival oriental overlord The Yellow Claw.

First though, he must crush Iron Man – who has tracked him down and freed Sunfire in ‘Confrontation!’ That bombastic battle ends when the Golden Avenger is rendered unconscious and thrown into space…

‘Who Shall Stop… Ultimo?’ finds the revived giant robot-monster targeting Mandarin’s castle (claimed by the Claw in a previous battle) as the sinister Celestial duels the ancient enemy to the death, with both Iron Man and Sunfire arriving too late and forced to mop up the sole survivor of the contest in ‘Battle: Tooth and Yellow Claw! (Confrontation Part 3)’. After all that Eastern Armageddon, a change of pace is called for, so Stark takes in the San Diego Comicon in #72’s ‘Convention of Fear!’ (by Friedrich, Tuska & Vince Colletta, from a plot by Barry Alfonso), only to find himself ambushed by fellow incognito attendees Whiplash, Man-Bull and The Melter – who are made an offer they should have refused by the ubiquitous and iniquitous Black Lama…

Next issue the Super-Villain War kicks into high gear with ‘Turnabout: A Most Foul Play!’ (illustrated by Arvell Jones, Keith Pollard & Jim Mooney and derived from a premise by letterer Tom Orzechowski). After secret-sharing confidantes Pepper Potts-Hogan and her husband Happy settle a long-festering squabble with Tony at Stark International’s Manila plant, Iron Man returns to Vietnam and dives into a deadly clash with Crimson Dynamo in a hidden, high-tech jungle city subsequently razed to the ground by their explosive combat.

Inked by Dick Ayers, Iron Man #74’s ‘The M.O.D.O.K. Machine!’ brings Black Lama’s contest to the fore as The Mad Thinker electronically overrides the Avenger’s armour, setting helpless passenger Stark upon the malevolent, mutated master of Advanced Idea Mechanics…

Without autonomy, the Golden Gladiator is easily overwhelmed and ‘Slave to the Power Imperious!’ (Chic Stone inks) sees the hero dragged back to The Thinker’s lair and laid low by a strange psychic hallucination, even as M.O.D.O.K. finishes his cognitive co-combatant and apparently turns the still-enslaved steel-shod hero on his next opponent: Yellow Claw.

As this is happening, elsewhere radical terrorist Firebrand is somehow sharing Stark’s Black Lama-inspired “psycho-feedback” episodes…

The tale wraps on a twisty cliffhanger as the Claw destroys M.O.D.O.K.  and his clockwork puppet Avenger, only to discover that the Thinker is not only still alive but still holds the real Iron Man captive. That’s quite unfortunate as issue #76 blew its deadline and instead reprinted Iron Man #9 (represented here by its cover) before Friedrich, Jones & Stone’s ‘I Cry: Revenge!’ finds the fighting-mad hero breaking free of the Thinker’s control, just as Black Lama teleports the Claw in to finish his final felonious opponent…

Still extremely ticked off, the Armoured Avenger takes on all comers before being ambushed by late-arriving Firebrand who has been psionically drawn into the melee. As Shellhead goes down, the Lama declares non-contestant Firebrand ultimate victor, gratuitously explaining how he has voyaged from an alternate universe before duping the unstable and uncaring flaming rabble-rouser into re-crossing the dimensional void with him. Although a certifiable loon and cold-blooded killer, Firebrand is Roxie Gilbert’s brother and groggily reviving Iron Man feels honour-bound to follow him through the rapidly closing portal to elsewhere…

Deadline problems persisted however, and the next two issues are both fill-in tales, beginning with #78’s ‘Long Time Gone’ Crafted by Bill Mantlo, Tuska & Vince Colletta it harks back to the Avenger’s early days and a mission during the Vietnam war which first brought home the cost in blood and misery Stark’s munitions building had caused. IM #79 then shares a ‘Midnite on Murder Mountain!’ (Friedrich, Tuska & Colletta) wherein our hero emphatically ends scientific abominations wrought by deranged geneticist/mind-swapper Professor Kurakill…

At last, Iron Man #80 sees Friedrich, Stone & Colletta return to the ongoing inter-dimensional operations as ‘Mission into Madness!’ follows the multiversal voyagers to a very different America where warring kingdoms and principalities jostle for prestige, position and power. Here the Lama is revealed as King Jerald of Grand Rapid: a ruler under threat from outside invaders and insidious usurpers within. He’d come to Earth looking for powerful allies but had not realised travel to other realms drives non-indigenous residents completely crazy…

With the mind-warp effect already destabilising Iron Man and Firebrand, it’s fortunate treacherous Baroness Rockler makes her move to kill the returned Jerald immediately, and the Earthlings are quickly embroiled in a cataclysmic ‘War of the Mind-Dragons!’ before turning on each other and fleeing the devastated kingdom for the less psychologically hazardous environs of their homeworld…

With an extended epic spanning the world and alternate dimensions completed, long-term writer Mike Friedrich moved on, and Iron Man #82 began a new era and tone as Len Wein, Herb Trimpe, Marie Severin & Jack Abel revamped the armour just in time for the Red Ghost and his super simians to kidnap super genius Stark in ‘Plunder of the Apes!’ Debuting in that tale was NYPD detective Michael O’Brien, who holds Stark responsible and accountable for the tragic death of his brother Kevin. The deceased researcher had been Stark’s confidante until his mind snapped. He had died running amok wearing a prototype suit of Guardsman armour. Here and now, Mike smells a corporate cover-up…

Inked by Marie Severin, IM #83 exhibits ‘The Rage of the Red Ghost!’ as the rogue Russian forces Stark to cure his gradual dispersal into unconnected atoms, only to realise, following a bombastic battle, that the inventor has outwitted him once again, after which Wein, Roger Slifer, Trimpe & John Tartaglione detail how the infamous never fully tested Enervator ray again turns grievously injured Happy Hogan into a mindless monster. This time, the medical miracle machine saturates him with so much Cobalt radiation that he becomes a ticking inhuman nuke on the ‘Night of the Walking Bomb!’

The tense tick-tock to doom is narrowly and spectacularly halted in ‘…And the Freak Shall Inherit the Earth!’ (Slifer, Wein, Trimpe & Severin) after which Mantlo, Tuska & Vince Colletta revive and revamp one of the Golden Avenger’s oldest and least-remembered rogues when disgraced thermal technologist Gregor Shapanka sheds his loser status as Jack Frost to attack Stark International in a deadly new guise.

In # 86 we learn ‘The Gentleman’s Name is Blizzard!’ but despite his improved image, the sub-zero zealot can’t quite close ‘The Icy Hand of Death!’ in the next instalment, leading to mid-year spectacular Iron Man Annual #3 (June 1976) which unveils ‘More or Less… the Return of the Molecule Man!’ courtesy of Steve Gerber, Sal Buscema & Abel.

When Tony Stark looks into redeveloping some soggy Florida real estate, a little girl finds a strange wand and is possessed and transformed by the consciousness of one of the most powerful creatures in existence. Although Iron Man is helpless to combat the reality-warping attacks of the combination petulant girl/narcissistic maniac, luckily for the universe, the shambling elemental shocker dubbed Man-Thing had no mind to mess with or conscience to trouble…

Iron Man #88 signalled the too-brief reunion of veteran scribe Archie Goodwin with Tuska as ‘Fear Wears Two Faces!’ finds the Armoured Avenger battling escaped aliens The Blood Brothers after the vicious space thugs are psychically summoned to a mystery rendezvous by another old enemy of Iron Man. Inked by Colletta, the tale concludes in ‘Brute Fury!’ as Daredevil deals himself in to the cataclysmic clash and just barely tips the scales before the hidden manipulator is exposed in #90 ‘When Calls the Controller!’ (Jim Shooter, Tuska & Abel). The life-force thief seeks to escape months of entombment by enslaving and feeding off hapless down-&-outs, but his rapid defeat is only a prelude to greater catastrophe as Gerry Conway scripts and Bob Layton inks #91’s ‘Breakout!’ as the fiend tries too hard, too fast and again fades into helpless captivity…

Closing the covers on this stellar compilation are Gil Kane’s stellar front to all-reprint Giant-Size Iron Man #1 (1975 and including the original artwork prior to edits), House ads and an 8-page gallery of original art covers and pages by Kane, Jones, Esposito, Ed Hannigan, Frank Giacoia, Jim Starlin, Sal Buscema & Pollard.

From our distant vantage point the polemical energy and impact might be dissipated, but the sheer quality of the comics and cool thrill of the eternal aspiration of man in partnership with magic metal remains. These Fights ‘n’ Tights classics are amongst the most underrated tales of the period and are well worth your time, consideration and cold cash…
© 2023 MARVEL.

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Avengers Epic Collection volume 10: The Yesterday Quest 1978-1979


By Jim Shooter, David Michelinie, Roger Stern, Marv Wolfman, George Pérez, Bill Mantlo, Roger Slifer, Steve Gerber, Tom DeFalco, Mark Gruenwald, Steven Grant, Scott Edelman, Dave Wenzel, John Byrne, Sal Buscema, Carmine Infantino, Jim Mooney, Don Newton, Michael Netzer & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-8790-5 (TPB/Digital edition)

The Avengers have always proved that putting all one’s star eggs in a single basket pays off big-time: even when all Marvel’s classic all-stars such as Thor, Captain America and Iron Man are absent, it merely allows the team’s lesser lights to shine more brightly.

Of course, all the founding stars were regularly featured due to the rotating, open door policy, which means that every issue includes somebody’s fave-rave – and the boldly grand-scale impressive stories and artwork are no hindrance either. With the team now global icons, let’s look again at the stories which form the foundation of that pre-eminence.

Re-presenting Avengers #167, Avengers Annual #8 & 9 and material from Marvel Tales #100 (cumulatively spanning January 1978 to October 1979), these stories still see the team in turbulent transition. That was as much a result of creative upheaval at the House of Ideas as narrative exigency. Times were changing for the company which would soon become a plaything of relentless corporate forces.

The storytelling begins in #167 as an epic opens. Jim Shooter’s connection to the series, although episodic, was long-lived and produced some of that period’s greatest tales, none more so than the stellar – if deadline-doomed – saga that unfolded over succeeding months: a sprawling tale of time-travel and cosmic conquest which began in Avengers #167-168 before an enforced brief pause saw a diversion before resuming for #170 through #177.

In previous issues Captain America and Iron Man’s difference of opinion over leadership styles had begun to polarise the team. Cracks appeared and tensions showed in #167’s ‘Tomorrow Dies Today!’ (by Shooter, George Pérez & Pablos Marcos).

In the Gods-&-Monsters filled Marvel Universe there are entrenched and jealous Hierarchies of Power, so when a new player mysteriously materialises in the 20th century the very Fabric of Reality is threatened. It all kicks off when star-spanning 31st century freedom Fighters Guardians of the Galaxy blip into Earth orbit, in hot pursuit of cyborg despot Korvac. Their arrival inadvertently sets off planetary incursion alarms, so their moon-sized ship is swiftly boarded by an Avengers squad, where – after the obligatory introductory squabble – the future men (Charlie-27, Yondu, Martinex, Nikki, Vance Astro and enigmatic Space God Starhawk) explain the purpose of their mission…

Captain America had once fought beside them to liberate their home era from Badoon rule and Thor recently battled the fugitive Korvac, so peace soon breaks out, but even with the resources of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, the time travellers are unable to find their quarry…

Meanwhile on Earth, a mysterious being named Michael lurks in the background. At a fashion show staged by The Wasp, he achieves a psychic communion with model Carina Walters before they both vanish…

‘First Blood’ (Avengers #168) stirs up more trouble as Federal liaison/doctrinaire martinet Henry Peter Gyrich makes life bureaucratically hot for the government-funded superhero team. Meanwhile in Colorado, Hawkeye gets a shock as his travelling partner Two-Gun Kid vanishes before his eyes.

In suburban Forest Hills, Starhawk – in his female iteration Aleta – approaches a quiet residence. Michael/Korvac’s scheme consists of subtly altering events as he gathers strength in secret preparation for a sneak attack on those aforementioned Cosmic Hierarchies. His entire plan revolves around not being noticed. Thus, when Starhawk confronts him, the villain kills the stellar intruder but instantly resurrects him – minus the ability to perceive Michael or any of his works…

The drama screeches to a halt in #169, which instead declares ‘If We Should Fail… The World Dies Tonight!’ The out of context potboiler – by Marv Wolfman, Sal Buscema & Dave Hunt – sees Cap, Iron Man and The Black Panther scouring Earth in search of doomsday bombs wired to the failing heart of a dying man, after which the major mayhem resumes in #170 with ‘…Though Hell Should Bar the Way!’ by Shooter, Pérez & Marcos. As Sentinel of Liberty and Golden Avenger finally settle their differences, in Inhuman city Attilan, ex-Avenger Quicksilver suddenly disappears, even as dormant mechanoid Jocasta (designed by maniac AI Ultron to be his bride) goes on a rampage before vanishing into the wilds of New York City.

In stealthy pursuit and hoping her trail will lead to Ultron himself, the team stride into a trap ‘…Where Angels Fear to Tread’, but nevertheless triumph thanks to the hex powers of The Scarlet Witch, the assistance of pushy, no-nonsense new hero Ms. Marvel and Jocasta’s own rebellion against the metal monster who made her. However, at their moment of triumph the Avengers are stunned to witness Cap and Jocasta winking out of existence…

Problems pile up in #172 (Shooter, Sal Buscema & Klaus Janson) as Watchdog-come-Gadfly Gyrich is roughly manhandled and captured by out-of-the-loop returnee Hawkeye. He responds by rescinding the team’s Federal clearances. Badly handicapped, the heroes are unable to warn other inactive members of the ongoing disappearances even as a squad of heavy hitters rush off to tackle marauding Atlantean maverick Tyrak the Treacherous who is bloodily enacting a ‘Holocaust in New York Harbor!’

Plotted by Shooter, with David Michelinie scripting for Sal Buscema & D(iverse) Hands to illustrate, answers to the growing mystery are finally forthcoming in ‘Threshold of Oblivion!’ As the vanishings escalate, the remaining Avengers (Thor, Wasp, Hawkeye and Iron Man – with the assistance of Vance Astro) track down their hidden foe and beam into a cloaked starship to liberate the ‘Captives of the Collector!’ (Shooter, Bill Mantlo, Dave Wenzel & Marcos)…

After a staggering struggle, the heroes triumph and their old foe reveals a shocking truth: he is an Elder of the Universe who foresaw cosmic doom millennia previously and sought to preserve special artefacts and creatures – such as The Avengers – from the approaching apocalypse. As he reveals that predicted end-time is here and that he has sent his own daughter Carina to infiltrate the Enemy’s stronghold, the cosmic curator is obliterated by a devastating blast of energy. The damage, however, is done and the entrenched hierarchies of creation may well be alerted…

Issue #175 started the final countdown as ‘The End… and Beginning!’ (Shooter, Michelinie, Wenzel & Marcos) sees the amassed and liberated ranks of Avengers and Guardians follow clues to Michael, just as the new god shares the incredible secret of his apotheosis with Carina, before ‘The Destiny Hunt!’ and ‘The Hope… and the Slaughter!’ (Shooter, Wenzel, Marcos & Ricardo Villamonte) depict the army of champions eradicated and resurrected when Michael easily overpowers all opposition but falters for lack of one fundamental failing…

Spread through a series of lesser adventures, the overarching epic ponderously and ominously unfolds before finally exploding into a devastating and tragic Battle Royale that is the epitome of superhero comics. This is pure escapist fantasy at its finest.

Despite being somewhat diminished by the artwork when the magnificent Pérez gave way to less enthused hands and afflicted by the inability to keep a regular inker (Pablo Marcos, Klaus Janson, Ricardo Villamonte and Tom Morgan all pitched in), sheer epic scope nevertheless carries this story through to its cataclysmic and fulfilling conclusion. Even Shooter’s reluctant replacement by scripters Dave Michelinie and Bill Mantlo (as his editorial career advanced) couldn’t derail this juggernaut of adventure. If you want to see what makes Superhero fiction work, and can keep track of nearly two dozen flamboyant characters, this is a fine example of how to make such an unwieldy proposition easily accessible to the new and returning reader…

Jim Shooter, having galvanised and steadied the company’s notional flagship, moved on, leaving David Michelinie to impress his own ideas and personality upon the team, but such transitions are always tricky and some water-treading fill-ins were necessary before progress resumed.

After the death and resurrection of the heroes, focus slipped seamlessly into Avengers Annual #8, getting back to business with monolithic Fights ‘n’ Tights melee ‘Spectrums of Deceit!’, courtesy of Roger Slifer, Pérez, Marcos & Villamonte as the sentient power-prism of archvillain Doctor Spectrum systematically possesses Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. The upshot is another blockbusting battle against The Squadron Sinister and ethically ambivalent extra-dimensional “Femizon” Thundra and offers another guest shot for mighty Ms. Marvel…

A subtle change of pace and tone came in Avengers #178. ‘The Martyr Perplex!’ – by Steve Gerber, Carmine Infantino & Rudy Nebres – sees mutant Hank McCoy/The Beast targeted by master brainwasher The Manipulator in a tense psycho-thriller teeming with shady crooks and government spooks. Then Tom DeFalco, Jim Mooney, Al Gordon & Mike Esposito deliver a 2-part yarn introducing tragic mutant Bloodhawk and an ambitious human hitman in ‘Slowly Slays the Stinger!’

Whilst Stinger cautiously executes his commission, another cohort of champions accompany Bloodhawk to his desolate island home of Maura for a ‘Berserkers’ Holiday’, just in time to battle an animated and agitated stone idol. When they return victorious, Stinger is waiting and the assemblage loses its newest ally forever…

Finally back on track, Avengers #181 introduces new regular creative team Michelinie & John Byrne (augmented by inker Gene Day) as ‘On the Matter of Heroes!’ sees intrusive, obsessive Gyrich lay down the law and winnow the legion of heroes down to a federally acceptable seven. As the Guardians of the Galaxy head back to their future, Iron Man, The Vision, Captain America, Scarlet Witch, Beast and Wasp must placate Hawkeye after he is rejected in favour of new recruit The Falcon – reluctantly parachuted in to conform to government affirmative action quotas…

Almost immediately, Gyrich’s methodically calculated plans are in tatters as an elderly Romani sorcerer attacks. Claiming mutants Wanda and Pietro Frank as his long-lost children, the mage traps their souls inside little wooden dolls, with the resultant clash in #182’s ‘Honor Thy Father’ (inked by Janson) creating even more questions as overwhelming evidence seems to confirm Django Maximoff’s story. The upshot sees Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver leave with him on a quest for answers…

Michelinie, Byrne, Janson & D Hands provide a breathtaking all-action extravaganza in #183-184 as ‘The Redoubtable Return of Crusher Creel!’ finds Carol Danvers/Ms. Marvel cleared by Gyrich to replace Wanda. Elsewhere in the Big Apple, the formidable Absorbing Man has opted to leave the country and quit being thrashed by heroes. Unfortunately, his departure plans include kidnapping a young woman “for company”, leading to a cataclysmic showdown with the heroes and Hawkeye (still determined to win back his place on the team) and resulting in carnage, chaos and ‘Death on the Hudson!’…

Historical continuity addicts Mark Gruenwald & Steven Grant plotted #185’s ‘The Yesterday Quest!’ for Michelinie, Byrne & Dan Green to execute as, in America, robotic ally Jocasta strives to entice The Vision even as his wife and brother-in-law arrive in Balkan state Transia. In the shadow of mystic Mount Wundagore, Wanda is beguiled by Modred the Mystic, leaving Quicksilver to perish if not for the ministrations of talking humanoid cow Bova. The wetnurse once employed by the High Evolutionary doesn’t mind. After all she was midwife to Pietro’s mother years ago…

‘Nights of Wundagore!’ unpicks years of mystery with secrets of the mutants’ origins: how Bova passed them off as the stillborn children of American WWII superhero Bob Frank and offers big hints as to their true father’s identity. Wanda, meanwhile, has lost a magic duel with Modred and is now possessed by ancient demon Chthon. Pietro barely survives his clash with her/it, and calls for help, but thanks to more pointless bureaucracy from Gyrich, it is hours before the Avengers – missing Iron Man but including Wonder Man – arrive to face the world rending ‘Call of the Mountain Thing!’

Although they ultimately triumph, not every participant makes it out alive…

The way home is just as momentous, as #188’s ‘Elementary, Dear Avengers’ (Bill Mantlo, Byrne, Green & Frank Springer) begins with a side trip to Attilan and news that Quicksilver is about to become a dad, and ends with the team causing an international incident by diverting over Russian airspace. Thankfully, the incident overlaps with a secret Soviet science experiment going badly wrong, compelling the heroes to tackle sentient elements with a taste for death and destruction…

Avengers Annual #9 then introduces a lethal secret from the past as Mantlo, Don Newton, Jack Abel & Joe Rubinstein introduce a deadly robotic sleeper locked for decades beneath Avengers Mansion. ‘…Today the Avengers Die!’ reprises Iron Man’s recent battle against deadly vintage mechanoid Arsenal and reveals how the Howard Stark-built weapon was cached in his old townhouse. Now ‘Something Deadly Lurks Below!’ proves that they should have let sleeping bots lie…

Rounding out the chronologically completist action is a snippet from Marvel Tales #100 (February 1979) as time-displaced Two-Gun Kid and Hawkeye battle Killgrave the Controller in ‘Killers of a Purple Rage!’ by Scott Edelman, Michael Netzer & Terry Austin.

Supplemented by previous compilation covers courtesy of Pérez & Joe Rosas and Steve Epting & Tom Palmer, contemporary House Ads, editorial material debating the new origins for Pietro and Wanda, an epilogue strip by Mark Gruenwald & Tom Morgan from Avengers: The Korvac Saga, and a wealth of original covers/page art by Pérez, Byrne, Dave Cockrum and more, this archival tome and type of heroic adventure might not be to every reader’s taste but these – and the truly epic yarns that followed – set the tone for fantastic Fights ‘n’ Tights dramas for decades to come and informed all those movies everybody loves. This science fiction double feature can still boggle the mind and take the breath away, even here in the quietly isolated and no less dangerous 21st century…
© 2023 MARVEL.

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Guardians of the Galaxy Epic Collection volume 1: Earth Shall Overcome 1969-1977


By Arnold Drake & Gene Colan, Steve Gerber, Roger Stern, Gerry Conway, Roger Slifer, Len Wein, Chris Claremont, Scott Edelman, Stan Lee, Sal Buscema, Don Heck, Al Milgrom, John Buscema & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-5043-9 (TPB/Digital edition)

With the final GoTG Marvel Cinematic interpretation done and dusted, there’s little to look forward too other than the past, but at least in this anniversary year – 55 and counting! – there’s this timely collection ideal for boning up on some of the lesser-known original stars…

There are two distinct and separate iterations of the Guardians of the Galaxy. The films concentrated on the second, but with inescapable connections between them and the stellar stalwarts here so pay close attention. The original comic book team were freedom fighters united to defeat an invasion a thousand years from the present. The other were a later conception: springing out of contemporary crises seen in The Annihilation publishing event.

This treasury of torrid tales gathers landmark moments of the former as seen in Marvel Super-Heroes #18, Marvel Two-In-One #4-5, Giant-Size Defenders #5, Defenders #26-29, the time-busting team’s first solo series as originally seen in Marvel Presents #3-12 and Thor Annual #6: collaboratively and monumentally spanning cover-dates January 1969 to December 1977. It features a radically different set-up than that of the silver screen stars, but is grand comic book sci fi fare all the same. One thing to recall at all times, though, is that there are two teams. Never the twain shall meet …until they one day did…

Despite its key mission to make superheroes more realistic, Marvel also always kept a close connection with its fantasy roots and outlandish cosmic chaos – as typified in the pre-Sixties “monsters-in-underpants” mini-sagas. Thus, this pantheon of much-travelled space stalwarts maintains that wild “Anything Goes” attitude in all of their many and varied iterations.

A blistering battle-fest opens with ‘Guardians of the Galaxy: Earth Shall Overcome!’ as first seen in new-concept try-out/Golden Age reprint vehicle Marvel Super-Heroes #18. Cover-dated January 1969, it went on sale mid-October 1968, just as the Summer of Love was dying.

This terse, grittily engaging episode introduced disparate freedom fighters reluctantly rallying and united to save Earth from occupation and humanity from extinction at the scaly claws of the sinister, reptilian Brotherhood of Badoon. It began when Jovian militia-man Charlie-27 returned home from a 6-month tour of scout duty to find his entire colony subjugated by invading aliens. Fighting free, Charlie jumped into a randomly-programmed teleporter and emerged on Pluto, just in time to accidentally scupper the escape of crystalline scientist and resistance fighter Martinex.

Both survivors are examples of radical human genetic engineering: manufactured subspecies carefully designed to populate and colonise Sol system’s outer planets, but now possibly the last individuals of their respective kinds. After helping the mineral man complete his mission of sabotage – by blowing up potentially useful material before the Badoon can get their hands on it – the odd couple set the teleporter for Earth and jump into the unknown. Unfortunately, the invaders have already taken the homeworld…

The Supreme Badoon Elite are there, busily mocking the oldest Earthman alive. Major Vance Astro had been humanity’s first interstellar astronaut; solo flying in cold sleep to Alpha Centauri at a plodding fraction of the speed of light. When he got there a millennium later, humanity was waiting for him, having cracked trans-luminal speeds a mere two centuries after he took off. Now Astro and Centauri aborigine Yondu are a comedy exhibit for the cruel conquerors actively eradicating both of their species.

The smug invaders are utterly overwhelmed when Astro breaks free, utilising psionic powers he developed during hibernation, before Yondu butchers them with the sound-controlled energy arrows he carries. In their pell-mell flight, the escaping pair stumble across incoming Martinex and Charlie-27 and a new legend of valiant resistance is born…

As envisioned by Arnold Drake, Gene Colan & Mike Esposito, the eccentric team were presented to an audience undergoing immense social change, with dissent in the air, riot in the streets and the ongoing Vietnam War being visibly lost on their TV screens every night.

Perhaps the jingoistic militaristic overtones were off-putting, or maybe the tenor of the times were against The Guardians, since costumed hero titles were entering a temporary downturn at that juncture, but whatever the reason the feature was a rare “Miss” for the Early Marvel Hit Factory. The futuristic freedom fighters were not seen again for years.

They drifted in limbo until 1974 when Steve Gerber incorporated them into some of his assigned titles (specifically Marvel Two-In-One and The Defenders), wherein assorted 20th century champions travelled into the future to ensure humanity’s survival…

In MTIO #4, ‘Doomsday 3014!’ (Gerber, Sal Buscema & Frank Giacoia) sees Ben Grimm – AKA The Thing – and Captain America catapulted into the 31st century to free enslaved humanity from the Badoon, concluding an issue later as a transformed and reconfigured Guardians of the Galaxy climb aboard the Freedom Rocket to help the time-lost champions liberate occupied New York before returning home.

The fabulous Future Force returned that visit in Giant Sized Defenders #5: a diverse-handed production with the story ‘Eelar Moves in Mysterious Ways’ credited to Gerber, Gerry Conway, Roger Slifer, Len Wein, Chris Claremont & Scott Edelman. Dependable Don Heck & Mike Esposito drew the (surprisingly) satisfying and cohesive results, revealing how the Defenders met with future heroes Guardians of the Galaxy in a time-twisting disaster yarn where their very presence seemed to cause nature to run wild. It was simply an introduction, setting up a continued epic arc for the monthly comic book…

Beginning with ‘Savage Time’ (Defenders #26 by Gerber, Sal Buscema & Colletta) it depicts The Hulk, Doctor Strange, Nighthawk and Valkyrie accompanying the Guardians back to 3015 AD in a bold bid to liberate the last survivors of mankind from the all-conquering and genocidal Badoon. The mission continued with ‘Three Worlds to Conquer!’, becoming infinitely more complicated when ‘My Mother, The Badoon!’ reveals sex-based divisions that so compellingly motivate the marauding lizard-men to roam and tyrannise, before climaxing triumphantly in rousingly impassioned conclusion ‘Let My Planet Go!’

Along the way the Guardians picked up – or been unwillingly allied with – an enigmatic stellar powerhouse dubbed Starhawk. Also answering to Stakar, he was a glib, unfriendly type who referred to himself as “one who knows” and infuriatingly usually did, even if he never shared any useful intel…

That portion of the saga is interspersed with the covers of latterday compilations Guardians of the Galaxy: Earth Shall Overcome Premiere Hardcover (by Gil Kane & Chris Sotomayor and Ron Wilson & Matt Milla), before the next giant leap…

Rejuvenated by exposure, the squad rededicated themselves to liberating star-scattered Humanity and having astral adventures, in a short-lived series in Marvel Presents (#3-12, February 1976-August 1977) before cancellation left them roaming the MU as perennial guest-stars in cosmically-tinged titles like Thor and The Avengers. That first solo run began with ‘Just Another Planet Story!’ – by Gerber, Al Milgrom & Pablo Marcos – with all Badoon removed from an exultant Earth and our now purposeless Guardians realising peace and freedom were not for them. Unable to adapt to civilian life, they reassembled, stole their old starship “The Captain America” and rocketed off into the void…

More compilation covers – Guardians of the Galaxy: Tomorrow’s Heroes Omnibus (by John Romita Sr & Veronica Gandini) and Guardians of the Galaxy: The Power of Starhawk Premiere HC by Milgrom & Tom Chu – interleave the unfolding saga, but the original text feature ‘Readers Space’ (episodically delineating future history of Marvel Universe Mankind using various deceased company sci fi series as mile markers, way stations and signposts) is bundled to the bonus section at the back of the book. At the time the roadmap firmly established a timeline which would endure for decades…

Back to comics and in MP #4, Gerber & Milgrom descended ‘Into the Maw of Madness!’ as the noble nomads pick up feisty teenage Nikki: a Mercurian survivor of the Badoon genocide, and noted first inklings that something vast, alien and inimical was coming from “out there” to consume the galaxy. The warriors also met cosmic enigma Starhawk’s better half Aleta: a glamorous woman and mother of his three children sharing his/their body at that time…

When the star-farers and their ship are swallowed by star-system-sized monster Karanada, they discover a universe inside the undead beast and end up stranded on the ‘Planet of the Absurd’ (Gerber, Milgrom & Howard Chaykin), allowing the author to indulge his gift for political and social satire as our heroes seek to escape a society comprising a vast variety of species which somehow mimics 20th century Earth…

Escape achieved, the fantastic fantasy accelerates to top gear when they crash into the heart of the invading force on a galaxy-sized planet in humanoid form. ‘The Topographical Man’ (inked by Terry Austin) holds all answers they seek in a strange sidereal nunnery where Nikki is expected to make a supreme sacrifice: one that changes Vance’s life forever in ways he never imagined.

This all transpires as they spiritually unite to ‘Embrace the Void!’ (Bob Wiacek inks) in a metaphysical rollercoaster which ends the menace of the soul-sucking galactic devourer. At this time deadlines were a critical problem and Marvel Presents #8 adapted a story from Silver Surfer #2 (1968) as the team find an old Badoon data-log and learn ‘Once Upon a Time… the Silver Surfer!’ had saved Earth from the alien predators in a two-layered yarn attributed to Gerber, Milgrom, Wiacek, Stan Lee, John Buscema & Joe Sinnott…

Back on track for MP #9, Gerber & Milgrom revealed ‘Breaking Up is Death to Do!’ as the Guardians’ ship is ambushed by predatory Reivers of Arcturus, leading into the long-awaited shocking origins of Starhawk and Aleta. It also set the assembled heroes on a doomed quest to save the bonded couple’s children from brainwashing, mutation and murder by their own grandfather in ‘Death-Bird Rising!’ before concluding ‘At War with Arcturus!’ (both inked by Wiacek).

The series abruptly concluded just as new scripter Roger Stern signed on with ‘The Shipyard of Deep Space!’, as the beleaguered and battered team escape Arcturus and stumble onto a lost Earth vessel missing since the beginning of the Badoon invasion. “Drydock” is a mobile space station the size of a small moon, built to maintain and repair Terran starships. However, what initially seems to be a moving reunion with lost comrades and actual survivors of many gene-gineered human subspecies eradicated by the saurian supremacists is revealed to be just one more deadly snare for the Guardians to overcome or escape…

The time-busting mayhem concludes for now with ‘Thunder in the 31st Century!’ (from Thor Annual #6, December 1977) by Stern, Sal Buscema & Klaus Janson,in which the mighty Thunderer is accidentally deposited in the Guardians’ era by a cyborg maniac named Korvac. The god warrior eagerly joins them in battling a gang of superpowered aliens to thwart Korvac’s scheme to make himself master of the universe before returning to his own place and time…

The aforementioned bonus bounty ending this titanic temporal tome also includes the cover of Astonishing Tales #29 (April 1975 and reprinting Marvel Super-Heroes #18), articles on Guardians of the Galaxy by Gerber and Stern from F.O.O.M. #21 (Spring 1978), original art pages and covers by Sal Buscema, Colletta, Milgrom, Rich Buckler, Wiacek & Janson and one last past collection cover – from Guardians of the Galaxy: Tomorrow’s Avengers vol. 2 TPB by John Buscema, Joe Sinnott & Thomas Mason.

This rousing record of riotous star-roving derring-do is a non-stop feast of tense suspense, surreal fun, swingeing satire and blockbuster action tightly tailored and on-target to turn curious moviegoers into fans of the comic incarnation, and beguile even the most jaded interstellar Fights ‘n’ Tights fanatic into dreaming again with eyes wide open.
© 2023 MARVEL.

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Marvel Masterworks Daredevil volume 14


By Jim Shooter, Roger McKenzie, Gil Kane, Gerry Conway, Jo Duffy, Don McGregor, Gene Colan, Carmine Infantino, Frank Miller, Lee Elias, George Tuska, Frank Robbins, Tom Sutton & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-2163-7 (HB/Digital edition)

Matt Murdock is a blind lawyer whose remaining senses hyper-compensate, making him an astonishing acrobat, formidable fighter and living lie-detector. A second-string hero for much of his early career, Daredevil was nonetheless a striking and popular one, due mostly to the captivatingly humanistic art of Gene Colan. DD fought gangsters, super-villains and even the occasional monster or alien invasion, quipping and wisecracking his way through life and life-threatening combat, utterly unlike the grim, moody, quasi-religious metaphor he became.

After a disastrous on-again, off-again relationship with his secretary Karen Page, Murdock took up with Russian emigre Natasha Romanoff, infamous and notorious ex-spy The Black Widow. She was framed for murder and prosecuted by Matt’s best friend and law partner Franklin “Foggy” Nelson before the blind lawman cleared her. Leaving New York with her for the West Coast, Matt joined a prestigious San Francisco law firm but adventure, disaster and intrigue sought out the Sightless Sentinel and ultimately drew him back to the festering Big Apple. When they finally split up, Murdock and his alter ego remained to champion the law and justice their way…

Spanning April 1977 to March 1979, this pivotal collection gathers Daredevil #144-158, plus a sidebar spin-off from Marvel Premiere #43, subtly shifting the tone and feel of the long-running feature as the Man Without Fear hovers on the brink of a major overhaul and global super-stardom.

Following incoming scripter Roger McKenzie’s reflective Introduction ‘Dreams’, the heroic endeavours resume with writer Jim Shooter, penciller Lee Elias & inker Dan Green amping up the edginess and darkening the foreboding shadows by proving ‘Man-Bull Means Mayhem’ as the petty thug-turned-mutated-menace Bill Taurens again clashes with the Crimson Crusader. The battle begins when he breaks jail to join DD’s oldest archenemy The Owl and it emerges the avian ganglord is critically enfeebled, under attack by rivals and needs the Man-Bull to kidnap the one scientist who can fix him. Sadly, the boffin might also be able to cure Taurens, and the brute’s selfish betrayal leads to disaster when Daredevil intervenes again…

The Owl’s fate is sealed in ‘Danger Rides the Bitter Wind!’ (Shooter from Gerry Conway’s plot, illustrated by George Tuska & Jim Mooney) as the desperate raptor goes after Dr. Petrovic personally, raiding a hospital and triggering his own doom in a rooftop clash with Daredevil. Shooter then amped up the tension as #146 saw Gil Kane pencilling for Mooney as maniac marksman Bullseye returned to force a showdown ‘Duel!’ with the hero by taking a TV studio hostage before being defeated again…

Throughout The Jester’s media reality war, Daredevil had dated flighty socialite Heather Glenn. When, as both masked hero and lawyer he discovered her father was a corrupt slumlord and white collar criminal, he began looking for proof to exonerate his potential father-in-law, but everywhere came further damning proof. Matt Murdock’s girlfriend knows her dad isn’t a ruthless, murdering monster and that someone must have framed him. All evidence says otherwise…

Now another long running plot thread – which had seen Foggy’s girlfriend Debbie Harris kidnapped and held for months – converges as DD confronts Maxwell Glenn and the true culprit reveals himself to readers if not the hero. As Glenn confesses to everything and is arrested, the hero hits his ‘Breaking Point!’ (Shooter, Kane & Janson) after dramatically liberating the broken captive but failing to catch the true villain – mindwarping former foe Killgrave, the Purple Man…

With Kane co-plotting, and Glenn actually believing himself guilty, #148’s ‘Manhunt!’ sees the increasingly overwhelmed adventurer lash out at the entire underworld in search of the malign manipulator, only to stumble into a wholly separate evil plot instigated by the diabolical Death-Stalker. Murdock’s relationship with Foggy also takes a hit as the usually genial partner deals with a PTSD ravaged Debbie and can’t understand why his best friend is defending self-confessed perpetrator Glenn…

For DD #149 Carmine Infantino joined Shooter & Janson as ‘Catspaw!’ sees Heather dump Matt and super-thug The Smasher target Daredevil in a blistering battle bout that is mere prelude to #150’s ‘Catastrophe!’ which finds the hero stretched beyond his capacity in court and on the streets just as charming mercenary Paladin debuts in a clash of vigilante jurisdictions. The debuting mercenary hero for hire is also after the Purple Man and has advantages DD can’t match, but no scruples at all…

Kane returns as plotter and penciller with Shooter giving way to McKenzie who joins the creative crew to script ‘Crisis!’ as another tragic death blights Murdock’s soul. As a result Heather accidentally uncovers Matt’s heroic secret and DD simply quits. However the horrors of the world and his own overzealous Catholic conscience soon force him back to work again…

Both Paladin and Infantino return for ‘Prisoner!’ (DD #152) with McKenzie & Janson reintroducing Death-Stalker just as our masked hero makes an intervention to reunite Foggy with his traumatised fiancé Debbie. Although that ploy is successful, another clash with the mercenary leaves DD beaten and open to a surprise attack by The Cobra & Mr Hyde in #153.

Crafted by McKenzie, Gene Colan & Tony DeZuñiga, ‘Betrayal!’ introduces Daily Bugle reporter Ben Urich – who will play a huge part in Daredevil’s future – as the weary hero is ambushed, eventually defeated and dragged to the ‘Arena!’ (inked by Steve Leialoha) where Killgrave seeks ultimate victory by mind-piloting a squad of DD’s foes – including The Jester, Gladiator, Cobra & Hyde – to kill the swashbuckler in front of a captive audience. It proves to be the fiend’s final mistake when Paladin shows up to shift the balance of power…

Guest-starring Black Widow, Hercules and The Avengers, aftermath episode ‘The Man Without Fear?’ is illustrated by Franks Robbins & Springer, as a brain-damaged Murdock repeatedly attacks innocent bystanders and his allies before collapsing. Keenly observing, Death-stalker spots an opportunity and follows the hospitalised hero into #156’s ‘Ring of Death!’ (McKenzie, Colan & Janson). As DD undergoes surgery and suffers deadly delusions of fighting himself, the teleporting terror with a death-touch seeks to end his meddling forever, but finds the Avengers almost too much to handle…

The assault ends in 157 ‘The Ungrateful Dead’, with Mary Jo Duffy scripting from McKenzie’s plot as, after frustrating the vanishing villain, Matt is cruelly kidnapped by a new squad of the Ani-Men (Ape-Man, Cat-Man & Bird-Man) all leading to Frank Miller’s debut as penciller in ‘A Grave Mistake!’

With McKenzie writing and Janson inking, all plot threads regarding Death-Stalker spectacularly conclude as the monster gloatingly explains his true origins and reasons for haunting the Sightless Swashbuckler for so long. As always, Villain underestimates Hero and the stunning final fight in a graveyard became one of the most iconic duels in superhero history…

Also included here is a Paladin pilot from Marvel Premiere #43. Cover-dated August 1978 and devised by Don McGregor & Tom Sutton as a super hero/bodyguard/private eye mash-up, it sees Paladin Paul Denning learning ‘In Manhattan, They Play for Keeps’ as the suave merc faces a new iteration of Mr Fear calling himself Phantasm. Mutated in a radiation accident, the maniac soon graduates from abusive boyfriend to enemy of capitalism, fixated on old girlfriend Marsha Connors until she hires Paladin to save her…

Supplementing the resurgent rise in comics form are a gallery of covers by Ed Hannigan, Al Milgrom, Dave Cockrum, Kane, Joe Sinnott, Ron Wilson & Frank Giacoia, Janson, Terry Austin, Colan, Steve Leialoha, Frank Springer, Miller and Joe Rubinstein, contemporary house ads and original art (full pages and covers) by Kane, Infantino, Janson, Colan, DeZuñiga & Leialoha, Al Milgrom & Miller, plus the Marvel Bullpen Bulletins page heralding Miller’s debut and biographies on the many creators involved in setting Daredevil back on the path to multimedia greatness.

As the 1970s closed, these gritty tales laid the groundwork for groundbreaking mature dramas to come, promising the true potential of Daredevil was finally in reach. Their narrative energy and exuberant excitement are dashing delights no action fan will care to miss.

…And the next volume heads full on into darker shadows, the grimmest of territory and the breaking of many boundaries…
© 2020 MARVEL.