Category: Science Fiction

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Al Williamson Archives volume 1


By Al Williamson with an introduction by Angelo Torres (Flesk)
ISBN: 978-1-933865-29-4

Al Williamson is one of the greatest draughtsmen ever to grace the pages of comicbooks and newspaper comics sections. He was born in 1931 before his family moved from New York City to Bogota Columbia at the height of the Golden Age of syndicated adventure strips.

The lad’s passion for strips – especially Alex Raymond’s Flash Gordon and Jungle Jim – was broadened as he devoured imported and translated US material as well as the best that Europe and Latin America could provide in such anthology magazines as Paquin and Pif Paf. Aged 12 Williamson returned to America and, after finishing school, found work in the industry that had always obsessed him.

In the early 1950s he became a star of E.C. Comics’ science fiction titles, beside kindred spirits Joe Orlando, Wally Wood, Roy G. Krenkel, Frank Frazetta and Angelo Torres, and drew Westerns Kid Colt and Ringo Kid for Atlas/Marvel. During the business’ darkest days he gravitated to newspaper strips, assisting John Prentice on Rip Kirby – another masterpiece originally created by Alex Raymond.

When comicbooks gradually recovered, Williamson drew Flash Gordon for King Comics and worked on mystery tales and westerns for DC whilst drawing such globally distributed newspaper features as Secret Agent Corrigan plus groundbreaking film adaptations of Bladerunner and Star Wars.

His stunning poetic realism, sophisticated compositions and fantastic naturalism graced many varied tales, but in later years he became almost exclusively a star inker over pencillers as varied as John Romita Jr., Larry Stroman, Rick Leonardi, Mark Bright, José Delbo and a host of others on everything from Transformers to Spider-Man 2099, Daredevil to Spider-Girl.

Al Williamson passed away in June 2010.

Flesk Publications is an outfit specialising in art books and the tomes dedicated to the greats of our industry include volumes on sequential narrative and fantasy illustration starring Steve Rude, Mark Shultz, James Bama, Gary Gianni, Franklin Booth, William Stout and Joseph Clement Coll. The guiding light behind the company is devoted and passionate art lover John Fleskes.

This initial oversized (305 x 232mm) 64 page collection of sketches, working drawings, unused and unfinished pages from one of the stellar creators of our art form stars captivating heroines, lusty barbarians, space heroes, beasts, aliens and so many wonderful dinosaurs, but also presents lesser known western scenes, science fiction tech, character sketches, duels, action sequences, nudes and glamour studies, unfinished pages from Xenozoic tales and John Carter of Mars, religious scenes and delicious unseen excerpts from Rip Kirby, as well as a glimpse into Williamson’s creative process.

The beautifully intimate glimpses of a master at work, with full colour reproduction capturing every nuance of Williamsons’ gorgeous pencil strokes, make this a book a vital primer for anybody dreaming of drawing for a living and the stirring lavish material revealed here will enthral and entice every fan of wondrous worlds and fantastic forgotten realms.

© 2010 Al Williamson. All Rights Reserved.

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Yeah!


By Peter Bagge & Gilbert Hernandez, with Jaime Hernadez & Eric Reynolds (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-412-2

More generally known for their challenging (I so loathe that word “alternative”) material for mature audiences, cartooning legends Peter (Neat Stuff, Hate, Buddy Bradley) Bagge and Gilbert (Love & Rockets, Birdland, Sloth) Hernandez collaborated in 1999 on an intriguing and manically enticing, all-ages cartoon romp for the grievously underserved juvenile girls market, published by mainstream industry leader DC under their WildStorm imprint.

Said feature has finally been collected – regrettably without the gloriously vivid colour – in a superbly silly upbeat collection that will hopefully, in these more enlightened graphic times, find the approving audience it deserved.

As Bagge relates in his introduction, the original concept was an updating of Dan DeCarlo’s Josie and the Pussycats (voluntarily created under the strictures of the Comics Code) which would appeal to a pre-teen market; inspired by the writer’s complete immersion in the Girl-Power culture of the Spice Girls and their many imitators, thanks to his own daughter turning eight and discovering pop music…

Yeah! follows the trials and tribulations of fresh young New Jersey girls Woo-Woo, Honey and Krazy, who with their on-again, off-again, sleazy-hippie-burn-out manager Crusty seek stardom and a steady paycheque. Naturally it’s not quite that straightforward…

The girls’ extremely unique situation is introduced in ‘Everybody Say Yeah!’ as they finish a tour of the galaxy which sees them crowned “the Most Popular Band in the History of the Universe” before returning to Earth where they are still completely unknown and unable to land a single gig. Crusty has unique contacts and connections but none of them are on the planet of his birth. The best he can manage here is a cheesy school talent contest with their arch rival boy-band The Snobs…

Fed up, fame-hungry keyboardist Woo-Woo sets up a meeting with disgusting mega-millionaire Mongrel Mogul, who agrees to manage and promote them – but only if guitarist Krazy agrees to marry him. Although Woo-Woo thinks it’s worth it the girls eventually decline and Mogul instead aligns himself with their arch-enemy Miss Hellraiser…

None of the performers in Yeah! are ordinary or average. Woo-Woo’s ambitions are all-encompassing, diminutive drummer Honey is a Vegan eco-activist with a befuddled hippie boyfriend called Muddy and Krazy has telepathic powers. … And old Crusty really does commune regularly with extraterrestrials…

We meet the parents in ‘Woo-Woo, Phone Home!’ as the girls fail at a succession of menial jobs whilst waiting for the Big Time (alien money being useless on Earth) before giving up and moving to the Planet Erb where they’re properly appreciated. Unfortunately they – and especially Muddy’s goat – can’t handle the food and they have to go back when Woo-Woo’s terrifyingly blue-collar dad gets ill – but not before Crusty signs up and then abandons an Erbian tribute act called “!yaeH”…

‘Stalky’ reveals that whilst they’ve been gone an alien has been crashing at Krazy’s place, consuming her stupendous stash of junk-food (the only thing she ever eats), but the girls have bigger problems: Crusty has lined them up to be Miss Hellraiser’s backing band – and for free!

‘The Origins of Yeah!’ reveals how the girls met, when The Snobs became their enemies and why Hellraiser isn’t in Yeah! anymore, whilst ‘Yeah! Takes Off!’ uncovers Crusty’s alien connections and the girls first intergalactic successes, before ‘Honey’s Crisis!’ highlights corporate skulduggery and girly passions as Krazy and Woo-Woo become rivals for the attention of Hobo Cappilletto – the most successful boy pop-star in the World – culminating in the minor mega-sensation making his romantic play in ‘Hobo’s in Love!’

The band gets caught up in an interplanetary conflict when ‘Yeah! Goes to War!’, unexpectedly becoming folk heroes of planet Sunburnia before the fight for fame comes to an abrupt end in ‘Make Way for !yaeH’ as the erstwhile Erbian trio become a sensation on Earth whilst Yeah! still can’t get arrested in their own home town…

The volume ends with creator biographies and a mini-saga written and illustrated by Bagge hilariously depicting ‘A Day in the Life of The Snobs’…

There’s precious little around for kids and especially girl readers in American funnybooks: their options relegated to Archie Comics’ prodigious, but generally safe, output or whatever manga makes it into English translation so this intriguing and wildly imaginative series which seamlessly combined fantasy, science fiction, fashion, pop and school cultures in a wild blend of frantic fun and thoroughly deserves another chance to shine.

Moreover let’s hope the publishers follow up with more of the same and Bagge’s marvellous warts-and-all comedic comics-industry expose Sweatshop is soon to follow…

© 2011 Peter Bagge. This edition © 2011 Fantagraphics Books. All Rights Reserved.

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Alien Legion: A Grey Day to Die – An Epic Graphic Novel


By Carl Potts, Alan Zelenetz, Frank Cirocco, Terry Austin & Steve Oliff (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-207-9

During the 1980s the American comics scene experienced a magical proliferation of new titles and companies following the creation of the Direct Sales Market. With publishers now able to firm-sale straight to retail outlets rather than overprint and accept returned copies from non-specialised shops, the industry was able to support less generic titles and creators were able to experiment without losing their shirts.

In response Marvel developed its own line of creator-owned properties during the height of the creative explosion, generating a number of supremely impressive, idiosyncratic series on better quality paper in a variety of formats under the watchful, canny eye of Editor Archie Goodwin. The delightfully disparate line was called Epic Comics and the results reshaped the industry.

One of the earliest hits was a dark, lovely and compelling science fiction serial with a beautifully simple core concept: the Foreign Legion of Space. Created by Carl Potts, Alan Zelenetz and Frank Cirocco, The Alien Legion debuted in its own on-going series in April 1984, running for 20 issues, before re-booting into a second, 18 issue volume. The series has come and gone ever since, most recently from Dark Horse Comics – who have begun compiling the series into collected omnibuses -and there is, of course, a movie in the offing…

In 1986 the creators produced an all-new one-shot for the satisfyingly oversized Marvel Graphic Novel line (#25 if you’re counting): a venue for a variety of  “big stories” told on larger than normal pages (285 x 220mm rather than the now customary 258 x 168mm, similar to the standard European format of the times) featuring not only proprietary characters but also licensed assets like Conan, creator-owned properties like Jim Starlin’s Dreadstar and media tie-ins like Willow or Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

The Legion keeps the peace of the pan-galactic Galarchy on a million worlds spread over three galaxies: a broad brotherhood of outcast sentients united by a need to belong and a desire to escape their pasts. For such beings honour and tradition are the only things holding them together.

This grimly engaging tale finds series regular Commander Sarigar dispatching his best troops from Nomad Squadron (humanoid liberal Torrie Montroc, self-serving sociopath Jugger Grimrod, telepathic Meico, serving grunts Durge and Torqa Dun plus despondent retiring veteran Skathe Mescad) to a distant world for a dirty “wet-work” mission. Although most find the task distasteful, Grimrod is eager to practise the skills the Legion usually punishes him for indulging in…

The Technoids are a growing movement among many sentient species, espousing participant evolution and the replacement of organic features with cybernetic and mechanical parts. These aggressive cyborgs believe flesh is outmoded and aren’t too fussy about whether the surgeries are voluntary…

Technoids have battled the forces of the Galarchy for decades: in fact the most cherished victory legend of the Legion involves four heroic troopers who held off a thousand cyborg foes and chose death before surrender…

Now the Technoid leader Deathron has moved into politics and stands ready to convince an entire planet to trade their flesh for steel and plastic – a perfect opportunity to assassinate the head of the insidious movement. However nothing is ever easy for Nomad and Dethron has a hidden surprise waiting for the already unsettled and disconcerted soldiers…

Terse, tense and compellingly action-packed, this imaginative yarn by Potts and Zelenetz is splendidly readable and instantly accessible to those unfamiliar with the series, whilst the larger pages allow Cirocco and Terry Austin’s magnificent art and the inspired colouring of Cirocco and Steve Oliff to leap out and grab the reader. Sheer space opera gold and well worth tracking down.
© 1986 Carl Potts. All Rights Reserved.

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Axa volumes 5 and 6


By Donne Avenell & Enrique Badia Romero (Ken Pierce Books)
Vol. 5 ISBN: 0-912277-21-1   Vol. 6 no ISBN: 0-912277-22-X

Although the “Swinging Sixties” is thought of as the moment when we all lost our prudish innocence, the real era of sexual liberation was the early 1970s. In that period of swiftly shifting social and cultural morés and rapidly evolving attitudes to adult behaviour British newspapers radically altered much of their traditional style and content in response to the seemingly inexorable wave of female social emancipation and reputed sexual equality.

All the same, this still allowed newspaper editors plenty of leeway to squeeze in oodles of undraped women, who finally escaped from the perfectly rendered comics strips and onto the regular pages (usually the third one), the centre-spreads, pop pages and fashion features…

However the only place where truly affirmative female role-models appeared to be taken seriously were the aforementioned cartoon sections, but even there the likes of Modesty Blaise, Danielle, Scarth, Amanda and all the other capable ladies who walked all over the oppressor gender, both humorously and in straight adventure scenarios, lost clothes and shed undies repeatedly, continuously, frivolously and in the manner they always had…

Nobody complained (no one important or who was ever taken seriously): it was just tradition and the idiom of the medium… and besides, most artists have always liked to draw bare-naked ladies as much as blokes liked to see them and it was even educational for the kiddies – who could buy any newspaper in any shop without interference even if they couldn’t get into cinemas to view Flashdance, Trading Places or Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone without an accompanying adult…

Sales kept soaring…

Take-charge chicks were practically commonplace when the Star Wars phenomenon reinvigorated public interest in science fiction and the old standby of scantily-clad, curvy amazons and post-apocalyptic wonderlands regained their sales-appeal. Thus The Sun hired Enrique Badia Romero and Donne Avenell to produce just such an attention-getter for their already well-stacked cartoon section.

Romero had begun his career in Spain in 1953, producing everything from westerns, sports, war stories and trading cards, often in conjunction with his brother Jorge Badía Romero. He even formed his own publishing house. “Enric” began working for the higher-paying UK market in the 1960s on strips such as ‘Cathy and Wendy’, ‘Isometrics’ and ‘Cassius Clay’ before successfully assuming the drawing duties on the high-profile Modesty Blaise strip in 1970 (see Modesty Blaise: The Hell Makers and Modesty Blaise: The Green Eyed Monster), only leaving when this enticing new prospect appeared.

In 1986 political and editorial intrigue saw Axa cancelled in the middle of a story and Romero returned to the bodacious Blaise until creator/writer Peter O’Donnell retired in 2001. Since then he has produced Modesty material for Scandinavia and a number of projects such as Durham Red for 2000AD.

Axa ran in The Sun Monday to Saturday from 1978 to her abrupt disappearance in 1986 and, other than these slim volumes from strip historian Ken Pierce, has never been graced with a definitive collection. It should be noted also that at the time of these books the strip was still being published to great acclaim.

In ‘Axa the Eager’ opens with the winsome wanderer and her current paramour Dirk drifting along barren coastlines until they encounter a bird-like man-creature and are drawn inescapably into a clash of ideologies between two factions of tree-dwelling humanoids.

One, led by the boisterous dreamer Zeph, wishes to remain in the safety of the canopies until they evolve into true fliers whilst his brother Galen wishes to return the Sky People to the Earth and the ways of technological progress. The division also splits Dirk and Axa and to complicate matters further the solid ground they’re all squawking about is surrounded by deadly mutated toad monsters…

Powerful and impressively philosophical, this tale of family discord could only end in tragedy…

‘Axa the Carefree’ finds the chastened explorers travelling inland to a new and desolate landscape concealing a sedate well-hidden village. Impossibly it seems to have escaped unscathed the horrors of the Great Contamination and investigating further Axa and Dirk discover a population of simple peasants blithely thriving, unaware of the horrors of the last hundred years. However, as always, things are not as they seem and the farmers are only a satellite branch of specialist technological guilds collectively dubbed “The Artisans”.

Ever curious the nubile nomad sneaks into the mountain citadel of the Artisans to find a virtual paradise where her wild beauty captivates one too many of the masters of the Craft Guilds that run the place. She is also reunited with her lost companion Mark 10, a robotic servant she won and lost in Axa volume 3.

Tensions are already rising when the bored and enamoured Galen stumbles onto the scene and, as her very presence incites the normally-stable creative types into a kind of madness, there looks to be a revolution in the Artisans’ immediate future unless Axa can broker a return to productive rationality…

Axa 6 dispenses with tedious text and dashes straight into the graphic action of ‘Axa the Dwarfed’ with the glorious gladiatrix and Mark 10 abandoning the Artisans to trek across a bleak wasteland until they stumble into an old government research facility where the flora and insect life has grown to immense proportions. Moreover, truly advanced and properly civilised scientists appear to be running the whole show…

Typically however, even this technological Garden of Eden has a serpent in the form of one boffin with a little too much ambition, so it’s a lucky thing old flame Matt has been tracking Axa for months and finally reunites with her just as the unscrupulous mastermind makes his move…

‘Axa the Untamed’ finds the fiery fury dragging Matt and Mark 10 into a different kind of danger when the trio encounter a tribe of Gipsies who have proliferated into a modern horde of nomadic Mongol plainsmen, trading horses and other valuable commodities in a mad, macho wonderland of testosterone and arrogance.

Even Axa’s freedom-fuelled head is turned by the attentions of Gipsy Prince Django, much to Matt’s dismay, but it isn’t too long before the glamour fades and the worth of women in Django’s world leads her to reassess its value. It’s a lot harder to cure her love affair with his magnificent horses though…

These tales are superb examples of the uniquely British newspaper strip style: lavishly drawn, subversively written, expansive in scope and utterly enchanting in their basic simplicity – with lots of flashed flesh, emphatic action and sly, knowing humour. Eminently readable and re-readable (and there’s still that dwindling promise of a major motion picture) Axa is long overdue for a definitive collection. Here’s hoping there’s a bold publisher out there looking for the next big thing…
© 1984 Express Newspapers, Ltd.

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Valerian and Laureline book 1: The City of Shifting Waters


By J.-C. Méziéres & P. Christin, with colours by E. Tranlé and translated by Jerome Saincantin (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-84918-038-2

Valérian is possibly the most influential science fiction series ever drawn – and yes, I am including both Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon in that expansive and undoubtedly contentious statement. Although to a large extent those venerable newspaper strips formed the medium itself, anybody who has seen a Star Wars movie has seen some of Jean-Claude Méziéres & Pierre Christin’s brilliant imaginings which the filmic phenomenon has shamelessly plundered for decades: everything from the look of the Millennium Falcon to Leia’s Slave Girl outfit…

Simply put, more carbon-based lifeforms have experienced and marvelled at the uniquely innovative, grungy, lived-in tech realism and light-hearted swashbuckling rollercoasting of Méziéres & Christin than any other cartoon spacer ever imagined possible.

Valérian: Spatio-Temporal Agent launched in the November 9th, 1967 edition of Pilote (#420, running until February 15th 1968) and was an instant hit. The graphic novel under discussion here ‘The City of Shifting Waters’ is actually the second chronological yarn.

The groundbreaking series followed a Franco-Belgian mini-boom in science fiction triggered by Jean-Claude Forest’s 1962 creation Barbarella.

Other notable successes of the era include Greg & Eddy Paape’s Luc Orient and Philippe Druillet’s Lone Sloane and, which all with Valérian‘s hot public reception led to the creation of dedicated fantasy masterpiece Métal Hurlant in 1977.

Valérian and Laureline (as the series eventually became) is a light-hearted, wildly imaginative time-travel adventure-romp (a bit like Dr. Who, but not really at all…), drenched in wry, satirical, humanist and political commentary, starring (at first) an affable, capable, unimaginative and by-the-book cop tasked with protecting the universal time-lines and counteracting paradoxes caused by casual time-travellers.

When Valérian travelled to 11th century France in the first tale ‘Les Mauvais Rêves (‘Bad Dreams’) he was rescued from a tricky situation by a fiery, capable young woman named Laureline and he brought her back with him to the 28th super-citadel and administrative wonderland of Galaxity, capital of the Terran Empire. The indomitable girl trained as a Spatio-Temporal operative and by the time of this book was accompanying him on his missions throughout time and space.

Every subsequent Valérian adventure until the 13th was first serialised weekly in Pilote until the conclusion of ‘The Rage of Hypsis’ (January 1st – September 1st 1985) after which the mind-bending sagas were published as all new complete graphic novels, until the magnificent opus concluded in 2010.

(One clarifying note: in the canon “Hypsis” is counted as the twelfth tale, due to the collected albums being numbered from ‘The City of Shifting Waters’ – the second story but the first to be released in collected book form. When ‘Bad Dreams’ was finally released in a collected edition in 1983 it was given the number #0.)

The City of Shifting Waters was originally published in two tranches; ‘La Cité des Eaux Mouvantes’ (#455 25th July to 468, 24th October 1968) and ‘Terre en Flammes’ (‘Earth in Flames’, #492-505, 10th April to 10th July 1969), and opens here with the odd couple dispatched to 1986 – when civilisation on earth was destroyed due to ecological negligence and political chicanery – to recapture Xombul, a madman determined to undermine Galaxity and establish himself as Dictator of the Universe.

To attain his goal the renegade has travelled to New York after a nuclear accident has melted the ice caps and flooded the metropolis (and everywhere else), seeking hidden scientific secrets that would allow him to conquer the devastated planet and prevent the Terran Empire from ever forming…

Plunged back into an apocalyptic nightmare where Broadway and Wall Street are under water, jungle vines connect the deserted skyscrapers, Tsunamis are an hourly hazard and bold looters are snatching up the last golden treasures of a lost civilisation, the S-T agents find unique allies to preserve the proper past, survive even greater catastrophes such as the volcanic eruption of Yellowstone Park and frustrate the plans of the most ambitious mass killer in all of history…

Visually spectacular, mind-bogglingly ingenious and steeped in delightful in-jokes (the utterly-mad-yet-brilliant boffin who helps them is a hilarious dead ringer for Jerry Lewis in the 1963 film “The Nutty Professor”) this is still a timelessly perfect Science Fiction masterpiece every fan of the genre – in whatever medium – would be crazy to miss…
© Dargaud Paris, 1976 Christin, Méziéres & Tran-Lệ. All rights reserved. English translation © 2010 Cinebook Ltd.

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Green Lantern: Agent Orange (Prelude to Blackest Night)


By Geoff Johns, Philip Tan & Jonathan Glapion (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-2420-2

Hal Jordan was a young test pilot in California when an alien policeman crashed on Earth. Mortally wounded, Abin Sur commanded his ring, a device which could materialise thoughts and fuelled by willpower, to seek out a replacement ring-bearer, honest and without fear. Scanning the planet it selected Jordan and brought him to the crash-site. The dying alien bequeathed his ring, the lantern-shaped Battery of Power and his profession to the astonished Earthman.

Over the years Jordan became one of the greatest members of that serried band of law-enforcers, The Green Lantern Corps, which had protected the cosmos from evil for millennia under the auspices of immortal super-beings who dubbed themselves the Guardians of the Universe. These undying patrons of Order were one of the first races in creation and currently dwell in sublime emotionless security on the world of Oa at the very centre of creation.

If all this is new to you then this book should absolutely not be your introduction to the series. Go read (at least) Green Lantern: Secret Origin and preferably all the other collections of this monumental fixture in the comicbook firmament before attempting to decipher the compulsive, compelling, pell-mell onslaught of characters and concepts scripter Geoff Johns throws at the reader as his extended epic thoroughly reshapes the DC Universe.

Following the bombastic, blockbusting Sinestro Corps War the entire cosmos was in turmoil at the revelation that Green was not the only colour and an entire emotional spectrum of puissant energies underpinned and operated upon reality. In increasingly ambitious storylines, Johns began exploring the adherents and disciples of each hue and the forces transformed by or seeking to control them…a situation which led inexorably into DC’s major crossover events Blackest Night and its sequel Brightest Day.

This volume (collecting Green Lantern #39-42 and portions of Blackest Night #0), illustrated by Philip Tan & Jonathan Glapion, Eddy Barrows, Ruy José & Julio Ferreira, opens with a band of Controllers (a splinter group who split from the Guardians eons ago) encountering the possessor of the Orange light of Avarice.

The resultant slaughter precipitates another crisis when its sole user – a bestial, undying monstrosity named Larfleeze – abrogates an ancient secret treaty with the Oans and explodes out of his exile in the Vega system to take whatever takes his voracious fancy…

The very first thing he espies is Hal Jordan, currently overloaded by the exponentially increased power of a Blue Lantern ring overwhelming his own emerald weapon with the azure energy of Hope.

As revelations of the Guardians’ duplicitous past intrigues come to light, the vengeance-crazed, Green Lantern-hunting Fatality is overtaken by the Violet power of Love and becomes a Zamaron Star Sapphire (another dissident faction formed when the female Guardians also abandoned Oa) and attempts an uncomfortable rapprochement with her arch-enemy Green Lantern John Stewart…

Due to the Guardians’ ancient treaty with Larfleeze Vega had always been outside GL Corps jurisdiction and subsequently became a stellar sinkhole and safe-haven for the very worst scum of universe. With nothing left to hide anymore the remaining, still-squabbling Guardians lead a phalanx of their best peacekeepers in a punitive mission to clean out the sector of intergalactic criminals now that the Avatar of Greed has gone…

Sadly Larfleeze has left unique defences and the sortie ends badly. With the Orange Obsessive still hungry for Jordan’s Blue ring (which refuses to leave Hal’s hand and resists all efforts at removal) the Oans are forced to resort to a further deal with the devil…

Meanwhile Sinestro, controlling the Yellow light of Fear, and the diabolical Atrocitus, wielding the corrupting Red light of Rage, are jockeying into position for their own assaults on the embattled Guardians…

Jordan finally overcomes the paralysing burden of too much power and acts decisively to temporarily end the threat of Larfleeze, but not before the Guardians are betrayed from within and the Black light of Death resurrects the greatest threat to life there has ever been…

…Which will only become clear in the next volume.

Feeling uncomfortably like entering a play late and leaving before the end, the spectacle and action here will impress and bewilder in equal amounts, but at least there’s a selection of short complete vignettes included to afford the briefest modicum of narrative closure; beginning with ‘Origins and Omens’ (illustrated by Ivan Reis & Oclair Albert) which explores the history of the Star Sapphires and the salutary ‘Tales of the Orange Lanterns: Weed Killer’ with art by Rafael Albuquerque, which reveals the rise to power of the ravenous Orange subordinate Agent Glomulous…

After a gallery of variant covers and a fascinating design, commentary and sketch section from Philip Tan and Doug Mahnke, the book closes with informational pages on the eight colours of the Emotional Spectrum by Mahnke, Christian Alamy & Tom Nguyen

Combining big-picture theatrics with solid characterization, Green Lantern is an ideal contemporary superhero series, vast in scope, superb in execution and blending just the right amounts of angst, gloss and action in the storytelling mix – but a basic familiarity with DC/Green Lantern history is more necessary than advisable.

Impressive, exciting enticing and engrossing: all terms you’ll happily apply to Green Lantern: Agent Orange – but only after doing your homework and reading the other stuff first…
© 2009 DC Comics. All rights reserved.

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Alien: The Illustrated Story


By Archie Goodwin & Walter Simonson from a screenplay by Dan O’Bannon and a story by Dan O’Bannon & Ronald Shusett (Heavy Metal/Futura)
ISBN: 0-7088-1559-6

Alien was released in 1979 and utterly refreshed the science fiction cinema genre. Creeping in on the back of the jolly adventuring romps of the Star Wars phenomenon and its shiny, happy rip-offs, Dan O’Bannon’s dark tale and Ridley Scott’s grimly meticulous vision reintroduced the vital element of apocalyptic terror that had been absent from the medium since the headiest, most paranoiac days of the 1950s B-Movies.

You know the plot: a bunch of interstellar miners are diverted by their untrustworthy bosses to a lost planet where they find an extraterrestrial shipwreck. One of the humans is infected and brings aboard a horror that grows and picks off the crew one by one and cannot be stopped, escaped from or killed…

Lots of films have had comics adaptations: good bad or indifferent. Very few have ever come as close to capturing the stunning, senses-overloading feel – rather than the plot or look or detail – of the source material, although all of those too are well-catered for in this slim but superb graphic extravaganza from the award-winning creative team of Archie Goodwin and Walt Simonson (see Manhunter: the Special Edition for perhaps their ultimate moment of comics collaboration).

Spectacular, engrossing, visually innovative (in both storytelling and lettering/calligraphic effects) and absolutely absorbing, this hard-to-find gem (either in the original US edition from Heavy Metal Productions or the mass-market UK edition from Futura) is a true lost landmark of comics, long overdue for a new release – but only in the original large, square European Album format please…

© 1979 by Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation, All rights reserved.

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Cycops


By Julie Woodcock & Brian Stelfreeze (Comics Interview Publications)
No ISBN

The mid-1980s were a great time for American comics creators. It was as if an entire new industry had opened up with the proliferation of the Direct Sales market and dedicated specialist retail outlets; new companies were experimenting with format and content, and punters had a bit of spare cash to play with. Moreover much of the “kid’s stuff” stigma had finally abated and the country was catching up to the rest of the world in acknowledging that sequential narrative might just be an actual art-form…

Consequently many new companies began competing for the attention and cash of punters who had grown accustomed – or resigned – to getting their on-going sequential narratives from DC, Marvel, Archie and/or Harvey Comics. European and Japanese styled material had been creeping in and by 1983 a host of young companies such as WaRP Graphics, Pacific, Eclipse, Capital, Now, Comico, Dark Horse, First and many others had established themselves and were making impressive inroads.

New talent, established stars and fresh ideas all found a thriving forum to try something a little different both in terms of content and format. Even smaller companies had a fair shot at the big time and a lot of great material came – and often, sadly went – without getting the attention or success it warranted.

One such lost gem is Cycops: a neat and appealing science fiction romp released by David Anthony Kraft’s Comics Interview Publications. The journalist, writer, editor, publisher and literary agent specialised in publishing intriguing funnybooks, as well as the wonderful, informative and award-winning titular magazine of comics journalism, with the most notable forays probably being Southern Knights, X-Thieves, and Comics Revue.

Originally released as a black and white 3-issue miniseries Cycops is set in a star-spanning 25th century where civilisation is a loose confederation of autonomous states governed – or at least kept generally honest – by the Human Coalition Senate and an elected President.

The eponymous agents are scientifically enhanced and augmented warriors tasked by the Interstellar Bureau of Criminal Investigation with upholding basic human rights and dealing with criminals and threats generated by the manic proliferation of technology.

The processes used to create Cycops produce super-strong, fast and tough peace-keepers who are a breed apart from normal humanity; not least because the procedures generally halve their life-spans…

The saga begins with ‘Cycops Blues’ which introduces Valcyr, Tanaka and Radm, the celebrated White Team who are tasked by President Kamdr herself with a delicate undercover mission… exposing popular Senator Desron Tec’s slavery racket and proving she has turned her world of Kagni into a sadistic hellworld of degradation and brutal sex-tourism…

Before they can begin however the President is murdered by Tec’s ally Ragoczy: a legendary, nigh-immortal hyper-augmented assassin who easily defeats all three Cycops and frames them for Kamdr’s death…

In ‘White Heat’ the Cycops corps searches for the three fugitives who have become Ragoczy’s helpless possessions on Kagni. However dissension is growing between the super-warrior and the depraved Desron Tec who feels her power is slipping away. Held by bonds cybernetic and psychological, Radm struggles to win free as he witnesses horror after horror… When he finally succeeds and liberates his comrades the scene is set for a catastrophic conclusion in the savage showdown ‘Seeing Red’…

A stunning combination of hard-science adventure and dark, procedural cop thriller, Julie Woodcock’s script is sharp, understated and winningly effective whilst the black and white art from then-newcomer Brian Stelfreeze (who probably enjoys his greatest fame today as a brilliant cover painter) perfectly captures the simultaneous experience of an ancient brotherhood of soldiers, a galaxy of wonders and a human history of inescapable depravity that will always need extraordinary guardians to defend us.

Still available in both hardback and softcover editions this collection also boasts behind-the-scenes interviews and commentary plus an extensive sketchbook section.

Impressive and frustrating (the promise of further adventures sadly unfulfilled) Cycops is a solid piece of comics entertainment long overdue for a second look by today’s broader minded, less superhero obsessed readers.
© 1988, 1989 Woodcock, Stelfreeze, Kraft. All rights reserved.

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Showcase Presents Blackhawk volume 1


By anonymous, Dick Dillin & Chuck Cuidera (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-1983-3

The early days of the American comicbook industry were awash with both opportunity and talent and these factors also coincided with a vast population hungry for cheap entertainment. Comics had no acknowledged fans or collectors; only a large, transient market-place open to all varied aspects of yarn-spinning and tale-telling – a situation which maintained right up to the middle of the 1960s.

Thus, even though loudly isolationist and more than six months away from active inclusion in World War II, creators like Will Eisner and publishers like Everett M. (“Busy”) Arnold felt that Americans were ready for the themed anthology title Military Comics.

Nobody was ready for Blackhawk.

Military Comics #1 launched on May 30th 1941 (with an August cover-date) and included in its gritty, two-fisted line-up Death Patrol by Jack Cole, Miss America, Fred Guardineer’s Blue Tracer, X of the Underground, the Yankee Eagle, Q-Boat, Shot and Shell, Archie Atkins and Loops and Banks by “Bud Ernest” (actually aviation-nut and unsung comics genius Bob Powell), but none of the strips, not even Cole’s surreal and suicidal team of hell-bent fliers, had the instant cachet and sheer appeal of Eisner and Powell’s “Foreign Legion of the Air” led by the charismatic Dark Knight of the airways known only as Blackhawk.

Chuck Cuidera, already famed for creating the original Blue Beetle for Fox, drew ‘the Origin of Blackhawk’ for the first issue, wherein a lone pilot fighting the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939 was shot down by Nazi Ace Von Tepp; only to rise bloody and unbowed from his plane’s wreckage to form the World’s greatest team of airborne fighting men…

This mysterious paramilitary squadron of unbeatable fliers, dedicated to crushing injustice and smashing the Axis war-machine, battled on all fronts during the war and stayed together to crush international crime, Communism and every threat to democracy from alien invaders to supernatural monsters, becoming one of the true milestones of the US industry. Eisner wrote the first four Blackhawk episodes before moving on and Cuidera stayed until issue #11 – although he triumphantly returned in later years.

There were many melodramatic touches that made the Blackhawks so memorable in the eyes of a wide-eyed populace of thrill-hungry kids. There was the cool, black leather uniforms and peaked caps. The unique, outrageous – but authentic – Grumman F5F-1 Skyrocket planes they flew from their secret island base and of course their eerie battle-cry “Hawkaaaaa!”

But perhaps the oddest idiosyncrasy to modern readers was that they had their own song (would you be more comfortable if we started calling it an international anthem?) which Blackhawk, André, Stanislaus, Olaf, Chuck, Hendrickson and Chop-Chop would sing as they plummeted into battle (to see the music and lyrics check out the Blackhawk Archives edition); just remember this number was written for seven really tough leather-clad guys to sing while dodging bullets…

Quality adapted well to peacetime demands: Plastic Man and Doll Man lasted far longer than most Golden Age superhero titles, whilst the rest of the line adapted into tough-guy crime, war, western, horror and racy comedy titles. The Blackhawks soared to even greater heights, starring in their own movie serial in 1952. However the hostility of the marketplace to mature-targeted titles after the adoption of the self-censorious Comics Code was a clear sign of the times; as 1956 ended Arnold sold most of his comics properties and titles to National Publishing Periodicals (now DC) and set up as a general magazine publisher.

Many of the purchases were a huge boost to National’s portfolio, with titles such as GI Combat, Heart Throbs and Blackhawk lasting uninterrupted well into the 1970s (GI Combat survived until in 1987), whilst the unceasing draw and potential of characters such as Uncle Sam, the assorted Freedom Fighters costumed pantheon, Kid Eternity and Plastic Man have paid dividends ever since.

This commodious monochrome collection covers the first National-emblazoned issue (#108, January 1957) through #127 (August 1958) which saw the Air Aces hit the ground running in a monthly title (at a time when Superman and Batman were only published eight times a year) and almost instantly established themselves as a valuable draw in the DC firmament.

Regrettably many of the records are lost so scripter-credits are not available (potential candidates include Ed “France” Herron, Arnold Drake, George Kashdan, Jack Miller, Bill Woolfolk, Jack Schiff and/or Dave Wood) but the art remained in the capable hands of veteran illustrators Dick Dillin and Chuck Cuidera: a team who meshed so seamlessly that they often traded roles with few any the wiser…

Moreover although broadly formulaic the gritty cachet, crime and Sci Fi underpinnings and international jurisdiction of the team always allowed great internal variety within the tales, so with three complete adventures per issue, this terrific tome is a joyous celebration and compelling reminder of simpler yet more intriguing times.

The action begins with ‘The Threat From the Abyss’ an old-school “Commie-Stomper” yarn wherein the Magnificent Seven put paid to a sinister subsea Soviet rocket base, after which ‘Killer Shark’s Secret Weapon’ stuck with the watery theme as the Blackhawks’ greatest foe returned with another outrageous mechanical masterpiece to aid his piratical schemes. Issue #108 concludes with ‘The Mutiny of the Red Sailors’ wherein a mass-defection of Russian mariners in Hong Kong proved to be a cunning scheme to destroy the British Colony.

‘The Avalanche King’ detailed the struggle against Red infiltrators in South America, ‘Blackhawk the Sorcerer!’ saw the team discover a lost outpost of Norman knights who had missed the invasion of England in 1066 and ‘The Raid on Blackhawk Island’ pitted the squad against their own trophies as an intruder invaded their secret base and turned a host of captured super-weapons against them.

Blackhawk #110 opened with ‘The Mystery of Tigress Island’ as the doughty lads battled an all-girl team of rival international aviators, ‘The Prophet of Disaster’ proved to be not a seer but simply a middle Eastern conman and ‘Duel of Giants’ pitted the team against a deranged scientist who could enlarge his body to blockbuster proportions.

‘The Menace of the Machines’ found the heroes battling the incredible gimmicks of a Hollywood special effects wizard who had turned to crime, ‘The Perils of Blackie, the Wonder Bird’ featured the team’s incredible feathered mascot who cunningly turned the tables on the spy-ring which had captured him whilst ‘Trigger Craig’s Magic Carpet’ proved once again that Crime Does Not Pay but also that even ancient sorcery was no match for bold hearts and heavy machine-guns…

‘The Doomed Dogfight’ opened #112 as a Nazi ace schemed to rerun his WWII aerial duel against Blackhawk; criminal counterpart squadron ‘The Crimson Vultures’ proved to be no match for the Dark Knights and ‘The Eighth Blackhawk’ was nothing more than a dirty traitor… or was he?

‘The Volunteers of Doom’ found the team uncovering sabotage whilst testing dangerous super-weapons for the US Government and ‘The Saboteur of Blackhawk Island’ only appeared to be one of the valiant crew before ‘The Cellblock in the Sky’ found the heroes imprisoned by a disenchanted genius in floating cages – but not for long…

‘The Gladiators of Blackhawk Island’ saw a training exercise co-opted by criminals with deadly consequences whilst costumed criminal the Mole almost enslaved ‘20,000 Leagues Beneath the Earth’ and Blackie was transformed into a ravening and uncontrollable menace in ‘The Winged Goliath’.

In ‘The Tyrant’s Return’ a group of Nazi war criminals rallied sympathisers around a new Hitler, ‘Blackie Goes Wild’ saw the gifted raptor  revert to savagery but still thwart a South American revolution whilst ‘The Creature of Blackhawk Island’ saw a extra-dimensional monster foolishly begin smashing through to our reality on the most heavily fortified military base on Earth…

As ‘The Prisoners of the Black Palace’ the old comrades crushed a criminal scheme to quartermaster the entire international underworld, Blackhawk became ‘The Human Torpedo’ to eradicate a sea-going gangster but ended up in contention with a race of mermen, and old Hendrickson became ‘The Outcast Blackhawk’ after failing his annual requalification exams…

Blackhawk #117 began with the team tackling what seemed to be a lost tribe of Vikings in ‘The Menace of the Dragon Boat’ before becoming the targets of a ruthless mastermind in ‘The Seven Little Blackhawks’ and battling a chilling criminal maniac in ‘The Fantastic Mr. Freeze’.

‘The Bandit with 1,000 Nets’ proved to be yet another audacious thief with a novel gimmick whereas the Pacific Ocean was the real enemy when an accident marooned ‘The Blackhawk Robinson Crusoes’ as they hunted the nefarious Sting Ray, before ‘The Human Clay Pigeons’ found the team helpless targets of international assassin and spymaster the Sniper.

A time-travel accident propelled the aviators back to the old West in ‘Blackhawk vs Chief Black Hawk’ and on their return Frenchman Andre inherited a fortune and became ‘The Playboy Blackhawk’ before being kicked off the team. However he was happily back for the all-out dinosaur action of ‘The Valley of the Monsters’…

‘The Challenge of the Wizard’ led in #120 as the crew tackled an ingenious stage magician whilst a well-meaning kid made plenty of trouble for them when he elected himself ‘The Junior Blackhawk!’ before the sinister Professor tricked the heroes into re-enacting ‘The Perils of Ulysses’ with deadly robotic monsters.

‘Secret Weapon of the Archer’ pitted the team against a fantastic attention-seeking costumed menace, whilst ‘The Jinxed Blackhawk’ found the team struggling against bad luck, superstition and a cunning criminal before ‘Siege in the Sahara’ saw them imitating Beau Geste whilst rescuing hijacked atomic weapons from bandit chieftain the Tiger…

‘The Movie that Backfired’ started out as a biopic but developed into a mystery when criminals began making murderous alterations to the script, ‘The Sky Kites’ found the squad battling aerial pirates The Ravens and ‘The Day the Blackhawks Died’ saw the deadly Cobra lay a lethal trap unaware that he was the prey not the predator…

Killer Shark returned to unsuccessfully assault ‘The Underseas Gold Fort’, more leftover Nazis resurfaced to solve a ‘Mystery on Top of the World’ that involved the location of the Reich’s stolen gold and Blackhawk became ‘The Human Rocket’ to thwart an alien invasion.

In issue #124, figures from history were robbing at will and even the Blackhawks were implicated but the ‘Thieves With a Thousand Faces’ proved to be far from supernatural whilst ‘The Beauty and the Blackhawks’ saw shy Chuck apparently bamboozled by a sultry siren whilst ‘The Mechanical Spies From Space’ attempted to establish an Earthly beachhead but were soundly defeated by the Magnificent Seven’s unique blend of human heroism and heavy ordnance.

‘The Secrets of the Blackhawk Time Capsule’ proved an irresistible temptation for scientific super-criminal the Schemer whilst ‘The Sunken Island!’ hid a lost Mongol civilisation in the throes of civil war and ‘The Super Blackhawk’ saw an atomic accident transform the group’s leader into a all-powerful metahuman… unfortunately it did the same for the Mole and his entire gang too…

‘The Secret of the Glass Fort’ revisited the idea as the entire team temporarily received superpowers to battle alien invaders whilst The Prisoner of Zenda provided the plot for ‘Hendrickson, King For a Day’ as the venerable Dutchman doubled for a missing monarch and ‘The Man Who Collected Blackhawks’ quickly learned to regret using his shrinking ray on the toughest crime-fighters in the World…

This stupendous selection climaxes with issue #127: starting with ‘Blackie – the Winged Sky Fighter’ wherein the formidable hawk rescued his human colleagues from an impossible death-trap, after which strongman Olaf took centre-stage as ‘The Show-Off Blackhawk’ when a showbiz career diverted his attention from the most important things in life and the manly monochrome marvels conclude when a criminal infiltrating the squad disguised as American member Chuck seemingly succeeds in killing the legendary leader in man ‘The Ghost of Blackhawk’.

These stories were produced at a pivotal moment in comics history: the last great outpouring of broadly human-scaled action-heroes in a marketplace increasingly filling up with gaudily clad wondermen and superwomen. The iconic blend of weary sophistication and glorious, juvenile bravado where a few good men with wits, firearms and a trusty animal companion could overcome all odds was fading in the light of spectacular scenarios and ubiquitous alien encounters.

For this precious moment though these rousing tales of the miracles that (extra) ordinary guys can accomplish are some of the early Silver Age’s finest moments. Terrific traditional all-ages entertainment and some of the best comics stories of their time, these tales are forgotten gems of their genre and I sincerely hope DC finds the time and money to continue the magic in further collections.

And so will you…

© 1957, 1958, 2008 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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Showcase Presents Eclipso


By Bob Haney, Lee Elias, Alex Toth & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-2315-1

Although it’s generally accepted that everybody loves a good villain they seldom permit them the opportunity of starring in their own series (except perhaps in British comics, where for decades the most bizarre and outrageous rogues such as Charlie Peace, Spring-Heeled Jack, Dick Turpin, Von Hoffman or The Dwarf were seen as far more interesting than mere lawmen).

However when America went superhero crazy in the 1960s (even before the Batman TV show sent the entire world into a wild and garish “High Camp” frenzy) DC converted all of its anthology titles into character-driven vehicles and long-running paranormal investigator Mark Merlin suddenly found himself sharing the cover spot with a costumed but very different kind of co-star.

Breathing new life into the hallowed Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde concept, Bob Haney and Lee Elias debuted ‘Eclipso, The Genius Who Fought Himself’ in House of Secrets #61, cover-dated July-August 1963, the saga of solar scientist Bruce Gordon who was cursed to become host to a timeless Evil.

Whilst observing a solar eclipse on tropical Diablo Island, Gordon was attacked and wounded by a crazed witchdoctor named Mophir, wielding a black diamond. As a result whenever an eclipse occurred Gordon’s body was possessed by a demonic, destructive alter ego with incredible powers and malign hyper-intellect. The remainder of the first instalment showed how the intangible interloper destroyed Gordon’s greatest achievement: a futuristic solar-powered city.

The format established, Gordon, his fiancé Mona Bennett and her father, who was also Gordon’s mentor, pursued and battled the incredible Eclipso and his increasingly astounding schemes. At least he ha a handy weakness: exposure to sudden bright lights would propel him back to his cage within Bruce Gordon…

‘Duel of the Divided Man’ saw the helpless scientist attempting to thwart the uncontrollable transformations by submerging to the bottom of the Ocean and exiling himself to space – to no effect, whilst in ‘Eclipso’s Amazing Ally!’, illustrated by the legendary Alex Toth, the malignant presence manifests when an artificial eclipse and lab accident frees him entirely from Gordon’s body. Against the backdrop of a South American war Gordon and Professor Bennett struggled to contain the liberated horror but all was not as it seemed…

Issue #64 ‘Hideout on Fear Island’ saw Gordon, Mona and Bennett hijacked to a Caribbean nation inundated by giant plants for an incredible clash with giant robots and Nazi scientists. Naturally when Eclipso broke out things went from bad to worse…

‘The Man Who Destroyed Eclipso’ had the Photonic Fiend kidnap Mona before a deranged physicist actually separated Eclipso and Gordon in a wild scheme to steal a nuclear missile, whilst the threat of a terrifying alien omnivore forced heroes and villain to temporarily join forces in ‘The Two Faces of Doom!’

‘Challenge of the Split-Man!’ found Gordon and Eclipso once more at odds as the desperate scientist returned to Mophir’s lair in search of a cure before inexplicably following the liberated villain to a robot factory in Scotland.

Veteran cartoonist Jack Sparling took over the artist’s role with #68 wherein ‘Eclipso’s Deadly Doubles!’ revealed how Gordon’s latest attempt to effect a cure only multiplied his problems, after which ‘Wanted: Eclipso Dead or Alive!’ found the beleaguered scientist hired by Scotland Yard to capture himself – or at least his wicked and still secret other self…

‘Bruce Gordon, Eclipso’s Ally!’ returned the long suffering trio to Latin America where an accident robbed Gordon of his memory – but not his curse, leading to the most ironic alliance in comics, ‘The Trial of Eclipso’ had the periodically freed felon finally captured by the police and threatening to expose Gordon’s dark secret and ‘The Moonstone People’ stranded the Bennetts, Gordon and Eclipso on a lost island populated by scientists who hadn’t aged since their own arrival in 1612…

Even such a talented writer as Bob Haney occasionally strained at the restrictions of writing a fresh story for a villainous protagonist under Comics Code Restrictions and the later tales became increasingly more outlandish after ‘Eclipso Battles the Sea Titan’ wherein a subsea monster threatened not just the surface world but also Eclipso’s ultimate refuge – Bruce Gordon’s body…

Another attempt to expel or eradicate the horror inside accidentally created a far more dangerous enemy in ‘The Negative Eclipso’ after which a criminal syndicate, fed up with the Photonic Fury’s disruption of their operations, decreed ‘Eclipso Must Die!’

It had to happen – and did – when Mark Merlin (in his superhero persona of Prince Ra-Man) met his House of Secrets stable-mate in the book-length thriller ‘Helio, the Sun Demon!’ (#76, with the concluding second chapter drawn by the inimitable Bernard Baily) wherein Eclipso created a fearsome, fiery solar slave and the Bennetts teamed with the enigmatic super-sorcerer to free Bruce and save the world from flaming destruction.

All-out fantasy subsumed suspense in the strip’s dying days with aliens and creatures abounding, such as ‘The Moon Creatures’ which Eclipso grew from lunar dust to do his wicked bidding or the hidden treasure of Stonehenge that transformed him into a ‘Monster Eclipso’.

Issue #79 featured a return match for Prince Ra-Man in ‘The Master of Yesterday and Tomorrow!’ with Baily again pitching in to tackle an extended epic wherein Eclipso got his scurrilous hands on a selection of time-bending trinkets, whilst #80 (October 1966) ended the series with no fanfare, no warning and no ultimate resolution as ‘The Giant Eclipso!’ pitted the fade-away fiend against mutants, cops and his own colossal doppelganger.

Not everything old is gold and this quirky, exceedingly eccentric collection of comics thrillers certainly won’t appeal to everyone. However there is a gloriously outré charm and fanciful delight in these silly but absorbing sagas if you’re of an open minded mien, and the art of Elias, Toth, Sparling and Baily has never looked more vibrant or effective than in this crisp and splendid black and white collection.

Not for him or them then, but perhaps this book is for you…

© 1963-1966, 2009 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.