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The Definitive Betty Boop: The Classic Comic Strip Collection


By Max Fleischer, Bud Counihan, with Hal Seeger & various (Titan Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-84856-707-8 (HB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Betty Boop is one of the most famous and long-lived fictional media icons on the planet and probably the one who has generated the least amount of narrative creative material – as opposed to simply merchandise – per year since her debut.

She was created at the Fleischer Cartoon Studios, most likely by either by Max Fleischer himself or top cartoonist and animator Grim Natwick – depending on whomever you’ve just read – and had a bit part in the monochrome animated short feature Dizzy Dishes: the seventh “Talkartoon” release from the studio, screened for the first time on August 9th 1930.

A calculatedly racy sex-symbol from the start, albeit anthropomorphised into a sexy French Poodle (!!), Betty was primarily based on silent movie star and infamous “It-Girl” Clara Bow. Or, according to some historians, it was far more than just her distinctive sound Betty took from popular contemporary star Helen Kane. In those pioneering days of “talkies”, Betty was voiced by a succession of actresses including Margie Hines, Kate Wright, Ann Rothschild and ultimately Mae Questel, who all mimicked Bow’s soft, seductive (no, really!) Brooklyn accent. Or possibly Kane’s. There’s a court case involved in this history so opinions are hard held and still very divided…

Although frequently appearing beside early Fleischer Studios stars Bimbo (a homely puppy dog also called Fitz) and Koko the Clown – who both debuted in Fleischer’s earliest screen offerings Out of the Inkwell – Betty had become a fully, if wickedly shaped, human girl by 1932’s Any Rags, and she quickly co-opted and monopolised all the remaining Talkartoons, before graduating to the Screen Songs featurettes. Betty ultimately won her own animated cartoon series to become “The Queen of the Animated Screen”, reigning until the end of the decade.

A Jazz Age flapper in the Depression Era, the delectable Boop was probably the first sex-charged teen-rebel of the 20th century, yet remained winningly innocent and knowledgeably chaste throughout her career. Maybe that’s why she became so astoundingly, incredibly popular – although her appeal diminished appreciably once the censorious Hayes Production Code cleaned up all that smut and fun and sophistication oozing out of Hollywood in 1934 – even though the Fleisher Studio was proudly New York born and bred.

Saucy singer Helen Kane – who had performed in a sexy “Bow-esque” Brooklyn accent throughout the 1920s and was billed as “The Boop-Oop-A-Doop Girl” – famously sued for “deliberate caricature” in 1932. As well as a renowned actor, she was sharp enough to briefly steal the show and actually become the star of the first Betty newspaper strips…

When Kane’s lawsuit failed, Betty took over the paper outlets in her own name, but couldn’t withstand a prolonged assault by the National Legion of Decency and Hayes Code myrmidons. With all innuendo removed, salacious movements restricted and wearing much longer skirts, Betty gained a boyfriend and family, whilst newspaper strip scripts consciously targeted younger audiences. The tabloid feature folded in 1937 and her last animated cartoon stories were released in 1939. The only advantage to Betty’s screen neutering and new wholesome image was that she suddenly became eligible for inclusion on the Funnies pages of family newspapers, alongside the likes of Popeye, Little Orphan Annie and Mickey Mouse….

This superb collection gathers every pre-war iteration associated with Betty Boop – including ones she isn’t in – and is augmented by fond remembrances from Mark Fleischer and Virginia Mahoney in their Foreword ‘About our grandad, Max Fleischer…’ and comes with an informative Introduction tracing Betty’s wild ride of a career. Supplementing his text with candid behind-the-scenes photos and contemporary art as well as advertising items and memorabilia of the time, cartoonist Brian Walker (son of Beetle Bailey and Hi & Lois creator Mort Walker) traces the celluloid and tabloid star’s creation, rise, fall and latter day resurgence in ‘Made of Pen and Ink, she can win you with a Wink’.

There was a brief flurry of renewed activity during the 1980s, which led to a couple of TV specials, a comic book from First Comics (Betty Boop’s Big Break, 1990) and a second newspaper strip. Betty Boop and Felix was crafted by Walker and his brothers Neal, Greg, and Morgan, wherein the glamour queen shared adventures with fellow King Features nostalgia icon Felix the Cat. It ran from July 23rd 1984 – January 31st 1988, but even counting those – and we aren’t here – that’s still a pretty meagre complete comics canon for a lady of Betty’s longevity, pedigree and stature…

Confusion and contention abound in Betty’s print career and that’s mirrored in this book. Her first regular strip was as a daily feature in black-&-white, but you’ll see that last, because the comics experience begins in full colour with an experimental Out of the Inkwell – Koko the Klown Sunday strip starring the manic mime in silent surreal romps that have the cachet of being Fleischer’s first work for King Features Syndicate. They ran from November 25th – December 15th 1934 and are followed by The Original Boop Boop-A-Doop Girl: a Sunday feature spanning August 5th to October 12th 1934. As negotiations between Fleischer and King Features stalled in 1933, Helen Kane approached the Syndicate and offered herself as a straight knock-off for the cartoon star. The resultant domestic comedy strip ran for just 11 weeks, and only in the tabloid New York Sunday Mirror. It was dropped as soon as Fleischer signed with King Features…

Attributed to Kane and drawn by Ving Fuller, the succession of manic gag pages are basic, innocently racy vaudeville one-liners, but do still evoke a certain nostalgic charm…

Whilst we’re on a possibly touchy subject: a lot of attitudes to women and visualisations of minorities won’t really pass an earnest examination here, and readers should be aware that these were all created in a different time for far less enlightened audiences. A little patience and forbearance will be your best guides on some pages…

Running from November 25th 1934 to November 27th 1937, the full colour Sunday strips starring the original and genuine Betty Boop were drawn by Bud Counihan: a veteran ink-slinger who had created the Little Napoleon strip in the 1920s before becoming Chic Young’s assistant on Blondie. They commenced a few months after the daily feature and might be a little confusing as they encompass a large supporting cast for aspiring starlet Betty as she navigates a tiresome and treacherous career in Hollywood. I’d advise reading the dailies first and ending your reading enjoyment here, but it’s your choice…

These gag episodes feature the freshly-sanitised, family-oriented heroine of the post-Hayes Code era, but for devotees of the period and comics fans in general, the strip still retains a unique and abiding charm. Counihan’s Betty is still oddly, innocently coquettish yet confidant: a saucy thing with too-short skirts and skimpy apparel. Some outfits – especially bathing costumes – would raise eyebrows even now, and although the bald innuendo that made her a star is absent, these tales of a street-wise young thing trying to “make it” in Tinseltown are plenty sophisticated when viewed through the knowing, sexually adroit and informed eyes of 21st century readers. Well some of them, anyway…

Produced as full-page strips, the Sundays are broadly slapstick, with moments of cunning wordplay: single joke stories regarding the weirdness of acting and the travails of fandom. There’s a succession of blandly arrogant romantic leading men (mostly called Van something-or-other) but none stick around for long as Betty builds her career, and eventually scenarios change to a western setting as cast and crew begin making Cowboy Pictures, leading to many weeks’ worth of “Injun Jokes”, but ones working delightfully and hilariously counter to expected unpleasant stereotypes of those times. However, the introduction of fearsome lower-class virago Aunt Tillie – chaperone, bouncer and sometime comedy movie extra – moves the strip into an unexpected direction and begins Betty’s life as an extra in her own show…

Soon, a clear and unflinching formula sets in with Bubby (see below), Aunt Tillie and her diminutive new beau Hunky Dory increasingly edging Betty out of the spotlight and even occasionally off the page entirely. By 1937 the show was over…

The Betty Boop daily strip began on July 23rd 1934: a raw, raucous comedy gig that ran until March 18th 1935 in an extended sequence of gag-a-day encounters blending into an epic comedy-of-errors. Here Betty’s lawyers do litigious battle with movie directors and producers to arrive at the perfect contract for all parties. That’s clearly a war that still rages to this day and once again it’s happening under the cost restrictions of what is, after all, another Great Depression like the one Betty was a constant momentary antidote to…

Jokes come thick and fast in the same vein, with lawyers, entourage and all extras providing the bulk of the humour whilst Betty stands in for the Straight Man in her own strip… Except for a recurring riff about losing weight to honour her contract, which stipulates she cannot be filmed weighing more than 100 pounds! Geez! Her head alone has got to weigh at least… sorry, I know… it’s just a comic…

Like most modern stars, Betty had a dual career and there’s a lot of recording industry and song jokes as well as fan affrontery and boyfriend woes, as well as the introduction of the first of an extended cast: Betty’s streetwise baby brother Bubby (originally Billy). He’s a riotous rapscallion intended to act as a chaotic foil to the star’s affably sweet, knowingly dim complacency, and he’s another celluloid wannabe in waiting…

By no means a major effort of the Golden Age of Comics Strips, Counihan’s Betty Boop (like most licensed syndicated features the strip was “signed” by the copyright holder, in this case Max Fleischer) remains a hugely effective, engaging and entertaining work, splendidly executed and well worthy of the attentions of fans with a penchant for history or feeling for fashion.

With the huge merchandising empire built around the effervescent cartoon Gamin/Houri, (everything from apparel to wallpaper, clocks to drinking paraphernalia) surely there’s room today to address her small brief but potent contributions to the comics arts. If you think so, this book is for you…

Betty Boop © 2015 King Features Syndicate, Inc./Fleischer Studios, Inc. ™ & © Hearst Holdings, Inc./Fleischer Studios, Inc. All rights reserved. Foreword © 2015 Mark Fleischer & Ginny Mahoney. Introduction © 2015 Brian Walker.

Today in 1877, pioneering Swedish cartoonist/comics creator Oskar Emil “O.A.” Andersson was born, and in 1911 the amazing Jack Burney (Superman, Batman, Starman) also arrived. In 1957 Belgian star Bernard “Yslaire” Hislaire was born followed a year later by Ms. Tree co-creator Terry Beatty with writer/editor Bob Harras coming one year later. Sam (Zero Girl, The Maxx, Wolverine) Keith, arrived in 1963.

Sadly in 1998 we lost astoundingly adept Canadian import Win Mortimer (Superman, Batman, Legion of Super-Heroes).

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Tintin and the Picaros


By Hergé and Studios Hergé, translated by Leslie Lonsdale-Cooper & Michael Turner (Egmont)
ISBN: 978-1-40520-823-9 (album HB) 978-1-405206-35-8 (Album PB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Georges Prosper Remi, AKA Hergé created an undying masterpiece of graphic literature with his serialised tales of a plucky boy reporter and entourage of iconically odd associates. Singly, and later with assistants including Edgar P. Jacobs, Bob de Moor, Roger Leloup and other supreme stylists comprising the Hergé Studio, he created 23 timeless yarns (initially episodic instalments for a variety of newspaper periodicals) which have since grown beyond their mass-entertainment roots to attain the status of High Art and international cultural icons.

On leaving school in 1925, Remi began working for conservative Catholic newspaper Le Vingtiéme Siècle where he fell under the influence of its Svengali-esque editor Abbot Norbert Wallez. A devoted Boy Scout, one year later the young artist was producing his first strip series – The Adventures of Totor – for monthly Boy Scouts of Belgium magazine. By 1928 Remi was also in charge of producing the contents of the LVS’s weekly children’s supplement Le Petit Vingtiéme.

While Remi was illustrating The Adventures of Flup, Nénesse, Poussette and Cochonette – written by the staff sports reporter – Wallez required his compliant creative cash-cow to concoct a new and contemporary adventure series. Perhaps a young reporter who roamed the world, doing good whilst displaying solid Catholic values and virtues?

The rest is history…

Some of that history is quite dark: During the Nazi Occupation of Belgium, Le Vingtiéme Siècle was closed down and Hergé was compelled to move his supremely popular strip to daily newspaper Le Soir (Brussels’ most prominent French-language periodical, and thus appropriated and controlled by the Nazis). He diligently toiled on for the duration, and, following Belgium’s liberation, was accused of collaboration and even of being a Nazi sympathiser. It took the intervention of Belgian Resistance war hero Raymond Leblanc to dispel the cloud over Hergé, which he did by simply vouching for the cartoonist through words and deeds.

Leblanc provided cash to create a new magazine – Le Journal de Tintin – which he published and managed. The anthology comic swiftly achieved a huge weekly circulation, allowing Remi and his studio team to remaster past tales: excising material dictated by the Fascist invaders to ideologically shade the wartime adventures. Post-war modernising exercises also improved and updated the great tales, just in time for Tintin to become a global phenomenon, both in books and as an early star of animated TV adventure.

With the war over and his reputation restored, Hergé entered the most successful period of his artistic career. He had mastered his storytelling craft, possessed a dedicated audience eager for his every effort and was finally able to say exactly what he wanted in his work, free from fear or censure, if not his personal demons and declining health…

The greatest sign of this was not substantially in the comics tales – although Hergé continued to tinker with the form of his efforts – but rather in how long the gaps were between new exploits. The previous (22nd) romp had completed serialisation in 1967 and was duly collected as an album in 1968. It was then eight years before Tintin et les Picaros was simultaneously serialised in Belgium and France in Tintin-l’Hebdoptmiste magazine (from 16th September 1975 to April 13th 1976) but at least the inevitable book collection came out almost immediately upon completion.

Tintin and the Picaros is in all ways the concluding adventure, as many old characters and locales from previous tales make one final appearance. A partial sequel to The Broken Ear (please link to September 15, 2018) it finds operatic phenomenon Bianca Castafiore implausibly arrested for spying in Central American republic San Theodoros, with Tintin, Captain Haddock and Professor Calculus eventually lured to her rescue.

Insidious Colonel Sponsz – last seen in The Calculus Affair (please link to June 13, 2019) – is Bordurian Military Advisor to the Government of usurper General Tapioca, and has used his position to exact revenge on the intrepid band who humiliated him in his own land. When Tintin & company escape into the jungles during a murder attempt they soon link up with old comrade Alcazar, now leading a band of Picaro guerrillas dedicated to restoring him to power.

Central and South American revolutions were all the rage in the 1970s and Hergé’s cast had been involved with this one on and off since 1935. With the welcome return of anthropologist Doctor Ridgewell and the hysterical Arumbayas, and even an improbable action role (kind of) for obnoxious insurance salesman and comedy foil Jolyon Wagg, the doughty band bring about the final downfall of Tapioca in a thrilling yet bloodless coup during Carnival time, thanks to a hilarious comedy maguffin (initially targeting dipsomaniac Haddock) that turns out to be a brilliant piece of narrative misdirection by the author.

Sly, subtle, thrilling and warmly comforting, this tale was generally slated when first released but with the perspective of intervening decades can be seen as a most fitting place to end The Adventures of Tintin… but only until you pick up another volume and read them again – as you indubitably will.
Tintin and the Picaros: artwork © 1976 by Editions Casterman, Paris & Tournai. Text © 1976 Egmont UK Limited. All rights reserved.

Today in 1887 Betty Boop creator Bud Counihan was born, as was Dixie Dugan creator J.P. McEvoy in 1894. In 1909 DC stalwart Jack Miller (Rip Hunter, Aquaman, Deadman) was born, and as you’ve just seen Tintin debuted today in 1929 in the first episode of Tintin in the Land of the Soviets.

In 1932 the first Sunday Mickey Mouse page appeared as did UK footie mag Scorcher in 1970. Most momentously, Marvel mainstay John Buscema died today in 2002.

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Jonah Hex: Welcome to Paradise


By John Albano, Michael Fleischer, Tony DeZuñiga, Doug Wildey, Noly Panaligan, George Moliterni, José Luis García-López & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-2757-9 (TPB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Western stories are shaped by an odd duality. The genre can almost be sub-divided into two discrete halves: the sparkly, shiny version that dominated kids’ books, comics and television for decades, as typified by Zane Grey stories and heroes such as Roy Rogers and Gene Autry… and the other stuff. That kind of cowboy tale – grimy, gritty, excessively dark – was done best for years by Europeans in such strips as Jean-Michel Charlier’s Lieutenant Blueberry or Bonelli & Galleppini’s Tex Willer which gradually made their way into US culture through the films of Sam Peckinpah and Sergio Leone. Jonah Hex is the USA’s greatest example of the latter sort…

DC (or National Periodicals as it then was) had generated a stable of clean-cut gunslingers since the collapse of the super-hero genre in 1949, with such dashing – and highly readable – luminaries as Johnny Thunder, The Trigger Twins, Nighthawk, Matt Savage and dozens of others in a marketplace that seemed insatiable in its voracious hunger for chaps in chaps. However, all things end, and by the early sixties, sagebrush stalwarts had dwindled to a few venerable properties. As the 1960s closed, thematic changes in the cinematic Cowboy filtered through to a comics industry suffering its second superhero sundown in twenty years. Although a critical success, the light-hearted Western series Bat Lash couldn’t garner a solid following, but DC, urgently pursuing a genre readers would warm to, retrenched and revived an old title, gambling once again on heroes who were no longer simply boy scouts with sixguns.

All-Star Western #1 was released with an August/September 1970 cover date, packed with Pow-Wow Smith reprints. It became an all-new anthology with the second bi-monthly issue. The magazine was allocated a large number of creative all-stars, including Robert Kanigher, Neal Adams, Gray Morrow, Al Williamson, Gil Kane, Angelo Torres and Dick Giordano, all working on such strips as Outlaw!, Billy the Kid and cult sleeper hit El Diablo, combining shoot-’em-up shenanigans with supernatural chills, in deference to the real hit genre that saved comics in those dark days: horror comics.

It wasn’t until the tenth issue and introduction of a grotesquely disfigured, irascible bounty hunter created by writer John Albano & Tony DeZuñiga that the company found its greatest and most enduring Western warrior.

This superb collection of the garish gunman’s early appearances has been around for a few years, with no apparent sign of a sequel yet, so consider this another heartfelt attempt to generate a few sales and more interest – especially as the company has recently released a collection of those aforementioned 70s western treats in its DC Finest range…

Our star is the very model of the modern anti-hero. Jonah Hex first appeared in All-Star Comics #10, a coarse and callous bounty hunter clad in shabbily battered Confederate Grey tunic and hat, half his face lost to some hideous past injury; a brutal thug little better than the scum he hunted – and certainly a man to avoid…

Collecting key stories from All-Star Western #10, Weird Western Tales #14, 17, 22, 26, 29, 30 and Jonah Hex #2 & 4 (ranging from March 1972 to September 1977), the grisly gunplay begins with Albano & DeZuñiga’s ‘Welcome to Paradise’ which introduced the character and his world in a powerful action thriller, with a subtle sting of sentimentality that anyone who has seen the classic western Shane cannot fail to appreciate.

From the first bullets blazing, blistering set-up Albano was constantly hinting at the tortured depths hidden behind Hex’s hellishly scarred visage and deadly proficiency. With the next issue the comic had been re-titled Weird Western Tales (aligning it with the company’s highly successful horror/mystery books) and adventures continually plumbed the depths of human malice and depravity…

Even at the very start the series sought to redress some of the most unpalatable motifs of old style cowboy literature and any fan of films like Soldier Blue or Little Big Man or familiar with Dee Brown’s iconoclastic book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee will feel a grim sense of vicarious satisfaction and redress at most of the stories here. There’s also a huge degree of world-weary cynicism that wasn’t to be found in other comics until well past the Watergate Scandal, when America as nation lost its social and political innocence…

From Weird Western #14, ‘Killers Die Alone!’ (Albano & DeZuñiga) is a vicious tear jerker of a tale where Hex’s only friend valiantly dies to save him from the vengeance of killers who blame the bounty hunter for their brother’s death. Then comes a reckoning that is the stuff of nightmares. ‘The Hangin’ Woman’ (WWT #17) is a classy, gripping thriller wherein Hex runs afoul of a sadistic harridan ruling her hometown with hemp and hot lead before meeting an ending both ironic and much-deserved…

It was left to incoming writer Michael Fleisher (assisted at first by Russell Carley) to reveal Hex’s secrets, beginning with Weird Western Tales #22’s ‘Showdown at Hard Times’. A chance meeting in a stagecoach put a cabal of ex-Confederate soldiers on the trail of their ex-comrade for some unspecified earlier betrayal and it inevitably ended in a sixgun bloodbath, whilst creating an ominous returning nemesis for the grizzled gunslinger.

Train-robbers were the bad guys in the superb traditionally-informed caper ‘Face-Off with the Gallagher Boys!’ – scripted by Fleischer and illustrated by the inimitable Doug Wildey – after which further details of Jonah’s chequered past are revealed in #29’s ‘Breakout at Fort Charlotte’, limned by Noly Panaligan. It was the first chapter of a 2-part extravaganza that gorily concluded in #30 with ‘The Trial’ (illustrated by George Moliterni) as a battalion of Confederate veterans and former comrades-in-arms pass judgement on the man they believed to be the worst traitor in the history of the South…

Inevitably, Hex graduated from Weird Western Tales into his own solo title and the final brace of tales in this primal primer are both drawn by the magnificent José Luis García-López. In ‘The Lair of the Parrot!’, Fleischer has the doom-drenched demon-faced desperado sucked into a scheme designed by US Secret Service agent Ned Landon to infiltrate the gang of flamboyant Mexican bandit and border raider El Papagayo. Hex is none too happy when he finally realises Landon is playing both sides for personal gain, leaving the bounty hunter to the brigand’s tender mercies after framing him for murder in Texas…

The tale continues and concludes in ‘The Day of the Chameleon!’ as a disguise artist steals Hex’s identity to perpetrate even more brazen crimes at the behest of a rich and powerful man determined to destroy the bounty hunter at all costs…

Happily, Jonah has unsuspected allies determined to save him from the villain and his own prideful, stubborn nature…

With a cover gallery by DeZuñiga, Luis Dominguez and García-López, this outrageous assemblage of uncanny exploits proves Jonah Hex is the most unique character in cowboy comics: darkly comedic, riotously rowdy, chilling and cathartically satisfying. His saga is a Western for those who despise the form whilst being the perfect modern interpretation of a great storytelling tradition. No matter what your reading preference, this is a collection you don’t want to miss.
© 1972-1975, 1977, 2010 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

Today in 1886 Bud Fisher’s Mutt and Jeff “ghost” Arthur “Bugs” Baer was born, as was Blondie’s originator Chic Young in 1901. In 1908 picture story pioneer Wilhelm Busch, creator of Max and Moritz died. In 1915 the inimitable Dick Breifer was born – and you should go look at Frankenstein: The Mad Science of Dick Briefer – for what you need to know there. Writer-Artist for The Heap, GI Joe and other Golden Age standards, Ernie Schroeder was born in 1916 and in 1938 Raggedy Ann & Raggedy Andy and Mr Twee Deedle creator Johnny Gruelle died.

In 1953, Hugo Pratt & Héctor Germán Oesterheld’s Sergeant Kirk debuted in Argentinian weekly comic Misterix #225.

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Bernet


By Jordi Bernet & various, edited by Manual Auad (Auad Publishing)
ISBN: 978-0-96693-812-8 (HB)

In anticipation of the impending Legend Testers collection from Rebellion Studios expected next week, here’s a glance at a translated treat from a bygone era confirming why you should adore this graphic genius as much as I do. It’s well worth the search and I’ll be cribbing from it heavily when I get around to the turbulent time troubleshooters themselves…

When you’re a life-long thrill-starved kid enchanted by comics, the first stage of development is slavishly absorbing everything good, bad and indifferent. Then comes the moment that you see subtle nuances which inexplicably makes some features favourites whilst others become simply filler.

I first recognised Jordi Bernet’s work on UK thriller serial The Legend Testers… and by “recognised” I mean the very moment I first discerned that somebody actually drew the stuff I was mesmerised by, and that it was better than the stuff either side of it. This was 1966 when British comics were mostly monochrome and never had signatures or credits, so it was years before I knew who had sparked my interest.

Jordi Bernet Cussó was born in Barcelona in 1944, son of a prominent, successful humour cartoonist. When his father died suddenly Jordi, aged 15, took over his father’s strip Doña Urraca (Mrs. Magpie). A huge fan of Alex Raymond, Hal Foster and especially expressionist genius Milton Caniff, Jordi yearned for less restrictive horizons and left Spain in the early 1960s and moved into dramatic storytelling.

He worked for Belgium’s Le Journal de Spirou, and Germany’s Pip and Primo, before finding a home in British weeklies. Bernet worked for UK publishers between 1964 and 1967, and as well as the Odhams/Fleetway/IPC anthologies Smash, Tiger and War Picture Library, also produced superb material for DC Thomson’s Victor and Hornet. He even illustrated a Gardner Fox horror short for Marvel’s Vampire Tales #1 in 1973, but mainstream America was generally denied his mastery (other than a few translated Torpedo volumes and a Batman short story) until the 21st century reincarnation of Jonah Hex which he truly made his own…

His most famous strips include thrillers Dan Lacombe (written by his uncle Miguel Cussó), Paul Foran (scripted by José Larraz) the saucy Wat 69 and spectacular post-apocalyptic barbarian epic Andrax (both with uncle Cussó again). When fascist dictator Franco died, Bernet returned to Spain and began working for Cimoc, Creepy and Metropol, collaborating with Antonio Segura on the sexy adult fantasy Sarvan and the dystopian SF black comedy Kraken, and with Enrique Sánchez Abuli on the gangster and adult themes tales that have made him one of the world’s most honoured artists. These culminated on the incredibly successful crime saga Torpedo 1936.

This magnificent commemoration of his career thus far spans those years when he first echoed his father’s style through to the sleek minimalist, chiaroscuric, emphatic line economy that drills into readers hindbrains like hot lead from a smoking 45. Also on view, as well as the violence there’s ample example of his sly, witty (and just as hot!) sex comedy material. Bernet is an absolute master of the female form and his adult material – created with Carlos Trillo – such as Custer, Clara De Noche and Cicca is truly remarkable and unforgettable.

This glorious deluxe hardback gathers together a vast quantity of covers; book illustrations; sketches; drawings, pin-ups &studies; advertising work and that Batman stuff, with a separate chapter on Bernet’s Beauties, a biography (which could, I must admit, have done with one last proof-read before going to press) and full checklisting of his works and awards. There are heartfelt artistic contributions and tributes from some of his vast legion of fans: Will Eisner, Joe Kubert, Jordi Langaron, Carlos Nine, Josep M. Bea, Luca Biagnini, Al Dellinges, Josep Toutain, Eduardo Risso, Horacio Altuna, Carlos Gimenez, Sergio Aragonés, Carlos Trillo, Juan Gimenez and Hobie MacQuarrie, but the true delights here are the 16 complete stories – Torpedo 1936, Sarvan, Custer, Clara De Noche and Kraken – as well as westerns, war stories, comedies and crime thrillers.

This is an incredible tribute to an incredible creator, and one no artist with professional aspirations can afford to miss, but parents be warned – there’s lots of nudity and violence beautifully depicted here – so be sure to read it yourselves first. Just in case…
All art and characters © 2009 their respective copyright holders. All Rights Reserved.

Today in 1955, sleek design master/airbrush aviation nut Ken Steacy was born, and we lost master craftsmen Victor (Redbeard, Buck Danny) Hubinon in 1979 and Bernard Krigstein in 1990. If you read nothing else by “Krig”, go find “Master Race” (Impact Comics #1, April 1955) and learn something important…

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Invincible Iron Man Epic Collection volume 7 (1976-1978): Ten Rings to Rule the World


By Bill Mantlo, Gerry Conway, Herb Trimpe, Roger Stern, George Tuska, Keith Pollard, Keith Giffen, Carmine Infantino, Jeff Aclin, Mike Esposito, Don Perlin, Jack Abel, Fred Kida, Alfredo Alcala, Rudy Nebres, Bruce Patterson, Josef Rubinstein, Bob Wiacek, Pablo Marcos, Don Newton & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-6059-9 (TPB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Arch-technocrat and supreme survivor Tony Stark has changed profile and rebuilt himself many times since debuting in Tales of Suspense #39 (March 1963). There and then, as a VIP visitor to Vietnam assessing the efficacy of 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 upon completion, Stark instead crafted the first of innumerable technologically-augmented protective 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…

Conceived after the Cuban Missile Crisis at a time when Western economies were booming and “Commie-bashing” was America’s obsession, a dashing new Thomas Edison employing Yankee ingenuity, wealth and invention to safeguard the Land of the Free and better the World seemed an obvious development. Combining 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, benevolent, rich, technocratic and all-conquering hero when clad in super-scientific armour – 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 myriad big business abuses new zeitgeists of the young, the Golden Avenger and Stark International were soon confronting some tricky questions from an increasingly politically savvy readership.

With glamour, money and fancy gadgetry not quite so cool anymore the questing voices of a new generation of writers began posing uncomfortable questions in the pages of a series that was once a bastion of militarised America. Collectively accommodating cover-dates November 1976 to October 1978, this Epic chronological epistle completes that transitional period, reprinting Iron Man #92-114, plus Annual #4 and a guest yarn from Marvel Premiere #44 as Bill Mantlo’s passionate writing triggered a minor renaissance in the Steel Sentinel’s chrome-plated chronicles that resulted in some of the best stories of the Eighties era. It also returned Iron Man to the top-rank of Marvel stars.

If you’re a fan thanks to the movie interpretation, that iteration starts right here, right now…

The mettle majesty opens with manic menace The Melter who soon regrets an ill-advised grudge rematch in ‘Burn, Hero… Burn!’ (Gerry Conway, George Tuska & Jack Abel) before Herb Trimpe returns to plot and pencil Iron Man #93. Pitting Old Shellhead against a British-based modern-day pirate in ‘Kraken Kills’ (Conway script & Abel inks), the self-declared Commander deduces Stark’s secret identity before blackmailing the inventor into building weapons for his super-submarine fleet. Never at a loss, though, Stark turns the tables, sparking ‘Frenzy at Fifty Fathoms!’ to scupper the madman’s plans…

Invincible Iron Man Annual #4 (August 1977) offers an all-action alliance with newly constituted super-team The Champions by Mantlo, Tuska & inker Don Perlin. When psychic assassin M.O.D.O.K. overwhelms the Golden Avenger, Iron Man calls in old allies Black Widow and Hercules (plus teammates Ghost Rider, Iceman, Darkstar and The Angel) to thwart ‘The Doomsday Connection!’

Also from that issue comes an out-of-place martial arts vignette by Roger Stern, Jeff Aclin & Don Newton. ‘Death Lair!’ stars former Master of Kung Fu villain Midnight on a mission of murder against old Iron Man enemy Half-Face…

The regular monthly climb to reclaimed pole position resumes with veteran Iron Man artist Tuska joining plotter Conway, scripter Mantlo and inker Perlin in unleashing giant android ‘Ultimo!’ (IM #95, cover-dated February 1977) against Washington DC. Clad in upgraded armour and in the Capitol to answer congressional questions about his company, Stark is targeted by a vengeful hidden nemesis who activates the mountainous monster for a classic B-movie sci fi rampage in the streets, with the Golden Avenger supplementing hard pressed Army and National Guard units… before falling in ignominious defeat due to sabotage…

Mantlo, Tuska & Abel prove you can’t keep a good Iron Man down as the embattled hero rallies and retaliates in ‘Only a Friend Can Save Him’ as former close ally and dutiful S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Jasper Sitwell joins the counterattack. Meanwhile, a long-simmering plotline advances as NYPD detective Michael O’Brien – who holds Stark responsible and accountable for the death of his brother Kevin – finally allows his obsession with a cover-up to pull him across legal lines and into collusion with shady PI Harry Key, whose latest client also has nasty plans for the playboy inventor…

Thanks to ingenuity and sheer guts, Stillwell & Iron Man seemingly destroy Ultimo deep below DC, but their triumph is short lived as a return to Stark’s Long Island factory provokes a ‘Showdown with the Guardsman!’ (Conway, Mantlo, Tuska & Perlin). When Mike takes PA Krissy Longfellow hostage, steals the armour suit that drove his brother insane and ambushes the Golden Avenger wearing it, the clash is swift and brutal. Thankfully this time, the blockbusting battle ends before another good man dies…

Whilst subsequently treating O’Brien, another distraction comes when an old frenemy attacks the facility and US interventionist economic practises. ‘Sunfire Strikes Again!’ sees the Japanese ultra-nationalist mutant warrior again seek to derail progress, unaware that he’s a pawn of the lurking presence gunning for Stark. However, the harried hero’s problems start with the fact that his greatest weapon is offline and he’s fighting in borrowed Guardsman armour. When the conflict frees imprisoned Michael O’Brien, the cop seeks to make amends by joining the battle in an obsolete Iron Man outfit, but – even with Mike Esposito inking – the new allies rapidly find themselves ‘At the Mercy of the Mandarin!’

During the melee, Key tries his luck in the Stark vaults once too often and encounters an unexpected problem, thanks to another insidious infiltrator planted by a different scheming mastermind. However, having freed himself, Tony is too now busy rushing to a far-distant, potentially world-ending final battle in anniversary issue #100. Invading China, Iron Man faces horrors, homunculi Death Squads, nuclear armageddon and his most obsessive enemy whose ‘Ten Rings to Rule the World!’ ultimately prove insufficient to the task…

With the tyrant’s countless plots to discredit Stark now exposed, our hero starts a long journey home, even as in Long Island, Harry Key, Sitwell and one of the traitors in Stark’s midst begin a cautious espionage dance…

Iron Man’s trip stalls when he’s shot down over Yugoslavia (just google it) and awakens in a creepy old castle filled with freaks and outcasts safeguarded by a familiar – to elderly or dedicated Marvelites at least – huge and daunting figure. Recovering in ‘Then Came the Monster!’ our weary voyager views Castle Frankenstein and panics: clashing with the gentle “Modern Prometheus” before the real menace emerges.

Inked by Esposito & Pablo Marcos, ‘Dreadknight and the Daughter of Creation!’ channels old Marvel horror tales as a brutal and brutalised escaped experiment of Doctor Doom’s laboratories seeks to compel the great granddaughter of Victor Frankenstein to share with him the secrets of creating life…

This ruthless high-tech paladin’s sadistic efforts are eventually thwarted by Iron Man and the original (good) Monster, after which the Steel-Shod Sentinel at last arrives home in #103’s ‘Run for the Money!’ by Mantlo, Tuska & Esposito. Sadly, it’s just in time for the next domestic crisis as Sitwell exposes the traitor only to be captured by revolting corporate villain Midas, who – patience exhausted – launches a truly hostile takeover using tanks, mercenaries, lawyers and the Stock Market…

He is temporarily checked by itinerant junior hero/innocent bystander Jack of Hearts who – as per standard Marvel protocol – is attacked by weary, late arriving Iron Man who misconstrues events and assaults the well-meaning stranger. Shock follows shock as Midas’ legal chicanery forces Iron Man’s surrender, ceding control of Stark International to his enemy, even as the villain’s agent and top lieutenant Madame Masque quits to ally herself with the defeated hero and his ousted, outmanoeuvred alter ego Tony Stark.

In the aftermath, repercussions of the takeover ripple outwards. With Stark no longer paying her bill, deeply disturbed super-telepath (and former Stark inamorata) Marianne Rodgers is kicked out of the sanatorium that has been keeping her psionic deadly tendencies in check…

The fightback begins in ‘Triad! (Mantlo, Tuska & Esposito) after Stark initially refuses the help of Masque. Thus she instead allies with former lover/patsy Sitwell whilst elsewhere, interested parties Michael O’Brien and Jack of Hearts also seek to stop Midas converting Stark’s purloined resources into a world-conquering armed force. Also heading slowly towards a showdown, Marianne graduates towards Long Island, leaving a trail of bodies in her wake…

With ‘Every Hand Against Him!’ and despite the stakes being so high, Tony has quit forever, preferring to hide in his father’s old house with Madame Masque. Less sanguine over the crisis and National Security threat, many of Iron Man’s allies join a volunteer force recruited by psychic superhero The Wraith and eventually consisting of Police Captain Jean de Wolf, former Iron Man stand-in Eddie March, The Guardsman & Jack of Hearts, covertly backed up by Sitwell and (the first) Nick Fury…

Still short of power, they co-opt through blackmail, Masque’s lethal skills and Tony’s last remaining armour suit to take out Midas. ‘Then There Came a War!’ (#106) sees the squad invade SI to face a legion of automated Iron Men. At the height of battle Marianne Rodgers – in a fugue state – finally reaches her destination. As Keith Pollard & Fred Kida step in to illustrate the catastrophic conclusion, ‘And, in the End…’ sees her power tip the scales, uncovering even more treachery in Tony’s inner circle and inspiring the despondent hero to take back his heritage, his company and his honour…

With most of his allies apparently dead, Iron Man calls in Avenging ally Yellowjacket (AKA original Ant-Man Henry Pym) to help whip up a miracle cure in #108 (Mantlo, Carmine Infantino & Bob Wiacek). This incurs some ‘Growing Pains!’ and a palate-cleansing action-filled monster-bash as the clear-up somehow reactivates Kang the Conqueror’s devastating Growing Man android to add to the wreckage and rubble…

Once the fighting is finished, rebuilding Stark International begins, with Mantlo, Infantino & Kida dictating the pace prior to another crisis after Jack of Hearts traces the Growing Man’s programming commands as emanating from Luna. Thus Iron Man and his superhero apprentice board a Quinjet and experiences a very painful ‘Moonrise!’ when their mission intersects a secret sortie by Soviet Super-soldiers Darkstar, Vanguard & Crimson Dynamo. The Communist cosmonauts are only investigating a bizarre alien artefact, but entrenched political and personal animosities spark a savage clash. Both sides are preoccupied when the silver egg activates, transporting those closest to it – the Americans – to somewhere far, far away…

Mantlo, Pollard & Kida stretch their fantasy muscles in an astral epic as the heroes materialise aboard a vast ship bearing Colonizers of Rigel to their next conquest. Sadly, these ‘Sojourners Through Space!’ have targeted Wundagore II – used by animal-enhancing man-made deity the High Evolutionary to store former experiments – and are soon caught up in a battle against formidable space Knights of Wundagore and two devastating late-arriving, quickly escaping human captives within their colossal Command ship…

When an alliance of humans and hyper-evolved Earth beasts proves too costly, the Rigellian venture is called off in ‘The Man, the Metal, and the Mayhem!’  but this in turn leads to renegade Colonizer subcommander Arcturus spitefully targeting Earth with a robot stolen from Galactus (the original Punisher from Fantastic Four #48-50). Upon its despatch, closing instalment ‘Moon Wars!’ (IM #112, July 1978 by Mantlo, Pollard & Alfredo Alcala) sees a swift, unauthorised Colonizer strike prompt a desperate dash back to Luna and shattering descent to Detroit for Iron Man, resulting in blistering battle with the cosmic weapon of chastisement and a new definition of the word “invincible” for the triumphant Golden Avenger…

With Mantlo scripting, Pollard layout pages and Trimpe’s pencilling for inker Josef Rubinstein, Iron Man #113 trumpeted a fresh beginning for Stark International after defeating the bloody takeover bid of Mr Midas. However, as the new complex opened for business, an old enemy is already infiltrating the company whilst a more brazen assault comes after a dying foe is manipulated into attacking the complex using ‘The Horn of the Unicorn!’

Seeking help for the beaten-and-at-death’s door Unicorn, the Metal Marvel consults The Avengers and inadvertently triggers a second assault by the villain who also activates a long-interred robotic threat that seems agonisingly familiar in ‘The Menace of… Arsenal!’ (Mantlo, Giffen & Bruce D. Patterson) leading to a turning point moment you’ll need the next book or another collection to enjoy…

To Be Continued…

Here, however, one last narrative nubbin comes from Marvel Premiere #44 (October 1978): the one-shot try-out of Stark’s former apprentice, by Mantlo, Giffen & Rudy Nebres). ‘The Jack of Hearts!’ reexamines the origin of trust fund brat Jack Hart, who was inundated in the experimental “zero fluid” invented by his murdered father. Seemingly resurrected and imbued with incredible energy and computational powers, Jack hunts The Corporation who ordered the hit and here – thanks to new connection in S.H.I.E.L.D. – inconclusively clashes with their preferred hitman Hemlock…

With covers throughout by Jack Kirby, Al Milgrom, Abel, Ron Wilson, Dan Adkins, Gil Kane, Dave Cockrum, Sal Buscema, Jim Starlin, Val Mayerik, George Pérez, Terry Austin, Frank Giacoia, Joe Sinnott, Joe Rubinstein, John Byrne, Wiacek, Pollard, John Romta Jr., Ed Hannigan & Frank Giacoia, other extras include house ads, cartoon fan letter ‘Printed Circuits’ (by Fred Hembeck from #112); editorial pages and style sheets from Marvel Premiere #44 and original art covers by Starlin, Mayerik & Cockrum.

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 perfect partnership with magic metal remains. These Fights ‘n’ Tights classics are amongst the most underrated but impressive tales of the period and are well worth your time, consideration and cold hard cash
© 2025 MARVEL.

You’d think we barely have room for a review this time as it’s such an auspicious day for comics…

In 1912 today creepy cartoon colossus Charles Addams was born, and in 1929 both Buck Rogers by Dick Calkins and Hal Foster’s Tarzan strips debuted. In 1934 Alex Raymond & Don Moore launched Jungle Jim and a year later combined it with new idea Flash Gordon.

Underground and Mad magazine artist Jay Lynch was born in 1945 and two years later Milton Caniff premiered his other masterpiece with the launch of Steve Canyon. That ran until 1988.

In 1953, Bob Wiacek joined the party as did Karl Kesel in 1959, and publisher Fabrice Giger (Les Humanoïdes Associés) arrived in 1965. Surely by coincidence, two years after, that nativity was followed by the launch of Greg & Eddie Paape’s Luc Orient in Le Journal de Tintin.

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Lone Wolf and Cub volume 1: The Assassins Road


By Kazuo Koike & Goseki Kojima, translated by Dana Lewis (Dark Horse Manga)
ISBN: 978-1-56971-502-4 (TPB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Best known in the West as Lone Wolf and Cub, the epic Samurai saga created by Kazuo Koike & Goseki Kojima is a global classic of comics literature. An example of the hugely popular Chanbara (“sword-fighting”) genre of print and screen, Kozure Okami was serialised in Weekly Manga Action from September 1970 until April 1976. It was an immense and overwhelming Seinen (“Men’s manga”) hit. Those tales quickly prompted thematic companion series Kubikiri Asa (Samurai Executioner) which ran from 1972-1976, but the major draw and main attraction – at home and, increasingly, abroad – was always the nomadic wanderings of doomed noble Ōgami Ittō and his solemn silent child Daigoro: framed by family rivals, dishonoured by the Shōgun and condemned to death by his peers. Breaching all etiquette, the court executioner refused to suicide quietly and instead opted to vengefully walk the bloody road to Meifumadō: the hell of Buddhist legend…

Revered and influential, Kozure Okami was followed after years of supplication by fans and editors by sequel Shin Lone Wolf & Cub (illustrated by Hideki Mori). The serial even spawned – through Koike’s indirect participation – science fiction homage Lone Wolf 2100 by Mike Kennedy & Francisco Ruiz Velasco.

The original saga has been successfully adapted to most other media, spawning movies, plays, TV series (plural), games and merchandise. The property is notoriously still in pre-production in Hollywood.

The several thousand pages of enthralling, exotic, intoxicating narrative art produced by the legendary creators eventually filled 28 collected volumes, beguiling generations of readers in Japan and, inevitably, the world. More importantly, their philosophically nihilistic odyssey – with its timeless themes and iconic visuals – has influenced hordes of other creators. The many manga, comics, movies, TV and animated versions these stories have inspired around the globe are utterly impossible to count. Frank Miller, who illustrated the cover of this edition, referenced the series in Daredevil, his dystopian opus Ronin, The Dark Knight Returns and Sin City. Max Allan Collins’ Road to Perdition is a proudly unashamed tribute to the masterpiece of vengeance-fiction. Stan Sakai has superbly spoofed, pastiched and celebrated the wanderer’s path in his own epic Usagi Yojimbo, and children’s cartoon shows like Samurai Jack are direct descendants of this astounding achievement of graphic narrative. The material has become part of a shared global culture.

In the West, we first saw the translated tales in 1987 as 45 Prestige Format editions from First Comics. That innovative trailblazer foundered before getting even a third of the way through the vast canon, after which Dark Horse Comics acquired the rights, systematically reprinting and translating the entire epic into 28 tank?bon-style editions of around 300 pages each. Once the entire epic was translated (between September 2000 & December 2002) it was all placed online through the Dark Horse Digital project.

Following a cautionary ‘Note to Readers’ – on stylistic interpretation – this moodily magnificent monochrome missal truly gets underway, retaining many terms and concepts western readers may find unfamiliar. Therefore this lean, mean, martial edition offers at the close a Glossary providing detailed context on the term used in the stories, plus profiles of author Koike Kazuo & illustrator Kojima Goseki and the first instalment of ‘The Ronin Report’: an occasional series of articles offering potted history essays on the period of the Tokugawa Shogunate, with Tim Ervin starting the ball rolling here.

Of course, the true meat is the captivating, grimly compelling combination of revenge fable and action-adventure which opens here with intriguing episodes of stripped-down mystery, gripping intensity and galvanic bloodletting as the first tale introduces a scruffy indigent pushing a homemade bamboo pram with a 3-year-old boy in it. A banner on the contraption proclaims ‘Son for Hire, Sword for Hire’ and, as the man stoically ignores mockery and derision from louts on the road, his promotional ploy attracts the attention of four deadly men who have been warned of an assassin carrying his baby boy with him…

A basic formula informs early episodes: the acceptance of a commission to kill an impossible target necessitates the forging of a cunning plan and relentless determination leads to inevitable success: all underscored with bleak philosophical musings alternately informed by Buddhist teachings in conjunction with or in opposition to the unflinching personal honour code of Bushido…

You won’t learn it until the end of this tome, but the fore-doomed killer-wanderer was once the Shogun’s official executioner: capable of cleaving a man in half with one stroke. An eminent individual of esteemed imperial standing, elevated social position and impeccable honour, Ōgami Ittō lost it all and now roams feudal Japan as a doomed soul, hellbent for the dire, demon-haunted underworld of Meifumadō. When the noble’s wife was murdered and his clan dishonoured due to the machinations of the treacherous and politically ambitious Yagyu Clan, the Emperor ordered Ōgami to commit suicide.

Instead, he rebelled, choosing to become a despised Ronin (masterless samurai) and assassin, pledging to revenge himself on the traitors until they were all dead or Hell claimed him. His son, toddler Daigoro, also chose the way of the sword and together they roam the grim and evocative landscapes of feudal Japan, one step ahead of doom and with death behind and before them. Frequently, the infallible assassin’s best ploy is to allow himself to be captured, endure unimaginable torture and then fight his way out having slaughtered his target…

The tactic is again employed in ‘A Father Knows His Child’s Heart, As Only a Child Can Know His Father’s’, with the wolf despatching willing Daigoro to penetrate the unyielding defences of Takai Han so Papa can kill a dishonourable usurper…

Another aspect of Ōgami’s methodology emerges in ‘From North to South, From West to East’. The assassin always insists on a personal interview with every client, demanding not only who is to die, but why. Perhaps the cautious killer only wants to know the extent of what he’s getting into, but we know he’s judging: seeing whether the target deserves death… or if the client does…

The legend of the Lone Wolf and Cub quickly spreads, and when faithful guards briefly hire Daigoro to help their beloved mistress, it is with full knowledge of what the boy’s father is. In ‘Baby Cart on the River Styx’ that knowledge is crucial to Ōgami’s plan for quashing a gang turf-war before it begins, even whilst bringing down a corrupt yet untouchable lord. Shocking for us may be the accepted conceit that father is fully prepared to sacrifice son to compete the mission, fulfil his promises and uphold his word. ‘Suio School Zanbato’ sees the boy willingly become hostage to fortune so his dad can lure a swords-master – and all his honourless students – into an officially sanctioned duel, killing all without legal ramifications or repercussions.

Lyrically twisting the theme of star-crossed lovers, ‘Waiting for the Rains’ sees him befriend a dying woman even as his father stoically anticipates completing his next commission: expunging the man she so patiently awaits…

These stories are deeply metaphorical and work on multiple cultural levels most of us westerners just won’t grasp on first reading – even with contextual aid provided by the bonus features. That only makes them more exotic and fascinating. Also a little unsettling is the even-handed treatment of women in the tales. Within the confines of the notoriously stratified society depicted, women – from servants to courtesans, prostitutes to highborn ladies – are all fully rounded characters, with their own motivations and drives. The wolf’s female allies are valiant and dependable, and his foes, whether targets or mere enemy combatants in his path, are treated with professional respect by Ōgami. He kills them just as if they were men…

In ‘Eight Gates of Deceit’ the indomitable nomad is ambushed by an octet of female assassins hired by his latest client who foolishly chooses to discount the professional honour of his hireling in favour of clearing up loose ends. It’s his last mistake…

‘Wings to the Birds, Fangs to the Beast’ finds the tireless wanderer stumbling into a hot-spa village recently taken over by bandits. To their eternal cost, and despite the newcomer’s every forbearing effort, the human beasts refuse to believe the man with the baby wants no trouble…

This stunning opening collection ends with a few of the answers readers want as the scene shifts to the recent past at the Shogun’s palace in Edo for an origin. There, thanks to political manoeuvrings of ambitious nefarious Lord Yagyu, Shogun’s Executioner Ōgami Ittō has been ousted and his entire clan disgraced. With his wife Asami dead, the austere warrior outwits his opponent – who assumed honourable suicide the only option he’d left his enemy – by opting to travel ‘The Assassin’s Road’ with his baby son momentously choosing to follow him to Meifumadō or victory…

Whichever English transliteration you prefer – Wolf and Baby Carriage is what I was first introduced to – the grandiose, thought-provoking hellbent Samurai tragedy created by Kazuo Koike & Goseki Kojima is without doubt one of those all too rare breakthrough classics of comics literature. A breathtaking tour de force, these are comics you must not miss.
© 1995, 2000 Kazuo Koike & Goseki Kojima. All other material © 2000 Dark Horse Comics, Inc. Cover art © 2000 Frank Miller. All rights reserved.

Today in 1916 lettering legend Artie Simek was born and in Italy in 1953 Dylan Dog cocreator Angelo Stano arrived, whilst 2000 saw the end of an era as Mad mastermind Don Martin died.

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Spirou and Fantasio volume 9: The Dictator and the Mushroom


By André Franquin, translated by Jerome Saincantin (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-84918-267-6 (album PB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Another anniversary I just couldn’t leave unremarked upon. Deal with it. I’m old, morose and accursed with nostalgia.

André Franquin was born in Etterbeek, Belgium on January 3rd 1924 and died on January 5th 1997. In between there were good times and bad, which he offset by creating the most incredible characters and stories, and by making people laugh and think – but mostly laugh. This is one of the very best you can find translated into English.

Adventure-seeking kid Spirou headlined the magazine he was named for from the first issue (dated April 21st 1938). He was created by French cartoonist Françoise Robert Velter using his pen-name Rob-Vel for Belgian publisher Éditions Dupuis in direct response to the success of Hergé’s Tintin for rival outfit Casterman. Originally a plucky bellboy/lift operator employed by the Moustique Hotel (a sly reference to the publisher’s premier periodical Le Moustique), his improbable exploits with pet squirrel Spip gradually grew into high-flying, far-reaching and surreal comedy dramas. That evolution was mainly thanks to Velter’s wife Blanche “Davine” Dumoulin who took over the strip when her husband enlisted in 1939 and Belgian artist assistant Luc Lafnet… at least until 1943 when Dupuis purchased all rights to the property, after which comic-strip prodigy Joseph Gillain (Jijé) took the helm.

Our interest really begins when Jijé handed his own trainee assistant complete responsibility for the flagship strip part-way through Spirou et la maison préfabriqué, (Le Journal de Spirou #427, June 20th 1946). Andre Franquin ran with it for two decades; enlarging the scope and horizons until it became purely his own. Almost every week fans would meet startling new characters such as comrade/rival Fantasio or crackpot inventor and Merlin of mushroom mechanics the Count of Champignac.

Spirou and Fantasio became globe-trotting journalists, travelling to exotic places, uncovering crimes, exploring the fantastic and clashing with a coterie of exotic arch-enemies such as Zorglub and Fantasio’s unsavoury cousin Zantafio. Incidentally, eerily-relevant The Dictator and the Mushroom features the second appearances of Zantafio and strong, capable, female (!) rival journalist Seccotine (renamed Cellophine for these English translations)…

Franquin, plagued in later life by bouts of depression, passed away in 1997 but his legacy remains; a vast body of work which reshaped the landscape of European comics.

Here then as originally serialised in LJdS #801-838, between 1953 and 1954 before subsequently being released on the continent in 1956 as hardcover album Spirou et Fantasio 7 – Le Dictateur et Le Champignon, this epic episode begins as globe-trotting troubleshooter Spirou and his short-tempered reporter pal Fantasio approach the isolated home of eccentric inventor Count Champignac. They are resolved to return the mischievous miracle monkey Marsupilami to its natural habitat in the jungles of Palombia…

Sadly, whilst they discuss their plan with the elderly savant, the mischievous monkey he’s been safeguarding swipes the inventor’s latest mycoprotein marvel and heads for town…

Champignac calls the gaseous form of his newest mushroom extract “metalsoft” and that’s exactly what the stuff does: reduce the solidity of iron, brass, bronze, tin or whatever to the consistency of hot wax. By the time the prankish primate has finished innocently playing with the pump dispenser, locals are in uproar and their village is practically a puddle…

With nobody in Europe objecting, the lads promptly book passage on a South America-bound cruise ship, where once again the elastic-tailed terror causes a cacophony of comedic chaos. Eventually, though, our increasingly irate and exhausted adventurers at last head in-country towards sleepy Palombia where a big surprise is waiting for them…

Thanks to Marsupilami, they are forced to travel the last ten miles to capital city Chiquito on foot and are astonished to observe the sheer number of military vehicles constantly overtaking them. In the city, an altercation with soldiers leads to their arrest and interview with new supreme dictator General Zantas. The meeting is both a huge shock and unhappy reunion…

Fantasio’s cousin Zantafio had been only a little mean and perhaps misguided when they were all first hunting for the Marsupilami, but since then has reinvented himself, graduating into a full-blown murderous megalomaniac. A cheap thug in a flashy uniform, he is determined to carve himself a bloody empire and vast wealth through the conquest of his national neighbours. Moreover, Zantafio/Zantas wants his countrymen and cousin to join him in the campaign of conquest, a horrific demand the reporters initially refuse.

Locked in jail, Spirou & Fantasio ponder how to stop the murderous scheme and realise the perfect counter to Zantas’ burgeoning war machine is Champignac’s Metalsoft. All they have to do is get a message to the inventor and have him send enough of the wonder stuff to destroy the ever-expanding army…

Thus they apparently switch sides and are soon installed as high ranking officers. Of course, Zantafio is no fool and sets his most cunning spy to watch them; just waiting for the moment when they betray themselves.

It’s not our heroes’ first rodeo either and, aware of their shadow, the lads engage in a prolonged and hilarious game of cat-&-mouse with the spook, all the while fretting that D-Day is approaching and they still haven’t been able to smuggle out a message…

A solution presents itself when go-getting journalist Cellophine makes contact. She’s been secretly covering the crisis for ages – without being caught like her mere male rivals – and offers to ferry the request for Metalsoft to Champignac ASAP…

Things aren’t all going Zantafio’s way. Even though weapons dealers are frantically auditioning their death-dealing wares for the General, Colonels Spirou & Fantasio are especially diligent and somehow able to find dangerous faults in everything on offer…

And then one night Cellophine sneaks back into Palombia with the secret weapon which will end Zantas’ dreams of empire…

Following a fantastical fight with the mushroom-gas-wielding trio battling an entire modern military, and a tense yet inconclusive showdown with Zantafio, peace and democracy break out and the boys finally complete their original mission. Having at last safely returned the Marsupilami to his natural wilderness, Spirou & Fantasio wearily head back to civilisation, content in the knowledge that the lovable little perisher is back where he belongs.

Of course, the pestilential primate has his own ideas on the matter…

Stuffed with superb slapstick situations, riotous chases and gallons of gags, but barely concealing a strongly satirical anti-war message, this exuberant yarn is a joyous example of angst-free action, thrills and spills. Easily accessible to readers of all ages and drawn with beguiling style and seductively wholesome élan, this is an enduring comics treat from a long line of superb exploits, deserving to be as much a household name as that other kid reporter and his dog…
Original edition © Dupuis, 1956 by Franquin. All rights reserved. English translation 2015 © Cinebook Ltd.

Today in 1941 mangaka/anime director Hayao Miyazaki (Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind) was born, and two years later so was street level/underground commix crafter Roger (Eerie, Tales of Sex and Death, Yellow Dog) Brand. In 1957 Brick Bradford cartoonist Clarence Gray died, as did André Franquin in 1997, and in 2000, master mangaka Goseki Kojima famed and missed for such wonders as Kozure Okami (Lone Wolf and Cub), Kubikiri Asa (Samurai Executioner) and Hanzo no Mon (Path of the Assassin).

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The Phantom: The Complete Newspaper Dailies volume 1 1936-1937


By Lee Falk & Ray Moore: introduction by Ron Goulart (Hermes Press)
ISBN: 978-1-932563-41-5 (HB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

There are plenty of comics-significant anniversaries this year, and this guy is probably right at the top of the birthday cake. As next month sees his 90th anniversary here’s tasty reminder of why he is considered one of our industry’s landmark figures.

For such a long-lived, influential series, in terms of compendia or graphic novel collections, The Phantom has been very poorly served by the English language market (except in Australia where he has always been accorded the status of a pop culture god). Numerous companies have sought to collect the strips – one of the longest continually running adventure serials in publishing history – but in no systematic or chronological order and never with any sustained success. At least the former issue began to be rectified with this initial curated collection from Archival specialists Hermes Press. This particular edition is a lovely large hardback (albeit also available in digital formats), printed in landscape format, displaying two days strip per page in black & white with ancillary features and articles in dazzling colour where required.

Born Leon Harrison Gross, Lee Falk created the Jungle Avenger at the request of his King Features Syndicate employers who were already making history, public headway and loads of money with his first strip sensation Mandrake the Magician. Although technically not the first ever costumed champion in comics, The Phantom’s instant popularity made him the prototype paladin as he was the first to wear a skin-tight body-stocking and have a mask with opaque eye-slits…

“The Ghost Who Walks” debuted on February 17th 1936 in an extended sequence pitting him against an ancient global confederation of pirates. Falk wrote and drew the daily strip for the first two weeks before handing over illustration to artist Ray Moore. A spectacular and hugely influential Sunday feature began in May 1939. In a text feature stuffed with sumptuous visual goodies like movie posters; covers for comics, Feature and Little Big Books plus many kinds of merchandise, Ron Goulart’s eruditely enticing ‘Introduction: Enter the Ghost Who Walks’ tells all you need to know about the character’s creation before the vintage magic begins with ‘Chapter 1: The Singh Brotherhood’.

American adventurer Diane Palmer returns to the USA by sea, carrying a most valuable secret making her the target of mobsters, sleazy society ne’er-do-wells and exotic cultists. Thankfully, she seems to have also attracted an enigmatic guardian angel who calls himself the Phantom…

Successive attacks and assaults endanger the dashing debutante, and she learns an ancient brotherhood of ruthless piratical thieves wants her secret, but that they have been opposed for centuries by one man. Kidnapped and held hostage at the bottom of the sea, Diana is saved by the mystery man who naturally falls in love and eventually shares an incredible history with her…

In the 17th century a British sailor survived an attack by pirates, and – washing ashore on the African coast – swore on the skull of his murdered father to dedicate his life and that of his descendants to destroying all pirates and criminals. The Phantom fights crime and injustice from a base deep in the jungles of Bengali, and throughout Africa is known as the Ghost Who Walks. His unchanging appearance and unswerving war against injustice have led to him being considered an immortal avenger by the credulous and the wicked. Down the decades, one hero after another has fought and died in an unbroken family line, and the latest wearer of the mask, indistinguishable from the first, continues the never-ending battle. And he’s looking to extend the line and the legend…

In the meantime, however, there’s the slight problem of Emperor of Evil Kabai Singh and his superstitious armies to deal with…

‘Chapter 2: The Sky Band’ (originally published from 9th November 1936 to April 10th 1937) finds the mystery avenger caught in love’s old game as a potential rival for Diana’s affections materialises in the rather stuffy form of career soldier Captain Meville Horton: a decent, honourable man who sadly knows when he’s outmatched, unwanted and in the way. Mistakenly determined to do the right thing too, our masked mystery man concentrates on destroying a squadron of thieving aviators targeting the burgeoning sky clipper trade: airborne bandits raiding passenger planes and airships throughout the orient. Initial efforts infuriatingly lead to the Phantom’s arrest: implicated in the sky pirates’ crimes, before escaping from police custody with the aid of his devoted “pygmy witch doctor” Guran and faithful Bandar tribe allies, he’s soon hot on the trail of the real mastermind…

Upon infiltrating their base, he discovers the airborne brigands are all women, and that his manly charms have driven a lethal wedge between the deadly commander and her ambitious second in command Sala…

A patient plaything of the manic Baroness, The Phantom eventually turns the tide not by force but by batting his invisible eyes and exerting his masculine wiles upon the hot-blooded – if certifiably psychopathic – harridan, unaware until too late that his own beloved, true-blue Diana is watching. When she then sets a trap for the Sky Band, it triggers civil war in the gang, a brutal clash with the British army and the seeming end of our hero, triggering Diana’s despondent decision to return alone to America…

‘Chapter 3: The Diamond Hunters’ opened on April 12th 1936 and revealed how the best laid plans can go awry. In Llongo territory, white prospectors Smiley and Hill unearth rich diamond fields but cannot convince or induce local tribes to grant them mineral rights to the gems they consider worthless. Like most indigenous Africans, they’re content to live comfortably under the “Phantom’s Peace” and it takes all the miners’ guile – including kidnapping a neighbouring chief’s daughter and framing the Llongo; gunrunning and claiming the Ghost Who Walks has died – to set the contented residents at each other’s throats. Recovering from wounds, the Phantom is slow to act, but when he does his actions are decisive and unforgettable…

With the plot foiled and peace restored, Smiley flees, only to encounter a returned Diana who has acted on news that her man still lives. Seeing a chance for revenge and profit, Smiley kidnaps “the Phantom’s girl”, provoking his being shunned by all who live in the region, a deadly pursuit and spectacular last-minute rescue. Smiley’s biggest and last mistake is reaching the coast and joining up with a band of seagoing pirates…

At least he is the catalyst for Diana and The Ghost finally addressing their romantic issues…

To Be Continued…

‘Afterword: For Those Who Came in Late…’ then sees editor Ed Rhoades offer his own thoughts on the strip’s achievements and accomplishments.

Stuffed with chases, assorted fights, torture, blood & thunder antics, daredevil stunts and many a misapprehension and coincidence – police and government authorities clearly having a hard time believing a pistol-packing masked man with a pet wolf might not be a bad egg – this a pure enthralling excitement that still packs a punch and plenty of sly laughs.
© 2010 King Features Syndicate, Inc.: ® Hearst Holdings, Inc.; reprinted with permission. All rights reserved.

Today in 1907, astounding illustrator Bruno (Doom Patrol, Teen Titans) Premiani was born, as was artist and inker Chic (Nemesis, Batman, all the best 1960s Thor, X-Men and FF stories) Stone in 1923.

In 1975 Archie co-creator Bob Montana died; and the day is infamous in the UK as the last day Buster was published. Kidding. Nobody noticed because we’d all stopped buying it. We are really sorry now though…

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Die Laughing


By Andre Franquin, translated by Jenna Allen (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-68396-091-1 (HB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times. This book includes Discriminatory Content included for dramatic effect.

Like so much in Franco-Belgian comics, it all starts with Le Journal de Spirou. The momentous magazine debuted on April 2nd 1938, with its engaging and eponymous lead strip created by Rob-Vel (Françoise Robert Velter). In 1943 publishing giant Dupuis purchased all rights to the comic and its titular star, after which comic-strip prodigy Joseph Gillain/Jijé took the helm. In 1946 Jijé’s assistant assumed the creative reins, gradually sidelining previously preferred gag vignettes in favour of extended adventure serials. He introduced a broad, engaging cast of regulars: adding to the mix phenomenally popular rare beast and animal marvel Marsupilami (first seen in Spirou et les héritiers in 1952 and eventually a spin-off star of screen, plush toy store, console games and albums in his own right).

The auteur continued crafting increasingly fantastic tales and absorbing Spirou sagas until his resignation in 1969. Throughout that period the creator was deeply involved in the production of the weekly Spirou comic and increasingly beset by depression and other mental health issues.

André Franquin was born in Etterbeek, Belgium on January 3rd 1924. Drawing from an early age, the lad began formal art training at École Saint-Luc in 1943 but only until the war forced the school’s closure a year later. He then found work at Compagnie Belge d’Animation in Brussels where he met Maurice de Bévère (Lucky Luke creator Morris), Pierre Culliford (Peyo, creator of The Smurfs and Benny Breakiron) and Eddy Paape (Valhardi, Luc Orient). In 1945 all but Peyo signed on with Dupuis, and Franquin began his career as a jobbing cartoonist/illustrator. He produced covers for Le Moustique and scouting magazine Plein Jeu. During those early days, Franquin and Morris were being tutored by Jijé, who was the main illustrator at Le Journal de Spirou. He turned the youngsters – and fellow neophyte Willy Maltaite (AKA Will of Tif et Tondu, Isabelle, Le jardin des désirs) – into a smoothly functioning creative bullpen known as La bande des quatre or “Gang of Four”. They later reshaped and revolutionised Belgian comics with their prolific and engaging “Marcinelle school” style of graphic storytelling…

Jijé handed Franquin all responsibilities for the flagship strip part-way through Spirou et la maison préfabriquée (Spirou #427, June 20th 1946). The kid ran with it for the next two decades; enlarging the scope and horizons of the feature until it became purely his own. Almost every week fans would meet startling new characters such as comrade/rival Fantasio or crackpot inventor and Merlin of mushroom mechanics the Count of Champignac.

Spirou & Fantasio became globe-trotting journalists, travelling to exotic places, uncovering crimes, exploring the fantastic and clashing with a coterie of exotic arch-enemies. However, throughout all that time Fantasio was still a full-fledged reporter for Le Journal de Spirou and had to pop into the office all the time. While there he conceived another landmark icon, a comedic foil/meta-real alter ego who was an accident-prone, big-headed junior in charge of minor jobs and dogs-bodying. He was Gaston Lagaffe and through him Franquin expressed his unruly dissident opinions and tendencies…

Gaston – who debuted in #985 (February 28th 1957) – grew to be one of the comic’s most popular and perennial components. In terms of entertainment schtick and delivery, older readers will certainly recognise beats of Jacques Tati; timeless elements of well-meaning self-delusion British readers will recognise from Some Mothers Do Have ‘Em or Mr Bean. It’s primal slapstick, paralysing puns, pomposity lampooned and no good deed going noticed, rewarded or unpunished…

In a splendid example of good practise, Franquin mentored his own band of apprentice cartoonists during the 1950s. These included Jean Roba (La Ribambelle, Boule et Bill/Billy and Buddy); Jidéhem (Sophie, Starter, Gaston Lagaffe) & Greg (Comanche, Bruno Brazil, Bernard Prince, Zig et Puce, Achille Talon), all co-workers with him on Spirou et Fantasio. In 1955, a contractual spat with Dupuis saw Franquin briefly enlist with rivals Casterman on Le Journal de Tintin, where he collaborated with René Goscinny and old pal Peyo whilst creating the fashion/lifestyle domestic comedy gag strip Modeste et Pompon. Franquin almost immediately patched things up with Dupuis and returned to Spirou, subsequently co-creating Gaston Lagaffe (known in Britain these days as Gomer Goof) in 1957, but was still obliged to carry on his Casterman commitments too…

From 1959, writer Greg and background artist Jidéhem assisted Franquin, but by 1969 the artist had reached his Spirou limit. He quit, taking his mystic yellow monkey with him.

Later creations include fantasy series Isabelle, illustration sequence Monsters and this arcane convergence of bleak gallows humour, adult conceptual nihilism and impassioned social and ideological frustration lensed through bitter comedy. If you’re aware of the later work of Spike Milligan, you’ll know what I mean. The strip and original series title Idées Noires has become linguistic common currency in French-speaking countries, as a term for gloomy or negative thoughts: dark ideas daily obsessing people in crisis expunged and expressed through strident manic humour…

It began as Franquin recuperated from a heart attack in 1975. Idées Noires was part of an insert comic – Le Trombone illustré – he & Yvan Delporte produced for weekly Le Journal de Spirou beginning in 1977 with the March 17th issue. After 30 mini-issues, and with the global situation looking increasingly fraught, a revitalised Franquin took the strip to mature reader magazine Fluide Glacial where it ran until 1983.Plagued throughout his life by depression, Franquin passed away on January 5th 1997, but his legacy remains: a vast body of work that reshaped the landscape of European comics. In 2018, Fantagraphics gathered and translated the strips, releasing them as Die Laughing.

As seen in Cynthia Rose’s erudite and informative Introduction – ‘Liberty, Audacity, Hilarity: André Franquin’ – the peripatetic feature gave the troubled genius room to address his allegiances with issues of environmentalism, animal cruelty, political duplicity and plain old human insanity, and strike back with the best weapons in his arsenal: sarcasm, mockery and despairing outrage.

To further demarcate the material from past works, the images were delivered in scratchy, shocking lines and solid blacks, with elements reversed out. It’s a world of silhouettes, deep shadows and brooding forward spaces and middle-grounds, with no extraneous detail: all delivered in eerie evocative, expressionist monochrome, rather than the shining, substantial Disney-inspired colour of Spirou and Marsupilami.

This compilation consists of half and full page shorts plus some longer strips lampooning and spearing smug pomposity, business greed, military-industrial chicanery and ruthlessness, planetary abuse such as inflicted by oil companies and the global arms race. There are many mordant observations on sport, war for profit, the death penalty (still the guillotine, for Pete’s sake!), alien abduction, the rat race; sheer random surreal absurdism, all skewered by a sense of cosmic justice acknowledged, if not satisfied…

A constant theme returned to with merciless regularity is bloodsports and the kind of arsehole who finds fun and feels magnified by pointless slaughter. Especially singled out are those French traditionalists (think of whatever the French have instead of our steadfast “Gammon” crowd) who simply must slaughter songbirds in their thousands every year as they migrate to and from Europe…

Franquin was a master of comedy in all its aspects from whimsically light to trenchantly black-edged. Come see how and why…

Die Laughing © 2018 by Fantagraphics Books, Inc. Comics © Editions Audie/Franquin Estate. All rights reserved. Introduction © 2018 by Cynthis Rose. Afterword © 2018 Gotlib Estate. All other images and text © 2018 their respective copyright holders. All rights reserved.

Today in 1911 DC writer/editor Murray Boltinoff was born, and in 1977 the newspaper strip Amazing Spider-Man by Stan Lee & John Romita Sr. began.

In 2005 we lost one of the true greats as Will Eisner finally put down his pens. As always, there are many places other than us to go learn more and read stuff. Do that then, yes?

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Blackmark – 30th Anniversary Edition


By Gil Kane, with Archie Goodwin, Harvey Kurtzman & Neal Adams (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-56097-456-7 (TPB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Gil Kane was one of the pivotal players in the development of the American comics industry, and indeed of the art form itself. Working as an artist, and an increasingly more effective and influential one, he drew for many companies since his 1940s debut: on superheroes, action, war, mystery, romance, movie adaptations and, perhaps most importantly, Westerns and Science Fiction tales. In the late 1950s Kane became one of editor Julius Schwartz’s key artists in regenerating the superhero. Yet by 1968, at the top of his (admittedly much denigrated) profession, this relentlessly revolutionary and creative man felt so confined by the juvenile strictures of the industry that he struck out on bold new ventures that jettisoned the editorial and format bondage of comic books for new visions and media.

His Name Is Savage was an adult-oriented black & white magazine about a cold and ruthless super-spy in the James Bond/Matt Helm/Man Called Flint mould, co-written by friend and collaborator Archie Goodwin. It was very much a precursor in tone, treatment and subject matter of many of today’s adventure titles.

The other venture, Blackmark (also with Goodwin), not only ushered in the comic book age of Sword and Sorcery, but also became one of the first Graphic Novels. Technically, as the series was commissioned by fantasy publisher Ballantine as eight volumes, it was also envisioned as America’s first comic Limited Series. Volume 1 was released in January 1971, with volume 2 just completed when the publisher cancelled the project. A generation Kane’s junior but a long term, seasoned collaborator, Roy Thomas reprinted those tales in Marvel’s monochrome magazines Savage Sword of Conan and Marvel Preview, with the artwork rejigged to accommodate the different page format.

That’s enough background. Blackmark tells the tale of a boy born into a war-ravaged, primitive future where atomic holocaust has resulted in a superstitious society that fears and shuns technology and science – like parts of the American Bible Belt. Similarly, feudal lords rule by might and terror, whilst rebel technophiles are hunted like dogs. One night, and when fleeing persecution, a married couple encounter a dying scientist-king who pays the woman to impregnate her with a son pre-programmed to be a messiah of science.

Blackmark is born into a life of poverty and toil. When his parents are killed by a wandering warlord he devotes his life to vengeance, and learns all the physical skills necessary when he is taken for a gladiator slave. It is (sadly) overwhelmingly familiar to us today, simply because it was so influential at the time – albeit with those few original purchasers who seem to have become the next generation of comics and literary creators.

Although the plot might seem old hat, the beauty and power of the illustration has never been matched. Kane designed the pages with blocks of text as part of the whole, rather than with willy-nilly blurb and balloons to distract the eye, and his evocative figure drawing has never been as taut, tense and passionate. Always suffering from deadline pressures, the artist called in colleagues Harvey Kurtzman & Neal Adams to help lay out and finish the project on time. The script, over Kane’s story, was provided by the incomparable Goodwin, as much a master as Kane himself; Nevertheless, Blackmark is very much quintessential Kane.

This compilation (incomprehensibly out of print and hard to find) collects original volumes 1 and 2 and presents them in a size far larger than the original standard paperback. As well as a fantasy masterpiece, and a spectacular comic romp, it preserves and presents a literal breakthrough in comic storytelling that should be on every fan’s must-read list.

And in bloody print…
© 2002 Fantagraphics Books & the estate of Gil Kane. All Rights Reserved.

Today in 1857 pioneering cartoon satirist and comic strip creator Frederick Burr Opper was born. He did Happy Hooligan, And Her Name Was Maud and Alphonse and Gaston and so have we, so go look back in wonder. In 1913 George McManus’ Bringing Up Father launched and charmed generations until 2000. Look for that too, but perhaps wonder why Red Ryder isn’t better represented here. After all its artist Fred Harman died today in 1982…

In comic books, unsung wonders Joe Certa (Martian Manhunter) and Don Heck (everything) were born in 1919 and 1929 respectively. In 1958 the utterly unique H. G. Peter passed away. He was still drawing Wonder Woman at the time. Less well known but just as dedicated, Kid Colt, Outlaw and drag racing comics illustrator Jack Keller passed on in 2003.