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The Archies & Josie and the Pussycats: Archie & Friends All Stars Series volume 8


By Dan Parent, Bill Galvan, Rick Koslowski & Jim Amash (Archie Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-879794-61-0

MLJ were a publisher who jumped on the “mystery-man” bandwagon following the debut of Superman with their own small but inspirational pantheon of gaudily clad crusaders, beginning in November 1939 with Blue Ribbon Comics, promptly followed by Top-Notch and Pep Comics. The content was the standard blend of costumed heroes, two-fisted adventure strips, prose pieces and gag panels.

After a few years Maurice Coyne, Louis Silberkleit and John Goldwater (hence MLJ) spotted a gap in their blossoming market. In December 1941 the costumed heroes and two-fisted adventure strips were nudged aside by a far less imposing hero, an “average teen” who would have ordinary adventures like the readers, but with the laughs, good times, romance and slapstick emphasised.

Pep Comics #22 introduced a gap-toothed, freckle-faced red-headed goof showing off to the pretty blonde next door. Taking his lead from the popular Andy Hardy matinee movies starring Mickey Rooney, Goldwater developed the concept of a youthful everyman protagonist, tasking writer Vic Bloom and artist Bob Montana with the job of making it work. The six-page tale entitled ‘Archie’ introduced goofy Archie Andrews and pretty girl-next-door Betty Cooper. Archie’s unconventional best friend and confidante Jughead Jones also debuted in that first story as did the small-town utopia of Riverdale.

The feature was an instant hit and by the winter of 1942 had won its own title. Archie Comics #1 was the company’s first non-anthology magazine and with it began the gradual transformation of the entire company. With the introduction of rich, raven-haired Veronica Lodge, all the pieces were in play for the comicbook industry’s second Genuine Phenomenon (Superman being the first).

By 1946 the kids had taken over, so the company renamed itself Archie Comics, retiring its heroic characters years before the end of the Golden Age and becoming to all intents and purposes a publisher of family comedies. Its success, like the Man of Steel’s, changed the content of every other publisher’s titles, and led to a multi-media industry including TV, movies, a chain of restaurants and in the swinging sixties a pop hit as “Sugar, Sugar” (a tune from their animated show) became a global smash. Their wholesome garage band “The Archies” has been a fixture of the comics ever since.

With such a successful format, naturally the company tried to add supplemental stars to their four-colour firmament, Wilbur Wilkins (1994), Suzie (1945), Ginger (1951) and Seymour, My Son (1963), with varying degrees of success. However another 1963 debut did catch and hold the readers attention. Her name was Josie and she was created by Dan DeCarlo as a veritable female clone of Archie.

With issue #45 (1967) the titian-haired ingénue and her best friend Melody formed a band and the title was changed to Josie and the Pussycats. Fame, stardom, a TV cartoon series, a major motion picture and two soundtrack albums later the band were only occasional visitors in the Archie universe until someone had a cunning idea…

Most of her supporting cast was introduced in the first issue, including best friend Pepper, boyfriend Albert… and Melody. Spoiled rich kids Alex and Alexandra Cabot soon joined the cast and the book changed its name with issue #45, and that it remained until the final issue in 1982.

One other fact about Archie’s publisher’s is that they certainly know how to create different publishing events that capture the attention of the general public – as anybody who saw the 1994 Archie Meets the Punisher inter-company crossover will attest…

The Archies & Josie and the Pussycats collects a storyline from 2009-2010 wherein ‘It Starts with a Kiss!’ as the two clean-living bands are signed to tour together, and our red-headed star and the Pussycats’ African-American bassist Valerie are drawn irresistibly together.

After a stolen kiss during a late-night song-writing session the attraction grows stronger in ‘More Than Words’ as hapless Archie tries to concentrate on his daily life – and Betty and Veronica – but can’t get Val off his mind. Moreover, the normally “sensible one” in Josie’s band is similarly distracted…

Luckily for all the tour soon ends and the girls are bound for Europe and a series of solo gigs, but the tearful farewell proves the attraction has grown into something far more serious. All the while the Pussycat’s rat-bag manager Alex Cabot has been trying to scotch the situation and now goes into overdrive in his scheming.

The 2-part ‘Love Smackdown!’ follows the separated and lovelorn Archie and Valerie as distance, daily drudgery, temptation and Alex all operate to keep them apart. After a misunderstanding leaves the couple acrimoniously separated forever events a new combined tour seems destined to rekindle the fire – but do Betty and Veronica want Archie for themselves or do they want him to be happy…?

Moreover, what’s the deal with Valerie’s old flame Declan McCord? He says he’s just a fill-in musician, but does the charismatic Celtic pop-star have plans to win Valerie back for himself…?

Star-crossed love and nigh-torrid melodrama combine with classic Riverdale slapstick in this delightful young romance that shows a burgeoning slice of maturity in the world’s favourite teenager (and don’t quibble: Justin Bieber has a limited shelf-life but Archie has been a teen heartthrob for seven decades) and the tale ends on a fascinating and intriguing open note…

This snazzy tome also has some impressive extra features including writer Dan Parent’s ‘Liner Notes’, full background and histories for The Archies and Josie and the Pussycats, and ‘Once More With Feeling’, 8 pages of penciller Bill Galvan’s art and unused covers reproduced before inkers Rick Koslowski & Jim Amash worked their own particular magic upon them.

All the world loves a lover, and this satisfyingly enticing down-to-earth comedy-drama is a solid example of the kind of comics there just aren’t enough of these days. Remember, “Superheroes aren’t the only fruit” – despite all the tights and stuff…

© 2010 Archie Comics Publications, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Buz Sawyer: The War in the Pacific


By Roy Crane (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-362-0

Modern comics evolved from newspaper comic strips, and these pictorial features were until relatively recently utterly ubiquitous and hugely popular with the public – and highly valued by publishers who used them as an irresistible sales weapon to guarantee and increase circulation and profits.

It’s virtually impossible for us to today to understand the overwhelming power of the comic strip in America (and the wider world) from the Great Depression to the end of World War II. With no television, broadcast radio far from universal and movie shows at best a weekly treat for most folk, household entertainment was mostly derived from the comic sections of daily and especially Sunday Newspapers. “The Funnies” were the most common recreation for millions who were well served by a fantastic variety and incredible quality.

From the very start humour was paramount; hence the terms “Funnies” and “Comics”, and from these gag and stunt beginnings – a blend of silent movie slapstick, outrageous fantasy and the vaudeville shows – came a thoroughly entertaining mutant hybrid: Roy Crane’s Wash Tubbs.

Debuting on April 21st 1924 Washington Tubbs II was a comedic gag-a-day strip that evolved into a globe-girdling adventure serial. Crane produced pages of stunning, addictive quality yarn-spinning whilst his introduction of moody swashbuckler Captain Easy in the landmark episode for 6th May, 1929 led to a Sunday colour page that was possibly the most compelling and visually impressive of the entire Golden Age of Newspaper strips (see Roy Crane’s Captain Easy, Soldier of Fortune: The Complete Sunday Newspaper Strips volume 1)

Almost improving minute by minute Crane’s imagination and his fabulous visual masterpieces achieved a timeless immediacy that made each page a unified piece of sequential art. The influence of those pages can be seen in the works of near-contemporaries such as Hergé, giants-in-waiting like Charles Schulz and comics creators like Alex Toth and John Severin ever since.

The work was obviously as much fun to create as to read. In fact, the cited reason for Crane surrendering the Sunday strip to his assistant Les turner in 1937 was the NEA/United Features Syndicate’s abrupt and arbitrary demand that all its strips must henceforward be produced in a rigid panel-structure to facilitate their being cut up and re-pasted as local editors dictated – although the compelling text features in this book dedicated to his second masterpiece reveal a few more commercial and professional reasons for the jump from the small and provincial syndicate to the monolithic King Features outfit.

At the height of his powers Crane just walked away from the astounding Captain Easy page, concentrating on the daily feature, and when his contract expired in 1943 he left United Features to create the World War II aviation strip Buz Sawyer, lured away by the grandee of strip poachers William Randolph Hearst.

Where Wash Tubbs was a brave but comedic Lothario and Easy a surly tight-lipped he-man, John Singer “Buz” Sawyer was a happy amalgam of the two: a simple good-looking popular country-boy who went to war because his country needed him.

After the gripping and informative text feature ‘Crane’s Great Gamble’ by Jeet Heer the strip explodes into action on Christmas Eve 1942 as new Essex Class Aircraft Carrier USS Tippecanoe steams for the Pacific Theatre of Operation carrying 100 fighter-bombers and an extremely keen pair of cartoon warriors.

Buz Sawyer was a fun-loving, skirt-chasing, musically inclined pilot and his devoted gunner Rosco Sweeney a bluff, simple ordinary Joe – and one of the best comedy foils ever created. The strip is a marvel of authenticity: picturing not just the action and drama of the locale and situation but more importantly capturing the quiet, dull hours of training, routine and desperate larks between the serious business of killing whilst staying alive.

Like contemporaries Bill Mauldin and Milton Caniff, Crane was acutely aware that all his readers had someone involved in the action and therefore felt he had a duty to inform and enlighten as well as entertain. Spectacular as the adventure was the true magic is the off-duty camaraderie and personal moments that pepper the daily drama.

This beautiful archival hardback covers the entire war years of the strip from November 1st 1943 to October 5th 1945 wherein the great artist perfected his masterly skill with craftint (a mechanical monochrome patterning effect used to add greys and halftones which Crane used to add miraculous depths and moods to his superb drawing) and opens with the lovable lads shot down whilst tackling a Japanese carrier.

Marooned, their life raft washed up on a desolate desert island where they’re hunted by enemy troops and discover a German farmer and his beautiful daughter. At first hostile, the lovely fraulein, April, soon succumbs to Buz’s boyish charm. Helping Buz and Roscoe escape, the trio only make it as far as the next islet where fellow pilot and friendly rival Chili Harrison had also been stranded since his plane went down.

Eventually rescued the Navy fliers return to “the Tip” for training on new planes (Curtiss SB2C Helldivers, in case you were wondering) in preparation for the push to Japan. Amidst spectacular action sequences shipboard life goes on, but during a raid on an occupied island Buz and Sweeney are once more shot down. In the middle of a fire-fight they effect repairs and head back to the Tippecanoe, but not without cost. Rosco has been hit…

Sawyer’s exploits haven’t gone unnoticed and, whilst Sweeney is recovering from wounds, he’s selected for a secret mission deep into enemy territory; ferrying an intelligence agent to a meeting with enigmatic underground leader the Cobra.

It all goes tragically wrong and the American agent is captured. With the enemy hunting high and low for the pilot, Buz then fell back on his most infuriating ability: falling into the willing laps of beautiful women.

‘Sultry’ was a gorgeous collaborator high in the favour of the occupying Japanese, but she too finds the corn-fed aviator irresistible. Of course it might simply be that she’s also Cobra…

This extended epic is a brilliant and breathtaking adventure that blends action, suspense, love and tragedy into a compelling thriller that took Buz all the way to December 1944. As a result of his trials the hero is sent home on a thirty day leave – enabling Crane to reveal some enticing background and invoke all the passions, joys and heartbreaks of the Home Front.

Buz doesn’t want to go but orders are order, so to make things a little more bearable Buz takes the still recuperating Sweeney with him. It isn’t that the young flier despises his origins – indeed his civilian life is a purely idyllic American Dream – it’s simply that he wanted to get the job done against the enemy. Nevertheless, with a warrior’s grace under pressure, he resigned himself to peace and enjoyment whilst his comrades soldier on. If he knew the foe he would face in his little hometown, Buz would probably have gone AWOL…

Crane’s inspirational use of the War at Home was a brilliant stroke: it’s not a world of spies and insidious Bundists but just a sweet little burg filled with home-comforts and proud people – the kind of place the soldiers were fighting to preserve and a powerful tool in the morale-builder’s arsenal. It’s also a place of completely different dangers…

Buz was the son of the town’s doctor; plain, simple and good-hearted. In that egalitarian environment the kid was the sweetheart of Tot Winter, the richest girl in town, and when her upstart nouveau riche parents heard of the decorated hero’s return they hijacked the homecoming and turned it into a publicity carnival.

Moreover the ghastly, snobbish Mrs. Winter conspired with her daughter to trap the lad into a quick and newsworthy marriage. Class, prejudice, financial greed and social climbing were enemies Buz and Sweeney were ill-equipped to fight, but luckily that annoying tomboy-brat Christy Jameson has blossomed into a sensible, down-to-earth, practical and clever young woman. She’s scrubbed up real pretty too…

After a staggeringly smart and compelling soap opera sequence that would do East Enders or Coronation Street proud, Buz ended up (accidentally) engaged to Tot after all. Mercifully the leave was over and he and Sweeney had to return to the war… but even then they were disappointed to discover that they wouldn’t immediately be fighting again.

Posted to Monterey, California, they were to be retrained for new planes and a new squadron, reuniting with rowdy rival Chili Harrison: but Mrs Winter was determined to have a war hero in the clan and pursued them with Tot in tow, determined to get Buz married before he returned to the Pacific.

Insights into another aspect of the military experience (Crane had almost unfettered access, consultation privileges and the grateful willing cooperation of the US Navy) were revealed to the readers as the whiz-kid was suddenly back in school again – and usually in the dog-house because of his hot-dogging. Dramatic tension was evenly split between Buz’s apparent inability to be a team-player and the increasingly insistent ploys of Mrs. Winter.

Moreover, the squadron’s training commander had an uncanny ability to predict which pilots would die in training or combat and Buz’s name was high on that list…

At last the training was over and, miraculously alive and unmarried, Buz and Sweeney shipped back to the Pacific and the relatively easy task of ending the war. Part of a massive fleet mopping up the island fortresses en route to Tokyo they were soon flying combat missions and before long, shot down once more. This time they were taken prisoner aboard an enemy submarine…

After another incredible escape and rousing triumph the war ended, but Crane actually ratcheted up the tension by covering the period of American consolidation and occupation as Buz and Sweeney awaited demobilisation. Whilst posted to a medical facility in Melatonga the boys and Chili came across a woman from Buz’s chequered past they had all believed long dead…

When their discharge papers finally arrived (in the episode for September 9th 1945) an era of desperate struggle was over. However with such a popular and pivotal strip as Buz Sawyer that only meant that the Era of Globe-Girdling adventure was about to begin…

This superb black and white hardback also contains a selection of Sunday strips in full colour. The eternal dichotomy and difficulty of producing Sunday Pages (many client papers would only buy dailies or Sunday strips, not both) meant that many strip creators would produce different story-lines for each feature – Milt Caniff’s Steve Canyon being one of the few notable exceptions.

Crane handled the problem with typical aplomb: using the Sundays to tell completely unrelated stories. For Wash Tubbs he created a prequel series starring Captain Easy in adventures set before the mismatched pair had met; in Buz Sawyer he turned over the Sabbath slot to Rosco Sweeney for lavish gag-a-day exploits, big on laughs and situation comedy. Set among the common “swabbies” aboard ship it was a far more family-oriented feature and probably much more welcome among the weekend crowd of parents and children than the often chilling or disturbing realistically and sophisticated saga that unfolded Mondays to Saturdays.

Also included here in delicious full-page fold outs are fifteen of the best – many with appearances by Buz (spanning November 28th 1943 to 25th February 1945) – a cheerily tantalising bonus which will hopefully turn one day into a archival collection of their own. Whilst not as innovative or groundbreaking as Captain Easy, they’re still proficient works by one of the Grand masters of our art-form.

This initial collection is the perfect means of discovering or rediscovering Crane’s second magnum opus – spectacular, enthralling, exotically immediate adventures that influenced generations of modern cartoonists, illustrators, comics creators and storytellers. Buz Sawyer: War in the Pacific ranks as one the greatest strip sequences ever created: stirring, thrilling, funny and moving tale-spinning that is unforgettable, unmissable and utterly irresistible.

Strips © 2010 King Features Syndicate, Inc. This edition © 2011 Fantagraphics Books, all other material © the respective copyright holders. All rights reserved.

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Archie New Look Series Book 5: Goodbye Forever


By Melanie J. Morgan & Norm Breyfogle (Archie Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-879794-63-4

For most of us, when we say comicbooks, people’s thoughts turn to buff men and women in garish tights hitting each other and lobbing trees or cars about, or stark, nihilistic crime, horror or science fiction sagas aimed an extremely mature and sophisticated readership of confirmed fans – and for American comics these days that is indeed the norm. Over the years though (and throughout the rest of the world still), other forms and genres have waxed and waned.

However one company has held its ground against the tide over the years – although probably better known for its spun-off television/movie franchise – is the teen-comedy genre begun by and synonymous with a carrot topped kid named Archie Andrews and the two girls he can’t choose between – Betty Cooper and Veronica Lodge.

Archie has thrived by constantly reinventing its core characters, seamlessly adapting to the changing world outside its bright, flimsy pages, shamelessly co-opting youth, pop culture and fashion trends into its infallible mix of slapstick and young romance.

Each and every social revolution has been painlessly assimilated into the mix (the company has managed to confront a number of social issues affecting the young in a manner both even-handed and tasteful over the years) and the constant addition of new characters such as African-American Chuck – who wants to be a cartoonist – his girlfriend Nancy, fashion-diva Ginger, Hispanic couple Frankie and Maria and a host of others such as spoiled home-wrecker-in-waiting Cheryl Blossom all contributed to a broad and refreshingly broad-minded scenario.

In 2010 Archie even jumped the final hurdle for the family-entertainment medium with the introduction of Kevin Keller, an openly gay young man and a clear-headed advocate capably tackling and dismantling the last major taboo in mainstream kids comics, but he was far from the only innovation.

In 2007 the company tried a risky experiment when they began a series of short serials in the pages of their various publications, featuring the regular cast in a far more realistically rendered manner rather than the gloriously utilitarian and trademarked loose cartoon style pioneered by Bob Montana in Pep Comics (beginning with #22 in 1941, reprinted in Archie: Best of the Forties) and honed to perfection by such unsung geniuses as Bob Bolling, Dan DeCarlo, Joe Edwards, Samm Schwartz, Bill Vigoda and the legendary Harry Lucey.

More importantly they moved away from the broad and outrageous slapstick and whimsical comedy by testing out a mildly soap-operatic sitcom flavour and social issues in tune with contemporary teens of the post MTV generation.

I thought it was a terrible idea – but I was quite wrong…

Not that there weren’t some obvious problems. Most tellingly, if you draw Archie Andrews more realistically what you get is Jimmy Olsen and it’s also really hard to see what hotties like Betty and especially billionaire’s daughter Veronica find so appealing about such a clumsy if well-meaning doofus…

Nonetheless the occasional adventures continued for a couple of years, all scripted by Melanie J. Morgan and illustrated by some of mainstream superhero comics’ most accomplished artists, including Steven Butler, Al Milgrom, Joe Staton, Tod Smith, Rich Burchett and Terry Austin.

This fifth collected yarn (which was first printed in Archie’s Double Digest #200-203, July-November 2009) is drawn by the superb Norm Breyfogle and highlights the biggest disaster that ever hit the happy community of Riverdale; a drama likely to break the hearts of both Betty and Veronica. After years of making do and getting by, Archie’s dad finally gets the promotion he’s always deserved, but the glad tidings have a bitter sting.

If he accepts it means uprooting the entire family from their small town roots and relocating to the big and very different city of Martinsville…

Of course they must go and Archie’s friends and loved ones have to face the fact that within a month he will be nothing but a memory. Idyllic little Riverdale will never be the same again…

Of course it all works out in the end, but while it’s happening there’s a very impressive sense of panic, injustice and loss. If kid’s soaps and dramas were this well produced I’d read less and watch a lot more TV…

Ultimately though, the experimental tales were discontinued and the beautifully garish cartoon universe resumed, as it has for nearly seventy years. Still and all I must admit that I rather enjoyed this “alternate world” of Archie despite all my initial misgivings and since there’s so little comics material for the older kid’s market maybe the company might want to try again – just next time not with my immortal, unchanging legendary freckle-faced fool…

© 2011 Archie Comics Publications, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Avengers: Death Trap, the Vault – A Marvel Graphic Novel


By Danny Fingeroth, Ron Lim, Jim Sanders & Fred Fredericks (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-87135-810-3

Marvel don’t generally publish original material graphic novel these days but once they were a market leader in the field with a range of “big stories” told on larger pages emulating the long-established European Album (285 x 220 mm rather than the standard 258 x 168 mm of today’s books) featuring not only proprietary characters in out-of-the-ordinary adventures but also licensed assets like Conan, creator-owned properties like Alien Legion and new character debuts.

However the company’s extended experiment with big ticket storytelling in the 1980s and 1990s produced some exciting (and if I’m scrupulously honest, appalling) results that the company has never come close to repeating in since. Many of the stories still stand out today – or would if they were still in print.

Released in 1991, Death Trap, the Vault is a conventional but enjoyable Fights ‘n’ Tights thriller in the Summer Blockbuster vein that fits solidly into the strictly-policed continuity of the mainstream Marvel Universe. Scripted by Danny Fingeroth and illustrated by Ron Lim with inking by Jim Sanders & Fred Fredericks, this yarn is potentially impenetrable to occasional fans but nevertheless delivers the tension, action and character byplay to the faithful readership that made Marvel the premier US comics publisher for such a long time.

The plot itself is simple and effective: with so many super-powered menaces on the loose the Federal Government constructed a specialised penitentiary to incarcerate villains once they’re captured. Some felons, deemed too dangerous for normal courts, are even tried there. Perhaps the authorities could have picked a better warden though: Truman Marsh might be a fine administrator but his parents were collateral casualties in a super-powered clash and he spends far too much time thinking about the Doomsday bomb hidden in the Vault in case of a mass breakout…

One day the inevitable finally occurs and a power outage enables a few convicts to bust free. Already on the scene Captain America and size-changing savant Doctor Pym fight a holding action against Venom, Mentallo, Orca, Bullet and a dozen other lethal adversaries, but with more being released every minute things look pretty grim and Marsh starts getting an itch in his trigger – or rather, button-pushing – finger…

With the super-creeps killing hostages and the entire complex in lockdown a team of Avengers and Government penal battalion Freedom Force have no choice but to break into the ultimate prison, unaware that the deadly clock is already counting down…

Moreover, since Freedom Force is composed of the kind of criminals the Vault was built to contain, can Earth’s mightiest Heroes risk trusting them whilst the rampaging escapees run riot?

Intense and visceral, this old-school, all-out action romp will delight the traditionally-minded reader and still holds a happy surprise or two for we older, ostensibly wiser, jaded, grumpy geezers…


The book was resized and repackaged in 1993 as Venom: Death Trap the Vault and if you don’t mind seeing your action on a slightly smaller scale this edition might be a little easier to find.
© 1991 Marvel Entertainment Group/Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Beowulf – First Graphic Novel #1


By Jerry Bingham, with Ken Bruzenak (First Comics)
ISBN: 978-0-915419-00-5

The mid-1980s were a great time for 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 four-colour kicks from DC, Marvel Archie and/or Harvey Comics. European and Japanese styled material had been creeping in but 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. Chicago based First Comics was an early frontrunner, with Frank Brunner’s Warp, Mike Grell’s Starslayer and Jon Sable and Howard Chaykin’s Landmark American Flagg!, as well as an impressive line of titles targeting a more sophisticated audience.

In 1984 they followed Marvel and DC’s lead with a line of impressive, European-styled over-sized graphic albums featuring new and out-of-the-ordinary comics sagas (see Time Beavers, Mazinger and two volumes of Time2 to see just how bold, broad and innovative the material could be). The premier release was a stunning and subsequently award-winning (1985 Kirby Award for Best Graphic Album) fantasy epic by Jerry Bingham.

Beowulf is a thrilling, compulsive and intensely visceral visualisation of the Anglo-Saxon epic poem committed to parchment sometime between the 8th and 11th century AD, and recently the subject of many screen iterations and interpretations (from The 13th Warrior to the three “straight” Beowulf movies in 1999, 2005 and 2007 and even the outrageously fun Outlander from 2008).

Need a plot summary? In the far North noble King Hrothgar built a mighty Mead-hall for heroes, but incurred the malignant enmity of the monster Grendel who would raid the citadel and slaughter some of the noble warriors every night. After twelve years of horror a valiant band of heroes led by Beowulf, Prince of the Geats, came to their aid seeking glory and battle…

The clash of Beowulf and Grendel is spectacularly handled as is the succeeding exploit wherein the stalking Horror’s demon mother comes seeking revenge, dragging Beowulf to her hideous lair beneath an icy lake, but the most effective and moving chapter is the very human-scaled Twilight of the Gods as, after fifty years of ruling his Geatish kingdom, aged Beowulf goes to his final glorious battle, dying heroically whilst destroying a ravening firedrake which threatens to eradicate his people: the only proper end for a Northman hero…

Bingham’s raw and fiercely realistic art-style perfectly captures the implacable sense of doom and by employing Prince Valiant‘s text and picture format he imparts the tale with a grandeur often as mythic as Hal Foster’s masterpiece, whilst leaving the art gloriously free of distracting word-balloons.

Letterer/calligrapher Ken Bruzenak’s particular facility perfectly enhances the artistic mood by carefully integrating captions filled with Bingham’s free-verse transliterations of the original 3182 long-poem into this classic interpretation of the epic. This is a wonderful and worthy piece of work that will delight any fan of the medium.

And for a perfect all-ages prose telling of the timeless tale I also heartily recommend Rosemary Sutcliff’s magnificent Beowulf: Dragonslayer: first released in 1961 and captivatingly illustrated by Charles Keeping;  it is still readily available and one of the books that changed my life.
© 1984 First Comics, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Betty and Veronica Storybook: Archie & Friends All-Stars Series volume 7


By Dan Parent, Rick Koslowski & Jim Amash (Archie Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-879794-60-3

Archie Andrews has been around for nearly seventy years: a good-hearted lad lacking common sense and Betty Cooper the pretty, sensible girl next door, with all that entails, who loves the ginger goof. Veronica Lodge is a rich, exotic and glamorous debutante who only settles for our boy if there’s nobody better around. She might actually love him too, though. Despite their rivalry, Betty and Veronica are firm friends. Archie, of course, can’t decide who or what he wants…

Archie’s unconventional best friend Jughead Jones is Mercutio to Archie’s Romeo, providing rationality and a reader’s voice, as well as being a powerful catalyst of events in his own right. That charming triangle (+ one) has been the foundation of decades of cartoon magic. Moreover the concept is eternally self-renewing…

Adapting seamlessly to every trend and fad of the growing youth culture, the host of writers and artists who’ve crafted the stories over the decades have made the “everyteen” characters of mythical Riverdale a benchmark for youth and a visual barometer of growing up.

In this collection, reprinting tales from 1995-2009, the warring gal-pals and extended cast of the small-town American Follies are plunged deep into whimsy and fable as writer/artist Dan Parent reinterprets classic fairytales and popular classics like a New World Crackerjack Christmas Panto (and boy, will that reference baffle anybody not British and/or under thirty), providing wry and often outright hilarious takes on the eternal nature and magic of young love…

Dotted with funny fashion page pin-ups such as ‘Storybook Style’ and ‘Bewitching Beauties’, lovely cover reproductions and behind-the-scenes commentaries, the wild whimsy begins with ‘Betty in Wonderland’ (inked by Jim Amash) wherein the ever-helpful Miss Cooper gives up a date with Archie to babysit for a neighbour in need. Letting her imagination run wild, her bedtime reading of the Lewis Carroll classic repopulates the tale with some very familiar faces…

Especially effective are science nerd Dilton as the sagacious caterpillar and Jughead and mean Reggie as Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum. However picturing Veronica as the vicious Blood-red Queen of Hearts might have been a little too close to the truth…

‘Sleeping Betty’ is another enchanting retelling as baby Princess Betty is cursed by the evil fairy Veronica to fall into a deep sleep on her sixteenth birthday. To thwart the hex the little princess was sent away to be raised in secret, but Veronica’s reach is long… Luckily there’s a red-headed prince hanging around…

‘There’s No Place Like… Riverdale’ (inked by Rich Koslowski) transports Betty and her little cat Carmel to a fantastic land over the rainbow where she lucks into some highly desirable Ruby Sneakers. To get home she needs unconventional help in the unappealing shapes of Archie the Scarecrow, Tin Man Jughead and the Cowardly Reggie, so it’s a good thing that Veronica is less a Wicked Witch and more a sorcerous spoiled brat…

The last tale in this collection is ‘Cinderellas’ (Amash inks again) as both girls find themselves helpless drudges working for an evil new mom and dreaming of a prince to whisk them away. Despite the sabotaging antics of mean stepsister Cheryl Blossom and a pretty second-rate Fairy Godmother, Cideronica and Cinderbetty overcome all odds and go to the Ball. In the slipper-sampling aftermath, thanks to some deft plotting, both girls get a happy ending…

Charming and clever, these tales are a marvellous example of why Archie has been unsurpassed in this genre; providing decades of family friendly fun and wholesome teen entertainment. Moreover, aspiring creators will also delight in the closing Sketch Book section of this collection which provides a fascinating glimpse of Parent’s original pencilled art in 9 pages culled from the preceding stories.

© 2010 Archie Comics Publications, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Batman Beyond


By Hilary J. Bader, Rich Burchett, Joe Staton & Terry Beatty (DC comics)
ISBN: 978-1-56389-604-0

The Batman Animated TV series masterminded by Bruce Timm and Paul Dini in the 1990s revolutionised the Dark Knight and also led to some of the absolute best comicbook adventures in his seventy-year publishing history with the tie-in monthly printed series. With the Dark Knight’s small screen credentials firmly re-established, follow-up series began (and are still coming), even recently feeding back into the overarching DCU continuity.

Following those award-winning cartoons in 1999 came a new incarnation set a generation into the future, featuring Bruce Wayne in the twilight of his life and a new teenaged hero picking up the eerily-scalloped mantle. In Britain the series was inspirationally re-titled Batman of the Future but for most of the impressed cognoscenti and awe-struck kids everywhere it was Batman Beyond!

Once again the show was augmented by a cool kid’s comicbook and this collection re-presents the first 6-issue miniseries in a hip and trendy, immensely entertaining package suitable for fans and aficionados of all ages. Although not necessary to the reader’s enjoyment, a passing familiarity with the TV episodes will enhance the overall experience…

All stories are written by Hilary J. Bader and the book opens with a two part adaptation of the pilot episode, illustrated by Rick Burchett & Terry Beatty. ‘Not On My Watch!’ offers brief glimpses of the last days of Batman’s crusade against crime before age, infirmity and injury slow him down to the point of compromising his principles and endangering the citizens he’s sworn to protect.

Years later Gotham City in the mid-21st century (notionally accepted as 2039AD – 100 years after the comic book debut of Batman in Detective Comics #27) is a dystopian urban jungle where angry, rebellious school-kid Terry McGinnis strikes a blow against pernicious street-punks The Jokerz and is chased out of the metropolis to the gates of a ramshackle mansion.

Meanwhile his research-scientist father has discovered too much about the company he works for…

Wayne-Powers used to be a decent place to work before old man Wayne became a recluse. Now Derek Powers runs the show and is ruthless enough to do anything to increase his profits… Outside town Terry is saved from a potentially fatal encounter with the Jokerz by a burly old man who then collapses. Helping the aged Bruce Wayne inside the mansion Terry discovers the long neglected Batcave before being chased away by the surly Wayne but doesn’t really care until he gets home to find his father has been murdered…

A storm of mixed emotions, he returns to Wayne Manor…

The concluding chapter ‘I Am Batman’ sees McGinnis attempt to force Wayne to act before giving up in frustration and stealing the hero’s greatest weapon; a cybernetic bat-suit that enhances strength, speed, durability and perception. Alone, untrained and unaided the new Batman sets to exact justice and revenge…

In the ensuing clash with Powers the unscrupulous entrepreneur is mutated into a radioactive monster named Blight before Wayne and Terry reach a tenuous truce and understanding. For the moment Terry will continue to clean up the Dark Knight’s city as a probationary, apprentice hero…

With issue #3 Bader, Burchett & Beatty began to tell original stories in the newly established future Gotham, commencing with ‘Never Mix, Never Worry’ wherein Blight returns to steal a selection of man-made radioactive elements which can only be used to cause harm… or can they?

Joe Staton took over the pencilling with #4 as a schoolboy nerd freed a devil from limbo and old man Wayne introduced the cocksure Terry to parapsychologist Jason Blood and his eldritch alter ego Etrigan the Demon in the spooky shocker ‘Magic Is Everywhere’, a sentiment repeated when a school-trip to the museum unleashed ancient lovers who fed on the life energy in the delightfully comical tragedy of ‘Mummy, Oh! and Juliet’

This captivating compendium of action and adventure ends in another compelling and edgy thriller as Terry stumbles into a return bout with a shape-shifting super-thief in ‘Permanent Inque Stains’, only to find that there are far worse crimes and far more evil villains haunting his city…

Fun, thrilling and surprisingly moving, these tales are magnificent examples of comics that appeal to young and old alike and are well overdue for re-issue. And once that’s done, there’s still another 24 issues from the 1999-2001 run plus a Return of the Joker one-shot to collect in spiffy graphic novel compilations…

In 2000 Titan Books released a British edition re-titled Batman of the Future (to comply with the renamed UK TV series) and this version is a little easier to locate by those eager to enjoy the stories rather than own an artefact.
© 1999 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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Richard Corben Complete Works volume 1: Underground


By Richard Corben and various (Catalan Communications)
ISBN: 978-0-87416-018-5

Although he has only infrequently strayed into the comicbook mainstream, animator, illustrator, publisher and cartoonist Richard Corben is one of America’s greatest living proponents of sequential narrative: a stunningly accomplished artist and unique, uncompromising stylist who grew out of the independent counterculture commix of the 1960s and 1970s to become a globally revered, multi-award winning creator.

He is best known for his mastery of the airbrush and delight in sardonic, darkly comedic horror and science fiction tales.

Born in Anderson, Missouri in 1940, he graduated from the Kansas City Art Institute with a Fine Arts degree in 1965 and found work as an animator. At that time, the Underground Commix revolution was just beginning as a motley crew of independent-minded creators across the continent began making and publishing stories that appealed to their rebellious, pharmacologically-enhanced sensibilities and unconventional lifestyles. Most of them were hugely influenced either by 1950s tales from EC Comics or Carl Barks’ Duck tales – and occasionally both.

Corben started the same way, producing the kind of stories that he would like to read, in as variety of small-press publications including Grim Wit, Slow Death, Skull, Fever Dreams and his own Fantagor often signed with his affectionate pseudonym “Gore”. As his style matured and his skills developed Corben’s work increasingly began to appear in more professionally produced venues. He began working for Warren Publishing in 1970 with tales in Eerie, Creepy, Vampirella, Comix International and laterally, the aggressively audacious adult science fiction anthology 1984. He also famously re-coloured a number of reprinted Spirit strips for the revival of Will Eisner’s the Spirit magazine.

In 1975 Corben submitted work to the French phenomenon Métal Hurlant and subsequently became a fixture in the magazine’s American iteration Heavy Metal where his career really took off. Soon he was producing stunning adult fantasy tales for a number of companies, making animated movies, painting film posters and producing record covers such as the multi-million-selling Meatloaf album Bat Out of Hell. He never stopped producing comics but always stuck to his own independent projects with collaborators such as Harlan Ellison, Bruce Jones and Jan Strnad.

This regrettably out-of-print collection of those early strip efforts, translated from a European edition by Jim Lisle, features a rather inaccurate introduction by Luis Vigil but boasts a dynamic collection of raw, powerful and wickedly sardonic and whimsical suspense tales in the EC vein that graphically display the artist’s rapid, radical creative development beginning with ‘Heirs of Earth’ (1971), a post-apocalyptic tale of love and cannibalism.

Corben’s infamous signature-stylisation includes lots of nudity, graphic violence and near grotesquely proportioned male and female physiques, none of which are apparent in the tantalisingly low-key spoof ‘Alice in Wanderlust’; an early skit by long-term co-creator Jan Strnad, after which ‘Horrible Harveys House’ (1971) tells an intriguing tale of young lust when film student Jarvis talks his stacked and rather easy girlfriend Zara into visiting an abandoned house to make an “art-movie”. Turns out the place isn’t completely empty after all…

From 1970, ‘Twilight of the Dogs’ is a classic sting-in-the-tale saga as Earth’s last surviving free men uncover some rather unfortunate facts about the aliens who conquered them whilst ‘Gastric Fortitude’ displays another side of love. ‘The Dweller in the Dark’ (from a story by Herb Arnold) is an early exploration of Corben’s fascination with and facility for depicting lost civilisations, wherein rain-forest dwellers Bo Glan and Nipta break taboo to explore a dead city only to fall foul of rapacious, invading white men and ancient things far worse…

All the previous yarns were reproduced in black and white: ranging from pen-line to airbrushed monochrome tones but worlds-within-worlds alien romance ‘Cidopey’ reveals its tragic twist in full colour, as does ‘For the Love of a Daemon’ which shows inklings of the artist’s later airbrush expertise in a boisterous black comedy of Barbarians and hot naked babes in distress.

Jan Strnad also wrote the dark dystopian ‘Kittens for Christian’, a moody post-cataclysm thriller with chilling echoes of Corben’s later graphic novel Vic and Blood (an adaptation and extension of Harlan Ellison’s “A Boy and his Dog”) before this volume concludes on a light and colourful note in the artist’s 1973 collaboration with Doug Moench: ‘Damsel in Dragon Dress’: a gleeful witches brew of fantasy, fairytale foible – a saucy cautionary tale on the unexpected dangers of drug abuse…

Richard Corben is a groundbreaking and rightfully renowned figure in our art-form and the fact that so much of his work is currently unavailable in English is a disgrace. Not only are his early works long overdue for a definitive re-issue but all his rude, riotous, raucously ribald revels need to be re-released now. Until that time stay tuned…
© 1970, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1985 Richard Corben. © 1985 Catalan Communications. All rights reserved.

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Emperor Doom starring the Mighty Avengers – A Marvel Graphic Novel


By Dave Michelinie, Bob Hall & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-87135-256-9

I can’t recall the last time Marvel published an all-original graphic novel as opposed to a collection of previously printed material, but once they were a market leader in the field with an entire range of “big stories” told on larger than normal pages (285 x 220 mm rather than the generally standard 258 x 168 mm of today’s books) featuring not only proprietary characters in out-of-the-ordinary adventures but also licensed assets like Conan, creator-owned properties like Alien Legion and new character debuts.

Nonetheless, Marvel’s ambitious dalliance with graphic novel publishing in the 1980s and 1990s produced some classy results that the company has never come close to repeating in the intervening years. Both original concepts and their own properties were represented in that initial run and many of the stories still stand out today – or would if they were still in print.

Released in 1987 Emperor Doom was conceived by Mark Gruenwald, David Michelinie and Jim Shooter, scripted by Michelinie and illustrated by Bob Hall with some additional inking by Keith Williams, and fits comfortably into the tightly policed continuity of the mainstream Marvel Universe.

If you’re wondering, despite coming out nearly two years after the launch of regular comicbook series West Coast Avengers, this saga is set just before that auspicious fresh start for Iron Man, Tigra, Wonder Man , Hawkeye and Mockingbird…

The plot itself is delightfully sly and simple: for once eschewing rash attacks against assembled superheroes, deadly dictator Doctor Doom has devised a scheme to dominate humanity through subtler means. Inviting Sub-Mariner to act as his agent the master villain uses the sub-sea anti-hero to neutralise mechanical heroes and rivals prior to using a pheromone-based bio-weapon to make all organic beings utterly compliant to his will. Naturally Doom then once-more betrayed his aquatic ally…

Meanwhile living energy being Wonder Man is undergoing a month-long isolation experiment to determine the nature of his abilities. When he exits the chamber 30 days later he discovers the entire planet has willingly, joyously accepted Doom as their natural and beloved ruler. Alone and desperate the last Avenger must devise a method of saving the world from its contented subjugation…

Of course there’s another side to this story. Doom, ultimately utterly successful, has turned the planet into an orderly, antiseptic paradise: no war, no want, no sickness and no conflict, just happy productive citizens doing what they’re told. In this perfect totalitarian triumph all the trains run on time and nobody is discontented. All Doom has to do is accept heartfelt cheers and do the daily paperwork.

With the entire world an idealised clone of Switzerland, the Iron Despot is bored out of his mind…

So it’s with mixed emotion that Doom realises Wonder Man and a select band of newly liberated Avengers are coming for him, determined to free the world or die…

Tense and compelling this intriguingly low-key tale abandoned the traditional all-out action for a far more reasoned and sinisterly realistic solution – disappointing and baffling a large number of fans at the time – but the clever premise and solution, underplayed art and wicked, tongue-in-cheek attitude remove this yarn from the ordinary Fights ‘n’ Tights milieu and elevate it to one of the most chillingly mature Avengers epics ever produced.

A cut above the average and well worth an open-eyed reappraisal, this is an Avengers adventure for every jaded superhero fan.
© 1987 Marvel Entertainment Group/Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Twilight of the Assholes: Cartoons and Essays


By Tim Kreider (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-398-9

This book is intended to make adults laugh and think. If the title isn’t clue enough, please be warned that these pages contain nudity, sexual imagery, intentionally insulting images of political figures and rational opinions clothed in harsh language and thought-provoking political comedy.

If that sort of thing offends you or you believe that blasphemy is a sin and/or a crime, read no further and don’t buy this book. The rest of us will just have to manage without you.

The early years of the 21st century were plagued with horrors and disasters exacerbated by a hideous global proliferation of lying, greedy, venal, demented and just plain stupid rulers and governments who finally elevated politicians to that phylum of useless tools and pimples on the butt of humanity once only occupied by lawyers.

Since then bankers, astrologers, wedding planners, doorstep evangelists, celebrity gossip columnists and all types of psychics have joined their rarefied ranks and I’m thinking I need to cut down on coffee or tighten my critical parameters…

When George Dubya Bush acceded to the throne of America there were a lot of apologetic liberals and whooping goons. There was also cartoonist Ted Kreider.

Born in 1967 and raised on comicbooks whilst actually paying attention in school, Kreider is an erudite and passionate man with thoughtfully reasoned opinions on politics, religion and the human condition among many other things. He is also an extremely gifted writer and cartoonist who began self publishing in 1994.

By 1997 The Baltimore City Paper had picked up his deliciously polemical panel strip-with-accompanying essay ‘The Pain – When Will it End?’ and they were closely followed by the Jackson Planet Weekly, Illinois’ Indy in Bloomington-Normal, The New York Press, The Stranger, Philadelphia Weekly plus other independent and alternative papers. In September 2000 Kreider began releasing the material as a webcomic.

Although a self-confessed left-leaning Democrat, that hasn’t ever stopped him punishing his own camp’s many gaffes, goofs, lies, embarrassments and ideological idiocies. Like our own Gerald Scarfe and Steve Bell with Margaret Thatcher, Kreider was lucky enough (if you discount elevated blood-pressure, maxed-out sense of disbelief and perpetually outraged moral compass) to have been given the gift of a perfect incumbent target in the Bush administration of 2000-2008 and the greater, right-wing anti-intellectual, Christian-fundamentalist crusade/pogrom that brought them to power.

Along the way Kreider also managed to incense other churches and faiths from Catholics to Moslems, all manner of bigot from racists to homophobes and outrage proponents of all those other aspects of modern US society that makes all us non-Americans nervous and giggly in equal measure.

Subtitled ‘Volume II of the Chronicles of the Era of Darkness 2004-2009’ this weighty and hilariously biting collection of gags and commentaries covers the – to Kreider especially – incomprehensible re-election and second term of the Republican Saviour and his dark apostles Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rove, Rice and the rest, whilst still finding room and Reasonable Cause to pictorially pummel Chinese expansion, assorted religions’ definitions of life and attitudes to sex, aspects and definitions of Freedom, geopolitics and Big Oil, Intelligent Design, the new Russian Empire, Secret Fantasies of the rich and statesmanlike, Crackpot Theories and all sorts of Science: from the author’s spirited defence of Pluto’s planet-hood to Human-Animal Hybrids, Parallel Universes and new roles for the Giant Squid…

With stunning examples of the cartoonist’s eternal roles as social conscience, intellectual champion, puncturer of pomposity and lampooning last bastion of grace under oppressive political pressure, Kreider boldly kicks the shins of the smug over-class and stamps on the toes of all the entrenched whited sepulchres and obnoxiously applied shibboleths that made him annoyed and ashamed of huge swathes of his fellow Americans. Not that Britain or any other colonial power has any moral high-ground to sneer down from…

The work covers the period November 4th 2004 to October 29th 2009 and includes the shocked rapture of a Democratic win and the nation’s first non-white president – and ends with a shaky dawning suspicion that all politicians might just be the same…

Particularly effective are ‘Jesus vs. Jeezus’, ‘The Conservative Christian’s Guide to Compassion’, ‘I “heart” Saddam’, ‘The War on Christmas’, ‘Americans vs. ‘Muricans’, ‘What is Freedom?’, ‘Me & George, We Got Problems’, ‘Silver Linings of the Holocaust’, ‘What You Can Do to Fight the War on Sex’, ‘Everything I Know I Learned from the Bush Administration’, ‘Secret Vices of the Liberals’, ‘Republican Sex Toys’, ‘God: Republican or Democrat?’, ‘After All the Money’s Gone’, ‘We Even Yet?’ and the 5-part ‘Contributions of the World’s Religions’ but there’s guaranteed to be something to shock  or offend everybody here – you might even be compelled to think for yourself and question a little bit more…

Excoriating, withering humour and viciously necessary satire tellingly rendered and savage yet personable and winningly intimate reportage make this one of the best cartoon coshes ever applied to the politics of this century.

His previous collections include The Pain – When Will It End? (2004) and Why Do They Kill Me? or: Scream, Honkey, Scream (2005), and I look forward to more from Kreider in the sorry certainty that people won’t get less stupid, rulers can’t change their spots and religions will never stop dictating what their followers can think or feel…

Cartoons and text © 2011 Tim Kreider. All rights reserved.