By Joe Kelly, Doug Mankhe & Tom Nguyen (DC Comics)
ISBN13: 978-1-84023-609-5
Joe Kelly’s run on the World’s Greatest Superheroes has some notable highs and lows. This slim volume collecting issues # 61-65 of the monthly comicbook happily falls into the former category. The title comes from the three-part tale that forms the bulk of the book, but before that the wonderment kicks off with the stand-alone tale ‘Two-Minute Warning’, one of the best “day-in-the-life†type stories I’ve ever seen, with sharp dialogue, spectacular art and a novel format that elevates it beyond the many other attempts to show what everyday means for such god-like beings.
‘Golden Perfect’ is a tale which examines the nature of Truth itself. When Wonder Woman leads the team to the hidden kingdom of Jarhanpur to rescue a baby from a life of hereditary slavery she encounters a despot whose philosophy counters her belief in objective or absolute truth. The dispute shatters her magical golden lasso of Hestia…
Soon however this defeat has astounding repercussions for the entire universe. The broken lasso has destroyed objective truth completely. What people believe becomes the only arbiter of Reality. The moon is made of green cheese, the world is flat, Earth is the centre of the universe… As it all unravels a devastated Wonder Woman must find a way to reconcile her beliefs within the new Reality while the team battle desperately to keep the cosmos alive.
A dynamic end-of-everything tale that challenges the mind as well as stirring the blood, the patented Kelly one-liners, especially from Plastic Man, leaven the tension and heighten the enjoyment in this cracking little epic.
Ending the volume is ‘Bouncing Baby Boy’, a wistful and funny team-up of the mismatched Batman and Plastic Man. This small story looks at the sad side of the eternal clown, seen through the “cold and emotionless†eyes of the Dark Knight, and provides a welcome change from the Big Stories that are increasingly all Super-team books consist of.
Golden Perfect is well written and superbly illustrated, but not a typical JLA collection: It’s much, much better than that…
By Warren Ellis & JH Williams III (WildStorm)
ISBN 1-84576-400-5
Los Angeles is a dump and a dumping ground. Personal opinions aside, that’s the premise of this deep, dark espionage thriller from comics wunderscribe Warren Ellis. When MI6 screw-up Michael Jones is no longer capable of doing his job he’s offered a comfy testing job as his ticket out. No-one in their right mind should ever trust security service types but that’s the point – the burnt out, alcoholic agent just wasn’t.
After years of unspeakable atrocities ostensibly intended to create better operatives up to and including the bizarre and inexplicable Desolation Test, the ravaged remains of Michael Jones is consigned to the reservation provided by the West’s Intelligence Agencies for retired, rejected and discarded agents plus all the experiments that didn’t measure up: Los Angeles, USA.
There they can live out their lives as they see fit, but they can never, ever leave the city. There’s no pension scheme but the dregs can do whatever they need to make a living as long as it’s within the city limits.
Jones is a mess, both physically and mentally. He can’t drink, won’t sleep and takes too many drugs. He avoids daylight, regularly hallucinates and is numb to all sensation and emotion. In “the Community†he freelances as a private eye-come-fixer, sorting out problems that can’t be resolved by legitimate methods.
In this first compilation (collecting issues #1-6 of the occasional WildStorm comicbook) that problem is a retired NSA spook who’s being blackmailed by new members of the Community who have stolen the Holy Grail of pornography. The ravaged Colonel Nigh wants Hitler’s homemade porno back and will do anything to get it. Unfortunately so will the other filthy rich deviants who populate Tinseltown.
But something isn’t right. Jones may not feel but something deeper is hiding behind all the subterfuge and depravity…
Sardonic and rather bleak, this caustic caper on the nasty side of the espionage genre is a thriller with plenty of twists and a solid mystery to intrigue the most jaded reader. The content is strictly adults only – by that I mean that the subtext of duty, love and honour are assaults on the traditions of the hero-spy in as brutal a manner as the sex and violence underscore the dark side of the American Dream-town. This is a story for cynical adults not horny kids with appropriate IDs. Great stuff beautifully executed by Ellis and magically illustrated by JH Williams III.
By Ed Brubaker & Sean Phillips (Titan Books)
ISBN13: 978-1-84856-151-9
The third captivating collection of Brubaker and Phillips’s addictive modern Noir thriller (see Criminal: Coward ISBN: 1-84576-610-5 and Criminal: Lawless ISBN13: 978-1-84576-611-5) takes an unexpected turn by travelling back to the 1970s and recounting via three interconnected stories the history of the dark characters who inhabit those first two books.
Collecting volume 2, issues #1-3, of the comic book series, we meet the son of a black gangster who teamed with white Wise Guy Walter Hyde to take over the city’s rackets in 1954. Hyde became the Big Man and Clevon Brown became his invisible second. After all, there’s only so much progress even bad guys will let a black man enjoy in 1950s America.
1972 and Hyde’s kid Sebastian is making his way in his dad’s business but Jake Brown has chosen another route. They grew up friends but Jake chose boxing as a way to out, leaving the rackets to Hyde. Their closeness was soured over a woman but his once-friend still drags him back to the gutters whenever he needs a favour. And then one day he sees her: The girl who got between them.
1972 and the second chapter finds a revenge-hungry Danica involved with returning Vietnam vet Teeg Lawless in a plan to steal from the Hyde’s. But when Lawless discovers just who he’s robbed he knows his method of making amends must be spectacular if he and his two baby boys are to live. His bloody mission to return the money and punish his confederates ensures his fearsome reputation for decades to come…
1972: Danica Briggs is making her way back to the city where her life ended. She wants money. She wants revenge. She wants to see Sebastian and Jake again. She wants it all to end…
‘Second Chance in Hell’, ‘A Wolf Among Wolves’ and ‘Female of the Species’ tell three tragic stories which combine into a brutal, foredoomed spiral of hopelessness which only violence can end. Oddly reminiscent of Christopher Nolan’s film Memento the story unfolds by taking us further back into each character’s past with each beginning but, nihilistically, at no stage does there ever appear to be a instant when a different path taken could have saved anyone. These trapped souls are doomed from the moment they met…
Dark, brutal and fearfully compelling, these tales of the other side of society are an irresistible view of raw humanity. These are stories that can’t be ignored… so don’t.
This themed collection re-presents some of the key clashes between the Gotham Guardian and the immortal mastermind and eco-activist Ra’s Al Ghul – a contemporary and more acceptable visual embodiment of the classic inscrutable foreign devil as typified in a less forgiving age as the Yellow Peril or Dr. Fu Manchu. This kind of alien archetype permeates fiction and is an overwhelmingly powerful villain symbol, although the character’s Arabic origins, neutral at the time, seem to embody a different kind of ethnic bogeyman in today’s post 9/11 world.
The concept of a villain who has the best interests of the planet at heart is not a new one, but Ra’s Al Ghul, whose avowed intent is to reduce teeming humanity to viable levels and save the world from our poison, hit a chord in the 1970s – a period where ecological issues first came to the attention of the young. It was a rare kid who didn’t find a note of sense in what the Demon’s Head planned.
Although the character is best remembered for the O’Neil/Adams collaborations, this book kicks off with a seminal story from Detective Comics #411 that featured the sinister League of Assassins (introduced in #405 I believe) and the exotic Talia. ‘Into the Den of the Death Dealers’ was written by Denny O’Neil and illustrated by the great Bob Brown, and inked by Dick Giordano.
‘Daughter of the Demon’ from Batman #232 by O’Neil and Neal Adams (with Giordano inking) is one of the signature high-points of the entire Batman canon, an exotic mystery yarn that draws the increasingly Dark Knight from Gotham’s concrete canyons to the Himalayas in search of hostages Robin and Talia. If you’re one of the few who hasn’t read this much reprinted tale I’m not going to spoil the joy that awaits you.
From Batman #235, with penciller Irv Novick joining regulars O’Neil and Giordano comes ‘Swamp Sinister’ a mystery tale and bio-hazard drama that gives some early insights into the true character of Talia and her ruthless sire. ‘Vengeance for a Dead Man’ (Batman #240) by the same creative team sets the scene for the groundbreaking “series-within-a-series†soon to follow as Batman uncovers one of Ra’s Al Ghul’s less worthy and far more grisly projects. As a result there was open war between Batman and the Demon…
Batman #242-244 and the epilogue from #245 (not included in this volume) formed an extended saga taken out of normal DC continuity, relating what was to be the final confrontation between two opposing ideals. Novick penciled the first part ‘Bruce Wayne – Rest in Peace!’ which saw Batman gather a small team of allies, including the still active today Matches Malone, to destroy the Demon forever, and Neal Adams returned with the second part ‘The Lazarus Pit’ which seemed to we consumers of the day a brilliant conclusion to the epic. But with the last three pages the rug was pulled out from under us and the saga continued!
How sad for modern fans with so many sources of information today: the chances of creators genuinely surprising their devoted readers are almost nonexistent but in the faraway 1970s, we had no idea what to expect from #244 when ‘The Demon Lives Again!’ hit the shops and news-stands. In a classic confrontation Batman triumphed and Ra’s Al Ghul disappeared for many years. He was considered by DC as a special villain and not one to be diluted through overuse. How times change…
In 1978 the company was experimenting with formats and genres in a time of poor comic sales. Part of that drive and was an irregular anthology entitled DC Special Series. From the all-Batman 15th issue comes an oddly enticing little gem scripted by Denny O’Neil and drawn by a talented young newcomer called Michael Golden, inked by the ubiquitous Dick Giordano. ‘I Now Pronounce you Batman and Wife’ is a stylish, pacy thriller that anticipates the 1980s sea-change in comics storytelling, but the most interesting aspect of the tale is the plot maguffin that inspired a trilogy of graphic novels in the 1990s and today’s Batman and Son (ISBN13: 978-1-84576-429-6) serial.
The volume concludes with another key multi-part epic, this time from Detective Comics #485, 489 and 490. Although picky me still wishes that all parts were included the truncated version here has no significant loss of narrative flow as Batman becomes involved in a civil war for leadership of the Al Ghul organization between the Demon and the aged oriental super-assassin the Sensei – who older fans will know as the villain behind the murder of Deadman.
It all begins with ‘The Vengeance Vow!’ as a long-standing member of the Batman Family is murdered, drawing the Caped Crimebuster into battle with the deadly martial artist Bronze Tiger. The concluding parts ‘Where Strike the Assassins!’ and ‘Requiem for a Martyr!’ whilst perhaps not as powerful as the O’Neil/Novick/Adams/Giordano run are nevertheless a stirring thriller with a satisfactory denouement, elevated to dizzy heights by the magnificent artwork of Don Newton. Inked here by Dan Adkins, Newton’s Batman could well have become the definitive 1980s look, but the artist’s tragically early death in 1984 cut short what should have been a superlative career.
Ra’s Al Ghul has become just another Bat-Foe in recent years, familiarity indeed breeding mediocrity if not contempt. But these unique tales from a unique era are comics at there very best and this book is well overdue for a definitive re-issue.
By Dennis O’Neil, Denys Cowan & Rick Magyar (DC Comics)
ISBN13: 978-1-84576-839-3
In the “real†world, some solutions require better Questions…
An ordinary man pushed to the edge by his obsessions, Vic Sage uses his fists and a mask that makes him look utterly faceless to get answers (and justice) whenever normal journalistic methods fail. After a few successes around the DC universe Sage got a TV reporting job in the town where he grew up.
This second collection (reprinting issues #7-12 of the highly regarded 1980s series) of the seminal reinterpretation of Steve Ditko’s faceless seeker of Truth finds the obsessively driven reporter back on the streets of Hub City – probably the Worst City in America – and encountering a succession of highly conflicted and complex characters.
In ‘Survivor’ it’s aging vulpine racketeer Volk, who finds himself in the way of lesser, but more venal thugs, whereas ‘Mikado’ is a good man driven by the daily horrors of the city to take action, making his punishments fit the crime. Formerly corrupt cop Izzy O’Toole continues his struggle for redemption in ‘Watchers’ as the Question searches for his missing mentor and confidante Professor Rodor, a hunt that takes him to the Tropical hell-hole of ‘Santa Prisca’ and a confrontation with a sadist who wants to be a Saint in ‘Transformation’.
The Halloween celebration ‘Poisoned Ground’ closes this volume as a contaminated housing project provides a backdrop for another killing spree for Baby Gun, the mentally impaired gunman who killed Sage in The Question: Zen and Violence (ISBN13: 978-1-84576-690-0).
These are tales that probe the very mature of the struggle between Good and Evil, using Eastern philosophy and very human prowess to challenge, crime corruption, abuse, neglect and complacency.
Combating Western dystopia with Eastern Thought and martial arts action is not a new concept but the author’s spotlight on cultural problems rather than super-heroics make this series O’Neil’s most philosophical work, and Cowan’s raw, edgy art imbues this darkly adult, powerfully sophisticated thriller with a maturity that is simply breathtaking.
The Question’s direct sales series was one of DC’s best efforts from a hugely creative period, so it’s up to you to make it the popular hit it always should have been via these superb trade paperback collections, available at last due to the hero’s major role in the weekly comic maxi-series 52.
By Michael O’Donoghue & Frank Springer (Ken Pierce Books)
ISBN: 0-912277-34-3
The 1960s satire boom left many unforgettable classics in film and television, but precious little in the form of comic-strips. One notable exception is this cerebral and innocently smutty masterpiece from Michael O’Donoghue – a brilliant writer and performer who was a co-founder of National Lampoon, as well as an involved citizen in the right place at the right time. His later jobs included working with Woody Allen and being the first head writer on the groundbreaking Saturday Night Live.
In a period of immense upheaval he was in a position to say something about Everything and chose methods that people couldn’t ignore – biting commentary, bizarre sexual practices and naked ladies.
His perfect partner in this endeavour was veteran comics stripper, cartoonist and animation artist Frank Springer, who began his career by assisting George Wunder on Terry and the Pirates before branching out into comic books for practically every company in America.
In 1965 they produced for the Evergreen Review a tongue-in-cheek, subversive assault on old America in the form of a parody of silent movie serials such as the Perils of Pauline. And like contemporary cartoon commentaries Little Annie Fanny and The Adventures of Pussycat they used tactics America couldn’t ignore – politics, sexual themes and the aforementioned naked ladies.
Evergreen Review was an eclectic literary magazine which began in the late 1950s. Despite being a “literary†periodical it was always heavily illustrated and carried many cartoons – often of a controversial, sophisticated or sexually charged nature.
The Review debuted pivotal works by Edward Albee, Samuel Beckett, Jorge Luis Borges, Bertolt Brecht, Charles Bukowski, William Burroughs, Albert Camus, Marguerite Duras, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Jean Genet, Allen Ginsberg, Gunter Grass, LeRoi Jones, Jack Kerouac, Norman Mailer, Henry Miller, Pablo Neruda, Vladimir Nabokov, Frank O’Hara, Kenzaburo Oe, Octavio Paz, Harold Pinter, Susan Sontag, Tom Stoppard, Derek Walcott and Malcolm X.
It closed in 1973, but returned in 1998 as an online magazine edited by founder Barney Rosset and Astrid Meyer. The new Review features flashbacks to classic editions, and new material by contemporary dissident poets such as Dennis Nurkse, Giannina Braschi and Regina Dereiva.
Evergreen Review ran thirteen instalments of Phoebe, ranging from four to eight pages with such chapter titles as ‘Peril Diver’, ‘Liquidated Assets’ and ‘Pain and Ink’ but the jocularity of the titles mask a very dark and instructive comedy. Many images and scenes involve brutality, humiliation, Nazism and bondage: not out of prurience but to make an antithetical statement.
This is clever, worthy stuff, but if you’re looking for a cheap thrill or can’t see past the surface, leave this book alone. The Review’s publisher Grove Press collected the series as a hardback book in 1968, and this paperback from 1986 reprints that edition.
This is a great lost gem, a powerful example of what comics can contribute to the adult world of debate and reason and a clever read. It’s about time for a third edition…
By Paul Jenkins & various (Marvel Comics)
ISBN 0-7851-1084-4
Paul Jenkins tells an interesting, if predictable, tale to tie-in with the Avengers publishing event that “ended†the forty year run of the Superteam. Of course it was only to replace them with both The New and The Young Avengers. Affiliated comicbooks such as the Fantastic Four and Spectacular Spider-Man ran parallel but not necessarily interconnected story-arcs to accompany the Big Show.
Sometime Avenger Spider-Man is in the neighbourhood when a sultry lady calling herself the Queen attacks New York City, causing massive destruction and mind-controlling a number of civilians. She commandeers a building, taking the workers inside hostage. Captain America is quickly on the scene and seems to know a lot more about her and her insect based powers than he’s letting on.
Already suffering from some hidden aspect of her abilities Spider-Man attacks only to be overwhelmed and then infected by The Queen’s kiss. He awakes as her prisoner, and although he escapes he realises that he is somehow mutating…
As Spidey slowly turns into an insectoid monster, Cap is forced to reveal secrets of America’s shameful political past that go all the way back to World War II, and the Queen’s ruthless intentions are revealed. New York and the World have never been closer to absolute disaster…
Wonderfully illustrated by Michael Ryan, Humberto Ramos, Paco Medina, Wayne Faucher and Juan Vlasco, this is a stylish but essentially vacuous tale of monsters, monstrous acts and monstrous betrayals, but there’s never any real tension and it’s very hard to escape the suspicion that Peter Parker’s subsequent metamorphosis was just a way to change his character in such a way as to bring him into line with his movie incarnation.
One of the greatest advantages of these big value black-&-white compendiums is the opportunity they provide whilst chronologically collecting a character’s adventures to include crossovers and guest spots from other titles. When the star is as long-lived and incredibly peripatetic as DC’s King of the Seven Seas that’s an awful lot of extra appearances for a fan to find…
One of the few superheroes to survive the collapse at the end of the Golden Age was a rather nondescript and generally bland looking chap who solved maritime crimes, rescuing fish and people from sub-sea disaster. Aquaman was created by Mort Weisinger and Paul Norris in the wake of Timely Comics’ Sub-Mariner, and debuted in More Fun Comics #73 (1941). Strictly a second stringer for most of his career he nevertheless continued on beyond many stronger features, illustrated by Norris, Louis Cazaneuve and Charles Paris, until young Ramona Fradon took over the art chores in 1954, by which time Aquaman had moved to a regular back-up slot in Adventure Comics. She was to draw every single adventure until 1960.
In 1956 Showcase #4 (see The Flash: Archive Edition Volume 1, ISBN: 1-56389-139-5) rekindled the public’s imagination and zest for costumed crime-fighters. As well as re-imagining Golden Age stalwarts, DC undertook to update and remake some of its hoary survivors such as Green Arrow and Aquaman. Records are incomplete, sadly, so often we don’t know who wrote what, but the initial revamp (“How Aquaman Got His Powers!†– Adventure Comics #260, May 1959) was the work of Robert Bernstein who wrote the majority of the Sea King’s adventures at this time.
From that tale on the hero had a new origin – offspring of a lighthouse keeper and a refugee from the undersea city of Atlantis – and eventually all the trappings of the modern superhero followed: Themed hideout, sidekick and even super-villains! Moreover, greater attention was paid to continuity and the concept of a shared universe.
In this volume are 49 adventures that cover that early period of renewal taking him from wandering back-up bit-player to stardom and his own comicbook. Writers from those years included the aforementioned Bernstein, Jack Miller, George Kashdan, Bob Haney and perhaps other DC regulars, but the art was always by Fradon, whose captivatingly clean economical line always made the pictures something special.
The initial stories are pretty undemanding fare, ranging from simply charming to simply bewildering examples of all-ages action to rank alongside the best the company offered at the time. ‘Aquaman Duels the Animal Master’, ‘The Undersea Hospital’, ‘The Great Ocean Election’, ‘Aquaman and his Sea-Police’, and ‘The Secret of the Super Safe’ kept the hero in soggy isolation, but with an early crossover Aquaman made his full entrance into the DC universe.
DC supported the popular 1950s Adventures of Superman TV show with a number of successful spin-off titles. Superman’s Girlfriend Lois Lane #12 (October 1959) featured ‘The Mermaid of Metropolis’ wherein the plucky news hen (and isn’t that a term that’s outlived its sell-by date?) suffers crippling injuries in a scuba-diving accident. On hand to save her is Aquaman and a surgeon who turns her into a mermaid so she can live a worthwhile life without legs beneath the waves.
I know, I know: but just accepting the adage “Simpler Times†often helps me at times like this. In all seriousness, this silly story, with no writer credited, is a key moment in the development of one-universe continuity. The fact that it’s drawn by Kurt Schaffenberger – one of the most accomplished artists ever to work in American comics – makes it even more adorable, for all its silliness – at least by our so cool modern standards.
‘Aquaman Meets Aquagirl’ (Adventure Comics #266) gave a little more information about lost Atlantis whilst testing the waters (sorry!) for a possible sidekick – after all, the Sea King spent most of his time expositorially dialoguing with an octopus! – With Adventure Comics #267 the editors tried a novel experiment.
At this time the title starred Superboy and featured two back-up features. ‘The Manhunt on Land’, saw villainous Shark Norton trade territories with Green Arrow’s foe The Wizard. In a rare crossover, both parts of which were written by Bernstein, the two heroes worked the same case with Aquaman fighting on dry land whilst the Emerald Archer pursued his enemy beneath the waves in his own strip; ‘The Underwater Archers’, illustrated by the great Lee Elias.
In the next issue ‘The Adventures of Aquaboy!’ we got a look at the early years of the Sea King, and following that a permanent sidekick, Aqualad, was introduced in ‘The Kid from Atlantis!’ In quick succession came ‘The Menace of Aqualad’, ‘The Second Deluge!’, ‘The Human Flying Fish!’, ‘Around the World in 80 Hours’, ‘Aqua-Queen’ and the intriguing mystery ‘The Interplanetary Mission’.
Originally appearing in Adventure Comics #275 – a few months after the debut of the Justice League of America in The Brave and the Bold #28 – the story concerned a plot to secure Kryptonite from the sea-floor. Although Superman did not appear, the threads of shared continuity were being gradually interwoven. Heroes would no longer work in assured solitude. It was business as usual with ‘The Aqua-thief of the Seven Seas’, ‘The Underwater Olympics’, ‘Aqualad Goes to School’, ‘Silly Sailors of the Sea’ and ‘The Lost Ocean’, a fairly mixed bag which just served to set the scene for a Big Event.
In Showcase #30 (January-February 1961) Jack Miller and Ramona Fradon expanded the origin of Aquaman in the full-length epic ‘The Creatures from Atlantis’, wherein extra-dimensional creatures conquered the sunken civilisation. From this point on the fanciful whimsy of the strip would be downplayed in favour of more character-driven drama. This was followed by the tense thriller ‘One Hour to Doom’ in Adventure Comics #282. Inked by Charles Paris, this was Ramona Fradon’s last art job for nearly a year and a half, and the second Showcase issue by Miller saw the first Aquaman job for comics veteran Nick Cardy who would visually make Aquaman his own for the next half-decade.
‘The Sea Beasts From One Million B.C.’ (Showcase #31, March-April 1961) is a wild romp of fabulous creatures, dotty scientists and evolution rays that presaged a new path for the King of the Seas. Jim Mooney drew ‘The Charge of Aquaman’s Sea Soldiers’ for Adventure #284, and the back up series then shifted to a new home, replaced by the truly unique Tales of the Bizarro World.
Before that however, there was another Showcase thriller. Miller and Cardy pulled out all the stops for ‘The Creature King of the Sea’; an action-packed duel against a monstrous villain with murder in mind. The hind end of Detective Comics #293 (July 1961) welcomed Aquaman and Aqualad who took only six pages to solve the mystery of ‘The Sensational Sea Scoops’. All this time Cardy, who had initially altered his drawing style to mirror Fradon’s had been gradually reverting to his natural, humanistic mode. By the time the fourth and final Showcase, ‘Prisoners of the Aqua-Planet’ (#33), appeared the Sea King was a rugged, burly He-Man, and his world, no matter how fantastic, had an added edge of realism to it.
Detective #294’s ‘The Fantastic Fish that Defeated Aquaman’ coincided with a guest –spot in a second Superman Family title. ‘The Monster that Loved Aqua-Jimmy’, drawn by Al Plastino, is from Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen #55, another product of its time that hasn’t aged well, but the big kid in me still regards it fondly and I hope that others will do it the same courtesy. Meanwhile back at Detective Comics #295 our heroes defied ‘The Curse of the Sea Hermit’ (scripted by George Kashdan), and the next month saw ‘The Mystery of Demon Island!‘
To accompany the more realistic art, and perhaps in honour of their new home, the stories too, became – briefly – less fantasy oriented. ‘Aqualad, Stand-In for a Star’ is credited to Miller and Cardy, though I rather suspect that Batman stalwart Sheldon Moldoff is the actual artist here, but there’s no doubt that Cardy drew both ‘The Secret Sentry of the Sea’ (#298) and ‘Aquaman’s Secret Teacher’ (#299).
The next month saw a milestone. After two decades of continuous adventuring the Sea King finally got a comicbook of his own. Aquaman #1 (January-February 1962) was a 25 page fantasy thriller that introduced one of the most controversial supporting characters in comics lore. The pixie-like Water-Sprite Quisp was part of a strange trend for cute imps and elves that attached themselves to far too many heroes of the time, but his contributions in ‘The Invasion of the Fire-Trolls’ and succeeding issues were numerous and obviously calculated.
‘The Mystery of the Undersea Safari!’ in Detective Comics #300 was the last before he moved again, this time to World’s Finest Comics. However prior to that residency commencing his own second issue appeared. ‘Captain Sykes’ Deadly Missions’ is a lovely looking thriller with fabulous monsters and a flamboyant pirate blackmailing the Sea King into retrieving deadly mystical artefacts.
‘Aquaman’s Super-Sidekick’ by Miller and Cardy started the World’s Finest run (#125) in fine style, and Aquaman #3 provided full-length thrills and more exposure for the lost city in ‘The Aquaman from Atlantis’ a tale of traitors and time-travel. WF #126 saw the heroes foil thieves with ‘Aquaman’s Super Sea Circus’ and for better or worse Quisp returned in #4’s ‘Menace of the Alien Island’.
A more welcome returnee was Ramona Fradon who took over the World’s Finest strip with #127’s ‘Aquaman’s Finny Commandos’. The next issue saw ‘The Trial of Aquaman’ end in his favour just in time to endure ‘The Haunted Sea’ in his own fifth issue, before encountering ‘The Menace of the Alien Fish’ in WF#129.
This bumper volume concludes with Aquaman #6 and the never more true ‘Too Many Quisps’, a case of painfully mistaken identity and a sentiment it’s hard not to agree with… but still beautifully illustrated by Mr. Cardy.
DC has a long and comforting history of gentle, innocuous yarn-spinning with quality artwork. Ramona Fradon’s Aquaman is one of the most neglected runs of such accessible material, and it’s a pleasure to discover just how readable they still are. And when the opportunity arises to compare her wonderful work to the early superhero work of such a stellar talent as Nick Cardy this book becomes a fan’s must-have item. More so when all the stories are still suitable for kids of all ages, Why not treat yourself and your youngsters to a timeless dose of whimsy and adventure? You won’t regret it.
By Pat Mills & Kevin O’Neill (DC Comics)
ISBN: 0-930289-10-2
In the years immediately following the release of Crisis on Infinite Earths DC Comics was a paragon of experimentation and quality, as this decidedly post-punk, English flavoured offering from 2000AD mainstays Pat Mills and Kevin O’Neill well shows. Not so long after this release artist O’Neill won the singular accolade of having his entire style of drawing – not a panel, not a story, but every single mark he left on paper – banned by the dried up but not quite dead Comics Code Authority!
Not that it stopped the rise of his remarkable talent.
In the far, far future robotic animals have evolved to fill the niches of the declining planet. Civilised humanity has absconded to the stars and Mek-Animals roam the savage Earth. Armageddon is the ruler of the ape-like Mekaka, proud and ambitious, but his tribe are losing faith. They live on scavenged power and the mammoth-like Wheeldebeasts have not been seen for five years.
But this season they will return, led by the terrible God-Beast Amok, and the Mekaka will kill him and rule the world. But complications arise when joy-riding humans Jool and Ngila crash on this which world most humans have forgotten.
They have knowledge but no survival instincts…
This story, later serialised in 2000AD, is pure savage satire and fantastic fantasy; and an undoubted highpoint in DC’s abortive Graphic Novel line of the 1980s. Its scope and power are mesmerising and its return to print long, long overdue. Let’s hope someone gets the message and whilst I’m dreaming, what about a sequel?
By Brad Meltzer, Geoff Johns & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-84576-789-1
Once the publishers realised the sales potential of super-team crossovers it was a foregone conclusion that such collaborations would become a regular part of comicbook life. One of the most crammed of these was the JLA/JSA annual team up in Justice League of America #147-148 in 1977, which included the additional team of 30th century champions the Legion of Super Heroes.
Thirty years later the modern incarnations of those heroes did it again in ‘The Lightning Saga’, a crossover that progressed through the post-52Justice League # 8-10 and Justice Society #5-6.
When minor villain Trident is captured he is found to be under the mind-control of the alien Starro the Conqueror. Further examination reveals that he is also from the 30th century. In fact he is a hero known as Karate Kid, part of a team of teen-aged champions that Superman joined when he was just starting out. Revelations follow swiftly as JSA-er Star Man – a mysterious hero suffering from mental illness – reveals that he too is a time-lost member of the Legion of Super Heroes.
For an unspecified reason, seven members have travelled back in time, becoming lost and amnesiac. The combined 21st century teams must track them down and discover what mission could be so vital that it would be worth risking the entire future for?
As the lost Legionnaires are recovered old-time readers might well be fooled by a brilliant red herring newer fans won’t pick up on, but rest assured the conclusion isn’t one you’ll see coming.
Terse, far-reaching, tense and filled with humour and tragedy, this action-extravaganza continues the policy of reuniting all the disparate strands of DC continuity back together after the separations of the two decades following Crisis on Infinite Earths, and does it in a stylish and thrilling manner.
This volume also includes ‘Walls’ by Brad Meltzer and Gene Ha from Justice League #11: a gritty tale of survival as Red Arrow and Vixen are buried alive under a collapsing building and #12’s ‘Monitor duty’ by Meltzer, Ed Benes & Eric Wight, which depicts a typical but never normal day in the life of the team.
Intense and very high maintenance, the modern JLA is epic in every way but might not be to everyone’s taste. Still, if tense dramas and soap-opera ethics are your thing this is a very impressive read, ‘though not perhaps, one for the casual browser.
