{"id":30642,"date":"2024-10-03T08:00:29","date_gmt":"2024-10-03T08:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=30642"},"modified":"2024-10-02T18:28:30","modified_gmt":"2024-10-02T18:28:30","slug":"marvel-masterworks-werewolf-by-night-volume-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2024\/10\/03\/marvel-masterworks-werewolf-by-night-volume-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Marvel Masterworks: Werewolf by Night volume 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nBy Marv Wolfman<\/strong>, Mike Friedrich<\/strong>, Gerry Conway<\/strong>, Tony Isabella<\/strong>, Doug Moench<\/strong>, Mike Ploog<\/strong>, Don Perlin<\/strong>, Tom Sutton<\/strong>, Gil Kane<\/strong>, Gerry Conway<\/strong>, Pat Broderick<\/strong>, Frank Chiaramonte<\/strong>, Mike Royer<\/strong>, Vince Colletta<\/strong>, Tom Palmer<\/strong>& various (MARVEL)
\nISBN: 978-1-3029-4948-8 (HB\/Digital edition)<\/p>\n

Win\u2019s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Magical unrealism\u2026 9\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n

This book includes Discriminatory Content<\/strong> produced in less enlightened times.<\/em><\/p>\n

As Marvel slowly grew to a position of market dominance in 1970, in the wake of losing their two most innovative and inspirational creators – Steve Ditko and Jack Kirby – they did so less by experimentation and more by expanding proven concepts and properties.<\/p>\n

The only real exception to this was a mass release of horror titles rapidly devised in response to an industry-wide down-turn in superhero sales. The move was handily expedited by a rapid revision in the wordings of the increasingly ineffectual Comics Code Authority rules.<\/p>\n

Almost overnight nasty monsters (plus narcotics and bent coppers – but that\u2019s another story) became acceptable fare within four-colour pages and whilst a parade of 1950s pre-code reprints made sound business sense (so they repackaged a bunch of those too) the creative aspect of the contemporary fascination in supernatural themes was catered to by adapting popular cultural icons before risking whole new concepts on an untested public.<\/p>\n

As always, the watch-word was fashion: what was hitting big outside comics was to be incorporated into the mix as soon as possible…<\/p>\n

When proto-monster Morbius, the Living Vampire<\/strong> debuted in Amazing Spider-Man<\/strong> #101 (October 1971) and the sky failed to fall in, Marvel moved ahead with a line of scary stars – beginning with a werewolf and traditional vampire – before chancing something new via a haunted biker who could tap into both Easy Rider<\/strong>\u2019s freewheeling motorcycling chic and the supernatural zeitgeist.<\/p>\n

With its title cribbed from a classic short thriller from pre-Code horror anthology Marvel Tales<\/strong> #116 (July 1953), Werewolf By Night<\/strong> debuted in Marvel Spotlight<\/strong> #2. It had been preceded by masked western hero Red Wolf<\/strong> in #1, and was followed by the afore-hinted Ghost Rider<\/strong>, but this hairy hero was destined to stick around for a while.<\/p>\n

This chillingly crackers compendium compiles more moody misadventures of a good-hearted young West Coast lycanthrope who briefly shone as an unlikely star for the entire length of a trading trend, as proved here by the reprinted full-colour contents of Werewolf By Night<\/strong> volume 1 #9-21, Giant-Size Creatures <\/strong>#1, and Tomb of Dracula<\/strong> #18, plus some enticing extracts from Monsters Unleashed<\/strong> #6 & 7: collectively spanning September 1973 to September 1974.<\/p>\n

Jack Russell<\/em> is a teenager with a rare but very disturbing condition. On her deathbed, his mother revealed unsuspected Transylvanian origins to her beloved boy: relating a family curse which would turn him into a raging beast on every night with a full moon… as soon as he reached his 18th<\/sup> birthday.<\/p>\n

And so it began…<\/p>\n

After many months of misunderstanding as Jack tried to cope alone with his periodic wild side, Jack\u2019s stepfather Philip Russell<\/em> expanded the story, revealing how the Russoff<\/em> line was cursed by the taint of Lycanthropy: every child doomed to become a wolf-thing under the full-moon from the moment they reached adulthood. Moreover, the feral blight would do the same to his little sister Lissa\u00a0<\/em>when she reached her own majority…<\/p>\n

As Jack tried and repeatedly failed to balance a normal life with his monthly cycle of uncontrollable ferocity, he met eventual mentor and confidante Buck Cowan<\/em>, an aging writer who became Jack\u2019s best friend after the pair began to jointly investigate the wolf-boy\u2019s past. Their incessant search for a cure was made more urgent by little Lissa\u2019s ever-encroaching birthday. In the course of their researches they crossed swords with many monsters – human and otherwise – including off-the-rails cop Lou Hackett<\/em>, who had been going increasingly crazy in his off-the-books investigation\/hunt for a werewolf nobody believed in. This time we will meet a fellow horror hairball who has found a shocking remedy to their condition…<\/p>\n

Following fond and effusive recollections from novelist\/comics scribe Duane Swierczynski in his Introduction \u2018My Favorite Fur Baby\u2019<\/em>, the saga resumes as Jack heads back to LA after meeting Spider-Man<\/strong>, only to find \u2018Terror Beneath the Earth!\u2019 <\/em>Here, Conway, Tom Sutton & George Roussos delve into an impending and thoroughly nefarious scheme by business cartel The Committee<\/em>. These out-of-the-box commercial gurus somehow possess a full dossier on Jack Russell\u2019s night-life and hire a maniac sewer-dwelling sound engineer to execute their radical plan to use monsters and derelicts to boost sales in a down-turned economy.<\/p>\n

Sadly, the bold sales scheme to frighten folk into spending more ends before it begins as the werewolf proves to be far from a team-player in wrap up \u2018The Sinister Secret of Sarnak!\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n

Werewolf by Night<\/strong> #11 revelled in irony as Marv Wolfman signed on as writer for \u2018Comes the Hangman\u2019<\/em> – illustrated by the incredible Gil Kane & Sutton – in which we learn something interesting about Philip Russell and The Committee, whilst Jack\u2019s attention is distracted by a new apartment, a very odd neighbour and a serial kidnapper abducting young women to keep them \u201csafe from corruption.\u201d When the self-deluded hooded hero snatches Lissa, he finds himself hunted by a monster beyond his wildest dreams…
\n\"\"
\nConcluding chapter \u2018Cry Werewolf!\u2019<\/em> brings in the criminally underappreciated Don Perlin as inker. In a few short months he would become the strip\u2019s penciller for the rest of the run, but before that original illustrator Mike Ploog (with Frank Chiaramonte) pops back for another stunning session, introducing a manic mystic and a new love-interest (not the same person) in WBN<\/strong> #13\u2019s \u2018His Name is Taboo\u2019<\/em>. An aged sorcerer coveting the werewolf\u2019s energies for his own arcane purposes, the magician is stunned when his adopted daughter Topaz<\/em> finds her loyalties divided and her psionic gifts more help than hindrance to the ravening moon-beast.<\/p>\n

\u2018Lo, the Monster Strikes!\u2019<\/em> pits the wolf against Taboo\u2019s undead – but getting better – son and sees revelation and reconciliation between Philip and Jack Russell. As a result, the young man and new girlfriend Topaz set off for Transylvania, the ancestral Russoff estate and a crossover confrontation with the Lord of Vampires…<\/p>\n

Tomb of Dracula<\/strong> #18 (March 1974) commences the clash in \u2018Enter: Werewolf by Night\u2019 <\/em>(Wolfman, Gene Colan & Tom Palmer) as Jack & Topaz investigate a potential cure for lycanthropy, only to be ambushed by Dracula. Driven off by the strange girl\u2019s psychic powers, the cunning Count realises the threat she poses to him and resolves to slay her…<\/p>\n

It concludes courtesy of Wolfman, Ploog & Chiaramonte in Werewolf by Night<\/strong> #15 and the \u2018Death of a Monster!\u2019<\/em> as the battle of beasts resolves into a messy stalemate, but only after Jack learns of his family\u2019s long connection to Dracula…<\/p>\n

The suspense builds as Jack & Topaz reach Paris. After failing to find a cure in his Balkan homeland, and clashing with a vampire they were forced to endure a tiresome – and crucially untimely – forced stopover in the City of Lights. Quel dommage!<\/p>\n

This leads to an impromptu clash with a modern-day Hunchback of Notre Dame<\/em> (he doesn\u2019t sing and he\u2019s not very gentle here) and ends with \u2018Death in the Cathedral!\u2019<\/em>. Scripted by Mike Friedrich and inked by Chiaramonte, this bombastic battle was co-originator Ploog\u2019s farewell performance as artist in residence.<\/p>\n

WBN<\/strong> #17 was by Friedrich & Don Perlin, with Jack & Topaz escaping Paris only to fall into The Committee\u2019s latest scheme, as blustering Baron Thunder<\/em> and his favourite monster \u2018The Behemoth!\u2019<\/em> try to make the werewolf their plaything again. The plot concluded in \u2018Murder by Moonlight!\u2019<\/em> (Perlin inked by Mike Royer) as the secret of Jack\u2019s mystery neighbour is exposed when Thunder attacks again, aided by witch-queen Ma Mayhem<\/em>. However, it\u2019s all a feint for The Committee to kidnap Lissa who will, one day soon, become a werewolf too… and hopefully a far more manageable one…<\/p>\n

A potent pin-up carries us onwards before – whilst searching for Lissa – Jack finds out some of the secrets of nasty neighbour Raymond Coker<\/em> before falling foul of two undead film-stars haunting the Hollywood backlots in #19\u2019s \u2018Vampires on the Moon\u2019<\/em> (Friedrich, Perlin & Vince Colletta).<\/p>\n

Armed with the knowledge that for a werewolf to lift his curse, he\/she must kill another one, it\u2019s a swift lope to \u00a0Giant-Size Creatures<\/strong> #1, where Tony Isabella, Perlin & Colletta moodily re-imagine a failed costumed crusader and introduce a new creepy champion in \u2018Tigra the Were-Woman!\u2019<\/em> Greer Nelson – one-time feminist avenger The Cat<\/strong> – is \u201cassassinated\u201d by Hydra agents, revived by ancient hidden race the Cat-People<\/em> and becomes an unwilling object of temporary affection for feral and frisky moonwalker Jack Russell…<\/p>\n

Following text piece \u2018Waiter, there\u2019s a Werewolf in my Soup!\u2019<\/em> – also from Giant-Size Creatures<\/strong> and explaining the genesis of Marvel\u2019s horror line – WBN<\/strong> #20 debuts writer Doug Moench to wrap up all the disparate plot threads in \u2018Eye of the Wolf!\u2019<\/em>: a rushed but satisfactory conclusion offering a whole pack of werewolves, Baron Thunder, Ma Mayhem and lots and lots of action.<\/p>\n

With the decks cleared, Moench began making the series uniquely his own, beginning with #21\u2019s \u2018One Wolf\u2019s Cure… Another\u2019s Poison!\u2019<\/em>, wherein he starts playing up the ever-encroaching 18th<\/sup> birthday of little Lissa, before deftly engineering the final reckoning with rogue cop Hackett…<\/p>\n

With the stage set for some truly outrageous yarn-spinning we abruptly divert to a brace of sidebar shorts taken from Monsters Unleashed<\/strong> #6 and 7. Here Gerry Conway\u2019s prose yarn \u2018Panic by Moonlight\u2019<\/em> and concluding instalment \u2018Madness Under a Mid-Summer Moon\u2019<\/em> (with spot illustrations by Ploog, Pat Broderick & Klaus Janson) detail how a gang of bikers pick the wrong night to home-invade the flashy singles complex Jack Russell lives in…<\/p>\n

Kicking off the bonus section is an Introduction by Ralph Macchio first seen in 2017\u2019s Werewolf By Night: The Complete Collection<\/strong> volume 1, contemporary house ads and – complementing the cover gallery by Sutton, Kane, John Romita, Ernie Chan, Ploog, Palmer, Frank Giacoia, Ron Wilson, Klaus Janson – a selection of original art by Kane, Ploog, Perlin & Chiaramonte.<\/p>\n

A moody masterpiece of macabre menace and all-out animal action, this compilation comprises some of the most under-appreciated magic moments in Marvel history: tense, suspenseful and solidly compelling. If you must have a mixed bag of lycanthropes, bloodsuckers and moody young magical misses, this is a far more entertaining mix than many modern movies, books or miscellaneous matter…
\n\u00a9 2023 MARVEL.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Marv Wolfman, Mike Friedrich, Gerry Conway, Tony Isabella, Doug Moench, Mike Ploog, Don Perlin, Tom Sutton, Gil Kane, Gerry Conway, Pat Broderick, Frank Chiaramonte, Mike Royer, Vince Colletta, Tom Palmer& various (MARVEL) ISBN: 978-1-3029-4948-8 (HB\/Digital edition) Win\u2019s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Magical unrealism\u2026 9\/10 This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times. As … <\/p>\n

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