The Irish Situation

Budget 20 & 13 the likes never been seen...
A great fiscal adjustment..
The sick hardly have a crutch to lean...
Even in the grave, shirt off your back...
Can't leave death untaxed
For Neck they just don't lack

10 cent on the pint
20 quid on the rent,
All well and good,
Governments hellbent

outlanders clamouring for money,
can't get enough of the welfare trick,
they think it funny,
Same old sob story

We have one bedroom
They have three
Half of them do nothing,
Been busy as a bee

Austerity the new word,
On the country they bet,
Gambling on the Irish herd,
Propaganda from a TV set

Noonan tarred and feathered,
Very good
, i'd rather he'd be leathered,
With a Sam Brown belt,
each repeated lash,
uneasy on his pelt....

'Romantic Ireland dead and gone
With O' Leary in the Grave'
Pyrite ridden estates are long,
families a banker's slave...

1985: Incredible Hulk #314

This might just be my favorite Hulk comic. Not without good reason. Everything about this issue is flawless. The pacing of the story is amazing. Everything flows along perfectly. Every movement and action in the issue has purpose and meaning. There are no cackhanded attempts at shoehorning plot elements in. Betty Ross' story is removed from the main action in a 1 page interlude. The central narrative is very simple - the near mindless Hulk is drawn by some subconscious impulse to return to New Mexico, his birthplace, of sorts. Doc Samson follows him and Hulk dukes it out with hallucinations of his main antagonists, all depicted in the amazing cover above. While the Hulk is distracted with these figments of his tortured subconscious the good Doctor Samson scores that elusive KO victory over the behemoth in one of the greatest and most remembered splash pages of the 1980's. This really is an example of John Byrne flexing his artistic muscles as large over sized panels and splashes dominate the issue. Byrne once claimed that he could not depict a punch possessed off the same power that Jack Kirby could but the punch Samson lands at the end of this issue is awesome. Banner's subconscious still exists as is clear from the manifestations of all of Hulk's main antagonists. This was Banner's attempt to distract the Hulk so Samson could defeat him. Samson cottons on to this on the last page as relates the events of the encounter into a Dictaphone. It is this ingenuity on the part of Byrne that grounds a fanciful plot in a semblance of reality. I'm not a huge Hulk fan, I like the character but in the last decade I've moved away from him. This is one special issue that I always remember as being one of the best Hulk stories ever. It is sad that Byrne's run had to be aborted due to editorial differences,that in itself is one of the greatest 'what-if' stories Marvel has ever seen.

That punch!!

 

My Absence and Return Explained...A Note on Spitfire and the Troubleshooters #5

I've been neglecting this blog for the last few months..I've started a new job and previous to that I had just finished my final exams... After that upheaval I went on a bender for a few months, with only my four-colour friends to balm my alcoholic headaches...Well , suprisingly enough a much maligned 80's gem from the doomed and much derided New Universe line reawakened my joy in this brand of ephemera... Drum roll please.. Spitfire and the Troubleshooters #5 February 1987. A little hidden gem picked up for the exorbitant sum of 50c. Here's the cover in all it's 80's glory. What drama, what characterisation, what action!!! Never let anyone keep ya away from a hidden treasure. Take comics as you find 'em, and don't let any half assed 'critics' steer you. Nuggets of gold are out there. Tell 'em Sparky sent you.                                                                                                                      

Classic Issue Thor Annual #13

Just replaced this issue during the week having spilled beer or coffee on the last copy I owned many moons ago. It's from 1985 and occurs during the aftermath of Asgard's battle with Surtur, Thor #353 (I think) . Simonson provides the striking cover, left.
  The story itself involves Mephisto trying to destroy Thor, who is in deep mourning following the loss of his father Odin during the aforementioned Surtur saga. His spirit is broken. Mephisto sees this and secures the services of Ulik, the mightiest of trolls to battle him. He kidnaps Ulik's brother to force Ulik to seek out Thor. Thor and Ulik battle, and it's a pretty good fight sequence, with Thor as broken in spirit as he is, pummeling Ulik in the end. Ulik tells Thor about Mephisto's machinations and Thor journeys to Mephisto's realm to confront him. A pretty mediocre and unimaginative premise. A plot that looks like a straight lift from Lee/Buscema's Silver Surfer comics of the late 60's. Actually, the whole thing reads like a love letter to those stories from writer Alan Zelentz. So Sparky, you may ask, why is this issue a classic?. In a nutshell, the artwork by John Buscema (who also inks) is absolutely mind-blowing, that's why!!!!

'No sooner bid than done Master!'

Buscema's depiction of Mephisto's realm is so beautifully rendered, eerie strange creatures (see left) and scenes of torment and human anguish.
As a purely visual experience this is as good as anything I've seen Big John ever illustrate. It is a far cry from his wonderfully slick Joe Sinnott inked pages on Fantastic Four and more akin to the amazing work he was doing in Savage Sword of Conan. It's no secret that Buscema was sick of Superheroes at this stage of his career.As it is plain to see from the workaday look of his pencils on Fantastic Four in 1987.(Still good, but 'twas clear Big John's heart wasn't in it) But, the scene of Mephisto's domain must have got his creative juices flowing again, and how.

Writer Alan Zelentz appeared to turn in a journeyman job until the last couple of pages when he redeems himself with a wonderfully wicked and clever twist, that I don't want to spoil if you haven't read this mag. It leaves the reader with a wonderfully satisfied feeling that you've in fact contrary to what you've thought during the book that you've read an absolute epic. Quality rating 8 out of 10. Check out the greatest depiction of Mephisto in History!

Uncanny X-Men #131 Classic Cover

Love this cover to Uncanny X-Men #131. The look of pure malevolence on the White Queen's face is classic. The design and use of colours is amazing...

Namor The Submariner #13 Classic Cover

Namor The Submariner (1990) 1-25 Lost Classic

Namor #4

This has got to be one of the great titles of the early 90's. To me it represents the last vestiges of the greatness of the 1980's before the Marvel Universe and its characters became a fictonal quagmire populated by cliche ridden tough guys, like Cable and Shatterstar, and Wolverine and the Punisher were pimped out to every low-selling Marvel Title to raise sales. Card embossed covers and cardboard cut-out characters were on the way in, characterization and intricate plots were on the way out. But that's a different post.
       Namor as a character was never really an a-lister, I feel aquatic heroes don't do as well as others(see Aquaman). Maybe it was his haughty imperious (Rex!) character that people didn't relate to. He had no feet of clay, except for maybe his temper. Mere mortal readers couldn't relate to him as they would Thor, who occasionally found himself humbled, and a lot of his stories dealt with the dangers of pride and over inflated ego. He just was more inherently likable as a character.
       I've always had a soft spot for Namor, and I can't properly explain why.  I think it is because I enjoyed him so much in Roger Stern's Avengers, where he was constantly at loggerheads with Hercules, and Stern fleshed his character out a bit from where he was when Roy Thomas was writing him in the 60's.
           John Byrne obviously liked the character and it shows. His Namor is still the same haughty, imperious , headstrong character but Byrne, and its a testament to his mastery of his craft, made him LIKABLE. Not only that but it was a beautiful looking comic inside and out.
           Just like Byrne revitalised the Fantastic Four and Superman, he works the same magic here, refining elements of Namor's mythos. One of the most interesting aspects is taking Namor from a pair of Speedos into a business suit as Namor entered the corporate world at the helm of an environmental protection company called Oracle, (very early 90's). This provided many a subplot and the nefarious Marrs twins Desmond and Phoebe, introduced in Byrne's Iron Man, attempted a hostile takeover, which was so full of intrigue and wild twists and turns that I won't spoil it. (Get the back issues or buy the trades, the back issues are dirt cheap).
           Namor had a sidekick his cousin Namorita who acted as a more whimsical counterpoint to the sometimes brooding and over-serious Namor. And Byrne draws a lovely Namorita, it has to be said. She even fashions a disguise for Namor in one of the early issues which is a typical Byrne motif; making the outlandish sound plausible. He did the same for Clark Kent in Man of Steel.

Just as some new comics just never seem to find their feet and end up in cancelation, Namor the Submariner had all major elements in place in the first three issues. A whole spectrum of Marvel characters show up, the FF, Cap, Iron Man, Ka-Zar, even the obligatory appearances of the Punisher and Wolverine, in an attempt to ground this title in the greater Marvel Universe. (Sadly other titles did not return the favour as mutants were the flavour of the day after Jim Lee's X-Men in 1991). If this title had appeared 7-8 years earlier it would have been an absolute smash and elevated Namor to a-list status, but Byrne was now superceded by McFarlane, Jim Lee and Rob Liefield while ironically, in my opinion was at the creative apex of his career.
      Namor's manner in this series is more nuanced than it had been earlier, there are subtleties in facial expression that Byrne allows that let the reader see through Namor's armour of aloofness. He has heart and is shown as fallible and self critical, but not overly so. This is something other writers have never been able to achieve with the character.
      His rages are explained by an imbalance of oxygen in his blood which drives him into temporary insanity, hence his wars on surface dwellers. A marine biologist he meets in #1 provides him with the cure. One of the greatest issues of any comic I've ever read was #13 'The trial of the Submariner' which is such a classic it deserves a post in itself. The book is also responsible for the reintroduction of Iron Fist into the Marvel Universe, in the climactic story arc, before Jae Lee takes over art duties. Luckily Namor has been released in two trade paperbacks collecting the whole run. Watch for 'em. I have only one complaint about this run on Namor, it was too short.

2 page splash ;-) from #1

X-Men Portfolio 1980. John Byrne,

Spider-man Vs. Superman!! Another great commission from John Byrne

From John Byrne's Facebook page. Simply amazing!!

https://www.facebook.com/pages/John-Byrne/47733924917

Marvel UK 1985-86 (Part 1)

Back in 1985-86 Marvel fans in Britain and Ireland who didn't have regular access to the American editions, were catered for by two weekly reprint titles Spider-Man and Zoids, and Secret Wars (2). It is a fun nostalgic experience now years later looking back on these editions. Spider-Man had to share his 24 page mag with the Zoids, a little remembered toy line created by Tomy, that featured mechanical dinosaurs on the planet Zoidstar (the people behind Hasbro's Transformers could sleep easy.) It also featured artwork by the great Kev Hopgood & Ron Smith among others and claimed the distinction of publishing Grant Morrison's first professional work in comics.
 As good as that strip was it was the Spider-man strip that I really waited to read every week. This was a great era for Spider-man, Tom Defalco was doing a bang up job writing the strip and the underated Ron Frenz was producing some amazing artwork.

Sineater! Notice how the credits are missing (bottom)

   
This was the era of the alien costume saga, the Hobgoblin and the Death of Jean DeWollf (Sineater) sagas. That might give some indication of why these mags are so memorable (a decade later Marvel UK had 100 page mammoth monthly comic out entitled 'The Exploits of Spider-Man' which chronicled the Ben Reilly saga and Spider-Man 2099 :-(  ) . The Spider-man strip usually was issued in weekly installments of 6-13 pages, but it was a weekly so we, as readers, were drip-fed our dose of Spider-man.

Marvel UK celebrates Marvels 25th 

Marvel UK version on right, original on left. Notice the difference in vibrancy.

                                                                                                                                                                                   The pages were larger than the American editions and glossy so the colours really shone and the bigger pages did the artwork more justice. To my 9-year-old mind they were simply amazing.
       Looking back Marvel UK had an awful habit of cutting panels and pages from these mags. They were notorious for it. Case in point point the last page of the Sineater saga, the start of a budding bromance between Matt Murdock and Parker is cut by a blurb for the next issue...

I'll never forget the Death of Jean DeWolff story from the Spectacular Spider-man, it brought a level of grit and realism to Spider-man that was missing in his main US title 'Amazing'.
But that's a different post.
     Spider-man and Zoids ran for one year only (51 issues) and its final Spider-man panel has got to be one of the most depressing ways to to finish up a strip I've ever witnessed. Of course these were the days before Parker married a super-model, released a best-selling coffee-table book and joined the Avengers, so art imitating life back then, Peter Parker had a whole host of worries, his ailing aunt, money, where the rent was going to come from etc. Here's that final panel in all it's 'slit-my-wrists now' glory.
   

Final panels from Spider-man (Spider-Man and Zoids)

Spider-man would return in late 1990 in the Complete Spider-Man a 100-page reprint title that kicked of with the Todd McFarlane story,Torment. Spidey, Marvel's flagship character and the rest of the superheroes did a vanishing act for nearly 4 years from Marvel UK's presses. Beat that Onslaught!!!! The editorial thinking being that the British public had minimal interest in superheroes. Action Force(G.I. Joe), The Real Ghostbusters,Transformers and the Thundercats were the order of the day. The Punisher got a weekly title in '89 that featured Frank Miller's Daredevil and Transformers had an Iron Man back up strip reprinted from Amazing Spider-Man annual 20. That was it. It was a sad time for many young fans...

Spidey returns!!!

For anyone out there that desires a more in depth look at these  fondly remembered pieces of ephemera, look no further than    

http://stevegoble.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/spider-man-and-zoids.html

Steve Goble is a man who has done a painstaking job detailing these mags and the little idiosynchrocies of the Marvel UK bullpen in presenting these reprints. With no desire for reward or recognition he has painstakingly detailed almost every story in this series and cross referenced it with it's original US counterpart in terms of continuity. It is a wry and humorous look but historically rock-solid. A major Spider-fan, there is a wealth of great posts there. Stay tuned for part 2 as I take a look at Marvel UK's treatment of the Secret Wars.

Starfire and Nightwing (Gorgeous cover to the George Perez Newsletter)

Iron Man Demon In A Bottle (Animation) Hilarious..

Got this from the Mighty World of Bronze Age site a great repository on al things Marvel 1970-79

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNF7oy6rFaPptmB4trFcsOSgm1T8u0Z3C31S9AvXbhRXjXjwrW91TqVTDrMFpQ5dpEqlwHfnLN6-jIC5Az_2wVv55TSGahwn_h5giossvpz-GAQxNOq3MTIqbQzz7gCnF0Jg0zFrylsIUM/s640/im128.gif

Strontium Dog Rage!!

Amazing video, showing the death of Johnny Alpha's partner Wulf Sternhammer, and Johnny's ultimate showdown with Max Bubba from the classic 2000AD strip Strontium Dog (Rage!). Whomever came up with this deserves an award... Magic!!!

Batman: A Death in the Family (Review)

This is one of the greatest stories of the Post-Crisis Batman. It would be a very welcome, but not essential, addition to any Batfan's bookshelf. To me only the trinity of  Miller's Dark Knight Returns, Year One and Moore's The Killing Joke belong to the category of being essential, (although I'm sure there are many out there that might add one or two that list). Death in the Family is a very well executed story. It is severely flawed, however by an outlandish plot and just two many 'million-to-one chance' type coincidences that writers use to keep a story moving and together. That said I've it's still excellent. My only real exposure to Starlin before this was his work on Warlock and Captain Marvel, and was surprised, in later life, when I actually stopped and noticed he wrote it and not Marv Wolfman or Doug Moench, being used to Starlin's wild space opera type stories. I do feel he goes a little over the top introducing the grit that had been the prevalent type of style since Miller's opus DKR.                                                                                                            

Of course, classic Batman artist Jim Aparo does his usual flawless job on pencils, while his work always looked better when he inked it himself, Mike DeCarlo, gives it a gorgeous slickness. The story opens with Robin being rash and aggressive and moody, taking unnecessary risks and Batman reprimands him. He stops him being Robin until he learns to come to terms with his parents death. Jason then leaves Wayne Manor where he goes back to his old neighborhood in Crime Alley where a woman gives him his late parents personal effects. He discovers his birth cert and realises that his mother is still alive, but because of the smudged writing on the cert and his fathers address book realises that it must be one of three women, two strangely enough located in Iran and one in Ethiopia, helping with famine relief. The fact that two are located in Iran where the Joker has gone attempting to sell a nuclear weapon is really a bit much to take. Jason leaves for Iran to track two of these women, without Batman knowing, Batman decides to leave for Iran also in order to stop the Joker (Strange coincidence). The two meet undercover in a lane way 2000 miles from home, Jason trying to find his mother in the same hotel Batman is stalking to find an associate of the Jokers (come on...)

Enough of the plot, Joker bludgeons Jason to death with a crow bar and kills him and his mother in a warehouse explosion in one of the most shocking depictions of a 12 year old being bludgeoned to death in code approved comics. What particularly unsettled me reading this is the callous, uncaring look on his mothers face as she watches her son being beaten with the Tyre iron. She winces and then casually lights a cigarette. Joker ties her up and Robin and blows up the warehouse, and we get the countdown scene where Jason tries to save his mother and they both try to make it out of the warehouse... and then BOOOOM!!!

Batman arrives on the scene to find the battered and burnt body of Jason.

The Joker is well off the scene and returns to the states as the Ambassador of Iran (no really) complete with turban and stuff, and plots to kill everyone in the UN assembly.Superman stops by to make sure Batman doesn't do anything stoopid, like jeprodising international relations like the big boy scout he is. Batman in one of the best scenes in the book nearly breaks his hand off Superman's face with an almighty  blow that would have probably felled Ali in his prime.
    There's a marvelous scene where Bruce Wayne and the Joker make prolonged eye contact as the Joker makes his way to the podium. Superman in disguise saves the assembly as he inhales all of the jokers toxic laughing gas, and then has enough lung power left to actually talk without exhaling the roomful of gas, in a move that conveniently sidesteps every biology, physics & chemistry law commonly held by man. Joker tries to escape batman jumps on his helicopter nad the Joker ends up shot in the chest. Batman jumps out of the helicopter and     then it explodes. Fini.

Rereading this years later I realise how depressing this book is and how sad the life of Jason Todd was. But it's still a great story, a real page-turner. Jason Todd was disliked by the majority of Batman's readers for being an obnoxious little prick, but in his last moments his inherent heroism shone through, and this adds added poignancy to his death. Interestingly this new edition for 24 bucks contains the sequel 'A Lonely Place of Dying' which is a good story and introduces the third Robin. It's crazy to think that when I originally picked up this book sans glossy pages it was exactly one tenth of the price it is to day. It always struck me as odd how Batman would take a twelve year old into battle with him, and does he learn his lesson after this? Hell no, he accepts another know-it-all pre-pubescent twerp to take up the mantle. There was only one Robin and his name is Dick Grayson and at least he was about 19 when he finished working with Batman and became Nightwing over in the pages of the New Teen Titans #39. 'Holy child endangerment Batman!!'
Here is the original cover for this collection which tears strips off the new one. (I tried to track it down after I lost the original but the guy in the shop was looking for 5 times its original cost). Bastard.

As I remember it

Avengers (Possibly the greatest Hawkeye story ever)

This is quite possibly the greatest Hawkeye story ever. It had been a long, long time since the archer had his time in the spotlight so this classic 1979 issue (Avengers #189) was more than timely. This one shows Hawkeye at his devil-may-care, wise-ass best.
      The plot is really simple, a disgruntled Hawkeye is forced to leave the Avengers to make way for the Falcon, as part of a government racial quota kind of thing. This leaves Hawkeye essentially unemployed but on retainer from the Avengers. We are treated to a look at Hawk's dilapidated flat in a rare touch of realism, which while his abode is not quite Dickensian, it is certainly in need of some D.I.Y. There are some humourous touches here too as we see a picture of the Scarlet Witch on the wall and a picture of the Falcon with some darts stuck in it.
 
There's a beautiful splash page at the beginning of this issue by John Byrne, depicting Thor swirling his hammer ready to take off and Iron Man in the doorway waving goodbye. As good as George Perez was at the time he hadn't quite matured into the artist he would become later in his career, and these Byrne issues were the standard against almost all other Avengers mags in the 70's were measured by (except for Neal Adams' issues during the Kree-Skrull war).

Anyway back to Hawkeye and his Job search. He spots an add in the paper for a security guard at Crosstech Technoligies, a rival to Stark Industries. Hawk impresses the guy with his guile claiming that if it was that easy for him to break in to the building, that he would be a highly effective security official. In a classic piece of jackassery, Hawkeye has his two feet on the table reading Playboy, when the employee arrives.













 In a piece of happenstance, there had been a series of break-ins lately at the plant, and Hawkeye is engaged with Deathbird! I haven't the issue at hand right now, but there is a 5 or 6 page fight scene between two that establish
Hawkeye as a force to be reckoned with, and that in a world of Asgardian Gods, Iron Men, and super soldiers, show that Clint Barton has what it takes to stand with the best of them. All in all, a highly entertaining issue...