July 2006
Note: If you read about a title in Bob's Thoughts that you can't find on the shelves at Pulp Fiction, ask Mike about the title. In many cases, titles can be ordered from Diamond directly.
JUST A REMINDER
Comic Con International will be held at the San Diego Convention Center on July 20-23 with a special Preview Night on July 19. Four Day Memberships are Adults: $65; Juniors/Seniors: $30 and children under 12 are free with PAID adult membership. One Day Memberships can only be ordered in advance online at www.comic-con.org, where you will also find a plethora of information about programming and up-to-the-minute listings of guests.Have fun and wear comfortable shoes!
AC
NOTE: NOTE: AC is way behind at this point. I'll try to reset things next month, so you should only see what is actually shipping, rather than what was solicited.America's Greatest Comics #15
Reed Crandall, Matt Baker, John Spranger, Bill Draut, Bob Powell and a Dick Briefer Frankenstein adventure make up another issue of the comic book that lives up to its name. SRP $6.95
Best of the West #57
Firehair by Lee Elias, Redmask by Frank Bolle, the Haunted Hoseman by Dick Ayers and The Durango Kid, Rocky Lane and The Latigo Kid are featured in another issue of this long running title. Westerns are making a comeback and these are some of the best in terms of art that you can find anywhere. Although not quite as good as the Marvel westerns of the 60s, they are still worth the read.SRP $6.95
Men of Mystery #60
Another issue devoted the the heroes from Quality Comics, including Dollman, Captain Triumph, Manhunter, T-Man and Lady Luck. SRP $6.95
BIG BANG COMICS
Big Bang Presents #1: ProtoplasmanMost of you remember the Big Bang comics and their wonderful "retro" comics that, in many cases, were somewhat better than the originals. Big Bang has, according to their website, cut loose from Image and will now be publishing new material on their own. The first new release will be Protoplasman: a new character with a wink and a nod to Jack Cole and Plastic Man. Other stories will follow, I'm sure. SRP $2.95
DARK HORSE
Nothing that caught my eye this month.DC
Superman Returns hits the theaters in late June and DC has two tie-ins to go along with the release. First is Superman Returns: The Movie Adaptation by Martin Pasko and Matt Haley, a 72 page re-telling of the movie with an SRP $6.99. Second, is Superman Returns: The Movie and Other Tales of the Man of Steel by a whole bunch of writers and a whole bunch of artists. I'm guessing this one will be a sampler for those who might be interested in reading more Superman stories because of the movie, since it reprints the movie adaption along with the origin of Superman from The Amazing World of Superman(Metropolis Edition) #1, and stories from Adventures of Superman #575, Superman #185 and Action Comics #810. Don't really know what to say about either book, just that I hope the movie turns out well.Detective Comics #821
I don't usually mention new comics, but Paul Dini will start as writer with this issue and, since Dini's work is usually of high quality (he was the head writer for the Batman animated cartoons) I would suggest that you give this one a squint since it only has an SRP of $2.99. Dini also wrote some of the best issues of Batman Adventures along with the stories collected as The World's Greatest Super-Heroes that were illustrated by Alex Ross, if you really needed any other incentive.
Batman Chronicles Vol. 2
Reprints Detective Comics #39-45, Batman #2-3, and New York World's Fair Comics #2 by Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson. Continuing the chronological reprinting of every Batman story ever published, this volume has some prime material from Kane and Robinson including some more of the early appearances of the Joker. The Batman of today owes a great deal to these early stories, in that Batman is feared by those who break the law. The difference, however, is that the early Batman was not obsessed, nor was he a borderline psycho. Rather the Kane/Robinson Batman had a job to do and, while he took a hard line on crime, he simply took it in stride: he enjoyed fighting crime, something evident by the fact that both Batman and Robin smile in most all their Golden Age appearances. This, and the previous volume, definitely belong on your sagging bookshelf, along with the Superman volume of the same title. A bargain at an SRP of $14.99 <Get both Batman Chronicles #1 and 2 for only $20 when you mention Bob's Thoughts!> Metal Men Archives Vol. 1
Reprints Showcase #37-40 and Metal Men #1-5 written by Robert Kanigher with art by Ross Andru and Mike Esposito. Many of the DC Silver Age stories included hard science as a part of each story. The Flash and the Atom dealt with physics, while Metamorpho would always explain which of his elements he was combining to produce a given chemical reaction. With the Metal Men, there was always an explanation of the properties of each metal and how it would be used to solve a particular problem or defeat a villain. These explantions, however, were deftly woven into the story and of all the Silver Age DC characters, the Metal Men seem to have obtained a sort of cult status among comic fans and with good reason. The adventures of Doc Magnus and his band of elemental robots were always enjoyable and humorous. Of course, the end of each adventure where they would end up as melted slag only to be recast for the next story was fun too. Definitely a must have! SRP49.99
Showcase Present The Elongated Man Vol. 1
Reprints The Flash #112, 115, 119, 124, 130, 134, 138 and Detective Comics #327-371 with story by John broome and Gardner Fox and art by Infantino, Adams, Anderson and Kane. Another telephone book collection of a fan favorite, wherein Ralph Dibny, with his wife Sue, solves mysteries, which he detects when his nose begins to wiggle (I'm not making this up). The Elongated Man adventures were interesting in that they were short mystery stories, where Ralph and Sue would use Ralph's stretching abilities (in a nice way) to solve crimes. The biggest mystery, however, is why DC created a new stretching character when they already owned the rights to Plastic Man (they gained the Quality characters around 1956). Plastic Man he's not, but still some good fun to be had along the way. SRP $16.99
GEMSTONE
Carl Bark's Greatest Ducktales Stories Vol. 2Features another 3 Barks Duck stories along with some background material about the cartoon series. As I said before, the Barks stories are not just funny animals, but are actually adventure stories told with ducks and really deserve to be read, and savored. SRP $10.95
Walt Disney Treasures Vol. 1: 75 Years of Disney Comics
A new trade paperback that will feature never before reprinted Mickey Mouse stories by Floyd Gottfredson and Ramona Scarpa, Duck stories by Carl Barks, Don Rosa and Al Taliaferro and various other material by anyone who ever drew a duck or mouse with a Big Bad Wolf story thrown in for good measure. Of everything listed here, the Gottfredson and Scarpa Mouse stories should be the big draw, although Gottfredson's work is re-formatted newspaper strip material. Both of these creators, however, have a great touch in making Mickey the equal of Barks' ducks when it comes to adventure. It will also be good to see a Rosa story in its entirety along with the work of Taliaferro, who did the Donald Duck newspaper strip. Sounds like it's at least worth a squint, if not picking up. SRP $12.99
MARVEL
Marvel's Greatest Comics: Fantastic Four #52Reprints the first appearance of the Black Panther by Lee, Kirby and Sinnott in a special fascimile reprint that reproduces the entire issue from cover to cover. The Black Panther was only one of the many characters Kirby created during the extremely fertile period between Fantastic Four #40 and #60. Others who made their first appearances included the Inhumans, Him (later Warlock) and, most importantly, the Watcher, the Silver Surfer and Galactus. The Black Panther, however, was groundbreaking, in that he was a black super hero, who also happened to be a brilliant scientist and the king of a foreign kingdom. T'Challa was very far removed from the character we know today in this first appearance, but it is still worth a squint, especially if you don't have this story elsewhere. SRP $2.99
Haunt of Horror: Edgar Allan Poe #3 (of 3)
The final issue of the Rich Margopoulos and Richard Corben mini-series, this time adapting "Bernice", "The Happiest Day" and "Israfel." I'll even recommend this one without having seen issue #1. How about that? I've said it before and I'll say it again...Corben was born to do Poe and this is worth a squint and worth buying. SRP $3.99
Jack Kirby's Galactic Bounty Hunters #1 (of 6)
Written by Lisa Kirby & Steve Robertson with pencils by Mike Thibodeaux. Published through the creator owned Icon imprint, this mini-series is one of the projects left uncompleted upon Kirby's death. From the notes and drawing Kirby left behind, his grand daughter, Lisa, is fleshing out this story of a suburban California family, where the father doesn't write science fiction, but is actually relating autobiographical stories of his life as a Galactic Bounty Hunter and must now embark on one final mission. Somewhere in the depths of my brain, I recall that this was originally a proposal for a cartoon series or something that was never produced, however I have no real idea how this will play as a comic book, nor if Thibodeaux's art has improved to the point that his pencils can carry the series. SRP $3.99 each
Marvel Masterworks: Captain America Vol. 3
Reprints Captain America (Vol. 1) #101-113 by Lee, Kirby and Steranko with a host of inkers. Except for some over-rendered Syd Shores inkes on the first couple of issues, this volume is a winner. The Red Skull, Sleepers, Cap's origin, Hydra and the Hulk all make an appearance. When Kirby left Cap to move onto other projects, Steranko came on board and did 3 issues before he left the book over disagreements with Marvel. Since Steranko used to work right up to his deadlines, Marvel became worried and had Kirby do a fill-in issue (#112), which he reportedly did over a weekend. When Steranko left, it was decided to change the direction of Cap and the Steranko storyline was finally finished in The Avengers (of all places) with art by Tuska and Cockrum (that storyline will be included in the next Essential Avengers). This one definitely belongs on your bookshelf! SRP $49.99
Black Panther by Jack Kirby Vol. 2
Reprints Black Panther #8-13 by Jack Kirby with a final issue thrown in by Ed Hannigan and Jerry Bingham. This was one of the last titles Kirby worked on upon his return to Marvel in the 70s. Not necessarily his best work, but it is an interesting take on the Black Panther, a character Kirby co-created with Lee in Fantastic Four #52. His interest in comics was low at this point and, although the stories are readable, they are just exercises in design and super heroics. Giant monsters and fantastic machines abound, but if you are familiar with the Black Panther as he currently appears, you probably won't like this interpretation. An outrageous SRP of $19.99
Essential Marvel Team-Up Vol. 2
The good news here is that it reprints Marvel Team-Up #25-51 and Marvel Two-In-One #17 and, with #34-51, you get the breakdown pencilling and the clean story telling of Sal Buscema. The bad news is that the vast majority of these stories are major turkeys and are far from inspired. Marvel Team-Up was a very uneven book, which seemed to be just an excuse to publish another Spider-Man title with only a few short runs of quality art and story. As mentioned earlier, the issues done by Sal Buscema are textbook examples of how to tell a comic book story. By the end of the run, the book became a way for Marvel to renew trademarks on characters who didn't currently have a book. So, you pays your money and you takes your chances! My suggestion: better to wait for the third volume, which will have the Claremont/Byrne run. SRP $16.99
TWOMORROWS
The Krypton CompanionA whopping 224 pages that will tell you everything you needed to know about Superman in the Silver and Bronze ages. Multiple Kryptonites! Bizarros! Super Pets! And interviews with the likes of Neal Adams, Murphy Anderson, Nick Cardy and others that covers the work of editors Mort Weisinger and Julius Schwartz. Heck, there's even an introduction by Bizarro #1! If you thought the X-Men continuity was complicated, you don't need to look any further than the Weisinger/Schwartz Superman eras. SRP $24.95
Modern Masters Vol. 8: Walt Simonson
An overview of Simonson's career with interviews, rare and unpublished art and a large sketchbook section. At one time, Simonson was pretty much at the top of the heap and was a major fan favorite. Today, his projects are few and far between, but this would be a good place to become acquainted with the body of work that he produced in the past. SRP $14.95
Swampmen: Muck Monsters of the Comics
The Heap, Swamp Thing, Man-Thing (love that name), Solomon Grundy and Marvin the Dead Thing all have their (pardon the pun) roots in the stagnant waters of swamps and bayous. Here's a book that covers all these creatures, including interviews with Steve Gerber, Mike Ploog, Steve Bissette and Alan Moore, with plenty of art, much of it new. SRP $24.95
BOB'S THOUGHTS ON THE ETERNALS
With Neil Gaimen's Eternals mini-series making its appearance this month, I thought I would take some time and re-read the original Kirby series (19 issues and an Annual). I had no solid memories of the series and was interested to see how it held up after some 30 years. I also was very interested to see what theme, or themes, Kirby used with the original, so I could compare the differences between Kirby's source work and Gaimen's redux.
When Kirby returned to Marvel in 1975, he was not welcomed back as the chief architect of the Marvel Universe. Rather, he was hired as a freelancer, whose contract was to produce a set number of comic pages and covers each month (although he was granted the title of writer/editor). Marvel also made it clear that they weren't interested in Jack creating new characters and concepts, such he had done at DC. Instead, they wanted the potential sales that Kirby's name would mean on characters that already existed at Marvel. After some negotiation, it was decided that Jack would take over Captain America, launch a new book featuring the Black Panther (two characters that he had co-created), produce an adaptation and ongoing series, based on Kubrick's 2001, and, lastly, he would do two original books: Devil Dinosaur (strictly a juvenile series) and what would prove to be Jack's last attempt at a mature series, The Eternals.
The basic theme of The Eternals was laid out in the first 3 issues, which read as a whole, and lead me to believe they may have been Kirby's original proposal for the series. Combining Kubrick's 2001 with Chariots of the Gods and then spinning off from there, Jack set up the premise that life on Earth had been seeded by beings (gods) from outer space and that these gods had been responsible for the development of life on Earth. There were 3 races that had evolved over time: the Eternals, mostly benevolent super-powered beings; the Deviants, malevolent mutants; and mankind, namely you and me. Most importantly, however, all mythology and ancient mysteries were the result of humans encountering the space gods, Eternals or Deviants. From this premise, I believe that Jack wanted to examine the relationship between mankind and a higher power, which issues #1-3 seem to bear out, since these first issues explore the reactions of human characters, along with numerous Eternals and Deviants, to the return of the space gods.
Unfortunately, we will never know what Jack originally intended for the series due to the numerous problems that cropped up as the series progressed. Those of you familiar with Marvel will recognize immediately that the basic premise of The Eternals goes against Marvel continuity, both then and now, and Marvel continually pressured Kirby to tie the series into the Marvel universe. Jack, for his part, wanted nothing to do with Marvel's continuity (something that had not been as heavily stressed during his previous tenure at Marvel) and just wanted to tell a good story. He was also incensed (justifiably) that although he was the writer/editor of his books, his work was regularly re-written and re-drawn at the Marvel offices.
The end result of these problems was the 19 issues and annual that were finally published and the reason they have a disjointed feel and lack of direction. I believe that Jack had finally had enough of both comics and editorial interference just after he started the series and by the 6th issue, the entire direction of the series started to unravel. In answer to Marvel's demands for tie-ins, some S.H.I.E.L.D. agents pop up here and there and there is even an appearance by The Hulk in #14-15, but the original theme and direction of the series disappears very early on. In their place, I think that Jack just gave Marvel an ever growing cast (toys tie-ins, you know) and an ongoing battle that was most likely done just to fill the pages of the comic until his contract ran out. The stories are readable, but far from what one would expect given the promising beginning seen in issues #1-3.
For those of you who have in interest in Kirby's work, there were a few issues of The Eternals that you might want to sample to get a feel of where the series might have gone and the themes that he most likely had in mind at the beginning:- Issues #1-3 stand pretty much on their own, set up the premise for the series, and are quite enjoyable, the John Verpoorten inking non-withstanding.
- Issue #7 features the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents mentioned above and probably comes quite close to the interaction between gods and men that Jack may have intended for the series.
- Issue #13 again features men and their reaction to gods as a group of astronauts encounter the main ship of the space gods. This issue also gives a bit more depth to the series since it is established that there is a god who is above the other space gods.
- Annual #1 features a stand-alone story that probably points to one direction that Jack might have taken with some of the stories. It features one Eternal teamed with two Deviants against the evil scheme of a third Deviant. Lots of good fun and one of the stronger stories of the entire series.