Vintage Spandex

2009-09-16T19:20:00.000-07:00

October 1978
Chris Claremont (author), John Byrne (penciler), Terry Austin (inker), Jean Simek (letterer), Glynis Wein (colorist), Jim Shooter (editor)

The Beast and Jean find themselves stranded in Antarctica. Luckily Jean's frantic attempts to get back underground to rescue the others attracts the attention of a helicopter pilot (I know, I know, it happens anyway) who rescues them. Returning to the mansion, Professor Xavier comes to believe that the other X-Men are dead. But, of course, they're not dead; instead they've wound up in the Savage Land and they too think that the others are dead. After having to deal with the local wildlife, the X-Men stay at a village, where Cyclops realizes he feels nothing after Jean's "death" while Colossus knocks up a local girl (no, really). After going off for a bath, Ororo disappears, and the X-Men soon learn that she's been taken by their old enemy Sauron.

Continuity Notes

Much, much later in Uncanny X-Men Annual #12 we find out that Colossus does sleep with one of the women he walks away with and she does get pregnant with a child, who is named Peter. He never gets referenced again, but I'm always impressed when superheroes leave behind illegitimate children.

Comments

Usually I love stories that show the universes of the Big Two to be wild and diverse places, but I''ve never really liked the Savage Land in any of the stories I've read. It's not that I'm against the whole Tarzan riff, but it always seems like the Savage Land is one of those elements that keeps being brought back for its own sake, not because the writers actually have any new stories to tell about it. Worse, this story brings back probably my least favorite villain from the X-Men's Silver Age period, Sauron, who just seems like one of those characters you can't even explain to people who don't read superhero comics ("Well, see, first this guy and his girlfriend were attacked by pterodactyls from Antarctica in Tierra del Fuego...") And this story hasn't really changed my mind.

Superman #75

2009-08-27T18:01:00.000-07:00

January 1993
"Doomsday!"
Dan Jurgens (writer and pencils), Brett Breeding (inks), Glenn Whitmore (colors) , John Costanza (letters), Mike Carlin (editor)

While the world watches through Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen's TV reporting, a weakened Superman and Doomsday fight on the streets of Metropolis. Although Superman is exhausted and badly wounded, he refuses to wait for reinforcements, believing he's the only one who has a chance at defeating Doomsday permanently. Finally Doomsday does fall, but so does Superman, who dies in Lois Lane's arms.

Comments

When this issue came out, it was a media, if not a cultural, event. I won't say that "death's revolving door" wasn't already an industry cliché or that anyone, even the Powers That Be at DC, weren't at least all but saying that Superman was going to come back sooner or later, but it was practically unheard of for the Big Two to kill off such an iconic, important character. The biggest superhero deaths I can think of before the "death" of Superman were the deaths of Captain Marvel and Barry Allen, but Captain Marvel had pretty much no resonance outside not-casual comic book fans and Barry Allen was even before "Crisis of Infinite Earths" established as a legacy character. So, yes, killing Superman was a cheap, one-shot publicity ploy, but it was a very effective cheap, one-shot publicity ploy, something that's easy to forget nowadays.

Unfortunately, it just didn't make for an interesting story, much less the genre-defining epic it aspires to be. For one thing, the entire issue is composed of splash pages. One would guess it's for establishing a cinematic quality to the comic, but, given the way the rest of the story played out, it's tempting to guess it was just a way to stretch out the conclusion. Jurgens once again tries to raise the gravitas by showing that Superman knows he's in the fight of his life and is essentially sacrificing himself since he's the only superhero who can stop Doomsday, but Jurgens can't quite bring the fight above the level of a brutal fist fight. Plus it doesn't help that over the years Doomsday has basically become a bruiser villain, a problem that haunts all event-villains.

At least Jurgens' art is suitably dramatic and crisp, despite its '90s trappings, and the last panel of Superman dying under a sobbing Lois Lane is actually very powerful, at least to us proud comic geeks. Still, when you compare this to DC's other big event, the breaking of Batman's back, the problems become all the more visible. Of course, the Knightfall storyline had its own issues (which we'll hopefully get to 10 or so years down the road) and like Doomsday Bane eventually lost his effectiveness from overuse by various writers, but at least Bane was a good foil for Batman: an opponent who was an intellectual powerhouse, a physical rival, and driven to an almost psychotic degree. Doomsday, however, is a villain with no personality, no motive, and no connection, even a thematic one, to Superman. I guess you can argue that Doomsday was the Michael Myers of supervillains: pointless destruction embodied in one entity. But Doomsday just never comes across as important. Frankly the only thing that makes Superman's fight with Doomsday feel that important is that Superman just happens to die at the end of it.

Uncanny X-Men #113

2009-08-13T22:26:00.000-07:00

"Showdown!"
September 1973
Chris Claremont (author), John Byrne (penciler), Terry Austin (inker), Gaspar Saladino and (letterer), Mary Titus (colorist), Jim Shooter (editor)

While the X-Men are still infantilized prisoners in his Antarctic base, Magneto conducts a series of raids on research facilities in Australia and New Zealand, stealing equipment. After a failed attempt, though, Storm is able to free herself and the others using a pin from her headress and the skills she learned as a thief in Cairo. Magneto is viciously ambushed by the X-Men when he returns and the fight eventually damages the base, which was located under a volcano, enough that lava begins to flood the chamber. Magneto escapes, as do Beast and Phoenix, but they are left stranded in Antarctica, believing that the others are dead.

Comments

Admittedly it is a little hokey for Magneto to have a base in a volcano (besides being very James Bond villain-y, it's so impractical), but the issue is so packed with an effective action sequence and character details it's a small quibble. It's worth pointing out that we're still not quite to the point where Magneto becomes a "tragic anti-hero", but already Claremont has more or less stripped him of much of his "raving megalomaniac" persona.

Footnotes

This is the first time Storm's background as a thief and pickpocket is mentioned. And, yes, she is the only character that really gets a detailed backstory by this point.

Superman: The Man of Steel #19

2009-08-10T23:33:00.000-07:00

"Doomsday Is Here!"
Louise Simonson (writer), Jon Bogdanove (pencils), Dennis Janke (inks), Glenn Whitmore (colors) , Bill Oakley (letters), Mike Carlin (editor)

Superman catches up with Doomsday at a construction site in Metropolis. He tries to carry Doomsday into outer space, but Doomsday escapes his grip. Now on the streets of Metropolis, Doomsday happens to come across the imprisoned Warworlders, who assume that Doomsday was sent to save them but instead he kills most of them. Supergirl, Cadmus' soldiers, Dan Turpin, Maggie Sawyer, and Professor Hamilton (armed with a giant laser, of course) join the fray, but to no avail. Superman vows that Metropolis will be where he will "hold the line."

Comments

I don't know what else to say by this point, so I'll just reiterate what I've been pointing out from the beginning: it's all just one long action scene, it's five times longer than it needs to be, and it's cross-franchise "event" storytelling at its worst. I will say that Louise Simonson does turn out the most interesting chapter so far, but she does benefit from being able to throw more of Superman's supporting cast into the mix. Maybe the story suffers from knowing where it's headed, but honestly the whole thing just reads like a really lackluster Superman/Incredible Hulk crossover (if the Hulk normally slaughtered innocent people).

Footnotes

At this point the Guardian was an agent of the Cadmus Project (which happened to be headed by the former Newsboy Legion). As you might guess, Dubbilex is one of Cadmus' creations.

Page 15, Panel 1 - What's up with Supergirl?! Well, this version of the character was a "protoplasmic matrix" created by a Lex Luthor from a parallel Earth to fight off a trio of Kryptonian criminals. After said criminals ended up destroying her homeworld regardless, she returned with Superman. Also the reason Lex Luthor is attracted to her - and is pretty obviously creasing the sheets with her on a daily basis - is because the other-universe Lex modeled her after his number one love, Lana Lang. And hopefully that's the most I'll ever have to write about the hellishly complex history of post-Crisis Supergirl(s).

Uncanny X-Men #112

2009-08-10T22:50:00.000-07:00

"Magneto Triumphant!"
Chris Claremont (author), John Byrne (penciler), Terry Austin (inker), Bruce Patterson (letterer), Mary Titus (colorist), Jim Shooter (editor)

The X-Men prepare to fight Magneto, but that idea is quickly vetoed when they discover that Magneto is using his powers to fly Mesmero's office/caravan. Magneto denies being involved with Mesmero's scheme, claiming that he never even met him before, and says he would have freed the X-Men from Mesmero's brainwashing if the Beast didn't do it for him. Unceremoniously Magneto ejects Mesmero from the caravan, stating (rather unconvincingly) that Mesmero will land on the ground virtually unharmed. When the caravan lands, the long-awaited battle begins, but only Jean proves to be a match for the rejuvenated Magneto and her powers give out at the worst possible moment, as if she hit an absolute limit. Later the X-Men find themselves strapped to mechanical chairs, unable to speak and barely able to move, and being tended to like infants by a robot named - and looking the part of a - Nanny.

Comments

Really I think this is where the Claremont/Byrne run really hits the ground running, in terms of both the art and the writing. The design for Nanny is quite inspired, like something out of a Douglas Adams novel, and Byrne at his best can draw one fantastic action scene. And while it is a cliche to praise a superhero comic from the pre-"Watchmen" era by referring to any "dark" and "mature" turns, there is something really striking about how it's basically a story about the good guys being kidnapped and brutally tortured by a villain - and not so they wouldn't be around to stop their latest evil scheme, but just out of pure hatred. Plus Magneto's idea for vengeance is downright disturbing, even in an era when mutilation and sadism in superhero comics are de rigeur.

Footnotes

It's been pretty obvious since the "reboot" that, apart from Magneto, Jean, and Cyclops, Claremont wasn't all that interested in the X-Men's Silver Age adventures, so it's a little off-putting when the continuity is referenced here. Anyway, the big deal is that originally Magneto was working with Mesmero in X-Men #48-51 in a convoluted plot to raise a mutant army and get Lorna Dane/Polaris to believe that she was Magneto's long-lost daughter (decades later, she actually does turn out to be Magneto's biological daughter, but that's another story...), but a retcon in #58 showed that the Magneto from that story was a robot - with no explanation. As happens more often than you might think in comics, "The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe #7" wrote the whole thing off as a scheme by Starr Saxon and called it a day.

Action Comics #684

2009-08-04T22:45:00.000-07:00

December 1992
"...Doomsday is Near!"
Roger Stern (writer), Jackson Guice (pencils), Denis Rodier (inks), Glenn Whitmore (colors) , Bill Oakley (letters), Mike Carlin (editor)

After recovering, Superman tracks Doomsday to a highway where he saves a driver whose car has been thrown into the air. Doomsday carries his rampage to a Lex-Mart where he learns about Metropolis from a TV ad about pro-wrestling (no, really). Meanwhile from a helicopter Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen start reporting on Superman and Doomsday's fighting from a helicopter. The brawl happens to erupt onto the mountain base of the Cadmus Project, where Superman is buried under some debris. Before he can get out, Doomsday reaches Metropolis.

Comments

This issue is treading water, and worse it's obvious, especially once the story ends with Superman just getting knocked out again and Doomsday moving on. Roger Stern does try to give the story some weight by focusing on the tragic toll Doomsday's rampage is making, and by presenting a more compassionate (and true to the character) Superman than Dan Jurgens, but there's just no getting around that this is a story stretched out of proportion by the need to have an installment in every title in the "Superman" franchise. (Cool cover, though!)

Footnotes

I forgot to mention, but it's all but clearly established in this storyline that Metropolis is on the East Coast, somewhere in the Mid-Atlantic region or in the northeast. (It's funny, I always thought of Gotham City as being on the East Coast while Metropolis is in the Midwest).

I should also mention...the bearded, long-haired, Australian guy running around? That's Lex Luthor. See, he developed terminal cancer (from, in a brilliant twist, radiation poisoning caused by kryptonite), so he faked his death, placed his mind in the body of a clone, and passed himself off as his own illegitimate son.

Page 6, Panel 1 - Doomsday and Superman's next fight takes place in Midvale, which is actually a part of Superman continuity; it was the hometown of the Silver Age Supergirl. And since the last issue stated that Superman was tracking Doomsday through Ohio, this Midvale may also be the real-life Midvale, Ohio (sadly the city authorities have yet to take advantage of this by launching a "Hometown of Supergirl, But Not The Current One, We Think" campaign). Also, for those of you interested in DC Universe geography, the issue also establishes that Metropolis is roughly less than 100 miles from Midvale, which, if we accept the implication that Midvale is in Ohio, puts Metropolis either elsewhere in Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, or Kentucky. Phew!

Uncanny X-Men #111

2009-07-29T22:55:00.000-07:00

April 1978
"Mindgames!"
Chris Claremont (writer), John Byrne (pencils), Terry Austin (inks), Mary Titus (colors), Tom Orzechowski (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor)

In Texas, the Beast finds the missing X-Men, who are performing in a carnival with Banshee as the carnival barker, Cyclops as a guard, and the other X-Men as performers and "freaks." The Beast tries to talk to Jean Grey, who doesn't recognize him and calls herself "Miz Destiny", but he only succeeds in getting beaten up by Cyclops, Colossus, and the rest of the hired muscle. The Beast is dragged before the party responsible, Mesmero, who is out for revenge for the time the X-Men defeated him. However, the chaos briefly caused by the Beast is enough to bring Wolverine out of Mesmero's mind control, and he promptly breaks the others from their trances. Converging on Mesmero's trailer, they find that he's unconscious - and sitting at his desk is Magneto.

Comments

For some reason I always think about this issue or the "Dark Phoenix Saga" when the topic of the Claremont/Byrne run comes up. At the very least this issue does have a great set-up; we cut straight to the Beast discovering the X-Men in a carnival/freak show and having to find out who's behind it. Aside from bringing back and refining the character of Magneto, Claremont didn't really tap into the X-Men's Silver Age rogues' gallery for a reason, but the use of Mesmero here is quite a nice twist, as is the final reveal at the end. It's the sort of thing that makes superhero comics - or any good serial genre, really - so much fun.

My bad!

2009-07-22T18:07:00.000-07:00

I'm getting ready to move halfway across the country. I thought I could keep up even my usual quasi-regular schedule, but I guess not.

Regular service will (hopefully) resume Tuesday of next week.

Adventures of Superman #497

2009-07-14T23:19:00.000-07:00

December 1992
"Under Fire!"
Jerry Orday (writer), Tom Grummett (pencils), Doug Hazlewood (inks), Glenn Whitmore (colors) , John Costanza (letters), Mike Carlin (editor)

After trapping Doomsday momentarily at the bottom of a lake, Superman returns to help Bloodwynd rescue Mitch and his mother. News crews report that Doomsday is slowly but surely heading toward Metropolis. Superman and Maxima keep fighting Doomsday until Maxima accidentally triggers an explosion that knocks them both out but leaves Doomsday standing. After being helped by the Guardian (Jim Harper), Superman realizes that he's the only one who has a chance of stopping Doomsday.

Comments

The entire issue is, like almost all the others, an extended fight scene, broken up by brief character scenes with Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, Supergirl (Matrix), and Lex Luthor (who was at this time posing as his own illegitimate son in a cloned body with a full head of hair and beard; long story) that all ultimately add little to the plot. There's also some foreshadowing about Bloodwynd's real identity, but that all turns out to be a plot over in "Justice League." The art is quite good and the fight scenes do have a cinematic quality, although it's also very workmanlike for the era. I've said it before, but...for all the effort the writers are trying to put into making Doomsday an exceptional threat, the story doesn't hold half the significance it should.

Page 3, Panel 1; Page 7, Panel 4 - Why is Superman a little suspicious of Bloodwynd? Because in "Justice League" it turns out that Bloodwynd is really Martian Manhunter, forced into disguise and brainwashed by a demon enemy of the real Bloodwynd. This also explains why Bloodwynd is terribly ineffective in a burning building.

Uncanny X-Men #110

2009-07-14T06:43:00.000-07:00

March 1978
"The 'X'-Sanction!"
Chris Claremont (writer), Tony DeZuniga and Dave Cockrum (pencils and inks) , Andy Yanchus (colors), Annette Kawecki (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor)

While the X-Men relax with a baseball game, a superpowered criminal named Warhawk sneaks into the mansion while disguised as a repairman. Later, while the X-Men are in a training session in the Danger Room, Warhawk immobilizes Professor Xavier, Jean, and Moira, and sabotages the Danger Room so that the traps become thoroughly life-threatening. Eventually they escape and detain Warhawk long enough for the police to arrive and take him away. Xavier remarks that Warhawk was telepathically shielded and had foreknowledge about the mansion and its defenses, meaning he had to have been sent by someone who knows about the X-Men.

Continuity Notes

It's the first time the X-Men play baseball, which became a pretty important recurring thing through Chris Claremont's run. It hasn't been used much since the early '90s, except by the occasional writer seeking to score nostalgia points.

Comments

By definition it's a throwaway issue, but since it's written by Chris Claremont there's some character moments involving Wolverine's short temper (the character really was softened up) and attraction to Jean and foreshadowing what would turn out to be the Hellfire Club plot. It's the kind of story - the X-Men face a threat but there's still an unsolved mystery lurking around it, building up to future stories (ideally) - that would eventually devolve into self-parody in the '90s, but by this point it still works as a fun little action story, in spite of some stiff fill-in art.

Footnotes

Page 19, Panel 4 - Warhawk started out as an Iron Fist villain, explaining Wolverine's thoughts on this panel.

Superman #74

2009-06-24T23:07:00.000-07:00

December 1992
"Countdown to Doomsday!"
Dan Jurgens (writer and pencils), Brett Breeding (inks), Glenn Whitmore (colors) , John Costanza (letters), Mike Carlin (editor)

Although Maxima is determined to chase the monster Superman and Booster Gold christen Doomsday, Ice convinces her to take a severely injured Blue Beetle to a doctor. Doomsday's rampage reaches a house inhabited by a woman, her teenage son Mitchell, and an infant. The remaining members of the Justice League and Superman combine their powers against Doomsday, but they fail to even stagger him. The fight causes a gas line to explode, destroying the family's house and trapping the mother and her baby. As Superman chases after Doomsday, afraid he'll kill again, while Mitchell screams for Superman's help.

Comments

I should apologize for fanning out on both my readers, but...Superman would not ignore someone's plea that he save a family, even if he was after a superpowered Adolf Hitler clone armed with a nuclear missile launch code. Apparently I wasn't the only one who objected to this scene, because, in the next installment, Jerry Ordway goes out of his way to explain that Superman thought one of the Justice Leaguers would be able to save the family, even at the risk of contradicting Jurgens' script. It's not the worst characterization of Superman that ever was but it does add to the case that Jurgens never had a good grasp of what makes Superman...well, Superman.

The whole story just feels fundamentally unnecessary. It's obvious from page one that the whole purpose is simply to set up Doomsday as a credible threat, yet he still mainly comes across as little more than an extremely tough mindless bruiser. Even the scene I complained about above apparently was written in just to emphasize, as if most readers wouldn't grasp it, that Doomsday is such a serious threat Superman would compromise his own idealism. It's not convincing. To be fair, Jurgens does try to fatten up the script by adding a human touch with a family in distress, but for the most part they come across as cliches; the mother is as saintly as the teenage boy is obnoxious. As negative as this review is, it's hardly horrible, but it is a prime example of event storytelling that never comes close to being the epic it's marketed as.

Uncanny X-Men #109

2009-06-24T22:16:00.000-07:00

February 1978
"Home Are The Heroes!"
Chris Claremont (writer), John Bryne (pencils), Terry Austin (inks) , Andy Yanchus (colors), Joe Roesen (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor)

Professor Xavier, the X-Men, and Lilandra all arrive at Xavier's mansion. Talking with her parents, Jean remembers promising Corsair that she won't tell Cyclops that he's his father. Later Jean tells her parents about turning into the Phoenix, which upsets them. Banshee, Storn, Colossus, Wolverine, and Moira MacTaggert head out to the woods on the mansion grounds for a picnic. While alone Wolverine is attacked by a man in a superpowered suit named James MacDonald Hudson, who calls himself Weapon Alpha and refers to Wolverine as "Weapon X." James tells Wolverine he was sent by the Canadian government to bring Wolverine back to Canada; of course, he objects. Wolverine and Weapon Alpha's brawl spills over to the clearing where the picnic is taking place. During the fight Moira is wounded and Weapon Alpha, outmatched, teleports away, thinking he'll return with "Alpha Flight." Wolverine tells the others that James and he "were buddies...almost brothers" and that "today's fracas was jus' the beginnin'."

What's Important?

It's the first appearance of James Hudson, whose better known by his later moniker of "Guardian." Along with that, it's the first time the Canadian superteam Alpha Flight is ever mentioned. However, Department H has yet to be named; James only makes a vague reference to "Control." Finally Wolverine is, for the first time, referred to as "Weapon X"...

Comments

I've commented on this before, but...in these early issues, Storm makes herself naked a lot, doesn't she? I guess you really can't recover childhood innocence.

This is the sort of "character-building" issue that Claremont perfected during his run and which had become (and still is) a staple of team superhero books. Nightcrawler's characterization as the carefree team member is built upon, Cyclops broods some more, and Storm and Wolverine turn out to be nature-lovers. It's a good issue for studying the influential Claremontian approach to superhero soap opera, but it doesn't offer much more than that.

Justice League #69

2009-06-09T23:11:00.000-07:00

December 1992
"Down for the Count"
Dan Jurgens (writer and pencils), Rick Burchett (inks), Gene D'Angelo (colors) , Willie Schubert (letters), Brian Augustyn (editor)

The Justice League (Booster Gold, Blue Beetle II, Ice, Bloodwynd, Maxima, Guy Gardner, and Fire) work to rescue truckers and other motorists from a horrific pile-up, which authorities say was caused by a "monster man" that was seen walking into the woods. Maxima telepathically scans for the being, finding him and discovering that "he's hate, death and blood lust personified! Nothing more." As the Justice League fights the monster in the forest and then at an oil processing plant, Superman is being interviewed on the Cary Grant show, where he tries to explain his ethics in response to audience questions. The monster effortlessly beats the entire Justice League into submission. Superman calls off the interview when he learns about what's happening in time to help Booster Gold, who tells him "it's like doomsday is here!"

Comments

I haven't read any of the Dan Jurgens run on Justice League aside from this issue, although I do know that it wasn't well-received. So I don't know if my comments will indict his run as a whole, but I can say that this issue feels like it's trying to capture the atmosphere of the still relatively recent Kieth Giffen run but with less humor. Where there is humor here, it feels forced (like Ice wishing she was watching TV instead of on a mission or an audience member asking Superman about Fire's ranking on the "babe-o-meter.") Generally speaking, the comic just feels...bland, at least blander than it should be when it features characters like Guy Gardner and Booster Gold. It's hard to even think about substantial criticisms to make about it. It doesn't help that this whole issue just exists to build up the fact that Doomsday is, well, really freakin' powerful.

Well, to be fair, the interview with Superman is a nice touch, even if the fact that he's asked about "his greatest fear" is blatant foreshadowing. Unfortunately, it also illustrates what I don't like about Dan Jurgens' interpretation of Superman. Jurgens' Superman often comes across as a humorless, somewhat authoritarian character lacking the touch of humanity; really it's the sort of Superman you'd expect to appear in a story featuring other characters, not the one you'd want to see starring in his own series.

The Tomb of Dracula #22

2009-06-02T21:46:00.000-07:00

July 1975
"In Death Do We Join"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks) , Linda Lessmann (colors), John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

In Moldavia, a couple save their daughter Petra from her husband Gorna, a vampire, but he vows to keep returning until he finally "claims" her. Petra recalls how Gorna was a possessive and abusive husband and how, before he "died" of vampirism, he vowed to never let her be with another man, a promise he kept by killing her lover. Meanwhile Dracula, who survived the confrontation with Doctor Sun after all, happens to arrive in the village, looking for a coffin he placed in the village years ago. Gorna appears and orders him to leave "his territory." An enraged Dracula attacks him with lightning, but Gorna shrugs off the attack and departs for Petra's house, where he's again driven off by Petra's father. Dracula follows him there and interrogates Petra on who Gorna is. With that knowledge, Dracula finds Gorna and destroys him, freeing her.

Continuity Notes

On the question of whether or not Dracula has the innate ability to control all vampires, we see that vampires can disobey him, but this comes as a total surprise to Dracula. It's implied but not at all explicitly stated that Gorna's obsession with his wife is what makes him immune to Dracula's control.

Comments

Almost all of the issues in "Tomb of Dracula" have been stand-alone, with occasional contributions toward an overarching stories, so you can make the case that the whole series should be read without the usual comic book nerd concerns about how each issue affects continuity and so on. With that in mind, this story still manages to feel inconsequential. Wolfman tries to give the story weight by tacking on a truly disturbing take on the vampire mythos - what if an abusive husband became a vampire? - but underneath it's still just an issue where Dracula brawls with another vampire. At least this issue is a showcase for some of Gene Colan's best work; I'm thinking especially of the designs of the masked, robed villagers who are prepared to kill Gorna in ceremonial fashion, and the image of the skeletal, deformed Gorna. It's good enough that it makes the issue worth a glimpse, despite the lackluster story.

Superman: Man of Steel #18

2009-05-20T22:50:00.000-07:00

December 1992
"Doomsday, Part One"
Louise Simonson (writer), Jon Bogdonave (pencils), Dennis Janke (inks), Glenn Whitmore (colors) , Bill Oakley (letters), Mike Carlin (editor)

In a metallic box underground in a forest, a fist with claws growing out of its knuckle pummels and tears its way through. Eventually the figure, completely wrapped in a costume that looks like surgical scrubs, bursts out of the ground. In Metropolis, a group of Underworlders force their way into a power plant with the intent to shut down the city's electricity. An orphaned boy named Keith, aware of the Underworlders' plans, sets out to find the Underworlders' base, even though the Underworlders told him that they're holding his real mother hostage. At the Daily Planet, Lois finds a message, telling her to tell Superman to go to the basement under the power station. Leaving a note on Clark's computer, Lois sets out alone and finds a homeless man she knows named Charlie...along with the Underworlders, who have shut off the city's power, causing Clark to never see the message on the computer. They claim that Charlie is working with them. Overhearing their conversation, Keith realizes that the Underworlders were lying about his mother and heads to a basketball court to alert Superman by spraying the Superman insignia using spraypaint, a tactic that works.

Thanks to Keith's warning, Superman arrives in time to stop the Underworlders from taking advantage of the lack of lights to invade the city. Superman beats them and destroys their weapons. Finding Lois, Superman is about to whale on Charlie when an aggravated Lois explains that Charlie was working with the pacifist Underworlders and was a mole for them and Lois. The other Underworlders decline Superman's offer to find a place for them on the surface while Lois asks Charlie to be her underworld correspondent. As Superman and Lois leave, Charlie wonders if he should have told them about "Bloodthirst." In the meantime, Doomsday rampages across the landscape, killing wildlife and causing massive car accidents in the process. Oberon learns what's happening from a trucker via CB radio and alerts the Justice League.

Continuity Notes

Since we're starting in mid-series here, let's clarify several things: the Underworlders are a motley crew of homeless people and refugees from Warworld stranded on Earth after the "Panic in the Sky" storyline. Bloodthirst, of course, turns out to be a villain in the wings, although he doesn't appear until Adventures of Superman #507, which came out exactly one year later.

Anyway, the big deal here is the first full appearance of Doomsday (sort of, since he's still mostly shrouded); we've only seen his fist up until now. His claim to fame as a character was being the one to kill Superman, but he's been used frequently since.

Comments

It's hard to believe now since DC has spent the decade drawing on its Silver Age past, but the early-mid '90s, especially 1993 and 1994, were the years for putting its flagship characters through the ringer. Superman died, Wonder Woman lost her position as ambassador to mankind to another, and Batman's back was broken. Interestingly, in all three cases each of the heroes was replaced by an "edgier", more violent version of themselves, perfectly suited for the atmosphere in superhero comics that prevailed in the early '90s, but the old traditional interpretations were eventually restored to their rightful places.

I think there might be a PhD thesis in there.

Anyway, when this story hit I had just been initiated into comics geekdom, via the influence of a comic geek cousin and three boxes filled with random comics my parents gave me for Christmas. Early on I became a Marvel devotee, but unlike some I didn't close myself off entirely to the other member of the Big Two (to this day I still don't get people who do exactly that, especially if they're older than 12, but I digress...) and I just had to follow the story detailing the demise of an American icon. Now I'm pretty sure that I knew the score well enough by then that I understood that Superman, one way or another, would be back, but it still felt like an event. The one character that embodied the very best in the human race would die at the hands of an entity that represented meaningless, pointless destruction.

I can't now articulate the reasons why, but I was disappointed. It just seemed like a letdown that Superman would be beaten to death by something that was essentially a cosmic thug. Now I can understand the thematic aspects of it - noble humanity versus pure brutality and all that - but still it made the whole affair less interesting that they invented a villain purely for this storyline. For now, though, the opener is better than I expected, even if, unfortunately for those reading this in trade, it starts off with the end of another storyline.

Despite that, this opener at least overcame my expectations. The art is strong if fairly typical for the era and what makes the story work is all the little touches Louise Simonson makes, like Keith's desparation to believe that his mother didn't die or abandon him but has been a prisoner of the "monsters" for years, Doomsday crushing a bird for no reason, and Superman being alerted by a very low-budget version of the Bat-signal. In hindsight it's hard to judge how the biuld-up to Superman's death is handled, but here at least Doomsday really is presented as an effective, mysterious threat.

Tomb of Dracula #21

2009-05-20T22:11:00.000-07:00

June 1975
"Deathknell"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks and colors) , John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Brand activates a force field that paralyzes Dracula, Frank, and Rachel. He explains that Doctor Sun was punished for failing an experiment for the Chinese military by being operated on with no anesthetics with a surgical team led by his own son. Sun's brain was used to see if it could be kept alive and plugged in with computers. Of course, this turned out to be a classic horror movie mistake, as Sun was able to override the computers and use the technological advantage to kill the surgeons and his former superiors. Sun frees Dracula and orders Brand to defeat him as a "final test." Brand wins the brawl and Sun tells a re-imprisoned Dracula that Sun also needs blood to survive and plans on using vampires to collect blood for him. In true megalomaniacal fashion, Sun begins to transfer Dracula's knowledge to Brand, allowing him to become the lord of vampires and to raise an army of the undead Sun can use to invade the planet.

Noticing that even with Dracula's memories Brand is barely a match for Dracula, Sun decides to release Frank and Rachel to distract Dracula if Brand loses, as the fight causes a fire to break out in the compound. Also unsurprisingly, Brand, once he seemingly destroys Dracula using the fire, turns on Sun, who effortlessly zaps him into ashes. Sun teleports away, leaving the base to explode. Frank and Rachel barely escape the inferno in their helicopter.

Comments

It's a fairly paint-by-numbers comic book plot: villain wants a powerful pawn, drawn-out fight ensues, pawn turns on villain, villain's headquarters are destroyed, and heroes make a dramatic escape. There's a little bit of novelty with the sheer b-movie glory of Doctor Sun, the Communist brain in a jar, and a vampire brawl, but nothing is done with the return of Graves and Brand beyond being set-pieces for action scenes. It's rather fun for what it is, but it's a story that largely misses what makes this series interesting in the first place.

Detective Comics #45

2009-05-08T21:35:00.000-07:00

November 1940
"The Case of the Laughing Death!"
Bill Finger (writer), Bob Kane (pencils), Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson (inks)

Batman stops a gang from robbing a bank and tries to track an escaping member, but he eludes Batman and makes it to a music store owned by a man known as "A. Rekoj." Of course, it's the Joker, who presumably, this early in his career, has yet to concoct any halfway decent aliases. After his lackey leaves, the Joker sends a record to the district attorney, who plays it and, following an "eerie tune", hears a message from the Joker, informing him that the needle scratching the record released a deadly dose of the Joker's fatal laughing gas. Afterward as Rekoj the Joker sends his men to rob concert attendees disguised as orchestra players, only to rob them himself as the Joker. When Batman eventually catches up with the Joker in his lair, he traps him under a suffocating glass. After freeing himself with a vial of acid, Batman, following up on a tip left by the Joker himself, flies to an ocean liner, where the Joker is trying to steal a jade Buddha statue being transported to the United States. During the inevitable struggle Batman retrieves the statue and knocks the Joker into the ocean, from where he doesn't resurface.

It's the 40s

In the first definite reference to World War II in the series, we learn that the jade statue is being sold, apparently by the Chinese, to the US for funds to go toward helping citizens who are suffering because of "the war." It isn't spelled out, but it's pretty clear the story is referring specifically to the Japanese invasion and occupation of China.

Comments

I should take a minute to point out that, even though Batman in the '40s is supposed to be a "dark" character, he's not quite the driven, grim vigilante that might be expected, especially in the 21st century. In fact, the many wisecracks he makes in this story might come across to the modern reader as Spider-Man-esque. But, hey, at least the Joker is still killing innocent people.

Anyway, this isn't remembered as one of the classic encounters between the Joker and Batman from the Golden Age, and it's easy to see why, as it feels like three different stories jumbled together. In one the Joker follows his usual-at-the-time modus operandi of using long-distance methods of killing rich people or authorities that have wronged him using his laughing gas; in another he's double-crossing some gangsters; in the last he has an elaborate plot to get on and steal a valuable treasure from a ship. The murder of the district attorney sticks out worst of all, since it has no real bearing on the plot and none of the characters refer to it again. You can almost hear Bill Finger mumbling at the typewriter: "Damn, I have no idea how to fill this script out. Hell, I'll just have the Joker kill some guy. That could use up two or three pages."

Tomb of Dracula #20

2009-05-08T13:29:00.000-07:00

May 1975
"The Coming of Doctor Sun"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks), Glynis Wein (colors) , John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Rachel and Frank pursue Dracula through the Alps in their helicopter, attacking with wooden bullets. Fleeing into a cave, Dracula finds the body of a man who seemingly died from hypothermia, but after trying to feed on blood from the corpse discovers that the man's blood had been poisoned, as if to trap Dracula himself. While Rachel circles around looking for Dracula, she relates that Dracula, after being resurrected the first time following the events recorded in Bram Stoker's novel, had killed Abraham Van Helsing and then murdered Rachel's parents as she watched. Only Quincy Harker's intervention saved Rachel as well. Elsewhere Brand discovers that the Doctor Sun who has been having him trained to fight is a disembodied brain in a nutrient tank, and an exhausted Dracula is finally taken to Doctor Sun's lair. Professor Morgo, one of Sun's scientists, explains to an imprisoned Dracula that they were helped in tracking and understanding Dracula by Clifton Graves, who was retrieved from the wreckage of the ocean liner Dracula destroyed and brought to life by Sun's scientists, even though they had to literally patch him together.

Eventually Dracula frees himself and kills Morgo. Rachel and Frank arrive on the scene and join the fray, but Dracula seemingly kills Graves (again) by using him as a human shield against Rachel's arrows. Suddenly Doctor Sun reveals himself and declares that he wishes to duel with Dracula for "lordship of the vampires."

What's Important?

It's been all but spelled out for us before, but we do see Rachel's origin. It's what you might expect, but we do learn that Dracula personally did the deed.

Comments

Take my advice: if anyone ever gets on your case for reading superhero comics, just describe this issue and ask them how many genres out there typically offer something like Count Dracula fighting the disembodied brain of a mad scientist. They may not be impressed, but, hell, it's something you probably won't get from reading Thomas Pynchon or Toni Morrison!

Anyway, from the standpoint of pure storytelling mechanics, it is a letdown that all the build-up to the Doctor Sun storyline has led to a two-parter, one that awkwardly disrupts another storyline in progress (we have yet to learn exactly what happened to the dreaded Second Book of Sins, and it's only mentioned in passing) with the help of one or two plot-convenient coincidences (good thing that Doctor Sun happened to have a complex right in the Transylvanian Alps!). Still, so far the best stories in the series have been the ones that have Dracula intruding on other genres, and this opening to the Doctor Sun story bucks the trend.

Detective Comics #44

2009-04-30T22:44:00.000-07:00

October 1940
"The Land Behind The Light"
Bill Finger (writer), Bob Kane (pencils), Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson (inks)

Just as Dick Grayson is about to fall asleep reading, Batman shows up and asks him to help as Robin in his investigation of a "Dr. Marco." While investigating his home, the two are confronted by Dr. Marco himself, who claims to have "discovered the secret of the fourth dimension." Dr. Marco shows them a machine generating a light, which he walks into and vanishes. Following him, Batman and Robin find themselves in a forest with giant trees. Before they can investigate their surroundings, they're captured by a giant in medieval style clothing, who thinks that they were sent by "the small ones." The giant takes them to a castle where, after a thwarted escape attempt, they're taken to the giants' king, who assumes that they're the end results of the "small ones" attempting to breed giants. Batman and Robin again escape, this time successfully, and find themselves in the village of the "small ones", where they find Dr. Marko, who explains that the "good" "small ones" are at war with the "evil" giants. Batman teaches various tactics to the army of the "small ones" who succeed in driving off a group of attacking giants except one, who almost captures Robin. Suddenly Dick Grayson is awoken by Bruce Wayne, who is amused to find that he's been reading a book titled "Giants and Dwarfs in Myth and Fable."

Comments

This may be the first cross-genre Batman adventure, but it's not as bizarre or fun as you might assume. Bob Kane's depiction of the fantasy world is fairly generic, aside from a visual gag with one of the "small people" commanders reading comic strips while he orders his troops into war. There is a bit of a quirky, novelty value in seeing Batman wrestle with cats and run from giants armed with spiked clubs, but compared to some of the stories that would come out of the Silver Age this one seems very tame and predictable.

Tomb of Dracula #19

2009-04-30T22:20:00.000-07:00

April 1975
"Snowbound in Hell!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks), Glynis Wein (colors) , John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Dracula and Rachel are both trapped on the Alps in the middle of a blizzard. Dracula protects Rachel, intending to keep her as an emergency food supply, and recalls how he crashed the helicopter Rachel was riding in. A helicopter with Frank Drake on it arrives. Dracula tries to kill Rachel before she can be rescued, but Frank drives Dracula away with wooden bullets. Back in Paris, Quincy Harker prepares to drive a stake through Blade, thinking Dracula turned into a vampire, but Blade stops him and proves that he's still human. Harker deduces that somehow because his mother was made into a vampire while Blade was still in the womb, Blade is immune to vampire bites.

What's Important?

Blade's immunity to vampire bites, and his status as a quasi-vampire, is established here.

Comments

The jump from the last story to this one is a bit too abrupt - and it isn't made clear that Frank actually wasn't on the helicopter Rachel took off in last issue - but it's worth it for an age-old but fun type of character-driven story, as two enemies are forced to rely on each other to survive a hostile environment. It doesn't work entirely; Rachel's motives are a little inconsistent, as she shifts from being willing to kill herself to insure Dracula's destruction to being in full survival mode. But everyone loves a halfway decent "mortal enemies thrown together against their will" yarn, and this issue should be no cause for exceptions.

Detective Comics #43

2009-04-23T21:25:00.000-07:00

September 1940
"The Case of the City of Terror"
Bill Finger (writer), Bob Kane (pencils), Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson (inks)

Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson are driving across the United States for a vacation. After stopping at a town to stay the night, Bruce sees two cops beating up a man for speaking out about Mayor Greer. Bruce's suspicions are raised further when no one in the town is willing to talk to him about what happened. That night Bruce as Batman goes to interview Mr. Carter, the town's leading citizen, but finds that he is also being arrested by a few cops on the charge of libel against Greer. After trouncing the cops, Batman learns from Carter that Greer is allied with a local racketeer, "Bugs" Norton, and that he replaced all the town's policemen with Norton's thugs. Batman and Robin singlehandedly battle Norton and Greer's goons and dismantle their gambling outlets. Robin even gets some local boys to start up a newspaper denouncing Greer's regime, which eventually encourages the townspeople to riot. Batman captures Norton and Greer when they try to escape the mob. Afterwards, the town leaders unveil a pair of statues modeled after Batman and Robin.

What's Important?

It's established here that Batman is famous across the nation, which I think you can see as a big step away from Bob Kane's gritty, The Shadow-esque vigilante conception of the character and toward the jolly, all-benevolent superhero of the Silver Age.

How to Write Dialogue

Robin: "This is the life! No worries about gangsters and nutty scientists who want to rule the world!" I just really liked this line; metacommentary is something you don't see a lot of in Golden Age comics.

Comments

I've written a little about this before, but it is difficult to write a fair review of a Golden Age comic. This is largely because standards are now so very different - Bill Finger or Bob Kane certainly never thought of themselves as pop culture pioneers - but also because, at a certain point, the historical gap between the reader and the comic becomes very wide indeed. In this case, it's easy to forget that even as late as the '40s gangsters were major cultural figures in the US and people really were concerned, with justification, about the glamorization of gangsters. Some of this tapered off with the end of the Prohibition era, when gangsters lost their one large claim to be latter-day Robin Hoods, and the downfall of Al Capone, but there were enough living and thriving mobsters like Bugsy Siegel who seemed to prove that, sure, sometimes crime does pay, and pay very well, which is a potent lesson when you and your family are still slogging through the Depression.

So this is why this, and other '40s Batman comics, seem stuffed full of story-stopping sermons. Batman and Robin really are being used to present an anti-gangster message. It all seems quaint and kind of obvious now, but it becomes a bit more interesting if you stop to consider that this comic was published at a time when there were mobsters who still went around rubbing shoulders with film stars and moguls and commanding a kind of legitimacy that really doesn't exist for any Mafia leaders now, at least not on the national scale.

So, anyway, it is nice to see Bill Finger do something different after three murder mysteries with very similar set-ups in a row. At least to us spoiled modern readers, seeing Batman and Robin take on a whole town overwhelmed by the mob probably isn't as rewarding as might be expected, but hopefully you can get as much fun reading it in its historical context as I did.

Also it's sort of funny that Bruce Wayne/Batman's first instinct when in an unfamiliar place and situation is to ask the nearest rich person, isn't it?

Werewolf by Night #15

2009-04-22T12:38:00.000-07:00

March 1975
"Death of a Monster!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Mike Ploog (pencils), Frank Chiarmonte (inks), Petra Goldberg (colors) , John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Jack and Topaz turn the tables on Dracula, forcing him to fly away. Taking the opportunity to leave, Topaz and Jake return to the mansion where they find a diary written by Jake's direct ancestor, a Baron Russoff. The diary describes how Baron Russoff set out to destroy Dracula after his wife Louisa was killed by the vampire. After driving a stake through Dracula while he slept, Baron Russoff found and rescued a girl named Lydia, who claimed she was being kept around as a blood source by Dracula. Leaving the castle with Lydia, Baron Russoff found out the hard way that she was a werewolf. Jack deduces that Lydia's attack on Baron Russoff was the origin of the lycanthropy that runs through his family and that Dracula kept Lydia in his castle because he could not control werewolves and wanted to find out how. Meanwhile Rachel and Frank arrive at Castle Dracula via a helicopter.

Jack decides to use his curse for good by combining the werewolf's strength with Topaz's powers to kill Dracula once again. Outside the castle, Jack in werewolf form engages Dracula, who now wants Baron Russoff's diary, which has clues toward the location of a book with information on how to destroy vampires, the Second Book of Sins. Dracula takes the diary from Topaz, who is too focused on guiding Jack to protect the book. However, Rachel and Frank manage to steal the book in turn and, figuring out that its contents are important, fly off with it with Dracula in hot pursuit, leaving behind Topaz and Jack.

Comments

As it turns out, Wolfman does dodge two problems that usually happen in crossovers like these: he doesn't make Jack Russell an even match for Dracula (if nothing else, Jack is just a major inconvenience), and in the second part the crossover does influence the overall story arc of the series, although maybe giving Dracula a role, however marginal, in the origin of Jack Russell's family curse might be going too far in the other direction.

The plot is still a jumble, though. Throughout his run Wolfman has put a lot of effort into making Dracula seem like an uber-efficient anti-hero, one who plans ahead to a mastermind degree, always compensates for his weaknesses, and has a dozen contingencies for any potential problem. It rather undoes that to find out here that this book that poses a threat to Dracula's existence has been practically next door for centuries and only now does Dracula do anything about it.

It's also striking how dependent this version of Dracula is on Gene Colan's inks. Frank Chiarmonte is a talented artist, especially with Petra Goldberg doing colors, but his effort to mimic Colan's portrayl of Dracula leaves him looking a bit too cartoonish and lacking in gravitas.

So, basically, it's not a classic, but hey, it's still a story that's all about a vampire kicking the crap out of a werewolf (for a werewolf kicking the crap out of a vampire story, there's always the movie Howling VI).

Tomb of Dracula #18

2009-04-22T10:39:00.000-07:00

March 1975
"Enter: Werewolf by Night"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks), Linda Lessmann (colors) , John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Jack Russell, "Werewolf By Night", and his companion and lover, the sorceress Topaz, arrive in Transylvania about the same time as Dracula reoccupies his old castle. That night, Jack turns into a werewolf and Topaz follows him into the streets to stop him from killing a sailor who had been harassing them. Suddenly Dracula appears, choosing Topaz of all people to be his next victim. However, Topaz is able to not only overcome Dracula's hypnotism, but to telepathically counterattack as well. Dracula is able to easily knock out Jack, but Topaz drives him off telepathically before he can finish off Jack.

Later Jack and Topaz arrive at his family mansion, which happens to be in Transylvania near Castle Dracula. Jack discovers that his late father had been observing Castle Dracula, which is enough to convince Jack that there must be something worth discovering in the castle. As soon as they arrive, Dracula abducts Topaz and demands that she reveal the secret of her powers. Jack turns into his werewolf form again, but Dracula subdues both the sorceress and the werewolf.

Comments

This was the start of a two-part crossover between "Tomb of Dracula" and "Werewolf by Night", which were at the time both written by Marv Wolfman. Like...well, almost all comic book crossovers, the payoff is nothing more than seeing two characters who otherwise belong in completely different series duking it out. In that sense, it's a fun diversion that taps into what makes vast fictional universes appealing. In the minus column, it is a pretty blatant disruption in the flow of the series. Even though a little information about Jack Russell's background is thrown in and the story arc in "Tomb of Dracula" inches forward with Dracula arriving back in his ancestral castle, there really isn't much of anything of consequence for either series.

As silly as it is to complain about suspension of disbelief in a comic book about Dracula fighting a werewolf and his witchcraft-practicing lover, there are also a lot of coincidences that have to be swallowed. Did Wolfman really have to have Dracula pick out Topaz as a would-be blood donor? Wasn't it enough to have Russell's father just happen to have a mansion in the same neighborhood as Dracula's castle (incidentally, wouldn't you love to be a journalist working for the local paper in that town?)?

To be fair, the story does do what it sets out to accomplish: have some werewolf vs. vampire action. It just would have been a little less distracting if it had achieved this with a plot more up to the standards established by Wolfman's run.

Detective Comics #42

2009-04-15T00:44:00.000-07:00

August 1940
"The Case of the Prophetic Pictures!"
Bill Finger (writer), Bob Kane (pencils), Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson (inks)

Bruce Wayne heads out to attend a party thrown by Mr. Wylie, a well-known art collector. Mr. Wylie introduces the newest artist he's patroning, Antal, who is suddenly angrily accosted by another artist, Mikoff, whose sister committed suicide after Antal left her. Bruce also overhears Antal in an argument with the socialite, Mr. Drake, whose wife is having an affair with the artist. In the following days, a millionare and an opera singer have portraits done by Antal, only to later find that the pictures are later altered, showing them being killed by different weapons. The day after each portrait is completed, each person is killed exactly in the manner their portrait predicts. Batman goes to the home of the latest patron of Antal, Mr. Warren, whose portrait shows him being lynched, but only arrives in time to find Warren in a noose and the police, from whom he has a narrow escape. Batman and Robin manage to find the killer on a yacht, disguised in a painter's costume while wearing a green skull and pursuing his next victim. Although they save the intended victim, the killer escapes.

To lure him out, Bruce Wayne has a painting done by Antal and sets up a dummy to fool the killer. In his mansion's study, Batman manages to detain and unmask the killer, who turns out to be Wylie. Batman explains to Robin that Wylie was on the verge of bankruptcy and, after purchasing a number of Antal's works, set up the "prophetic portraits" scheme as a way of giving Antal a profitable notoriety. Before Batman can react, Mr. Wylie kills himself with his own gun.

Comments

This is probably the one era in the title's history when it was in fact "Detective Comics." While over in "Batman" thre were already outlandish criminals like the Joker, the Cat (the future Cat-Woman), and giant ape-men to fight, here Batman is actually solving mysteries. It's not an era that lasts, and it's easy to see why since only a few issues in the series has fallen into formula: Batman and/or Robin stumbles into some backdrop, there's a list of suspects clumsily introduced in only a short scene, and while the reader is offered a clue here and there mostly the reveal of the killer depends on information Batman uncovers entirely off-panel. At least the premise of this murder mystery is deliciously macabre, the sort of thing that won't be allowed for much longer.

Footnotes

Page 2, Panel 2- "They say he is probably the laziest, most useless chap in our set!" It's not the first time Bruce Wayne has been portrayed as unambitious and meek, but I think this is really the first indication readers get that Batman deliberately cultivates an unflattering playboy image to keep his secret identity safe.

Tomb of Dracula #17

2009-04-14T23:57:00.000-07:00

February 1975
"Death Rides The Rails!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks and colors), John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

After a nice night of hunting in Paris, Dracula finds to his horror that Rachel van Helsing and the others have found and destroyed another coffin that contained Transylvanian soil that he had hidden in England and France. Blade turns up and attacks, but Dracula pins him to the ground and bites him. Dracula goes to a coffin that one of his brainwashed helpers, a farmer near Paris, had been hiding for decades. The next day Dracula takes a train going through Germany toward Transylvania, but Frank and Rachel, anticipating his move, are also onboard. Also on the train is a terrified man carrying a suitcase with valuable information and with a bodyguard, convinced someone's out to kill him. Elsewhere Dr. Sun tests the newly resurrected vampire Rafe Brand (originally from this issue) against three of his guards. Brand wins almost effortlessly.

Back to the main plot, the nervous man suspects Dracula, Rachel, and Frank of being the ones after him and orders the bodyguard to kill them. Unfortunately, he first targets Dracula, who kills him without breaking a sweat (er, if he could sweat). The commotion alerts Frank and Rachel to Dracula's presence. In the brawl they lose and only succeed in being literally thrown into another car by Dracula. Soon Dracula runs into the the nervous man from before, who suspects that Dracula was sent by "the Master." Screaming "The vampire - they have the vampire at last!", the man hurls himself to his death through a window. Outside an agent of Dr. Sun reports the man's death and collects the suitcase.

Comments

Once again the fun in this issue is seeing Dracula getting involved in an entirely different type of story, in this case a James Bond-esque yarn unfolding on a trans-Europe train. It doesn't quite work as well as you might hope, since even a seasoned secret agent trained by MI6's best wouldn't stand much of a chance in a claustrophobic train car against Count Dracula (well, maybe the Sean Connery James Bond would put up a good fight), but at least Wolfman takes the opportunity to finally bring the Dr. Sun story thread to the forefront.

Footnotes

Page 10, Panel 6 - "A long time ago--[I had] a boy and a girl." Yep, the Dracula of the Marvel Universe had children, and the daughter, Lilith, whom we'll meet soon, was about as screwed up as you might expect. His son, Vlad, never became a significant character, I believe. However, there was also a second son who shows up later in the series, Janus, who was conceived via magic after Dracula's conversion to vampirism, but, much like the origin of Swamp Thing's daughter Tefe, it's a very, very long story.

Detective Comics #41

2009-04-08T18:54:00.000-07:00

July 1941
"A Master Murderer"
Bill Finger (writer), Bob Kane (pencils), Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson (inks)

Near a private boys' school, Blake's School for Boys, a "homicidal maniac" escapes from an asylum. That same night at the school, a janitor's body is found after he was strangled to death. Meanwhile one of the students is kidnapped. To investigate the murder, Bruce Wayne enrolls Dick Grayson at the school. Quickly Dick meets and sizes up the possible suspects: the principal, Mr. Blake; Mr. Greer, a fired teacher who swears revenge on Mr. Blake; Mr. Graves, the art teacher; and Mr. Hodges, the history teacher, who acts suspiciously from the get-go. That night, as Robin, Dick finds the kidnapped student's diary, where there's an entry about seeing a masked man lurking in the school. The very same man appears and grabs the diary. Despite Robin's best efforts, the masked man gets away and burns the diary.

The next night Robin comes across the escaped mental patient attacking another janitor, thinking he's an asylum orderly come to take him back to his cell. Robin defeats the lunatic and leaves him for the police. The following morning the school's staff assume that the student was also kidnapped and killed by the maniac, but Robin plans to continue his own investigation. Later Robin finds that Mr. Blake has been murdered and the police arrest Mr. Greer, who was fired because he failed the child of a wealthy donor, who just happened to be the kidnapped student. Batman asks Robin to nonetheless patrol the school. That night Robin sees the masked man again and follows him to a house nearby, where a counterfeiting ring is being run and the kidnapped boy is being held. Before the masked man can kill the boy, Batman and Robin intervene, finding out that the masked man is Mr. Graves. Batman reasons that Blake and Graves were partners, but panicked when Graves had to kidnap the student to cover his tracks, eventually leading to his own murder. Graves was returning to the school as the masked man in order to find and take Blake's own stash of money.

Ah, The Golden Age...

Robin feels compelled to wear his costume, even when he's just exploring the school.

It's really more of a "bad editing" than a "Golden Age" thing, but the first victim is identified as a superintendent while later he's identified as a janitor.

Comments

Like last issue, here is a murder mystery where much of the needed information isn't revealed until the end. Also there's a tremendous cheat here with the element of the escaped maniac, who comes across as the largest red herring in the history of mystery fiction. To be fair, though, with these types of stories one really should remember that the target audience was children - not sad adults writing pop culture blogs - so on that level the mystery, with its few clues, would be satisfactory. Not bad all in all, and it's good to see Robin being put to some use since his introductory story, but pretty forgettable.

Tomb of Dracula #16

2009-04-07T19:06:00.001-07:00

January 1975
"Return from the Grave!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks and colors), John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

A skeleton dressed in a trenchcoat attacks a lawyer and kills his secretary, stealing some papers from their office in the process. Nearby Dracula watches as two of his intended victims, a pair of gravediggers, are killed by the same skeleton rising from a coffin. Before Dracula can confront the being, it falls apart. Dracula does later find that the skeleton has risen again, this time to take the necklace of a woman named Theresa Beare, and finds out the hard way that its strength matches his. When he tracks it down to a coffin, once again it only disintegrates. In the meantime, Inspector Chelm of Scotland Yard is investigating the murders and robberies committed by the skeleton and follows the trail of clues to a dead man named Paul Beare. Dracula is also on the case, finding in Paul Beare's house a corpse with the note, "Do not bury him again", pinned to his suit. Out of curiosity Dracula plans to bury Paul's body in hopes of unraveling the mystery of the skeleton, but Professor Chelm intervenes, explaining that Paul Beare was a rich, superstitious man who had hired the same lawyer attacked before to exhume the body of Duncan Corley, who happened to be buried at the exact spot Paul wanted his grave to be for occult reasons. Somehow what was left of Duncan Corley was animated and took the papers pertaining to the gravesite as well as Paul's widow's necklace, which had been made from his original tombstone. Dracula agrees to leave Inspector Chelm in peace and to bury Duncan Corley at his rightful grave himself.

Comments

There's a lot of plot crammed into this issue, and I'm not ashamed to say I found certain points nearly as confusing as a Thomas Pynchon novel, at least on the first reading (especially because the story seems to suggest that there's actually more than one rogue skeleton afoot). Nonetheless I did love the basic idea of Dracula getting shoehorned into a horror story where he is, for once, not the antagonist and being as confused by the proceedings as any mortal protagonist. It just wouldn't have hurt to have maybe stretched this issue out into a two-parter.

Detective Comics #40

2009-03-31T19:58:00.000-07:00

June 1940
"Beware of Clayface"
Bill Finger (writer), Bob Kane (pencils), Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson (inks)

Bruce Wayne heads over to Argus Pictures to visit his fiancee, Julie Madison, who has a role in Dread Castle, a remake of an earlier horror film. While there Bruce meets the studio head, Mr. Bentley; the film's star, Kenneth Todd; and Basil Karlo, the actor who starred in the original and whose career was ruined by his habit of getting into "scrapes" and "a lot of crazy things." Bruce and Julie witness an argument between Bentley and the director Ned Norton, whom Bentley fires. Later they also see the star Lorna Dane publicly break up with her lover Fred Walker, who threatens to kill her. Once the two leave, Bentley refuses to pay protection money to a gangster, Roxy Brenner, who goes on to threaten Bentley's actors.

A few days later, the lights are shut off during the filming of a key scene and Lorna Dane is stabbed to death. While investigating Batman and Robin come across Bentley accusing Roxy of killing Lorna, but after defeating Roxy's goons he swears he did not kill Lorna. Next Batman heads to Ned Norton's house, but finds him hanging from a hook inside a closet, dying and claiming his killer was "Clayface." After Robin is thrown into the set's moat by Clayface, Batman succeeds in stopping him just as he's about to kill Julie in the middle of another scene. Before the crew, Batman reveals Clayface's identity - Basil Karlo - and declares that Basil wanted to sabotage the film because someone else was playing his role, but he identified so strongly with the killer he played in the original film he began killing the actors who played the victims in the film in the right order.

What's Important?

It's the first appearance of the Clayface identity, which will go on to become part of Batman's "official" rogues gallery. Yet it's not the Clayface most people recognize. That would be Matt Hagen, who doesn't appear for another twenty-one years - and a whopping 258 issues - after this issue. Hagen, who was created during the "science fiction era" of the "Batman" franchise, had the name, but Basil Karlo's horror film motif was completely replaced with the idea of a generic shapeshifting villain, which became more or less the main characteristic of the proceeding Clayfaces. It's an interesting "what if?" to wonder if the original Clayface, whom Bill Finger clearly intended to become a recurring villain, would have lasted if Batman wasn't toned down in the following years, forcing the writers to jetison any villain who did anything more menacing than carry out contrived and colorful schemes to steal gems from socialites. Still, Basil Karlo has come back in the modern era, but just as a nod to continuity.

Comments

This is one of those stories continuity has not been kind to; anyone with any in-depth familiarity with Batman continuity would probably already know that Basil Karlo is the first Clayface and, thus, the story's killer. But none of that really matters as the mystery is a flimsy one; Basil Karlo's introduction and the killer's modus operandi just fit together too perfectly, at least for anyone who has read any work of fiction before. Nonetheless I can't dislike a story where the villain's name is a homage to Boris Karloff and Basil Rathbone.

Footnotes

Page 3, Panel 1 - I was a little surprised to see the name of an "X-Men" character invented in 1968 popping up in a 1940 issue of "Detective Comics", given how unusual both the first and late name are. The obvious explanation is that Polaris' creator, Arnold Drake, read this issue and consciously or unconsciously reused the name. I checked to see if Drake and Finger might have instead been drawing from the same cultural well; the closest possible source I could find was the title character of the 1869 British novel "Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor."

Tomb of Dracula #15

2009-03-30T17:37:00.000-07:00

December 1974
"Fear Is The Name of the Game!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks and colors), John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Dracula, writing in his diary (!), reflects on how a hunter shot him in his bat form while he was flying away from the scene of the battle with Father Josiah. Dracula quickly recovered and resumed human form. For his amusement Dracula has the hunter pursued by a swarm of rats and a pack of wolves. Sadly, the hunter doesn't do nearly as well as the hunted. Dracula then recalls how he was killed by the Ottoman Turks and was made into a vampire by a gypsy, but not in time to save his wife Maria from being murdered by his killer. Next Dracula remembers coming across a woman on the verge of death after being shot by her husband and granting her plea for revenge by turning her into a vampire, allowing her to kill her husband and his mistress.

Dracula segues into the story of an old man who tricked him, claiming that there was a hidden pool of blood that gave him 1,700 years of life and could give Dracula a perpetual source for nourishment. The old man claimed that the effects of the blood pool were wearing off and needed Dracula to take him, since no human could be trusted with the knowledge. However, the old man instead used a magic locket to destroy the pool, claiming that immortality is a curse.
Finally Dracula, reflecting on how he had been killed by Blade, thinks about the last person to kill him, a man from Scotland who attacked him in Transylvania in 1969, seeking revenge for the death of his son. He succeeded in staking Dracula, but not before he killed him by throwing him into a pit. His recollections concluded, Dracula vows that nothing will stop him from rising from his grave again and again.

What's Important?

This story - or rather one of the stories here - establishes that Dracula was undead and well for some time between when the novel "Dracula" takes place and when the series begins with Clifton accidentally resurrecting him. I'm not sure if this was Wolfman's plan all along or if it was just his way of explaining certain references to Dracula being around longer than you'd assume.

Comments

None of the stories here have much space to breathe, but there's a nice EC Comics vibe, with Dracula as the framing narrator and with each story having its own particular twist. It might seem like a digression, but fortunately Wolfman also has the issue double as a nice character building exercise, as we learn that Dracula is obsessed with immortality, enough that he can't even begin to think of any downsides to living forever, and has his own particular ideas about honor and justice. (Plus he's not the most humble guy in the world...).

This series has a reputation as one of the better mainstream horror comics in the history of either of the Big Two. I'm feeling more and more that such a reputation is completely deserved.

Detective Comics #39

2009-03-26T19:02:00.000-07:00

"The Horde of the Green Dragon!"
May 1940
Bill Finger (writer), Bob Kane (pencils), Bob Kane and Jerry Robinson (inks)

After learning about the abduction of two millionaires, Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson notice an ad in the newspaper, written out in a Chinese font and asking Batman for help "from a friend". Bruce deduces that the ad is from Wong, a leader of the Chinatown community who helped Batman in a previous case. Wong tells Batman that a secret organization known as the Green Dragon is selling opium to the people of Chinatown. When Batman later meet Wong, who promised that he would be able to provide information about the Green Dragon, he finds that he'd been killed with a hatchet to the head. Wong's killers ambush Batman and in the ensuing struggle Batman is knocked unconscious out on the street. Robin follows Batman's trail into Wong's office, finding that before his death Wong scratched the address of a pier on the desk.

While investigating the pier, Robin is likewise knocked unconscious and taken to the Master of the Green Dragon, who orders Robin to fight a swordsman to the death. Robin holds his own, long enough for Batman to knock over a large stone idol behind the Master, scattering the Green Dragon fighters. Also Batman manages to save the two millionaires, who explain that the Master was counting on the police suspecting white gangsters instead of Chinese criminals.

Comments

Batman fighting Chinese-American opium dealers in 1940? Well, fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on the reader's motives), this issue is not quite as racist or xenophobic as you might expect, apart from the Chinese crimelord who happens to have a massive Taoist statue behind him (which sort of has the same visual effect as a Native American character who happens to have a giant portrait of Sitting Bull in his den; we get it, you know?) and the usual stereotyped speech patterns. If anything, the story actually criticizes the anti-Chinese sentiments of the time, by making the police assuming that the Chinese would not be organized or intelligent enough to launch a major kidnapping plot into a plot point.

Aside from an amusing scene where Robin is forced to fight a swordsman with a wooden toy sword, this is a colorless story. Even the villain isn't allowed to have much of a personality, apart from a vague Fu Manchu riff.

Footnotes

Page 2, Panel 7 - Tongs were fraternal organizations founded by Chinese-Americans in the 1800s and early 1900s, which were often involved in gang activity and various illegal enterprises. By 1940 the tongs were already on the decline, but I think the term would have still been familiar.

Tomb of Dracula #14

2009-03-26T17:28:00.000-07:00

"Dracula is Dead!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks and colors), John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

A team of scientists working for someone named Doctor Sun manage to revive the vampire Rafe Brand. Back to the scene of Dracula's death, before the hunters can celebrate their victory over Dracula, they see an army if brainwashed locals descending on the castle to reclaim Dracula's body. As the hypnotized mob take off with their prize, Quincy notes that all someone will have to do is remove the knife to revive Dracula. However, as his body rapidly deteriorates, Dracula's control over the villagers evaporates and his body is abandoned, where it's found by a struggling and half-insane minister named Father Josiah, who promptly uses the promise of bringing Dracula back to life to draw a crowd.

Rachel, Blade, and the others try to stop Josiah at his big tent "revival", but before they can he removes the knife to resurrect Dracula, only for Josiah and his followers attack him with crosses to chants of "We're killing Satan's demon, Lord!" After a fierce fight, Dracula shatters Josiah's cross and kills him before once again escaping.

Comments

Half an issue later and already Dracula is back in business, so at least Wolfman didn't keep up with the pretense. The concept of Dracula as anti-hero is really brought to the fore here, as Rachel, Drake, and Blade hardly register and most of the issue has Dracula fighting a raving evangelical minister. It's a little contrived, but the premise of Dracula being resurrected by someone who just wanted to make a show out of him returning from the dead and being killed again stands out - and at least is more interesting than the expected "Dracula being revived by his followers" plot point. It's also to Wolfman's credit that he actually makes Josiah something of a tragic figure, despite carrying out one of the worst ideas in comic book history, rather than just a shallow religious fanatic archetype.

Green Lantern/Green Arrow #82

2009-03-18T21:50:00.000-07:00

March 1971
"How Do You Fight A Nightmare?"
Denny O'Neil (writer), Neal Adams (pencils), Dick Giordano and Bernie Wrightson (inks), Cory Adams (colors), John Costanza (letters), Julius Schwartz (editor)

In her house, Black Canary opens up what's supposed to be a box of roses from Green Arrow, but instead two harpies manifest from the box. The two flee the house and decide to get Hal's help. Hal finds the harpies and follows them to a disco where he's attacked by a woman calling herself the Witch Queen, who succeeds in trapping Hal inside a gem. Green Arrow discovers another gem inside the box of roses and investigate the flower shop Green Arrow went to, only to be ambushed by women claiming to be Amazons (although apparently not Wonder Woman's Amazons). The Amazons move in to kill Green Arrow but are reluctant to harm Black Canary. After defeating them, the Amazons' leader explains that before recorded history the Amazons and the Harpies were part of a sisterhood, led by the priestess Medusa, that were trapped in another dimension by a wizard Medusa had rejected as a husband. The Witch Queen gave them gems that allowed them to return temporarily and the sisterhood decided to use that time to avenge themselves on all men for the wizard's crime.

With the Amazons' help, Green Arrow and Black Canary locate the Witch Queen, along with her brother, who just so happens to be Hal's archenemy, Sinestro. The pair manage to defeat the two quickly and the Amazons, realizing they were being manipulated by Sinestro, agree to take Black Canary to their place to exile. Just as Medusa is on the verge of strangling Hal with her snakes, Black Canary convinces her to free him and let them leave. Green Arrow believes that everything they encountered were illusions created by the Witch Queen and Sinestro, but Hal insists it had to be real.

Comments

Before I started doing these write-ups, I had very little knowledge of O'Neil's classic run with Green Lantern and Green Arrow. In fact, my knowledge did not extend far beyond that the series had a liberal or at least a social activist POV, and, of course, the famous (and cruelly ironic) fate of Speedy. And so far the run hasn't been all that bad - I know I've read much worse from one of the Big Two - but it has been about as uneven as the moods of a bipolar person.

For starters, I know we've dumped Appa off at the Soylent Green Planet, but what happened to the whole "exploring America" trip? There was a quick editorial note at the end of the last issue that says "the journey is done", but thematically at least it feels like O'Neil is drastically changing gears. Secondly, I understand that O'Neil is aiming for a fairy tale/mythological feel for this story, but having this kick-ass sisterhood of legendary and mythical beings who wind up being banished because their leader was mean to an ugly man once and now think it's fair to indiscriminately kill men in revenge is, as my academic friends would put it, a bit "problematic." Really, writers (and I'm thinking of you especially Will Pfeifer), there's no federal law that requires you to write every society of strong, independent women as homicidal man-haters. Last of all, you bring back Hal Jordan's Lex Luthor and have him beaten in one and a half pages with basically one punch. What was the point of writing him into the story in the first palce?!

Now all these issues aside, it does work alright as pure filler. Black Canary gets to be in the spotlight, there's some nice banter between her and Green Arrow, and Nel Adams and Dick Giordano are on top of their game, making some particularly grand images out of the Harpies and Medusa. But in the end it's still filler that feels exactly like...filler.

Tomb of Dracula #13

2009-03-16T13:58:00.000-07:00

October 1974
"Night of the Screaming House!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks and colors), John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Despite Edith's death, Blade convinces the other hunters to waste no time in tracking down Dracula. Blade tells the others why he hunts vampires: when his mother was pregnant with him and on the verge of giving birth, a vampire drained her blood and killed her. Later the hunters find Dracula hiding inside a mansion, not suspecting that Dracula wanted them to find him. After a lengthy fight where Taj is seemingly killed, Blade manages to kill Dracula with a knife. Elsewhere the agents of a "Doctor Sun" steal the body of Rafe (the leader of the motorcycle gang from #11) from a morgue.

What's Important?

It's the first account of Blade's origin story, which has remained the same, although certain details - like the identity of the vampire as Deacon Frost (no relation to Emma Frost...I think) and the fact that his mother being bitten while he was still in utero gave him the strength and speed of a vampire - have yet to be filled in.

Comments

The ending is a bit of a wash, since obviously we know Dracula isn't going to stay dead. That quibble aside, this is a good issue, and not just because it finally makes Rachel and co. look highly competent (seriously, it was getting a little funny that they seemed prepared for every contingency except that Dracula would try to get away). What really makes it click are the subtle character moments, like Dracula being thoroughly unimpressed by the "safe" bloodshed in a boxing match and Quincy Harker sadly noting over Edith's body, "Her body will be cremated as is the procedure." The action scene is effective too, largely because, unlike most comic book serials, we don't necessarily know who is going to survive and who isn't.

Green Lantern/Green Arrow #81

2009-03-10T18:26:00.000-07:00

"Death Be My Destiny!"
November 1970
Denny O'Neil (writer), Neal Adams (pencils), Dick Giordano (inks), Cory Adams (colors), John Costanza (letters), Julius Schwartz (editor)

A tribune of Guardians find Appa guilty of deliberately causing environmental damage on Earth and endangering the ecosystem and the human race. Hal argues that the circumstances - having to save his life - absolves Appa of any guilt, but the Guardians maintain that the long-term well-being of humanity outweighs a single life. The Guardians strip Appa of his immortality and banish him to Maltus, the original homeworld of the Guardians. Hal, Green Arrow, and Black Canary (who suddenly shows up for some reason that's never explained) volunteer to accompany Appa to Maltus, but right on arrival find themselves attacked by a mob that violently demands that they leave.

A quick trip to the local archives reveal that centuries ago most of Malthus' human population became infertile after being exposed to a cloud of cosmic dust. A geneticist named Mother Juna saved the Maltusians from extinction by devising a means of mass cloning with the clones reaching full maturity in days and having preprogrammed memories. However, Juna did not stop production even after the population's fertility was restored. After witnessing random scenes of poverty and violence across the planet using Hal's ring, the party infiltrates Mother Juna's laboratory and are forced to fight Juna's super-strong, genetically engineered bodyguards. Black Canary subdues Juna as a mob, allowed entry by the disturbance, smashes up the laboratory. A tearful and insane Juna confides to a sympathetic Black Canary that she kept making clones because she never recovered her fertility after being exposed to the cosmic cloud and that she wanted to compensate for not being able to have children. Meanwhile Hal offers to return to Oa and appeal Appa's sentence, but Appa decides to stay in Malthus and work to mitigate the social and economic devastation caused by the overpopulation.

What's Important?

It's the first mentioning and appearance of the world of Maltus, which, confusingly enough, is the original home of the Guardians, rather than Oa, the planet long established as the Guardians' home. Later continuity established in "Secret Origins" vol. 2 #23, "The Green Lantern Bible", and elsewhere filled in the gaps about Maltus left by this story, explaining why the Guardians and the Zamarons (basically the Guardians' Amazonian counterparts) migrated from Maltus in the first place and what happened to the planet afterwards. (It's naturally pretty convoluted, but here's the the best summary I could find online).

Comments

Really, it looks like there are more plot holes than plot here. Besdes the glaring fact that the relationship between the Guardians and Maltus is only explained in the vaguest and briefest way possible, which is especially distracting because the Maltusians look only a little like the Guardians, the basic story itself hardly stands on its own. Above all, even with the explanation that Mother Juna devised a way to put the aging process in fast-forward, the idea that she managed to, all by her lonesome, cause a planet-wide population mega-boom requires enough suspension of disbelief to levitate cross the Atlantic Ocean. And this overlooks the other question of how Mother Juna, who is already at least a middle-aged woman in the flashbacks, lived long enough to engineer this explosion of clones (especially when the story hints it's been a considerably long amount of time since Mother Juna's career began). The one bit that bothered me most, though, is why would a billion-year old civilization, one advanced enough to have a floating fortress for a library and to have spawned a race of hyper-intelligent psychic beings, have an overpopulation crisis in the first place. Wouldn't interstellar travel and intergalactic colonization be as easy for them as building and riding a cruise ship is for us?

I'm sure I can go on, and I'm just as sure that, once again, someone out there thinks I'm being unfair. After all, this isn't really that far out of the Silver Age, and pointing out plot holes in Silver Age comics like that story where Batman is turned into a crime-fighting toddler is as pointless an endeavor as you can get. But it is extremely distracting when you have a story that tries to sell a serious environmentalist message and yet have such a sloppily pieced together premise and backdrop. Of course I'm not saying that it's impossible for a story like this to have outlandish elements and even one or two plot points that don't hold up under the weight of scrutiny and still have something socially relevent to say, but it's a little tricky to get that message across when the reader has to keep pausing and asking, "Wait, whaaaaaa...?"

The set-up does lead to one very effective scene, where Black Canary learns that Mother Juna went on her cloning spree because she was infertile and she had internalized her society's message that any woman who could not have children was worthless. In a good character moment, Black Canary, who was at this point in her history established as barren herself, reacts with empathy and horror. Even though it's only in two panels, it manages to be more poignant and convincing than anything else in the issue.

Footnotes

Page 4, Panel 2 - Maltus is a reference to Thomas Robert Malthus, a late 18th century British economist who wrote that historically population growth always exceeds available resources. Malthus made a big comeback by the end of the '60s, with Paul Ehrlich's book "The Population Bomb", which famously (or infamously) predicted that unprecedented population growth will lead to a global famine by the end of the '80s at the latest. Ehrlich was eventually proven wrong by history, but not before he caused a stir in the popular consciousness that led to works like the film Soylent Green (itself based on the novel "Make Room! Make Room!") and maybe this comic.

Tomb of Dracula #12

2009-03-03T15:10:00.000-08:00

September 1974
"Night of the Screaming House!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Jack Abel (inks), Petra Goldberg (colors), Tom Orzechowski (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

A skirmish between Dracula and Rachel and co. in London only results in Dracula abducting Edith Harker. Dracula dares them to follow him to an abandoned house in the country, which is of course heavily boobeytrapped. Blade, who was also "invited" by Dracula, shows up and manages to do enough harm to Dracula with a stake made of ebony wood that he flies off from the house as a bat. However, the team quickly learns that they were too late: Dracula already turned Edith into a vampire. Claiming that she's on the verge of losing control, Edith quickly provokes her father and the others into destroying her.

How Not to Write Dialogue

Page 3, Panel 1 - "Taj, you Indian fool..." Poor Taj. It seems that for some reason his companions feel the need to constantly remind him that he is, in fact, an Indian.

Comments

So the Dracula hunting team return with a bang - arguably. After praising Wolfman for taking the series in unexpected or at least more interesting directions, this story is pretty much a cliche served in a cliche wrapping, from the villain luring the heroes into a trap by kidnapping a loved one (why would the milksop Edith join the team's Dracula hunting expeditions anyway?) on. The one factor that rises the story up is that Wolfman does kill off a cast member, but unfortunately from the start Edith was written as such a non-entity - and really was always such a perfect Red Shirt - that the impact is not exactly deep. Still, Wolfman does get across that the death is very devestating to the remaining cast and manages to convey a sincere impression of people who have experienced a great deal of loss but are not hardened enough not to still feel a fresh death.

Footnotes

Page 10, Panel 1 - The narration hints at Taj's origin and the connection he shares with Rachel; she saved his life from the vampires that slaughtered his village. At least it establishes once and for all that Taj is not, in fact, Rachel's manservant.

Green Lantern/Green Arrow #80

2009-02-24T18:02:00.000-08:00

October 1970
"Even An Immortal Can Die!"
Denny O'Neil (writer), Neal Adams (pencils), Dick Giordano (inks), Cory Adams (colors), John Costanza (letters), Julius Schwartz (editor)

A car accident on a bridge causes Hal to accidentally drive into a river. Hal, Appa (who still isn't named yet), and Green Arrow are rescued by the crew of a ship hauling industrial waste. The ship's boiler explodes from overheating, seriously injuring Hal and putting the waste in danger of catching fire, endangering the crew. Appa deduces that he can use his powers to transport Hal to a hospital or stop the fire from reaching the waste, but not both, and decides to help Hal, leaving Green Arrow to dump most of the waste into the river to stop the fire from spreading. At the hospital, where Hal has made a complete recovery, an image of the Gaurdians appear, accusing Appa of committing a crime by allowing environmental damage to happen to Earth. Appa admits his guilt and the Gaurdians order him to go to Gallo, home planet to an alien race that dedicated itself to studying and practicing law, for his trial, with Green Arrow and Hal accompanying him as witnesses.

Things go awry quickly as the three learn that Gallo has been taken over by the Galloans' robot servants, who have all been reprogrammed by their mad engineer, who after a kangaroo court (with an all-robot jury) condemns Appa to death and Green Arrow and Hal to imprisonment. Sharing a cell with some of the overthrown Galloan jurists, they manage to escape and defeat their mechanical guards and save Appa from being encased in plastic by the engineer. In the end Appa decides to ask his fellow Guardians to try him.

Comments

In hindsight this seems like a filler issue; neither Gallo or the villain (who isn't even really named) ever reappear, and the Guardians' bizarre decision to palm Appa off on a third party when they could have tried him to begin with is blatant padding. Yet it's still a fun little diversion, with O'Neil and Adams' depiction of the three protagonists being put on trial in front of a jury of robots who all look like they were collected from 1950s' b-movies being an unquestionable highlight. Also Dennis O'Neil manages to avoid the temptation to simply turn the first half of the story into an environmentalist tale, instead using events to get across the point that what will seem like a responsible act to most people might, to an alien race like the Guardians, appear to be an act of destructive selfishness, without making the Guardians appear sociopathic. It almost makes up another panel where Hal, once again, frets over fighting someone who's obviously a dangerous lunatic because he's "conditioned to respect the authority of the law!"

Tomb of Dracula #11

2009-02-13T13:00:00.000-08:00

August 1974
"The Voodoo-Man!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Jack Abel (inks), Petra Goldberg (colors), Tom Orzechowski (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Dracula flies back to England, musing that he once believed that his vampirism was a curse and now he is convinced that vampirism "is the answer to man's dreams of immortality!" Safe in his tomb, Dracula decides to exact revenge from the motorcycle gang that nearly killed him. Elsewhere the leader of the same motorcycle gang, Brand, is getting instructions from Jason Faust, a voodoo practitioner restricted to an iron lung outfitted with mechanical arms who orders Brand and his gang to go after one of the men he holds responsible for his sickness. The gang crosses paths with Frank and Rachel in London, who decide to go see a play based on the novel "Dracula."

Later Brand confronts a banker named Oliver, who stopped Faust from cashing in his bonds to pay for an operation that might have saved him from the iron lung. Brand uses a voodoo doll to inflict pain on Oliver, but he stops and leaves when it turns out that Oliver has a security camera in his office. However, Brand sends a signal to Faust, who uses his own voodoo doll to inflict crippling, lifelong pain on Oliver. Later Faust relates to Brand that years ago in Haiti the man who is to be the gang's next victim, his business partner Laswell, had left him to the tender mercies of a hostile shaman, who tortured him with voodoo, leaving him crippled. When Dracula finally tracks the gang down, he instead finds Laswell's corpse and finds that, by coincidence, the gang's last victim in Quincy Harker, who unfortunately had advised Faust and Laswell to do business in Haiti to begin with. Dracula stops Brand from signaling Faust in time and hypnotizes and orders all the members of the gang except Brand to ride their bikes to the cliffs of Dover and commit suicide. As for Brand, Dracula turns him into a vampire and sends him to likewise turn Faust into a vampire. Faust manages to detail Brand using voodoo, but not before he succeeds in his mission and the newly vampirized Faust, still trapped in his iron lung, can only wait to be killed by sunlight the coming morning.

Comments

This story really does get at the heart of what Wolfman did to make the series work; he actually made Dracula, not the vampire hunters, the center of the plot, and it makes for a more interesting series all around. This issue the plot is stretched a little too thin, leaving some wrinkles like the bizarre coincidence that one of Faust's planned victims would happen to be Quincy Harker (at least Wolfman pokes a little fun at himself in the narrative panels: "If this were a story, we could chalk it all to coincidence - to the turns and fancies of a writer's mind - but this is more than just a simple tale..."), how someone who can't afford an operation can still afford an iron lung (with mechanical arms, to boot) and hire a motorcycle gang, and the question of how exactly Dracula figures out what Jason Faust is up to is left in the air (the implication seems to be that Dracula has been around enough to recognize death by voodoo when he sees it, but with all due respect I don't think Wolfman was all that interested in patching up every little plot hole). It still works even better than you'd expect a "Dracula versus a voodoo-using motorcycle gang" story would.

Footnotes

Page 6, Panel 1 - It's little known in most circles nowadays, but there was a play based on the novel "Dracula" that was first produced in 1924. Being a play, the writers economized on the cast of characters and the plot significantly, and the Tod Browning's 1931 film adaptation actually drew more from that version than from the novel. In a small and weird case of fiction preceding reality, there actually was a major revival of the play in 1977, just three years after this issue came out.

Green Lantern/Green Arrow #79

2009-02-11T21:46:00.000-08:00

September 1970
"Ulysses Star Is Still Alive!"
Denny O'Neil (writer), Neal Adams (pencils), Dan Adkins (inks), Cory Adams (colors), John Costanza (letters), Julius Schwartz (editor)

While camping in the woods at night, Hal and Green Arrow come across two men threatening to shoot a Native American. The two assailants are Theodore Pudd, who is in charge of a lumberman's union, and Pierre O'Rourke, who is disputing ownership of some lands which the local tribe claims through a treaty signed with the US government in the 1870s. However, all records of the treaty had been lost and the only surviving copy belonged to Abe, son of the chieftain who signed the treaty, Ulysses Star. Hal sympathizes with the tribe but feels they have no legal case, a stance that sparks an argument with Green Arrow. Nonetheless Hal goes to nearby Evergreen City, where he follows the paper trail to Abe Star, determined to prove to Green Arrow that the tribe can be helped through legal means. He does find Abe in time to save him from an apartment fire, but Abe tells him that the papers were just destroyed in the fire.

Meanwhile a figure claiming to be the ghost of Ulysses Star attacks O'Rourke and Pudd with an arrow and then encourages the tribe's leaders to "stop playing doormat." The tribe and O'Rourke and Pudd's lackeys get into a fight, with Black Canary and "Ulysses Star" fighting on the tribe's side. Green Lantern stops both sides and shows that he brought with him a Congressman who will work on behalf of the tribe. "Ulysses Star" urges the tribe to keep fighting until Hal reveals that "Ulysses Star" is Green Arrow in disguise (of course). Green Arrow refuses to back down and the two fight each other to a standstill. Later O'Rourke and Pudd are arrested for hiring an arsonist to burn Abe Star's apartment building, but a Native American bitterly notes that there won't be much help coming from the law to deal with the problems of poverty and hopelessness on the reservation.

Comments

Despite the obvious "mystery" in this issue, I like it for several reasons: 1) it does bring attention to Native American rights issues, which don't usually receive that much attention even from self-professed liberal quarters, and 2) Green Arrow and Green Lantern finally get around to duking it out, although the fight does end in something of a cop-out since the two knock each other out.

Still, at least here there's actually an understandable ideological dispute between the two. Previously the "conflicts" between the two have required Hal acting like an authoritarian to illogical and even surreal lengths (for instance, "I see no need why we should stop this guy from having a folk singer lynched if he's the acknowledged authority here!") Here not only do Hal and Ollie have a real reason to disagree with each other, in the end Hal's approach is the one that wins the day while Green Arrow's attempts to prod the tribe back into self-respect stand on their own. It's actually a fairly nuanced issue, compared to what we've seen before; neither Hal or Green Arrow are left as completely wrong or oblivious and, for the most part, there are no easy answers to the issues raised here. Even the persecuted Native American from the beginning is allowed to sling around some racial epithets of his own against whites, rather than being portrayed as a purely noble, wise minority figure (unfortunately, the idea that, yes, members of persecuted and marginalized minorities can be bigoted too is one that most writers think their audience won't be able to grasp).

The problem is that, once again, it turns out that the villains were engaged in illegal activities all along. I suppose for a mainstream 1970s comic book seeing the villains dragged off to jail is necessary to give the story some kind of basic resolution, but at the same time it does sort of leave the message that anyone that's corrupt can eventually be exposed as a bona fide criminal. That aside, I think this is by far the strongest issue in the run so far.

Footnotes

Page 6, Panel 1 - Yes, Hal Jordan used to be an insurance investigator. In an even earlier attempt to shake up his series' status quo, Hal, after being dumped by Carol Ferris, traveled around the US taking different jobs. One of them was insurance investigator (my own favorite of his jobs during this era was traveling toy salesman!).

Tomb of Dracula #10

2009-02-10T18:26:00.000-08:00

July 1974
"His Name Is...Blade!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Jack Able (inks), Petra Goldberg (colors), Denise Vladimer (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

A man calling himself "Blade the vampire killer" rescues a couple attacked by two vampires on a dock. Blade effortlessly kills the vampires and ends up being lectured by Quincy, who along with Edith were trying to follow those vampires to Dracula. Blade only replies that Quincy has been trying to kill Dracula for "sixty years." Blade leaves to find Dracula himself. Meanwhile on a luxury cruise ship filled with disenfranchised royalty, aristocrats, and celebrities, Dracula is presented as the guest of honor. He assures the other passengers that his vampirism is actually a blood condition that requires occasional transfusions and that his bad reputation comes from an ancestor of his.

After the party, Dracula takes over the mind of the ship's captain and demands that the passengers choose between using their influence to help him or being made into vampires themselves. Instead the passengers fight back with the help of a cross. Blade joins the fight and manages to force Dracula to flee. Before he leaves, Dracula brags that he just had the ship's captain set enough explosives to destroy the ship. While Dracula leaves Graves to die, Blade manages to evacuate the passengers (except Graves) overboard in time to escape the explosion.

What's Important?

At last we have the first appearance of Blade, who ended up becoming a much more popular and used character than even the Marvel Universe Dracula and has made in the years since this issue a vast number of appearances in mainstream Marvel titles, starting with "Doctor Strange", but not until "Tomb" was canceled (although he did appear in a few other titles during the series' run, "Fear", "Marvel Preview", and "Vampire Tales.")

It's also established that Dracula not only hypnotizes his victims, but can exercise long-distance mind control as well over those he has bitten.

How To Write Dialogue

I just love Dracula's line on Page 10, Panel 5: "There! This vessel now sails on my course...a course through Hell itself!"

Comments

Apparently Marv Wolfman had an inkling of the character's potential, because, except for a two-page appearance by Quincy, he's allowed to hijack the role of Dracula's nemesis from the regular cast. The fact that Blade talks jive is a little distracting, especially nowadays, and his Afro and '70s-style visor haven't aged well either, but he still comes across as a great character - a more modern and slightly more ruthless version of the type of vampire hunter we've seen in the series so far. Dracula still comes across as more of a supervillain-type character than he probably should, although having his victims effectively fight back is a welcome and unexpected change from what we've seen before, and a good way to establish that Dracula is not invincible without undermining him as a villain/anti-hero.

Once again I have to wrap up by praising Gene Colan's art, which manages to bring a dark, horror sensibility even to the backdrop of a luxury cruise ship. Also I think Petra Goldberg's colors is the perfect match for Colan, although unfortunately the translation into black and white for the "Marvel Essentials" volume has diluted the effect of their combined work somewhat. So, in other words, it's worth it to try to get this issue (and others, in fact) in the original color.

Footnotes

Page 6, Panel 1 - Blade's statement about Quincy chasing Dracula for six decades isn't really a mistake, or at least it was later changed to retroactively make it no longer a mistake; later in the series there is an explicit retcon that Dracula had actually been active for some time between the period recorded in the novel "Dracula" and his accidental resurrection by Frank and Graves. When he was discovered in #1, he had been "destroyed" another time later than the end of "Dracula."

Page 7, Panel 7 - Dracula is referring to, well, himself, but this is a reference to Vlad the Impaler, a tyrannical ruler from modern day Romania who may have been a major influence for Bram Stoker when writing "Dracula." The Marvel Universe "Count Dracula" and "Vlad the Impaler" are one in the same.

Green Lantern/Green Arrow #78

2009-01-30T19:03:00.000-08:00

August 1970
"A Kind of Loving, A Way of Death!"
Denny O'Neil (writer), Neal Adams (pencils), Frank Giacoia (inks), Cory Adams (colors), John Costanza (letters), Julius Schwartz (editor)

Riding through rural Washington in her motorcycle, Black Canary is accosted by a gang of bikers. She easily defeats most of them, but their leader runs her down with his motorcycle, knocks her unconscious, and after stealing her motorcycle leaves her to die. Stopping at a restaurant at a Native American reservation to eat, Hal and Green Arrow run afoul of the same gang and get into a fight. Green Arrow nearly beats the leader to death when he tells him that he encountered Black Canary two weeks ago.

Green Arrow and Hal investigate the wooded area where Black Canary fought the bikers and find her, claiming that this is "my home." They are asked to leave by a man who calls himself Joshua, who claims to be a member of "a band of the enlightened." When Green Arrow kisses her before leaving, she suddenly remembers her husband Larry's death, her relationship with Green Arrow, and she had set out to find him and join his cross-country trek. Her reminiscence is interrupted by Joshua, who hands her a gun and hypnotizes her. Later in the night Green Arrow comes across Black Canary and other members of Joshua's "band" and learns from Joshua's raving that he's a white supremacist who plans to force his followers to attack the nearby reservation. Hal and Green Arrow are discovered and attacked. Hal is able to detain the cult with his power ring, but Black Canary remains and comes close to shooting Green Arrow, but she's able to overcome Joshua's mind control. Joshua accidentally shoots and kills himself after Hal intervenes to stop him from shooting Green Arrow himself. Green Arrow wonders if Joshua was able to control his victims by exploiting the hate buried deep within them.

It's the '70s

I'm sure there are plenty of references to issues of the time that I missed as a result of the fact that I was born in the '80s, but, as someone who personally follows Native American rights stories, I did recognize that this issue refers heavily to legal controversies over Native American fishing rights that ran through the '60s and '70s. Basically state agencies and other groups challenged the policy tradition that held that tribes still possessed rights to fish and hunt in certain traditional areas outside reservation borders guaranteed to them under treaties signed in the 1800s without being subject to state hunting and fishing regulations. The "big-bellies in the capital" did try to take away these rights, but generally those rights were preserved in a series of legal decisions by the US Supreme Court. As far as I know the tribes in the Northwest still largely have these rights, but in 1970 the outcome would have been in doubt.

Comments

The "brainwashed person is saved by being reminded of love" plot point is a cliche older than some countries and this story doesn't really offer up a fresh angle. There's the hint of an idea that Joshua has the ability to tap into people's repressed bigotry, but it's only brought up in the end to make a closing moral. What sells the issue is the artwork. It goes without saying that Neal Adams is a genius, but Frank Giacona's inks and Cory Adams' colors do bring an earthiness to the art work that matches the rural backdrop extremely well.

Footnotes

Page 14 - Ah, Larry Lance...one of many obscure DC characters whose minor role in continuity was needlessly complicated by "Crisis on Infinite Earths." He started out as Black Canary's love interest, a police detective from Gotham City, in her original series. They both originally lived on Earth-2 where she was a member of the Justice Society of America, but Larry was killed during one of the many JLA/JSA crossovers and Black Canary was so grieved by his death she migrated over to Earth-1 where she met Green Arrow, but in post-Crisis continuity Larry is now the current Black Canary's father, who married her mother, the original Black Canary. Got that?

Tomb of Dracula #9

2009-01-29T19:09:00.000-08:00

June 1974
"Death from the Sea!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Vince Colletta (inks), Artie Samek (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

While Rachel and Frank practice their vampire hunting at Quincy's mansion, a badly wounded and unconscious Dracula is discovered in the ocean by a fisherman. Thinking the man is dead, the fisherman and a local young man named Dave take the "corpse" to the local church to eventually be buried. After everyone leaves, Dracula awakens to the sight of a cross and panics, escaping the church and shocking the locals. Dracula, going by the alias "Mr. Drake", convinces them that they were only mistaken that he was dead and tells them that he was weak from a blood transfusion and, after trying to cure himself with some "medicine" (actually the blood of a would-be victim), was attacked by a biker gang that tried to rob him and threw him into the sea. Dave offers to let Dracula stay at his house and confides in him that he desperately wants to leave his small, isolated town, but his girlfriend Andrea opposes this.

After "retiring", Dracula kills a woman and turns her into a vampire; she in turn "converts" a man. After Dave tries rather unsuccessfully to save Andrea from the two new vampires, Dracula intervenes to save Dave, who figures out that Dracula is a vampire. Unfortunately, the local priest also deduces Dracula's identity, and goes to lead an old-fashioned mob. The mob kills the two vampires, but Dracula eludes them, thanks to some deception on Dave's part. Dracula later appears to thank Dave and invites him to join Dracula as a vampire. Dave politely declines and Dracula, before flying off as a bat, vows that Dave will remain under his protection.

Comments

I really like this issue, as it makes Dracula a more complex character without softening him up and while building from scenes left by other writers that indicated that at the least Dracula still had an aristocratic sense of honor. Also it manages to reposition Dracula, not Rachel van Helsing and Frank Drake, as the real center of the series, which is a more interesting way to approach the series. Dracula is still saddled with the desire to take over the world that was introduced last issue, which I think is a mistake since it reduces Dracula to the same level as the average supervillain and isn't a compelling motive for such a classic character, but all in all it's the strongest, most original installment in the series yet.

Green Lantern/Green Arrow #77

2009-01-23T17:52:00.000-08:00

June 1970
"Journey to Desolation!"
Danny O'Neil (writer), Neal Adams (pencils and inks), Cory Adams (colors), John Costanza (letters), Julie Schwartz (editor)

Driving through the Rockies, Hal, Green Arrow, and Appa come across a tiny mining town named "Desolation." As soon as they pass the sign, men with rifles fire on their vehicle. After effortlessly subduing the men, they reluctantly explain that they thought Hal and the others were working for Slapper Soames, the corrupt owner of the local mine who, with the help of his private army, has started treating the town like his own private fiefdom. The men also mention that Johnny Walden, a folk singer, was arrested by Soames' goons for stirring up discontent with his songs and that Soames is planning to lynch him soon. After a little reluctance, Hal agrees with Green Arrow and Appa to help the men confront Soames.

In the Desolation prison, Soames tells Johnny that the real reason he's been marked to death is that he is afraid Johnny would eventually become famous, which would lead the media to learning about the situation in Desolation. Meanwhile Green Arrow and Hal join in an uprising against Soames, only for Hal, at the worst possible moment, to learn telepathically from Appa that the Guardians reduced the potency of the power ring because Hal is on "leave of absence." Still, in spite of help from a turncoat in the town who nearly kills Green Arrow, Soames is eventually overthrown and arrested, although many of the men in Desolation have been left wounded or dead.

It's the 70s

It's fairly obvious that Johnny Walden is based on Bob Dylan, something that even Soames notices in his dialogue.

Yes, Green Arrow Deserves A Section

"Because Soames muscled his way into authority, he's a good guy, huh? Pal, Hitler was the 'boss' of Germany, remember? And there was Genghis Khan, Nero...Throughout history, cheap punks have made themselves leaders!"

Hi, sorry, GA, but Hitler was democratically elected while Genghis Khan and Nero were the legitimate, designated heirs to their respective monarchies. So maybe they're not the best people to compare to Soames. Well...maybe you should just stay away from the historical allegories, at least for five or six more issues.

And really what is it with Green Arrow's fixation on Hitler? If only Godwin's Law had been around in 1970...

Comments

One of the main problems with the last issue -the political commentary being dulled by the antagonist turning out to be a bona fide criminal - is magnified by the hundreds here. Any genuine exploration of workers' rights issues as well as the abuses that can go unnoticed in isolated rural communities is overshadowed by the ostentatious portrayal of Soames, whose actions are completely and obviously illegal. I know this is a comic from the early Bronze Age and so the standards of depth and realism and audience expectations are very different from what they generally are in 2009, but still...Soames even hires ex-Nazis as his henchmen!

The most distracting part is that Hal is portrayed here as such a blind follower of authority that he's willing to consider that it might be wrong to depose Soames even after he hears that Soames has an army of Nazi mercenaries and that he's going to lynch an innocent man! It's depressing to imagine how this interpretation of Hal did with his work as a Green Lantern: "Pardon me, but do you and your intergalactic armada have a permit to carry out this genocide of an entire world? You do? Well, carry on, then."

Tomb of Dracula #8

2009-01-22T20:58:00.000-08:00

May 1974
"The Hell-Crawlers"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Ernie Chua (inks), Charlotte Jetter (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Wounded in the fight with Rachel and co., Dracula transforms into a bat and crashes into the home of Dr. Heinrich Mortte. Dracula, who knows the doctor from a previous encounter, mocks Mortte for being a vampire hiding his true identity among humans, even from his still human daughter, and demands that he cure him from the wound. Mortte complies and is horrified when Dracula claims he also wants Mortte to give him "the projector", a device Mortte invented to help heal the dying but which Dracula can use to revive the dead as vampires. Meanwhile Rachel, Taj, Frank, and Quincy escape from the army of children in the fortress but end up being trapped in their car because Dracula had cut the wires. Edith rescues them using a helicopter capable of emitting a "sub-sonic scream" that causes the children to fall unconscious. Elsewhere Mortte has led Dracula to the projector, which Dracula uses to raise the dead in a graveyard and plans to use to enslave humanity to vampires. When Dracula declares that Mortte's daughter, who has stumbled across them, will be his army's first victim, Mortte transforms into a bat with the projector in tow and flees. Dracula fights him bat-on-bat and manages to kill him, but not before the projector is destroyed, likewise destroying the first recruits in Dracula's makeshift army.

What's Important?

This is the first issue that clearly indicates that the Marvel Universe Dracula has some form of authority over vampires across the world. It's not entirely clear here if the power Dracula holds over Mortte is purely a hierarchical thing or if one of Dracula's powers is that he actually has some degree of mind control over other vampires. The events of the story do suggest the former and while later stories that fleshed out Dracula's origin and the origin of all MU vampires hint that vampires are inherently forced to be subservient to Dracula or anyone claiming his title as lord of the vampires, it's ultimately one of those things that you have to say is up to the writer.

Comments

A bit of a letdown from Marv Wolfman's strong debut, this issue is filled with great ideas, but none of them are given space to breathe. After a large build-up the army of children from last issue are dispatched in what almost amounts to a sub-plot (and, although Wolfman tries to cover it up with a couple of lines of dialogue, Rachel and the gang do come across as a bunch of pricks for leaving the kids lying unconscious on the ground out in the middle of nowhere!) and Dracula's army of vampires only last about three pages. Worst of all is the lack of development given to Mortte. A vampire doctor secretly living among humans and living off blood donations is a great idea, especially for a title like this, and there really should have been more details about his origin and more depth to his conflict with Dracula. As it is, this issue feels like two stories compressed together, with lots of interesting bits edited out.

Green Lantern/Green Arrow #76

2009-01-20T17:33:00.000-08:00

April 1970
"No Evil Shall Escape My Sight!"
Danny O'Neil (writer), Neal Adams (pencils and inks), Cory Adams (colors), John Costanza (letters), Julie Schwartz (editor)

Flying over Star City, Green Lantern (Hal Jordan) spots a teenager threatening a man in a business suit while his friends cheer him on. Hal uses his ring to restrain the teenager and send him to the police. After helping send the suit on his way, a mob assails him with trash. Before he can attack one of the men in the mob, Green Arrow intervenes, threatening to fight Hal, who is shocked that Green Arrow would come to the defense of "anarchists." Green Arrow takes Hal into the apartment building the teenager Hal detained came from and shows him that it's a slum owned by the man Hal rescued. Also the slumlord, Jubal Slade, plans to have the building torn down to make way for a parking lot. A black man from the building challenges Hal to explain why he's helped the "blue skins", the "orange skins", and the "purple skins" on other planets, but done nothing for the "black skins" on Earth. Hal only replies, "I...can't..."

Hal tries to reason with Jubal Slade, who only brags that he has the law on his side and tries to throw Hal out. Unfortunately, Hal loses his temper and is about to punch Jubal when he's summoned back to Oa. The Oans lecture Hal for attacking a "brother Earthling" for no real reason and send him on a pointless mission. Back on Earth, Green Arrow pretends to want to extort money out of Jubal and arranges a meeting in an abandoned store. Jubal's goons try to kill him but in the fight Green Arrow's tape recorder with the incriminating evidence is destroyed. After meeting with Green Arrow, Hal uses his ring to disguise himself as one of Jubal's goons and manages to get him to confess to putting a hit out on Green Arrow. Hal thwarts a murder-suicide attempt by Jubal and hand him over to the district attorney, who has the evidence needed to charge him. The Guardians chastise Hal again, but Green Arrow convinces Hal to defy their orders and urges the Guardians to try to understand humanity. In response they send one of their own to Earth disguised as a human being. Hal, Green Arrow, and the disguised Oan set out to travel across the United States.

What's Important?

In terms of strict continuity, nothing much, but this issue is generally believed to have been key in setting the tone for the Bronze Age by paving the way for more grounded, topical stories. It does have the first appearance of Appa Ali Apsa, the Oan who travels with Hal and Green Arrow. He is used again after Danny O'Niel's run, but like so many characters who don't have a niche he went insane and was killed off. Surprisingly he hasn't come back, at least as far as I know.

Comments

It's more or less impossible to talk about this issue at any length without getting into the subject of American politics and comics, so let's just hold our noses and dive in. Now there's something to be said about superhero comics having a bit of a reactionary slant to them; after all, you really don't get much more reactionary than having self-appointed champions beating the crap out of anyone who violently challenges the status quo. However, it is easy enough to also see themes that could be described as "liberal" in the contemporary sense like the Golden Age Superman confronting corrupt landlords and Captain America adopting a strict no-killing-criminals policy. And before comics had Bill Willingham and Warren Ellis and others none so subtly injecting their stories with their pet political and social issues, there were those like Steve Ditko and Steve Gerber who also found in comics the ideal place to express their views.

All this to say, real-world politics, including politics that can be described as "liberal", in comics is and even in 1970 was nothing new. Still, Danny O'Neil's run on "Green Lantern/Green Arrow" was almost unique in how overt (or, depending on your point of view, unsubtle) it was in trying to bring contemporary problems onto the printed page. How well does it work? Well...while I'm on record as writing something like "you had to have read it at the time it came out" is a reviewer's out I think...you had to have read it at the time it came out. The stories do unfairly suffer a bit, simply from being looked at in a more jaded and cynical era like ours. There's just this hokey but appealing idealism in having an entire run based on a conservative and a liberal superhero setting out along with an alien to see and possibly save the soul of America that you you just can't imagine working, at least not without some thick layers of irony, at any date past 1981 or so.

Now for that reason "Green Lantern/Green Arrow" sharply divides contemporary fans: some see it as a hugely successful experiment in forcing superhero comics to speak to their readers on relevant issues, and others see it as too preachy to be genuine and effective. Personally I think Danny O'Neil's obvious sincerety still bleeds through, despite the occasional overwrought monologue from Green Arrow, but there are a few problems I had. For instance, Danny, I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt on this but...did you really have to give the slumlord a Jewish name? Plus there's this little exchange between Green Arrow and Hal:

Hal: "Easy...you've no cause to yell at me! I have a job...I do it!"
GA: "Seems I've heard that line before...at the Nazi war trials!"

All Green Lantern did was help a man who was apparently about to be attacked and you compare him to Nazis?! Having to deal with a guy like that, no wonder Speedy turned to hard drugs.

Qualms aside, there's no denying that Neal Adams is doing quality work here, managing to capture both gritty urbanscapes and the solar system with seeming ease. There are also effective moments that, in my opinion, still work. For example, Hal's short but crushing meeting with a poor tenant really drives home the concept of Green Lantern's powerlessness in front of everyday brutalities. In fact, it's Hal's characterization as a well-meaning but too duty-bound hero above all that really drives this issue, especially next to Green Arrow's bombastic and self-righteous portrayal. Unfortunately, the entire story is kept back from achieving quite what it sets out to do by two plot conveniences. First, Hal gets chewed out for basically failing to be a mind-reader. Second, the slumlord turns out to be an outright criminal, one that can be arrested and shut away in prison. That alone undercuts the attempt to bring the two characters down to the level of real-life social problems while making Hal's dilemma more simple than it ought to be.

Tomb of Dracula #7

2009-01-13T21:46:00.000-08:00

March 1974
"Night of the Deathstalkers!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks and letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

A young woman named Edith is attacked by Dracula on the streets of London. She recognizes him and wards him off with a cross, but not before he knocks her unconscious and leaves her to be killed by a pack of rats under his control. She's rescued by her father, an elderly man in a wheelchair named Quincy Harker, who decides to warn Rachel van Helsing that Dracula has returned to London. After receiving a telegram from Quincy at the Derings' mansion, Rachel, Frank, and Taj relocate to Quincy's estate where he demonstrates various hi-tech devices and weapons he has invented to fight vampires.

Quincy tells Frank about his father, Jonathan Harker, and how he and his friends killed Dracula to save his mother Mina, as in the "novel." As he grew up he was trained in vampire hunting by Abraham van Helsing, a cause that cost him the use of his legs. In the meantime Dracula, attended by a still brainwashed Clifton, hypnotizes a large group of children. That night he kills a man near Quincy's estate, drawing out the vampire hunters who pursue Dracula to a medieval fortress outside London. Inside they are tricked into staking a corpse made to look like a sleeping Dracula while the genuine article sics his army of loyal children on them.

Comments

Marv Wolfman's run begins here and it will last for the rest of the series. The improvements are noticeable out the gate: while Dracula's dialogue still has shades of purple it's still not as bizarre and archaic as it sounded the last several issues; there are nice details adding depth to the proceedings like Dracula killing someone who is about to be married; and while the issue still follows the template of "Dracula kills some people, the hunters come after him, he sets a trap of some kind for them", at the least the introduction of new cast members in the form of Quincy and Edith Harker and the element of Dracula recruiting an enemy Rachel and her gang can't ethically harm add spice. The series is still in a bit of a rut, but at the same time it's clear the wheels are finally moving.

Footnotes

Page 7, Panel 1 - "Nice place -- like an old Hammer movie set." Frank is talking about Hammer Studios, a British film company that had been around since the 1930s but became famous for the horror films they produced through the '60s and '70s. The reference is apt, since Hammer made its own series of films based on Dracula, usually portrayed by Christoper Lee. I guess the combination of science-y things and a Gothic backdrop reminded Frank of something like Hammer's Frankeinstein Must Be Destroyed (excellent film, by the by).

Page 9, Panel 1 - As this panel makes explicit, Quincy Harker's first name is a reference to Quincey Morris, one of the protagonists of the novel who dies killing Dracula. This character is actually mentioned in the novel as Jonathan and Mina's newborn son. Of course, the name is slightly misspelled - it should be Quincey not Quincy - but still it stuck.

Batman #420

2009-01-05T19:37:00.000-08:00

June 1988
Ten Nights of the Beast Part IV
Jim Starlin (writer), Jim Aparo (pencils), Mike DeCarlo (inks), Adrienne Roy (colors), John Costanza (letters), Danny O'Neil (editor)

After buying a gun attachment to replace his amputated hand from the engineer/underground weapons dealer Ambrose Dearling, KGBeast kills him, leaving Batman to find the bullet-ridden corpse. Later Batman, with the help of Gordon and Agent Bundy, "kidnap" President Reagan after he arrives in Gotham for a speech at a Republican convention in order to protect him from the mole that Batman and Gordon believe to be in Parker's FBI team. At a hotel, Batman explains to Reagan what is happening, and he decides to trust Batman, Gordon, and Bundy instead of Parker. Batman feeds Parker a fake plan for escorting Reagan, which is promptly reported to KBBeast and Salari by the mole. After Parker and his men leave, Batman assures Reagan that he knows who the mole is and that he is going to set a trap for the mole and KGBeast. Meanwhile Bundy tells Batman that KGBeast will be rescued from imprisonment by the USSR government and subtly suggests that the only way to ensure KGBeast will never hurt anyone again is if he's killed.

While preparing to board Reagan on a helicopter, Parker and his group are attacked by Salari, who is flying a hanglider and has dynamite strapped to his body. Robin kicks Salari to the side, causing him to explode without harming anyone, while Parker discovers that the "Reagan" he was escorting was really a disguised Gordon. In the rear entrance to the convention center, Batman and the "real" Reagan are ambushed by KGBeast while the mole, who turns out to be one of Parker's agents, shoots Batman in the shoulder. In the fight the mole is shot to death by Agent Bundy and KGBeast escapes into the sewers with Batman following. In the inevitable confrontation Batman manages in the end to best KGBeast, who flees into a maintenance room and challenges Batman to continue the fight. Batman refuses and instead traps KGBeast inside the room. Back on the streets, Batman calmly tells Bundy that he and the CIA won't have to "worry about [KGBeast] anymore." An exhausted Batman gets into a car driven by another Reagan imposter, who is really Alfred in disguise.

It's the 80s!

Batman kidnaps President Reagan.

Take a minute and let it sink in.

Batman swoops in, snatches up President Reagan in front of a crowd and the Secret Service, and escapes while carrying him like a bag of groceries.

This is a perfect example of why I love superhero comics.

Comments

I've been pretty lukewarm about this story from the start, so it's nice that I have the privilege to say that the last installment is an improvement, if only because the plot finally progresses at a healthy pace and Batman chases KGBeast in the sewers, instead of the rooftops. Still, you can probably accuse me of being too harsh, because it is well-written, the plot is fairly sophisticated (at least compared to some of the action thrillers that came out the same year and were embraced by the mainstream, like Rambo III), and Starlin obviously had a clear idea of the story he wanted to see in print: Batman embroiled in Cold War intrigue.

Unfortunately, it does capture the problems that plagued Starlin through his run on "Batman." Starlin tried to bring the "Batman" series into the post-Watchmen era, something which the bloodied corpse of Jason Todd proves beyond a reasonable doubt, and here we have a Batman who grimly leaves a mass murdering enemy to starve to death in a sewer (although it is hard not to be disappointed that Batman didn't have any consideration for the poor city utility worker who would, I imagine, inevitably stumble across KGBeast and get a bullet in the brain). Unfortunately, as all of us diehard superhero comic readers have had many, many occasions to learn since the mid-80s, "grim and gritty" alone does not a good story make, at least not without mixing in the qualities and originality that made the careers of Frank Miller, Alan Moore, and the other pioneers of DC's Golden Age.

Now someone might call this story "dated", although the scene with the suicide bomber and the threat of terrorism does give "Ten Nights of the Beast" a depressing relevance. The problem isn't that it's a Cold War-era thriller, but that the entire plot hinges on...the success of the strategic missile defense initiative, which even in 1988 was well on its way to inspiring writers to find original ways to write "billion dollar flop" and "take that, inner city schools!" Instead it's more to the point to say that it just doesn't feel like a Batman story. It is true that over the decades Batman has been drawn into a variety of genres, many of which don't exactly lend themselves to stories starring an urban vigilante. At least, regardless of the setting he finds himself in, it's still possible to make Batman feel essential to the story. Case in point: Dennis o'Neill's "Daughter of the Demon", the story that introduced Talia and Ra's al Ghul to the Batman mythos and, despite being an "old school" pulp adventure, still seemed like a quintessential Batman yarn. With "Ten Nights of the Beast", Batman's involvement in the plot is so minimal that almost anyone, from Green Arrow to Black Canary to Marion Cobretti, could be the hero here.

Tomb of Dracula #6

2008-12-27T22:11:00.000-08:00

January 1974
"The Moorlands Monster!"
Gardner Fox (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks), John Costanza (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Dracula and Lenore walk out of the mirror into an abandoned chapel near an English moor in the present day and waste no time in finding victims. Rachel, Taj, and Frank appear through the same mirror and find the inspector they worked with before, who has been looking for them. He tells them that a corpse drained of blood had been found in the moors as well as sightings of a shaggy monster. Rachel warns the local aristocrats, the Derings, who tell her that one of their servants went missing. The vampire hunters find and confront Dracula and Lenore at the chapel where Dracula casually sacrifices Lenore to save himself.

After Dracula escapes, Rachel and the others find the body of the Derings' servant. Lord Dering admits that several hereditary illnesses run in his family, which causes a male child in every few generations to develop a deformed body covered by hair, and the latest to inherit the disease was his son Randolph, who was secretly left to live in the chapel with the servant as the provider of his meals. Thanks to a hint from Lord Derling, the vampire hunters follow Dracula to a ruined castle nearby, where he manages to subdue Taj and trap Frank and Rachel in a dungeon, but not before he taunts Frank by suggesting that he might also turn into a vampire. Thinking they're facing a slow death, Rachel and Frank grow romantically closer while Frank worries he cannot start a relationship with Rachel due to the possibility he may become a vampire thanks to Dracula's legacy. In the end, they are rescued by Randolph Dering.

Wha...?

The narration describes Dracula and Lenore being watched by the Moorland Monster when they first enter the chapel, but six demonic eyes are drawn (in addition to a glimpse of the Moorland Monster's body.) I guess they were supposed to be bats...?

How Not to Write Dialogue

Poor Taj is referred to as a "mute servant" twice.

Comments

Marv Wolfman's rightfully celebrated run begins next issue and, frankly, it cannot start soon enough. This issue is just a showcase of squandered ideas. Lenore, who really wasn't much of a character to start with, is killed off without affecting the plot. The supposed centerpiece of the story, the "Moorland Monster", is a total wash, despite the build-up. All the narration's talk of him wanting revenge for the servant's death and all the hints that he is capable of putting up a vicious fight, and all you get is he rescues the heroes from a medieval pit? I know comic book covers are notoriously deceptive when it comes to the actual plots of issues, but would it have been so hard to have the Moorland Monster have a fight with Dracula or just be involved with the development of the story in any way before the very end?! What's even more inexplicable is how characters constantly assure each other that Dracula, not the Moorland Monster, is responsible for the deaths, even though no one posits him as a suspect. In other words, the characters are responding to a murder mystery that doesn't even exist.

To be fair, the idea that Frank would somehow "inherit" Dracula's condition is a neat if sorely undeveloped parallel to the origin of the Moorland Monster. Also the fact that Frank is a direct descendant of Dracula hasn't really been exploited since the very beginning of the series. Nonetheless the idea doesn't quite work, if only because Fox was apparently just planning to use it as a contrived source of angst for Frank and Rachel, so it's not a surprise that Marv Wolfman never really followed up on that particular plot idea.

As always, the art goes a long way to salvage the issue. The designs for the Moorland Monster are very well-done, although it would have been better if he actually had anything to do...

Footnotes

Page 12, Panel 3 - Lord Dering claims his son suffers from two genetic illnesses, rachitis and naevus pilosis. "Rachitis", much more commonly known as rickets, is a bone disease that can lead to deformities in adulthood, but instead of being genetic it's caused by calcium and vitamin D deficiencies in childhood. "Naevus pilosis" is a reference to another actual medical condition, although the correct phrase is actually "nevus pilosus", which is simply a mole from which body hair grows. Maybe Gardner Fox thought he was referring to hypertrichosis, a rare hereditary condition where the victim grows a large amount of body hair, or maybe it was an odd joke.

(Quick Note: I hate to do this again to my fine readers - all five of you - but I won't be updating until next weekend since I'm going on a vacation to visit friends until after New Year's. Given all the moving and work I've been doing the past month, I just feel like I didn't have a "proper" holiday around Thanksgiving or Christmas, so here it is. I'll be back with some more bondage-loving KGB assassins, Dracula, and something new!)

Batman #419, Ten Nights of the Beast Pt. 3

2008-12-23T20:52:00.000-08:00

May 1988
Ten Nights of the Beast! Part III
Jim Starlin (writer), Jim Aparo (pencils), Mike DeCarlo (inks), Adrienne Roy (colors), John Costanza (letters), Danny O'Neil (editor)

KGBeast and Salari manage to blow up a private jet carrying Agent Bundy and another of KGBeast's planned victims, General Ridwell, using a rocket launcher. Gordon worries whether or not the next two on the hit list, Senator Dayle and Congressman Burns, will be safe under guard at a hotel, but later the Congressman is killed by an explosion in his room. Despite Batman's objections, Parker arranges to have the Senator and his men taken to the ground floor through the elevator. Unfortunately, the elevator is stopped by KGBeast, who begins hurling cement blocks down the shaft, killing an FBI agent and nearly killing the Senator. Batman pursues KGBeast out of the hotel and onto the rooftops, where he manages to restrain his hand with a rope but KGBeast cuts it off to free himself. Afterwards Agent Bundy shows up alive and well, revealing that the plane that had been destroyed was empty and controlled by remote while the General had been secreted away to DC. Batman supposes that, even without a hand, KGBeast will still come after the last target on his list, President Reagan, who will soon be making a speech in Gotham.

How Not To Write Dialogue

At one point Gordon becomes possessed by the Ghost of Plot Exposition: "CIA Agent Budy knew the risks, trying to sneak General Ridwell out of town that way...General Brian Ridwell, the military head of the Star Wars program." Now arguably that chunk of exposition, while clumsily inserted with a jackhammer, was a tad necessary for those jumping in the middle of the storyline, but there's really no excuse for this: "...looked like it might turn up who the traitor in our midst is...the turncoat supplying the Beast with inside info on the victims." Thanks, Jim, but you might want to throw in a couple of more synonyms for "traitor" just to be extra sure we're following along.

Comments

I'll just come out and say it: this story is boring. Yes, pretty much half of the issue is an action sequence, but it's still Batman, Gordon, and a bunch of people with no personalities beyond what could be picked up by rummaging through some old thriller/espionage movie cliches fretting over KGBeast's rampage or who the mole is; the plot still taps into the exciting and compelling topic of strategic missile defense initiatives; and in the end Batman is still chasing KGBeast through the rooftops.

To keep with the spirit of things, I think I'll even end up writing the same review. In fact, I will point out again that Starlin does at least try to make this feel like "more" than just a Batman yarn by throwing in a few hints of real world politics. This time, Robin vocally suspects Parker is the mole because he was involved with the Students for a Democratic Society, which, as Robin points out, is "the group the radical Weathermen sprang from." Batman rebukes Robin for his logic, pointing out rightly to Robin, who apparently is a Joe McCarthy apologist in his spare time, that just being a member of a leftist student group in the past doesn't make one a Communist spy now. This is the sort of thing that fuels fanboy debates over the political leanings of superheroes.

On a related note, Starlin's efforts to make this story arc into a serious geopolitical thriller really are undercut by KGBeast's depiction. I don't mean how he's written - from what few glimpses of a personality we have the cool, competent killer archetype standard for this type of story - but how he's drawn. Of course, the vast majority of supervillain costumes are neither aesthetically or practically sensible, but this is too much:

It does look less like a Mexican wrestler get-up and more like a vision of a gay S&M bar.

The only aspect that's at all engaging is the mystery of who the mole is, and even that is ruined for the careful reader. I'm not sure if this counts as a spoiler, but in this issue just watch out for any tertiary characters who suddenly start becoming the centerpiece for more than one scene. I suppose the action sequences are fairly good too, although there's really only so much enjoyment you can get out of seeing Batman chase a steroid-pumped bondage fetishist for the second time in a row.

2008-12-08T14:20:00.000-08:00

Hi all,

We're going to have to take a hiatus (hey, at least I'm bothering to announce it this time!). I'm in the middle of helping family make a major move and moving myself, so my life is a bit of a nightmare right now. I probably won't have regular Internet access for some time yet, but next week, when overall everything should be settled, I'll update with the thrilling (well, no, not really) conclusion to "Batman: Ten Nights of the Beast" and start with Dennis O'Neil's famous run on "Green Lantern/Green Arrow."

-Chad

Tomb of Dracula #5

2008-11-23T01:46:00.000-08:00

November 1973
"Death to a Vampire Slayer!"
Gardner Fox (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks), Artie Simek (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Dracula and Taj find themselves standing in the middle of a desolate landscape filled with demons who attack right away. Dracula rescues Taj, but only to protect his food supply. They stumble on a temple with a mirror resembling Ilsa's inside. Using it Dracula and Taj are transported to Dracula's castle in late nineteenth century Transylvania, just after Van Helsing had "destroyed" Dracula as in the novel. Dracula traps Taj in a coffin in order to preserve an emergency meal. Back in the present, Drake and Rachel are led to the occult book that provided Ilsa Strangway with the incantation for the mirror by Ilsa's butler. Since they calculate exactly when Dracula would show up, Rachel and Drake manage to travel to the nineteenth century unharmed and free Taj. Dracula sends Lenore, a vampire he "imprisoned centuries ago", after them as he goes to enact his revenge on Abraham Van Helsing, but Drake and Taj drive her off with the shadow of a cross. Although Rachel manages to save her ancestor, Dracula and Lenore escape back through the mirror.

How Not to Write Dialogue

Rachel: "Frank! Count Dracula's dragging my mute servant Taj into the demon mirror!" It only would have been more perfect is she had said "mute, Indian, turban-wearing servant" too.

Also this does contradict Tomb of Dracula #2, where Rachel at least referred to Taj as her companion. Maybe in the heat of the moment she dropped the pretense...

Comments

There's yet another writing change, and unfortunately the effects are (as much as I love Gardner Fox) painfully obvious. The amount of unnecessary, awkward exposition goes up at least 90 percent, with the example quoted above as just the beginning, while Dracula starts oozing purple prose, with lines like "Avaunt, you creatures of this hellish world!", "By Beelzebub and Sathanus whom you serve - BE OFF!", and "A silvery pathway...". Tom Palmer and Gene Colan manage to make the demonic world Dracula and Taj are trapped in memorable, especially the depiction of the temple, which has a gate lit by two burning corpses. Unfortunately that setting is only used for about three pages and is dropped in favor of just another repeat of the "Dracula kills a few people, gets driven off by Rachel and her allies" plot template, but with the novel's backdrop as the only innovation.

Tomb of Dracula #4

2008-11-22T23:21:00.000-08:00

September 1973
"Through a Mirror Darkly!"
Archie Goodwin (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks), Jon Costa (letters), Roy Thomas (editor)

Ilsa Strangway invites Dracula into her mansion, allowing him entrance. Dracula wants to punish Ilsa for having the audacity to purchase his ancestral castle, but Ilsa wards him off with a cross and admits she hoped that by buying the castle from Drake she would lure him to her. Ilsa cites the passage from Bram Stoker's "Dracula" where Jonathan Harker finds Dracula in his coffin and sees that he has been rejuvenated and asks if it's true that feeding on blood as a vampire can restore a youthful appearance. Although Dracula never explicitly says "yes", Ilsa allows Dracula to feed on her and offers him a mirror with a supernatural significance in exchange. After Dracula takes the first bite, Ilsa's butler rushes in and Dracula knocks him unconscious.

The next day in a hospital, the butler explains to Rachel and Drake what happened. As they set off to once again find Dracula, the newly vampired Ilsa explains to Dracula that the mirror, with the right incantation, can be used to travel through time. Ilsa heads out and happily feeds on a young couple. Meanwhile Rachel, Taj, and Drake capture Clifton, who has become a latter-day Renfield, attack Dracula with lights set up to project the shadows of a cross. When Ilsa returns and begs not to be destroyed just when she's recovered her youth, Rachel points out that her appearance has not, in fact, changed. Clifton gloats that while a vampire ages when they can't feed they can with a steady blood supply revert back to the age they "converted" - and Dracula was thirty when he joined the undead club. Ilsa replies that she cheated Dracula too by neglecting to tell him that anyone who uses the mirror without knowing the exact location of a counterpart mirror winds up in a dimension filled with demons. After nearly killing Clfton, she begs Rachel to put her out of her misery. Afterwards Dracula escapes using the mirror and drags Taj along with him.

Sex n' Violence

Although they still can't show a vampire actually biting a victim, the portraits of the young Ilsa Strangway are right on the brink of "full frontal" territory.

Comments

In an amusing nod to the outlandish premise of the series and the idea that Dracula is an undead and not breathing vampire, Dracula actually finds the existence of Bram Stoker's novel to be absurd: "That the book even exists stretches my credulity!" So far the series actually has avoided "explaining" Bram Stoker's "Dracula", but I think at some point it's established that Stoker somehow got his hands on Jonathan Harker's journal and the other materials that comprised the novel and passed them off as fictional.

This really is the strongest installment in the series so far. It not only references the novel, something that just seemed to be a dodge in earlier issues, but uses it as a plot point and as a set-up for a "Tales from the Crypt"-esque morality tale. (As an English major, I should also point out that Ilsa Strangway gets hers not just for refusing to accept the aging process, but for not being a close reader!) Even more importantly, Dracula actually exhibits signs of a personality. His ethos comes out strongly here, as he tries to get revenge against the person who claimed ownership of his home and is offended when Ilsa tries to bargain with a nobleman like him. Writing characters from "exotic" locales like the Balkans and East Asia as having elaborate codes of honor is something that pervades superhero comics, but here it actually works, since it does present Dracula as someone who hasn't left the trappings of aristocracy behind. It's a nice touch of characterization and an accurate reflection of how Stoker wrote the character.

Footnotes

Page 3, Panel 1-2 - The passage from "Dracula" that Ilsa reads is, in my 1981 Bantam Classic edition, on pages 53-54. It's the June 30 entry in Jonathan Harker's journal.

Batman #418, Ten Nights of the Beast Pt. 2

2008-11-12T14:20:00.000-08:00

April 1988
Ten Nights of the Beast Part II
Jim Starlin (writer), Jim Aparo (pencils), Mike de Carlo (inks), Adrienne Roy (colors), John Costanza (letters), Danny O'Neil (editor)

While Batman contemplates his strategy, KGBeast manages to poison the scientist Sylvia Burrows and her boyfriend in his apartment. In the meantime Salari manages to wipe out an entire Republican fundraising luncheon, including a key Presidential advisor, with poison. Batman confronts Salari as he tries to escape through an alley, but KGBeast intervenes and escapes with Salari in a van. By aiming the van toward a school bus, the two manage to distract Batman long enough to escape. Batman realizes that by killing everyone at the luncheon KGBeast was making a statement and that they have a mole. Gordon arranges to have the next suspected targets, a Senator and a Congressman, hidden without the knowledge of even Parker. KGBeast launches a bazooka rocket at what he believes is the location of the Senator, but it's a staged trap and Batman gives chase. After a chase on the rooftops, KGBeast manages to elude Batman, who realizes, "I've finally run into someone who's better at this game than I am."

It's the '80s!

Dammit, how can there not be any good '80s pop culture references in a story about the "Star Wars" Program and a villain called "KGBeast"? The best I could find is Page 14, where there's the requisite "The Cold War really is senseless, isn't it?" conversation between characters.

Comments

Batman has more of a prominent role here than in the first issue, although except for one action scene Batman really doesn't have much of a hand in moving the plot along. In fact, the pace of the story can be described as brisk...or glacial. Hardly anything actually changes in this installment. KGBeast and Salari are still racking up the body count, Batman and the authorities are still mostly helpless, and it's again pointed out that there is a mole. At least Starlin makes a sincere effort to drive home the absurdity of the Cold War and how arbitrary and meaningless all the deaths are. The effort at realism is undercut by the useful coincidence that all of the KGBeast's targets just happen to be working or traveling in Gotham City or its environs.

Although their style is fairly typical of the era, De Carlo and Roy give the action scenes a kinetic edge. Nonetheless in the rooftop chase KGBeast's outfit manages to look even more bizarre, even by the standards of Bronze Age comics.

Footnotes

Page 6, Panel 1 - "The Knights of Coprolite..." This is an analogue for the Knights of Columbus, a conservative Catholic fraternal organization. Don't miss the sharp barb here, though; a Coprolite is a piece of fossilized animal dung.

Batman #417, Ten Nights of the Beast Pt. 1

2008-11-12T12:30:00.000-08:00

March 1988
Ten Nights of the Beast!
Jim Starlin (writer), Jim Aparo (pencils), Mike de Carlo (inks), Adrienne Roy (colors), Agustin Mas (letters), Danny O'Neil (editor)

On a beach south of Gotham City, a team of DEA agents looking for drug runners are brutally and effortlessly murdered by a powerfully built man coming ashore with another man. Later a KGB agent, Andrei Yevtushenko, warns Commissioner Gordon, CIA official Ralph Bundy, and FBI agent Keith Parker that "the Hammer", a rogue branch of the KGB, had initiated a project called "Operation Skywaler", a plan to disrupt the United States' "Star Wars" Project's operations in Gotham through the services of one person: a well-trained and cybernetically enhanced assassin named Anatoli Knyazev, known to the CIA as "KGBeast." Parker informs the rest that KGBeast already succeeded in killing two administrators working on the project. When Gordon hints that he's willing to bring in Batman, Parker flips, refusing to enlist Gordon's "pet vigilante." However, Batman and Robin have already monitored the entire meeting using a transmitter disguised as a button on Gordon's suit.

Batman leaves to warn the Project's head of security, Jason Greene, only to find KGBeast throwing Greene off the top of his office building. Batman "saves him", but Greene's neck has already been broken. Batman next meets with Gordon and Bundy, who has fewer qualms about dealing with superheroes. Bundy reveals that KGBeast is working with an Iranian terrorist, Nabih Salari. As they speak Salari, disguised as a janitor, manages to electrocute a head scientist involved with the Project. With the help of an unseen informant, KGBeast is on the trail of another scientist, Sylvia Burrows. Meanwhile Batman tells Robin that he plans to lure KGBeast to them and "hope we survive the experience."

What's Important?

As the introduction by editor Dan Raspler points out, it was the first time a titled, "official" story arc or "miniseries-within-a-series" was written and drawn by the series' current creative team. It's also the first appearance of KGBeast who has, thanks to obvious political developments, lost a bit of his topical cache. He's actually stuck around, but over the years he's devolved into a standard henchman character.

Comments

My friend Lauren, who gave me the TPB as a birthday gift, described "Ten Nights of the Beast" as the "ultimate '80s Batman story." That is almost an understatement; you have a plot centered around the "Star Wars" program, the culmination of extravagant and pointless Reagan-era military spending, and lingering Cold War paranoia; and a tone that resembles a 1980s action-thriller more than a superhero comic. In fact, take out Batman and the muscular cyborg in the Mexican wrestler get-up, slap in Harrison Ford, Sylvester Stallone, or maybe Arnold Schwarzenegger, and you'd have a quintessentially '80s action thriller. All that's missing is a female lead with an elaborate perm and shoulder pads.

Since this was the grittier, more realistic post-"Year One" and post-"Dark Knight Returns" era, the atmosphere is ready for this type of story. Still, Batman's role here does feel superfluous, as the focus wanders from him and even KGBeast to building an angle of international intrigue and flooding the reader with names of minor characters (most of whom end up on the body pile anyway). In the overview Batman probably is the best character in the DC stable to feature in this sort of story, but so far it feels like he's intruding in someone else's comic book.

Tomb of Dracula #3

2008-10-30T21:34:00.000-07:00

Who Stalks The Vampire?
June 1973
Archie Goodwin (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Tom Palmer (inks), Jon Costa (letters), Stan Lee (editor)

On a bridge in London, Frank Drake, overwhelmed by the experience of watching Jean die as a vampire, prepares to jump to his death. He's rescued by a woman claiming to be Rachel van Helsing and her burly, mute assistant Taj. Rachel explains that she is a descendant of the Van Helsing, that hunting vampires is the family business, and that she had been seeking Frank since she learned that he had sold Castle Dracula. Rachel also mentions that Taj is a survivor of a mass vampire attack in India while implying that she is the last Van Helsing left because of Dracula. When Rachel offers to allow Drake to join her crusade, he accepts. Meanwhile a broke and drunk Clifton is enslaved by Dracula, who sends him to retrieve his coffin, which Dracula doesn't need to survive (after all, he has other coffins) but because it contains a secret supply of gold coins. The vampire hunters confront Dracula at where the coffin was stored, but he and Clifton escape with most of the gold, while the three are detained by the London police, who blame them for the deaths of one of Dracula's victims.

When said victim arises as a vampire and is quickly dealt with by Rachel and Taj before the police inspector, the three are released from custody. As for Dracula, he approaches the mansion of the person who just purchased his castle, Ilsa Strangeway, an aging woman obsessed with regaining her lost youth through occult means. When she sees Dracula, she is unsurprised and gladly welcomes him inside.

What's Important?

Rachel Van Helsing first appears, becoming a major character through the rest of the "Tomb of Dracula" series.

Comments

Three issues in and already we have a new writer, Archie Goodwin. He gives the series a more solid sense of direction, with what would turn out to be a permanent cast of vampire hunters. Arguably this weakens the punch of the series, since it introduces a group of traditional heroes. However, one can still read this with Dracula as the protagonist and the vampire hunters as the antagonists. That seems like the approach Goodwin, and then Marv Wolfman, wanted to take.

By this point it's worth mentioning that fans of modern horror comics will probably be disappointed at how bloodless this series about a vampire is. While the Code had weakened enough at this stage to even allow a series centered about a vampire, it was still difficult to publish a scene showing a vampire actually biting a victim. Goodwin and Colan try to get around this by showing expressions of horror in Dracula's about-to-be victims and keeping the body count high - and not just among Dracula's traditional female and young victims. At the least it does succeed in creating the impression of a series where no character, perhaps not even the main vampire hunters, is safe.

And, yes, for some reason Rachel does hang out with a large Hindi man wearing a turban. The "Hindi manservant" is such a weird motif from pulp fiction and Golden Age comics, one I'm surprised to see around and kicking even in the '70s. At least he isn't meant to be her servant, although the way he acts in the story doesn't exactly bear that out.

Footnotes

Page 6, Panel 3 - Later stories in the series do flesh out the origins of Rachel and Taj. Taj's village was massacred and his son vampirized by Dracula and his followers while as a child Rachel watched Dracula kill her parents.

Tomb of Dracula #2

2008-10-30T19:32:00.000-07:00

The Fear Within!
May 1972
Gerry Conway (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Vince Colletta (inks), Jon Costa (letters), Stan Lee (editor)

Frank Drake and a man named Gort search for Dracula's tomb, in hopes of killing Dracula again and saving Jean from vampirism. However, the tomb is empty and they only find a trapped and terrified Clifton. Drake decides to content himself with stealing Dracula's coffin and taking it to the United States. After feeding on a woman on the street, Dracula comes to the house of a Dr. Karl von Harbou, one of his "servants." After Harbou works to fix Dracula's complexion to make him look human, but Dracula then kills him for betraying him as a child. At their hotel room in London the night before they were scheduled to leave for the US, Jean attacks Drake and Clifton and succeeds in hypnotizing the latter. Drake finds himself attacked by Clifton, Jean, and Dracula. He's only saved by the arrival of dawn, which forces Dracula to flee and destroys Jean.

Comments

This actually comes across as a stronger introduction to the series than the first issue, since this allows to establish just how much of an anti-hero Dracula will be. It's still fairly rare to have an out-and-out villain (anti-heroes like the Punisher or Hitman exempted) be the protagonist of a series in the histories of the Big Two, DC's short-lived "Joker" series and the more recent Marvel series "The Hood" being a couple of examples off the top of my head. It's a fun enough issue, although it still drags badly with completely extraneous scenes of Dracula getting into a brawl in London. Frank Drake also comes across as a bit of a cipher, but luckily that particular problem is about to be resolved. Again - and I can't stress it enough - Gene Colan's art is enough to make this issue a classic.

Footnotes

Page 10, Panel 5 - It's later established that in the Marvel Universe it isn't actually the cross itself that harms vampires. Instead any object of faith is effective - depending on the actual beliefs of the user, so a cross wouldn't do an agnostic any good against a vampire while a lotus flower might work for a Hindi or Buddhist vampire hunter. (I suppose atheism would be a liability for a vampire hunter in the MU, unless something like a copy of "The God Delusion" would suffice).

Tomb of Dracula #1

2008-10-09T13:59:00.000-07:00

"Dracula"

April 1972

Gerry Conway (writer), Gene Colan (pencils), Jon Costa (letters), Stan Lee (editor)

Three people - Frank Drake, his girlfriend Jean, and their friend Clifton - find themselves stranded in Transylvania when their jeep hits a ditch. The crash causes tensions between the three to erupt, caused by Clifton's unrequited love for Jean. In a nearby tavern, a few townspeople debate over Frank Drake and whether or not he should open "the castle" his family owns to tourists. When Frank and his party appear at the inn and ask for help, Clifton is astonished when one man claims that no one will take them to the castle. After Clifton mentions Bram Stoker, the man asserts, "Herr Stoker told the truth - in part." However, a man named Otto volunteers to take the party and their luggage up to the castle in a carriage for a price, dismissing his friend's fears as "superstition."

At what Frank calls Castle Dracula, he remembers how he used up his family's inheritance and how it was Clifton's idea to revive Frank's wealth by turning the castle into a tourist spot. While the three explore the castle, Clifton falls through a wooden floor and finds himself facing Count Dracula's coffin. Inside he discovers the body of Dracula, complete with a stake driven through it. Mumbling about his plans to kill Frank and take ownership of the castle for himself, Clifton makes perhaps the ultimate horror character mistake by removing the stake, which causes the Count to regenerate. Acting rather ungrateful, Dracula hurls Clifton into a pit and falls back on his old habits: killing a bar maid from the nearby town and hypnotizing Jean into removing her crucifix, allowing Dracula to bite her. Frank wards Dracula off with a silver compact (with the silver and the mirror both harming Dracula) while a mob of townsfolk burn the castle. Dracula flees into the night with a vampirized Jean in tow.

What's Important?

It's the first apperance of the official Marvel Universe Dracula, courtesy of Bram Stoker's novel falling into the public domain and the relaxation of Comic Code Authority rules which had previously included a blanket ban on depictions of vampires. The character here is mostly based on Bram Stoker's character, but would also see elements of the historic Dracula, Vlad the Impaler, who in the sixteenth century ruled over the principality of Wallachia (as voivode, or prince, not count, by the way), which is now southern Romania.

There's also the debut of Frank Drake, Dracula's modern descendant, who stuck around as a key character through the "Tomb of Dracula" series and even after the series' cancellation has popped up elsewhere in the Marvel Universe now and then. Above all, this issue alone pretty firmly incorporates the Dracula mythos, if not the concept of vampires, into the Marvel Universe.
Comments

Gene Colan must have been born to draw this book. Able to capture facial expressions as easily as decaying landscapes, Colan brings to the pages a unique, truly atmospheric approach which fits well with Gerry Conway's plot, which seems to have been lifted from a Hammer Studios "Dracula" film: a few rich, sophisticated young people head off to the "Old World" and end up thrown against old-fashioned horrors with the same success as an egg against a brick wall.

For the most part Conway succeeds in capturing the feel of the horror films of the time, although the story's black and white morality undermines Conway's own attempts to tap into genuine macabre. From the start Clifton is marked as a villain, which seems to be why several times Frank treats Clifton with hostility for no discernable reason, like telling him to "shut up" just because he's startled by a bat (as it is, it's hard not to blame Clifton for ranting to himself about having Frank die in an "accident"). Worse, there's an actual plot point formed out of the fact that Dracula is drawn to Jean because she is "untouched by hatred's claws", while the barmaid he kills was "corrupt" and "bitter with petty evil", apparently just because she hopes she'll get some tourist dollars out of Frank rebuilding Castle Dracula and at one point even states she never goes to church while Jean is found wearing a crucifix. Of course, the barmaid, although she only really gets several scenes, comes across as more interesting than the stock character Jean.

Footnotes

Page 1 - These scenes where Frank, Jean, and Clifton's vehicle gets stranded in the rain and mud and ends up in the ditch are best read with "Over At The Frankenstein Place" playing in the background.

Pages 3-4 - The more anal among you, if you're following along, are probably wondering why, if Frank and his crew are in Transylvania, why do these people all have German names, instead of Romanian or Hungarian? It is true that today Transylvania is part of Romania while much of the region used to be considered part of Hungary, but for centuries Transylvania also had a large German-speaking population. After the start of World War II, most of that population migrated into Austria and Germany, but even in 1972 it wouldn't have been impossible to come across people with German names in Transylvania.

Still...I have a feeling Gerry Conway put less thought into the locals' names than I just put into this footnote.

Page 23, Panel 5-7 - It's later established that in the Marvel Universe crucifixes are actually ineffective against vampires if the wearer or holder isn't Christian, but other objects of faith can work just as well (for instance, a star of David would actually ward off a vampire if it is used by a devout Jew).

Uncanny X-Men #108

2008-10-07T16:37:00.000-07:00

December 1977
"Armageddon Now!"
Chris Claremont (writer), John Byrne (pencils), Terry Austin (inks), Tom Orzechowski and Denise Wohl (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor and editor-in-chief)

The M'Kraan Crystal begins to fill the sky with light. A small, impish figure calling himself Jahf confronts the X-Men and the Starjammers, claiming that he exists only to kill anyone who approaches the Crystal. Jahf punches Wolverine into the stratosphere, where the Starjammers' sentient spaceship computer, Waldo, rescues him. Jahf proves to be practically invincible, although Banshee manages to knock him out with a concentrated scream. As soon as Jahf falls, though, the X-Men fight a second guardian, Modt, who claims that the X-Men will only face an unending line of guardians, each stronger than the last. When Waldo informs everyone on the ground that the Crystal is causing reality itself to unravel, Raza flies into a rage and hurls D'Ken against the Crystal, which causes everyone to appear inside the Crystal, where they find a giant, empty city.

Everyone present is assaulted with their worst fears; only Jean is immune because her greatest fear is a fear of dying, something she has already experienced. Jean finds that in his delirium Cyclops damaged a sphere at the Crystal's core. Inside the sphere Jean/Phoenix discovers that within the sphere is a "neutron galaxy" and, if it is released, the universe will be destroyed, with a brand new universe replacing it. Drawing on the volunteered "life forces" of Storm and Corsair, whom Jean knows is Cyclops' father, Christopher Summers, Jean repairs the sphere and teleports the X-Men and Lilandra back to Earth. Lilandra reveals to Xavier that D'Ken's experiences inside the M'Kraan Crystal have driven him insane and that, after she's absolved of treason, she will become the next ruler of the Shi'ar - and she admits that she's fallen in love with him.

What's Important?

This issue ends the Phoenix Saga and kicks off John Byrne's influential run on "Uncanny X-Men."

Comments

Again, this all does seem rushed. It's telling that three issues are devoted to the X-Men being in Ireland, while only two issues actually delve into the X-Men fighting the Shi'ar and the conclusion of the Phoenix Saga. A particular casualty of this is the depiction of the Shi'ar Empire, which very few writers, even its creator Chris Claremont, have really portrayed as more than a generic intergalactic empire. These last two issues have still been the strongest in the whole Phoenix Saga and John Byrne does an admirable job of picking up where Cockrum left off (his depiction of the fight with the M'Kraan guardians and the eerie city inside the Crystal are particular highlights). There are definite flaws in pacing and in how the world of the Shi'ar is set up, but, at least toward the end, the Phoenix Saga deserves its reputation as a classic.

Footnotes

Page 10, Panel 3 - Corsair is flashing back to his origin, when his wife Kate Summers was murdered by D'Ken. The retcon from "Deadly Genesis" established that Kate was pregnant when D'Ken killed her and the fetus was preserved by Shi'ar technology, growing into the character of Vulcan.

Page 11, Panel 5 - Weirdly enough, Jean surviving Cyclops' eye-beam without a scratch makes more sense with the retcon - that the "Jean" here is actually a construct by the Phoenix Force that thinks it's Jean - than it did with the original idea - that Jean and the Phoenix Force have entered a symbiotic relationship.

Page 14, Panel 3 - Jean: "Aaaahhh...yessss..." More foreshadowing for the Dark Phoenix Saga?

Uncanny X-Men #107

2008-10-07T15:20:00.000-07:00

October 1977

"Where No X-Man Has Gone Before!"

Chris Claremont (writer), Dave Cockrum (pencils), Dan Green (inks), Joe Rosen (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor and editor-in-chief)

The X-Men find themselves on an alien planet, facing the Emperor D'Ken, the Shi'ar Imperial Guard, and a giant crystal. When Cyclops demands that Lilandra be handed over, the Imperial Guard attacks. D'Ken sics a demonic entity called the "Soul-Drinker" on Lilandra, but Nightcrawler rescues her and teleports her over to the X-Men's side. Lilandra tells Cyclops that she led a military revolt against D'Ken, fearing that a mysterious and ancient power he wanted for himself could destroy the universe, and failed. After escaping capture, Lilandra became aware of Charles Xavier and the X-Men's existence when Xavier launched a massive telepathetic attack against the alien Z'Nox and was drawn to Earth. Eric the Red was a Shi'ar agent stationed near Earth in order to observe it until D'Ken ordered him to either kill Xavier or prevent Lilandra from contacting him. Finally Lilandra explains that they are near the M'Kraan Crystal, which according to legend is the "gateway" to the power.

Gladiator, the leader of the Imperial Guard, refuses to listen to Lilandra's warnings about the nature of the power and the fact that an ancient race named it "The-End-Of-All-That-Is." When the X-Men are on the brink of defeat by the Imperial Guard, a group of alien pirates, the Starjammers, join the fray. Jean telepathically discovers a secret about the Starjammers' human and apparently American leader, Corsair. As D'Ken prepares to take advantage of the M'Kraan Crystal being activated by an extremely rare alignment of stars, back on Earth Reed Richards and Peter Corbeau discover that for a nanosecond all of reality blinked out of existence.

What's Important?

All of the Starjammers except Waldo appear for the first time, with the first appearances of Hepzibah and Raza. It's also the first appearance of the Shi'ar Imperial Guard, whose roster has remained more or less constant over the years. Finally it's the first time the M'Kraan Crystal, which went on to become an important relic in a number of X-Men stories including "The Age of Apocalypse", has appeared.

In terms of the talent, this marks the end of Dave Cockrum's first run on "Uncanny X-Men." At least he got to go out drawing a huge space opera issue.

Comments

After months of creative stalling, the Phoenix Saga jumps up several gears. In fact, if anything the conclusion can be accused of being too rushed, as we get a quick crash course on the Shi'ar Empire and the villain's plans while Eric the Red, after months of build-up, practically vanishes between issues. Still, it's as busy and garish and silly as superhero/space opera should be, and Cockrum's work on this issue, starting with the absolutely gorgeous two-page spread, is simply brilliant.

Footnotes

Page 2-3 - It's fairly common knowledge, at least among comic geeks, that the Shi'ar Imperial Guard are all based on DC's Legion of Superheroes. Some of the more obvious analogues are Oracle/Saturn Girl, Gladiator/Mon-El, Mentor/Brainiac 5, Astra/Phantom Girl, and Fang/Timber Wolf. I wasn't able to find a chart or anything online that attempts to point out all the analogues (admittedly this was only after five minutes of using Google), but the Marvel Universe Appendix has articles on most of the Imperial Guard members where possible counterparts in the Legion are suggested.

Page 12-13 - Later stories, namely the "Age of Apocalypse" crossover, established that the M'Kraan Crystal is also a nexus point between all universes. Also there's a little bit of a retcon here. The recent mini-series, "X-Men: Emperor Vulcan", puts forward that at some point the Shi'ar conquered and colonized the planet the M'Kraan Crystal is located on, displacing another alien race they found there. Lilandra's narrative implies instead that the planet had been recently discovered.

Page 19 - Sharra and K'Ythri are the creator gods from Shi'ar religion.

Uncanny X-Men #106

2008-10-01T10:43:00.000-07:00

"Dark Shroud of the Past!"
Chris Claremont (writer), Bob Brown and Dave Cockrum (pencils), Tom Sutton (inks), Joe Rosen (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor and editor-in-chief)

Firelord demands a rematch with Phoenix, but calms down after Xavier collapses from stress. Xavier remembers how, one night shortly after Moira McTaggert's arrival, he had a breakdown and telepathically attacked the X-Men himself, fighting them with dopplegangers of Beast, Iceman, and Angel. Xavier crawls over to the scene of the fight and banishes the dopplegangers, but suddenly a psychotic version of Xavier appears and nearly kills Wolverine by making him believe he is about to fall into a chasm. The "real" Xavier summons images of the original five X-Men again, this time to get rid of his dark self. Xavier explains that the X-Men just met the personification of a dangerous aspect of Xavier's personality that he can usually keep in check, but the mental strain caused by his visions of Lilandra was causing his psychological self-control to break down.

What's Important?

This is the first story to really exploit the idea that Xavier is such a powerful telepath that the temptation to use his powers for self-gain and harming others is literally overwhelming. You can also make the case that it's the first appearance of the entity that would become Onslaught.

Comments

Dave Cockrum shares penciling duties on this issue and the result isn't bad by any means, but it does seem more rough and less organic than Cockrum's usual work. The story itself, however, just feels misplaced. Not only is it obvious padding, but it reads like a story that should have been printed months ago, before the mystery of Xavier's visions were solved and when the idea that he might be going insane was more central to the story arc. That the entire story is told in flashback feels like a cheat. Plus the "hook" is that it's the new X-Men fighting members of the original team, something we've already seen. The story does get some mileage from the appearance of an evil Xavier, but he's really only part of the story for at most two pages.

Uncanny X-Men #105

2008-10-01T09:11:00.000-07:00

June 1977

"Phoenix Unleashed!"

Chris Claremont (writer), Dave Cockrum (pencils), Bob Layton (inks), Tom Orzechowski and Gaspar Saladino (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor and editor-in-chief)

Eric the Red appears at Xavier's mansion, but does not defend himself when the X-Men attack. Suddenly Firelord, a former herald of Galactus, appears and protects Eric the Red, effortlessly knocking all the X-Men unconscious in the process. Eric reflects on how he tricked Firelord into believing that he's trying to stop Professor Xavier from taking over Earth and pretends to be a pacifist. Meanwhile an alien spaceship from the Shi'ar Empire's fleet has followed Lilandra to Earth. When the crew learns that Galactus has been defeated on Earth four times, the ship immediately flees, but not before they destroy Lilandra's ship. A stunned Lilandra teleports down to the planet, appearing in the middle of a dinner party at Jean Grey's apartment with her parents, her roommate Misty Knight, and Professor Xavier, who is horrified to see the woman from his visions appear. Right away Firelord attacks, prompting Jean to morph into the Phoenix. Surprised at her ability to fly and the level of power she has, Jean is able to defeat Firelord with relative ease. During the fight, Eric the Red kidnaps the unconscious Lilandra and takes her through a stargate, which shuts down before the X-Men can cross it. Jean learns that Lilandra, a member of the Shi'ar imperial family, revolted against her brother, the emperor D'Ken, because she became convinced that he was on the brink of doing something that could endanger the existence of the universe and is able to use the Phoenix energy to re-open the stargate. After the X-Men leave, an angry Firelord appears to confront Professor Xavier and Misty Knight.

What's Important?

It's made clear that "Jean" as Phoenix has experienced quite a bit of a power upgrade. A scene where Jean is tempted to finish off Firelord is arguably also the first foreshadowing of the "Dark Phoenix Saga.

It's also, in a way, the first "appearance" of the Shi'ar Empire, as readers get their first glimpse of Shi'ar officers and the first full appearance of Lilandra.

Comments

Yet another story where Eric the Red sends someone else against the X-Men, at least there's a little development in the Phoenix arc by establishing just how powerful Phoenix is and finally having Xavier meet Lilandra. And, in terms of the Marvel Universe, beating able to casually mop the floor with an ex-herald of Galactus is a very big deal indeed. Thanks to Cockrum, it is a lively action issue, but the whole story feels drawn out at this point.

Footnotes

Pages 2-3 - Firelord is a one-time enemy/sometime ally of Thor. As he says, he was once a herald of Galactus, until he replaced himself with the Thor villain the Destroyer.

Page 7, Panel 3-6 - The command center of the Shi'ar spaceship has more than a slight resemblance to the deck of the USS Enterprise, especially in how the crew is situated around the room. Not only that, but I'd swear that the ship's captain is striking a Captain Kirk-esque pose in Page 7, Panel 3. Also the mentioning of a"Prime Directive" - in an appropriate "Star Trek" context, in fact - clinches the reference. There's probably other little "clues" elsewhere on this page too, but I just wanted to refer to the more obvious ones, or else I might betray the fact that I am not, in fact, a "Star Trek" geek.

Panel 6 - The "four times" Galactus was driven from Earth include, I think, Fantastic Four #48-50 (the classic "Galactus Trilogy"), Fantastic Four #74-5, Fantastic Four #120-2, and Thor #225-7.

Page 8, Panel 6 - I really should have written this footnote earlier, but Misty Knight, Jean's roommate, is an established Marvel character. She was both a supporting character in "Power Man and Iron Fist" and appeared in stories in her own right, often with the character Colleen Wing, with whom she founded a detective agency. As you might expect, Chris Claremont had also written a few of her early adventures.

Also note that Jean's mother calls Jean's apartment a "flat", a Britishism that Chris Claremont had accidentally let slip.

Page 11, Panel 5, Page 12, Panel 1 - Chris and Dave make a not-so-subtle cameo.

Crisis on Infinite Earths #12

2008-09-20T14:24:00.000-07:00

March 1986
"Final Crisis"
Marv Wolfman (writer and editor), George Pérez (pencils), Jerry Ordway (inks), Carl Gafford (colors), John Costanza (letters), Len Wein and Robert Greenberger (editors), Jenette Kahn (editor-in-chief)

Rip Hunter's team quickly discover that Brainiac is alive, but doesn't remember his actions during the Crisis. Still, they convince him about the Anti-Monitor's existence and the threat he poses to the universe. Brainiac proceeds to transport himself and his passengers to a mysterious location. Back on Earth, the Anti-Monitor declares to the world that he has taken the Earth into the anti-matter universe in order to destroy it and its heroes, so that he can eradicate the rest of the universe unopposed. From the Anti-Monitor's speech, Wally West learns that the Flash is dead. After the image of the Anti-Monitor vanishes, the Earth is covered in darkness, which turns out to be the result of shadow-demons covering the sky. The Harbinger enlists the two Supermen, Dr. Light, both Wonder Women, and some of the other heroes for a final assault on the Anti-Monitor. Meanwhile the shadow demons attack all over the planet, with the remaining heroes defending the people, and the world's sorcerors try unsuccessfully to revive the Spectre.

Brainiac takes Rip Hunter and the others to Apokolips, to ask for Darkseid's help against the Anti-Monitor. During the shadow demon attack on Earth, the heroes Dove, Lori Lemaris, the Lieutenant Marvels (possibly), the Earth-2 Green Arrow, Prince Ra-Man, Kole, Sunburst, the Huntress, and the Earth-2 Dick Grayson are killed, as are the villains Clayface (Matt Hagen), the Ten-Eyed Man, and the Bug-Eyed Bandit. After giving up on awakening the Spectre, the sorcerors, with Alan Scott (the Earth-2 Green Lantern) and Doctor Occult acting as the nexus, entrap all the shadow demons in a mystical net. On Qward's moon, the Harbinger's heroes find the Anti-Monitor's fortress practically deserted and Wally West discovers the Flash's costume and ring along with a totally insane Psycho-Pirate. Suddenly the Anti-Monitor appears, ready to attack. The Harbinger and Alexander Luthor coordinate the heroes' attacks, which culminate in Dr. Light absorbing the energy of a star and unleashing it on the Anti-Monitor, seemingly killing him. After Alexander Luthor uses his powers to get the Earth and many of the heroes out of the anti-matter universe, the shadow demons sealed away by the sorcerors are absorbed by a still living Anti-Monitor, who blasts the Earth-1 Wonder Woman, seemingly out of existence. However, the Anti-Monitor is weakened because the sorcerors also "poisoned" the shadow demons, anticipating that the Anti-Monitor would draw his energy back from them.

Only Lady Quark and the two Supermen are left in the anti-matter universe. The Earth-2 Superman knocks the Earth-1 Superman and Lady Quark unconscious and has the Superboy of Earth-Prime take them through Alexander Luthor's portal to the positive matter universe before it closes. Superboy refuses to leave while Alexander Luthor realizes he has to stay in the anti-matter universe in order to fully close the portal. Superman and Superboy keep fighting a wounded and furious but still powerful Anti-Monitor. Darkseid observes the battle through Alexander Luthor and projects a blast of energy through Luthor's eyes, knocking the Anti-Monitor into the heart of a star. Rip Hunter thanks Darkseid for his aid, but Darkseid replies that he only helped because cooperation was necessary and that next time he will be Earth's enemy. However, Darkseid's attack was not entirely successful: a dying Anti-Monitor reaches out to kill Superman, who finishes him off with a punch. The death of the Anti-Monitor causes an explosion that threatens to kill everyone in the vicinity. To save them, Alexander Luthor reveals that his powers still allow him to open a portal to a paradise dimension where the Lois Lane of Earth-2, who was rescued by Luthor, knowing that the Multiverse would be erased from existence, awaits. Alexander Luthor, Lois Lane, Superboy, and the Earth-2 Superman disappear into the new dimension.

Back on Earth, the Earth-1 Wonder Woman is regressed into clay, which falls on Paradise Island. The Greek gods offer a home on Olympus to the Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor of Earth-2. Wally West decides to take on the mantle of the Flash. The Harbinger, Pariah, and Lady Quark set out together to explore the new Earth. Finally, in a cell at Arkham Asylum, the Psycho-Pirate raves to himself that he's now the only one alive who remembers the Multiverse.

What's Important?

Presumably the last page finally sets up post-Crisis continuity proper where the Multiverse is not only gone but (mostly) forgotten. It's still not clear when (and even how) the characters forget the Multiverse and the various rebootings take place, but presumably it happens after the final fight with the Anti-Monitor and as a result of the cosmic "reorganization" the Harbinger hints is taking place.

It's also where the characters mentioned above are killed, although as of this writing the original Huntress, Prince Ra-Man, Lori, and the Lieutenant Marvels have all been brought back in one form or another. Two new Doves (Wiley Wolverman and Dawn Gragner) have appeared since "Crisis" while there's also been a new Sunburst, although he may have died in the first issue he appeared, Doom Patrol #26, as a victim of the Brotherhood of Dada. At any rate, the second Sunburst hasn't appeared since. And there have been various Clayfaces following Matt Hagen (who was himself only the second Clayface), but Hagen himself has not (yet) been resurrected, unless you count his appearances in "Batman the Animated Series" and "Justice League Unlimited."

I should also mention that, like trying to guess where pre-Crisis continuity really ends and where post-Crisis continuity really begins, fitting in the deaths that take place here into current continuity can be headache-inducing. For instance, Lori was eventually brought back as a "new" character with a new history, "reborn" as a result of the Crisis. However, even though most characters don't remember the events of "Crisis", Matt Hagen is known to have lived and died, even though the circumstances of his death are usually unmentioned in later stories. Why did Hagen's death "count" while Lori's didn't? Well, if you really need an explanation, just take Harbinger's words from #11: "There are many paradoxes, and not all can be explained."

For the most part, though, the deaths that took place through "Crisis" aren't remembered in the main continuity. This fact has even been used to good storytelling effect, as in 1989's "Christmas With The Superheroes", when Deadman encounters the spirit of the original Supergirl, who explains to him why he should continue doing acts of heroism:

"We don't do it for the glory. We don't do it for the recognition. We do it because it needs to be done. Because, if we don't, no one else will. And we do it even if no one knows what we've done. Even if no one knows we exist. Even if no one remembers we ever existed."

"I... I don't even know your name..."

"My name is Kara, athough I doubt that'll mean anything to you."

Comments

So "Crisis" draws to an appropriately epic close, although it doesn't quite provide the bridge between pre-Crisis continuity and the post-reboot DC universe that might still be expected. As mentioned above, most of the deaths in this issue are obviously not there for any sort of dramatic reason, but to clear away unpopular characters or ones who are inconvenient leftovers from the Multiverse, which makes it somewhat difficult to read this as just a story and not a maneuver by DC management.

That "Crisis" was a cornerstone not just for DC Comics, but for the entire genre - perhaps the entire medium - is not in doubt. It was arguably the very first time either of the Big Two really took advantage of their large, diverse universes by spinning a story that would draw in a large range of their unique characters and locales as well as the complex elements of their histories. Also it was the first time one of the Big Two had used "event storytelling" to change aspects of their universe and continuity in order to appeal to fans, but the scale of what DC did here - effectively pruning most of a 50-year old continuity and more or less creating a brand new starting point for most of their characters and titles - hasn't really been replicated, even by DC itself and even after two sequels, "Zero Hour" and "Infinite Crisis." If nothing else, Marv Wolfman with "Crisis" exhibited a genuine, heart-felt love for this universe and its very long and very rich history, as well as setting a template for ambitious stories that exist just to explore and take full advantage of these fictional worlds.

Still, "Crisis" may have at least helped set in stone some precedents that have actually harmed the genre over the years. Many crossovers and "spandex epics" have followed "Crisis" in being written almost entirely for the fans, with very little room for newcomers. Ironically, even though "Crisis on Infinite Earths" was put together in order to make DC Comics more reader-friendly, in the long run it inspired a slew of stories from both DC and Marvel written at best for people already familiar with ongoing storylines in various titles and at worst for fans with a near-encyclopedic knowledge of continuity. Along with this, "Crisis on Infinite Earths" was the forefather of "stories by editorial decree" where entertaining readers takes a back seat to fulfilling mandates. Finally, following the trend of the '80s, the post-Crisis universe was a more serious place, with goofy and beloved oddities like Bizarro World, Wonder Tot, and Krypto the Wonder Dog written out. Significantly many of those changes have been rolled back in the past ten years or so, as DC tries to recapture the glorious weirdness of the pre-Crisis DC Universe while maintaining the "mature" storytelling of modern superhero comics.

All that's well and good, but how does "Crisis on Infinite Earths" hold together as a story? To be honest, it's more than a bit of a tangled mess, with sub-plots and teasers (namely Wolfman pushing in unrelated sub-plots from his "Teen Titans" run and the new Wildcat) that have very little if anything to do with the overall story arc. I think it still works, mainly because despite several weak chapters and the obvious editorial notes it genuinely does feel like an epic, written out of love for a universe that's grown organically across generations of writers, artists, and readers. I've seen "Crisis on Infinite Earths" described as a love letter to the fans of DC Comics, and superhero comics in general, but I think it's more apt to call it a love letter to a universe.

Footnotes

Page 14 - Apokolips (and by extension New Genesis) is not part of the DC universe proper, so the New Gods have not been affected by the Crisis at all.

Page 16, Panels 3-4 - Note the appearance of Zatara. This places the conclusion of "Crisis" before the conclusion of "American Gothic" in Swamp Thing #50, where Zatarra sacrificed his life to save his daughter Zatanna.

Page 30, Panel 8 - The point of this scene, showing Wonder Woman apparently killed by the Anti-Monitor, and the subsequent scene revealing that she was regressed into clay is a mystery to me. I suppose it was to set up the reboot of the "Wonder Woman" franchise.

Page 35, Panel 3 - Don't miss the short and sweet visual Kirby reference Perez uses Darkseid for here.

Page 36-37 - Alexander Luthor, Earth-2 Lois Lane, Earth-2 Superman, and Earth-Prime Superboy do eventually return from their "happy ending" in "Infinite Crisis" - and not all of them come back happy.

Page 38-39 - The Harbinger's tapes are a set-up for "The History of the DC Universe", which was published in 1986 and was also done by Marv Wolfman and George Pérez. It wa what the title claims it is. While its value as a guide to DC continuity has suffered immensely thanks to subsequent stories like "Hawkworld", "Zero Hour", etc. it's still beautiful to look at and gives an idea of what "Crisis on Infinite Earths" was meant to accomplish.

Page 39, Panel 1 - This establishes that the "Great Disaster" timeline no longer exists in the post-Crisis universe. Kamandi still exists, although here he turns out to be Tommy Tomorrow of the Planeteers. Later stories have re-established the "Great Disaster" and Kamandi's original role and, in fact, Kamandi and the "Great Disaster" have been playing a pivotal (although as of yet unclear) role in the recent "Countdown" and "Final Crisis."

Panel 2 - Because of the Crisis (and DC's desire to try something new with the character, whose ongoing series was unpopular enough to be cancelled), Jonah Hex became lost in time and ended up in an post-apocalyptic future, featured in a new series, "Hex." This was not a successful move, although apparently "Hex" became something on an international cult classic. At any rate, Jonah was eventually returned to the nineteenth century American West.

Page 40, Panel 4 - "I'm the only one left who remembers the infinite Earths." Psycho-Pirate is wrong. Pariah, Lady Quark, the Harbinger, and the inhabitants of Alexander Luthor's paradise still remember, as do, it turns out later, the characters of Dark Angel and Donna Troy, for reasons a bit too complicated to get into.

Uncanny X-Men #104

2008-09-16T12:32:00.000-07:00

April 1977

"The Gentleman's Name Is Magneto"

Chris Claremont (writer), Dave Cockrum (pencils), Sam Grainger (inks), Andy Yanchus (colorist), Bruce Patterson (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor), Marv Wolfman (editor-in-chief)

While still in Ireland, Banshee, Colossus, Wolverine, and Storm receive an alert from Moira MacTaggert, who had left a mutant named Jamie Madrox to look after her island facilities off the northern coast of Scotland and recently lost contact with him . Out of the blue the hoverboat they're riding to Moira's island collapses. Also it seems that Moira's laboratory is covered by a force field while the ground the X-Men are standing on is hurled by an unseen force toward a wall with them on it. They manage to break into the complex and find themselves facing a rejuvenated - and very unhappy - Magneto. Meanwhile Moira and Cyclops arrive on the island, finding a wounded Jamie Madrox, who explains that Eric the Red, Havok, and Polaris attacked the laboratory and restored Magneto, who had been physically reverted back to near-infancy, to adulthood. Magneto proceeds to effortlessly wipe the floor with the X-Men. Cyclops ambushes Magneto and succeeds in distracting him long enough to save the others, but orders them to retreat, despite Wolverine's violent objections. Unnoticed to anyone, one of Moira's holding cells for dangerous mutants was breached in the fight. Far away, a small group of intergalactic pirates called the Starjammers prepare to try to stop "the Emperor." Lilandra, who the reader learns is the Emperor's sister, arrives in Earth orbit, but is attacked by another spaceship. Back in New York, Eric the Red is on the verge of ambushing Professor Xavier at the home of Jean Grey's family.

What's Important?

The main thing is Magneto's first post-reboot appearance, although as I'll talk about below it's still not "Claremont's Magneto." It's also the debut of the Starjammers, who are first named, although only Christopher Summers and Ch'od actually appear. Also Muir Island isn't named, but it's the first time the island and the facility make an appearance.

Comments

Reading this it's difficult not to notice that most of the Phoenix Saga was basically Eric the Red throwing various superpowered enemies at the X-Men. This time it's Magneto, who seems to appear only so Claremont can make him a useable character again. Also readers expecting Claremont's "tortured, tragically misguided" Magneto will be roundly disappointed. Here Magneto is still the ranting megalomaniac of the Silver Age, although to be fair he is tuned down a bit from the old days.

Footnotes

Page 8, Panel 2 - Following the massive retcon following "Deadly Genesis", it turns out that Cyclops had indeed visited Muir Island before, but thanks to Professor Xavier he doesn't remember. Eventually Muir Island became little more than the X-Men's go-to place for scientific help, but here the idea is that it's an explanation for what happens to all the mutant criminals the X-Men defeat. Anyway, I don't believe there was ever a reason given to explain why Xavier kept Moira MacTaggert and Muir Island a secret (well, besides, of course, that they hadn't been thought of yet) until "Deadly Genesis." Just chalk it up to the character's penchant for arbitrary deception.

Panel 4-6 - Jamie Madrox, a.k.a. the Multiple Man, first appeared in Giant-Size Fantastic Four #4. In another early example of Chris Claremont's tendency to "cross-polinate" the characters and titles he works on, Giant-Size Fantastic Four #4 was co-written by Chris Claremont.

Page 9, Panel 2-3 - In Defenders #16, Magneto was regressed into early childhood by the near-omnipotent mutant Alpha, whom he created (in the Silver Age, Magneto had the means to handcraft his own mutants, something that has been understandably dropped). This plot point, although unforgiveably goofy by current standards, has actually remained an important part of Magneto's biography. Why? First, a retcon in X-Men (vol. 2) #2-3 established that, when Magneto was at Muir Island, Moira discovered that when Magneto overuses his powers he is affected physiologically, making him mentally unbalanced (which, incidentally, also provided a convenient explanation for the huge discrepencies between how Magneto was characterized in the Silver Age as well as most of the '90s and how he acted in Claremont's stories). Second, Magneto's rejuvenation by Eric the Red remains a pretty good explanation why someone who was at least a child during the Holocaust still appears relatively youthful.

Page 19, Panel 7 - I assume the escape of Dragonfly, one of the Ani-Men the X-Men fought back in #96, from Muir Island was meant to set up a storyline that never happened. In fact, the character didn't appear again until 1990 in "Quasar", of all titles.

Page 20, Panel 7 - In a teaser for a story that does happen, we see that the fight with Magneto has freed a "Mutant X", who is much better known as the villain Proteus.

Uncanny X-Men #103

2008-09-16T10:14:00.000-07:00

February 1977

"The Fall Of The Tower"

Chris Claremont (writer), Dave Cockrum (pencils), Sam Grainger (inks), Bonnie Wilford (colorist), John Costanza (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor), Marv Wolfman (editor-in-chief)

A group of leprechauns take an unconscious Nightcrawler away from the scene of the battle and secret him away to another part of the castle. When he wakes up, Nightcrawler is naturally incredulous, and the leprechauns explain that Juggernaut and Black Tom, acting under instructions from an unknown third party, invaded the castle and took most of "the families" hostage. Led by Eamon, Nightcrawler finds the other X-Men, who are all restrained by high-tech devices. Black Tom plans to torture each of them, using a mechanical glove that causes pain without harming the body, until Prof. Xavier telepathically senses what's happening and intervenes personally. Desperately Nighcrawler appears and uses his image inducer to disguise himself as Xavier. In the ensuing fight, the Juggernaut blasts open a hole in the castle wall. The appearance of the open sky frees Storm from her phobia-induced catatonia. Storm breaks her bonds and frees the others while the Juggernaut and Black Tom try to get back the upper hand by threatening to throw Banshee from the top of the castle. Banshee manages to free himself and after a fight accidentally knocks Black Tom in the sea with the Juggernaut leaping after him. Elsewhere someone orders Eric the Red to keep trying to prevent "Princess Neramani" from contacting the X-Men. Eric responds that he's just recruited the X-Men's "oldest, deadliest foe" as an ally.

What's Important?

It's the first time Wolverine is named, although still not fully. And it's the first appearance of D'Ken Naramani, but he never became a recurring villain.

Comments

The Juggernaut has always been a fun villain for action-heavy issues, since his near-invulnerable status forces writers to try to be creative in how he's defeated. In the end Claremont cheats by having Juggernaut jump into the ocean after Black Tom, but the action elements still largely work. Other than those, it's hard to get past the obvious fact that the last several issues have contributed very little to the overall Phoenix arc - and of course those damn leprechauns.

Anyway, the "X-Men the Animated Series" episode based on this issue inspired the great "I'm the Juggernaut, bitch!" video.

Footnotes

Page 3, Panel 4 - Many years later, in Generation X #8 and #9 it turns out that the leprechauns actually inhabit another dimension, whose nexus happens to be in Cassidy Keep. In that story they are treated more like the denizens of a generic fantasy land rather than like traditional leprechauns.

Panel 6 - The man in shadow is, of course, Eric the Red. The narration here also explains why Flaherty sent the letter to Banshee: he thought Black Tom was just trying to steal his inheritance. It still doesn't quite reveal why Flaherty didn't bother to mention the whole "sociopathic cousin who happens to have escaped from prison and is out for revenge" thing.

Page 14, Panel 6 - Storm being able to free Wolverine is the first indication, beside the flashback from last issue, that she's still an expert lockpick.

Page 19, Panel 1-2 - The leprechauns somehow know that Wolverine's name is "Logan." It will still be decades before readers learn that his full name is "James Logan", or even that Logan is his last name, not his first.

Crisis on Infinite Earths #11

2008-09-10T22:28:00.000-07:00

February 1986

"Aftershock"

Marv Wolfman (writer and editor), George Pérez (pencils), Jerry Ordway (inks), Carl Gafford (colors), John Costanza (letters), Len Wein and Robert Greenberger (editors), Jenette Kahn (editor-in-chief)

The Superman of Earth-2 wakes up in his apartment with no memories of what actually happened at the dawn of time. He heads to his job as editor-in-chief at the "Daily Star", but ends up in Perry White's office at the "Daily Planet." Earth-1 Clark Kent shows up and "explains" that Earth-2 Clark Kent is his uncle, who came to the office to visit and mistakenly thought that his nephew was editor-in-chief. The two Supermen head off to the "Warp Zone" in New York City to go to Earth-2, but a cop explains that the Warp Zone vanished months ago. Next the two go to see the Flash and use his cosmic treadmill to take the Earth-2 Superman home. They are confused when they see that Keystone City, which existed only on Earth-2, and Central City, which was on Earth-1, now mysteriously co-exist as twin cities. Also Jay Garrick's wife Joan doesn't recognize the Earth-2 Superman, even though they've met on Earth-2. Jay Garrick and Wally West operate the cosmic treadmill, only to find a void where Earth-2's universe is supposed to be. The Earth-2 Superman, on the brink of losing his sanity, tries to fly out into the void, but is barely stopped by his counterpart.

A team consisting of Rip Hunter, Animal Man, Dolphin, the Atomic Knight, and Adam Strange travel through time and notice that history itself has changed. Returning to the present, they discover Brainiac's satellite, which they assume has been abandoned, in orbit and decide to explore it. In the Titans Tower, various superheroes, some of them displaced from the other Earths, discuss what's happened and deduce that only one universe exists now, which shares elements from all the old parallel universes. The Harbinger, who called the meeting, appears and explains that reality has been reborn, with only the people who were present at the dawn of time remembering the old order. Helena Wayne, the Huntress, tells the Earth-2 Dick Grayson that she could find no traces of her life in Gotham City and they both realize that they shouldn't exist. Earth-2 Superman flies off in a rage while his Earth-1 counterpart tries to assure him that he can find a new life on the new Earth.

On Paradise Island, the Earth-2 Wonder Woman and her daughter Lyla Hall show up, but no one recognizes them. A group of professional detectives having a conference in Las Vegas discover that the villain Angle Man has died, seemingly killed by his own weapon. Etrigan and Dr. Fate intervene to rescue Princess Amethyst from the Anti-Monitor's shadow-demons, who are reappearing. The Phantom Stranger and Deadman find that the Spectre, wounded by the battle at the beginning of time, is in a comatose state. Alexander Luthor, Batman, and Robin talk to Lex Luthor, who is in a prison cell, to find out if he or any of the villains remember journeying to Oa; they apparently do not. As red flashes of energy fill the sky, Alexander Luthor's anti-matter manipulation powers flare up and Pariah disappears. The two Supermen realize that Earth has been taken into the anti-matter universe and see an image of an angry Anti-Monitor in the sky.

What's Important?

Technically it's the first story to take place in post-Crisis continuity, but we're not there quite yet, as this still takes place before the continuity changes brought on by DC's rebooting of all their major franchises. So I guess you can say that the continuity in these issues - as well as in the other DC titles from this time that hadn't yet fully washed away the old Earth-1 continuity - is "mid-Crisis."

Nonetheless it does set up the status quo - the Golden Age characters have a place in the revised history, while the "second generation" heroes from Earth-2 are either to be jettisoned (like the Huntress) or given new origins (like Lyla Hall/The Fury) - and bring the Captain Marvel and the Charlton Comics characters into the "main" DC universe.

Comments

In a sense all of "Crisis on Infinite Earths" is merely a deck-clearing exercise with a story wrapped around it. Nowhere is it more clear in this issue, which has the sense of the writers and editors speaking through the characters, assuring readers that this really is a new universe with a new continuity. Still, to Marv Wolfman's credit he does take advantage of the very real dramatic potential in this scenario. Helena Wayne and Earth-2 Superman get some good moments, although they're spoiled a bit by the knowledge that they'd just be written off the next issue. It's not a wooden installment by any means, but it does have the trademarks of "story by editorial decree" all over it.

Footnotes

Pages 1-2 - In the earliest Superman stories, Clark Kent's workplace is the "Daily Star", not the "Daily Planet." It became established later that the "Daily Star" was Earth-2's answer to the "Daily Planet" (can you see now why they wanted to get rid of the Multiverse?).

Page 4, Panel 2 - Here's a reference to the weirdness of "mid-Crisis" continuity. Earth-1 Superman notes that the public doesn't remember most of the Crisis, but they do remember Supergirl. When post-Crisis continuity proper gets started, the original Supergirl is forgotten by nearly everyone.

Page 9, Panel 1 - As you might expect, the cosmic treadmill doesn't remain broken, in spite of Wally West's pessimism.

Page 14, Panel 8 - There's a gaffe here in Harbinger's speech: the United States didn't invade England on Earth-X, but on Earth-3.

Page 17-18 - The cause of Angle Man's death is never explained or really followed up on. It may not be a forgotten teaser, but instead readers are supposed to understand that the Angle Man died from attempting to travel to one of the other Earths.

Page 19-20 - Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld is an obscure character now. Her title was geared toward a young female audience and unfortunately it came out just after the superhero genre was really dominating the Big Two and just before DC started successfully experimenting with releasing lines specifically targeted toward audiences not so much interested in superheroes. Basically this is a set-up for a storyline that reveals that Amethyst is one of the Lords of Order, which is why Dr. Fate takes such an interest in her.

Page 22, Panels 5-10 - To the present-day DC fan the appearance of old criminal/old-fashioned mad scientist Luthor, instead of John Byrne's ruthless businessman/genius inventor Luthor, is probably the clearest indication that we're not dealing with the real post-Crisis world just yet. In fact, I think, chronologically at least, this might be the last appearance of the pre-Crisis Luthor, although anyone is welcome to correct me.

Uncanny X-Men #102

2008-09-09T09:37:00.000-07:00

December 1976

"Who Will Stop The Juggernaut?"

Chris Claremont (writer), Dave Cockrum (pencils), Sam Grainger (inks), Bonnie Wilford (colorist), John Costanza (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor), Marv Wolfman (editor-in-chief)

The X-Men aren't able to even slow down the Juggernaut. During the fight Storm huddles in a corner and flashes back to the event that causes her claustrophobia: the violent deaths of her parents when their house in Cairo was hit by a damaged Israeli jet during the Suez Crisis and her waking-up in the rubble next to the corpse of her mother. Xavier telepathically senses Storm's distress while he, Cyclops, and Jean's roommate Misty Knight are visiting Jean at the hospital. He orders Cyclops to go to Ireland to help the X-Men, but Cyclops refuses to go on any mission until Jean is fully recovered. Xavier explodes with rage, calling Cyclops an "ungrateful, unspeakable cur." However, his anger vanishes as he's disturbed by a vision of an alien woman.

Back in Ireland, only Nightcrawler holds his own against the Juggernaut by being able to easily dodge his punches. This does no good in the end, as Black Tom uses his power - focusing energy through the wood staff he carries - to knock Nightcrawler unconscious. Falling unnoticed into the shadows, Nightcrawler is rescued by shadowy beings who note that he's "invisible." In a fight with Banshee, Black Tom explains that he wasn't expecting Banshee's arrival, but he and the Juggernaut were broken out of prison and paid to kill the X-Men by a third party. Storm finally overcomes her claustrophobia and tries to hit the Juggernaut with lightning, but it proves too little too late. The Juggernaut suggests that he and Black Tom torture the X-Men until Xavier is forced to come to Ireland.

What's Important?

It's the first time Storm's origin is explored at length, from her childhood in Harlem and then Cairo, the deaths of her parents, and her time as a homeless orphan-turned-trained-thief. The story has pretty much remained the same, although for obvious reasons the Suez Crisis connection has been cut out.

Plus it's the first full appearance of Lilandra Neramani, although it isn't made clear who she is just yet.

Comments

All in all this issue is just an excuse to pit the new team against the Juggernaut, with only a little attention being given to the ongoing subplots. It actually makes good use of continuity by having the tactic the X-Men used in the past to handle the Juggernaut, tearing off his helmet and then zapping him with telepathy, isn't an option this time. It's a fun story if you enjoy this sort of thing.

However, it isn't the Juggernaut fight, but Storm's flashbacks, that should be remembered as one of the highlights of Cockrum's run. From the depiction of a firefight over Cairo to the images of an adolescent Storm wandering the Sahara, Cockrum taps into the dramatic storytelling potential of the medium. The image of Storm as a child seeing her mother's bloody hand buried in the wreckage is still, even looking at it from this era of "gory" and graphic superhero comics, a strong and disturbing image.

Footnotes

Page 5, Panel 3 - Nightcrawler shouts "Gods!" here. Obviously Claremont hasn't decided to write him as a devout Catholic just yet.

Page 7 - Since the Suez Crisis and the invasion of Egypt by Israel, Britain, and France took place in 1956, Storm would have to at least be in her mid-50s by today. Like Xavier and the Juggernaut's original pasts as soldiers in the Korean War, this gets downplayed or flatout ignored.

Page 13, Panel 6 - This sets up Nightcrawler's power to turn invisible in shadows, which comes as a surprise even to him. Here he literally becomes invisible, but later writers have tended to interpret this as Nightcrawler just being very well-camouflaged in dark areas.

Uncanny X-Men #101

2008-09-08T21:48:00.000-07:00

October 1976

"Like A Phoenix From The Ashes!"
Chris Claremont (writer), Dave Cockrum (pencils), Frank Chiaramonte (inks), Bonnie Wilford (colorist), John Costanza (letters), Archie Goodwin (editor), Marv Wolfman (editor-in-chief)

The X-Men's shuttle crashlands in Jamaica Bay. Everyone surfaces except Jean and Cyclops frantically searches for her, but then Jean in a strange new costume literally flies out of the water, declaring, "I am fire! And life incarnate! Now and forever, I am Phoenix!", before falling unconscious. At a hospital, a doctor announces that Jean has not been seriously injured. Professor Xavier follows up by informing everyone that he will send them on a vacation while Jean recovers, a decision that angers Wolverine, who is rather openly pining for Jean. Banshee volunteers to take the others to his ancestral home, Cassidy Keep, in Ireland, which he just learned via a letter sent by his lawyer that he has inherited.

As Banshee and his guests arrive at what looks like a medieval castle (complete with a drawbridge!), inside "Black" Tom Cassidy threatens the steward, Eamon O'Donnell, by vowing to harm "the families" if he alerts anyone to his presence. On their way to a formal dinner, the X-Men fall down a trap door, taking them to the bottom levels of the castle. Inside they find Black Tom and his partner-in-crime, the X-Men's old enemy, the Juggernaut, waiting for them. Before they can even start to defend themselves, Storm, overwhelmed by her terror of enclosed spaces, has a panic attack that renders her helpless.

What's Important?

The most important is that it's the first appearance and the first mentioning of the Phoenix, which goes on to be a central part of the X-Men mythos.

Also it's the first full appearance of Tom Cassidy, Banshee's cousin and lifelong rival. At the same time it establishes the partnership between Tom and the Juggernaut, which still shapes stories involving these characters today.

Comments

And so we come to the story with the damn leprechauns...

It's a little strange to see a British writer like Chris Claremont following the old superhero writer (or, really, the American writer) tendency to write as if most of Europe and the British Isles are still halfway in the Middle Ages. I guess this is one of those times when I, like so many online reviewers of vintage pop culture products, need a voice in my head that bellows, "This was something made for children, idiot", whenever I'm about to complain in his vein. And in that view it does make perfect sense to have a fun little yarn where the superheroes hang out in a cliched medieval castle, complete with torches, heraldic symbols, and ramparts. Still, isn't it a little insulting to have the cast's perfectly good Irish character turn out to be the owner of a castle populated by leprechauns? Besides which, it's never really explained how Banshee inherited his castle. In light of later plot developments it seems that it became his after Black Tom was formally disinherited as a result of his crimes, but here it does come across as Banshee being awfully glib about the death of one of his relatives.

What salvages the story somewhat are the debut of Phoenix, which does set up an intriguing mystery (although to us now it's anything but that), and some effective little character moments. Wolverine throwing away the flowers he bought for Jean because he's afraid that the others will learn about his infatuation is a good counterbalance to the sometimes over-the-top way Wolverine is being written at this time (of course, arguably Wolverine ended up having too much of a heart of gold later in Claremont's run). Nightcrawler's playful seduction of Storm is another solid character moment, as Claremont milks the irony of the X-Men's one truly disfigured member being a charismatic womanizer instead of the expected socially awkward outsider. Also there's a good throwaway scene where Storm casually shoots down Colossus and Nightcrawler's attempts to claim her as their "date." It's a reminder that from the beginning Claremont really did have a penchant for writing strong female characters - and (without naming names) in his heyday did a more convincing job of it than certain currently popular male writers who endlessly congratulate themselves on doing the same.

Something else worth mentioning is that this story has been subjected to one of the most famous - or, depending on your point of view, infamous - retcons in the history of the genre. In order to allow for Jean Grey's resurrection, the behind-the-scenes happenings surrounding this story were changed so that Jean was secreted away while the Phoenix Force literally took her place (see below). Even if you think Jean's resurrection spoiled the Phoenix story arc, it technically works, since nothing in the revised continuity contradicts anything that happens in this issue. In fact, it actually makes quite a bit of sense.

Footnotes

Page 5, Panel 3 - Because of the retcon mentioned above, this isn't the "real" Jean Grey. In the revised continuity, the Phoenix didn't enter some sort of symbiotic relationship with Jean as implied in the original stories, but rather made a copy of her body for herself and and imitated Jean to the point where she believed she was Jean, all so that she could experience human life for herself (or to save the universe or both; the stories that fleshed all this out get a little muddled at this point). The actual Jean was left in a cocoon at the body of Jamaica Bay, where she would remain in a state of stasis until her body would fully heal from the radiation poisoning. All this takes place in the back-up story of Classic X-Men #8, in between this issue and #100.

Later on writers, including Chris Claremont himself and Alan Davis, have taken Phoenix's "life incarnate" line literally. She's not just one of the Marvel Universe's many cosmic entities, but the embodiment of all life in the universe.

Page 8, Panel 3 - "I cannot help this girl I once thought I loved as much as you." This is a reference to something mentioned in the old Silver Age stories: Xavier's attraction to Jean. As a reader pointed out to me, Xavier originally was meant to be a young man turned prematurely bald and not much older than the first five X-Men themselves. In present-day continuity Xavier is and always has been considerably older, especially since now he's supposed to be in at least roughly the same generation as Magneto, who is still being written as a Holocaust survivor. This discrepency in age was used to great effect by Mark Waid in "X-Men #53", where Onslaught reveals to Jean Xavier's true feelings about her as an example of the dangerous emotions Xavier typically represses.

Page 15, Panel 2 - "Seneschal" - now that's an obscure word! It was a feudal title given to the servant in charge of running a nobleman's home and estates. It's a medieval and French word, so, yes, it is a tad odd that a twentieth-century Irishman, even an aristocrat, would casually use it. But at least it's more evidence that superhero comics can be educational after all.

Page 15, Panel 4-7 - How does Storm manage to make her clothes disappear and later transform them? It's revealed at some point that the X-Men's costumes are made of "unstable molecules", an invention by Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four used to create the costumes of most of Marvel's superheroes. Basically it's a catch-all explanation for all those little logic bumps involving superhero costumes (i.e., how shapeshifting characters aren't impeded by their costumes, etc.) But, yes, in these early Claremont stories, Storm did have a strange habit of making her clothes vanish and using her powers to take an impromptu nude shower. I suppose if you want to be charitable you can explain it as Claremont emphasizing to the reader Storm's naturalistic manner and non-Western sense of propriety, but you would have to be very charitable.

Page 16, Panels 4-7 - Anyone familiar with early-mid twentieth century Hollywood would probably be able to recognize all the figures Nightcrawler uses his hologram projector to morph into, but just for the hell of it, they are, in order: Clark Gable, Frank Sinatra, Groucho Marx, and his "usual" Errol Flynn.

Page 20, Panel 5 - One of Claremont's many writing quirks is having "ethnic" characters blurt out cultural- or language-specific exclamations. Usually an American reader can still understand them, but Banshee's "Hannigan's Bog!" stumped me. I suspect it might just be a sly reference to Ed Hannigan, a writer and artist working for Marvel Comics in this period.

Crisis on Infinite Earths #10

2008-09-02T15:49:00.000-07:00

January 1986

"Death At The Dawn Of Time!"

Marv Wolfman (writer and editor), George Pérez (pencils), Jerry Ordway (inks), Anthony Tollin (colors), John Costanza (letters), Len Wein and Robert Greenberger (editors), Jenette Kahn (editor-in-chief)

Psimon telepathically tortures Lex Luthor and brags that he will take over his and Brainiac's operation, but suddenly Brainiac appears in a new body and kills him. Brainiac explains to Lex that his consciousness exists within the entire satellite and so he's able to create new bodies when the old ones are destroyed. The superhero-supervillain war continues, but is interrupted by the Spectre, who speaks to the heroes and villains on all the earths simultaneously. The Spectre warns everyone that the Anti-Monitor is journeying back in time in order to destroy the Multiverse in its infancy. Everyone agrees to the Spectre's plan to stop him and the heroes are joined by the Superboy from Earth-Prime, one of the words destroyed by the anti-matter wave. The Lord of Time and the Time Trapper transport the supervillains back to Oa in Krona's time in order to stop his pivotal experiment, while a collaborative effort between Rip Hunter, Dr. Magnus, Kid Flash, and the Earth-2 Flash open a time portal to the beginning of the universe. Back in the present, Brainiac predicts that their chances of success and his odds of survival are very slim, so he shuts himself down in order to maximize his own chances of enduring.

Alexander Luthor and the heroes find that the Anti-Monitor has already arrived and has trapped Pariah. When Pariah blames himself for the Anti-Monitor's actions, he brags that he took advantage of Pariah's experiment in order to destroy Pariah's world and others. While the superheroes take on the Monitor, the supervillains attack the Oan capital, but are overcome by the Oans' telepathic abilities. The villains who do make it to Krona's lab are killed in a trap set by Krona, who assumes that they were hired by the other Oans to sabotage his research. At the dawn of time, the Anti-Monitor starts absorbing the superheroes' energies, raving that he was waiting for them because he needed their power. As the Anti-Monitor prepares to destroy the nascent Multiverse, the Spectre, his power boosted by various magic-users, tries to resist him. As Krona connects to the past, the Spectre screams again as everything vanishes into a white void.

What's Important?

Basically this is the last story to take place in pre-Crisis continuity and the "classic" DC Multiverse. After the last panel, the original Multiverse was erased from existence. With "Infinite Crisis" and "52" a new DC Multiverse, which resembles the old one in quite a few ways, has emerged, although technically it's not supposed to be the same.

Comments

There's not much to say about this issue that hasn't been said before, except it truly does capitalize on the epic potential of the series. Of course, you really don't get much more of a superhero epic feel than having two god-like beings wrestle each other in the middle of the birth of the universe. My one complaint is that the exoneration of Pariah is awkward and unnecessary, nor does Lady Quark suddenly deciding that he isn't culpable at all make much sense. Not only is it an abrupt cutting off of one of the very few character arcs in the series, but it leaves the question of why, if his experiment still awakened the Anti-Monitor and gave him the opportunity to start destroying the Multiverse, under Quark's logic he should be any less guilty than if he unintentionally triggered the destruction of his world?

Footnotes

Page 9, Panel 7 - The "Monitor files" that run at the bottom through the rest of "Crisis on Infinite Earths" are miscellaneous tie-ins to other series and sub-plots Wolfman intended to include but had to cut. Here the second Starman, Prince Gavyn, is seemingly killed, but in the 1990s "Starman" series it turns out he survived after all.

Page 13, Panel 4 - The "problem" Earth-2 Flash refers to in regards to Wally West is that, at the time, his powers were slowly killing him, which is why he quit the Teen Titans.

Panel 6 - This is Superboy-Prime, who should be well-known to present DC Comics readers. He first appeared in DC Comics Presents #87, a "Crisis" tie-in, but Earth-Prime was established much earlier in Flash #178. In the first few stories involving Earth-Prime, it was basically just a setting that allowed DC Comics writers to interact with characters in a tongue-in-cheek manner (my favorite is Justice League of America #124, where DC writer Carey Bates murders the entire Justice Society of America and has to be stopped by Elliott S! Magin), although later Earth-Prime was written as a world that had the potential for superheroes of its own but it "wasn't ready." Even though Earth-Prime was supposed to have been destroyed in the Crisis, a short sequence in "Infinite Crisis" strongly hinted that Earth-Prime not only still exists, but is in fact the world of the reader.

Page 10, Panel 22 - Quite a few characters do seem to die in this issue, but have actually survived, including the second Starman, the Earth-2 Hawkman, and the Immortal Man. However, the three villains killed here - Maaldor the Darklord, Sam Scudder the original Mirror Master, and the original Icicle - have politely remained dead.

Page 23, Panel 8 - So the giant hand holding the infant universe from previous scenes of Krona observing the birth of the universe isn't a Creator, as might be assumed, but actually the Anti-Monitor!

Crisis on Infinite Earths #9

2008-09-02T13:38:00.000-07:00

December 1985

"War Zone"

A small group of rogue Oans bestow a power ring on Guy Gardner. Suddenly a wave of anti-matter energy strikes, killing everyone except Guy Gardener and one Oan. The surviving Oan urges Gardner to avenge the deaths of the others. On Brainiac's satellite, Brainiac and the Earth-1 Lex Luthor address an assemblage of the supervillains from all five earths. The Earth-2 Lex Luthor interrupts, claiming that his intellect is superior to his Earth-1 counterpart and that he isn't needed. Brainiac disintergrates him, calmly stating, "But you are correct. We do not need two Luthors!" Back in New York City on Earth-1, a small part of the city, deemed the "Warp Zone", still links to other times and the different earths. Donna Troy and Firehawk decide to explore the "Warp Zone" to find Donna's missing husband, Terry.

Meanwhile the supervillains, organized and led by Lex Luthor and Brainiac, effortlessly conquer Earth-4, Earth-S, and Earth-X while the majority of the Multiverse's heroes are gathered on Earth-1. There Alexander Luthor, the Harbinger, and Pariah address the UN, trying to assure the assembly that the remaining Earths are safe from the Anti-Monitor. However, Pariah suddenly disappears, shouting that his vanishing means that the danger has returned. Then a holograph of Brainiac appears, demanding that Earths-1 and 2 surrender or else they'll destroy...well, everything. The Harbinger enlists Wally West, who takes up his old mantle of Kid Flash and helps the heroes of Earth-1 and 2 break the barriers between the Earths in order to fight the supervillain regime. On all the Earths the tide starts to turn in favor of the superheroes because they are much better organized, but there are casualties: Aquagirl (Tula) is fatally poisoned by Chemo on Earth-4 while on Earth-X Dr. Phosphorus critically wounds the Earth-1 Hawkman. Still, Lex Luthor is worried that the heroes are holding their own despite being outnumbered - and becomes considerably more distressed when Psimon comes out of hiding and apparently destroys Brainiac.

What's Important?

Aquagirl and the Earth-2 Lex Luthor die and...well, that's it,r eally.

Comments

This is probably the least new-reader-friendly part in a very un-new-reader-friendly series. Part of it is because Marv Wolfman still has a bad habit of shoehorning his pet projects into an already overstuffed story (this time he advances a couple of sub-plots from his run on Teen Titans, even though the Titans barely figure into "Crisis" at all) and part of it is that this entire installment revolves around just about every superhero and supervillain in the DC canon brawling across the Multiverse. You get scenes like Poison Ivy and the Joker holding Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters hostage or Superman punching Starro the Conqueror, which I suppose is fan pandering, but it's the good kind of fan pandering.

Footnotes

Page 1-2 - Guy Gardner has a fairly complicated origin, but suffice it to say that he was supposed to be the second Green Lantern instead of Hal Jordan (and would have been if not for a time-traveling Booster Gold's meddling) and served as Hal's backup. It isn't made clear here why the rogue Oans would pick Gardner as their champion, but in his recent appearances Gardner developed what we'd call "anger management issues." In Green Lantern #125, he ends up trying to raise an army of intergalactic criminals to attack the Anti-Monitor. Anyway, it turns out that the anti-matter wave that struck Oa isn't a direct attack, but a side-effect of the Anti-Monitor traveling to the dawn of the universe.

Page 5 - This is all foreshadowing for a Teen Titans storyline where Starfire's family, the rulers of the planet Tamaran, request that she return. It turns out that her parents have arranged for her to marry for political reasons, which is why Starfire's brother is worried when she brings along her boyfriend Nightwing.

Page 9, Panel 7 - "Terry" is Donna Troy/Wonder Girl's husband, married as of New Teen Titans #50. He's not a well-remembered character and usually ends up mocked as one of comics' most blatant and unappealing examples of a "Mary Sue"/Obvious Reader Identification Figure (I don't think it's a coincidence that he doesn't even have a Wikipedia article!). Anyway, he makes it out of "Crisis" alright, but later he divorced Donna Troy and was unceremoniously killed off in a car crash (along with his children by Donna).

Uncanny X-Men #100

2008-08-27T23:17:00.001-07:00

"Greater Love Hath No X-Man..."

February 1976

Chris Claremont (writer), Dave Cockrum (pencils and inks), Annette Kawecki (letters), Marv Wolfman (editor and editor-in-chief)

One of the things I miss about old comics is titles like that...

Anyway, "Xavier" orders his X-Men to kill the "imposters." The battle goes badly for the new X-Men until Wolverine's hightened senses lead him to realize that he and the others are fighting androids. No longer afraid of pulling their punches, the new X-Men easily dismantle the mechanical dopplegangers. Lang raves that the androids, his "X-Sentinels", were meant to wipe out mutantkind. A now conscious Cyclops breaks out of his imprisonment and frees the others. When Lang tries to fight back using a flying gunship, Jean telekinetically causes the ship to crash. Everyone boards Corbeau's shuttle to escape, but Corbeau finds that, due to damage caused by the Sentinels, a manual re-entry is mandatory, but the combination of a solar flare and a hole in the hull means that anyone who pilots the shuttle will most likely be killed by radiation poisoning. Jean volunteers, using her telepathy to absorb the information needed to steer and land the shuttle from Corbeau's mind and arguing that her telekinesis might shield her from the radiation. When Cyclops intervenes, Jean knocks him out. After a confrontation with Wolverine and a tearful goodbye from Storm, Jean pilots the ship back to Earth successfully at first, but is eventually overcome by the solar radiation.

What's Important?

I'll get into this more when it's time to talk about Phoenix, but this story is the last we'll see of the "real" Jean Grey until Fantastic Four #286 in 1985. It also continues the broad hints about Wolverine's attraction to Jean that began in #98 and is the first time Jean's close friendship to Storm is made explicit.

Comments

For all the build-up, Project Armaggedon is rather easily dispatched this issue. Still, the fight between "old" and "new" X-Men has some fantastically fannish moments, including a great panel where the faux-Xavier stands up from his wheelchair in order to deck Wolverine. It's probably also one of Dave Cockrum's finest issues in this run; there's lots of opportunities for melodramatic facial expressions and outlandish fights for him to work with. In the overview this does, more so than the last issues dealing with Project Armaggedon, feel like a transparent set-up for the Phoenix Saga. At least, while the "hero sacrifices themselves to insure the safety of others" plot twist has become a genre cliche, the final scenes with Jean do feel like genuine character moments, particularly the argument between Jean and Wolverine, rather than just an elaborate cliffhanger.

Footnotes

Page 11 - Through a classic villainous monologue, Lang reveals the origin of Project Armaggedon, although, once more through the magic of a decades-old continuity, things get a little complicated here. It's established that Lang was working for both the US government and the Council of the Chosen, who are better known as the Inner Circle of the Hellfire Club (it still isn't explained why Colonel Rossi was running errands for the Council). The government wanted Lang to research mutants and the Council wanted him to find ways to control and exploit mutants, but Lang wanted genocide.

It's simple enough, but the backstory in Classic X-Men #6 fleshed things out (or, depending on your point of view, needlessly complicated things) a bit. At the time the Council was predominantly human and run by Ned Buckman and Paris Seville as the White King and White Queen. It turns out that Buckman and Seville actually shared Lang's anti-mutant sentiments and they send Lang's Sentinels to assassinate Emma Frost and Sebastian Shaw, the Circle's mutant members. The pair survive and manage to launch a coup, which results in the violent deaths of all the Circle's members. Taking over, Shaw and Frost then stacked the Circle's membership with mutants, thus bringing about the "classic" Inner Circle line-up we all know and love.

Uncanny X-Men #99

2008-08-27T20:49:00.000-07:00

January 1976

"Deathstar Rising!"

Chris Claremont (writer), Dave Cockrum (pencils), Frank Charamonte (inks), Irving Watanabe (letters), Marv Wolfman (editor and editor-in-chief)

Anti-mutant hysteria arises across the country in response to the Sentnel-X-Men brawl in Manhattan. In Ireland, a lawyer, after mailing a letter to Sean Cassidy (Banshee), is attacked and killed by a man claiming to be Sean's cousin. Back to the crisis at hand, Sentinels snatch Jean, Cassidy, and Wolverine from outer space. On Earth, Dr. Corbeau and Cyclops use Xavier's access to NORAD's databanks to deduce that the Sentinels came from a believed-to-be abandoned SHIELD satellite. After arranging to have the X-Men disguised as the crew for a routine shuttle mission, Corbeau flies the shuttle toward the satellite and tries to trick Steven Lang into allowing the shuttle to dock there. Instead Lang detects the presence of mutants and sics Sentinels on them. Corbeau forces the shuttle into the docking bay and the X-Men manage to destroy the Sentinels, although Cyclops notes that these Sentinels were not as dangerous as the ones he fought in the past. Cyclops and Corbeau split off from the others in order to rescue Lang's captives; the others head off to find some means of escape. Finding Lang and Jean, Cyclops beats Lang to a pulp, but is zapped unconscious by an unseen force. Meanwhile the other X-Men are confronted by Professor Xavier and the original five X-Men, along with Polaris and Havok.

What's Important?

Not much really, but Colossus' older brother, Mikhail Rasputin, does get mentioned for the first time when Colossus explains that Mikhail was a Soviet cosmonaught who was killed when an experimental rocket went awry. Much later Mikhail was brought back and became a villain who appeared in quite a few stories through the late '90s (including the infamous "Storm" mini-series). Like so many characters from that era, he never really had much of a lasting impact.

It's also (sort of) the first appearance of "Black Tom" Cassidy, although he's unnamed and only appears in silhouette.

Comments

Time has not been this story's friend. Over the years it became a stock plot that's been used a dozen times by Chris Claremont and other writers since 1976: a villain's actions spark hostilities between humans and mutants and the X-Men are forced in some way to intervene. Even in 1976, the joke that the X-Men are not exactly proactive superheroes had a ring of truth to it. Even with the curse of retrospection, it's possible to see why Chris Claremont's run would take off. Steven Lang is a caricature of a bigot - the sort of villain you might expect from an afterschool special about racism or homophobia - but, despite the orbiting headquarters and the giant killer robots, there is an unsettling bit of reality in his motives and his dialogue. Plus the brief scenes of anti-mutant riots early in the issue do effectively establish that, unlike other superhero comics being published in this time, the X-Men were not fighting to save the world from would-be despots and mad scientists, but were struggling against something more pervasive and with more real-world echos.

In that light, it is kind of a shame that the whole series went over for a lengthy "Star Wars" rip-off (but at least that worked too!).

Footnotes

Page 3, Panel 2 - It might be hard to believe in 2008, but the legends are true: there was a time when Geraldo Rivera was a respected journalist, long before that whole "The Mysteries of Al Capone's Vault" fiasco, the "map in the sand" blunder, and, of course, my personal favorite, his "special reports" on the US' one million or so child abusing Satanists.

Panel 3 - A rare reference to Silver Age X-Men continuity, Judge Chalmers had helped Larry Trask, the son of the Sentinels' inventor Bolivar Trask, in Uncanny X-Men #58-60 with his plans to build a new generation of Sentinels and unleash them on mutants worldwide. In that story he turned on Larry and drastically changed his mind about mutants, which is made clear here.

Page 4, Panels 5-8 - It turns out in Uncanny X-Men #285, which came out about sixteen years later, that Mikhail Rasputin didn't actually die in an accidental rocket explosion as Colossus believes here; the Soviet government discovered his mutant powers (channeling energy and opening interdimensional portals) and faked his death in order to secretly turn him into a superpowered agent. On a secret mission designed to test his powers, Mikhail ended up stuck in another dimension.

Page 12, Panel 4 - Olga Korbut was a Soviet gymnast who had won three gold medals in the 1972 Olympics as well as one of the most publicly recognized athletes from that year's Olympics, enough that she arguably popularized gymnastics as a girls' sport in the United States single-handedly. Also she was well-known for her flamboyant, acrobatic style, which explains Nightcrawler's joke (and why Colossus becomes a little indignant).

Crisis on Infinite Earths #8

2008-08-16T16:51:00.000-07:00

"A Flash of the Lightning"

November 1985

Marv Wolfman (writer and editor), George Pérez (penciler), Jerry Ordway (inker), Anthony Tollin (colorist), John Costanza (letterer), Jenette Kahn (editor-in-chief)

An unhinged Psycho-Pirate begs the Flash, who is unconscious, to help him murder the Anti-Monitor. While Psycho-Pirate hopes that the Anti-Monitor was destroyed, he does appear in new armor and claims to have recovered. On Apokolips, Darkseid recognizes the Anti-Monitor as a threat but decides to take a "wait and see" approach. Meanwhile on Oa, the Guardians have been freed by the destruction of the Anti-Monitor's machinery, but are bitterly divided on what should be done. Vixen takes T.O. Morrow to the JLA satellite in an attempt to repair the Red Tornado's malfunctioning body. Morrow discovers that the Red Tornado has been altered by the Anti-Monitor. Investigating further, Morrow accidentally triggers an explosion that decimates the satellite. During the explosion Morrow vanishes into the portal. While trying to follow him, the Blue Devil winds up on a spaceship piloted by the Omega Men.

Back in the antimatter universe, the Thunderers are building a new anti-matter canon for the Anti-Monitor, which he thinks will pierce the negaverse and destroy the remaining five universes. While the Anti-Monitor is distracted supervising the work, the Flash regains consciousness, escapes his restraints, and beats up the Psycho-Pirate. The Flash forces the Psycho-Pirate to use his powers to turn the Thunderers against the Anti-Monitor while he runs into the cannon. As he runs the Flash realizes he's slipping through time (as a result of the Anti-Monitor preparing to travel back to the dawn of the universe), explaining why Batman, the Joker, and others had images of him. He ages and disintergrates while he runs to sabotage the canon. An enraged Anti-Monitor absorbs planets from the antimatter universe in order to boost his powers. The Spectre screams, sensing that the Anti-Monitor is again trying to destroy the universe.

What's Important?

Wally West dies. Also the JLA satellite is destroyed, which kicks off the plot that eventually has the Justice League relocating planetside.

Comments

This issue is a little cluttered with subplots, but it does create a true sense of urgency, especially once Darkseid and the Guardians show up to make their plans to deal with the Anti-Monitor. Also the death of Barry Allen is still rightfully remembered as a milestone in the DC Universe's continuity. Even after all these years, it comes across as a huge payoff in the story, especially coming so soon after the death of another prominent character. It's definitely one of the best, if not the best, installments in the series.

Footnotes

Page 6, Panel 7 - As is hinted here, T.O. Morrow created the Red Tornado using stolen future technology in Justice League of America (first series) #64.

Page 8, Panel 9 - People think the Crisis is over because of the destruction of the Anti-Monitor's devices, which had been causing the breaking down of the interdimensional barriers.

Page 11, Panel 6-8, Page 12, Panel 1-3 - T.O. Morrow has just ended up as one of the villains being "collected" by Brainiac. What happened to the Blue Devil isn't related, but was caused by a tear in space opened up over in the "Omega Men" series.

Page 21, Panel 4-5 - The people the Flash is thinking of as he dies are: his wife Iris Allen, his girlfriend and almost-wife Fiona Webb, Wally West the Kid Flash (and after the events of "Crisis" the third Flash), Dexter Myles the Flash Museum's curator, Ralph Dibny the Elongated Man and Barry's friend, Ralph's wife Sue Dibny and another friend, and Hal Jordan, the second Green Lantern and another close friend.

Crisis on Infinite Earths #7

2008-08-16T14:19:00.000-07:00

"Beyond The Silent Night"
October 1985
Marv Wolfman (writer and editor), George Pérez (penciler), Dick Giordano and Jerry Ordway (inkers), Tom Ziuko (colorer), John Costanza (letterer), Jenette Kahn (editor in chief)

While Brainiac teleports Captain Marvel foes Dr. Sivana and Ibbac to his satellite, the Harbinger, Alexander Luthor, and Pariah gather together Lady Quark and representatives from the surviving earths: the Earth-1 and Earth-2 Supermans, Captain Marvel, Blue Beetle, and Uncle Sam. At the brink of the Monitor's netherverse, the Harbinger explains that the Crisis began on the planet Oa millions of years ago, where and when the scientist Krona, against the warnings of Oan legend, used a device to view the birth of the universe. Somehow Krona's actions changed the process of the universe's formation, causing both an antimatter universe and multiple parallel positive matter universes to be created. According to the Harbinger, the Oans formed the Manhunters and then the Green Lantern Corps to atone for the what Krona did.

The Harbinger goes on to explain that the Monitor and the Anti-Monitor were then born, the former on Oa's moon and the latter on the moon of Oa's antimatter universe counterpart, Qward. The two entities fought each other, but only succeeded in placing each other into a state of stasis. Taking over the story, the Paraih then tells everyone that he was a scientist from a parallel earth that achieved utopia thanks to his own scientific inventions. Unfortunately, his earth was destroyed and the Anti-Monitor and the Monitor awakened when he tried to open a portal into the antimatter universe in order to observe the dawn of the universe. The destruction of Pariah's universe caused the Anti-Monitor to realize that he would grow more powerful with every positive matter universe that's destroyed. The Harbinger then explains that she was a child nearly killed in a shipwreck when the Monitor rescued him. Lady Quark interrupts when she angrily accuses Pariah of being responsible for the deaths of her family and home world.

A team including the two Supermans, Supergirl, Alan Scott, Jade, the new Doctor Light, the Ray, Captain Marvel, Captain Atom, the Earth-2 Wonder Woman, Firestorm, Martian Manhunter, Wildfire, Pariah and Firestorm are sent into the antimatter universe by Alexander Luthor's powers in order to fight the Anti-Monitor on Qward's moon. They find that the Anti-Monitor has converted the entire moon into a giant fortress. The Anti-Monitor tries to use the Psycho-Pirate's abilities on the invaders, but he admits that his powers have been burned out since he was used to control the populations of the earths. Instead he defends the lunar fortress with nearly invulnerable stone gargoyles. When the Earth-1 Superman finds the device the Anti-Monitor uses to weaken the barriers between earths and threatens to destroy it, the Anti-Monitor attacks and nearly kills him. Supergirl saves him and relentlessly attacks the Anti-Monitor, shattering his armor and destroying his machines. Before escaping the Anti-Monitor manages to kill Supergirl. Leaving the antimatter universe, the Superman of Earth-1 and other heroes take time to mourn.

What's Important?

Perhaps the one event that still gets referenced in contemporary stories is the death of the original Supergirl, Kara Zor-El or Linda Lee Danvers. She wasn't so much killed by the Anti-Monitor as she was by an editorial fiat that Superman should once again be the sole survivor of Krypton (Kara's origin was that she was the sole survivor of Argo City, a Kryptonian city that was jettisoned into space after Krypton exploded). In the decades since, DC has reversed its position and a new Kara Zor-El - not the same character, but one with a similar origin that also makes her a Kryptonian and Superman's biological cousin - debuted in Superman/Batman #8 and got her own (rather unpopular) series.

This is also an important issue in Green Lantern continuity, since it does retcon the origin of the Green Lantern Corps. Originally the Oans formed the Green Lanterns because Krona's experiments were responsible for introducing the concept of evil into the universe. Already by the story of this story, that had been changed to Krona being responsible for the creation of the world of Qward and its rulers, the Thunderers, who were Green Lantern adversaries who had been around since #2 of the first series. In this issue, Krona accidentally creates both Qward and the antimatter universe as well as the multiverse. Eventually the nature of Krona's crime changed again, and in present DC continuity Krona is to blame for shortening the lifespan of the universe by one billion years.

Besides all that, it's also the origins of the Monitor and the Anti-Monitor, Pariah, and the Harbinger, which may or may not be important since those characters never really developed much significance outside "Crisis."

Comments

Another weak installment, the issue does suffer from awkward dialogue, particularly heavy doses of unnecessary exposition ("I'm scared for the Ray and the others, entering that Anti-Matter Universe..." "I know, Firebrand. Then slipping into smaller groups, separately attacking the Anti-Monitor's fortress...") and a bit too much background explanation (on top of all the information about Krona, did we also need a reiteration of the complete history of Oa?). One can accuse the story of having an anti-science slant, which I think is fair - while indeed the ethical dimensions of science is a good soruce for superhero comics, is trying to view the Big Bang really such a horrible thing? And why basically retell Krona's story with Pariah? Most distracting of all is Marv Wolfman's less than subtle pushing of his new character, Yolanda Montez, as the new Wildcat. While I can appreciate Wolfman's desire to make the DC Universe more ethnically diverse, the unneeded spotlight on a minor character who doesn't even end up affecting the plot in an already crowded story is irritating. As for the long-waited confrontation with the Anti-Monitor, you'd expect he could do more than punch people, fire off energy beams, and conjure up gargoyles.

For all that, Supergirl's death is indeed a highlight, which goes far into makign it feel like a genuine creative choice rather than an editorial mandate. George Pérez's rather graphic depiction of Supergirl's mortally injured form and the silhouette of Superman clutching her body add a human touch to a story with plenty of inhuman characters.

Footnotes

Page 10, Panel 1 - As the narrative panel hints at, the alive (and quite insane) Krona resurfaced as a villain in Green Lantern #40 (first series) and Tales of the Green Lantern Corps #1.

Uncanny X-Men #98

2008-08-12T08:46:00.000-07:00

Uncanny X-Men #98

December 1975

"Merry Christmas, X-Men..."

Chris Claremont (writer), Dake Cockrum (pencils), Sam Grainger (inks), Joe Rosen (letterer), Janice Cohen (colorist), Marv Wolfman (editor), Gerry Conway (editor-in-chief)

Cyclops, Banshee, Storm, Jean Grey, and Banshee are in their civilian guises and celebrating Christmas in Midtown. Suddenly Cyclops and Jean are attacked in Rockefeller Plaza by the Sentinels. Despite the ambush the X-Men are able to destroy all the Sentinels except one that escapes with Jean in tow. A Sentinel also attacks Professor Xavier, who is vacationing with scientist Peter Corbeau in the Bahamas, and ends up capturing him. Steven Lang explains to a restrained Jean Grey and Wolverine that he considers killing the X-Men a crucial first step toward destroying the mutant species. Angered by Lang slapping Jean, Wolverine manages to free himself and the others. They are on the brink of breaking out of Lang's headquarters altogether, only to discover that his base is orbiting the planet.

What's Important?

Quite a bit, actually. Most importantly, one can argue that this is the thematic start of Chris Claremont's run. While Claremont wasn't actually the first writer to treat mutants as a metaphor for persecuted racial minorities (and, perhaps even at that point, gay people as well) - that theme can be traced all the way back to Stan Lee's stories - he made it a centerpiece of the franchise. In fact, this approach would dominate not just "Uncanny X-Men" but the entire franchise until 2001, when Grant Morrison broke with the then 30-year old pattern in order to treat mutants like an actual science-fiction concept and explore the implications of a new species of humanity rather than continue using the idea as a metaphor.

It's also the first issue that both hints at Wolverine's attraction to Jean Grey, as well as Storm's friendship with the latter. There's also a blink-and-you'll-miss-it debut by Amanda Sefton (a.k.a. Jimaine Szardos), Nightcrawler's on-and-off girlfriend and foster sister (eeeew). It turns out later that she had been secretly following Nightcrawler since he relocated to the United States.

Addendum: My friend Steve reminds me that it's also the first issue that spells out that Wolverine's claws are a part of his body, which of course leads up to him also having a metal skeleton.

It's The '70s...

Throughout this and coming issues, Jean Grey is sporting a giant gold medallion/necklace which was quite fashionable in 1975. When in the '80s it turned out that the Jean from these issues had been secretly placed in suspended animation (we'll get to all that later), she still had on that necklace, which even just a decade later looked like a bizarre fashion artifact.

Footnotes

Page 1, Panel 1 - I'm probably going to lose geek credentials here. Among the crowd of bystanders walking past the X-Men, I can make out Matt Murdock and Nick Fury, who are pretty obvious, but I honestly can't tell who the others are supposed to be, if anybody significant. Perhaps the bearded man standing in front of Nick Fury is Dave Cockrum?

Page 3, Panel 1-2 - More cameos! Of course, these men are Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.

Page 10, Panel 2-3 - There's a bit of a flub here, as Xavier, at least under contemporary "rules", shouldn't be able to attack a Sentinel with his telepathy. Under modern continuity it's become more or less a rule of thumb that telepaths can only affect organic minds.

Page 12, Panel 3 - Steven Lang's discovery that his sensors don't register Wolverine as a mutant is foreshadowing for a storyline that never saw the light of print. Originally Wolverine was supposed to be revealed as...an actual wolverine evolved into a humanoid form by the High Evolutionary. Needless to say we're all better off.

Crisis on Infinite Earths #6

2008-07-23T11:24:00.000-07:00

Crisis on Infinite Earths #6
"3 Earths! 3 Deaths!"
Marv Wolfman (writer), George Pérez (pencils), Jerry Ordway (inks), Tony Tollin (colors), John Costanza (letters)

The Anti-Monitor boosts the Psycho-Pirate's abilities to the point that he can influence the emotions of every human being on the remaining Earths outside the netherverse. Before the Monitor's satellite is completely destroyed the Harbinger acts to save everyone. Yolanda Montez watches a crippled Wildcat and vows to take up his legacy, Lex Luthor is abducted and taken to Brainiac's spaceship, and superheroes sent from Earth-1 and Earth-2 by Alexander Luthor to help the other three Earths are suddenly attacked by mobs driven into a frenzy by the Psycho-Pirate. Also thanks to the Psycho-Pirate, the heroes of Earth-S (home of Captain Marvel), Earth-4 (home of the Charlton Comics heroes), and Earth-X (home to the Freedom Fighters) react with paranoia and then violence to the heroes from Earth-1 and Earth-2. Even as the anti-matter wave begins to decimate those three Earths, the Harbinger burns out her powers drawing the other three universes into the netherverse. Alexander Luthor observes that now the surviving universes are in danger of merging too quickly and destroying each other.

What's Important?

Yolanda Montez more or less officially takes up the mantle of Wildcat. It's debatable how important this really is, since the character was, in spite of Marv Wolfman's ongoing efforts here to make the DC Universe more ethnically diverse, killed off soon after “Crisis.”

Comments

If you've ever wanted to see Captain Marvel fight the original Supergirl or the Golden Age Flash tussle with various Charlton Comics heroes, this is the issue for you. It's basically an extended and fairly chaotic fight scene, but at least the plot is less sluggish. Plus, as always, the fun lies in seeing just how wide and diverse the DC Universe “cast” really is.

Ah, The '80s...

Page 13, Panel 2: “They scared me outta my wits with this fright story that'd give goosebumps to Stephen King!” It's not a dated reference by any means, but I thought, since pop culture references are rare in this series, it would be worth pointing out that at the time of the issue Stephen King had in the past few years written “Christine”, “Pet Cemetery”, and “Skeleton Crew”, so arguably he was at the peak of his popularity.

Crisis on Infinite Earths #5

2008-07-23T11:05:00.000-07:00

Crisis On Infinite Earths #5
“Worlds in Limbo”

Marv Wolfman (writer), George Pérez (pencils), Jerry Ordway (inks), Tony Tollin (colors), John Costanza (letters)

A depressed (more than usual, at least) Pariah and a horrified Habringer mourn the Monitor. Suddenly they see a recorded message left by the Monitor, claiming that he had anticipated his own death, knowing that it would release his energies into the towers and cause Earth-1 and Earth-2 to be protected from the anti-matter wave in a new “netherverse”. A now adult Alexander Luthor assures the pair that the Monitor had shown him how to save the universes and helps Pariah and the Harbringer “bury” the Monitor's body by launching it into space. Meanwhile “the other” captures the Flash and orders the Psycho-Pirate to keep him subdued. Back on the Earths time and the barriers between Earth-2 and Earth-1 have become unrivaled, causing people to catch glimpses into the other Earth and individuals, machines, and animals from past and future eras to appear in the present.

On the Monitor's satellite, the Harbringer and Alexander Luthor have gathered together the heroes and villains from different times on Earth-1 and Earth-2. The Harbringer shows that the same temporal distortions are affecting every planet in existence and explains that they need all superpowered beings' help in saving the remaining universes. Alexander Luthor sends the heroes back to their respective Earths and times to see the effects of the Crisis for themselves. Back home in the twentieth century on Earth-1 superheroes scramble to rescue people from natural disasters and the effects of the “time crunch.” In the chaos Wildcat's legs are severely injured and the Red Tornado is discovered, considerably damaged. Realizing the scope of what's happening, they agree to go on a mission for Alexander Luthor. However, before he can send them, the Monitor's satellite starts to fall apart, thanks to the “other.” In Oa, members of the Green Lantern Corps find that the Guardians have been been imprisoned in a yellow stasis beam just before they are knocked out by an explosion. Elsewhere the Flash demands that “the other” reveal himself. Stepping forward, he calls himself “the Monitor.” Also the anti-matter wave is almost on the brink of destroying one of the five remaining worlds, Earth-X.

What's Important?

Yolanda Montez, the second Wildcat, makes a blink-and-you'll-miss-it appearance, although she's not in costume just yet. The reader also gets the first full view of the Anti-Monitor.

Comments

One of the weaker issues in the series, it does feel like padded up. The plot only inches forward, with the marshaling of the troops on the Monitor's satellite and the Anti-Monitor revealing himself for the first time being the only real events of note. As with most superhero stories like this, though, it is rather fun seeing all hell breaking out among people on the street. Scenes like the elderly couple who see a vision of their dead daughter, who happens to have an alive and well double on Earth-1, do add a new dimension to what might be seen as just an excuse to draw cowboys and dinosaurs together.

Footnotes

Pages 7-8 – The same gathering is shown from a different and darker perspective (along with other scenes in the Crisis) in Swamp Thing #46. As Swamp Thing hints, the Crisis is causing extremely morbid happenings to occur across the world.

Page 25 – Earth-X, which was established in Justice League of America #107, was an Earth where the Nazi regime never collapsed. Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters, as shown here, are pretty much the only heroes from that world. They're not natives, but rather migrated over from Earth-1.

Uncanny X-Men #97

2008-07-10T15:04:00.000-07:00

Uncanny X-Men #97
November 1975
“My Brother, My Enemy!”

Chris Claremont (writer), Dave Cockrum (penciler), Bob McLeod (inker), Tom Orzechowski (letterer), Len Wein (editor), Gerry Conway (editor-in-chief)

Professor Xavier has a nightmare where he watches a war being fought somewhere in outer space. To Moira, he confides that he's worried that he's going insane. In Death Valley, Alex Summers and Lorna Dane, who are there for a geological study, are attacked and brainwashed by an unseen figure who declares his intent to assassinate Charles Xavier. At Kennedy International Airport, Jean Grey and the X-Men sans Wolverine and Banshee are gathered to see Professor Xavier off, but suddenly Havok and Polaris attack in costume. Havok comes close to destroying the plane Professor Xavier is in, but Nightcrawler causes his blast to instead hit an empty plane. After the explosion someone disguised as Eric the Red claims responsibility for the attack and joins the fray. When Banshee and Wolverine show up, Eric the Red escapes with Polaris and Havok in tow. Cyclops refuses to blast them out of the sky, which leads to a short and ugly tussle with Wolverine.

What's Important?

The main thing is that it's the first chapter in what fans have dubbed “the Phoenix Saga.” Beyond that, this is the first of many, many Chris Claremont stories involving mind control.

Comments

There isn't much to talk about since thie issue is basically an extended action scene with plenty of explosions and dialogue stuffed with cheese, although Chris Claremont does a good job of setting up a sense of mystery. Plus it's an elaborate excuse for Dave Cockrum to pull off some wonderful visuals, including a pissed off Storm zapping the hell out of Polaris. He even pulls off making Eric the Red's goofy costume look impressive in front of a raging fire.

Footnotes

Page 4, Panel 7 – So we find out that Xavier's visions of outer space have been recurring and Moira's real reason for coming to the United States has been to help Xavier cope with his recurring visions. I'm assuming that when Xavier says, “I had no right to ask you, not after...” he's referring to either Moira turning down Xavier's marriage proposal or the decision to imprison Moira's son Proteus (both of which come out a little ways down the line). However, with the retcon that came in the wake of “Deadly Genesis”, fans can imagine that Xavier is really referring to that little matter where he picked up a few of Moira's young mutant refugees, sent them off to their deaths, and lied about it to everyone.

Page 5, Panel 3 - "Oh Jean, something I forgot - please tell Nightcrawler that Tony Stark's image inducer is not a toy. It's to make him look unobtrusive, not like some 1930's movie star." Specifically Nightcrawler has programmed himself to look like Errol Flynn, who was famous for both his romantic, swashbuckling roles and his womanizing, alcohol-drenched private life. Needless to say, Nightcrawler's choice turns out to be a good reflection.

Page 10, Panel 4 – As an editorial note reminds us, Eric the Red was a fake supervillain identity used by Cyclops in Uncanny X-Men #51 and #52. This Eric the Red is Davan Shakari, a Shi'ar agent.