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THIS ISSUE: BRONZE AGE EVENTS!

Avengers vs.

Defenders JLA/JSA Secret Wars Crisis’ 30th anniversary Legends Millennium Invasion!

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Infinity Gauntlet & more!

Avengers, Defenders, and all related characters TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

THE RETRO COMICS EXPERIENCE!

Edited by MICHAEL EURY, BACK ISSUE magazine celebrates comic books of the 1970s, 1980s, and today through recurring (and rotating) departments like “Pro2Pro” (dialogue between professionals), “BackStage Pass” (behind-the-scenes of comicsbased media), “Greatest Stories Never Told” (spotlighting unrealized comics series or stories), and more!

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“Incredible Hulk in the Bronze Age!” Looks into Hulk’s mind, his role as a team player, his TV show and cartoon, merchandising, Hulk newspaper strip, Teen Hulk, villain history of the Abomination, art and artifacts by SAL BUSCEMA, JOHN BYRNE, PETER DAVID, KENNETH JOHNSON, BILL MANTLO, AL MILGROM, EARL NOREM, ROGER STERN, HERB TRIMPE, LEN WEIN, new cover by TRIMPE and GERHARD!

“Tryouts, One-Shots, & One-Hit Wonders”!

Marvel Premiere, Marvel Spotlight, Marvel Feature, Strange Tales, Showcase, First Issue Special, New Talent Showcase, DC’s Dick Tracy tabloid, Sherlock Holmes, Marvel’s Generic Comic Books, Bat-Squad, Crusader, & Swashbuckler, with BRUNNER, CARDY, COLAN, FRADON, GRELL, PLOOG, TRIMPE, and an ARTHUR ADAMS “Clea” cover!

“Robots” issue! Cyborg, Metal Men, Robotman, Red Tornado, Mister Atom, the Vision, Jocasta, Shogun Warriors, and Big Guy and Rusty the Boy Robot, plus the legacy of Brainiac! Featuring the riveting work of DARROW, GERBER, INFANTINO, PAUL KUPPERBERG, MILLER, MOENCH, PEREZ, SIMONSON, STATON, THOMAS, WOLFMAN, and more, behind a Metal Men cover by MICHAEL ALLRED.

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“Batman’s Partners!” MIKE W. BARR and ALAN DAVIS on their Detective Comics, Batman and the Outsiders, Nightwing flies solo, Man-Bat history, Commissioner Gordon, the last days of World’s Finest, Bat-Mite, the Batmobile, plus Dark Knight’s girl Robin! Featuring work by APARO, BUSIEK, DITKO, KRAFT, MILGROM, MILLER, PÉREZ, WOLFMAN, and more, with a cover by ALAN DAVIS and MARK FARMER.

“Bronze Age Fantastic Four!” The animated FF, the FF radio show of 1975, Human Torch goes solo, Galactus villain history, FF Mego figures… and the Impossible Man! Exploring work by RICH BUCKLER, JOHN BUSCEMA, JOHN BYRNE, GERRY CONWAY, STEVE ENGLEHART, GEORGE PÉREZ, KEITH POLLARD, ROY THOMAS, LEN WEIN, MARV WOLFMAN, and more! Cover by KEITH POLLARD and JOE RUBINSTEIN.

“‘80s Independents!” In-depth looks at PAUL CHADWICK’s Concrete, DAVE SIM’s Cerebus the Aardvark, and RICHARD AND WENDY PINI’s Elfquest! Plus see ‘80s independent comics go Hollywood, DAVID SCROGGY remembers Pacific Comics, TRINA ROBBINS’ California Girls, and DENIS KITCHEN’s star-studded horror/sci-fi anthology Death Rattle. Cover by PAUL CHADWICK!

“Let’s Get Small!” Marvel’s Micronauts, The Atom in the Bronze Age, JAN STRNAD and GIL KANE’s Sword of the Atom, the rocky relationship of Ant-Man the Wasp, Gold Key’s Microbots, Super Jrs., DC Digests, and Marvel Value Stamps. Featuring the work of PAT BRODERICK, JACKSON GUICE, ELLIOT S! MAGGIN, BILL MANTLO, AL MILGROM, ALEX SAVIUK, ROGER STERN, LEN WEIN, & more. Cover by PAT BRODERICK!

“When Comics Were Fun!” HEMBECK cover and gallery, Plastic Man, Blue Devil, Marvel’s Star Comics imprint, VALENTINO’s normalman, Bronze Age’s goofiest Superman stories, and the Batman/Dick Tracy team-up you didn’t see! Featuring MAX ALLAN COLLINS, PARIS CULLINS, RAMONA FRADON, ALAN KUPPERBERG, MISHKIN & COHN, STEVE SKEATES, JOE STATON, CURT SWAN, and more!

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A New Day For Comics Fans!

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“Weird Issue!” Batman’s Weirdest TeamUps, ORLANDO’s Weird Adventure Comics, Weird War Tales, Weird Mystery Tales, DITKO’s Shade the Changing Man and Stalker, CHAYKIN’s Iron Wolf, CRUMB’s Weirdo, and STARLIN and WRIGHTSON’s The Weird! Featuring JIM APARO, LUIS DOMINGUEZ, MICHAEL FLEISHER, BOB HANEY, PAUL LEVITZ, and more. Batman and Deadman cover by ALAN CRADDOCK.

“Charlton Action Heroes in the Bronze Age!” DAVE GIBBONS on Charlton’s WATCHMEN connection, LEN WEIN and PARIS CULLINS’ Blue Beetle, CARY BATES and PAT BRODERICK’s Captain Atom, Peacemaker, Peter Cannon: Thunderbolt, and a look at Blockbuster Weekly! Featuring MIKE COLLINS, GIORDANO, KUPPERBERG, ALAN MOORE, PAT MORISI, ALEX ROSS, and more. Cover by AL MILGROM.

“Flash and Green Lantern in the Bronze Age” (crossover with ALTER EGO #132)! In-depth spotlights of their 1970s and 1980s adventures, MARK WAID’s look at the Flash/GL team, and PAUL KUPPERBERG’s Lost GL Fillins. Bonus: DC’s New York Office Memories, and Green Lantern: Ganthet’s Tale by LARRY NIVEN and JOHN BYRNE. With BARR, BATES, GIBBONS, GRELL, INFANTINO, WEIN, and more. Cover by GEORGE PÉREZ.

“DC Bronze Age Giants and Reprints!” An indepth exploration of DC’s 100-PAGE SUPER SPECTACULARS, plus: a history of comics giants, DC indexes galore, and a salute to “human encyclopedia” E. NELSON BRIDWELL. Featuring the work of PAT BRODERICK, RICH BUCKLER, FRANK FRAZETTA, JOE KUBERT, BOB ROZAKIS, BERNIE WRIGHTSON, and more. Super Spec tribute cover featuring classic art by NICK CARDY.

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Volume 1, Number 82 August 2015 EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Michael Eury PUBLISHER John Morrow

Comics’ Bronze Age and Beyond!

DESIGNER Rich Fowlks COVER ARTIST John Byrne (from the collection of Scott Green) COVER COLORIST Glenn Whitmore COVER DESIGNER Michael Kronenberg PROOFREADER Rob Smentek JimShooter.com Dan Jurgens Barbara Kesel Jim Kingman John K. Kirk Stan “The Man” Lee Alan Light Pat Loika Marvel Comics David Michelinie Allen Milgrom Luigi Novi Dennis O’Neil Martin Pasko Tom Peyer Bill Sienkiewicz Anthony Snyder Jim Starlin Joe Staton Roger Stern Max Talley Roy Thomas John Trumbull Karen Walker John Wells Marv Wolfman Mike Zeck

BACK SEAT DRIVER: Editorial by Michael Eury . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2 OFF MY CHEST: The Twilight of Stan Lee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3 The slow fadeout of Stan the Man as a comic writer FLASHBACK: Summertime Special: The Avengers–Defenders War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8 The summer Steve Englehart pitted team against non-team FLASHBACK: Crisis? What Crisis? JLA/JSA Crossovers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15 JLA writers chime in on the endless summers of Bronze Age Justice League/Justice Society gatherings THE TOY BOX: Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30 A maxiseries hit for Marvel produced a dud toy line for Mattel. What went wrong?

FLASHBACK: Secret Wars II: The Crossover Takes Over . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .38 A star-studded remembrance of the Beyonder’s return FLASHBACK: Crisis at 30 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48 A look back at the most influential crossover in comics history

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FLASHBACK: Crisis on Infinite Crossovers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .55 The post-Crisis crossovers of DC Comics FLASHBACK: The Infinity Saga . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .68 Jim Starlin discusses his trio of Thanos-starring Marvel epics BACK TALK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .74 Reader reactions

BACK ISSUE™ is published 8 times a year by TwoMorrows Publishing, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614. Michael Eury, Editor-in-Chief. John Morrow, Publisher. Editorial Office: BACK ISSUE, c/o Michael Eury, Editor-in-Chief, 118 Edgewood Avenue NE, Concord, NC 28025. Email: euryman@gmail.com. Six-issue subscriptions: $60 Standard US, $85 Canada, $107 Surface International. Please send subscription orders and funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial office.

Cover art by John Byrne. Avengers, Defenders, and related characters TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved. All characters are © their respective companies. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © 2015 Michael Eury and TwoMorrows Publishing. BACK ISSUE is a TM of TwoMorrows Publishing. ISSN 1932-6904. Printed in China. FIRST PRINTING. Bronze Age Events Issue

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In the background: Cover to Crisis on Infinite Earths #5 (Aug. 1985). Art by George Pérez. TM & © DC Comics.

SPECIAL THANKS Andrew Arnell Ian Ascher Paul Balzè Steven Bayer The Beyonder Al Bigley Michael Breakfield Chris Brennaman Eliot R. Brown Rich Buckler Bob Budiansky Sal Buscema Kurt Busiek Jarrod Buttery ByrneRobotics.com Gerry Conway Tom DeFalco Steve Englehart Jackie Estrada Danny Fingeroth Mike Friedrich Keith Giffen Peter B. Gillis Grand Comics Database Scott Green Robert Greenberger Heritage Comics Auctions Paul Howley

by

Many of us who have read comic books for decades suffer from “event fatigue.” When the hyperbole blasts about how the newest multi-hero crossover epic will forever shape the lives of its characters, we chuckle, roll our eyes, and realize that the latest secret crisis is just another of a long line of secret crises designed to sell comics, and that “forever” only lasts until the next new idea comes along.

Yet that is the nature of superhero comics. Publishers’ worlds are so heavily populated with characters that the simple threats of the past—a mobster, a spy, or a nutcase with a super-weapon and a passion for bank robberies—no longer cut it. The fate of New York, or the United States, or Earth, or the cosmos, must hang in the balance until a gaggle of heroes—sometimes joined by villains!— narrowly saves the day.

During the Golden Age, the focus of the men in suits whose publishing houses and sweatshops cranked out comic books was merely to release the next issue to satiate a demand. What few “events” actually occurred during that era—such as the Sub-Mariner fighting the Human Torch, or the inaugural gathering of the Justice Society of America, or the first meeting between Superman and Batman—had limited fanfare, especially when compared to today’s info-drenched culture.

As you’ll read in this issue, you might credit DC Comics editor Julius Schwartz with launching the “event comic,” when he first paired the Silver Age Flash with the Golden Age Flash in 1961.

These fast friends met again, and again, and from their team-up

Michael Eury

emerged similar encounters between two generations of Green Lanterns and Atoms, but most notably between the Justice League of America and Justice Society of America, the two super-teams whose annual crisis would unite them for a summer treat for readers.

And thus the event comic was born.

This issue, we take a look back at the events which stirred up fandom during the 1970s and 1980s. For those of you too young to have read these comics when they were first published, try to imagine the excitement experienced by readers during these days of business-as-usual storytelling, when a slugfest between our cover stars the Avengers and the Defenders or when the worlds-blending Crisis on Infinite Earths really elevated pulses and sales. The stories covered in the following pages surely rocked my adolescence—and I know the same can be said about many BI readers.

Before we get started, however, I must give a nod to perhaps the BIGGEST event of 1970, one of the first defining moments of the Bronze Age: Jack Kirby leaving Marvel Comics for DC Comics. Since TwoMorrows devotes an entire magazine to “the King”—The Jack Kirby Collector—there’s no article about this event in this issue. But back then, when fanzines and comic-cons were rare, the word of Kirby’s evacuation from the House of Ideas spread across schoolyards and newsstands. DC dropped “Kirby is Coming!” teasers in various books to build the enthusiasm, then unleashed a salvo of house ads as bombastic as the King’s art and imagination. Now, that was a comicbook event!

TM & © DC Comics.

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Stan’s Last Stand Stan Lee, as seen in a Crazy! Magazine subscription ad from the mid-1970s, and some of the last comics he wrote at Marvel. by

M a x Ta l l e y

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

This article covers the final two and a half years Stan Lee wrote monthly Batman or Superman story would stand alone, leaving less room for comics. Of course, he continued to write/edit Marvel anthologies and character development, or sense of continuity—is uncertain.

Stan’s Soapbox of January 1970 stated, “If our earth-shattering new created the Spider-Man newspaper strip. But my focus is on a transitional, unsettled time when the Silver Age morphed into the Bronze Age, policy hasn’t really grabbed you by the time you read these words—don’t when the two writers (Stan Lee and Roy Thomas) who controlled the worry! We’ll switch back to our old, cataclysmically confusing, continuedcontinuity and changes within the Marvel Universe ceded their strict story policy before you can say, ‘No wonder they dumped old Stan!’ ” Fan backlash over the decision was immediate. “I was sorry to hear control to new writers like Gerry Conway and Steve Englehart.

This period is rarely discussed in detail. Something went wrong at of your decision to cut down to single issue stories, as I don’t feel you can Marvel in early 1970, but there were several factors involved in this get the proper characterization and motivation into so few pages and still have action,” wrote Christine Cassello in The Amazing Spider-Man #82. misdirection—beyond the usual tired memes that Stan was over the hill, Sadly, with a couple of exceptions, the policy remained for a year, or couldn’t create anything without Jack Kirby’s avalanche of characters and classic extended storylines like those involving Dr. Doom (Fantastic and Steve Ditko’s plotting abilities.

To understand the slump of 1970, one must first look at 1968 and Four #84–87), or Namor’s Serpent Crown saga (Sub-Mariner #9–13), or Spider-Man’s Tablet adventure (Amazing Spider-Man #68–75), the first half of 1969. Pick any Marvel title during those months would not return until the Kree–Skrull War. In those multi-part and you’ll find a stunning cover, usually symbolic, with few stories, the writers could provide the character development if any blurbs. Inside the covers, there is art by Kirby, often lacking in their distinguished competition’s comics, John Buscema, John Romita, Gene Colan, John Severin, and the artists could really let loose. When forced back Marie Severin, Jim Steranko—all at their peak. Even into the early Marvel style of short stories that concluded newcomers like Barry Smith and DC stalwarts Neal quickly, it was an uncomfortable switch for Lee and Roy Adams and Gil Kane joined in the fun. The few Thomas—who had both excelled for years on subplots stories not written by Stan Lee and Roy Thomas are and large casts of characters. It was also harder on the

by Archie Goodwin or Gary Friedrich. artists, who as part of the “Marvel Method” either By the January 1970 cover-dated Marvel issues, plotted or co-plotted the stories. Suddenly, they had Steranko has gone, Barry Smith isn’t drawing superto wrap up their stories fast and then come up with a heroes, and Dr. Strange and Nick Fury have been canceled, brand-new plot and villain every month. while the once giant-sized The Silver Surfer is struggling Take a look at Amazing Spider-Man #80 from 1970. as a 15-cent book, causing Stan to throw in guest-stars Large panels, often only four to five a page, and much like the Human Torch and Spider-Man. Lee has handed roy thomas less writing than a year before. Captions and editorial The Incredible Hulk over to Roy Thomas. A few months © Marvel. asides are rare. There are dialogue balloons and thought later, Neal Adams stops penciling The X-Men and the title slides into reprint limbo for five years, Gil Kane and Thomas stop working balloons. (The reduction of paper size from 12.5" x 18.5" to 10" x 15" also contributed to this.) The return of the Chameleon after 78 issues would on the peripatetic Captain Marvel, and Archie Goodwin leaves Iron Man. However, Marvel still retained a wealth of talent. What could slow down seem to be a momentous event, but he is easily dispatched in a single issue.

Then in issue #81 we are treated to the Kangaroo. Feeling nostalgic? their creative ascendancy of the preceding six years? These are solely my own opinions as an outsider, and I respect that many insiders may disagree. Neither am I. With the new easy-come, easy-go policy, Stan and Roy were forced to come up with new villains fast. The Kangaroo might have fit into Stan’s editorial decision to switch from multi-part stories to singleissue stories had a profound effect, though it was publisher Martin the first year of Spider-Man, or among early Daredevil foes like the Leap-Frog.

Goodman’s idea, according to Roy Thomas (who did not read or But this bland blonde who described the acquisition of his skills thusly: “I lived necessarily agree with my editorial, but was kind enough to provide a in kangaroo country—eating what they ate—going where they were— few email answers). Whether it had been Marvel readers complaining working—training,” seemed absurd in the maturing Marvel of 1970.

Perhaps worse evidence of the single-issue constraints can be that they couldn’t follow the story if they missed an issue, or Marvel’s attempt to copy a weaker aspect of most DC comics—that every found in The Mighty Thor. After never-to-be-forgotten cosmic storylines Bronze Age Events Issue

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involving Galactus and Mangog, our man with the mallet found himself battling the Thermal Man from Communist China in Thor #170; Kronin Krask, a man of extreme wealth and immense girth, in #172; and Crypto-Man in #174. Any of these bogus characters could have come from the dawn of the ’60s, before Marvel became synonymous with quality.

Jackson Chadda wrote in Thor #182’s (Nov. 1970) letters page, “I have been quite disappointed with the ‘hero meets villain—hero fights villain—hero defeats villain routine.’ This development seems to coincide with recent change from the related, continued issues of the past to the simplified format of the present.

This very lack of quality is the reason I abandoned your competitors. Thor, with all his significance and possibilities, is reduced to violent combat with gimmickladen villains in a repetitious format.”

To be fair, the cardboard villains came at the end of Jack Kirby’s long run on Thor. As has been stated in The Jack Kirby Collector, he’d lost interest in creating new concepts or characters for Marvel and saved new ideas for his Fourth World comics at DC. Still, after so many cosmic storylines, to be consigned to Earthbound single-issue stories must have seemed like punishment from Odin himself. Kirby’s heroic figures, large panels, and full-page drawings cried out for sagas. Thor #175 was an exception, with Kirby and Bill Everett delivering a classic first part of a “Loki attempts to steal Odin’s throne” saga.

Once the Skrull kidnapping of the Thing storyline ended (influenced by Lost in Space episode “The Deadly Games of Gamma 6,” as well as Star Trek episode “A Piece of the Action”), The Fantastic Four slid into mediocrity. Some of those issues were inked by Frank Giacoia, a once-great Kirby inker who by early 1970 had become the anti-Sinnott, all sharp angles and jagged lines, compared to Sinnott’s thick outlines and flattering embellishments on the King.

Even Roy Thomas, at the peak of his superhero writing on Dr. Strange, Sub-Mariner, and The Avengers, suddenly began throwing characters like Crime Wave, Torpedo, and Brother Brimstone at the wall in Daredevil to see if any would stick. They didn’t. This after an incredible arc starting in Daredevil #50 with Starr Saxon discovering DD’s secret identity, which culminated in #57 where DD revealed his identity to Karen Page. No, Thomas hadn’t hit a slump or writer’s block. The reality was that writing six monthly titles under Goodman’s single-issue edict must have been grueling.

Perhaps Conan and arguably The Incredible Hulk could thrive in that format, but Dr. Strange, Daredevil, and Sub-Mariner had improved as serials, where even if a foe was defeated in an issue or two, they made up a part of much longer story arcs. Gene Colan could stretch out stories with ease, but in a single issue often ran out of room, forcing the story to an uneasy conclusion in the last page—or even the final panel.

Michael Lang put it succinctly in the lettercol of Daredevil #67: “As for DD #61, BOO—BOO! Here you take three great villains, the Jester, the Cobra and Mr. Hyde, and concluded the story in one issue. We Marvelites don’t want you to stop your continued stories or confused sub-plots. How could you combine the FF’s fight with Dr. Doom [#84–87] into one story? Or DD’s fight with Saxon?

Or the Sub-Mariner’s story about the Serpentine Helmet?”

In the June 1970 Marvel books, Stan included a survey, asking people to respond to, “Hey, man, these are my favorite type of plots”; “These are the kind of yarns that turn me off”; “If I were you Stan (ugh!), these are the changes I’d make at Marvel.”

Clearly, to paraphrase Bob Dylan: “You know something’s wrong here, but you don’t know what it is, Mr. Lee…” With Kirby’s departure looming, the new-story policy backfiring among fans, and printing costs forcing a temporary lowering of the page count from 20 to 19, Stan’s survey showed, for the first time, confusion at the top—after nine years of “facing forward” with unquestioning confidence.

It’s not that 1970 was universally bad, just wildly inconsistent. After months of Amazing Spider-Man watered down with too little story and art by John Buscema and Jim Mooney creating vague Romita impersonations, Stan and John Romita re-teamed for a three-part story beginning in Spider-Man #83. The Schemer muscles in on Kingpin’s territory, while the Kingpin’s wife seems to split her allegiance between both crooks. (Of course, in Romita’s glamorous art, even a fat, bald,

The Thunder Silenced (top) Lee and Kirby at their zenith with Galactus, in Thor #160 (Jan. 1969). (bottom) By issue #174 (Mar. 1970), Stan and Jack were phoning it in with Crypto-Man. Kirby was also beginning his exodus to DC Comics around this time.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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Hopping Mad (left) Amazing Spider-Man #81 (Feb. 1970): The title hits rock bottom with the Kangaroo. (right) Spider-Man #98 (July 1971): Stan is back on top with Spidey’s non-Comic Code “drug” issues.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

with dull colors. To add insult to injury, many of those covers were festooned and ugly criminal has a beautiful wife.) This plotline was a throwback to an earlier Lee/Romita era of Spider-Man and it played to Stan’s strengths: with more blurbs, captions, and word balloons than on interior panels.

Gil Kane produced scads of covers a month, but at such a dizzying pace, a multi-part story, with multiple characters, subplots, and father-and-son few ranked with his Green Lantern masterpieces. Stan was too busy to overtensions. Sigmund Freud meets Shakespeare in a 15-cent action comic.

Suddenly, Amazing Spider-Man was on a roll again, first with Romita see art corrections or to maintain the singular look of Marvel covers, so that giving Black Widow an Emma Peel leather costume, then in the Dr. outstanding ones, like Daredevil #80, The Avengers #92, and Barry Smith’s Octopus story that ended in the death of Captain Stacy. Fans had wanted Conan covers were exceptions during this phase, and not the norm.

Elsewhere at Marvel, the expansion of 1968 had contracted by the someone Spidey could entrust his secret identity to. Well, Captain Stacy knew the truth, but only revealed that just before dying. In Spider-Man #89 to 92, end of 1970. The Silver Surfer joined Dr. Strange in cancellation. Nick Fury was literally killed off (before an awkward rebirth in Avengers #72).

Gil Kane delivered his elongated figures, rubbery style, and dramatic In retrospect, Fury and the good doctor could have easily been rooftop views of NYC, with just enough of Romita’s inks on re-teamed in Strange Tales, and the Surfer could have joined the principals’ faces to keep consistency for longtime fans. the Inhumans in Amazing Adventures with some quip Again the pendulum swings, and a few disjointed, from Stan: “We couldn’t bear to deprive you fans of mediocre issues follow. The return of the Beetle, another these wacky heroes, so we combined them to give villain who fit in the pre-1965 Marvel but seemed out you more for your shekels, true believers!” of place in 1971, is brief in #94, and made briefer by Instead, supporting characters like Black Widow a retelling of Spidey’s origin. Sal Buscema was a major and Ka-Zar were given a chance in the split-format talent and a workhorse. However, his inking on Romita books. Their success often dependent on the quality of was not flattering. Actually, it seemed to literally flatten the art. As long as a character was new, Marvel gave the art, making it look two-dimensional and almost it a shot, much like DC had in the Creeper/Hawk and the crude. This art team continued in #95 where Spidey Dove/Bat Lash era. Similar to DC, the first batch of new goes to London to follow Gwen and encounters Marvel titles like Red Wolf, Claws of the Cat, Gunhawks, terrorists. The story shows the weakness of a single-issue and Night Nurse didn’t last long. Even Conan was plot without a notable foe, subplots, or interesting john romita nearly canceled before becoming a major success. secondary characters. Stan the Man comes back strong Stan’s Soapbox of January 1971 stated: “Even though with Gil Kane on the three-part Green Goblin story, the © Marvel. famous drug issues that didn’t have the seal of the Comics Code Authority. we long ago tossed in the sponge—even though we’ve been running When Stan concentrated and allowed himself the luxury of a continued as many continued stories as ever for the past few months—we still get hundreds of letters a week demanding the return to continued stories!” story, he could provide action, entertainment, and a social message!

Perhaps Stan doth protesteth too much. Spider-Man mixed single-issue Another casualty of the early ’70s slump was the classic Marvel cover.

In the late ’60s, eye-catching covers by Steranko on Nick Fury, Romita on stories with longer ones, because the character was dependent on a large Spider-Man, Neal Adams on X-Men, and Kirby on Captain America, Thor, and cast of evolving characters. But the first seven months of 1970 brought Fantastic Four abounded, all under Stan Lee’s strict art direction. Bullpen seven single-issue Fantastic Four stories. Most Marvel titles followed the FF. artists like Marie Severin and John Romita have stated that as editor, Lee The occasional two-part stories were often shorn of the subplots that spent as much time on the Silver Age covers as the stories themselves. sometimes ran through as many as ten consecutive issues. But fans were But by 1970, the character or title sold the comic, not the cover. really demanding a return to excellence. Spoiled by Marvel between 1966 And when the amount of Marvel titles doubled, the vivid coloring and big and 1969, readers bemoaned the loss of a quality that made them feel symbolic images got traded for rough sketches by Romita, Buscema, and the characters were real. Characters that changed, grew, made mistakes, Marie Severin, hastily inked by Sal Buscema or John Verpoorten, and finished and then learned from them. Complex, haunted villains like Dr. Doom, Bronze Age Events Issue

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Rascally Roy’s Bouncing Acts Max Talley contends that the work of writer Roy Thomas, Stan’s #2 man, also fluctuated during Lee’s twilight: (far left) After the landmark Daredevil #57 (Oct. 1969), (center left) the thrill was gone one year later. (center right) The unsightly Brain-Child in Avengers #86 (Mar. 1971) marked a rare dip in one of Marvel’s most consistent titles, but Thomas’ last year on the book is one sustained high note, including (far right) this iconic Neal Adams issue featuring the Kree–Skrull War. TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

Galactus, Ego the Living Planet, and Kingpin had been displaced by … Brutivac, the Tribune, Stunt-Master, Commander Kraken, the Prowler, and Monocle!!!

Amazing Spider-Man #100 (Sept. 1971) had a classic, iconic Romita cover. At that point, Roy Thomas stepped in for four issues. Throughout the ’60s, Thomas inherited strips from Stan like The Avengers, X-Men, and Dr. Strange and made them his own. Although no other writer at Marvel was as qualified to take over Spider-Man, those issues have a decidedly different feel to them. Stan might claim the Silver Surfer was the character closest to his heart, but Spider-Man’s success had made Stan, as much as he (with Ditko, and then Romita) made Spider-Man. Lee had written a hundred issues, along with several Annuals, two Spectaculars, and special issues. Spider-Man had become the most popular title at Marvel, and in a mere ten years, a rival to Superman’s 30-year reign as the most-popular comic character.

In my singular opinion, while some of Marvel’s lesspopular characters have been interpreted as well and sometimes better by other writers after Stan, both The Amazing Spider-Man and The Fantastic Four were so imbued with Stan’s voice that they’ve never been written as well by others as they were during his 12-year run.

That being said, Roy Thomas and Gil Kane had fun giving Spidey four extra arms, having him battle Morbius and the Lizard, and then sending him off to the Savage Land with Ka-Zar and Kraven the Hunter. If anything, these issues look like a tryout for the soon-to-appear Marvel Team-Up, where Spidey would team with Morbius, or the Torch, among others, often in stories drawn by Gil Kane (or Ross Andru) and written by Roy Thomas (or Gerry Conway)—Marvel’s answer to DC’s The Brave and The Bold.

On other fronts, Captain America went from a comic that had Steranko, Kirby, Romita, and Buscema doing classic art over a six-month period, that had Stan Lee writing excellent philosophical stories about Cap’s place amid the turmoil of protests and youth culture, to a dull phase during 1970 and 1971. Gene Colan and Joe Sinnott started out great. But after Sinnott left, an overworked Colan, brutally inked by Dick Ayers, rushed out single-issue stories with tired plots, even borrowing from Easy Rider. Captain America #127 (July 1970) was a rare gem. Wally Wood’s inking dominated and made one forget the silly plot, where the suspicions of one Aryan-looking scientist at S.H.I.E.L.D. convince Nick Fury that Cap is a traitor. Not even Tom Palmer’s inks could save Stan’s threadbare story in #135 about a scientist turning into a gorilla. True believers would have hoped that DC had a binding copyright on gorilla stories.

The only bright spots in Cap had been the addition of the Falcon and the resuscitation of Nick Fury from limbo

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as a supporting character. Switching Romita to Captain America gave the title a shot in the arm for another six months, but the storylines wouldn’t go beyond fun, basic action until Steve Englehart took over late in 1972.

After Kirby’s last Fantastic Four, issue #102 (Sept. 1970), John Romita got called in to basically impersonate Kirby so that younger buyers (who did not follow artists names or inside info) would see continuity.

“If you look at those issues, you’ll see everything was taken from Jack,” Romita told Roy Thomas in Alter Ego #9. “If there’s any Romita in there, it’s only because I couldn’t find a shot to swipe!”

John Buscema soon replaced him, with Joe Sinnott’s embellishments keeping the Kirby-era sheen. Buscema also took over Thor. Some fans mourned the loss of the old John Buscema, the strikingly original artist of Silver Surfer, The Avengers, and Sub-Mariner, to the ’70s Marvel workhorse.

He was forced by his immense workload to gravitate toward layouts/breakdowns and a style dependent on the quality of the inker finishing his work. This same transition occurred with Gene Colan. He, and both John and Sal Buscema, seemed to be everywhere in the early ’70s. Unlike Kirby in his prime, when most artists had to draw three or four monthly comics, the quality of their work varied wildly.

What is amazing is that Stan Lee had time to do any great writing. He had become the P. T. Barnum, the spokesman, and cheerleader of all things Marvel.

Certainly, giving speeches to young, appreciative crowds at colleges must have been more enjoyable than the solitary life of a writer dreaming up monthly adventures under a deadline. Not only was Stan touring, he met with film directors Frederico Fellini and Alan Resnais to collaborate on a movie script. Magazines demanded interviews, while other distractions like Marvelmania came and went, as well as the Carnegie Hall “A Night with Stan Lee” show in 1972.

Many things happened in 1972. Martin Goodman stepped down as publisher. He left his son Chip in charge.

After decades at Timely and Marvel, Stan Lee had to take orders from a young, inexperienced boss, “to Stan’s chagrin,” as Roy Thomas said. Thankfully, Stan would soon be the official publisher, while Roy Thomas got promoted to editor-in-chief for a dizzying two years.

Once Stan returned from his writing vacation in March of 1972, he allowed Thor to remain in the hands of Gerry Conway and Captain America with Gary Friedrich. His authorial thumbprint on the Marvel Universe was reduced to Spider-Man and the Fantastic Four. In retrospect, it seems obvious he was moving away from writing, but at the time, before fan press and the Internet, it was not. Once “Stan Lee Presents” was

A Sad Day for True Believers Amazing Spider-Man #118 (Mar. 1973)—the last monthly comic issue with the Man’s name in the writing credits. Stan Lee-autographed copy courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com).

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

emblazoned on every Marvel issue, the young or incurious assumed he was writing, or creating (or at least presenting) on a monthly basis.

Stan did produce some last Spider-Man issues of merit. The Spider-Slayer story in issues #105–107 was a throwback to both the Ditko and earlier Romita eras. And the following two-parter in #108 and 109 (May and June 1972) involving Flash Thompson marked for murder due to his innocent involvement in the destruction of a sacred temple in Vietnam has been cited by John Romita as his own favorite. For once, Flash (burdened with a name closer to Moose and Jughead in Archie comics) seemed to have a personality beyond his two-dimensional “He loves Spidey but hates Peter Parker” characterization. Stan even threw in Dr. Strange to the mix! In my opinion, this is the last really great Stan Lee Spider-Man story, and the inspired art, solely by Romita, helps, too.

The transition from Lee to Gerry Conway began soon after. Lee is credited on a few later issues, but in the case of the Smasher story #116–118, it was a curious hodge-podge of Lee’s 1968 story from Spectacular Spider-Man #1 and new material by Conway.

Marvel expanded rapidly; new titles appeared on almost a monthly basis. The eventual success of Conan—largely due to Roy Thomas, and the stunning art of Barry (Windsor-) Smith, led to the black-and-white Savage Tales, which led to a black-and-white magazine line. The advent of new comics and magazines demanded more writers. Doug Moench, Steve Gerber, and Don McGregor—young talent that had grown up as Marvel readers—showed up at the Marvel offices hungry for work. The 18-year-old Gerry Conway had inherited Daredevil then Sub-Mariner from Thomas, and Thor from Stan. Archie Goodwin took the reins on Hulk, but relinquished Iron Man—which It was the rapid handover of the smooth blend of the floundered with weak writing for years after (and was complimentary writing styles of Lee and Thomas to almost folded into the Daredevil title in 1971). gerry conway fannish newcomers with less reverence for Marvel Eventually, after 70 issues, Roy Thomas gave up history that created some initial awkward moments. © The Monster Times. Special thanks to Al Bigley. his beloved Avengers to Steve Englehart. “I was just too Gerry Conway brought back the cosmic opus aspect on Thor (see busy and needed to drop something, otherwise, I’d have kept The Avengers in particular,” Thomas says. “Busy” is an understatement. Thomas was #210–220) that had been lacking since 1968. After slowly developing his immersed in writing monthly Conan projects, not to mention Kull, comic writing skills on Daredevil for a year, reducing his initial tendency not to mention the first issues of the numerous new non-superhero to overwrite, Conway did stellar work on issues #86–95, teaming DD titles. Not to mention his promotion to editor-in-chief, overseeing a with Black Widow in an adult relationship and then moving them out much-expanded line of comics, when Stan became Marvel’s publisher. to San Francisco (exquisitely rendered by the Colan/Palmer art team).

Englehart, along with Frank Brunner, created the definitive ’70s By this time, after 1971’s brief rise to larger 25-cent books, then retreat to 20-cent ones, Marvel effectively overtook National Periodical version of Dr. Strange in Marvel Premiere, and then in Strange’s renewed Publications (DC Comics) sales-wise when DC decided to continue at title. Englehart also made Captain America thought-provoking again 25 cents for over a year. DC took a hit and Marvel became number one. after years of a kind of Groundhog Day syndrome. Despite a definite shift in art quality on The Avengers, Englehart delighted Bronze Age fans There is no doubt that Marvel had climbed out of its 1970 slump and reigned triumphant. They had numerous comic titles, a magazine line, with his Avengers–Defenders crossover series. He could tell complex market dominance, and more writers and artists to fill the increased stories with character development over long arcs.

As the ’70s continued, there was always the amount of pages. The only losses were in Stan’s retirement as a writer, and the end of the strict Marvel continuity and quality control that he and hope that some day Stan Lee would return to Thomas had maintained up to that point. Steve Englehart’s ham-fisted writing monthly Spider-Man or FF comics, or attempt to reframe the classic Lee/Steranko Captain America #110–113 even Annuals. Sadly, besides a special Spider-Man story in The Avengers #106 was an example of something that might not issue here or Silver Surfer book there, that day have happened under Stan’s editorial control. However one feels about has not yet come. Let’s hope that the youthful the death of Gwen Stacy as authored by Gerry Conway, it would not have nonagenarian (how many of those do you slid by Stan if he’d been active editor-in-chief, or a hands-on publisher. know?) will stick around to become a centenarian.

“If I agreed to it [Gwen’s death], it was probably because I had my Because that sounds like a Marvel character! mind on something else,” Stan told Roy Thomas in Comic Book Artist MAX TALLEY is a writer/musician living in Santa #2. “I was careless, because if I’d really considered it, I would have said, Barbara, California. His dystopian sci-fi novel ‘Roy, let’s talk this over.’ ” Yesterday We Forget Tomorrow is available on Not that either Conway or Englehart were blundering oafs. They were amazon.com, damnationbooks.com, as well as in extremely intelligent writers who quickly matured into major Marvel talents. discerning California bookstores.

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It was July of 1973. The Watergate hearings were in full swing, “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown” was a number-one hit for Jim Croce, and Live and Let Die, the eighth James Bond film, was out in theaters. Comics were still a bargain at 20 cents and were a great summertime diversion.

Sadly, though, that summer there would be no King-Sized Annuals from Marvel Comics to provide some extra zing. But writer Steve Englehart would come to the rescue. He devised a plan to give readers a special summer treat: a multi-issue, multi-month matchup between two titanic super-teams that would move back and forth between two different titles! This was a new idea, and a daring one, too.

It was a matchup of establishment heroes against outsiders, friends against friends, and had more superheroes than you could shake an uru mallet at!

This was…

THE AVENGERS–DEFENDERS WAR!

THE WARM-UP

by

The idea of super-teams battling was not a new one, of course. It had happened repeatedly throughout comics history. Typically, teams would meet, perhaps briefly fight due to an initial misunderstanding, and then join forces against a common foe. This would all take place within one title, usually even one issue.

In the Marvel Universe, the first such team vs. team confrontation took place in Fantastic Four #26 (cover-dated May 1964), when the Avengers and Fantastic Four came into conflict while going after the Hulk. And so it would go, teams occasionally running into one another and scuffling before they worked things out.

By 1973, the Avengers had been around for a full decade and had seen numerous roster changes. They were arguably the number-one team at Marvel, and had established themsteve englehart selves as major leaguers with the Kree–Skrull War, an epic story arc, Photo credit: Alan Light. just a couple of years before.

The Defenders, on the other hand, while composed of some of Marvel’s heaviest hitters like the Hulk, Sub-Mariner, and Dr. Strange, was a team of outcasts and iconoclasts. The Defenders, as a team, had only been around for two years, appearing first in Marvel Feature #1 (Dec. 1971) and continuing for two more issues of that title before getting their own book in 1972.

Roy Thomas would write the team’s first three appearances in Marvel Feature; Steve Englehart would take over with the first issue of The Defenders. The Silver Surfer was added to the mix and the cast was further

“You Wouldn’t Like Me When I’m Angry” The man-mountains mix it up in the conclusion of the Avengers–Defenders War! From The Defenders #10 (Nov. 1973) and the team of Steve Englehart/Sal Buscema/Frank Bolle.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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Karen Walker

expanded with the addition of the Valkyrie. Holding such disparate personalities together was no easy task for Dr. Strange, and the Defenders gained the nickname of “the non-team”—they never really wanted to admit they were a team!

Englehart had also been writing The Avengers since issue #105, again taking the reins from Thomas. It was because Englehart was writing both of these team titles that he came up with the idea for what would become the Avengers–Defenders War (or Clash, as he prefers to call it). “I had gotten used to reading the Annuals in the summer, and when they said, ‘This year we’re not gonna do it,’ I just thought, ‘Well, then, what can I do that would be sort of a special thing for the readers, that wouldn’t require a whole separate book like an Annual?’ And I was writing both The Avengers and The Defenders at that point and I thought, I could do a story in which they fought each other, and it would last all summer long. And that would be a fun thing for people for the summer.”

The story mostly arrived through serendipity. But there was some inspiration from comics Englehart had enjoyed as a reader: “The whole idea of Avengers vs.

Defenders was certainly coming from what DC used to do, with the JLA and the JSA fighting it out. I mean, Roy had done things like that with the Squadron Supreme vs. the Avengers. I had basically all the cool Marvel characters—well, not all, but most of the cool Marvel characters at that time at my disposal—I mean, how could you not have fun doing that?”

While crossovers are practically the norm today, they were unheard of in 1973. Then-editor-in-chief Roy Thomas was enthused about the idea, but had concerns about giving the go-ahead. “If one [book] was late, we probably would have had to delay another one,” Thomas says. “It would have been really bad.

But it worked out all right. I don’t remember any particular close calls. So it worked out okay, and it’s been reprinted a couple of times, so certainly it’s a sort of a landmark, for the first real back-and-forth crossover between books on that kind of scale. It showed it could be done.”

Handling the art chores on the two titles were two veterans: Bob Brown on The Avengers and Sal Buscema on The Defenders. Of his collaborators, Englehart remarks, “I knew Sal; I’d worked with Sal pretty much from the start of my career. I mean, the first thing I did was the Beast [in Amazing Adventures], but the second thing I did was Defenders and then Captain America, and I was working with Sal. And I’ve often said thank God for that, because Sal was the guy who could draw anything easily. I mean, I never had to worry about, ‘Is this too complicated?’ or ‘Is this too weird?’ I just would think up whatever idea was a cool idea to me and I had learned that I could hand that off to Sal and would get back that story told clearly and competently and all that kind of stuff. So I attribute some part of whatever I did in comics to the fact that my first real long-term artist was someone who could facilitate anything I thought up. Bob Brown I knew less well personally but I’d been a big fan of his for years when he was at DC doing Challengers of the Unknown. So when he came over to Marvel, I was very familiar with his work, and didn’t have any worries.”

Although the head-to-head battles are obviously the focus of this saga, a word or two should be said about the setup. Two big-time villains were behind it all: Dormammu, extra-dimensional foe of Dr. Strange, and Loki, thorn in the side of both the Avengers and his stepbrother, Thor. Englehart explains why he chose

THE AVENGERS–DEFENDERS WAR: A FIGHT-BY-FIGHT BREAKDOWN

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All A-Board!

The battle begins in (right) The Avengers #116 (Oct. 1973).

Cover by John Romita/ Mike Esposito. (left) A dynamic fight scene

by Bob Brown and Esposito from that issue. Original art courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com).

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

these two: “ I was going for the sort of supernaturaloverlord kind of thing to put this together. I mean, it had to be an entity strong enough to get the Avengers and the Defenders fighting each other.” Dormammu takes advantage of the Defenders’ efforts to help former Avenger the Black Knight reunite his spirit with his body, which had been turned to stone. He fakes a message from the Knight’s spirit to Dr. Strange, saying the only thing that can free him from the Netherworld is a mystic artifact called the Evil Eye. The Eye had previously been seen with the character Prester John in Fantastic Four #54 and was believed destroyed, but had really been split into six pieces, scattered around the globe. In actuality, the Eye would allow Dormammu to extend his dimension into Earth’s and invade it.

Why include the Evil Eye, an artifact from an obscure Fantastic Four story? Because Englehart was a fan before he was a writer. “I totally bought into the whole ‘Marvel is a continuous, connected reality’ thing, and you know, Stan had done the continuity, and Roy and everybody had continued it, and so did I.

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I totally understand why it’s a problem and thus has been jettisoned 50 years into the whole deal, but at that point we were only ten years into it. Prester John’s [story] was perfectly legit to work with, and I wanted to do something that came from the solid Marvel reality.”

Loki is basically along for the ride, having been blinded not long before in Thor #207. He assists Dormammu in exchange for a promise of having his sight restored. However, he soon has doubts, and tattles to the Avengers. But being Loki, he can’t do anything in a straightforward manner. He tells the Avengers that the Defenders plan to use the Eye to conquer the world. The Avengers are already suspicious of Dr. Strange, as they had been searching for the Knight, and heard (wrongly) that he had been kidnapped by the magician. Loki’s information about the Eye is the final straw and sets the Avengers off to recover the Eye before the Defenders do.

Readers remember the Avengers–Defenders War for the matchups, and Englehart enjoyed the process of setting up these confrontations: “One thing that I really liked about it was sitting there and going, ‘Okay, who’s gonna fight who? And why, and in what order, and how is that going to fit into the overall story?’ I love stuff like that. The whole plotting, fitting pieces together, making it all into a whole, I love that. It was fun. Some people—Hawkeye vs. Iron Man, Captain America vs. Sub-Mariner—those were kind of obvious things to do, because of their histories, and the Swordsman vs. the Valkyrie, because they both had swords. I wanted to find a way to make each of those battles actually make sense, too, and not just, let’s throw one hero against the other hero. Again, I do what I do and I was trying to tell a story and develop character and all that kind of stuff, in addition to all the spectacle of the thing. So it was fun for me to lay out who’s gonna fight who, in what order, in which book, and how is that going to lead out to the end.”

ROUND ONE: SILVER SURFER VS. THE VISION AND THE SCARLET WITCH (Avengers #116, Oct. 1973) The first matchup in the Avengers–Defenders War starts off with a bang—it features the Silver Surfer facing the Vision and the Scarlet Witch against the backdrop of an erupting volcano! Englehart says, “In putting together the different confrontations, the connecting point there really was the kind of alien-ness of both the Surfer and the Vision. The kind of humanity back behind the ‘odd skin’ kind of approach. I didn’t have room or the inclination to hit that over the head but that was the linchpin of that to me. The kind of ‘repressed human’ Surfer versus the ‘repressed human’ Vision. Plus, I started with them because I really like Wanda and the Vision—and I liked the Surfer, too, for that matter—so overall I thought they made an interesting group to get people in the door. ‘Surfer vs. the Vision and Wanda—that sounds like an interesting thing. I guess I’ll read the next issue.’ ” Wanda is injured by a volcanic explosion, which the Vision assumes is an attack, and he becomes enraged. He tackles the Surfer in the heart of the volcano. Artist Bob Brown does a terrific job portraying the chaos and fury as the two opponents struggle waistdeep in magma. The Eye is exposed in the volcano, but the Vision sees the unconscious Scarlet Witch in the path of molten lava and has to make a decision—Wanda or the Eye. It’s no decision at all, and as he saves her, the Surfer makes off with the Eye. Round One goes to the Defenders, and a dismayed sentinel of the spaceways heads off to warn his teammates that the Avengers have inexplicably become their foes.

Instituto Technologico and discovers a professor there who has a piece of the Eye. It looks like it’s going to be an easy trip until a grappling-hook arrow suddenly pulls the Eye out of the Golden Avenger’s hand. The fight is on!

Hawkeye runs his mouth (as usual), declaring he’s going to walk away with the Eye. Iron Man tells Hawkeye he’s always had a swelled head—“First you thought you were better than me—then, once you joined the Avengers, it was Cap—then the whole team!” He can’t believe he was the one who backed Hawkeye for membership. As the fight goes on it certainly looks like Iron Man has the upper hand. He condescendingly tells Hawkeye that because he was once a good man, he’ll knock him out lightly. But the archer manages to deflect the Armored Avenger’s repulsor beam so it strikes a construction site.

With a building collapsing, Iron Man flies off to protect people, while Hawkeye makes off with the Eye. Of this battle, Englehart says, “Their relationship began—that’s primal Marvel; not all the way back to the beginning, but pretty far back, Hawkeye and Iron Man. So they both had a long history. I think both of them would really have liked to have beaten the other one. Not that they hated each other so much, but they’d been sort of butting heads over time, and I think that was kind of what I took out of their relationship. You know, Hawkeye would really like to beat the more popular, powerful Iron Man, and Iron Man just thought Hawkeye was too much humorous, too satisfied with himself.”

ROUND 3: DR. STRANGE VS. THE BLACK PANTHER AND MANTIS (Defenders #9, Oct. 1973) Perhaps the strangest of all the matchups in the Avengers– Defenders War is this third one. The foes seemingly have no connections, nor do they align on the basis of power type or level. So why set this particular fight up? “That was a favorite of mine,” Englehart responds, “because it was odd.

I mean, there’s nobody who can fight Dr. Strange one-onone, when he’s using his powers. So that story I really liked because, what the Hell are they going to do? Either one of them, or both together.

So it was a story about courage, and we may get mowed down here ’cause we can’t really fight this guy but we’re gonna figure out some way to make it happen because we’re Avengers.”

Dr. Strange, Mantis, and the Black Panther all wind up in a

ROUND TWO: HAWKEYE VS. IRON MAN (Defenders #9, Oct. 1973) The second bout features the most personal of all the battles, as the two players with the deepest connection go at it in a no-holds-barred contest where the wounds are not just physical. Hawkeye was playing for the Defenders here, but that was a recent development; he’d just met up with the team in Defenders #7. Prior to this, he had a long and colorful history with the Avengers, starting with the classic issue #16 (May 1965), where he and Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch joined the ranks of the team, marking the first major lineup change. His history with Iron Man goes back to his very origin, in Tales of Suspense #57 (Sept. 1964). At that time, Hawkeye was a former carnival archer who wanted to be a superhero, but wound up on the wrong side of the law—and Iron Man. Nearly nine years later, he’d be fighting him again.

Dropped off in Mexico City by the Valkyrie, Hawkeye soon spots the gleaming form of Iron Man overhead. Iron Man heads to the

They’ve Got Hawkeye’s Back Iron Man’s in for a rude awakening on this powerful Sal Buscema cover to The Defenders #9 (Oct. 1973).

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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cornfield in Fort Wayne, Indiana, searching for a piece of the Evil Eye. Strange finds the artifact, and, wishing to avoid a fight, casts an illusion about himself, to appear like a normal person. But Mantis, with her preternatural abilities, senses something is not right and attacks him.

And from there, the two badly outclassed Avengers try—unsuccessfully— to obtain the Eye. What’s truly interesting about this segment is how it shaped future Avengers stories: “Mantis, when I introduced her, my idea was that she was gonna be a temptress,” Englehart explains. “She was gonna be this sort of exotic temptress who was going to mess with the minds of all the male members of the team. And I no sooner got her into the book that I said, ‘Hey, Roy, how about doing this crossover thing?’ So all of a sudden—I had said she was going to be a temptress but the first thing she had to do was go out and be an effective teammate as an Avenger.

And that changed her completely. That’s where she stopped being this kind of disruptive force and became somebody who obviously had a lot more heroism in her than I had planned for her to have. And that started the whole Celestial Madonna thing. It’s the seed leading to an oak tree over time.”

ROUND 4: VALKYRIE VS. THE SWORDSMAN (Avengers #117, Nov. 1973) This was a rather obvious bout to set up: Each team had a resident sword-slinger. Both had at one time been villains. The Swordsman had started out in his debut as an infiltrator sent by the Mandarin to destroy the Avengers, but he couldn’t go through with it. He’d continued a criminal career, but when he met Mantis, he found himself wanting to change, to redeem himself. He’d gone back to the Avengers and asked to join—and was surprisingly given a second chance. Englehart brought in the Swordsman and Mantis during his run to shake up things, and they did that. But the Swordsman also gave readers the

portrait of a man who was striving to make up for the past, always trying to prove himself—and never quite succeeding. It was touching and unlike anything we’d seen before.

The Valkyrie had once menaced the Avengers, too—but that was truly a completely different person, as the original Valkyrie had simply been another guise for Asgardian villainess the Enchantress.

The Valkyrie who joined the Defenders was a lost soul, a cipher who wore the body of a mortal woman but had a personality all her own.

As she struggled to find herself, the Defenders became her family.

These two met in Bolivia, where, oddly enough, they found a European castle in the middle of a jungle. The Swordsman gets to the castle first and discovers its sole occupant, a mysterious American.

The man allows the Avenger in and tells him he’s only been there a few months. He says the castle was originally built by an escaped Nazi. The conversation doesn’t go much further before the Valkyrie appears, and the battle is joined. The two are well matched, with Swordsman having an edge in skill, but the blonde-tressed Defender possesses much greater strength. They crash all around the castle, finally discovering a treasure horde and the piece of the Eye. The Swordsman grabs the prize, but suddenly their host appears, armed with a ray gun, and blasts the Avenger in the back!

The Swordsman falls, but not before he lashes out with his blade at his attacker. Valkyrie comes in to take the Eye, but she checks on her foe, ensuring that his wound is not lethal. He’s earned her respect, but she still leaves with the Eye just as local police arrive.

In this pairing, although the swords were an obvious connection, Englehart also liked the contrast between the two characters—the strong woman and the weak man: “The two of them, it was a nice sort of role reversal from what you might expect if you didn’t know either one of them.” It also helped further the Swordsman’s “beautiful loser” persona: “I kind of wanted to show his weakness, and so her strength was a good way to get at that.”

Although the match was an exciting one, the setting itself seemed to make little sense. Why was there a castle in the jungle?

Who was the man and why was he hiding there? When originally written, the owner of the castle was intended to have been a suspect in the Watergate conspiracy who was hiding out to avoid prosecution. However, at the time of publication, no one had been convicted for anything related to that incident, and it was thought best to leave that aspect out of the tale. So it came across more than a little odd.

ROUND 5: SUB-MARINER VS. CAPTAIN AMERICA (Avengers #117, Nov. 1973) This round features two antagonists whose histories extend back past the Marvel era and into the very beginnings of superhero comics.

Sub-Mariner was the first of the two to appear, in Timely Comics’ premiere book, Marvel Comics #1, cover-dated October 1939.

Cap would come along almost two years later, in Captain America Comics #1. They appeared together along with the Human Torch, the Torch’s sidekick Toro, Cap’s sidekick Bucky, and Timely heroes the Whizzer and Miss America as members of the All-Winners Squad in All Winners Comics #19 (Fall 1946) and 21 (Winter 1946).

Their historic origins seem an obvious hook here. “That one was bringing the two World War II characters that knew each other in the Marvel history—Cap, Sub-Mariner, that just seemed like I had to do that and it would be fun to do,” Englehart says. “But the Japanese character [Sunfire] was also a nod toward WWII; it wasn’t overt but that’s what my thinking was encompassing at that point. But, yeah, they had a history just like Hawkeye and Iron Man had a history, so it gave me something to talk about while these two were fighting over their piece of the puzzle.”

First in Fight Two of Marvel’s Golden Agers, Captain America and Sub-Mariner, revisit an old grudge on this punchy Romita/Esposito cover to Avengers #117 (Nov. 1973).

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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Cap reaches Japan to find that Namor already has the Eye in hand. Arrogant as always, Subby tells Cap he’s heard that the Star-Spangled Avenger has recently gained limited super-strength (Captain America #158), “But my strength is unlimited”—and then he essentially dares Cap to take the Eye from him by force! It’s largely a contest of skill and battle savvy against raw power. Cap’s newfound super-strength, while useful, is no match for an opponent who can keep the Hulk at bay. Subby pounds Cap and then makes to dive into the ocean—but is stopped by a perfectly thrown shield. Struggling in the water over the Eye, the two are surprised by a blast of flame from above. Complicating the situation is Sunfire, the Japanese mutant with a bad attitude. He grabs the Eye and berates both combatants for invading his home, and then zooms off with the artifact, with Namor following—and Cap hitching a ride on his ankle!

Englehart captures both characters’ voices perfectly in this segment, as they begin to figure out what is truly going on. Namor wrenches Cap loose and dangles him by his foot over the ocean. He complains that after all the Defenders have done to help the Black Knight, this is how the Avengers respond. Cap spits out that the Avengers know the Defenders plan to take over the universe. Sub-Mariner responds as only he could: “Your so-called mind is filled with Loki’s lies! I should drop you on your cowled cranium like the minor annoyance you are, with no further delay … yet as the only other superhuman remaining from the Second World War, you deserve better!”

Namor proceeds to explain what happened to the Knight, and how Dr. Strange believes the Eye can help restore him. And then he dumps Cap in the ocean! Cap is now uncertain about his mission. Namor clobbers Sunfire, but the mutant drops the Eye and it falls right into Cap’s hands. Cap runs off with it but can’t outrun Namor. The two realize that things are not adding up.

The Captain does hand the Eye over to the Sub-Mariner, but they decide to work together.

ROUND 6: HULK VS. THOR (Defenders #10, Nov. 1973) We come to the final, perhaps most anticipated fight: Hulk vs. Thor. The thinking on this one was simple.

“Those were the two strongest guys, so that had to be the final battle. So that’s why they came last,” Englehart says. These two had a history, having fought each other a couple of times before, both times inconclusively.

Thor catches up to the Hulk in Los Angeles to find the brute has dug up the Eye from underneath the pavement in front of a high-class hotel. The Thunder God tries to reason with the Hulk, reminding him that they were once Avengers together. The Hulk remembers— “Yes, Hulk was Avenger once … didn’t like it!”— and punches Thor right in the face. Surprisingly, Thor gathers himself up and tries to convince Hulk to give up by mentioning their past meetings and stating that he is obviously superior. This turns out to be a poor tactic. The two bash away at each other as a city gazes on in shock and fear. However, one panel depicts two young boys, each cheering on a different hero! (Marvel fans, no doubt.)

As the two fight, the destruction mounts, as does the Hulk’s anger. Thor realizes Hulk’s gone berserk, and that he has to stop him some way. The two come to a halt, grappling with each other. They struggle, immobile, for an hour, before their teammates— the combined forces of the Avengers and the Defenders— show up to put an end to their fight.

Up to this point, every matchup in the Avengers– Defenders War had provided a clear winner. Asked

about whether there was any edict that the fight should carry on the tradition of ending in a standstill, Englehart responds, “No, again, there were no suggestions. I just thought, these are both—I mean, the Hulk always beats the Thing. If they go at it, we’ve established that the Thing is not quite as strong as the Hulk. I don’t know if even today I could tell you whether the Hulk is stronger than Thor or vice versa. So it just occurred to me that maybe I didn’t need for the final battle, that was going to lead into everybody getting back together, maybe I didn’t need a winner. Maybe I could just leave it with the two of them just locked in this eternal immovable object vs. irresistible force situation, until they got interrupted by people going, ‘Hey, we don’t have to do this.’ So I thought, I could certainly stage a big, spectacular battle and one of them could beat the other, but no. Me, personally, I liked the idea that neither one could beat the other, at least within the time frame allotted.”

Artist Sal Buscema does a bang-up job on this fight.

The longtime Hulk artist clearly put his all into it. Buscema still has fond memories of working with Steve Englehart

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Big Boys and Bubble Heads Really, is it possible not to love this Romita cover to Defenders #10 (Nov. 1973)?

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Assembled!

Courtesy of Heritage, Romita original art to the cover of The Avengers #118 (Dec. 1973), featuring the conclusion of the Avengers–Defenders War. TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

probably about a month or two before it became my job to sell the Avengers. So I was protective of them.

I wanted them to look good, and show that they did belong.”

The two teams quickly put their misunderstandings behind them—they had to, as Dormammu struck, sending an agent to collect the six pieces of the Eye, which allowed the demon lord to merge his dimension with Earth. Ordinary humans began to transform into monsters, and it was up to the combined group of heroes to travel into Dormammu’s realm to stop him.

In Avengers #118, artist Bob Brown gets special accolades on the splash page for taking on a herculean effort, drawing not only both teams, but a multitude of guest-stars, as seemingly all of Marvel’s heroes (and even a few villains) pitch in to protect Earth while our heroes enter Dormammu’s dimension. Nick Fury, the Fantastic Four, Luke Cage, and even Thanos get in on the action! Over in Dormammu’s dimension, the Watcher shows up, so you know this is a big deal. Englehart says, “That was me early on, living in that reality, thinking, ‘Well, it’s big enough if—we’re still only ten years into this thing—if the Avengers and the Defenders are gonna fight it out for the fate of the universe with these gods and all this kind of stuff, other people would notice. Other people would react to it.’ You know, I’m sure that was true every month in every book, but for the climax of that thing, I wanted to go big.

So having all those other guys show up— for the one panel—just trying again to give you some scope, to make it as big an event as I could make it.”

The heroes struggle and look to be defeated, but a combination of efforts from the Scarlet Witch and Loki (of all people) wind up destroying Dormammu—at least for a little while. Everyone returns home safe on the project. “Steve and I had a great and sound. And comics were never working relationship. His writing and the same! my illustrating just seemed to click.

The Avengers–Defenders War has I’m very proud of the body of work sal buscema been reprinted repeatedly; there are we did together. As a matter of fact, several different trade-paperback I still receive compliments to this day © Marvel. about the books we did,” Buscema states. When asked versions and volume 2 of The Defenders Marvel Masterworks about the Hulk–Thor battle, and whether he might have and volume 12 of The Avengers Marvel Masterworks liked to have seen ol’ Greenskin take it, Buscema have both the Defenders and Avengers issues for the remarks, “As you surmised, Hulk–Thor would be my complete story. Fans seemingly can’t get enough of this tale. favorite, but no one beat Thor in those days.”

Even today it’s tremendously THE WRAP-UP fun to read—and isn’t that Clearly, the Defenders dominated the battles. One what you want out of a big wonders which team really should have been calling extravaganza like this? itself “Earth’s Mightiest Heroes” at this point! Was it Englehart’s plan to have the Defenders come out on Many thanks to Sal Buscema, Steve top? “Not really, not really. But it kind of broke that Englehart, and Roy Thomas for sharing way. And part of my overall thinking was, if the their time and insights.

Avengers lose every fight, nobody’s going to think, KAREN WALKER is stuck in the ’70s ‘Wow, they’re really weak and useless,’ because they’re and loving it. She is one half of the Avengers, but the Defenders were the new team on the team that proudly produces the block ... and it was my job to sell the Defenders www.bronzeagebabies.blogspot.com.

14 • BACK ISSUE • Bronze Age Events Issue

[Editor’s note: This exhaustive survey of JLA/JSA crossovers contains some SPOILERS—but hopefully they won’t diminish your enjoyment of these classic tales, some of which have been reprinted multiple times.]

I was born in July of 1961, the same month and year that the concept of Earth-Two, created by writer John Broome, artists Carmine Infantino and Joe Giella, and editor Julius Schwartz, was introduced in “Flash of Two Worlds!”, published in The Flash #123 (Sept. 1961). The Flash learned that there was another Earth— another entire universe, actually—existing in a parallel dimension, separated by a transition zone, where the superheroes and mystery men he knew only from comic books actually lived. The Flash met his counterpart, who came out of retirement to aid the Scarlet Speedster on a case. This original and older Flash had a heralded superhero career years earlier, and had also been a member of the Justice Society of America, a counterpart to the Flash’s own Justice League of America. To simplify matters (although a lengthier explanation would always be required), the then-current Flash, Barry Allen, who in time would be known as the Silver Age Flash, lived on Earth-One, and the Golden Age Flash, Jay Garrick, resided on Earth-Two. In 1963, in “Crisis on Earth-One!” and “Crisis on Earth-Two!”, published in Justice League of America #21 and 22 (Aug. and Sept. 1963), and written by Fox, illustrated by Mike Sekowsky and Bernard Sachs, and edited by Schwartz, the Justice League and the Justice Society teamed up for the first time, and this truly classic crossover blossomed into an annual event that lasted 23 endless summers. I did not read those early adventures, although I became familiar with the Justice League and various members by watching their animated adventures in The Superman/Aquaman Hour of Adventure cartoons broadcast on Saturday mornings during the late 1960s.

In 1970, my parents purchased for me my first superhero comic book, Justice League of America #82 (Aug. 1970), so that at the age of eight I was introduced to the concept of Earth-Two, the Justice Society of America, and JLA members I was not familiar with (Green Arrow and Black Canary) in one exciting and entertaining swoop. So what I had missed before, and had no real connection to, now became an integral part of my life, integral to this very day, although the continuation of Earth-Two, the Justice Society of America, and the JLA/JSA team-ups as I knew them were vanquished from my life 30 years ago, leaving only its history, its memories, and its nostalgia. And for all the research I’ve put into this article, all the focus I’ve maintained to make this a thorough history of JLA/JSA team-ups published during the Bronze Age, it is also an excursion in my own personal nostalgia.

SETTING THE STAGE FOR THE JLA/JSA’S BRONZE AGE

TM & © DC Comics.

Fox’s JLA tales were plot- and puzzle-driven, two of Schwartz’s editorial trademarks, and not character-driven, a “trademark” of DC during the Silver Age of comics. Writer Denny O’Neil changed all that when he took over the book in 1968 with JLA #66 (Nov. 1966), although it took a few issues for the changes to kick into gear. During the transition period from Silver to Bronze Age, 1968–1969, O’Neil had Diana Prince–Wonder Woman take a leave of absence (#69), J’onn J’onzz, the Martian Manhunter leave to seek out his fellow Martian refugees (#71), and Green Arrow become the social conscience of the League. Although the Bronze Age formally began in 1970, O’Neil’s first JLA/JSA team-up in the summer of 1969 set a new standard for the annual crossover by adding emotional punch and a surprising new addition to the JLA.

by

Jim Kingman

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #73 (Aug. 1969) “Star Light, Star Bright—Death Star I See Tonight!”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #74 (Sept. 1969) “Where Death Fears to Dread!

Writer: Denny O’Neil. Artists: Dick Dillin and Sid Greene. Editor: Julius Schwartz.

Justice League of America: Superman, Batman, the Flash, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, the Atom, Hawkman. Justice Society of America: Black Canary, Dr. Fate, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Dr. Mid-Nite, Superman, Red Tornado, Starman. Villain: Aquarius. Guest-star: Larry Lance.

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The Council of Living Stars banishes one JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #82 of its own, the manic-depressive Aquarius, (Aug. 1970) reducing it to nearly powerless energy to “Peril of the Paired Planets” drift through the universe, where it grows JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #83 even more psychopathic. Thus the dawning (Sept. 1970) of the rage of Aquarius eventually finds its “Where Valor Fails … Will Magic way to Earth-Two. Absorbing the energy Triumph?” of Starman’s cosmic rod and the power of Writer: Denny O’Neil. Artists: Dick Dillin one of Dr. Fate’s spells, Aquarius regains and Joe Giella. Editor: Julius Schwartz. his strength and toys with the citizens of Justice League of America: Superman, a major city. The Justice Society, along with Batman, the Flash, Green Lantern, Dinah (Black Canary) Lance’s husband, Green Arrow, Black Canary, the Atom, detective Larry Lance, battle Aquarius. But Hawkman. Justice Society of America: the star’s powers have reached a cosmic Superman, Dr. Mid-Nite, Red Tornado, level, and Aquarius sends all of Earth-Two to the Flash, Green Lantern, Dr. Fate, Johnny oblivion, its entire existence hanging by a Thunder and his Thunderbolt, Hawkman, thread in the memories of the remaining members of the JSA, who are the Spectre. Villain: Creator2. sheltered in a life-sustaining bubble conjured by Dr. Fate. Unknown to The story opens with the Superman Aquarius, Fate is able to send the android Red Tornado across the dimen- of Earth-One flying uncontrollably over sional barriers between Earth-One and Earth-Two, in hope that the only Metropolis. He eventually crashes through remaining JSAer can bring the Justice League of America to the JSA’s aid. the pavement, where he lands unconscious This was a nice setup for the climatic battle in JLA #74, a battle unlike on a subway rail. The JLA is notified and he is any other depicted in JLA before. The JLA travel to Earth-Two and are transported to the JLA satellite for treatment, forced into a skirmish with their friends in the JSA, who Aquarius has where it is determined that magic is involved brainwashed to attack them. Since Earth-Two Green Lantern’s power ring in his fall. Suddenly, Batman collapses. The has been depleted after a two-week long stay in the bubble, Hal (Green scene shifts to a one-page explanation of Lantern) Jordan easily subdues him and uses his power ring to bring Earth-One and Earth-Two (my first such Aquarius to them. Aquarius responds by sending a deadly spheroid to explanation; I had no problem following destroy our heroes, and Black Canary becomes trapped as it threatens to it). Now on Earth-Two we shift a few hours fatally roll over her. Seeing his wife’s life threatened, Larry breaks free into the past, where the Red Tornado of Aquarius’ mind control and rushes to Dinah’s aid, leaping in investigates the arrival of a front of the spheroid to take the blow himself, sacrificing his mysterious spaceship. He is life. Meanwhile, the JLA and JSA are successful in bringing captured and brought to Creator2, a cosmic contractor Earth-Two back to reality. Aquarius escapes. who intends to destroy Earths-One and -Two and then use It doesn’t get any more heartbreaking than the empty space to construct a new planet. A powerful these words: “—a large world is saved … and a magnetic device is installed in Reddy’s head, and the small world, a private world of love and devotion, android is positioned in the transition zone between ends forever!” Coupled with the sequential visual dimensions where he acts as a conduit bringing the of Black Canary’s growing agony that her husband two worlds together. is dead, it is one of the most dramatic scenes in Creator2 then unleashes web-snares to subdue the superhero comics up to that time. Even though JSA, a potential threat to his plans, and “matrix corrections” Larry Lance was not a familiar character, you to accomplish both Earths’ destruction. The web-snare couldn’t help but feel Dinah’s devastating loss. fells the Superman of Earth-Two (at which point the The combined JLA and JSA eventually defeat Superman of Earth-One begins his rampage, as there dennis o’neil Aquarius, of course (the GLs lead Aquarius into is a link between the two); Dr. Mid-Nite is downed the anti-matter universe where he is promptly (at which point Batman collapses); and the Flash of destroyed), and a mourning Black Canary chooses to leave Earth-Two Earth-Two is ensnared (and down goes the Flash of Earth-One). Earths-One for Earth-One to start a new life. and -Two brush together, and opposites shimmer into view, igniting “A few years ago,” recalls writer Martin Pasko, “I reread several fear in the populace. The JSA hold an emergency meeting to discuss a JLA/JSA stories when I was asked to write an introduction for one of course of action (the Spectre attends this meeting; keep that in mind). the volumes of DC trade paperbacks that collected the team-ups Champing at the bit, Starman soars off to find their missing friends. chronologically. I was surprised by how much more I appreciated JLA On Earth-One, Green Lantern and Green Arrow answer Hawkman’s #73–74 than when it first came out, when I’d had my usual, hypercritical summons; the Atom learns via computer that Earth-Two is being pulled comments about them published in the letter columns. What into Earth-One’s dimension; GL confirms that the transition zone is closing; impressed me most was the refreshing contrast between Fox’s scripts Atom considers any possible link between the two; and Black Canary, as heavily rewritten by Julie—all plot-plot-plot, gimmick-gimmick- formerly of Earth-Two, considers herself that link and contemplates gimmick, starring superheroes with interchangeable (or non-existent) suicide to save both worlds. Thus ends JLA #82, and it would be five personalities—and Denny’s attempt at giving the characters emotional years before I read the concluding installment. lives and extracting drama from their feelings.

I began purchasing comic-book back issues in 1975, and my first order “That probably sounds like a strange remark to the younger readers, through Richard Alf’s outfit in San Diego included Justice League of America because what I seem to be heralding as an achievement is simply #83 (not to mention JLA #92). Alf ran an advertisement in DC comics at Writing 101, and we take it for granted in comics today. But back that time and I probably selected him because San Diego was closer to then, at least in the DC books edited by the ‘old guard’ like Julie, Pasadena, California; I most likely would receive the comics I ordered sooner Mort Weisinger, and Murray Boltinoff, it was a novelty. The idea of than those unfamiliar cities advertising from the East Coast. I was finally Black Canary leaving Earth-Two to move to Earth-One to get over able to read how two Earths survived (it was obvious they had, of course, her grief at the loss of her husband was a development motivated but I didn’t know how). Creator2 has had it with the JSA thwarting his plan of by a personal human drama, rather than a science-fiction gimmick. building a new world by destroying Earths-One and -Two so he unleashes That was almost revolutionary in JLA and, on rereading it, I thought additional snare nets on the entire JSA in their secret sanctuary. One by one it was nicely executed for its time. So was Denny’s treatment of Red the Society members fall, and when Hawkman is ensnared his counterpart Tornado—specifically, the whole why-am-I-not-supposed-to-have- collapses. But it is Green Lantern who suffers the greatest setback. He is feelings-just-because-I’m-an-android shtick.” on the verge of rescuing the Red Tornado (who he calls the JSA’s “pet

Splitting Headache The Spectre’s valiant sacrifice, from Justice League of America #83 (Sept. 1970).

Original art by Dick Dillin and Joe Giella, courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions.

TM & © DC Comics.

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android”; apparently, hard-traveling time on the road with Green Arrow in GL/GA had made the Emerald Crusader a little testy), but when his EarthTwo counterpart becomes imprisoned in a wooden cage, GL is stopped in his tracks and can no longer move. Under circumstances he cannot Fly, Robin, Fly explain, Hal doesn’t trust using his ring, and doom for all draws closer.

Dr. Fate has a desperate plan, and it’s a move that really throws the story Robins of Two for a loop. He, Johnny Thunder, and Johnny’s Thunderbolt travel to a cemetery where the Spectre is imprisoned in a tomb. Apparently, the Spectre has Worlds meet— been trapped there for some time. (But how is that possible? The Spectre and the Earth-One attended the JSA meeting in the previous issue!) The Spectre has his own plan, and he, Dr. Fate, and Thunderbolt head off to outer space to confront Teen Wonder sports Creator2 directly. The Spectre enlarges himself and wedges his essence these Neal Adamsbetween the two worlds, while Fate and Thunderbolt make a direct assault on Creator2’s spaceship. Fate is injured, and Thunderbolt cannot tackle designed threads the deed alone. Fate is able to exert a devastating spell that destroys the that the Earth-Two ship, Creator2, and his minions. With the threat vanquished, the device in Reddy’s head is disabled and the worlds pull safely apart. However, the version would soon force of the retraction tears the Spectre apart, and with a tear in his eye claim as his own he is destroyed. Fate sends a message of explanation to Red Tornado, who fills in Green Lantern. Meanwhile, on Earth-One, with the threat in the pages of averted, the Black Canary no longer needs to contemplate suicide.

All-Star Comics.

I asked Denny O’Neil if he had a problem juggling so many characters, and if there were there ones he was particular From JLA #92. fond of. He seemed to like Dr. Mid-Nite, making him TM & © DC Comics. an equivalent to Batman in JLA #82. “I responded to the Doc because I remember reading his stories as a kid,” O’Neil explains. “And generally, I’m not a big fan of large casts. I guess I want a tight plot focus— recognizable hero and antagonist, clear conflicts, complete resolutions. Hard to do that stuff with a mob.”

This is the only JLA/JSA crossover that features I also mentioned to O’Neil his giving the Spectre a members of the JLA and their exact counterparts: major role in JLA #83 and then killing him off. Did he Superman, Flash, Green Lantern, Atom, and Hawkman. have an issue with the character, or was he just trying An alien boy, A-Rym, and his pet, Teppy, are separated to top JLA #74? “I was never fond of the Spectre,” in the dimensional space between Earths-One and replies O’Neil. “I seem to resist the supernatural and, -Two, with the boy catapulted to Earth-Two and the mike friedrich let’s face it, it’s hard to get a dead hero into trouble.” pet to Earth-One. This disconnection of their symbiotic It is posited in The Official Justice League of America relationship will result in the deaths of both if they Index #3 (May 1986) that the Spectre journeyed to Earth-One where are not reunited in 37 1/2 Earth hours. The separation also affects their he reformed and continued as a spirit of vengeance in Adventure Comics psyche and drives them to violent behavior. The Flash encounters #431–440 (this would also explain his Teppy and is nearly killed by the creature. Green Lantern of Earth-Two Earth-One team-ups with Batman in The confronts A-Rym, and the boy steals his power ring. With that, it is a Brave and the Bold). The Ghostly Guardian mission for the Justice League and Justice Society of America. would return to Earth-Two to help resurrect The JLA and JSA form two teams to deal with each Earth’s threat. members of the Justice Society, thus clearing The Earth-One group—Flash of Earth-Two, the two Supermen, and the the JLA for their murders in JLA #123–124. two Atoms—are successful in capturing Teppy. However, the Earth-Two team—Green Lantern, the two Hawkmen, and the Robins of EarthsJUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #91 One and -Two (soon joined by the Earth-Two Flash and Earth-One (Aug. 1971) Superman)—do not fare as well. A-Rym injures an overzealous Robin of “Earth—The Monster Maker!”

Earth-One. The alien boy goes on to encounter and find a friend in JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #92 Solomon Grundy, the marshland monster of Slaughter Swamp.

(Sept. 1971) When I started collecting comics in the spring of 1972, I came in just “Solomon Grundy—The One and Only!” before the release of JLA #100. In fact, my first issue of JLA as a collector was Writer: Mike Friedrich. Artists: Dick Dillin #98. But my second was #91, the first part of 1971’s JLA/JSA team-up. and Joe Giella. Editor: Julius Schwartz.

Sometime during the early weeks of my collecting, I stumbled upon a Justice League of America: Superman, rack of comics sold in two-in-one-plastic-bags at a local Pantry market in the Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman, the Pasadena. Inside one of them were JLA #91 and Batman #234. Both comics Atom. Guest-star: Robin. Justice Society had an August cover date. I was confused. Comic books couldn’t possibly of America: Superman, Robin, the Flash, publish their runs backwards! I bought the pack, and was surprised to find Green Lantern, Hawkman, the Atom. that I had purchased two comics released in June of 1971. They had been Villain: Solomon Grundy. Supporting on that comics rack in a major super market for 11 months. As with JLA #82, characters: A-Rym and Teppy.

I had an exciting, not to mention unexpected, JLA/JSA story to add to my Writer Mike Friedrich brought a younger, budding collection. But as with JLA #83, the second part of 1970’s JLA/JSA hipper sensibility to his JLA stories, and for team-up, I had no way of acquiring #92. That, of course, changed in 1975. his only JLA/JSA team-up he focused on the In JLA #92, Grundy defeats the JLA and JSA heroes, and Robin has his physical, mental, and emotional links that damaged uniform temporarily replaced with a different costume (designed bind us, and how easily those connections by artist Neal Adams) provided by the Earth-Two Robin. His ring returned, can be broken and the harm it could cause.

Earth-Two’s Green Lantern teams with Hal Jordan to defeat Grundy and He also provided a nod to the counterculture imprison him in Slaughter Swamp. A-Rym is finally captured but on the at that time by highlighting the generational verge of death. The two Robins realize that the boy may be saved by being gap of attitudes in some of the younger brought together with the creature on Earth-One. Happily reunited (and and older superheroes. regaining their health, too), A-Rym and Teppy are then retrieved by their 18 • BACK ISSUE • Bronze Age Events Issue

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #100 (Aug. 1972) “The Unknown Soldier of Victory!”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #101 (Sept. 1972) “The Hand That Shook the World” JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #102 (Oct. 1972) “And One of Us Must Die!” Writer: Len Wein. Artists: Dick Dillin, Joe Giella, and Dick Giordano. Editor: Julius Schwartz.

Justice League of America: Superman, Batman, the Flash, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, Black Canary, the Atom,

Hawkman, Aquaman. Guest-stars: The Elongated Man, Zatanna, Metamorpho, Diana Prince. Justice Society of America: Dr. Fate, the Sandman, Wildcat, Dr. MidNite, Hourman, Starman, Johnny Thunder and Thunderbolt, Wonder Woman, the Red Tornado, Green Lantern, Mr. Terrific, Robin. The Seven Soldiers of Victory: The Crimson Avenger (Wing, his sidekick, is also shown briefly in flashback), the Shining Knight, Green Arrow, Speedy, Star-Spangled Kid, Stripesy, the Vigilante. Villains: The Iron Hand, the Nebula-Man. Writer Len Wein noted in his introduction in Crisis on Multiple Earths vol. 3 (2004, DC Comics), “The last few team-ups, written by the venerable O’Neil and young upstart Friedrich, had veered some from the original recipe created by the legendary Gardner Fox. As a reader, I had always loved the mixing and matching of the greatest heroes of two worlds, breaking them up into individual chapters; first and foremost, I wanted to get back to that formula. Still, a story big enough to celebrate this comics milestone needed to be something more. And that’s when I remembered the Seven Soldiers of Victory.”

The milestone was the 100th issue of Justice League of America. Of course, the World’s Greatest Super-Heroes could not proclaim it as such, so the story opens with the 100th meeting of the JLA. The team has just begun its celebration in their original mountain headquarters when it is abruptly cut short by the summons of Dr. Fate, who transports the League, plus their guests, to Earth-Two. There, they meet a badly defeated and demoralized Justice Society and learn the tale of the horrific hand that holds the Earth, a hand that will crush the planet to dust.

This is an event comic of the highest order, arguably the best JLA/JSA team-up of all time. Dr. Fate summons the mysterious Oracle, basically a cosmic Gandalf with a much more colorful robe, to aid the heroes. Oracle declares to the assemblage that he cannot help them, only inform and direct them. Oracle explains that it is the Seven Soldiers of Victory who can actually help them, but no one can remember who the Seven Soldiers are. Oracle continues to squash our heroes’ hopes by announcing that they no longer exist. The Seven Soldiers were thrown into the corridors of time during their major battle with the Nebula Man in the Himalayas, a battle where one of their own sacrificed his life to defeat the villain. This unknown Soldier would be buried there. Oracle then has the superheroes form seven teams to journey through the past and locate the remaining Soldiers and bring them back to the present.

Dr. Fate, the Elongated Man, and the Atom rescue the Crimson Avenger from the Aztecs; Superman, the Sandman, and Metamorpho (in a very amusing episode) locate the Shining Knight, who is allied with Genghis Kahn; Hawkman, Dr. Mid-Nite, and Wonder Woman rescue Green Arrow from a British castle during the time of Robin Hood; Batman, Hourman, and Starman rescue Stripesy from captivity in ancient Egypt; Green Arrow, Black Canary, and Johnny Thunder save the Vigilante from Native American Indians; Green Lantern, Aquaman, and Wildcat find the Star-Spangled Kid suffering from the flu in a prehistoric era; and the Flash, Zatanna, and the Red Tornado rescue Speedy from the sorceress Circe.

Meanwhile, in the present, it is revealed that the menace is the Iron Hand, formerly the Hand, who appeared in the first Seven Soldiers of Victory adventure published in Leading Comics #1. The Iron Hand breaks into JSA headquarters and overcomes Diana Prince while Green Lantern, Mr. Terrific, and the Earth-Two Robin tackle many of the natural disasters being caused by the closing of the giant nebulous hand. They also hope to learn who is actually buried in the tomb of the unknown Soldier in the Himalayas.

Our heroes have been successful across the board, and return with the Seven Soldiers of Victory to JSA headquarters via Oracle’s powers.

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TM & © DC Comics.

extradimensional friends. (Adams’ Robin costume would later be worn by the Earth-Two Robin in Gerry Conway’s 1975 revival of All-Star Comics.)

I asked Mike Friedrich about the “links” theme, the generational divide between the Hawkmen and Robins (hmm, not exactly birds of a feather), his own experience as a young writer amongst older colleagues, and Robin’s new costume. “By the time I was writing this particular JLA/JSA story,” recalls Friedrich, “the Justice League assignment was ongoing, carried on longdistance while I was finishing my last year of college in California. I would have probably provided Julie a rough outline by then before the next script was due; he probably just swallowed hard and went along with me. He seemed to appreciate the more emotional approach I was taking to the characters, though he once complained I was writing too much ‘like Marvel.’ A year later I had left DC to work for Marvel, so he was probably right.

“I was significantly younger than most of the comics pros working at the same time, and as a ‘baby boomer’ there was a cultural and personal ‘generation gap’ that I experienced. It was not a coincidence that I felt more comfortable with the emerging number of my contemporaries.

A large part of the distinction was how seriously we then younger folks took the material as fan-kids. The older guys (and they were almost all guys) had families and mortgages to worry about, so the comics were as much a job as anything else. But that perspective didn’t come until later for us.

“It may have been Julie’s idea to use the Adams-designed Robin costume,” Friedrich continues. “I wish I could remember more details about this, but I think Neal proposed a costume change but it was turned down, probably because of the product licensing already going on, so Julie and I used it in the comic itself to see if we could generate any fan enthusiasm. Whatever response was received (and I wasn’t in the office to know) wasn’t enough to make for a permanent change.”

Friedrich concludes, “The part I found most surprising in re-reading this story 40 years later is that the story was focusing on how it’s our connections to each other that make us heroic (or in the case of the ‘villains,’ enable us to live more fully), which is a major theme of my current work four decades later as a Deacon in the United Methodist Church. I didn’t realize that these insights went that far back in my life.”

“On rereading JLA #s 91 and 92, I’d give them an ‘A for Effort,’ ” Martin Pasko tells BACK ISSUE, “but the style of the writing is wildly uneven because of Julie’s rewriting, and there are some of those same moments as in the Spider-Man book that sound like the writer was working far afield of his own experience. These kinds of comics improved over time, though—because the young writers at DC had publisher Carmine Infantino’s support and because, to the best of my knowledge, Roy Thomas, who by the early ’70s was Marvel’s editor-in-chief, never resisted Relevance in the first place. At DC, the mild pressure from Carmine, plus positive reader reaction, gradually convinced the older editors to loosen their grip on the reins a bit. When Mike and his contemporaries were left to write with less editorial interference, the books edited by Julie, though not too much Murray’s (and Weisinger was gone by ’70), started getting more interesting, I think, with GL/GA being the apotheosis of that.

“Mike was a great friend and mentor to me as I was trying to break into comics. He used to write me letters describing working for Julie in terms that suggested it was sometimes a losing battle to get his stuff into print as he wrote it. But playing the kid sidekicks as going through identityseparation issues with their older guardians, as Mike did in that team-up, was a perfectly natural and naturalistic creative choice. So even if the execution was a bit uneven, I thought it was a reasonably satisfying story.”

But, wait, announces an incredulous Johnny Thunder—if the Seven Soldiers are alive, who is buried in the tomb of the unknown Soldier? Green Lantern, Mr. Terrific, and Robin return with the answer, but the Crimson Avenger interrupts them and reveals it was his sidekick, Wing, who sacrificed his life to defeat the Nebula Man. The Iron Hand appears with Diana Prince in his clutches, but she is able to subdue him with well-timed judo.

Unfortunately, the Iron Hand’s mechanical hand is destroyed and the nebulous hand around the Earth cannot be deactivated. The heroes team up to recreate the device that Wing used to defeat the Nebula Man. Upon completion, an intense debate breaks out over who should carry the device. As the arguing continues, the Red Tornado quietly takes the weapon and soars into the heart of the menace. A massive explosion occurs, the hand is gone, and the JLA and JSA soon realize what their android colleague has done. Our heroes are shocked and heartbroken by their friend’s sacrifice. Crimson Avenger, no stranger to that kind of loss, offers comforting words to Hourman as the spirits of the Red Tornado and Wing wave from the heavens and the story ends in bittersweet victory.

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #107 (Sept.–Oct. 1973) “Crisis on Earth-X!” JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #108 (Nov.–Dec. 1973) “Thirteen Against the Earth!”

Writer: Len Wein. Artists: Dick Dillin and Dick Giordano. Editor: Julius Schwartz.

Justice League of America: Batman, Green Arrow, the Elongated Man, the Red Tornado. Justice Society of America: Dr. Fate, Superman, the Sandman. The Freedom Fighters: Uncle Sam, Phantom Lady, the Black Condor, the Human Bomb, the Ray, Doll Man. Villains: Nazis, Nazi computer, Adolf Hitler android.

“As a collector,” Wein continued in his Introduction in Crisis on Multiple Earths v3, “I had always been a fan of the old Quality Comics line, publishers of Plastic Man and Blackhawk and G.I. Combat and many other favorites from the 1940s until the early 1950s.

When Quality folded, DC had acquired the rights to their titles and continued publishing several of them, especially the ones I just mentioned. The Quality characters seemed the next likely choice for revival.”

That revival came in Wein’s next JLA/ JSA team-up in JLA #107 and 108. Wein reintroduced Uncle Sam, the Black Condor, the Human Bomb, the Ray, Phantom Lady, and Doll Man as the Freedom Fighters on a parallel Earth, Earth-X, where the Allied forces had lost to the Nazis in World War II. To tell their story, Wein first had to get the JLA and JSA to their Earth. I should mention that the Red Tornado returned from the dead and joined the JLA in JLA #106 (July–Aug. 1973).

The JLA and JSA have constructed a transmatter cube that will allow our heroes to transport from Earth-One to Earth-Two and vice versa. If the trial run proves successful the teams will no longer have to rely on crossing the dimensional barrier at one specific time of the year. The Red Tornado is dejected when he is told he cannot participate in the crossing because the device has not been tested on transporting a machine. He slips into the device anyway, whirling so fast that he cannot be seen by his comrades, although the slight breeze he generates is noticed by Green

Where Nazis Rule Splash page to JLA #107. Writer Len Wein originally wanted to call the Freedom Fighters’ world Earth-[Swastika symbol] but was vetoed by editor Julius Schwartz.

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Arrow. Reddy’s presence disrupts the transmission, and Batman, the Elongated Man, and Green Arrow of Earth-One and Superman, Dr. Fate, and the Sandman of Earth-Two are transported to a completely different Earth, where Nazi tanks roll down American streets.

The combined JLA/JSAers are defeated by the attacking Nazis, but rescued by the fugitive Freedom Fighters and taken to their secret headquarters, where they explain to the displaced heroes what befell their Earth. The Nazis have installed several mind-control machines to keep humanity in their thrall, and the heroes divide into three teams to destroy the machines. They are successful, but all feel like nothing has been accomplished; mankind is still forced to obey its oppressors. The JLA and JSA also become controlled by the machines and turn on the Freedom Fighters. The Red Tornado discovers that the Nazis have a satellite in orbit around the Earth, where an android Adolf Hitler holds court. Also in the satellite is an operational master mind-control computer. Reddy destroys the satellite and humanity is no longer enslaved. Our heroic android also obtains a device that allows the JLA and JSA to contact their respective Earths. Soon to return home, our heroes hope one day to see the Freedom Fighters again. And they will, because the Freedom Fighters will come to Earth-One in late 1975 and begin a new life in their own magazine. [Editor’s note: See BI #41 for the Freedom Fighters’ story.]

Comic-book distribution was spotty in those days; I had no idea where I would be purchasing the next issue of Justice League of America, or any comic book I was collecting. JLA #100 was bought at Thrifty’s, #101 at 7-Eleven, #102 at Pantry Market, and so on. I got lucky with JLA—it was always on sale somewhere in Pasadena … until JLA #108, that is. It never arrived at any of the local convenience stores. I took a chance, as DC had a strict no back-issue policy (you read about it every other month or so in any given letters column), in sending 50 cents to DC with a desperate plea for a copy of the issue. A couple of weeks later an envelope arrived in the mail with JLA #108 enclosed along with a short note, its content long forgotten, from Bob Rozakis, who I believe was an assistant to Schwartz at that time. I’ve always been grateful to Bob for sending me that comic. And the near-miss convinced me to subscribe to JLA before potentially missing JLA #109 (which arrived, to my dismay, folded in half, but that’s another story).

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appearance in JLA aside of a brief JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #113 appearance in JLA #147, although the (Sept.–Oct. 1974) character would do quite well for himself “The Creature in the Velvet Cage!” in the revived JSA series in All-Star Writer: Len Wein. Artists: Dick Dillin and Comics), Robin, Johnny Thunder and his Dick Giordano. Editor: Julius Schwartz.

Thunderbolt, the Spectre (last active role Justice League of America: Superman, in a JLA/JSA Bronze Age team-up; makes Batman, Green Lantern, the Elongated a brief appearance in JLA #220).

Man. Justice Society of America: the Villains: Cary Bates; the Injustice Society: Sandman (last JLA/JSA team-up appearance the Wizard, the Icicle, Sportsmaster, in the Bronze Age), Hourman, the Flash, Huntress, Shade, the Gambler.

Wonder Woman. Villains: The Horned Supporting characters: Elliot S! Maggin, Owl Gang. Supporting character: Julius Schwartz, Carmine Infantino, God. Sandy, the Golden Boy. This may be the strangest JLA/JSA teamWein’s last JLA/JSA team-up as writer up of them all. On Earth-Prime—the Earth took a different approach and tone. “I had you and I reside on—writer Cary Bates is always been a fan of the Golden Age Sandman,” he recalled from his CoME introduction, “and had always transported into the transition zone between Earths-One and -Two wondered why he’d been put back in his double-breasted Man of Mystery when his buddy, writer Elliot S! Maggin, accidentally activates the Cosmic Treadmill Bates was standing on. In the transition zone, Bates is Gas-Mask outfit when he was revived, instead of the more traditional purple-and-yellow superhero costume he’d worn in the latter half of subjected to a spell conjured by the Wizard, a member of the Injustice Society, and becomes a villain on Earth-Two. Maggin utilizes the the 1940s. This would make the perfect place to find out.”

The result is a stripped-down, emotional powerhouse. At only 20 Treadmill in hope of rescuing Bates, much to the befuddlement and pages, JLA #114’s “The Creature in the Velvet Cage!” is the shortest concern of editor Julius Schwartz, and travels to Earth-One, where he is Justice League/Justice Society team-up. Wein effortlessly shifted from discovered by Aquaman. Soon, Maggin is in the JLA satellite pleading blockbuster to poignancy: not only explaining the change in costume, his case for saving Bates before disbelieving members of the JLA. The Flash arrives to confirm Maggin’s story (the Flash had previously visited but tying it into the tragic tale of a “lost” character of the Golden Earth-Prime and had left that particular Cosmic Treadmill Age, Sandy the Golden Boy, the Sandman’s sidekick, who had behind). The JLA travel with Maggin to Earth-Two to aid not been seen for decades. the writer in his quest to find his friend.

On Earth-Two, the JSA and visiting members of Meanwhile, Bates has battled and defeated members the JLA make quick work of the Horned Owl Gang of the Justice Society. When the JLA and Maggin (possibly the fastest downfall of any villainous group arrive on Earth-Two, they are attacked by members in JLA/JSA history). A beeper set off in the Sandman’s of the Injustice Society. The intense battle ends with car causes Wesley (Sandman) Dodds to immediately the Injustice Society’s defeat, but to the JLA’s dismay leave the scene with no explanation to his bewildered they discover their foes are dead. Then the foes friends. The JLA/JSA follow Sandman to his townhouse, are transformed back into their actual selves, the JSA and find a distraught Dodds in the basement, and the JLA realize they’ve killed their friends, all at the standing over shattered glass. It had once been a glass nefarious hands of Bates. The JLA feel so rotten that cage containing his former sidekick, Sandy, who Wesley they take over fighting evil on Earth-Two until they had held in captivity for years. can figure out a way to explain to the populace the Years before, the Sandman explains, an experimental len wein tragedy that has befallen their heroes. Maggin, in the weapon they were testing exploded, causing Sandy middle of his buddy’s villainous plot twists, is also to change into a monster bent on total destruction.

When the boy collapsed, the guilt-ridden Dodds imprisoned Sandy in trying to figure out what to do.

Then the Spectre pops up (having returned to Earth-Two after his the cage, where a debilitating gas rendered the monster unconscious.

The Sandman tore up his yellow-and-purple costume and returned to series was dropped from Adventure Comics earlier in the year), first as thoughtful mist, gradually developing into a more corporeal form, finally his original uniform. Now, after all these years, his friend was loose.

In smaller units, the combined teams seek out and battle the as the being we’re all familiar with, at which point he zips off to Heaven and stands before God to request His mercy by restoring the perished creature, eventually subduing Sandy. They realize that rather than being on a destructive binge, Sandy had attempted to halt a series of earth JSAers to life. And God thinks on it a while and grants the Astral Avenger’s request. The JLA and revived JSA defeat the Injustice Society tremors. Now able to speak, Sandy delivered a heartbreaking explanation of his condition, revealing that his initial destructive outburst was a and the villainous Mr. Bates (who is off the hook because he was influenced temporary side effect that soon passed, but he was unable to communicate by the Wizard and was not responsible for the havoc he caused). The JLA are grateful that their friends are miraculously alive. They don’t ask any that to Dodds while imprisoned.

Wesley is devastated. Wonder Woman feels that Amazonian science questions, having just been lifted off the guilt-ridden hook themselves.

At story’s end, Bates and Maggin debate on how the JSA reacted to can cure Sandy, but Batman is more concerned that there is no salvation being returned to life, and the explanations are silly, but it’s pretty for Sandman’s soul. apparent to me that the JSA should respond by expressing a lot more JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #123 faith in an all-mighty being. Aww, why debate matters? As the Spectre (Oct. 1975) triumphantly states on page 18, “So be it!”

“Where on Earth Am I?” “Cary and I wrote this story,” recalls Elliot S. Maggin, “as we did all JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #124 the stories where we collaborated, by dividing the job mechanically.

(Nov. 1975) Cary wrote panel-by-panel scene descriptions and I filled in the dialogue “Avenging Ghosts of the Justice Society!” from that. He wrote script pages with spaces for the balloons and Writers: Cary Bates and Elliot S! Maggin. captions and I filled in the spaces.

Artists: Dick Dillin and Frank “Neither of us took this story very seriously at the time. We were McLaughlin. Editor: Julius Schwartz. kind of appalled by the profusion of stories of the period that incorporated Justice League of America: Batman, writers and artists and their friends as characters. Our idea was to the Flash, Green Arrow, Black Canary, take this concept and vault way over the top with it. We’d make a Hawkman, Aquaman. Justice Society of JLA/JSA story essentially about the two of us and our lives, and I was America: Hourman, Wonder Woman, always glad to have Cary around to hammer out the kinks in whatever Dr. Mid-Nite, Wildcat (last active JLA/JSA we came up with.”

The Joke’s on You! Bat-characters hog this “super-champions of three worlds” cover of JLA #136. Original cover art by Ernie Chan.

Courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com).

TM & © DC Comics.

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #135 (Oct. 1976) “Crisis in Eternity!”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #136 (Nov. 1976) “Crisis on Earth-S!” JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #137 (Dec. 1976) “Crisis in Tomorrow!”

Writers: E. Nelson Bridwell and Martin Pasko. Artists: Dick Dillin and Frank McLaughlin. Editor: Julius Schwartz.

Justice League of America: Superman, the Flash, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, Hawkman. Guest-star: Hawkgirl. Justice Society of America: Batman, Robin, the Flash, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, Johnny Thunder and Thunderbolt. Heroes of Earth-S: Bulletman, Bulletgirl, Ibis the Invincible, Mr. Scarlet, Pinky, Spy Smasher. Other Earth-S heroes: Shazam, Mercury, Captain (Billy Batson) Marvel, Mary (Batson) Marvel, Captain (Freddy Freeman) Marvel, Jr. Villains: King Kull, Queen Clea, the Penguin, Ibac, Blockbuster, the Joker, the Weeper, Shade, Dr. Light, Mr. Atom, Brainiac.

I’m not going to get overly critical, but this is probably the weakest JLA/JSA team-up of the Bronze Age. It has some good moments, though, particularly the first-ever meeting between Superman and the original Captain Marvel (no, the clash between Superman and “Captain Thunder” in Superman #276 doesn’t count). A new Earth is introduced, Earth-S (for Shazam), home to the one-time Fawcett superheroes, including Captain Marvel, Mary Marvel, and Captain Marvel, Jr. The major villain, King Kull, is dead-set on destroying mankind to avenge the genocide of his race, the Beastmen, but he overreaches by going after three Earths instead of the one he basically conquered at the story’s outset. And, honestly, it’s hard to take seriously a superhero called “Pinky.”

“Though not the regular writer of JLA,” recalls Pasko, “I got involved because Julie said he needed ‘insurance’; I did them as a favor to him. By 1976, the DC books’ editorial page count was down to 17 an issue. JLA was always hard to write (Julie considered it his hardest book to write back when the stories were 22–24 pages), but at 17 pages, it was breathtakingly difficult. So, because it didn’t pay any more than a less-complex book, it was an assignment I actively dodged after the first two or three issues I wrote. I lost money every time I tackled it.

“Meanwhile, for several years it had been getting harder and harder to keep the annual JLA/JSA team-ups surprising and innovative. So it was becoming a foregone conclusion that the team-up would involve yet another parallel world, which would be introduced as the home of yet another superhero team that DC owned but which wasn’t part of DC’s current continuity. So the team-up now always involved a third

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superhero team, and at two installments of 17 pages each, the assignment had become a widowmaker.

“It had gotten to the point where Julie felt it was a bigger job than one writer could handle, and as a result there was the previous one that Bates and Maggin co-wrote,” Pasko says. “Other writer pairings followed.

But, as we all learned, to our lasting regret, this notion was professional insanity, because each writer was doing twice as much work as he’d have to do on a single-hero script, but splitting the page rate and making only half what he would’ve otherwise! In my case, it was even worse.

“E. Nelson Bridwell, who was Julie’s assistant editor, was the only writer working for Julie at that point who knew the Fawcett continuity and character group very well. And, as far as I could tell, the only writer who really liked them. I was never a Shazam! fan and thought the rest—Ibis, the Spy Smasher, etc.—were pretty lame. But Julie never found Nelson’s plotting inspired and thought Nelson had a tin ear for dialogue; he was happy to have Bridwell on short backups intended for very young readers, like Shazam! or Super Friends, but didn’t want him tackling something like the annual JLA/JSA team-up. But turning a deaf ear to Nelson’s pitch that he was the best-qualified writer in Julie’s stable to do the story, since Nelson was writing a lot for Shazam! at that point, was difficult to justify. And, considering that those two shared an office, and Nelson was practically on his knees, begging, it was politically difficult for Julie to reject Bridwell outright.

“So Julie brought me in to ‘guarantee’ that the dialogue would have more ‘spark’ (Julie’s term). He also knew that I’d try hard to tweak the gimmicks in Nelson’s plot so they would be less Weisinger-absurd. I didn’t want that job, but I needed it even for the low money because of some unexpected dental bills, so I literally gritted my teeth and did the best I could. But it was 100% Nelson’s plot, completed before I was brought in.

And I could tell at a single glance that the thing was over- JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #147 (Oct. 1977) plotted, as well as kitchen-sinked with extraneous characters “Crisis in the 30th Century!” from the Fawcett archives that were obscure for good JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #148 (Nov. 1977) reason. Crowd scenes in every panel. I thought that if I “Crisis in Triplicate!” didn’t have a heart attack trying to execute that thing, Writers: Paul Levitz and Martin Pasko. Artists: Dick Dillin poor Dick Dillin certainly would have. It was the only and Frank McLaughlin. Editor: Julius Schwartz. time in my comics career I ever apologized to an artist Justice League of America: Superman, Batman, the for what my script put him through.

Flash, Green Lantern, Green Arrow (GA’s last “And, because Bridwell was tone-deaf— JLA/JSA appearance; he quits the League in incapable, it seemed, of even perceiving JLA #181, appears at the JLA/JSA gathering the challenge of blending the oil of in #195, returns to the League in Captain Marvel whimsy with the water #200, and still misses out on the last of JLA’s Earth-Shattering Seriousness, three JLA/JSA team-ups), Black Canary. never mind capable of figuring out Justice Society of America: Power how to address that challenge—the Girl, Dr. Fate, the Flash, Green plot came to me in a form that, in my Lantern, Hawkman. The Legion of opinion, had as little ‘annual JLA/JSA Super-Heroes: Sun Boy, Shadow team-up flavor’ to it as humanly possible.

Lass, Brainiac 5, Princess Projectra, So, because the approach had already Wildfire, Chameleon Boy, Saturn Girl, been determined, there was never a Lightning Lad, Ultra Boy. Villains: chance that my ‘fanboyish’ notion of Mordru, Abnegazar, Rath, Ghast. martin pasko how these team-ups should be done There’s a lot to like about this would influence my thinking. I was JLA/JSA team-up. It guest-stars the just there to bail water out of the sinking ship. And then, popular Legion of Super-Heroes and one of their greatest after all that, Nelson got to my script before Julie did foes, Mordru. It features the return of some of the JLA’s and rewrote a lot of my dialogue in his own style, oldest foes, the Demons Three: Abnegazar, Rath, and defeating the purpose of all the agony I’d gone through. Ghast. It is Power Girl’s first appearance in a JLA/JSA By that point, Julie was too tired to argue and let it go team-up. And it has a nice plot twist at the end of part through that way. Wish I’d taken my name off it. Not a one. So why does it feel overlooked? Probably because happy experience, that job.” it’s sandwiched in between writer Steve Englehart’s

Durable Dick Dillin From (left) JLA #123’s Cary Bates and Elliot Maggin, to (top right) #137’s Fawcett heroes, to (bottom right) #148’s Legion of Super-Heroes, penciler Dick Dillin could draw ’em all!

TM & © DC Comics.

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and I’d flesh them out into script pages the next day while he was at the office, so he’d have pages to read and notate when he came home. I think we burned through the writing in, like, ten days.

Smooth, fun, and, because of the page count, a nice payday, even splitting it 50–50.”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #159 (Oct. 1978) “Crisis from Yesterday!”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #160 (Nov. 1978) “Crisis from Tomorrow!”

Writer: Gerry Conway. Artists: Dick Dillin and Frank McLaughlin. Editor: Julius Schwartz.

Justice League of America: Superman, the Flash, Hawkman, the Elongated Man. Brief appearances: Batman, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, Black Canary, the Atom, Aquaman (the Sea King plays a larger role than the others listed here, but he is not a part of the official JLA/JSA team-up), the Red Tornado, Hawkgirl, Wonder Woman. Justice Society of America: Wonder Woman, Dr. Mid-Nite, Star Spangled Kid, the Huntress. Brief appearances: Superman, the Flash, Green Lantern, Dr. Fate. Heroes from Yesterday: The Black Pirate, the Viking Prince, Jonah Hex, Enemy Ace, Miss Liberty. Villains: The Lord of Time and his too-literal-thinking creation, the Eternity Brain.

Although this was Conway’s first JLA/JSA team-up (and Schwartz’s last as editor), he was already familiar with the teams, having written several issues of JLA and kicking off the revived JSA in All-Star Comics in 1975.

The Time Lord lives an isolated existence in a dimensional pocket outside of our galaxy, where time has no meaning or function. In his immense futuristic outpost, the villain schemes to selfishly control the flow of time. In this particular instance he has programmed his computer, the Eternity Brain, to freeze time in place, but the computer has taken the command a harrowing step further and will stop time in its tracks, permanently, in ten hours time.

The Time Lord plucks five heroic (some notorious) figures from history—the Viking Prince, the Black Pirate, Lady Liberty, Jonah Hex, and Enemy Ace—endows them with scientifically enhanced powers, and places them in July 15, 1978 to attack the combined Justice League and Justice Society, who are in attendance at Club 22 in New York City on Earth-One to celebrate their annual gathering without any threat to themselves or their respective Earths.

The sudden, violent attack on our heroes by the displaced travelers proves more debilitating than expected. Almost two-thirds of the gathering is crippled and on the verge of death. The remaining JLA/JSAers, Superman, the Flash, the Elongated Man, and Hawkman (of Earth-One) and Wonder Woman, Dr. Mid-Nite, the Star-Spangled Kid, and Huntress (of Earth-Two), regroup and set out to battle their new foes. They are resoundingly defeated at Valley Forge, but their resiliency is strong, and that turns out to have been the Time Lord’s plan all along. With their greatest defeat, the superheroes will be more determined to triumph over their attackers and, as yet unknown to them, destroy the Lord’s computer.

The five heroes of yesteryear make a concentrated attack on the Time Lord’s castle, but are defeated by the Eternity Brain’s defense procedures.

With that, they are out of the story, leaving the JLA and JSA as all of humankind’s last hope. They make tremendous progress toward the computer, but at a brutal cost as our heroes gradually fall, leaving a doubting Elongated Man as the last chance to save the continuation of time.

Still, Ralph stretches to the occasion and is able to destroy the computer.

The JLA returns the time-displaced heroes to their respective eras.

TM & © DC Comics.

exemplary run on JLA that ran in Justice League of America #139–146 and 149–150.

From the 30th Century, Mordru reaches back in time to pluck three objects (the red jar of Calythos, the green ball of Uthool, and the silver wheel of Nyorlath) from the past, which he intends to use to summon the Demons Three (Abnegazar, Rath, and Ghast) to aid him in conquering the galaxy. Instead, he brings back five members of the JLA and five members of the JSA. Imprisoning Green Arrow and Black Canary in a giant hourglass, Mordru orders the JLA and JSA to team with members of the Legion to locate the three objects that were dispersed in the destruction of the JLA satellite in the early 21st Century.

With the three magical objects eventually in his possession, Mordru uses his wizardry to release the three demons. He then orders them to destroy the JLA and JSA. In recognizing the JLA members, the trio relish in dispatching their foes and the JSA to their time periods, not exactly a permanent vanquish. They then turn on Mordru, blasting him unconscious before the startled Legionnaires. They then turn their attention on the three objects, vowing to destroy them so they can rule the Earth once more.

However, the Demons Three are no longer in agreement on how the Earth should be ruled, so they bring the Justice League and Justice Society back from the past, control their minds, and divide them into teams to battle for each demon, winner take all. A fierce battle ensues that has our heroes and the Legion also coming up with a plan to stop the demons. The final demon is encased in the rebuilt Justice League satellite, pulled together by Dr. Fate’s spell. With the superheroes triumphant, Green Lantern wills his ring to blot all his colleagues’ knowledge of the future, and the JLA and JSA return to their respective worlds with only a vague memory of the adventure that transpired.

“This one one started out amid similar concerns but proceeded much more collegially and pleasantly,” explains Pasko. “And by then, DC had changed JLA’s format and upped the page-count. We had close to 70 pages, enough room to do it right. Paul Levitz, DC’s editorial coordinator at that point, was, in terms of his knowledge of the Legion of Super-Heroes, as much DC’s resident expert as Bridwell was on Shazam! It was Paul who suggested the Legionnaires for the next team-up, in a story that went through time rather than to a parallel world. Julie liked it, but didn’t know much about the Legion (the references to it in Julie’s Superman titles had been few and far between).

Paul was, by that time, also the Legion’s regular writer, but Julie had never worked with him before and didn’t think Paul would necessarily understand the quirks of Julie’s editorial tastes. Besides, because Paul was also working a staff job at the same time, his writing the 67 or 68 pages by himself was out of the question in any case. So—again, to help with Julie’s comfort level—I was brought in.

“It was much less stressful and a lot more fun the second time, and simpler both logistically and collaboratively: I was sharing an apartment with Paul and already writing for him on books he edited.

We understood each other’s writing habits and processes very well.

Paul also understood my anxiety about making sure that this team-up had a stronger ‘JLA/JSA flavor’ than the Fawcett story, and agreed with me that one of the things that was wrong with the previous team-up was the wonky tone-shifts. JLA/JSA team-ups already had that problem to begin with, since there is more magical fantasy in the JSA’s ‘make-up’— e.g., Dr. Fate, Hawkman, and the Alan Scott Green Lantern’s backstories— and more ‘hard’ SF in the JLA’s. (This was due to the fact that SF was Julie’s first love, as well as the genre in which he had his greatest successes in comics in the 1950s, so in the ‘Silver Age,’ he purposefully and carefully reinvented the JSA heroes for a ‘Space Age’ readership.)

It was important to find just the right villains for the story, which the Fawcett team-up didn’t have, either: antagonists that required both magic and science-based superpowers, in equal measure, to defeat it.

This would be key.

“So, for the menace that brought the JLA, JSA, and LSH together, I pitched the three demons from ‘One Hour to Doomsday’—the Time Lord story in JLA #11—because of their ‘magical’ powers and their association with a time-travel story (and also because I thought the design of the demons was really cool when I was kid). When both Paul and Julie liked that idea, we were off and running. For a couple days, we worked out the story beats at night, after dinner. Then, once we had the plot worked out, Paul would write page breakdowns at night

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #171 (Oct. 1979) “The Murderer Among Us: Crisis Above Earth-One!” JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #172 (Nov. 1979) “I Accuse…”

Writer: Gerry Conway. Artists: Dick Dillin and Frank McLaughlin. Editor: Ross Andru.

Justice League of America: Superman, Batman, the Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman, the Red Tornado, Zatanna.

Justice Society of America: Power Girl, the Huntress, the Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman, Dr. Fate, Mr. Terrific. Villain: The Spirit King.

1979 was a grim-and-gritty year in DC comics, long before grim-and-gritty was a catchphrase. It’s as if every DC writer at that time was assigned to kill off at least one character in the ongoing series they were chronicling. Paul Levitz kicked things off at the end of 1978 with the death of Earth-Two’s Batman in Adventure Comics; Cary Bates had Iris Allen, the Flash’s wife, murdered in the Scarlet Speedster’s book; Denny O’Neil killed Kathy Kane, Batwoman, in Detective Comics; and Jim Starlin was a little more lenient in Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes— he just drove Brainiac 5 and Matter-Eater Lad insane. In JLA #171, Conway veered dramatically from last year’s epic to the personal, bringing Mr. Terrific’s life to a violent, mysterious close.

The Justice League and Justice Society make another attempt to hold their annual gathering without any life-threatening or earthshattering disruptions, this time in the JLA satellite on Earth-One. The party starts off well, and includes a moving discussion between Batman and the Huntress on the recent death of the Earth-Two Batman, but a disturbing conversation with Mr. Terrific leads the Flashes of two Earths to believe that something may be mentally wrong with Terry (Mr. Terrific) Sloane. But before this can be pursued further, an explosion occurs on the satellite and Sloane is killed.

On further investigation by Batman and the Huntress, it is discovered that Mr. Terrific was strangled before the explosion occurred. After a quick search of the satellite by the two Flashes, no intruders are detected, and the only conclusion that can be reached is that one of the superheroes is a murderer.

Fate and the two GLs construct a force field around the satellite so that no one can leave. Batman and the Huntress begin an investigation, and just as the Huntress finds a vital clue she is severely injured in an explosion. The Batman takes over, and finds that the killer is the Earth-Two Flash, who has been possessed by the Spirit King, an old foe of Mr. Terrific. The Spirit King is able to escape to Earth-Two through the transmatter device (a potential escape route that the World’s Greatest Super-Heroes overlooked … sigh), and although the JSA vows to bring him to justice, that would not happen until the mid-1990s in The Spectre.

Conway explains the genesis of this story: “My interest as a writer is always to come up with an emotional angle to a story as much as

anything else. While I’ve always enjoyed the puzzle aspect of DC books, for years the primary motivating driving force of a DC book was the plot, as opposed to character. I thought that there would be more energy behind a story that had an actual emotional hook rather than just a clever plot twist hook. And, quite honestly, Mr. Terrific at that point did not seem like a character who would likely be missed, but because of the long-term history he had with the JSA he would be somebody that you would care enough about to motivate a strong emotional reaction to the story.”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #183 (Oct. 1980) “Crisis on New Genesis” or “Where Have All the New Gods Gone?”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #184 (Nov. 1980) “Crisis Between Two Earths” or “Apokolips Now!” JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #185 (Dec. 1980) “Crisis on Apokolips” or “Darkseid Rising!”

Writer: Gerry Conway. Artists: Dick Dillin, George Pérez, and Frank McLaughlin. Editor: Len Wein.

Justice League of America: Superman, Batman, Green Lantern, Firestorm.

Justice Society of America: Power Girl, the Huntress, Wonder Woman, Dr. Fate.

The New Gods: Orion, Mister Miracle, Big Barda, Highfather, and Oberon.

Villains: Darkseid, Granny Goodness and The Injustice Society: The Fiddler, Icicle, Shade.

As selected members of the Justice League and Justice Society cross dimensions via transmatter cube to conduct a

The Fourth World’s Greatest Super-Heroes Dick Dillin passed away while drawing the first issue of the three-parter featuring Darkseid as the villain, with George Pérez stepping in as the new JLA artist. Pérez’s first cover, to JLA #184, inked by Dick Giordano.

TM & © DC Comics.

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Assembled Against Darkseid From the Heritage archives, original art to page 24 of JLA #185. Art by George Pérez and Frank McLaughlin.

TM & © DC Comics.

but at story’s end he does interfere, apparently, again, destroying Darkseid and bringing this epic story to an abrupt conclusion.

“You’re looking for a menace that’s sufficiently impressive to justify a Crisis,” recalls Conway, “and once the New Gods returned to the DC Universe it was almost inevitable that they become part of that Crisis annual event. Having just left a run on The Return of the New Gods provided me the opportunity to bring them into an even bigger story in JLA.” Sadly, artist Dick Dillin, who had illustrated Justice League of America since 1968’s JLA/JSA crossover (JLA #64–65), suddenly passed away while drawing JLA #183. I am pleased that over the years there has been a growing appreciation of Dillin’s work, particularly his rendering of the annual JLA/JSA team-ups, which at times meant two to three times the number of superheroes and villains necessary to the epic event.

JLA/JSA gathering on two Earths, Metron of the New Gods transports both parties to New Genesis, where he explains that the entire population of New Genesis has been kidnapped by the Injustice Society and taken to Apokolips for a mysterious purpose, and that he believes the JLA and JSA can aid them.

Three teams are formed consisting of a JLA member, a JSA member, and one of the New Gods. On Apokolips, Superman, Wonder Woman, and Big Barda travel to Granny Goodness’ orphanage; Green Lantern, Dr. Fate, and Oberon travel to a barracks camp; and Power Girl, Firestorm, and Orion fly to the location of a giant machine constructed by the kidnapped men of New Genesis. At that location are Injustice Society members the Icicle, Shade, and the Fiddler. The Fiddler’s fiddle activates the machine. The machine’s rays converge on one object, and upon drawing closer Orion is shocked to see that the object is Darkseid (supposedly killed in Adventure Comics #460), on the verge of being resurrected. Meanwhile, Dr. Fate, GL, and Oberon rescue Highfather and Batman, and the Huntress and Mister Miracle discover Darkseid intends to transport Apokolips into the Earth-Two universe, where it will be positioned in the very spot Earth-Two exists (thus destroying Earth-Two for maximum dramatic effect).

At the beginning of JLA #185, Metron muses that he cannot interfere with the catastrophic chain of events that he is replaying for his observation by utilizing a previously unknown facet of the Boom Tube, 26 • BACK ISSUE • Bronze Age Events Issue

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #195 (Oct. 1981) “Targets on Two Worlds” JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #196 (Nov. 1981) “Countdown to Crisis!”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #197 (Dec. 1981) “Crisis in Limbo” Writer: Gerry Conway. Artists: George Pérez, Keith Pollard, John Beatty, and Romeo Tanghal. Editor: Len Wein.

Justice League of America: Batman (his last active role in a JLA/JSA Bronze Age team-up), Black Canary, the Atom, Wonder Woman (her first JLA/JSA team-up appearance since returning to active JLA membership in JLA #128), Firestorm.

Brief appearances: Superman, the Flash, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, the Elongated Man, Hawkman, Red Tornado, Hawkgirl, Zatanna. Justice Society of America: Superman, the Flash, Hawkman, Hourman, Johnny Thunder and his Thunderbolt. Brief appearances: Dr. Fate, the Huntress, Robin, Power Girl, the Atom, Green Lantern. Secret Society of Super-Villains: The Ultra-Humanite, the Mist, Signalman, the Monocle, Killer Frost, Brainwave, Psycho-Pirate, Plant-Master, Rag Doll, Cheetah II. The Ultra-Humanite of Earth-Two recruits villains from both Earths to battle and capture selected members of the Justice League and Justice Society. Once in his clutches, the Ultra-Humanite transports them to limbo, which will upset the cosmic balance and cause all superheroes on one Earth to no longer exist. What the villains do not know is the Ultra-Humanite is already aware that it is the superheroes of Earth-Two that will cease to be. When the Earth-One villains become aware of this betrayal, they rescue the superheroes cast to limbo and they return to thwart the Ultra-Humanite’s scheme and restore order to two universes.

This is a really interesting story, structured as a Secret Society of Super-Villains feature guest-starring the Justice League and Justice Society. Conway takes his time with the Ultra-Humanite’s recruitments, as one villain after another brings another villain into the Humanite’s team. After the annual gathering of the JLA/JSA in the JLA satellite is over, Black Canary is alone on monitor duty when the Mist attacks, and then Conway takes his time with a new set of extended episodes as each villain methodically subdues his or her superheroic prey.

“By that point I had written three team-ups,” recalls Conway, “and I was starting to look for ways to change it up and make it interesting for myself as a writer, so doing a story that was primarily told from the villains’ point of view was, I thought, a pretty good way of tackling the same kind of material we had seen before.”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #207 (Oct. 1982) “Crisis on Earth-Prime!” Book One: “Crisis Times Three” JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #208 (Nov. 1982) “Crisis on Earth-Prime!” Book Three: “The Bomb-Blast Heard ’Round the World!”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #209 (Dec. 1982) “Crisis on Earth-Prime!” Book Five: “Let Old Acquaintances Be Forgot…” plus ALL-STAR SQUADRON #14 (Book Two) and 15 (Book Four) Writers: Gerry Conway and Roy Thomas.

Artists: Don Heck, Romeo Tanghal, and Sal Trapani. Editor: Len Wein.

Justice League of America: Superman, Hawkman, Aquaman (his first active role in a JLA/JSA team-up since JLA #123–124, excluding his minor role in JLA #160), Zatanna, Firestorm. Justice Society of America: Power Girl, the Huntress, Green Lantern, Dr. Fate, Hourman. All-Star Squadron of Earth-Two: Commander Steel, Firebrand II, Robotman, Johnny Quick, Liberty Belle. Villains: Per Degaton, The Crime Syndicate of Earth-Three: Ultraman, Owlman, Superwoman, Johnny Quick, Power Ring.

During the history of JLA/JSA team-ups, there have been multiple Earths, multiple heroes, multiple villains, multiple teams, and multiple time periods, with multiple writers and artists to chronicle the tales, and multiple issues of Justice League to America to host the events. The 20th annual team-up of the JLA and JSA, the longest at well over 100 pages, brought in a new multiple wrinkle: an additional book, All-Star Squadron.

The Justice League of 1982 has traveled back in time to 1942 (of Earth-Two), where, alongside President Roosevelt and members of the All-Star Squadron, they learn that the villainous Per Degaton intends to detonate

atomic missiles that he has stolen from the year 1962 (of EarthPrime). Meanwhile, the Justice Society has switched places with the Crime Syndicate of Earth-Three, who aid Per Degaton in his scheme to rule the world, and later the JSA will arrive in EarthPrime’s future, where war has ravaged the world. There’s a lot going on in this story, and it certainly warranted taking five books to tell it.

Conway recalls, “This story came to be because Roy and I had been writing together as screenwriters for a number of years and were seeing each other all the time on a variety of projects. He had been one of the people who inspired me to create the All-Star SuperSquad back on my second run at DC Comics in the mid-1970s. Roy and I had always had a friendly disagreement about it because he didn’t approve of some of the things I did because I strayed from the canon and added my own take on some of the characters. When this particular time frame came up, and I was looking to do another JLA/JSA crossover, by that point we had All-Star Squadron, and we had to address the fact that there was this other book, and we were saying we should do it as a crossover between the two titles. When you’re working with Roy, who is a continuity fiend and wants to make sure all your ‘I’s are dotted and your ‘T’s are crossed, it requires you to really layer in a lot of material. So I sort of followed his lead plotting because he had a much clearer sense of where the JSA characters should be and what they should be up to and how they should fit into previous continuity and there were questions he wanted answered and so on. And I was glad to have his input and ideas because, again, by that point I had been writing the crossovers for several years and wanted to come up with something new.”

Roy Thomas recalls his association with this team-up: “Gerry and I were working together on film and even one or two TV scripts, and

The Per Degaton-Verse Befuddled JLAers on this original art page from JLA #208; courtesy of Heritage. Art by Don Heck and Sal Trapani.

TM & © DC Comics.

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Canary Cry A Chuck Patton/Romeo Tanghal-drawn flashback from JLA #219, from the JLA/JSA crossover that introduced a shocking surprise about the Black Canary!

TM & © DC Comics.

All-Star Squadron had recently returned utilizing many of the same JSA characters who’d been starring in the JLA/JSA team-ups for decades, so it seemed natural, with me writing Squadron and Gerry writing JLA, for us to team up. I suspect Gerry must have suggested it first, though; I wouldn’t have tried to talk him into it. Or if I did suggest it, it was in a very tentative way. And since the year was 1982, and Squadron took place in 1942, it made sense to split the difference epoch-wise and have them involved in 1962 … which, as fate would have it, was the year of the Cuban Missile Crisis. From there on, it was just a case of fleshing it out … over five issues.

“I’m proud to have been a part of it,” continues Thomas. “Some people liked it … some didn’t. I think it was one of the best of the later ones, but then, I love inverted history. I recall that we worked out some of the intricacies of the time-paradox and time-travel stuff on a blackboard or some such thing at an office he then had in the Sherman Oaks area. It gave me another chance to use Per Degaton, whom I’ve loved as a villain since 1947.”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #219 (Oct. 1983) “Crisis in the Thunderbolt Dimension!”

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #220 (Nov. 1983) “The Doppelganger Gambit” Writers: Roy Thomas and Gerry Conway.

Artists: Chuck Patton, Romeo Tanghal, and Pablo Marcos. Editor: Len Wein.

Justice League of America: The Flash, Green Lantern, Black Canary, the Elongated Man, the Red Tornado, Zatanna, Firestorm, Superman.

Guest-star: Sargon the Sorcerer.

Justice Society of America: The Flash, the Huntress, Power Girl, Starman, Hourman, Johnny Thunder and Thunderbolt, the Spectre. Villains: Johnny Thunder of Earth-One, The Crime Champions: Chronos, Fiddler, Icicle, Dr. Alchemy II, the Wizard, Felix Faust.

Now we come to the JLA/JSA team-up that fills me with more dread than nostalgia. JLA #219–220 contains the controversial revision of Black Canary’s origin. It’s not really a revision, per se, it’s a stunning missing piece that changed my perception of all I loved about Black Canary, who is my favorite superheroine of all time. I’ve discussed this story before in BACK ISSUE (see my Green Arrow/ Black Canary article in BI #64). Thanks to my writing for BACK ISSUE, this story continues to creep into my reality when I’d rather it just haunt me. That being said, I suppose the time has come to just give up the ghost, show some forgiveness, and give the story its due.

Johnny Thunder’s Thunderbolt is inexplicably attacking and subduing members of the Justice League during the annual JLA/JSA gathering on Earth-One. None of the JSAers are assaulted in such fashion. They soon learn that the Crime Champions (introduced way back in JLA #21–22) have re-formed, and it was Thunderbolt’s disposing of the JLAers that paved the way for the Champions to take control of three ancient locations, the Pyramid of the Sun in Mexico, the Great Pyramid in Egypt, and Stonehenge in England. The JSA go after the 28 • BACK ISSUE • Bronze Age Events Issue

Crime Champions, leaving Black Canary behind to coordinate efforts. Starman returns and tells the Canary that they should trail the Thunderbolt.

The duo enter the Thunderbolt Dimension via Starman’s cosmic rod and quickly locate Johnny Thunder’s Thunderbolt, who is being controlled by the now-revealed evil Johnny Thunder of Earth-One (introduced way back in JLA #37). Thunderbolt subdues Starman and Black Canary, and Thunder turns their attention to a hovering object he stumbled upon. It is a glass coffin, and inside is the deceased Larry Lance, Dinah’s husband. But more shocking is the lifeless figure next to Lance—another Black Canary!

Not just another Black Canary, mind you, but my Black Canary, who had actually been dead since the time between issues Justice League of America #74 and 75. The Black Canary I thought I knew for years is/was Black Canary’s daughter, confined to the Thunderbolt Dimension as an infant years earlier due to the Wizard’s revenge spell, which caused a permanent sonic cry that no human could endure, and released as a young adult when Superman discovered that my Dinah was dying due to exposure to Aquarius’ cosmic rays (although it wasn’t enough radiation to kill the 14 other JLA/JSAers exposed, but I digress). A never-beforerevealed memory switch-up was made between the two Lance ladies by the Thunderbolt and the elder Black Canary was left in the Thunderbolt Dimension to die in peace. Voila, a new, younger Black Canary (that fooled practically everyone) arrived on Earth-One. Green Arrow and I simply had to go along with this until Crisis on Infinite Earths negated our ordeal.

Oh, the Earth-One Johnny Thunderbolt and the Crime Champions are defeated, by the way.

Conway explains the retcon: “That’s Roy wanting to dot the ‘I’s and cross the ‘T’s. He wanted to explain the age of the character and why she is younger, and all these things that really raise more questions than needed to [laughs]. It was mostly something he wanted to accomplish.”

At the end of the story it is noted that Marv Wolfman suggested the idea. Thomas explains, “Marv himself says he doesn’t recall making any suggestion, but I do … though it wasn’t anything he was pushing for. He had made the comment somewhere, sometime, that it’d be better if the Black Canary now on Earth-One was the daughter of the Earth-Two one rather than the original Canary … and I ran with that. I never asked Marv for any input on the story, so he’s not to blame for what I may have done with his original notion.”

Well, okay, I’m over it, having veered my resentment to TV’s Arrow, where my favorite superheroine was fatally bombarded with arrows (What? She’s back?! I harbor no ill feelings at last!).

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TM & © DC Comics.

group, protected inside a giant green bubble created by Green JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #231 Lantern, tumble through various dimensions where they glimpse (Oct. 1984) parallel realities until finally reaching Earth-One. They part with the “Family Crisis!”

Champions, who have decided to leave Earth and seek out glimpses JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #232 of other dimensions.

(Nov. 1984) “I’d been reading JLA for years at that point,” continues Busiek.

“Battlegrounds!”

“I started when Englehart started writing it, and I was pretty well up on Writer: Kurt Busiek. Artist: Alan most of what was happening in the DC Universe. So I didn’t have to do Kupperberg. Editor: Alan Gold. much research, and if there was stuff I needed to know, Alan would Justice League of America: Superman, have told me. I had been a Flash fan for years, so it was fun to get to the Flash, Wonder Woman. Guest-star: interact with his continuity over in his own book, and being able to tip Supergirl. Justice Society of America: our hats to things like Sword of the Atom was fun.

Dr. Fate, Starman, Dr. Mid-Nite, Green “Mostly, as I recall, I got a kick out of having Supergirl and Dr. Fate Lantern. Villain: The Commander. interact, him being very serious and her having fun, needling him With all due respect to the next about it. It was a character relationship that came out of nowhere, but entry, JLA #244, Justice League of America it brought some humanity and humor to the proceedings.” #231 and 232 is the last standalone JLA/JSA team-up of the Bronze Age of JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #244 comics. And it’s a meaty tale, even (Nov. 1985) though only seven members of the JLA “The Final Crisis” and JSA are involved, the smallest roster Writer: Gerry Conway. Artists: Joe Staton of any JLA/JSA team-up. and Mike Machlan. Editor: Alan Gold.

Kurt Busiek stepped in to script this Editorial consultant: Roy Thomas. story. “Conway didn’t have time in Justice League of America: J’onn J’onzz, doing the crossover that year,” recalls the Martian Manhunter (J’onn’s third Busiek. “He had most of the JLA tied up appearance in an active role in a JLA/JSA in a story on Mars, and there weren’t team-up, the last being JLA #37–38; many characters available to use. So he during the Bronze Age, J’onn made a asked the editor, Alan Gold, to get one-panel appearance in JLA #100), someone else. Gold asked a few writers, the Elongated Man, Zatanna, Vixen, but they didn’t want to do it either, Steel, Vibe, Gypsy. Justice Society of mostly because so many of the characters America: Dr. Fate, the Flash, Wonder weren’t available. It wasn’t just the JLA members, it was the JSA as well, who were in the middle of stuff Woman, Hawkman, Dr. Mid-Nite. with the origin of Infinity, Inc. I’d been doing some stuff for Alan, Infinity, Inc.: Silver Scarab, Fury, Nuklon, so when the established writers he was asking said no, he asked me. Jade, Northwind. Villains: Commander Steel, Mekanique.

So there was a time, summer after summer during the Bronze I was young and eager, and I didn’t care that so many characters Age of Comics, when the JLA/JSA team-up was an event. That were tied up elsewhere. This was a chance to do somewasn’t exactly so in 1985. Justice League of America #244’s thing, so I said sure, I’d work with whatever limitations “The Final Crisis,” by Conway and artist Joe Staton, there were. should have been right up there with all the other “By the time Alan asked me to it, there wasn’t JLA/JSA events that had gone before, especially since it much time left, so I had to come up with a plot was the last JLA/JSA team-up involving Earths-One really fast. I did, kind of borrowing the core idea and -Two (well, the original Earths-One and -Two). from A Wrinkle in Time, with kids trying to save But it’s an odd, awkward conclusion to the endless their dad, who was a scientist who’d been summer of JLA/JSA crossovers dating back to 1963. possessed by an intergalactic conqueror. I put I do appreciate J’onn J’onzz being involved. He hadn’t together what heroes I could, getting the Flash been used in a JLA/JSA team-up for decades. temporarily out of jail, ringing in Supergirl to get “The Final Crisis” actually began in Infinity, Inc. #19, someone with an S-shield into the book, that sort which, like JLA #244, was part of several crossover of thing.” tie-ins with Crisis on Infinite Earths. CoIE was the On Earth-One, scientist Joshua Champion locates kurt busiek ultimate “Crisis” story, and “The Final Crisis” is simply an alternative universe and is apprehended by a small chapter in the classic epic that changed the the evil ruler of that dimension, the Commander.

DC Universe forever.

Champion is able to contact his sister and children and give them the power to resist the Commander’s plan to take over Earth. The After 23 endless summers, the Crisis on Infinite Earths came and Champion family contacts members of the Justice League and wiped out all the parallel Earths, including Earth-Two, leaving just one Supergirl and bring them to Earth-Two, where Dr. Champion has Earth within one universe to house them all. At that time I was told diverted the Commander’s efforts to seize Earth-One. The JLA teams that Earth-Two was gone forever, that it never had existed in the first up with the JSA and split up into two teams, one to protect Earth-Two place, then to add salt to that unsettling revelation the Justice Society from the Commander’s forces, the other journeying to the was banished to limbo for a spell, and nothing DC has tried to do Commander’s dimension, where they rescue Dr. Champion but since to re-establish Earth-Two has recaptured the magic that was lost unknowingly come under the Commander’s mental spell. (although great JLA and JSA comics have carried on, don’t get me On Earth-Two, the possessed heroes are ordered by the wrong). Some will say I’m being overly harsh here; some will say I’ve Commander to battle their teammates, and during the intense skirmish been overly sentimental at times throughout this article. I can’t help Dr. Champion and his family band together to release the super- it. For more than a generation there have been no annual JLA/JSA heroes from the spell. Then they all team up against the revealed team-ups, yet there was a time before then when some of us had Commander, who withstands the onslaught of the combined one every summer, and as the years have gone by, these JLA/JSA JLA and JSA and Champion family, only to be distracted the by the crossovers have remained nostalgic “Crises” of the mind and heart, intervention of the Monitor, a hint of a Crisis to come (“It was a line- and in my case it’s a beautiful thing. wide thing,” explains Busiek, “building up to Crisis on Infinite Earths.

Alan asked me to use him, and gave me the parameters for how to Bronze Age baby and DC aficionado JIM KINGMAN is a frequent BACK do it, so I stuck him in.” The Commander explodes and the heroic ISSUE contributor.

Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars was a comic-book/ toy crossover event of massive proportions that influenced comics publishing forever. Written by Marvel editor-inchief Jim Shooter, penciled by Mike Zeck and Bob Layton (various issues), and inked by John Beatty, this epic-scale, 12-issue maxiseries ran between 1984 and 1985. This series came about as the result of a toy line that Mattel Toys wanted to create to offset a DC-character-based series of action figures created by rival company Kenner.

While Marvel Comics, under Shooter’s leadership, profited hugely from it, their business partner, Mattel, missed out on significant product development and was unable to capitalize on this relationship for a number of reasons: communication issues, differences in creative vision, and economic factors. Mattel was unable to do with the toys what Marvel did with the series: create a memorable product that would resonate in the hearts and minds of its customers for years to come.

There were some astounding and significant after-effects of Jim Shooter’s monumental series on the rest of the Marvel Universe: the new direction of the Fantastic Four, the heart-rending breakup of Kitty Pryde and Peter Rasputin, Spider-Man’s black costume … and others.

To briefly summarize the plot of Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars, an assortment of superheroes, including the teams of the Avengers, the X-Men, and the Fantastic Four as well as Spider-Man, the Incredible Hulk, and Iron Man (James Rhodes, rather than Tony Stark) are abducted by a seemingly omnipotent cosmic being known as the Beyonder. Transported to a composite planet made up of sections taken from other planets (including Earth), they are set against a collection of abducted villains, including the Wrecking Crew, Dr. Doom, Dr. Octopus, the Lizard, Kang the Conqueror, Ultron, the Absorbing Man, the Enchantress, and the Molecule Man. Towering above this cadre of villains is the all-powerful Galactus. As Dr. Doom puts it, it is a gathering of forces, as if for war. The story sees a series of colossal battles between these two forces, which culminates in a struggle against Doom, who claims the Beyonder’s power for his own. After he is defeated, the Beyonder retrieves his jim shooter lost power, and the heroes and villains make their way back to Earth.

Jim Shooter’s tenure as Marvel’s editor-in-chief may have been controversial, but the fact remains that one of his legacies was the creation of this epic series that fundamentally shaped the direction of the publishing company he worked for and arguably influenced the nature of comic publishing for the future. The richly creative days of the ’80s

To Infinity and Beyond(er) The iconic Mike Zeck/John Beatty cover to Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #1 (May 1984). ’Nuff said!

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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John K. Kirk

Versus the Dreaded Deadline Doom This photograph taken by and courtesy of Eliot Brown shows (left to right) Art Nichols, Keith Williams, and Mike Zeck at the Roosevelt Hotel’s Penthouse Suite, slaving away on a Secret Wars deadline. were ripe for new developments and agreements, and that equally applied to the novel concept of licensing deals.

Shooter was quick to pounce on these opportunities, particularly with licensing.

Marvel had outstanding deals with other toy companies with properties like ROM (Parker Brothers), the Micronauts (Mego Toys), and G.I. Joe (Hasbro). In his blog post on www.jimshooter.com, “Righting the Ship,” Shooter states that he took the job as Marvel’s EIC with the goal of “improving things for the company.”

Looking for franchise opportunities and partnerships formed a part of this improvement matrix. Secret Wars was a part of this mindset, and while it mike zeck is conceivable that Shooter could have tracked down the opportunity on his own, it was Mattel Toys that approached Shooter with the idea of licensing characters to market a new toy line of action figures and playsets. Shooter’s bio on www.illustratedmedia.com, however, gives him full credit for this and states that, “In the mid-1980s, with Mattel, Shooter developed a highly successful toy line based on Marvel characters called Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars for Mattel Toys. The accompanying comic series proved to be one of the best-selling of all time.” It was, but the same can’t be said for the toy line. However, it is widely acknowledged that Shooter dominated the right. The toy line’s sales were dwindling, yet sales of direction of Secret Wars … when said, it was pretty the comic-book series were reaching critical mass. What started as a marketing gimmick was becoming one of much “all him.”

What about the effect of the toys? How much of an the most prolific comic series ever made, with publication influence did they have on the direction or even the numbers, according to Bradford Wright’s Comic Book sales of this maxiseries? If the purpose of the comic was to Nation, reaching the 800,000 monthly issue mark.

Tom DeFalco, the maxiseries’ editor, had a somewhat promote the toy line and provide an obvious direction for these toys, then wouldn’t there have been some different perspective on the combined editorial and marketing conversation between Marvel and Mattel. In an sort of reciprocal communication between the creative teams at Mattel and Marvel? Mike Zeck, the lead artist interview on Marvel.com, he recounted that Mattel had on Secret Wars, tells BACK ISSUE, “I still saw no indication done some research and decided that the words “Secret” that Mattel was in any way involved with the direction and “Wars” had to be used in a comic book to support one of their toy lines. A focus group poll of boys in the of the comics. If they were, it’s news to me.”

If we take a closer look at the toys and the significant right target age had determined that these were key developments in the Secret Wars storyline, we can words in a title that would seize their interest. DeFalco countered Mattel’s initial insistence on writing another determine what sort of a creative effect they had on each other. The creation of the toys was an operation that seemed book by stating that Marvel already had a number of to evince no sense of coordination between the two successful titles that could be used instead of coming up parties; as a result, the sales of the toys languished and with a totally new one. Also, he pushed for the title to be the editorial direction the comics eventually found simply “Marvel Super Heroes.” The two sides compromised themselves heading in contained very little trace of and came up with the title we know today and that there Mattel’s influence, based on what form the toys took. would be a new comic. Later on in the interview, DeFalco Marvel Comics held the dominant share of creative said,. “[Marvel] finally agreed to do a tie-in called MARVEL effort for this cooperative venture and it was Marvel SUPER HEROES SECRET WARS. Once Marvel agreed to do a tie-in title and told Mattel who was going to be in Comics that reaped the reward. it, they backed off and let us do our thing.”

CREATIVE DIRECTION From this can we conclude that Mattel limited its Though the purpose of the series was to support the toy involvement in the creation and direction of the comic line, by January of 1985 the series had significant traction that was supposed to be the instructional guide for and was approaching the point where it wasn’t fulfilling their toys? This is a hard question to answer, but Eliot its original purpose as a showcase for the toys, but R. Brown, who was on staff at Marvel at the time, performing as a majorly successful comic title in its own recalls that Jim Shooter lamented the idea of Marvel

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Home of He-Man Mattel’s El Segundo, California, headquarters, in 2012.

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Marvel Dossiers Fact-file info and comic-style intros for Captain America and Magneto, from the back sides of their Secret Wars figures’ blister cards.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

action figures carrying guns: “Jim said, ‘Okay, they need their toys, [but] Spider-Man can’t carry a gun! So right after they’re given the things, we’ll throw them away.’ ” In one of the instances where Mattel had offered some creative guidance into the formulation of the toys, it was easily dismissed for the comic. Perhaps there were other occasions when Mattel offered some guidance, but it was apparent that Shooter had his own passionate but clear intentions on the creative direction of the comic. Mattel’s direction, in contrast, wasn’t as clear.

Sean Howe’s book Marvel Comics: The Untold Story provides some insight into the difficulty of establishing the team. Mike Zeck had already been penciling Captain America for about three years. He was reluctant to give up the post to work on a totally different concept like Secret Wars. However, he would still get to draw Captain America, just in a different book. Shooter had considered cosmic artists like Jim Starlin or artists with a following like John Byrne or Frank Miller, but Byrne was busy writing and illustrating Alpha Flight at this point and Miller was on the verge of leaving Marvel. Zeck had popular appeal and was willing to leave Captain America. Marvel was running short on superstar talent that could guarantee sales, so while Bill Mantlo had earlier experience writing toys into comics with his work on The Micronauts, it was eventually decided that Jim Shooter would take over the writing himself and Zeck would handle the artistry.

Shooter preceded upon the only directive that Mattel president Ray Wagner had initially given him: it had to be big. For this purpose, the Beyonder had to be an entity of unlimited power that set the conditions for the battle and had to be greater than all the heroes and villains

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combined—including Galactus. If the Beyonder’s power dwarfed Galactus’, then the scale was truly enormous.

With such imagined power and appeal, it is difficult to reconcile the scope of the story with the eventual miniscule selection of action figures and vehicles that formed the basis of the toy line Mattel eventually created. This level of disparity also indicated the absence of cohesive communication between Mattel and Marvel. It is unclear to determine the full extent of Mattel’s input, but without any sense of what they could create, Shooter created his own storyline that dwarfed anything that Marvel had ever created before in the past. In fact, it can be argued that this lack of restriction could have been an excellent, if unintentional contribution by Mattel to the deal—which was to Marvel’s eventual and exclusive benefit, of course.

Jim Shooter’s demands were to prove too much for Mike Zeck. In reading Shooter’s blog again—“Secrets of the Secret Wars” (04/2011)—Shooter shared that while he was a Mike Zeck fan, Zeck simply couldn’t do cosmic, god-level stuff. He recalled how he had to provide layouts for Zeck, and while they helped, he felt that they didn’t help enough. In fact, he even went on to claim that they should have recast the artist but left out who could have filled in for Zeck. In the end, Shooter felt that because he was the writer, he deferred to the editor in such matters. It was editor Tom DeFalco’s concern, not his, but Mike Zeck’s art was well-loved by the hundreds of thousands who bought Secret Wars.

Issue #8 can be seen as a key issue that changed the book from a mere marketing piece to a deeper story.

There were significant character developments that had future implications on the Marvel Universe. The story seems to reveal that Shooter had forgotten about the “teaching purpose” of his comic and simply enjoyed writing the story. This also coincided around the same time that the Mattel sales figures had slipped into the red (www.fundinguniverse.com). In 1984, Mattel posted a $400 million loss; after a near-bankruptcy in 1983, the toy company had to be rescued and was no longer thinking about anything outside its core products, which did not include the Secret Wars toy line. It’s understandable that this was no longer on Mattel’s marketing radar, and this comic was no longer a sales piece—it had become a true story in its own right.

In issue #8, “Invasion,” we see the heroes finally assaulting the villains’ base. The X-Men agree to stand watch over Galactus, freeing the Avengers, the FF, and the other heroes to rescue She-Hulk. During this time, within the action we see more character insight into the characters in this comic than in the entire story to this point. We see Ben Grimm revert back to his human form, gain a new perspective into the nature of the Enchantress, learn more about Titania’s bullying insecurities, and, of course, there is the introduction of Spider-Man’s new costume. More would come, but this was when Secret Wars took a direction away from the toys and back to the characters.

This was a watershed point in Secret Wars. Mattel’s sales had dropped and the comic had taken on a life of its own. With other financial concerns, it is conceivable that Mattel could no longer pay any serious attention in directing the comic as a marketing initiative. Their toy sales did not provide the flanking efforts it was hoped to do, yet the comic had succeeded wildly beyond Shooter’s imagination. Owner of pop-culture store That’s Entertainment Paul Howley recalls that while Marvel’s then-direct sales manager Carol Kalish derided the series to a group of comic-store owners as “crap,” she still acknowledged its unarguable sales success. Whatever the reason, the fans loved Secret Wars.

THE BATTLEFIELDS If you look at the different possible scenes for the playset locations that Mattel could have chosen, it’s remarkable to think how little they actually resembled the ones from the comic. Was this ignorance or was it a decision based on resources or other factors at play? It’s hard to know, yet what we do know is that there was a limited representation of the environments based in the comic to what was actually created for the consumers.

Marvel had a variety of environments for use with the action figures.

Their eclectic and chaotic nature was justified by the patchwork nature of the Beyonder’s construction of Battle World. However, out of all the varieties that were available, Mattel came up with only two. They created two character bases as settings (out of the primary three from the comic): the Heroes’ Base (which did not share the Mattel name in the comic— somehow Freedom Fighter [playset] would have sounded hyperbolic, even by Secret Wars standards); the villains’ Tower of Doom (which did not resemble Doombase or the Tower of Doom at the end of the series). The last set which was not replicated by Mattel was Magneto’s base, which he later shared with the X-Men. With the exception of the Tower of Doom’s name, neither of these bases had any degree of physical similarity to their counterparts in the comics. This was a trend that Mattel repeated elsewhere throughout the relationship. It was especially odd, given that Kenner’s decision to license the DC characters as action figures literally panicked Mattel into approaching Marvel for a similar deal. It’s possible to speculate that their success with He-Man and the Masters of the Universe must have given them somewhat of a sense of premature fait accompli and a lack of concern so the creative input seemed to rest solely in the hands of Marvel. Did this mark a departure in the creative cohesiveness between the two companies? To appearances, it was a one-way street that Mattel seemed quite content to follow: by allowing Marvel—and Jim Shooter—to determine the physical shape of the Secret Wars in the comic, Mattel went their own way when it came time to mass produce some of the toys from the comic.

The epic-scale material that Shooter and Mike Zeck were hammering out seemed perfectly fitted for a toy line. Magneto’s base, which was essentially a giant horseshoe magnet suspended on a back tower, was ideally suited for the mass-production facilities Mattel had at its disposal.

With a hangar, a main chamber, and a bedroom or two, it would have been a very easy base to replicate, yet was completely ignored.

The Tower of Doom that Mattel designed and produced minimally resembled Victor von Doom’s golden fortress in that it had multiple levels.

However, that was it. With Galactus’ and then the Beyonder’s power coursing through his body, Doom created the massive tower in issue #11 of the series. It was supposed to intimidate others and glorify Doom’s ego, yet there was no way that Mattel could replicate Mike Zeck’s grand designs. In contrast, Mattel’s rendition was a disappointing three-level cross between the villains’ first base and the final tower.

Even the color didn’t match.

The villains’ first base was a massive structure, complete with cupolas, domes, and protruding weapons ports. However, the heroes’ base was even more grandiose; complete with a gigantic central dome surrounded by dozens of smaller buildings. The Mattel playset for this environment

was a series of three elevated platforms with patterns similar to Captain America’s shield and Spider-Man’s mask. Neither of Mattel’s renditions drew a significant degree of inspiration from their Marvel counterparts, which goes further to support the speculation that there was a departure between Mattel and Marvel’s combined creative efforts.

It is said that Jim Shooter was fond of repeating Stan Lee’s maxim: “If the comics are good, the sales will take care of themselves.” While this was not a statement that Marvel’s sales department would welcome, they had nothing to fear on this level. This comic sold, regardless of its sales-oriented origins. However, even the playsets and action figures it was supposed to sell languished while this book took upon a life of its own that transcended its marketing background and became a truly memorable series that fans would look back upon fondly.

The Marvel Omnibus collection of Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars includes an essay on the toys by toy historian Jason Geyer. He recounts that when Ray Wagner, president of Mattel, contacted Shooter in 1983 about creating a line of toys from the Marvel lineup of heroes, his prime concern in the partnership was to create a have a backup brand for the wildly successful He-Man toys—something to fall back on in case those toys faltered.

In his “Secrets of the Secret Wars” blog post, Shooter described Mattel’s perspective on the initiative as “hedging their bets.” The Secret Wars toy line was a flanking brand. It was quite clear that the specifics of the brand were solely in Shooter’s hands and that the toy line was never meant to be a standalone product series, and not a primary one. Wagner’s initial and sole contribution to the project requirements was the scope—to simply make it a big event that incorporated as many characters to sell as many toys as possible.

Wagner was of the opinion that Marvel heroes simply didn’t have the same recognizability as their DC counterparts, owing in part to DC’s presence on the silver screen. It’s also important to note that Mattel had also lost out to Kenner to license the DC characters, so Marvel was simply the next best thing.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc. Granted, there is a great distance between the designers and their mediums. Mike Zeck’s sketchboard was a more flexible medium to work with, which allowed him a great deal of latitude for his designs.

Mattel, on the other hand, had more physical material costs to consider as well as other physical size restrictions to work with—like the dimensions of the actual figures. Also, Mattel cut corners with their production capacity: There were only three primary molds for the figures and there was lesser degree of joint articulation. Though this was par for the times, there was a limitation to what they could actually make, but the complete departure from anything that resembled the playsets would have been disappointing to the comic reader who looked for the toys in his comic and found these caricatures of the characters, vehicles, and amazing backdrops instead.

THE WAR VEHICLES The vehicles actually show up in the series quite frequently. For a cast that had a number of flying characters at its disposal, the number of vehicles Shooter incorporated into his story allowed for a number of follow-up creations for the toy line. However, Mattel only produced a few vehicles that were completely their own invention and had nothing to do with the ones used by the characters in the story.

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For example, in issue #1, we see two giant space arks of near-Biblical proportions carrying the heroes and villains to the Battle Planet. Then we see Dr. Doom appropriating some sort of ultra-sophisticated fighter skycraft from the villains’ base and leaving them to strike out on his own. Kang takes advantage of the moment and blasts him out of the sky. A few pages later, the heroes are attacked by their foes and we see the Wrecking Crew on board a giant tripod walker that every kid would want to have. In the first issue alone, there are at least three vehicles that could have been used with the Mattel characters. Instead, what did Mattel produce?

Dr. Doom’s Doom Roller.

You have to question the designers’ choice of this vehicle design. Why couldn’t one from the comic have been used? Whatever the reason, perhaps it was easier to fabricate—who knows?—it’s clear to see that it had no relation or relevance to the comic’s plot. Likewise, Captain America’s Turbo Cycle was a fairly straightforward vehicle concept that was completely independent of any of the vehicles in the story and likely could have been made in any generic toy company’s line. Mattel demonstrated no connection to the story with the vehicles. In the comic, the Beyonder certainly didn’t create any of these things for the heroes, and they were conceptualized neither by Shooter or Zeck.

In fact, for this article Mike Zeck was asked about the nature of the involvement from Mattel, and he saw no indication of the company’s participation or interaction with the comic. To his recollection, the toy line was supposed to appear around the same time as the comics, as that was the nature of tie-ins. However, during the “year-long blur of rushed art and sleep-deprivation,” Mattel’s request for art barely registered and if the toy company was ever involved with the direction of the Secret Wars storyline, it would have been news to him.

According to Eliot R. Brown, Mattel wanted “itty-bitty toys, hot on the heels of G.I. Joe’s success.” Brown also recounts that Shooter had “sold the toy company on the idea of a big universe-involving storyline.” Shooter was also to have said to the toy designers that “toys were great, but you had to teach the kids how to use them.”

Sadly, the toys that were created could not have been taught by Shooter’s plotline. The vehicles and backgrounds in the book were either too generic in design to stand out and in no way represented the toy line that they were to promote—or were not important enough to register on Mattel’s radar. So where were the instructions?

What was apparent was that Mattel designed the toys themselves with no resemblance to what Shooter included in the book that was supposed to sell them.

The separation between Marvel’s and Mattel’s creative vision of the same universe was sadly great in nature.

Marvel seemed to have had free reign to write whatever they wanted about their properties, but Mattel had a clear, if unspoken, onus to create something that reflected the story. If Shooter and Wagner had a meeting of the minds about the scope of their mutual project, then why did it end there? Mattel created a cast and environment that was more suited to their manufacturing capabilities and resources and not Shooter’s vision.

Big Bang Theory (top) Signed Zeck-drawn original cover art to Secret Wars #12 (Apr. 1985), courtesy of Heritage. (below) Doc Doom’s mode of transportation.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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To further indicate this lack of communication There was actually nothing anthropomorphically wrong between two companies, even the figures’ abilities were misrepresented. Each figure came with an information with the figures that Mattel eventually created, but there was nothing really spectacular about them either. While card that explained their origin and powers, yet they were they were acceptably good sculpts for the time, save also equipped with “Secret Shields” and common blaster Magneto’s missing cape or the re-imagining of Dr. Doom, guns. Captain America’s shield wasn’t even his traditional the toy molds themselves were solid and decent one, to the disappointment of the character’s fans. representations of the cast, minus some articulation. The Another Eliot Brown recollection takes the form of Shooter carrying on about the nature of these additions characters were only articulated at the shoulders, hips, to the cast of Secret Wars: “I can remember sitting and necks. Also, each character was based only around with Tom and Jim, where Jim was on one of three primary body shapes Mattel carrying on about [Mattel] who wanted had available for the line. Furthermore, every character to have a gun and this there were only 14 characters chosen to damn-fool stupid ‘secret’ thing. Which represent the entire cast of the Secret turned out to be a lensatic [lenticular] Wars. This resulted in a limited selection prism toy—the one with two sliced-up of figures to hit the stores. pictures, where the slices interleave The figures were released in two and there’s a prism that allows you to sets in North America. The first wave see one or the other.” included Captain America, Spider-Man An instance of communication from (original costume), Iron Man, Mattel came in the form of a request Wolverine, Dr. Doom, Dr. Octopus, to change Dr. Doom’s costume. It was Magneto, and Kang. The second wave felt that he was too old-fashioned and included Spider-Man (black costume), eliot r. brown medieval. Could his armor be changed and strangely, Daredevil, Falcon, into something more high-tech? The Baron Zemo, and Hobgoblin. There was a third set toward the end of the run that only saw result was the new armor Doom took for himself when the light of day in Europe. This included another roster of he absorbed the power of Galactus and prepared to face the Beyonder. There was a bit of a spoiler to anyone who unrelated characters like Iceman, Electro, and Constrictor.

Granted, Spider-Man and Captain America were remembered looking at the toy ads and then reading must-haves, along with Wolverine, as they were popular issue #10 in 1985 as the house ads pre-dated the release in 1984. However, in terms of significance to the story, of this comic by about a year.

On the villain side, the new and improved Doom neither Wolverine nor Iron Man, for that matter, figured prominently in the plot of the comic they were supposed was included as well as Magneto, Kang, and Dr. Octopus. to have been inspired by. In the comic they were pretty Of course, an unfortunate side effect of the one of the minor as well. Shooter’s Wolverine’s contributions to the complaints of Secret Wars was that in The Uncanny X-Men, story were limited to episodes of bouts of bad temper writer Chris Claremont had carefully crafted Magneto and frustration at being trounced first by Spider-Man into a character worthy of exoneration and capable of restitution. However, Jim Shooter’s version of Magneto and then the Wasp, and the only significant development Iron Man played in the story was concealing that he was a return to his original villainous days, including his wasn’t Tony Stark. What were the criteria for selecting original costume. The Mattel version, in a further extension of irony, didn’t even include his cape. these figures for the first release of the toy line?

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Odd Men Out Later Secret Wars additions such as Daredevil and the European-distributed Iceman and Constrictor confounded some collectors, as those heroes were not among Marvel’s Secret Wars maxiseries’ main players.

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To further highlight Mattel’s detachment, Kang was chosen as one of their figures— a character whose significant presence in Secret Wars only lasted until issue #4, when he was killed by Ultron. His later resurrection consisted of a pair of panels in issue #11.

Dr. Octopus, whichever way you look at it, was also a minor character in the series.

Neither of these characters was critical to the plot and their selection as part of the first release of figures remains a mystery.

Of course, the second series of action figures was even stranger. Four of the five figures to follow weren’t even featured in the Secret Wars comic: Daredevil, Falcon, Baron Zemo, and the Hobgoblin. The final figure was the black-costumed Spider-Man, which was met with great pleasure from Mattel as it allowed them to sell a second Spidey action figure with minimal change to the manufacturing process.

In his essay, “Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars: The Toys,” toy historian Jason Geyer wrote that it was surprising, given that the whole purpose of the miniseries was to support the toy line, that Mattel didn’t use more of the characters. In fact, the entire lack of communication between Mattel and Marvel was a puzzling mystery.

There were a great number of characters missing from the lineup: Wasp, Enchantress, and the other female characters from the series; Molecule Man, the Fantastic Four, and a number of other prominent characters were also keenly absent. The absence of Hulk or the Thing could be explained by Mattel’s limitation of figure molds available. Hulk and the larger or oddly shaped characters were just out of luck since their molds would have been unable to be replicated. Along with Mattel’s cost-cutting decisions in the fabrication process, Geyer observed their absences alone clearly illustrated an absence of coordination between toy and comic company, but there were other significant features that also showed this poor influence that Mattel had on its partner.

A possible reason for Mattel’s limited manufacturing effort could be attributed to the destruction of its factory in Mexico in 1970. A brief history of Mattel (as found on www.fundinguniverse.com) reveals more economic challenges. The following year, a strike in shipping yards in the Far East also denied Mattel access to toys and toy supplies. Four years later, many of the Mattel executives resigned after trying to maintain the appearance of continued growth to its shareholders. In short, Mattel was busy trying to keep itself together.

The wild diversification that followed years later that caused Mattel’s profits to plummet further included the purchase of plastic-molding companies and other manufacturing facilities. These haphazard conditions set the context for the relationship that Mattel was entering into with Marvel.

Mattel observed there was a lack of female characters. There were only five female characters on the heroes’ side, compared to only one on the side of the villains. To please Mattel, one new hero, with the “imaginative” name of Spider-Woman, was added to the comic, in conjunction with new villainesses Titania and Volcana, who were ad hoc creations of Dr. Doom from the Denver suburb that was amalgamated into Battle World. In Marvel Comics: The Untold Story, Sean Howe described the latter two characters as having a “statuesque female-wrestler mode” and the similarity in body shapes seemed to indicate another manufacturing convenience factor for mass production. However, tom defalco none of these characters were ever created by Mattel. Yet all three went on to enjoy continued, if somewhat limited, canonical existence in the Marvel Comics Universe, particularly with Titania exhibiting a fundamental hatred and jealousy of She-Hulk in future stories that proved to be thoroughly entertaining and compelling.

This same convenience factor also manifested itself in the form of Spider-Man’s black costume.

Initially, Shooter hated the costume. Tom DeFalco recalled: “We got a ton of mail saying what a bad idea it was. To the point where Shooter came to me and said, ‘What issue does Spider-Man get his black costume?’ And I said [Amazing Spider-Man] ‘#252’. And he said, ‘Get rid of it by #253. Sales are going to plummet; everybody hates it.’ I had a long discussion with him and convinced him to keep it for at least eight issues. He wasn’t going to get it in Secret Wars until issue #8. I said, ‘We have to introduce it before we get rid of it.’ ” However, when Mattel discovered the concept of Spider-Man’s black costume, they immediately fell in love with the idea; now they could sell two versions of Spider-Man by keeping the same mold and just repainting the second one black. DeFalco recalled that the day they were going to send issue #252 out: “Shooter comes in and says, ‘Oh, by the way, keep the black costume.’ ” In retrospect, it’s unlikely that anyone at Marvel other than Jim Shooter could have written Secret Wars. The intentions and ambitions of the then-current writers of the characters appearing in Secret Wars were too diverse for any one of them to put aside their creative agendas for the crossover. Given the fact that Shooter had contractual obligations to Mattel, which didn’t provide him with any direction other than what he lists out in “Secrets of the Secret Wars,” there really wasn’t anyone else who could fill those obligations. After all,

Paint It Black Both versions of the Secret Wars Spider-Man figure.

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A Venomous Reaction The change in Spidey’s costume sparked a backlash within the Marvel offices. (left) Amazing Spider-Man #252 (May 1984) cover by Ron Frenz and Klaus Janson. (right) Secret Wars #8 (Dec. 1984) cover by Mike Zeck.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

Mattel had exclusively pitched the idea to him and he had re-pitched Secret Wars back. [Editor’s note: Much earlier in his career, Shooter had crafted a superhero series utilizing a toy company’s prerequisites: DC’s Captain Action, a tie-in to the Ideal Toys action figure.] Also, Shooter had been playing with the idea of an epic battle between heroes and villains prior to this, a concept he nicknamed “Cosmic Champions.”

Mattel’s overtures just seemed perfectly timed.

But the fact remained that Mattel had failed to provide Shooter with any majorly specific guidelines. They wanted playsets, for greater price-points, as Shooter claimed in “Secrets of the Secret Wars,” yet omitted from providing Shooter with any plans or specs. So Shooter and Zeck were forced to design their own. Mattel also wanted vehicles as well. Since Shooter already was thinking of stories in that direction, he was the best candidate to come up with the battleground for this great conflict.

When the time came for Mattel to begin production, they apparently chose from a list of characters and started designing vehicles and toys that somewhat resembled the characters and items from the comic in name only. The action figures they went with were three simple basic maleshaped figures that most of the characters were based on for manufacturing sake. They seemed to rely on their own interpretation or upon previous designs from other toys in the past. It is interesting to note that the basic shape of Dr. Doom’s Doom Roller is essentially the same hull shape of the Wind Raider or the Talon from the He-Man and the Masters of the Universe vehicles. Also, the concept for the Doom Roller seems to be an inverted variation of the Roton vehicle from the same line of toys.

Very little imaginative effort was seen in the toys’ construction, which indicated that the series really had little effect on the toys and vice-versa.

The lack of creative vision on Mattel’s part was partly a reflection of business performance in the early 1980s. According to www.fundinguniverse.com, in 1983, Mattel posted a $394 million loss and almost declared bankruptcy. The reason for this massive decline in profits was attributed to a tremendous amount of product diversification and a slump in Intellivision computer console game sales. Mattel’s Intellivision underdog brand was also up against stiff competition in the form of the Atari 2600 and fared badly contributing to its massive loss.

By 1987, Mattel had managed to restructure itself to return to a more profitable mode but only by returning to core brands, of which Secret Wars toy line was not a part. By 1987, the toy line had faded to obscurity and was filling bargain bins around the United States.

THE SECRET WAR BETWEEN MARVEL AND MATTEL Comparing Marvel versus Mattel, it’s clear to see that Marvel was the beneficiary out of the partnership. Not only did they achieve sales on an epic scale but they also created a canonical series that, to this day, still evokes fond memories in its readers. While the house ads of 1984 may have hyped the toys through their wailing dialogue, they proved to be a mere blip in the history of the Secret Wars. Mattel lost out, pure and simple, while Marvel reaped profits and enduring benefits that made Shooter’s tenure as EIC an extremely profitable period in Marvel’s corporate history. Mattel was haunted by supply and manufacturing issues and marked by periods of near-insolvency, contributing to the development of a toy line that barely resembled its promotional literature, but Secret Wars became one of the most profitable comics ever.

At the end of the series, events like the Kitty Pryde and Colossus breakup had to be reconciled. With ramifications that would extend almost a quarter-century later, this seemingly minor event would continue to haunt fans until the characters’ eventual reunion in Joss Whedon’s run of Astounding X-Men. She-Hulk became a member of the Fantastic Four in Fantastic Four #265 and was an exciting addition to John Byrne’s run on the series. Of course, Spider-Man’s black costume is the first thing that every fan will remember about Secret Wars.

In short, while the effects of the series may have been great upon the Marvel Universe, and indeed upon the comic publishing industry as a whole, the effects of the toys upon the comic were negligible.

The toys, loved by some and dismissed by others, would remain an amusing anecdote in the history of the development of this highly influential series—a toy story for the history books.

JOHN KIRK is a librarian and english teacher with the Toronto District School Board in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. John incorporates comics and comics history into his classroom teaching and reviews comics for www.popmythology.com. Also a contributor to Roddenberry Entertainment’s www.1701news.com, John is a pop-culture expert in the complete spectrum of all things Geek—much to the amusement of his students.

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TM

“Ever since I began here at Marvel, I’ve been getting suggestions—hundreds and hundreds in the mail, from readers—that a lot of our major characters, or all of our major characters, should be together in one story,” Jim Shooter (then-editor-in-chief of Marvel Comics) told Jim Salicrup in Comics Interview #14 (Aug. 1984). “We have another series in the works that’s related. I guess you could call it a ‘sequel.’ For the moment we’re calling it Secret Wars II, but that’s more of a joke than anything else, because I swore I’d never do anything like this again.”

THE WAR CONTINUES Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #1 (May 1984) ushered in the “Event Age.” The Beyonder, a mysterious entity from another universe—where he was that entire universe— became aware of us when an unknown event opened a pinhole from our universe into his. Intrigued, he set Marvel’s premier characters upon a patchwork planet, “Battleworld,” and urged them to fight. Enjoyable as it was seeing the Avengers, X-Men, Fantastic Four, Spidey, and the Hulk team up against some of Marvel’s biggest villains, and watching Dr. Doom—as usual—play outside the box and turn the tables on everyone, many questions were left unanswered. Who is the Beyonder? What event gave him access to our universe? To where did he (and Dr. Doom) disappear at the end of the 12-issue maxiseries? “From the very beginning I planned a sequel,” Shooter explained in Marvel Age #27 (June 1985). “In the presentation I gave two-and-a-half years ago, the last paragraph described the ideas I had for a sequel.

Naturally, if Secret Wars had been a disaster, we probably would have forgotten about ever doing Secret Wars II. But the twelve-issue series was one of the best-selling comics in several decades. So naturally we are going to go on and do SWII.” Once again, Jim Shooter was the writer and Sal Buscema was scheduled for art duties.

Secret Wars II #1 (July 1985) was published three months after the conclusion of the first series but, on his blog, Shooter emphatically denied that the sequel was rushed: “We knew from direct sales orders more than a month before #1 of the first SW series that the numbers were huge. Therefore, we planned a sequel immediately, more than a year before SWII #1. We were absolutely not ‘rushing out a sequel.’ Rushing had nothing to do with the quality of my work. Yes, I had plenty to do as EIC and writing SWII tested my limits of endurance, but I guarantee you, it was the best I can do. If I’d had more time I would have slept more, but I doubt that the writing would have been better. The artists, Al Milgrom and Steve Leialoha, probably wished they had more time, but artists always do. The main problem there was that Sal Buscema lost us a month.”

In the Marvel Age interview, Shooter stated, “Sal Buscema was originally slated to draw it, but the only trouble with Sal is that he’s in Virginia. And this book requires such tight continuity that it is difficult to work with someone so far from New York City. So there was nothing wrong with Sal, only where he was living.”

The Beyonder’s Back Mutants and Avengers gather on the John Byrne/ Terry Austin cover to Secret Wars II #1 (July 1985).

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by

Jarrod Buttery

Sal Buscema remembers the book and explains to BACK ISSUE, “Yes, I was asked to pencil SWII. When I received the first plot I was given detailed instructions on how to lay out the book. [I] penciled the first book and realized these restrictions prevented me from doing my best work.

I declined the rest of the project for this reason, explaining that I thought someone else would do a better job under these circumstances. The book I penciled was redone.” When asked if he still had any of the pages, Buscema replies, “I’m afraid they’re long gone.”

Gone but not lost.

As of this writing, Marvel has advance-solicited the Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars: Battleworld Box Set Slipcase, reprinting both series, most of the crossovers, and many extras— including “the original version of SWII #1 by Sal Buscema.” For those with a spare $500 US. Al Milgrom recalls, “I got along very well with Jim Shooter. At a Marvel Christmas party I was talking to him and I said, ‘One of these days you and I have to work together.’

[Author’s note: At this time, Buscema had penciled SWII #1.] I don’t know the exact details but Jim wanted some changes in the first issue and Sal didn’t want to have to go back and revisit stuff and do it over. So Jim asked if I’d like to take over on SWII. And I said, ‘Sure, I’d love to,’ and he said it wouldn’t be fair, if you’re going to do the whole rest of the series, for you not to get the royalties on the first issue—which would be the bestselling issue. And I replied, ‘But Sal’s good and it seems a shame to waste an entire issue by him,’ and Jim said, ‘That’s okay, it’s gonna make a lot of money, we can afford to write off one set of pencils.’

So a friendly conversation about working together some time in the future turned into working together right away—and since the first issue had to be redrawn, we lost a considerable amount of lead time as well. So it was right under the gun the whole time.”

Behold … the Beyonder John Byrne original art, courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com), to a Secret Wars II promo poster. (Yes, those are Jheri Curls!)

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

caricature of writer Steve Gerber, who had an acrimonious split from Marvel some years prior and who, in an interview in Comics Journal #41 (Aug. 1978), had decried the superficiality and hypocrisy of the media.

“I remember vaguely that sequence but I don’t remember drawing Steve— but that doesn’t mean I didn’t!” admits Milgrom.

Cadwall entreats the Beyonder for the power to change things. The Beyonder transforms him into the armored and armed Thundersword (cf.

Gerber’s sword-wielding cartoon character, Thundarr) who, astride his flying horse Boromir (tip of the hat to Valkyrie’s flying horse, Aragorn), proceeds to gratuitously raze downtown L.A.—opposed by the X-Men, New Mutants, Iron Man, and Captain America. The villain defeated, Captain America strides away, unaware that he’s being followed….

And so, the crossovers begin. Editor Bob Budiansky was responsible for their coordination and tells BACK ISSUE, “As for connecting SWII to other Marvel books, yes, that was always the plan. SWII was seen as a potentially huge seller and a great way to bring other Marvel books to readers’ attention by tying them into the SWII storyline. I don’t remember specifics. I’m sure Jim and I met with the rest of the editorial staff at the beginning of planning SWII and we broadly mapped out how different characters would be involved and EARTHFALL! how their books’ storylines would be affected. And then In Secret Wars II #1, the Beyonder falls to Earth near the those editors would have to run the plots to those home of Owen Reece (the Molecule Man) and Marsha crossover books by me so I could make sure everything Rosenberg (Volcana). He tells Owen, “I desire was consistent with what was happening in SWII.” experience!” Marsha suggests he should go to L.A.: Budiansky was asked if he contributed to the over“You can experience everything there!” The Beyonder all storyline: “Probably more than most books I edited AL MILGROM travels to Hollywood and is drawn to the rantings of during my years at Marvel, I felt like more of a caretaker disgruntled scriptwriter, Stewart Cadwall. Cadwall is in the than an editor on SWII. Jim Shooter had very definite middle of a telephone tirade about the pablum served up by the networks: ideas of what he wanted to do with the series. The Beyonder was Jim’s baby, the phony drama, car chases, and violence without consequences. so I left it to him to figure out what he wanted to do with the character.

According to the Comic Book Resources webpage, Cadwall is a thinly veiled Perhaps I suggested a few character details as the series proceeded, but I

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don’t really recall what, if anything, I added to Jim’s vision of him. I felt my job was mainly to put together script and artwork, and then get it to the printer on time, which was always a challenge with that book.

Jim Shooter was not known for turning in his writing work on schedule—as Marvel EIC, he had a lot of other things on his plate. Bobbie Chase was my assistant editor at the time.

She did a tremendous job pulling together each late issue since she was the one who had to beg the Marvel Bullpen production staff to work on word balloon paste-ups, art corrections—whatever was necessary to complete the book—with very little time to do it.

In Captain America #308, the disembodied Beyonder follows Cap (as the Armadillo makes his debut) but doesn’t interact. After observing Cap, the Beyonder believes (correctly) that this is the perfect example of a human and forges an identical corporeal body for himself. He pursues Illyana and her teammates

as they retreat into Limbo in New Mutants #30, where he telepathically connects with Rachel—who senses his power. Beyonder-Cap follows Rachel into Uncanny X-Men #196, noting that, “Of all the beings I have encountered on this world, she is potentially most like me.”

Thundersword (but not the Beyonder) returned in Iron Man #197, written by Denny O’Neil and penciled by Rich Buckler, who remembers drawing the issue: “The Iron Man work I did was a two-issue story arc (#196–197).

I didn’t get to draw the cover on one of them (#197), and I remember being disappointed about that. While this was a Secret Wars crossover story, I was unaware of that at the time. For my money, the bad guys were a little clunky, but I had a lot of fun with Thundersword— I love drawing flying horses!” Hilariously, as a defeated Thundersword plunges into the sea, Tony Stark muses, “We’ll probably hear from him again,” but Thundersword has never reappeared.

BOB BUDIANSKY

“I’LL TAKE MANHATTAN…” The Beyonder, now in his copy of Captain America’s body in SWII #2, learns the importance of human requirements such as money, clothes, eating, and, in a famous scene where he is assisted by Peter Parker, using the bathroom. “He had all this power but he didn’t have any toilet training—or much of any other kind of training,” muses Milgrom.

“I sort of wonder how it is that he could speak English right off the bat.”

Meanwhile, as depicted in the pages of Fantastic Four #281 (Aug. 1985), New York is experiencing a wave of irrational hatred courtesy of the Psycho-Man, Hate Monger, and Malice. In FF #281, Alicia Masters relates the disappearance of Sue Richards. SWII #2 shows that Sue was tricked and incapacitated by a disguised Hate Monger.

Sue is brainwashed into becoming Malice. FF #281 depicts her battle against Reed, Johnny, and Daredevil before Sue regains control. Sue vows revenge against the Hate Monger, but this confrontation appears in SWII #2. The Psycho-Man escapes and Hate Monger is shot by a shadowy figure proclaiming, “Justice is served.” This was another piece of Mark Gruenwald’s long-running “Scourge of the Underworld” subplot (crossovers within crossovers). FF #282 is billed as a SWII crossover but the Beyonder does not appear. Reed is keen to find the Beyonder but Sue insists that they pursue the Psycho-Man. At the end of SWII #2, Luke Cage attempts to explain to the Beyonder that humans need money—which stands for gold. The overriding theme running throughout the series is that the Beyonder is all-powerful but naïve, omnipotent but not omniscient. He is told that there is not enough gold— so he transforms an entire skyscraper into gold—and promptly disappears.

“Basically you just draw a skyscraper and the colorist has to make sure it’s yellow,” laughs Milgrom. “I’m sure I put in some sheen and some highlights, to give it that gold, glossy effect, but in the kind of coloring they did in those days I’m sure it was just yellow with some orange highlights.”

Danny Fingeroth and Tom DeFalco deal with the clean-up in the pages of Web of Spider-Man #6 and Amazing Spider-Man #268, respectively.

To prevent the news getting out, and the subsequent collapse of the world’s economy, the authorities resort to desperate measures—enlisting the assistance of the Kingpin and New York’s underworld as immediate containment and control, before the army and the feds arrive.

BI inquired how the story proceeded from SWII to the Spider-titles.

“I’m not sure, but I think Danny Fingeroth and I heard that Shooter planned to turn a skyscraper into gold and we suggested the Spider-Man team-up to him,” says DeFalco. Fingeroth agrees: “As I recall, turning the building to gold was Jim’s idea. I’m pretty sure he also came up with the solution to the problem caused by it, dumping it into the Marianas Trench. The details of how we’d get to the trench were the result of a group effort between the writers, artists, and editors.” So was it Fingeroth’s idea to use the Kingpin? “No. Not sure whose idea it was. But the Kingpin

Sword of Thunder steve gerber

Secret Wars II’s version of Howard the Duck co-creator Steve Gerber, and his alter ego, Thundersword.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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was much in use in that era, especially in Miller’s Daredevil, concerns to him when I read the plot that he had submitted where he was established as a force to be reckoned with.” weeks earlier. He was right, I should have. However, as he Asked if it was difficult continuing the story from Web was the EIC and I was merely a staff editor, I assumed he to Amazing, DeFalco replies, “No, not really. The Spider- set the moral standards of our published material, so I had writers would meet on a regular basis to compare notes kept my concerns to myself at the time I read the plot. and figure out ways to coordinate the Spider-titles.” After that incident I was more upfront with my opinions.”

Suddenly, halfway through the issue, the Beyonder Milgrom comments: “I’m glad to hear that. I was not having a lot of conversations with the other artists and starts wearing jumpsuits and gives himself black curly hair— writers; I figured Jim was engineering all that stuff, so I the look we are most familiar with. “My guess is Jim never asked for a transition, he just probably said in the plot, had very little contact outside of Jim directly. I don’t think ‘Okay, now he takes on the appearance that we’ve seen I ever talked to anyone else about what was going on when we roughed out the character before the in that book and how it affected their books.” whole series started,’ ” says Milgrom. “I don’t Milgrom was exceedingly busy but others remember why we decided to do that, had chance to network. “There was much or even why the Beyonder decided to do liaising,” remembers Fingeroth. “Jim was that. Maybe at that stage he decided involved in reading and commenting he needed a little more individuality.” on all the related stories. And we “I remember being told that his commented on each others’ stories at outfit was loosely based on a jumpsuit times, too.” DeFalco was also asked that Bill Sienkiewicz was wearing around how Shooter approached the writers that time,” volunteers Avengers-scribe and editors regarding the proposed Roger Stern. “You should double-check crossovers: “I really don’t remember how Shooter started the process. The sales and reader response to Secret Wars wasn’t lost on the creative danny fingeroth community. While almost no creator had any interest in Secret Wars before it went on sale, almost everyone could see the benefit of tying into SWII. I do remember that the goal was to do something different with SWII—bigger and more ambitious than Secret Wars. That shouldn’t come as a surprise.

We were always trying to top ourselves in those days.”

It is in this story that Spider-Man makes the shocking decision to secure a bonus for himself. “I came up with the golden notebook (apologies to Doris Lessing) being the specific thing that would tempt Spider-Man,” explains Fingeroth. “It followed on the ‘everyperson’ status of Spider-Man. Who wouldn’t be tempted to take just a tiny bit of gold which could help all the people he loved who needed the things the notebook could buy?

Ultimately, of course, he doesn’t keep it, which is why he’s Spider-Man and we’re not. I don’t remember specifically what I had in mind for it, beyond just knowing that Peter would definitely not keep it.”

The guilt of taking a gold notebook percolated for many issues, finally being resolved by writer David Michelinie in Web #15 (June 1986): “Continuity in Marvel stories was important (and doable) back in the 1980s,” Michelinie says. “I likely saw the gold notebook as a good element to create conflict (that magic word) in Peter Parker’s life, and to explore his character by the way he dealt with such a conflict. The storyline also gave me the chance to write the Black Fox, a character I’d always enjoyed reading, and to create Chance, a new character whose personality and modus operandi I enjoyed writing.”

Somebody Put Some Britches on That Ken Doll!

Peter Parker in an embarrassing scenario thanks to the Beyonder.

Original Al Milgrom/ Steve Leialoha art from SWII #2, courtesy of Heritage.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

THIS WORLD IS MINE! Secret Wars II #3 sees the Beyonder sticking to his Cap-body and befriending a kindly streetwalker who teaches him to eat from the crockery and not eat the crockery. “So … some matter is to eat—other matter is not! I understand!”

It is also implied that she teaches him … other practices.

Budiansky recalls, “Most of the time I worked well with Jim as his editor, but I do remember he criticized me after one particular issue saw print and received some criticism about a particular character’s [the streetwalker’s] immoral background. The appropriateness of depicting such a character in a comic book aimed at mostly children came into question; Jim was upset about it, and when I said I had concerns about the character as well he became upset with me. He said that as his editor I should have raised my

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with Bill. Someone in the office might have pulling my leg about the jumpsuit.”

Milgrom comments, “That’s interesting! Nobody ever told me that, but I do remember Bill wearing some of those one-piece jumpsuits.” Sienkiewicz concedes, “Sadly, this probably has a ring of truth to it—I went nuts with Brit Fashion that had absolutely nothing to do with classic bespoke style and tailoring. I grimace in horror at some of the suits I wore … chalk it up to youth.

And since I stopped drinking before all this, I can’t even blame it on alcohol—just to trying way too hard.”

This issue introduced Circuit Breaker, who would later feature in Marvel’s Transformers series. Budiansky explains, “I specifically requested that she be included in SWII prior to her first appearance in Transformers.

Actually any Marvel Universe book would have been okay, as long as she appeared in it prior to Transformers.

The reason for it had to do with copyright: Any character appearing in Transformers was automatically copyrighted

by Hasbro, unless the character had previously been copyrighted somewhere else. When I came up with the idea for Circuit Breaker I thought she was a strong enough character that I might want to use her in some future, non-Transformers Marvel book, so I asked Jim Shooter if we could have her appear somewhere in the Marvel Universe first and we decided on SWII.” The Beyonder takes over the mob, then the country, then the world—but discovers he is still not content.

He finds the gratitude of Circuit Breaker rewarding and believes this explains the previously unaccountable actions of the Avengers. Deciding to ask their advice, he travels to the Andromeda Galaxy.

Following the hijacking of Thanos’ abandoned starship, Sanctuary II, by the space mercenary Nebula, the Avengers had tracked it (and the shanghaied Captain Marvel) to the Andromeda Galaxy in Avengers #259 (Sept. 1985). In the following issue, Nebula claims a blood right to Sanctuary II because Thanos was her grandfather! On the verge of being captured, Nebula escapes when the Beyonder appears and, in trying to help, banishes her to parts unknown. An enraged Starfox (Thanos’ brother) decides to leave the Avengers to track her down.

Stern shares his thoughts on these changes: “That was born out of a desire to do something a little different with Starfox. Up to that point, he had been the happygo-lucky, devil-may-care demi-god, a role that was a little too much like that of Hercules. With the introduction of Nebula, Starfox was suddenly faced with some pretty serious family responsibilities. She was his grand-niece, after all, and seemed determined to pick up where Thanos had left off. Sending Starfox on a quest to find Nebula just felt like the right thing to do, and it advanced his character another notch or two. And I was already thinking ahead to the part he would play when Nebula next turned up in the Avengers. Unfortunately, I never got a chance to tell that story before I was fired.

Anyway, with Starfox gone, I had an open slot on the

Fashion Plate The Beyonder’s look changed as he tried to adapt to life among the Earthlings. (top tier) His metamorphosis as chronicled in the corner boxes from the covers of Secret Wars II #1–3. (bottom) His rad new look, as shown on Al “GQ” Milgrom’s cover to issue #6.

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42 • BACK ISSUE • Bronze Age Events Issue

team, which I was able to fill with the Sub-Mariner. Now, some might say encountered. As an experiment, he grants them their fondest dreams, there are similarities between Herc and Namor, as well. But there was proving that one must be careful what one wishes for. In the end, also the potential for friction between the two of them, which suggested the Beyonder serves his most useful function—that of deus ex machina— more possibilities for interesting stories. At least, it did to me.” curing Rick and Cindy, and sending Brandy to Galador to be with ROM. Asked about the organization of the crossovers, Stern offers, “As I After the disruption of their mission in space, Captain America recall, I received a schedule showing which issues of the Avengers should decides to give priority to tracking down the Beyonder—who literally feature cameos or guest-appearances of the Beyonder. I don’t know how pops onto the desk—in Avengers #261. After leading them on several those issues were determined; that was an editorial matter. But I was given merry chases, the Wasp extends Avengers membership (in training) to a far amount of leeway in how I could use the Beyonder.” the Beyonder—all the better to coach and keep an eye on him. However, Stern was also asked if writing the Beyonder presented specific the Beyonder decides he still has much to experience, and departs. difficulties: “It’s always a bit of a challenge to write omnipotent DESPAIR! characters. But by that point I’d already had a fair amount Secret Wars II #5 finds the Beyonder sulking, primarily of experience writing about otherworldly types in Dr. because of Alison’s rejection. If the series depicts the Strange, so it wasn’t that big of a stretch. And since I’d growth and maturation of an (admittedly omnipotent) received photocopies of the SWII stories in progress, individual from “birth” and self-awareness, it is clear I just did my best to follow up on what Jim was doing the Beyonder is now in his moody teenage years. in the limited series.”

Continuing his sulk into Thing #30, the Beyonder A thoroughly chastised Beyonder returns to Earth, cultivates a taste for beer and allows himself to be endeavoring to make up for his mistakes, and considers steered into the Unlimited Class Wrestling that fulfilment may arise from trying rather than Federation—and to be mercilessly pummelled by an doing. He enlists Matt Murdock in a bid to legally take aggrieved Ben Grimm. His human body verging over the Earth in Daredevil #223. As a down payment on near-constant inebriation, the Beyonder seeks he restores Murdock’s sight. Murdock spends a day enlightenment in Dr. Strange #74. Strange considers enjoying the beauty of the world but realizes the roger stern taking the opportunity to neutralize the Beyonder, longer he has his sight, the more he will be willing but instead shows him a possible solution: to use to do anything to keep it—possibly compromising his abilities to help others find their place. his sense of justice. He insists the Beyonder take back his gift: “Take it Writer Peter B. Gillis was initially thrilled to take over the reins of the back, or I’ll sue.”

Sorcerer Supreme and tells the story in his own words: Billed as a SWII crossover, Incredible Hulk #312 is better known as one of the most important issues of the title. At this point in his book, the “This is, more or less, the conversation I had with Roger Stern: near-mindless Hulk had been banished to an interdimensional crossroads ‘Well, Peter, I think I’m beginning to run dry of ideas on Dr.

by Dr. Strange. Flashbacks introduce Bruce Banner’s abusive father, Strange—how would you like to take Brian, and posit an explanation for Bruce’s over the book?’ pent-up rage. “Monster” has influenced ‘Good God, that’s a dream come true! the character’s direction ever since, and Absolutely! I’d love to do it!’ laid the foundation for 2003’s Hulk movie.

‘Fine! Great! That’s settled, then!’

In the last three pages, a coincidentally ‘Roger, I sense there’s a ‘but’ lurking in exploring Beyonder encounters Bruce all this. What is it?’

Banner, and redirects an energy-probe ‘Your first issue is the Beyonder crossover.’ from Alpha Flight #28 toward Bruce….

‘You bastard.’

Sterno laughs maliciously.

LOVE IS THE ANSWER! Back on Earth, the Beyonder researches the desires of everyone on the planet.

Thor’s incapacitated foe Algrim desires nothing more than revenge, so the Beyonder finds it interesting to restore and empower Algrim. Next, deciding to visit Owen and Marsha, he asks Owen to explain “love.” The Beyonder subsequently decides he needs some lovin’ and chooses Alison Blaire (Dazzler)—spending most of SWII #4 and Dazzler #40 trying to sway her. He does find time to visit Canada in between Alpha Flight #27 and 28 to interrupt a battle with Omega Flight.

With its title character only appearing in a one-panel flashback, ROM: Spaceknight #72 instead focuses on the supporting cast. After bombarding himself with gamma rays in Incredible Hulk #269 (Mar. 1982) in an attempt to assist the Hulk, Rick Jones developed incurable cancer.

Forging a friendship with ROM and Brandy Clark, Rick stayed with Brandy after ROM returned to his homeworld, Galador. Both are caring for the orphaned Cindy Adams, whose parents were killed by the alien Dire Wraiths. The Beyonder finds Rick’s, Brandy’s, and Cindy’s desires to be some of the most interesting he has

“Actually, all the crossovers turned out okay. I was told what was supposed to happen, Secret Wars-wise, in the issue and did it. I did obliquely hint that Strange could have effectively neutralized the Beyonder by wrapping him in a universe of illusion but decided against it because of what he saw in him. My little blow for my sense of just how potent Dr. Strange really is—and it got through.”

With a new purpose, the Beyonder consoles Johnny Storm in Fantastic Four #285 after a young fan tries to emulate the Human Torch by setting himself alight. “Hero” is one of writer/artist John

Fashion Plate, Part 2 Bill Sienkiewicz sporting some Big ’80s fashions in 1987. Courtesy of Jackie Estrada, from her book, Comic Book People: Photographs from the 1970s and 1980s (Exhibit A Press, San Diego, California, 2014).

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TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

For the Worth of Perth The Beyonder saves the home city of this article’s writer in Secret Wars II #6.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

Byrne’s most famous FF stories, yet Byrne was not happy point in my epic. I found it useful to use the Beyonder with the Beyonder’s involvement. On his webpage, to do it. I did find it kind of ironic that the Physician’s Byrne explained: “The Beyonder was forced upon me Desk Reference-sized collection of SWII [2009’s SWII in that story—halfway thru! If you have ever wondered Omnibus] did NOT have this story in it—because Marvel why Dr. Janet Darling plays such a significant role at no longer has the rights to the Micronauts.” the beginning and the end, but disappears out of the S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn’t take kindly to the Beyonder’s middle—that’s why. Shooter demanded that I stick the unilateral actions and goes to extreme lengths (to no Beyonder in the story, and the only thing I could think avail) in Power Man and Iron Fist #121—but it’s worth it to have him do that would not completely screw up to see Iron Fist punch a missile. Algrim finally reaches New what I had in mind, was to give him the ‘reveal’ scene York in Power Pack #18. Calling himself Kurse, he injures that originally belonged to Dr. Darling.

Mrs. Power, thus incurring the wrath of the Power children— “Shooter made up a list of the issues of other titles who assist when Kurse proves to be too much even for that were required to cross over with SWII. He did a lone Thunder God in Thor #363. Cloak and Dagger this based solely on the issue numbers, and with no realize that there is no easy solution to the problem of consultation with the various editorial offices about the drugs in issue #4 of their title, after convincing the stories that were planned for those issues. I BEGGED Beyonder that the possibility of reformation—however him to allow me to do ‘Hero’ without the Beyonder, slight—is preferable to execution. promising that I would make the next CHARGE OF THE DARK BRIGADE! story ‘All Beyonder, All the Time,’ but he No matter how much he tries to help, everyrefused. A few years back I proposed thing still goes wrong, so the Beyonder doing a ‘director’s cut’ of this issue, resigns himself to contemplation on a substituting Dr. Darling for the Pacific island in SWII #7. This prompts Beyonder—it was she who gave a swathe of followers—including Al Johnny the background on Tommy Milgrom and Steve Leialoha (page 8).

Hanson—as was her role in my Milgrom doesn’t stay long—three pages original plot. The scenes of Tommy in later, he and his wife are playing life were played out in the Torch’s Trivial Pursuit with Owen and Marsha! imagination, rather than through ‘Beyond“Jim gave very detailed plots so I’m o-Vision’. I offered to do this free of guessing this was indicated as such. charge, just to restore the intent of I don’t remember if Jim asked for it to my story, but Marvel declined.” rich buckler be me and my wife, or if I just decided to draw myself in.”

LIFE RULES! The Beyonder provides Rachel Summers with even Now committed to helping people, the Beyonder saves Perth, Western Australia, from a tidal wave in SWII #6— more power—rivalling his own—bidding her to slay for which this writer shall always be grateful. He is him or save her imperiled teammates in Uncanny X-Men then manipulated by Scion into playing deus ex machina #202. He also empowers a corrupted Moondragon— in Micronauts #16. Peter B. Gillis recalls, “With the who promptly destroys her team in Defenders #152.

Micronauts, I made the Beyonder issue a major turning Gillis was pleased with this final issue. “The Beyonder fit in but I could have done it all without him. I was very glad they let me have a double last issue—especially [so soon] after the double-sized 150th. (It sold very well.)”

Still trying hard, the Beyonder helps the Puma realize his destiny in Spectacular Spider-Man #111, written by Jim Owsley and drawn by Rich Buckler. Trouble is, the Puma’s destiny is to protect his tribe from a threat from beyond.

So for the Beyonder to become complete he must help others find their purpose, and the Puma’s purpose is to kill the Beyonder. Buckler remembers, “The story with Spider-Man and Puma was a crossover on the book I was drawing regularly back then, Spectacular Spider-Man. I had no idea who the Beyonder was and nobody in editorial had bothered to fill me in on anything about Secret Wars.”

The Puma storyline started in Amazing Spider-Man #273, written by DeFalco: “The basic idea was mine.

When Ron Frenz and I first created Puma, we built his backstory around the idea that he (and his ancestors) had been created to protect his people from some great menace from beyond. The Beyonder certainly fit that description so I explained the idea to Jim Owsley and he crafted his own story around it.”

BETRAYAL! At last, SWII #8 reveals that the laboratory accident that created the Molecule Man is the energy event that opened a pinhole into the Beyonder’s universe. But the Beyonder has now progressed from emo teen to angry young man. Owen barely manages to talk the Beyonder out of destroying our multiverse. Mephisto manages to coerce the Beyonder into a wager for existence. The Beyonder chooses Zarathos to torture Spider-Man to see if a mortal is worthy of life, in Amazing Spider-Man #274.

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The Beyonder Gets His Kicks Original art by Mark Bright to the SW II crossover issue, Power Man and Iron Fist #121 (Jan. 1986). Courtesy of Heritage. (inset) A crossover in ASM #273 (Feb. 1986).

Cover by Ron Frenz and Joe Rubinstein.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

This double-sized issue was written by DeFalco: “When Ron Frenz and I first pitched the story to our editor and Shooter, we sold it as the Spider-Man version of the story of Job. Mephisto and Zarathos (a personal favorite of mine) just screamed for inclusion.” Asked if the longerthan-usual story was difficult to organize, DeFalco admits, “Oh, yeah! We were racing the clock from the moment we started and barely managed to get the book to the printer on time.” The double-sized book required art assistance, but it was worth it to see John Romita, Sr. draw Gwen Stacy again.

“Always a pleasure,” smiles DeFalco.

Perhaps the most important character in the original Secret Wars was Dr. Doom. Yet how could he have participated at a time when he was supposedly dead? His body was destroyed in Fantastic Four #260 (Nov. 1983)! “Before I even embarked upon the story I knew exactly how Doom had survived,” explained Byrne on his webpage, “and I had several different scenarios by which he could get his own body back. When Shooter came along and stuck his big thumb in the pie I just shrugged, and took that as one more scenario added—the one that (having no choice) I used. That was one of the rare instances where I was actually able to use the Beyonder to my advantage, rather than having to shoehorn him into a long-planned story with which he had, originally, nothing to do (like ‘Hero’).”

Fantastic Four #288 reveals that the Beyonder plucked Doom from this future point in the timestream, restoring his true body and sending him back in time to Secret Wars #1. Closing the circle, the Doom who disappeared at the end of Secret Wars #12 reappeared at the end of FF #288.

Growing in fury, the Beyonder humbles our heroes in Avengers #265, and erases Xavier’s youngest pupils from existence in New Mutants #37. Over in Uncanny X-Men #203, Rachel realizes she still possesses some of the Beyonder’s empowerment. She taps into the Phoenix force and becomes one with the universe. She has the chance to destroy the Beyonder by destroying our entire universe—but chooses against it. The Beyonder arrives to reclaim his power, and Rachel gives it to him, along with the impression of the universe she has touched.

Finally—finally—the Beyonder understands the totality of life, in all its forms, all its infinite glory.

GOD IN MAN, MAN IN GOD! Issue #9: Having been touched by every being in existence, the Beyonder considers that there just might be something to mortality. He decides to be born into a human body and constructs a machine to facilitate this—a labor-saving device (yes, really). He tests it by reconstituting the New Mutants—uniforms and all. Mephisto attempts to interfere, as do Earth’s assembled heroes, but to no effect. The Beyonder subjects himself to the machine, turning himself into a human baby—but the Molecule Man destroys the machine. There is a catastrophic release of energy, which the Molecule Man directs through a pinhole into an empty universe. The energy expands, cools, and coalesces into matter, planets, and life itself: a New Universe.

A 32-page [no ads] special epilogue dealt with the consequences of the battle: a blast that disintegrated the Rocky Mountains and gouged a chasm down to Earth’s mantle. “Avengers #266 came about because I saw from preliminary material that SWII was going to end with the Rocky Mountains still pretty much ripped apart,” explains Stern. “So I called Jim and asked if I could write an Avengers issue that would give the assembled heroes an opportunity to reflect on what they’d just

been through, and to repair a little of the geological upheaval in the bargain. Jim gave me his blessing to write the epilogue, and made some helpful story suggestions. I don’t even remember how we were approved for an ad-free issue, but the added space was a godsend.”

Injured in the battle with the Beyonder, the Molecule Man nevertheless manages to fix the damage to the planet—seemingly at the cost of his own powers. “As for giving the Molecule Man and Marsha a happy ending, I think that might have been Jim’s idea,” postulates Stern. “It’s been almost 30 years, so I don’t remember for certain who all did what. But I know that Jim added a flashback scene, and I’m pretty sure that he supplied some of the Molecule Man’s final dialogue—which is why I insisted that he be acknowledged for his contributions in the credits.”

Quasar #8 (Mar. 1990) is a Secret Wars epilogue, rather than a SWII crossover. Deadpool Team-Up #1 (Dec. 1998) advertised itself as a SWII crossover. Shame on you if you believe this.

SECRET WARS III The Beyonder returned in the double-sized Fantastic Four #319 (Oct. 1988), written by Steve Englehart. In Tom DeFalco’s book, Comics Creators on Fantastic Four (Titan Books, 2005), FF editor Ralph Macchio stated, “I worked very closely with Steve on the whole SWIII storyline. I was never quite satisfied with the concept of the Beyonder in the first two Secret Wars limited series. I wanted to go back and clarify the Beyonder’s place in the Marvel Universe.”

Steve Englehart disputes this: “No, he did not ‘work closely with me’ on this. He told me he didn’t like the Beyonder, because he didn’t like Shooter, and would I please write the Beyonder out of the Marvel Universe. What happened after that—all the research and assemblage— was entirely my own doing.

“When I took over Green Lantern, the mystery of the Predator’s identity was unresolved,” Englehart continues. “I had an idea, that it Bronze Age Events Issue

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Don’t Collect ’Em All (left) Byrne snuck the Beyonder—or Ben DeRoy—into DC’s Superman #11 (Nov. 1987). (right) The final SWII “crossover,” Deadpool Team-Up #1 (Dec. 1998).

Superman TM & © DC Comics.

Deadpool TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

could be Carol Ferris, and I went back and researched every appearance she’d made, stringing together a through-line that could connect her various roles into a life that could lead to the Predator. With the Beyonder, I did the same thing, though without a preconceived ending. I reread all of his appearances, and little by little I saw how they could all be combined into one throughline that would end the Beyonder. Then I did it. Then I handed it to Ralph.”

Englehart masterfully connected the Beyonder and the Cosmic Cube to a race of aliens called the Beyonders, first mentioned in Marvel Two-in-One #63 (May 1980).

Dr. Doom explains: “The Beyonders have created a force which powers Cosmic Cubes. It comes through a rift in reality when those who wish to collect the force are ready.

But when Owen Reece had his accident, he inadvertently tore a hole in reality where no force field was waiting on this side to trap the unleashed power.” Owen Reece absorbed some of the power meant for a Cosmic Cube— thus becoming the Molecule Man—but the rest of the power poured through a pinhole into another universe.

The Beyonder is the embodiment of that power: part of a Cosmic Cube.

The Beyonder and the Molecule Man recombine to form a nascent Cosmic Cube. Just as the Skrull Cosmic Cube evolved into the Shaper of Worlds (Captain America Annual #7, 1983) and Earth’s Advanced Idea Mechanics Cosmic Cube evolved into Kubik (Avengers

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#289, Mar. 1988), the Beyonder/Molecule Man Cube eventually evolves into the being called Kosmos, in Fantastic Four Annual #23 (1990).

“Interestingly, I had not been a fan of the Beyonder myself, though I objected only to the character, not the creator,” states Englehart. “However, in building my ‘life story’ for him, I got to sympathize with him, and by the end, I was sorry to see him go. It was not planned from the start. I was just developing the FF as they moved forward, and then I was asked to end the Beyonder, so I built that part into the overall journey. It was my idea to make the Beyonder and the Molecule Man the two parts of the Cosmic Cube. And my idea to make that Beyonder story double-sized, ‘cause how was it gonna fit otherwise?”

BEYOND Surprisingly, out of nowhere, New Avengers: Illuminati #3 (July 2007) states that the Beyonder was a mutant Inhuman—already possessing powers before those abilities were amplified by the Terrigen Mists. And he’s still out there. Whether or not this has anything to do with Marvel’s advertised 2015 summer blockbuster— Secret Wars—remains to be seen at this writing.

If Secret Wars defined the “event,” then Secret Wars II defined the “crossover.” Despite some flaws, Secret Wars was successful due to the attraction of teaming up Marvel’s A-list characters for an extended story. Fans may have expected more of the same—this time on Earth—in SWII. Instead, the nine-issue sequel focused on the life story of a godlike alien discovering humanity. The Beyonder’s understanding progressed from complete innocence, to naive child, to surly teen, to adult acceptance and death.

Encounters with Marvel’s heroes were almost incidental in the series—often being left to the crossovers.

Shooter, himself, wrote on his blog: “Did I worry that the story would alienate long-time fans? No. Despite the flaws, I figured most people would enjoy it.

Sales results bore out my feelings. Did I worry that the quality of the story was suffering? If, by that you mean

MARVEL’S SECRET WARS II CROSSOVERS CHECKLIST • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Secret Wars II #1 (July 1985) New Mutants #30 (Aug. 1985) Captain America #308 (Aug. 1985) Uncanny X-Men #196 (Aug. 1985) Iron Man #197 (Aug. 1985) Secret Wars II #2 (Aug. 1985) Web of Spider-Man #6 (Sept. 1985) Amazing Spider-Man #268 (Sept. 1985) Fantastic Four #282 (Sept. 1985) Secret Wars II #3 (Sept. 1985) Daredevil #223 (Oct. 1985) Incredible Hulk #312 (Oct. 1985) Avengers #260 (Oct. 1985) Secret Wars II #4 (Oct. 1985) Dazzler #40 (Nov. 1985)

• • • • • • • • • • • • •

Alpha Flight #28 (Nov. 1985) ROM #72 (Nov. 1985) Avengers #261 (Nov. 1985) Secret Wars II #5 (Nov. 1985) Thing #30 (Dec. 1985) Dr. Strange #74 (Dec. 1985) Fantastic Four #285 (Dec. 1985) Secret Wars II #6 (Dec. 1985) Cloak and Dagger #4 (Jan. 1986) Power Pack #18 (Jan. 1986) Thor #363 (Jan. 1986) Micronauts #16 (Jan. 1986) Power Man and Iron Fist #121 (Jan. 1986) • Secret Wars II #7 (Jan. 1986)

• New Mutants #36 (Feb. 1986) • Amazing Spider-Man #273 (Feb. 1986) • Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #111 (Feb. 1986) • New Defenders #152 (Feb. 1986) • Uncanny X-Men #202 (Feb. 1986) • Secret Wars II #8 (Feb. 1986) • New Mutants #37 (Mar. 1986) • Amazing Spider-Man #274 (Mar. 1986) • Fantastic Four #288 (Mar. 1986) • Avengers #265 (Mar. 1986) • Uncanny X-Men #203 (Mar. 1986) • Secret Wars II #9 (Mar. 1986) • Avengers #266 (Apr. 1986) • Deadpool Team-Up #1 (Dec. 1998)

Avengers Assemble—and X-Men … and FF … and Everyone Else!

Original art by Ron Wilson for a Secret Wars II promo poster. Courtesy of Heritage.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

my writing, no. That story is as well crafted, tightly woven, and solidly planted as I could make it. Some may not like the concept or the execution, and that is their privilege, but I stand by my work.”

“The Beyonder clearly ‘grew up’ in his way, and that was the overriding character arc that ran through the series,” agrees Budiansky. “Overall, Jim and I got along reasonably well during the production of SWII, but it was never an easy book to produce. At the end of editing the series, Jim thanked me and Bobbie for putting up with all the grief of dealing with him—mainly stemming from the difficulty we had in meeting our publication schedule due to his chronic lateness—by giving each of us a very nice present.”

Buckler agrees: “Lots of artists and writers I have heard had unsatisfactory or creatively frustrating encounters with Shooter at one time or another. I never did. Jim just let me do my thing.”

Milgrom enjoyed the assignment: “I had a good working experience with Shooter, we got along well, and it gave me a little more insight into the way his creative brain worked.”

Gillis summarizes, “I will say that when Shooter called us in to tell us about SWII, I was impressed. It certainly was audacious. I think he phrased it that he was going to do the Book of Genesis backwards. After that, though, I just tried to give Jim what he wanted.”

The author would like to express his sincere gratitude to Rich Buckler, Bob Budiansky, Sal Buscema, Tom DeFalco, Steve Englehart, Danny Fingeroth, Peter B. Gillis, David Michelinie, Allen Milgrom, Bill Sienkiewicz, and Roger Stern.

JARROD BUTTERY has written several articles for BACK ISSUE. He lives in Perth, Western Australia, which is still above sea level (for the time being), thanks to the Beyonder.

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TM

by

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Robert Greenberger

In January 1986, comic-book readers were treated to the largest company reboot ever before attempted, one clearly with as much impact as the New 52 relaunch had on modern-day readers in September 2011. It’s hard to believe that three decades have passed since this seminal event, which left a legacy of financial imperatives and creative challenges that have become routine. As a result, fans arriving after Crisis on Infinite Earths have no sense of the mammoth displacement this had on all that had come before.

A refresher course, therefore, is required at the outset. Comic books didn’t have much of any sort of shared universe until the 1960s.

Prior to that, characters gathered in the same story as seen in the colossal battle between the Human Torch and Sub-Mariner. Even after All-American Comics and National Comics gathered their premiere heroes in All-Star Comics #3 as the Justice Society, their adventures were never reflected in their host series.

That all changed with Stan Lee and the Marvel Universe when Spider-Man showed up at the Baxter Building, hoping to get hired by the Fantastic Four. Suddenly, characters, both friend and foe, were bleeding across titles, a feat slowly imitated by DC Comics. DC then did Marvel one better by borrowing the concept of parallel universes from science-fiction stories and had the Golden Age Flash meet his Silver Age counterpart in Flash #123 in 1961, a story that slowly kicked off a trend we’re still seeing used (or overused, if you ask some) today.

As the parallel-worlds concept proved popular with readers, some of whom were reading the comics in their adulthood and remembering the earlier generation of heroes, editor Julie Schwartz rolled the dice and had

the legendary JSA meet their modern-day counterparts in “Crisis on Earth-One!” and “Crisis on Earth-Two!”, seen in 1963’s Justice League of America #21–22. The two-part story sold very well and became an annual event until the 1980s, each story using “Crisis” in its title.

“A CONFUSING BARRIER”

By 1981, DC had a growing number of parallel worlds, and even Marvel began having various universes, without the strict sense of numbering them (that came later). But, by then, the young, energetic Jenette Kahn was running DC and felt the concept was a confusing barrier to new readers.

When writer Marv Wolfman suggested in 1981 that something be done to streamline the continuity, she was all ears. Their discussions, later involving editor Len Wein and executive editor Dick Giordano, evolved into a mega-story slated for the company’s looming 50th anniversary in 1985.

It had been made clear that the story had to clean the slate in a way never before attempted. The story had a cosmic sweep to it and was initially considered to be The History of the DC Universe, but as the creative imperatives grew, the title no longer fit. Instead, the idea of collapsing the multiverse into a single DC Universe sounded like much more of a, ahem, crisis.

Plans were slow to form, but to signal this was no ordinary event, a character dubbed “the Monitor” began mysteriously appearing throughout the line, beginning in the summer of 1982. He could be found not only in the core superhero line but in Jonah Hex and G.I. Combat, implying he was traversing time and space, so whatever he wanted, it had to be something important.

Marvel Comics, meantime, heard what was happening at DC and set out to steal some of their commercial thunder. A moribund toy-line tie-in comic was released as Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars, noteworthy for being a company-wide crossover with “permanent” changes to the characters, marv wolfman although the only really long-lasting change was the arrival of a black Spider-Man costume, which later Photo credit: Alan Light. turned out to be a sentient being better known now as Venom.

DC’s announced plans included not one book, but two: Crisis on Infinite Earths and Who’s Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe.

Again, Marvel launched its own directory known as The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe, released in 1983, scooping DC by two years.

Clearly, readers were in for something special. It was discussed that not only would the multiverse be forever altered but substantial changes would happen throughout the lineup of heroes and villains. Nothing on this sort of scale had been attempted by a comics publisher before.

It was also something that had never been attempted on a creative level. DC Comics executives in the mid-1950s thought it had been long enough since the heyday of the superhero and that it might be worth trying again. And when Showcase #4, starring the Flash, sold well enough, management took a slow approach. Flash appeared in four scattered issues before being returned to his own title, but when DC tried to replicate that success with Green Lantern, they wisely gave him three consecutive issues of Showcase. As a result, it was a few years before there were enough revived characters to populate the JLA. Crisis on Infinite Earths’ format of a self-contained maxiseries was still a relatively new concept at the time, and previously, DC’s only other maxi-series were titles like Camelot 3000, which were set outside any continuity. A 12-part story featuring nearly every character the publisher possessed was a herculean task.

Today, the notion of editorial and writer retreats where years of events are sketched out grew out of the Superman Summits which didn’t begin until 1990 or so. In 1984, when Len Wein, Marv Wolfman, and I sat for weekly lunches to hammer out how the Crisis could take shape and who would be affected, we were treading in unknown waters. Three guys in a

Worlds Will Live, Worlds Will Die The utterly astounding Crisis on Infinite Earths limited edition print from 2000, illustrated by George Pérez and Alex Ross.

TM & © DC Comics.

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Monitor Duty This 1984 memo informed DC editors of the role of the Monitor (inset) in the upcoming Crisis crossover.

TM & © DC Comics.

room, for about two hours a week, may be common today, but back then it was a big deal. Things got easier once we had a beginning and an ending, and got even easier when Marv’s co-plotter on New Teen Titans, George Pérez, joined in on the fun. But once we got a handle on the story, we still needed to sell it to the editorial staff, which occurred at one of the first editorial retreats at the Mohonk Mountain House in the summer of 1984. There, Dick and Marv outlined the scope of the series, plus the changes being made to the mythos and the publishing line. It was also there when editors were told, not asked, to include the Monitor in two issues of each title they edited.

One writer/editor was miffed enough that he refused to speak to the staff the rest of the day, including the van ride back to Manhattan. He did it, though, but it shows that not everyone agreed with editorial directives interfering with their stories.

Some writers were eager to participate, understanding that tying in with the monumental event would clearly boost their sales. And much as the lineup in 2010 was selling below DC’s comfort level, so too was the line in

1983–1984. Some new titles experimented with format (Nathaniel Dusk) while others tried new, lighter fare (Blue Devil), attempting to broaden what was being done with superheroes. Readers seemed to collectively yawn, excited by little that was new and different (Saga of the Swamp Thing being the exception). Writers Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn may have been the most enthusiastic, seeing the possibilities.

Schwartz was readying to retire and accepted with gruff graciousness that DC Double Comics, which was to feature Superboy and Supergirl (see BACK ISSUE #17), would never see the light of day. Also, as the man who kicked off the Silver Age, Julie was there when Dick Giordano broke the news to writer/editor Cary Bates that The Flash would first be canceled and then the character killed off. Little ruffled Bates, and he worked out that issue #350 would be the finale and began plotting accordingly.

Looking back, Wolfman says, “It was definitely harder than anticipated. A 12-part, self-contained story that dealt with every character in a company, keeping them all in order, creating a plot that would not only be a fun comic to read, filled with surprises and shocks but also do what we wanted to in order to bring attention, and sales, to DC, put it in a bull’s-eye. If we failed it would have been a major disaster. The fact that it had never been done before meant there was no template for it, which meant I had to create one. Fortunately, I had several years, not weeks, to work out my ideas and continually hone in on the story I wanted to tell.”

INTERNAL COORDINATION Along with years to consider the story, the editorial staff knew this was coming and their cooperation would be required. With Dick gently cajoling one and all, it was expected each would do their part. Wolfman concurs, noting, “I assumed everyone knew that with the exception of Titans and Legion, DC’s sales at the time were pretty low, so everyone would want to do anything possible to help. But what I found was almost everyone was married to what they’d read all their lives, and that nobody wanted to change anything; many of the people wanted to just coast downhill.”

Among the events required to make readers understand this was not business as usual was the need for big deaths.

Killing the Bug-Eyed Bandit was not going to make readers do anything but shrug, but to kill Supergirl in issue #7 and then the second Flash a month later, it was clear DC meant things would never be the same again. Internally, it was clear these were commercially required changes, but some took it to heart. Librarian and longtime fan Mark Hanerfeld was so upset by this that his doctor ordered him to quit since the stress was adversely affecting his heath.

With Wolfman so focused on the main story, the best he could offer many writers was that the coming cosmic calamity was preceded by red skies and harsh meteorological conditions. With little in the way of guidance beyond that, many merely added red skies to their crossover issues. Again, nothing on this scale had been attempted before, and apparently, not enough lead time was built in to properly organize actual stories that could run concurrent with the main event. We’d all learn quickly enough in the next few years.

Roy Thomas, who had a unique contract with DC that gave him total control over Earth-Two, didn’t necessarily agree with the decisions being made. Still, he was a loyal soldier, and to this day Wolfman credits him for being a true professional:

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“Fortunately, Dick and Jenette were on my side. But since something like Crisis had never been done, we didn’t think we could just order people to participate. Editorially, Roy Thomas was the best. He may not have agreed with what we wanted to do, but he worked the hardest to cooperate, and that was before the sales came in. Once the others saw the huge sales as well as the extremely positive reviews, one by one most of them finally asked to be included. But Roy was there from the beginning.

Many of the others just made my life, as writer but more importantly editor, much more difficult than it needed to be. I had a lot more hair before Crisis.”

EXTERNAL REACTIONS While the story satisfied a certain set of creative needs, it was first and foremost a commercial project intended to bring exposure and profit to DC. Comic shops had by then become the majority sales source of comics and the buying power of the diehard fan was increasingly coveted.

Michael Breakfield, who works at Mile High Comics, was working retail at the time and offers his perspective: “As a fan, Crisis on Infinite Earths changed everything for me.

1) It was written and drawn by Marv Wolfman and George Pérez, the same creative team behind The New Teen Titans, so they had me sold right there; 2) the product, the story itself, was top-notch. This reboot was earned; 3) The relaunch of the DCU gave young fans like me at the time the absolutely best jumping-on point. After Crisis, I was an avid reader of Superman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Shazam!, Justice League, and Batman; 4) Crisis also raised the stakes for the comic reader. If icons like Flash and Supergirl could die saving the world, then the stakes in the story were real and it made reading Crisis resonate, even 30 years later; and 5) Was it necessary to reboot DCU continuity? Maybe.

Here’s how I feel about that: As I said, the Crisis reboot brought me into the DCU and those are the DC tales I know and love. I have a 15-year-old son now. He is a huge DC Comics fan and reads DC almost exclusively. And guess what—he only knows the New 52 continuity. So the New 52 is this generation’s Crisis. So in that respect I’d say, yes, it is a good thing to reboot every 30 years or so.”

When I began working on this article, I reached out via Facebook for people’s recollections and heard from several

Anticipation

dozen fans, from familiar old-time letterhacks to plain, old readers. I received over 50,000 words of recollections and opinions, the vast majority of it boiled down to this: to longtime readers, the multiverse was not confusing, but the Crisis was an amazing event with a true impact the likes of which had not been seen in comics before.

Were the changes expected to be as permanent as Abin Sur’s death? Andrew Arnell puts it this way: “All indications from DC were that this was now life as we know it in the DC Universe. And, with all of the x-overs and lingering story threads that were maintained after the series wrapped, there was little doubt.”

For Ian Ascher, who was 11 at the time, “The biggest surprise to me was … THEY KILLED SUPERHEROES! This was unheard of to me. It was still a fairly new concept to the industry itself. I mean, the Flash was dead. The Flash. He was a member of the Justice League and he died. Mind blown.”

Overall, readers found themselves truly missing the parallel worlds. After all, for most it had been a part of their reading experience and allowed them to see favorite heroes at different stages in their careers.

Stephen Bayer summed things up for the majority of respondents when he wrote, “At the time I didn’t miss it as much as I did later. After Crisis concluded, I was excited about this new status quo and the new storytelling possibilities. To be honest, the Earth-Two Batman had already been dead for several years, the Earth-Two Wonder Woman was rarely seen, and the Earth-Two Superman was still around but basically retired. A lot of the other Earth-Two (and -S and -X characters) basically still existed, it was just the different Earths they had lived on that were gone so I felt like I still had ‘my’ characters.

“However, years later, with more reflection, I do miss the parallel worlds because I think having multiple earths (which is basically another version of having multiple timelines with the same characters, just slightly different) opens up more storytelling possibilities. For example, we got to see the Earth-Two Batman marry and have children, the Earth-Two Robin grow up and become a hero in his own right, etc. In retrospect, I wish at the same, DC had allowed the Earth-One characters to exist in some fashion and we would be allowed to ‘check in’ on them every once in a while as they grew Bronze Age Events Issue

(left) Promo from late 1984’s DC Sampler #3 trumpeting the forthcoming crossover. (right) Amazing Heroes #66 was an early source of Crisisrelated data for fans.

TM & © DC Comics. Amazing Heroes © Fantagraphics Books.

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Who Watches the DCU? The vast scope of Crisis begins to unfold as early as this spread, pages 2–3, from the first issue.

Original art courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com).

TM & © DC Comics.

older, got married, had children, die, etc., just as we had with the Earth-Two characters.”

There was also the issue of how permanent these changes were going to remain. At the time, some characters from DC and Marvel had been killed and resurrected, although nowhere near as often as it occurs today. Longtime reader Paul Balzè had high hopes: “The whole thing was too big, too far-reaching, to just go away in a few months. Of course, this was in the mid-1980s, when you didn’t expect the whole universe to be put on the line every year. Now, you look at sweeping changes and you know they’re eventually going to be undone. I’m wondering how much longer the New 52 has left before someone says, ‘Time to change everything again!’ ” Marv Wolfman admits, “The fan reaction was better than I expected.

I was hoping a few Marvel fans would check out the book and discover DC had so many great heroes. But Crisis became our bestselling book by far. Many more people than I ever expected came to DC to check it out and stayed, sampling our other books. It was wonderful. And, of course, Crisis has almost never been out of print, which means the years of work coming up with the story paid off. Modesty aside, it’s still considered the benchmark for all company crossovers, which is a great ego boost.”

(Of course, Marv does not mention the long road to collecting the maxiseries. There was resistance within DC management, who felt that the story would make no sense to newer readers and there might not be enough demand to make it viable, especially given the restoration work required by the files. The book was finally collected to great financial success and has remained in print since.)

THE CROSSOVER IN RETROSPECT Still, Wolfman has had occasion to look back and reflect, noting, “I would have found a way to schmooze the other writers and editors better so as not to make the same mistakes. And except for the ending, I think the story still works.”

Wolfman has never been able to fully distance himself from the Crisis. Mike Carlin hired him to write one more Crisis crossover for Legends of the DC Universe, visiting a heretofore-unseen parallel world and its heroes. Then, DC’s licensed publishing division asked him to write a prose novelization of Crisis, which was published by Byron Preiss’ iBooks in 2005, the maxiseries’ 20th anniversary.

“Because of all the political nightmares in producing the book, and also problems in my personal life, I had never read the full 12 issues together before,” Wolfman says. “So when I read it all those years later,

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and very detached from those days and emotional tumult, I had forgotten so much of the story, so I was surprised at how complex it was, and shocked that I kept all the plates spinning as well as I had. By that point I felt all the dialogue was overdone and purple, but I really did like the story.

It did nearly everything I could have hoped for. Please note I’m only talking about the writing here; George’s art was brilliant and literally nobody else at DC could have done it half as well.”

With years to consider the streamlining and cosmic events, it’s a bit surprising to realize that from Jenette Kahn down, a lot less time was devoted to what would come next. Wolfman pushed for the entire DC Comics line to be relaunched in January 1986 with number ones, a clear signal of starting fresh. But Jenette and Dick wanted to use this occasion to revamp the Big Three and took their time seeking out just the right creators to perform the work. It was a big deal when John Byrne was lured from Marvel for Superman, ultimately working alongside Wolfman in the effort. Still, Byrne could not launch his version until summer 1986, meaning DC had to vamp for several months (which turned out not to be so terrible since it meant we got Alan Moore and Curt Swan’s sweet farewell, Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?). With Frank Miller working on The Dark Knight Returns, he seemed like the man to revisit Batman, but his Year One story would not be ready for print until late fall 1986. Meantime, Wonder Woman remained a vexing problem, so a bakeoff was held and editor Janice Race convinced Kahn that Greg Potter’s take was the right approach. George Pérez was so exhausted from Crisis, when he agreed to draw the series, it had to wait, and by then, he and incoming editor Karen Berger eased Potter out until this more and more reflected Pérez’s vision, as seen in November 1986. All of this creative wonderment meant a clean reboot in January 1986 was impossible.

And while Giordano later came to regret not rebooting the line in one sweep, Wolfman also agrees post-Crisis planning was shallow at best.

“I wanted 1986 to start with all-new number ones,” he tells BI. “We’d begin with origin stories and then take the books from there. If we wanted to re-introduce a character, we’d create it new as if it hadn’t been around before or done in such a way brand-new readers would understand them. Everything could be rebuilt from scratch. So Supergirl could come back (or Flash or anyone else) but they’d be created as if for the first time in 1986, with current thinking, rather than be stuck with decisions, good or bad, that were made back in the ’60s or before.

“The other problem was I had wanted all the heroes to forget the Crisis ever happened since a brand-new Earth was being formed where it never did happen. It was as if the Crisis happened in 1955, and the

The Death of the Monitor Harbinger (Lyla) and Pariah react to the demise of Crisis’ Peeping Tom on this breathtaking George Pérez cover to Crisis on Infinite Earths #4 (July 1985). Original art courtesy of Anthony Snyder (www.anthonyscomicbookart.com).

TM & © DC Comics.

next year the Barry Allen Flash was created with no reference or knowledge Barry had ever been Flash before.

“But one of the editors at the time fought that tooth and nail. He said if the heroes didn’t remember the Crisis it would invalidate the series.

I said the heroes don’t buy our books, the readers do, and they would remember. Besides, if we kept regurgitating the past, then it would make everything more complicated than ever. But I lost the fight so I had the heroes go back in time to before the new Big Bang so they would remember. But I was right; the constant discussion of the pre-Crisis universe made things confusing as hell for a long, long time.

“I would have wanted to work out the post-Crisis world, but sadly, Dick felt that DC at the time didn’t have enough talent to pull it off correctly.”

As a result, Paul Levitz, then the company’s publisher, began conducting editorial meetings to hammer out how the post-Crisis continuity would work, how it would be different. Unfortunately, as chronicled elsewhere, editorial didn’t necessarily buy into a set of stringent rules to guide the stories.

“At that point I moved from New York to California and any possible follow-through was over for several years,” Wolfman says. “Fortunately, the next group of editors fixed many of the problems.” Of course, without a strong singular editorial vision to guide the growing editorial staff, the continuity began acquiring contradictions, and confusion ultimately required a soft reboot in the form of Zero Hour and subsequent events.

LIFE AFTER CRISIS At the time, though, DC was left with threads that needed resolving creatively and there were commercial considerations affecting decisions being made about the major characters that were killed. At one point, a small faction in editorial, led by art director Neal Pozner, wanted to use this opportunity to actually recreate the Silver Age and start only with the names and create everything from scratch. Testing those waters, Giordano cautiously allowed interested people to pitch new Flash concepts.

Pozner’s, I recall, had everything to do with a “flash of light” as the premise and also would have given us a lead with a complete nuclear family, a rarity in a fictional world of single children. In the end, though, it was clear a Scarlet Speedster was needed, which meant the former Kid Flash Wally West, as seen in the final pages of Crisis #12, would be the next Flash.

One of the interesting byproducts of the Crisis was that the single Earth meant there was now a Justice Society of America before the Justice League of America. Roy Thomas began exploring this notion with his chronological stories in Secret Origins and over time the notion of legacy grew. There was something special about handing over the mantle, for example, from Jay Garrick to Barry Allen to Wally West. New characters, such as Damage, could trace their lineage all the way back to earliest costumed champions. The notion helped separate DC’s mythos from Marvel’s and lasted until Flashpoint, when the continuity was reset, eliminating that idea and replacing it with another idea: Superman was the first superhero on Earth (as seen not only on New Earth but Earth-Two).

From a commercial standpoint, the sales success of Crisis (and yes, Secret Wars) encouraged both publishers to try again. As seen in this issue, DC followed with Legends (after an earlier project, Crisis of the Soul [see BI #9], failed to gel).

“Crisis was created because DC’s sales were quite poor compared to Marvel’s, and because I felt it was difficult for new readers to get into the DCU because of its complexities,” Wolfman says. “Marvel’s continuity grew organically because, for the most, part only one person, Stan Lee, wrote everything. So everything sort of fit together. DC’s continuity was created over 50 years and by dozens of different people who didn’t read each other’s books. So there was a definite need to be filled there. But with the financial and critical success of Crisis, everyone rushed in to do it again, and unfortunately they didn’t have either a real reason to do it (other than

sales) or a story big enough or important enough. Those books were wrongly conceived. And sales for the crossovers started to decline.

“These days there are still crossovers, but they tend to come out of specific needs and many of them are therefore much better creatively.”

As noted throughout this issue, company-wide crossovers have been a required part of the publishing budget and readers have suffered through some very weak events and some staggeringly strong ones. Almost every year, the comics media runs pieces questioning when crossover fatigue will set in. Reader Paul Balzè points out, “Well, we keep saying we wish there were fewer of them, but we keep buying them, which I guess is good for the business. I’ve gotten pickier about what I buy during the big events, though. I read Marvel’s Civil War, but I didn’t buy every title that tied into it. As a reader, I do sometimes think it would be nice to get a full year of, say, Justice League, without having a five-month detour into an event. And some of them go on way too long (Forever Evil) or just aren’t very good.”

It’s interesting to note how the evolving method of telling comic-book stories, owing in equal parts to the ancient mythology and radio soap opera, has spilled beyond its four-color pages. You could see it infiltrate science fiction with shared universes such as Robert Lynn Aspirin and Lynn Abbey’s Thieves’ World and George R. R. Martin’s Wild Cards in the 1980s. In time, the serialized nature also found its way into primetime television as dramas got richer and deeper, an early example being Steven Bochco’s Hill Street Blues. It took time, but in recent years, it finally made it to the movies starting with subplots spun across the Star Wars and Star Trek films and finally, the team-up film—Marvel’s The Avengers.

Thirty years ago, when DC Comics promised worlds will live and worlds will die, no one knew that our reading and buying experiences would never be the same again.

Keep up with writer/editor/educator www.bobgreenberger.com.

ROBERT

Bronze Age Events Issue

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GREENBERGER

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The 1985 maxiseries Crisis on Infinite Earths left a new DC Universe in its wake. Crisis didn’t just reboot the DCU—it proved that crossover events could be very popular with readers. From 1986 on, DC instituted annual crossover series. Where once the JLA and the JSA were enough to solve any yearly crisis that occurred, now these stories spanned the entire breadth of the DCU. And as the years rolled on, they grew bigger and bigger.

THE MAKING OF LEGENDS

by

J o h n Tr u m b u l l

In 1986, DC’s multiple Earths had been merged down to one, but it was an Earth still in need of expansion and definition. Reboots of Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman were all underway, yet there was nothing to define the new DCU at large. Robert Greenberger, who was at DC at the time, says, “After Crisis proved such a success, Paul Levitz and Dick Giordano held a series of editorial meetings with an eye towards the post-Crisis universe.

There was money to be made so at one time, every editor was tasked with coming up with their own vision of a new company-wide crossover.

The winner was the one without a name which, as readers now know, was Paul’s own pitch which became the ill-fated Crisis of the Soul. [Author’s note: For more of the story behind Crisis of the Soul, see BACK ISSUE #9.]

“Once it was clear editorial and many creators were not crazy about Crisis of the Soul, Dick realized he had a gap on the schedule that needed filling. Since he was in the process of recruiting Mike Gold away from First Comics, he asked Mike for ideas. Gold, in turn, brought John Ostrander to the table and they brainstormed what became Legends.

Dick had Len Wein come in to dialogue to ensure everyone sounded right and I was on board to coordinate, especially in the weeks before Mike moved from Chicago and got settled into his new office.”

A limited cast made sense to editor Mike Gold, both as a way to keep the series manageable and to differentiate it from Crisis. Gold wrote in Legends #1, “As a starting point, I thought the story should focus in on characters with legendary status. The word ‘legendary’ stayed in John’s mind, triggering the word ‘Kirby,’ as in Jack Kirby, the legend who fused an epic quality in the way we see superheroes. From there, we developed a springboard: Darkseid looks at Earth and is offended its residents create legends out of heroes when the only legend they needed was Darkseid.”

As coordinating editor Greenberger explains, the goals of Legends were fairly clear: “Much as it was understood the Big Three (Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman) needed to be revamped as a result of the Crisis, the woefully underpowered JLA needed an infusion of major talent. And we needed a Flash. Once obvious needs were identified, then we looked to see what might grow out of the story being told that year. As Legends grew and the JLA and Flash were slotted for spinning off, new-to-DC John Ostrander was promised a book spinning out as well, so he and I got to work and we came up with Suicide Squad. Roy Thomas had been champing at the bit for Captain Marvel, so it made sense to add him to the mix” [for the Shazam!: The New Beginning miniseries].

As Crisis of the Soul morphed into Legends, original Soul penciler Jerry Ordway bowed out due to miscommunications as well as scheduling difficulties with the upcoming Adventures of Superman series. Incoming Superman writer/artist John Byrne was tapped to be Ordway’s replacement, but could only fit six issues into his schedule.

John Ostrander condensed his Legends plot down from eight issues to six, with the ever-creative Byrne suggesting revisions along the way.

Despite the change of creative personnel, the storyline of Legends remained fairly stable. As Robert Greenberger recalls, “The series premise barely changed although issue-to-issue elements evolved, especially as John Byrne began making more and more suggestions, like his dig at [the Marvel New Universe’s] Star Brand and Jim Shooter in the opening pages of issue #5, which was never in the plot.”

Byrne, Baby, Byrne!

Signed John Byrne cover art to the 4th issue of Legends, DC’s follow-up to Crisis on Infinite Earths. Courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com).

TM & © DC Comics.

Bronze Age Events Issue

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BACK ISSUE • 55

LEGENDS

Hated Heroes (top) From the ashes of the aborted Crisis of the Soul arose the DC crossover Legends. (bottom) President Reagan puts the kibosh on caped crusaders and the Boy Wonder has lost his fan club on the last page of Legends #2.

TM & © DC Comics.

56 • BACK ISSUE • Bronze Age Events Issue

As Legends opens, Darkseid, newly restored to the throne of Apokolips, decides that the best way to defeat Earth’s heroes is to destroy the legends around them. Once humanity’s faith in their heroes is shaken, they will be easily conquered by Darkseid’s forces. The Phantom Stranger disagrees with the Lord of Apokolips, arguing that mankind’s love for its heroes is too ingrained to ever be fully stamped out. Darkseid’s minion Glorious Godfrey is sent to Earth as pundit “G. Gordon Godfrey,” where his powers of persuasion kickstart an antisuperhero movement.

Darkseid’s plan yields several early victories. Firestorm, Cosmic Boy, and Justice League Detroit are defeated by the flaming giant Brimstone; Billy Batson is duped into believing that his alter ego Captain Marvel killed a villain with his magic lightning; and Robin (Jason Todd) is injured in an anti-superhero riot. In the midst of mounting violence, US President Ronald Reagan issues an executive order outlawing superheroes until order is restored.

Several heroes choose to defy the presidential edict, trying to do their jobs in spite of increasing public protests.

A total of 22 Legends tie-ins appeared over the course of the series, a modest number compared to the multiple Crisis crossovers of 1985. The venerable Justice League of America ended with issue #261 (Apr. 1987), as the Detroit League disbanded following the murders of Vibe and Steel. The March 1987 Superman titles presented a three-part tale where an amnesiac Man of Steel is manipulated into serving Darkseid on Apokolips. And Secret Origins explored the backgrounds of some of Legends’ characters, with four possible origins for the Phantom Stranger in #10 (Jan. 1987) and the full history of the Suicide Squad in #14 (May 1987).

Legends #3 (Jan. 1987) debuts the new Suicide Squad, as Amanda Waller and Col. Rick Flag recruit convicted supervillains such as Deadshot, Captain Boomerang, Bronze Tiger, the Enchantress, and Blockbuster to go on life-threatening missions in exchange for their freedom. Together, the group manages to destroy the rampaging Brimstone, with Blockbuster as the Squad’s first casualty (but far from the last).

The series climaxes at G. Gordon Godfrey’s rally on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, as the gathered heroes fight off Darkseid’s minions. An injured Robin leads a group of children to convince the angry mob of the value of heroism. Glorious Godfrey’s lust for power ultimately defeats him when donning Dr. Fate’s helmet overwhelms his mind. The public’s faith is restored, and the presidential ban is rescinded.

After the battle, Dr. Fate proposes a new Justice League to replace the disbanded group. Batman, Martian Manhunter, Guy Gardner, Black Canary, Captain Marvel, and Blue Beetle all agree to join, with Superman, the Flash, and Changeling agreeing to assist when needed. Wonder Woman slips away unnoticed. With the rebirth of the Justice League, it becomes clear that Darkseid has lost his debate with the Phantom Stranger. The Stranger tells Darkseid, “Instead of destroying the concept of legends, you have merely reaffirmed it!”

Also reaffirmed was the DC Universe, with classic characters revamped for a new age. The miniseries Shazam!: The New Beginning provided a post-Crisis origin for the World’s Mightiest Mortal, and the ongoing spin-offs all enjoyed healthy runs, with Suicide Squad lasting for 66 issues, the retitled Justice League International lasting for 113, and Flash running for 233.

The new DCU was off to a great start.

While Crisis had started DC’s company-wide crossovers, Legends crystallized the formula. Coming a year after Crisis, “Legends pretty much cemented that these were annual events,” Robert Greenberger says. “They sold well, were easy to market, and allowed the company to freshen the lineup in a fairly orderly manner. It became expected that every year there would be a crossover and it was like a hot potato— some editors were eager to try their hand while others wanted nothing to do with the coordination headache and dealing with varying-sized egos.”

Manhunters Everywhere!

Courtesy of Heritage, original cover art (on Duo-Shade board) to Millennium #3, by Joe Staton and Bruce Patterson.

TM & © DC Comics.

MILLENNIUM “One of these people has waited 1000 years to betray us!”

It was an enticing hook for the annual crossover: Every hero in the DC Universe was being spied on by a cult of killer androids. But this cosmic premise started out with a more down-to-earth idea. As writer Steve Englehart put it in Millennium #5, “I started wondering about the normal people in the DC Universe.” Of course, the DCU tended to turn the ordinary into the extraordinary…

Millennium’s format was rather unusual for American comics in 1987: It was released as eight weekly issues over two months, with multiple tie-ins across the line. As Robert Greenberger recalls, “By the time of Millennium, there was a little industry fatigue, especially once Marvel followed DC’s lead with their own annual events. As a result, both [companies] were struggling for ways to be different.

Condensing the crossover to eight weeks with a weekly comic as the spine was certainly original and daring.” DC’s confidence was reflected in an increased number of tie-ins, with 37 crossovers essentially making Millennium a 45-part story.

As Steve Englehart told Andy Mangels in Amazing Heroes #126 (Oct. 1, 1987), he wanted to make every tie-in count. “My personal feelings were that this is a forty-five part story, and that all the parts of it would have to function as a unit to make the story work to its best advantage. From the start, when I sat down to plot the thing, I figured out which characters were to be featured each week, and then wrote the story with that in mind.

If the characters were to be seen the following week, I would set something up in advance. I plotted it as if all the crossovers mattered.”

Millennium #1 (Jan. 1988) starts on “an ordinary day in the DC Universe,” as Guardian of the Universe Herupa Hando Hu and Zamaron Nadia Safir appear at the Green Lantern Corps’ Citadel. Having foretold that the next race of immortals will be born on Earth, Herupa and Nadia are preparing for the emergence of the Chosen, ten beings who will lead humanity to its next evolutionary leap forward. Trying to prevent this new age are the Manhunters, an evil race of androids that preceded the Green Lantern Corps. The heroes of the DC Universe pledge to protect the Chosen and ensure the advancement of the human race.

Striving to present as diverse a group for the Chosen as possible, Englehart introduced ten people from around the globe: aborigine Betty Clawman, Japanese businessman Takeo Yakata, Shanghai citizen Xiang Po, Russian functionary Nikolai Latikov, Caribbean-born London resident Celia Windward, Iranian Salima Baranizar, South African racial separatist Janwillem Kroef, gay Peruvian Gregorio de la Vega, and Hal Jordan’s Alaskan sidekick Tom Kalmaku. Englehart originally planned to name the Teen Titan Terra as the tenth member, completely forgetting that she’d been killed off in 1984’s Tales of the Teen Titans Annual #3. Amusingly, Englehart had Herupa and Nadia also forget that Terra was dead, showing that even cosmic-minded immortals could be out of touch with current events on Earth. Replacing Terra in the Chosen was the Floronic Man, a villain who had menaced Swamp Thing and the Justice League in the recent past.

At the end of Millennium’s first issue, another complication is revealed: Each hero in the DC Universe is being spied on by a Manhunter. In many cases, this kept the heroes too distracted to protect the Chosen.

Englehart let each book’s creative team choose who to reveal as Manhunters, leading to several different approaches. Some books (such as the canceled Booster Gold or The Outsiders) unmasked long-standing supporting cast members as Manhunter spies, some (like Blue Beetle) revealed that their Manhunters were already-established villains, while others (such as Batman) settled for temporary substitutes, like an android double of Commissioner Gordon. The Superman books went even bigger,

with Clark Kent’s childhood friend Lana Lang and most of Smallville being revealed as Manhunter sleeper agents. Flash Wally West was shocked to discover that his own father was a Manhunter, while Wonder Woman showed even Mount Olympus wasn’t safe, as the god Pan revealed himself as an android duplicate. The spies weren’t limited to the present day, either, as the Legion of Super-Heroes and the Young All-Stars dealt with Manhunters in both the future and the past. (Reports that First Lady Nancy Reagan was a possible Manhunter have been neither confirmed nor denied.)

GIBSON IS CALLED, STATON IS CHOSEN Like Legends before it, Millennium underwent a switch of artists before it got underway. Initially, Ian Gibson, artist of Halo Jones in the UK’s weekly 2000AD, was set to draw the series. Eventual artist Joe Staton remembers, “I was brought in out of the blue well into the project. [Editor] Andy Helfer was planning for Ian Gibson to pencil and ink the whole thing and I was peacefully going along with Green Lantern [Corps] as usual.”

Although DC was eager to use its newly recruited British talents wherever possible, Gibson’s distance from the US created some concern.

As Steve Englehart told Amazing Heroes, “The point was brought up that Ian wasn’t really up on all the goings on in the DC Universe, and would probably not have a sense of all the characters: who they were, and why they were doing what they were doing, and what their personality is like. Joe Staton is very good at that.”

Staton recalls today, “This was before the days of scans and FTPs and the like, and it quickly became apparent that to get things back and forth to Ian in England on the tight schedule wasn’t going to work. Andy had worked with me a lot and knew that I could turn things around as fast as needed.” It was decided that Ian Gibson would provide finishes over Staton, rather than doing the penciling himself. “I imagine Ian wasn’t pleased with the way things worked out,” Staton says, “but he stuck with it and we got it done. He deserves a lot of credit for that.” Englehart had written his story in advance, but the artistic switch and the weekly release schedule added up to a fair amount of deadline pressure for Staton. “There Bronze Age Events Issue

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BACK ISSUE • 57

Trust No One (left) Millennium revealed that Manhunters had infiltrated the world, as promoted in house ads like this one. (right) Weekly publication was another hallmark of this ambitious DC crossover.

TM & © DC Comics.

TM & © DC Comics.

was less than no lead time at all. I came in after things were under way and I was playing catch-up for the duration.”

Staton may have been under the gun, but time wasn’t his biggest concern. “I should say the compressed schedule was the most difficult, but I’m able to deal with tight time frames. I sort of enjoyed that aspect of the whole thing. I think the main difficulty was keeping the characters straight. And it wasn’t easy to come up with character designs for the Chosen with no lead time. Captain Atom shared covers from Jerry Bingham, which I One problem with them was that they were all different coordinated so they linked into a single image. We all ethnic types and I tend to lean to caricature, so I had to knew the crossover du jour would be successful if we all rein in my instincts to avoid being offensive. I wasn’t played nice, especially since no one knew who’d be entirely successful. I went through several versions of looking for cooperation the following year.”

The remainder of Millennium found the heroes of the Betty, the aboriginal woman, trying to avoid stereotyping DCU journeying from outer space to the center of the her. I worried a lot about her.”

Earth, combating the Manhunter cult all the way.

As for his favorite characters to draw, Staton Meanwhile, the Chosen endured their own says, “I particularly enjoyed drawing Blue Beetle. trials, with two members being killed before He’s a good, solid superhero and that’s they could accept the Immortals’ gift, a nice costume. There was a sequence two others ultimately rejecting the with Madame Xanadu that I liked and offer, and the rest struggling to accept a cover with her [#4] that I thought their true path. Millennium’s eighth worked well. I really disliked the and final issue saw the remaining redesign of Captain Atom, so I didn’t six of the Chosen transformed into care for pages including him. In fact, higher beings, ready to lead mankind I had running notes on the margins of to its new destiny. the pages with Captain Atom being on Millennium spawned two new a quest to find Steve Ditko and get his ongoing series from DC: Manhunter, clothes back.” New costumes were a featuring former Manhunter Mark particular bane for Staton on the Shaw’s new life as a bounty hunter, series. “One thing to note is that joe staton and The New Guardians, following the several of the characters were in the journey of the Chosen (the original midst of redesigns during the run of title Trumps was nixed to avoid offending Donald Trump).

Millennium and Ian and I weren’t always aware of that, so much of the art wound up being redrawn by the Unfortunately, both spin-offs proved less popular than production department on the fly. I’ve called this series the ones from Legends the year before: Manhunter lasted 24 issues, while The New Guardians was canceled after a triumph of DC’s production department.” only 12, following creative clashes over political and sexual content. In a final indignity, the New Guardians NO COMIC ESCAPES THE MANHUNTERS Unlike with previous crossovers, the tie-ins for Millennium discovered that another group was actually the true Chosen (apparently, Herupa and Nadia neglected to all functioned as one giant story. To make matters easier, each week’s books were marked with a color-coded include a “no backsies” clause in their offer).

Editor Andy Helfer was certainly feeling the strain Millennium banner behind their logos, so readers knew the correct reading order. Robert Greenberger adds, by the end of Millennium. As he told Amazing Heroes, “The work involved in putting together all the creative “As the weekly schedule became evident, editors were encouraged to coordinate amongst themselves for that personnel together is incredible. It was fun once, but I week’s run of titles. The most successful was probably don’t know if I would want to do another one of these Week Four, where Suicide Squad, Spectre, Detective, and for a good long while.”

58 • BACK ISSUE • Bronze Age Events Issue

INVASION! “A good long while” turned out to be only one year away for Helfer, as he became editor of Invasion!, the crossover event of 1988. Series plotter Keith Giffen fell into the project even more accidentally. “It was a case of ‘me and my big mouth,’ ” recalls Giffen. “I was gassing at Andy Helfer about how cool it would be to do a story that played out like a ’50s–’60s alien invasion movie (Invasion of the Saucer Men, Earth vs. the Flying Saucers). I thought that was the end of it until I came into the office a week later and Andy told me my alien invasion pitch had been approved and we were good to go as the next companywide crossover. I never even knew I was pitching!”

Giffen’s goal for the series was a simple one: “I just wanted to do a B-movie in comic-book form. Oddly enough, the storyline didn’t change all that much. Maybe it became a bit less cheesy….” To give the series extra scope, DC editorial decided to present Invasion! as three 80-Page Giants with no ads, a throwback to the early Silver Age. The 80-page format was fine with Keith Giffen. “I welcomed the extra space to spin out a story,” he says. “The challenge was in finding an artist crazy enough to draw all three 80-page books. As is obvious, we never did.”

So, like Millennium, Invasion! used an atypical format for its crossover. And, like Legends before that, it used creators best known for their work at other companies. Bill Mantlo, fresh off a four-year run on Marvel’s Alpha Flight, agreed to script his very first DC project, and fan-favorite Hulk and Spider-Man artist Todd McFarlane returned to DC to provide pencils over Keith Giffen’s breakdowns.

sun. The Alien Alliance demands the immediate surrender of Earth’s heroes, but the UN refuses, standing united against the extraterrestrial threat. Earth’s defiance is seen throughout the next month’s DC books, as heroes band together globally to repel the alien invaders. The war’s casualties include the Omega Men’s Felicity and Primus, as well as Celsius from the Doom Patrol.

From Robert Greenberger’s end, “Invasion!’s biggest headache seemed to be keeping everyone’s energy high while producing 80-page stories at a shot. We certainly had plenty of time built in for that one, so the pressure was far more limited to editor Andy Helfer and the creative teams.”

Comparing Invasion! to the previous year’s Millennium, Andy Helfer told Amazing Heroes, “It’s much easier because the crossovers are much less important.

What I mean by that is that in Millennium, without the crossovers, we had no story. It tied them all together, but if you read an issue of Millennium without reading the crossovers, you wouldn’t know what the hell was going on. With Invasion! you don’t have to read any of the crossovers unless you want to. That made it a lot easier.”

Taz in Trouble The Khunds have Australia’s Tasmanian Devil in custody.

Original art page from Invasion! #1, featuring Giffen breakdowns, McFarlane pencils, and P. Craig Russell inks. Courtesy of Anthony Snyder.

TM & © DC Comics.

INVASION! BOOK ONE: THE ALIEN ALLIANCE The first issue of Invasion! details the formation of the Alien Alliance, as well as their interest in Earth. The issue opens with the evil Dominators running 50 human prisoners through a Blaster minefield, hoping to discover the secret of human superpowers.

With only one out of the 50 expected to survive, a startling seven humans make it through. Among the survivors is the JLA’s old mascot, Snapper Carr. Concluding that humanity is too powerful and dangerous to survive, the Dominators decide to invade the Earth.

When it came to selecting which aliens would invade the Earth, Giffen confesses, “We just chose the DC alien races we could talk about without being reduced to gales of helpless laughter.

Believe me, there weren’t many.

We also shamelessly plundered the Legion’s alien races.”

The creators settled on nine alien races for the Alien Alliance. From Legion continuity came the Dominators (fanged scientists first seen in Adventure Comics #361, Oct. 1967), the Durlans (Chameleon Boy’s shape-shifting race), the Daxamites (observers from Mon-El’s home planet), the Khunds (a warlike race who first appeared in Adventure Comics #346, July 1966), and the Gil’Dishpan (an aquatic race of telepathic tube worms). From elsewhere in the DC Universe came the Thanagarians (fascist rulers from Hawkman’s home world), the Warlords of Okaara (the trainers of Starfire), the Citadel (foes of the Omega Men), and the Psions (a reptilian race of sadistic scientists).

The Khunds swiftly conquer Australia, the continent with the fewest superhumans to defend it, and set up base in Melbourne. The Daxamite observers remain steadfastly neutral, even after becoming supermen under Earth’s yellow

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A GREAT METROPOLITAN NEWSPAPER

Earth vs.

Flying Saucers (left) This house ad for Invasion!, like the crossover itself, was inspired by sci-fi B-movies of the 1950s. (right) This special edition of the Daily Planet was an Invasion! tie-in.

TM & © DC Comics.

The most memorable of Invasion’s 29 tie-ins was an actual edition of The Daily Planet dated November 4, 1988.

Published between Books One and Two, the 16-page newspaper featured articles and maps about the invasion, an editorial by Perry White, columns by Clark Kent and Cat Grant, as well as sports coverage, TV listings, movie reviews, and comic strips from the DC Universe, filled with in-jokes galore. Keith Giffen was “moderately” involved with the newspaper special. “Mostly just reading for consistency.

That’s ‘consistency,’ not continuity.

Continuity be damned.”

Robert Greenberger, who wrote several articles for the special, remembers, “The Daily Planet was actually a labor of love for most of us.

At the time, many members of staff had journalism experience, so we were all happy to exercise those muscles. It may have been the most stress-free tie-in

we ever produced. (A great anecdote: we were looking for someone to be the picture of our sports columnist when Eddie Whitebread, our messenger from Chemical Color, the separators, came in for his daily run. He posed, complaining he was double-parked.)” Several DC staffers also made photo cameos as man-on-the street interviews, with Jenette Kahn as S.T.A.R. Labs scientist Jenet Klyburn, Swamp Thing editor Karen Berger as Abigail Cable, writer Barbara Kesel as Barbara Gordon, and retail promotions manager Bob Wayne as Funky Flashman (!). Denny O’Neil appeared in the news section as White House aide Morris Fivinviniak (sadly, President Reagan did not achieve the hat trick of three DC crossovers in a row and had to settle for only being quoted in the Daily Planet).

FROM McFARLANE TO GIFFEN TO SEARS

Since it wouldn’t be a DC crossover without a crisis in the art team, Todd McFarlane left Invasion! halfway keith giffen through the second issue, forcing Giffen to complete the pencils on short © Marvel.wikia.com. notice. As editor Andy Helfer told Andy Mangels in Amazing Heroes #152 (Nov. 1, 1988), “Todd over-committed himself on various projects, and he was running so far behind schedule that we had to replace him.” While Keith Giffen declines to discuss McFarlane’s departure further, he was very thankful for issue #3’s new penciler. “Bart Sears was an Andy Helfer discovery and my personal savior. Hell, they had ME drawing part of the second book and my stuff SUCKED! Thank God Bart was available.” Giffen and Sears continued to work together on the Invasion! spin-off book Justice League Europe.

INVASION! BOOK TWO: BATTLEGROUND EARTH In issue #2, Earth’s defenses are organized under Gen. Wade Eiling, Captain Atom, Amanda Waller, and Maxwell Lord. Following a Superman-negotiated ceasefire, Earth’s superheroes finally go on the offensive.

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Superman’s selfless actions convince the Daxamite observers to ally with Earth, and the Khunds are repelled from Australia. Meanwhile, a lower-caste Dominator scientist has discovered the secret behind humanity’s proclivity for superpowers: the metagene.

In what proved to be Invasion!’s biggest contribution to DC lore, the metagene gave a blanket explanation for how superpowers happened. As the unnamed Dominator scientist explained it, “What is it that allows a handful of otherwise normal humans to survive near-encounters with death—and, more—to develop super powers? The answer is the metagene—a biological variant lying dormant in select members of the human race … until an instant of extraordinary physical or emotional stress activates it.

A spontaneous chromosomal combustion then takes place, as the metagene takes the source of the biostress—be it chemical, radioactive, or whatever—and turns the potential catastrophe into a catalyst for genetic change!” This revelation altered the way superpowers were perceived in the DCU, and ever since Invasion!, DC’s super-beings have been called the more scientific-sounding “metahumans.”

When asked how he came up with the concept of the metagene, Keith Giffen responds, “Y’know … I honestly don’t remember. What I do remember is DC editorial HATING it. I mean, really, really hating it and not being shy about letting us know. As for how it’s been used since … I really don’t care. My memories of the treatment we got for daring to introduce such a concept are so negative that I just walked away from the concept.

I’ve used the metagene since then, but always at the behest of the folks that hated it so much. Go figger.”

Following a combined Earth/Daxam assault on the alien armada, the Dominators and the Khunds turn against each other. With the Alliance crumbling, the aliens surrender and the Earth is freed. But at the end of that month’s Invasion! Aftermath crossover issues, the Dominators detonate a surprise secret weapon that negates the metagene—the gene bomb.

Independence Day (left) The Spectre drops in on the Lords of Order on page 70 of #1, and (right) Bart Sears/Joe Rubinstein original cover art to Invasion! #2. Courtesy of Heritage. Its editorial margin note indicates this art was rushed into production.

INVASION! BOOK THREE: WORLD WITHOUT HEROES As Book Three opens, the gene bomb has made the powers of Earth’s metahumans go haywire. Heroes and villains alike begin breaking down on a genetic level, and a mass emergency ward is quickly set up for their care. While some, like the Doom Patrol’s Scott Fisher, succumb to the disease, the gene bomb also has a few unexpected side-effects. The metagenes of normal people like Maxwell Lord are activated, and Metamorpho is brought back to life after being killed during Millennium the year before.

The few heroes unaffected by the gene-bomb go after the Dominion in outer space, hoping to find an antidote before it’s too late. With the help of the Blasters (the metagene-powered minefield survivors from Book One), a solution is found just in the nick of time, and Earth’s heroes are cured.

TM & © DC Comics.

INVASION! AFTERMATH Robert Greenberger recalls, “With all the metagenes being activated along with the larger cosmology coming to the fore, there seemed to be an opportunity to spin off some new series.” While DC’s crossover events were now expected to generate new ongoing books, Keith Bronze Age Events Issue

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Giffen says this was easier said than done. “We damn near had to beg for spin-off concepts … really! The only reason I wound up doing two of the spin-offs myself was because no one else pitched anything. Guess that metagene thing still had folks worked up.”

The Giffen-written spin-offs from Invasion! were Justice League Europe, a companion book to Justice League International, and L.E.G.I.O.N. ’89, featuring the 20th-Century ancestors of the Legion of Super-Heroes. Justice League Europe enjoyed a 68-issue run before the next League revival, while L.E.G.I.O.N. lasted for 70 issues before being revamped as R.E.B.E.L.S. in 1994.

The third Invasion! spin-off was The Blasters, an irreverent one-shot starring Snapper Carr and the other survivors of Dominator experiments, by Peter David and James Fry. Ironically, the massive success of Giffen’s humorous Justice League books may have doomed the one spin-off he wasn’t involved with.

Blasters editor Robert Greenberger explains, “At first, it appeared Blasters was going to be an ongoing, but while Peter David and I saw it would add some new flavor to the line, those in charge at the time felt humor was strictly the purview of Keith Giffen and Marc DeMatteis in Justice League. We were reduced to a one-shot while the JL Europe book played things straight.”

When asked if there’s anything about Invasion! he’d change in hindsight, Giffen says, “Find a capable artist instead of going for the ‘fan favorite.’

That kind of thinking will always come back and bite you. And props to Bill Mantlo for weathering the storm that hit during his first major DC project.”

The storm had clearly taken its toll on both Giffen and Helfer. When asked

by Andy Mangels if they intended to do any more crossover series after Invasion!, both replied no. A clearly burnt-out Giffen stated, “Never. Not even if it will help the space program. Even if I had cancer and it was the only cure.

It’s draining.” As DC’s only two-time crossover editor, Helfer was equally adamant: “No way! I’m finished. My crossover days are over. I’ve done it.

I’ve done it all—now I can die a happy man.”

ARMAGEDDON 2001 After reaffirming legends, evolving mankind, and fighting off aliens, what was next for DC’s crossovers? Time travel.

Armageddon 2001 offered the readers of 1991 a glimpse of DC’s heroes ten years into the future.

Artist Dan Jurgens recalls how he became involved: “Archie Goodwin was the first to ask me if I’d have any interest in working on it. After that, Dick Giordano, Mike Carlin, and Denny O’Neil all approached me. They laid out the general direction and purpose of the story. By then I’d gotten quite excited about it and was happy to jump on board. I’ve always been a sucker for future/time-travel type stories—which probably isn’t too dan jurgens hard to determine if you look at my overall body of work.”

Armageddon 2001 #1 (May 1991) by Archie Goodwin and Dan Jurgens set up an intriguing premise: One of the heroes of the DC Universe was going to turn into a villain. In the dystopian future of 2030, the former hero Monarch holds the world under his absolute control. Scientist Matthew Ryder volunteers for a time-travel experiment in the hopes of uncovering Monarch’s true identity. Exposure to the timestream turns Ryder into Waverider, possessing the ability to see possible futures for whomever he touches. Knowing only that Monarch emerged in the year 2001, Waverider starts looking ten years into the future of the then-current DCU, hoping to defeat Monarch before he even exists.

For all 12 of DC’s summer 1991 Annuals, Waverider saw an alternate future of a DC hero, in order to discover which one was destined to become Monarch. Although he saw such intriguing futures as a President Superman, the Flash in witness protection, and a new group of Teen Titans, Waverider never found his man (or woman). The answer would finally be revealed in Armageddon 2001 #2 (Oct. 1991) by Denny O’Neil and Jurgens.

Who’s the Villain? (top) One hero was destined to become the tyrannical Monarch in Armageddon 2001—and a publicity leak caused DC to shift creative gears after the project had launched! (bottom) Courtesy of Heritage, original Dan Jurgens/Terry Austin cover art for Armageddon 2001 #1 (here in its third printing).

TM & © DC Comics.

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On the creation of Armageddon’s new characters, always willing to tell ‘the press’ what they know Jurgens remembers, “Archie came up with the general because they think it makes them look more important.” idea of Waverider and then we went from there. I came When asked if he knows who leaked the information, up with the look, we went back and forth on that and Jurgens says, “We never found out categorically but there is one main suspect who’ll go unnamed.” some of the character notes, and then put it all together.

Denny contributed some ideas as well. It was a fun time.”

For her part, DCU writer Barbara Kesel recalls her MONARCH’S GREAT IDENTITY SWITCH With the ending of their story now public knowledge, reaction to another crossover event as “something along the lines of ‘enh’ or ‘whatever.’ That was after Crisis but the creators of Armageddon 2001 had a decision to make. before ‘crossover of the month,’ so doing yet another Should they switch Monarch to another suspect? As Dan Jurgens explains, “We first had to consider the concept world ends storyline seemed dumb. I didn’t have a of whether or not we even wanted to make the lot of enthusiasm for it, but my title (Hawk and change. Ultimately, it was decided that it was Dove) was going away and I was on the road the right thing to do. I kind of thought to working for a new company, so I didn’t we should have stayed the course but spend a lot of time thinking about it.” also saw the problem. We were trying Regarding the crossover annuals, to build a major reveal into the story Dan Jurgens says, “I think some worked and without that element of surprise, better than others, certainly, but overall, the story was compromised.”

I thought they fit quite well. I think As Barbara Kesel tells it, “A small individual writers were given enough group of guys who wanted to get room to flesh out the concept in terms the goat of ‘the Leaker’ got together of how it would best fit their characters.” and tossed around ideas based on With the main series confined to recently cancelled books and leftover two 64-page issues illustrated by the characters and made their decision.” ever-reliable Jurgens, Armageddon 2001 barbara kesel And, as Hawk and Dove had just been didn’t suffer a change of artists. Instead, canceled, Hank Hall became a prime it ran into an all-new problem: the candidate. Dan Jurgens concedes, “I surprise ending of Monarch’s identity got leaked. Justice don’t think we had a perfect solution available. Hawk, League Europe Annual #2, the final Annual to come out before the story’s conclusion, ended with Waverider making however, was probably the most reasonable choice.”

That choice could’ve been slightly different, however. contact with Captain Atom, clearly implying that the Captain would be revealed as Monarch in the opening Barbara Kesel reveals, “When I was FIRST told, I was pages of Armageddon 2001 #2, as was the original plan. told Hawk AND Dove were going to become Monarch.

How did such a big secret leak out? Dan Jurgens I thought that was a brilliant fix because the character, explains, “At the time, there was a 1-900 service that being a combination of the two, would be inherently people could call into. They charged a fee and promised unstable. When I found out that they were just playing all sorts of comic industry scoops in the process. another round of ‘Kill the Girl,’ I was extremely disappointed.

Remember—this was pre-Internet. They got the story You invest a lot of time and care building up a good and went with it. As for how they got it, I’m not sure. character—it sucks to have them considered disposable.”

TM & © DC Comics.

Altered States Who will Waverider discover is the future Monarch: Captain Atom or Hawk?

From Armageddon 2001 #2.

TM & © DC Comics.

One thing about this biz is that there a number of people

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Ironically, the Hawk and Dove merger was rejected because the Armageddon creators saw the characters differently. “I don’t think that [idea] got consideration for more than five minutes— if even that long,” says Dan Jurgens. “The thought was that if it was a combination of Hawk and Dove, there’s no way that individual would end up as Monarch. At that point, a combined character would be a balanced individual.” Jurgens certainly understands why the Hawk and Dove creative team was unhappy, however.

“They weren’t in favor of it and I don’t blame them. No one likes to have external events dictate their stories.”

The last-minute change required redrawing portions of the issue containing Monarch’s reveal. Dan Jurgens confirms, “We certainly had to make some major changes to make it work. I’d already drawn a fair chunk of the story so we had to go back and make the art adjustments on that and then reshape the ending.” As it is, the first 20 pages of issue #2 feature an alternate future where Captain Atom turns evil, no doubt reflecting the original plan. This left a limited amount of space for the new culprit, Hank Hall, to become Monarch, resulting in Hawk watching his future self murder Dove before becoming Monarch himself a mere three pages later.

In a final irony, Captain Atom, the hero once destined to become Monarch, instead became his greatest foe. Armageddon 2001 ended with both characters thrown back in time to the Triassic Era. Their battle continued in the spin-off miniseries Armageddon: The Alien Agenda, as they fought throughout time. Waverider appeared in another miniseries offshoot, Armageddon: Inferno. Monarch became the villain Extant after absorbing Waverider’s time-travel abilities in Zero Hour, a 1994 crossover book by Dan Jurgens. And Captain Atom would eventually become Monarch himself in 2008’s Countdown.

In retrospect, is there anything the creators wish could have gone differently? Barbara Kesel states, “I would like them to have made the bold choice and done the combined character, not just the shallow ‘Hawk goes mad’ version they ended up with. It ended up feeling like a really amateurish fix.” Dan Jurgens reflects, “It would have been nice if the end of the story hadn’t gotten out before readers

Perfect Pérez Editorial events may have conspired against George Pérez’s vision for his War of the Gods crossover— but, man, those covers!!

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had a chance to read it. I fail to understand why some people want to f*** with other peoples’ stories. Seriously, in a remarkably unprofessional business it’s among the most unprofessional things I can imagine. All that aside, no … I wouldn’t change anything. I think it was a fun project that people genuinely enjoyed and that’s what it’s all about.”

WAR OF THE GODS

Clash of the Titans Original art to the splash page of War of the Gods #2, signed by Cynthia Martin. Courtesy of Heritage.

TM & © DC Comics.

With Armageddon finally resolved, DC should’ve been done with tie-in books never saw—the editors crossovers for the year, yet War of never got them to them. So there the Gods #1 (Sept. 1991) hit the was a crossover that no one stands before Armageddon 2001 seemed to know anything about.” even concluded. The timing was According to Pérez in Comics perversely appropriate, as WOTG Interview #104, some creators came as a surprise not only to hadn’t even heard of War of the Gods readers, but to DC creators as well. until Pérez called them. Crossover War of the Gods spun out of veterans Keith Giffen, John Ostrander, George Pérez’s tenure on Wonder and Marv Wolfman, probably Woman, and featured the godempathizing with Pérez’s difficulties, dess Circe manipulating the all did their best to incorporate gods of Olympian, Roman, the WOTG storyline into their Norse, Egyptian, Aztec, Babylonian, comics on short notice.

African, Thanagarian, and Fourth At one point, Pérez learned that World mythologies into battling there was no newsstand distribution for supremacy. The god war causes for War of the Gods #1—leaving natural disasters throughout the the tie-ins promoting a main world, leaving DC’s heroes scramseries that newsstand readers bling. At one point, Princess Diana couldn’t buy. This problem was is reduced back to clay while New corrected with subsequent issues, Olympus appears in Earth’s orbit. but effectively slashed the sales on It was a storyline that Pérez had been the series. Other crossover issues developing since Wonder Woman were shipped late, mislabeled, or #51 (Feb. 1991), and gave both not marked as tie-ins at all.

Captain Marvel and the seldomWhen asked to clarify what seen Son of Vulcan prominent roles. happened, Tom Peyer is reluctant The project’s assistant editor to relive the circumstances. “Well, Tom Peyer recalls, “Before I even I could walk you through the details, started working at DC, [War of the or I could let you waterboard me.

Gods] was going to be a one-shot Your choice, really. The schedule celebrating Wonder Woman’s 50th problems were on me. It was my anniversary. I think it was Jenette job to see it through efficiently [Kahn] who said, ‘Let’s make it and, either through inexperience a crossover.’ ” The project then or denial or both, I didn’t get the morphed into four 40-page issues, ball over the line until the game with bonus mini-posters by Chris was over. It felt terrible.”

Sprouse. While George Pérez was To make matters worse, the happy to spotlight the underapearlier-published Armageddon 2001 preciated Amazon on her anniversary, ended up stealing the thunder the resulting series became more from War of the Gods, a situation of a millstone than a milestone. that frustrated Pérez to no end: “For a book that was supposed to focus As Pérez told Eric Nolen-Weathington in Modern Masters, on Wonder Woman and be the crossover of the year, I was unpleasantly “Originally, it was a gigantic overview from me. I plotted it out with surprised when Armageddon came out as ‘the crossover of the all the tie-ins I wanted to have and discussed it with Karen year.’ It was like working in a vacuum. So War of the Gods Berger. It was supposed to be called The Holy Wars, but they ended up becoming a very unpleasant experience and not thought that was too religious a title. The idea was for it what I wanted it to be.” to be a celebration of Wonder Woman’s 50th anniversary.

Tom Peyer thinks that Armageddon even had its origins Unfortunately, during the course of War of the Gods, in War of the Gods’ troubles. “As far as I can remember— Karen Berger—who was pregnant with her first child— and this might just be guilt talking—we knew WOTG had to take maternity leave.” would be late and we wanted to mitigate how embarWith Berger out of the picture, the task of coordinatrassing that might be for DC, so Armageddon was born.” ing War of the Gods and its 21 crossover issues fell to Pérez’s frustration with all of these problems “led her assistant, Tom Peyer. Looking back today, Peyer says, me to be careless with my deadlines, so that the “This was a lot bigger than anything I’d ever tried, before crossovers did not work chronologically. Part of that or since. I had to coordinate with a lot of editorial offices, was bad coordination, the unfortunate placing of an help a number of creators stay on track, and keep on top assistant editor in charge to replace Karen, and my of a very dense story. Which is not to say I came within own disgruntledness.” Even a glance at WOTG’s tom peyer a mile of accomplishing any of those things.” credits reveals trouble behind the scenes. Although George Pérez continued, “We were fighting an Pérez provides layouts for all four issues, the final art is uphill battle in trying to do the crossovers the way we wanted to make credited to a staggering 11 finishers: Cynthia Martin, Russell Braun, Pablo it work. And by the time the series was coming out it was quite obvious Marcos, Vince Giarrano, Scott Hanna, Romeo Thanghal, Alan Kupperberg, that, in some cases, I had done overviews that the creators of the Phil Jiminez, Gordon Purcell, Dick Giordano, and Frank McLaughlin.

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The entire affair was obviously a sour experience for Pérez. As he later recounted in Modern Masters, “War of the Gods was the beginning of the end of my relationship with the Wonder Woman character.” When asked what he’d change about the situation in retrospect, Tom Peyer at least retains a sense of humor about the debacle.

“Not a thing. Except I’d take out the war. And there wouldn’t be any gods.”

It seems that by 1991, DC’s crossovers had grown too big for even their creators to control.

POST-CRISIS ROUNDUP So, after all the brainstorming sessions, companymandated tie-ins, changed artists, and altered endings, do DC’s creators have a favorite crossover series, either creative- or business-wise?

Amazon Princess From the Heritage archives, a 2010 Wonder Woman sketch by George Pérez.

TM & © DC Comics.

KEITH GIFFEN: “I’m going to go with Legends only because it gave me the JLI. Self-serving and a bit craven?

Why, yes … yes, it is.”

ROBERT GREENBERGER: “I would have to say Legends, because it built off what came before it, helped re-establish the Justice League, and gave us new titles including Suicide Squad. While thematically it didn’t have lasting impact, elements from the tie-ins (Wally West’s need for high-calorie consumption, the Squad, the relevance of Dr. Fate) have lasted far longer than any of the others.

It was a creative and commercial success.”

JOE STATON: “I liked Invasion! with the Keith Giffen/ Bart Sears art. It was a hodgepodge but the aliens were cool and the whole Invasion thing sort of made sense.

Of course, my favorite big crossover of all was pre-Crisis when Paul Kupperberg and Paul Levitz and I did Showcase #100. That was fun.”

TOM PEYER: “In my experience, the one that deserves to be called a creative success was DC One Million, which came out a few years after. All of the participants were asked to create characters and ideas, rather than just go along.”

When it comes to company-wide crossovers in general, creators’ feelings run the gamut.

ROBERT GREENBERGER: “Being on staff from the beginning, it’s interesting because as a reader, I thought this was cool, a natural outgrowth of the JLA/JSA annual team-ups I grew up on. As an editor, I saw how much more work they were, especially after they stopped being organic and began being considered more like widgets to make budget.”

JOE STATON: “I suppose there was a legitimate reason for Marv Wolfman to come up with the original Crisis, but every one since then has been pretty obviously an artificial event to punch up sales.”

TOM PEYER: “There are so many: I guess readers must want them. It’s been awhile since I’ve had anything to do with one, so I’m pretty out of touch with how little or much trouble they’d be in 2015. The technology has changed, and different people are running things, so you know as much as I do.”

BARBARA KESEL: “It depends: When they’re nothing more than a directive from marketing without any lasting impact, they come across as hollow spectacle, disrupting individual storylines for no reason, but when the creators involved are genuinely having fun and looking for ways to take the uber-story and make it relevant to their characters, they’re big fun. Summer movie blockbuster fun. The very best comic-book crossovers going right now aren’t even in a comic: the Marvel movie/TV universe. It’s so much fun watching for cameos, hints, and possibilities.”

KEITH GIFFEN: “Depends. Back when I did Invasion!, there was a reason no one wanted to do two in a row.

They were really work-intensive. You had to dot all of the ‘I’s and cross all of the ‘T’s and, basically, supervise all of the tie-in books.

“Now? Not so much. I’ve been involved with crossovers that haven’t even been fully thought through before doling out tie-in issues. The company-wide crossover has become a lazy man’s game wherein all the principal creators care about is their, often slim, slice of the pie. The poor sods trapped doing tie-in issues are, more often than not, on their own and subject to multiple, capricious rewrites, most of them due to the main story being either incomplete or ill thought through.

“It’s just not fun anymore.”

DAN JURGENS: “Everything depends on what the exact nature of the crossover is. I’ve always thought that the perfect balance is one that allows the individual title in question to tell its own story—one that reflects what’s happening in the larger crossover title—rather than tie into it directly.

“It’s weird. I’ll have people come up to me and complain about crossovers and then wind it up by saying, ‘But I really liked this one. And that one! And you know what? This one over here was pretty good too!’

“So, like anything in life, it’s a bit of a mixed bag.”

JOHN TRUMBULL got rebooted this year, but is still hoping for a successful spin-off book. Thanks to Keith Giffen, Robert Greenberger, Dan Jurgens, Barbara Kesel, Tom Peyer, and Joe Staton for sharing their memories with BACK ISSUE. Special thanks to Andy Mangels and Eric Nolen-Weathington for the use of additional quotes from Steve Englehart, Keith Giffen, Andy Helfer, and George Pérez.

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DC’s POST-CRISIS CROSSOVERS CHECKLIST LEGENDS • Ch. 1: Batman #401 (Nov. 1986) • Ch. 2: Detective Comics #568 (Nov. 1986) • Legends #1 (Nov. 1986) • Ch. 3: Green Lantern Corps #207 (Dec. 1986) • Legends #2 (Dec. 1986) • Ch. 4: Cosmic Boy #1 (Dec. 1986) • Ch. 5: Justice League of America #258 (Jan. 1987) • Ch. 6: Secret Origins #10 (Jan. 1987) • Ch. 7: Firestorm #55 (Jan. 1987) • Legends #3 (Jan. 1987) • Ch. 8: Cosmic Boy #2 (Jan. 1987) • Ch. 9: Justice League of America #259 (Feb. 1987) • Ch. 10: Firestorm #56 (Feb. 1987) • Ch. 11: Blue Beetle #9 (Feb. 1987) • Legends #4 (Feb. 1987) • Ch. 12: Warlord #114 (Feb. 1987) • Ch. 13: Cosmic Boy #3 (Feb. 1987) • Ch. 14: Justice League of America #260 (Mar. 1987) • Ch. 15: Blue Beetle #10 (Mar. 1987) • Ch. 16: Warlord #115 (Mar. 1987) • Ch. 17: Superman #3 (Mar. 1987) • Ch. 18: Adventures of Superman #426 (Mar. 1987) • Ch. 19: Action Comics #586 (Mar. 1987) • Legends #5 (Mar. 1987) • Ch. 20: Cosmic Boy #4 (Mar. 1987) • Ch. 21: Justice League of America #261 (Apr. 1987) • Legends #6 (Apr. 1987) • Ch. 22: Secret Origins #14 (May 1987) LEGENDS SPIN-OFFS: • Shazam!: The New Beginning miniseries (Apr.–July 1987) • Justice League/Justice League International/ Justice League America ongoing (May 1987–Aug. 1996) • Suicide Squad ongoing (May 1987– June 1992) • Flash ongoing (June 1987–Feb. 2009) MILLENNIUM • Millennium #1 (Jan. 1988) • Justice League International #9 (Jan. 1988) • Firestorm #67 (Jan. 1988) • Outsiders #27 (Jan. 1988) • Flash #8 (Jan. 1988) • Wonder Woman #12 (Jan. 1988) • Millennium #2 (Jan. 1988) • Superman #13 (Jan. 1988) • Batman #415 (Jan. 1988) • Blue Beetle #20 (Jan. 1988) • Young All-Stars #8 (Jan. 1988) • Legion of Super-Heroes #42 (Jan. 1988) • Secret Origins #22 (Jan. 1988) • Millennium #3 (Jan. 1988) • Green Lantern Corps #220 (Jan. 1988) • Booster Gold #24 (Jan. 1988) • Infinity Inc. #46 (Jan. 1988) • Adventures of Superman #436 (Jan. 1988) • Millennium #4 (Jan. 1988)

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Detective Comics #592 (Jan. 1988) Suicide Squad #9 (Jan. 1988) Captain Atom #11 (Jan. 1988) Spectre #10 (Jan. 1988) Action Comics #596 (Jan. 1988) Teen Titans Spotlight #18 (Jan. 1988) Millennium #5 (Feb. 1988) Justice League International #10 (Feb. 1988) Firestorm #68 (Feb. 1988) Outsiders #28 (Feb. 1988) Flash #9 (Feb. 1988) Wonder Woman #13 (Feb. 1988) Millennium #6 (Feb. 1988) Superman #14 (Feb. 1988) Blue Beetle #21 (Feb. 1988) Young All-Stars #9 (Feb. 1988) Legion of Super-Heroes #43 (Feb. 1988) Secret Origins #23 (Feb. 1988) Millennium #7 (Feb. 1988) Green Lantern Corps #221 (Feb. 1988) Booster Gold #25 (Feb. 1988) Infinity Inc. #47 (Feb. 1988) Adventures of Superman #437 (Feb. 1988) Millennium #8 (Feb. 1988) Spectre #11 (Feb. 1988) Teen Titans Spotlight #19 (Feb. 1988)

MILLENNIUM SPIN-OFFS: • Manhunter ongoing (July 1988–Apr. 1990) • The New Guardians ongoing (Sept. 1988–Sept. 1989) INVASION! • Invasion! #1 (Jan. 1989) Invasion! First Strike: • Daily Planet Invasion Special #1 (Nov. 1988) • Checkmate! #11 (Jan. 1989) • Firestorm #80 (Feb. 1989) • Flash #21 (Holiday 1988) • Justice League International #22 (Jan. 1989) • Manhunter #8 (Holiday 1988) • Wonder Woman #25 (Dec. 1988) • Superman #26 (Dec. 1988) • Adventures of Superman #449 (Dec. 1988) • Animal Man #6 (Holiday 1988) • Doom Patrol #17 (Jan. 1989) • Power of the Atom #7 (Dec. 1988) • Starman #5 (Holiday 1988) • Swamp Thing #81 (Holiday 1988) • Captain Atom #24 (Jan. 1989) • Detective Comics #595 (Feb. 1989) • The New Guardians #6 (Holiday 1988) • Spectre #23 (Feb. 1989) • Invasion! #2 (Feb. 1989) Invasion! Aftermath: • Checkmate! #12 (Feb. 1989) • Firestorm #81 (Mar. 1989) • Flash #22 (Jan. 1989) • Justice League International #23 (Jan. 1989) • Manhunter #9 (Jan. 1989) • Wonder Woman #26 (Jan. 1989) • Superman #27 (Jan. 1989) • Adventures of Superman #450 (Jan. 1989) • Power of the Atom #8 (Jan. 1989) • Starman #6 (Jan. 1989)

• • •

Captain Atom #26 (Jan. 1989) The New Guardians #7 (Feb. 1989) Invasion! #3 (Mar. 1989)

INVASION! SPIN-OFFS: • L.E.G.I.O.N. ’89/’90/’91/’92/’93/’94 (Feb. 1989–Sept. 1994) • Blasters Special #1 (Mar. 1989) • Justice League Europe/Justice League International (Apr. 1989–Sept. 1994) ARMAGEDDON 2001 • Armageddon 2001 #1 (May 1991) • Superman Annual #3 (1991) • Batman Annual #15 (1991) • Justice League of America Annual #5 (1991) • Action Comics Annual #3 (1991) • Flash Annual #4 (1991) • Hawkworld Annual #2 (1991) • New Titans Annual #7 (1991) • Detective Comics Annual #4 (1991) • Adventures of Superman Annual #3 (1991) • L.E.G.I.O.N. Annual #2 (1991) • Hawk and Dove Annual #2 (1991) • Justice League Europe Annual #2 (1991) • Armageddon 2001 #2 (Oct. 1991) • Action Comics #670 (Oct. 1991) • Superman #61 (Nov. 1991) ARMAGEDDON 2001 SPIN-OFFS: • Armageddon: The Alien Agenda (Nov. 1991–Feb. 1992) • Armageddon: Inferno (Apr. 1992– July 1992) WAR OF THE GODS • Ch. 1: War of the Gods #1 (Sept. 1991) • Ch. 2: Wonder Woman #58 (Sept. 1991) • Ch. 3 Superman: Man of Steel #3 (Sept. 1991) • Ch. 4: Hawkworld #15 (Sept. 1991) • Ch. 5: Starman #38 (Sept. 1991) • Ch. 6: L.E.G.I.O.N. ’91 #31 (Sept. 1991) • Ch. 7 (mislabeled): Hawk and Dove #28 (Oct. 1991) • Ch. 8 (mislabeled): Captain Atom #56 (Aug. 1991) • Ch. 9: Doctor Fate #32 (Sept. 1991) • Ch. 10: Flash #55 (Oct. 1991) • Ch. 11: Wonder Woman #59 (Oct. 1991) • Ch. 12: Doctor Fate #32 (Oct. 1991) • Ch. 13: War of the Gods #2 (Oct. 1991) • Ch. 14 (mislabeled): Justice League Europe #31 (Oct. 1991) • Ch. 15: Batman #470 (Oct. 1991) • Ch. 16: Hawkworld #16 (Oct. 1991) • Ch. 17: Animal Man #40 (Oct. 1991) • Ch. 18: Captain Atom #57 (Sept. 1991) • Ch. 19: Suicide Squad #58 (Oct. 1991) • Ch. 20 (mislabeled): Wonder Woman #60 (Nov. 1991) • Ch. 21: War of the Gods #3 (Nov. 1991) • Ch. 22: Demon #17 (Nov. 1991) • Ch. 23: New Titans #81 (Dec. 1991) • Ch. 24: Wonder Woman #61 (Dec. 1991) • Ch. 25: War of the Gods ##4 (Dec. 1991)

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TM

It’s probably impossible to find a list ranking the greatest events in Marvel Comics and not see The Infinity Gauntlet included. A simple Google search proves that. If a website or publication has made that list, then odds are pretty good that The Infinity Gauntlet isn’t just on it, but at the top.

It’s not hard to understand why. For starters, the story is beyond grandiose. It’s not just superheroes confronting a supervillain. There are heroes, sure, and there are definitely villains. But there are also gods, celestials, living archetypes, physical embodiments of forces of nature, and scores of alien races all locked in cosmic combat, with some fights being too much for mere mortals to even comprehend, let alone witness.

On top of being grandiose, the story is oddly straightforward. The stakes are clearly defined, the villain easy to root against, and the heroes properly challenged. Sure, it makes for a richer reading experience if you track down and read a few story arcs from the 1970s, but you don’t actually have to do that to enjoy or even understand anything that’s going on.

Steeped in continuity, it’s actually perfectly crafted as a standalone.

Oh, and that villain we mentioned? He’s actually frighteningly competent and effectual. In the first issue of The Infinity Gauntlet, with a snap of his finger, he accomplishes his macabre goal of killing half of all sentient life in the universe. Just like that, he achieves his objective.

Before the story even really starts, Thanos the Mad Titan has already won.

And, despite its cosmic scale, The Infinity Gauntlet is a story that’s grounded and simple. Thanos has become God and Earth’s heroes aim to change that. That’s it. There are twists, turns, and swerves, but the story never really strays from being about two groups vying for one crazy, powerful object. It also manages to work in a few pretty amazing and quiet character moments, like when Captain America, surrounded by his dead friends, delivers to an all-powerful Thanos one of the most memorable Captain America quotes to date: “As long as one man stands against you, Thanos, you’ll never be able to claim victory.” Cap is backhanded to death three pages later, but that doesn’t negate that awesome moment.

However, despite being epic, despite being balls-to-the-wall action, despite just being a good story, the appeal of The Infinity Gauntlet and the three major stories that followed has always been firmly rooted in the affectations and voice of its architect, Jim Starlin. These were major tent-pole events, to be sure, but they were also direct continuations of stories started (and ended in some cases) by Starlin all the way back in the 1970s. The Infinity Saga, while easy to enjoy as a standalone story, is actually just another chapter in a larger tale told by the same visionary.

In a landscape where creators stick with a book for maybe an arc or two and one that is historically inhospitable to older talent, there’s something special about that.

The Infinity Gauntlet and its sequels, The Infinity War and The Infinity Crusade, were also equal parts product of their time and perfect confluence of many disparate events. While it’s fairly certain that characters as rich as Thanos and Adam Warlock would have eventually been resurrected under the pen and guidance of some other creator (and almost were), what’s uncertain is what would have happened if it had not been handled by Jim Starlin under the volatile business and publishing conditions of early-1990s Marvel.

THE SAGA OF THE INFINITY GAUNTLET There had certainly been cosmic stories before The Infinity Gauntlet, The Infinity War, and The Infinity Crusade debuted. Jim Starlin even penned more than a few of them. His career was practically built on all things cosmic thanks to 1970s runs on Marvel books like Captain Marvel and Warlock, and he continued the trend in his creator-owned series, Dreadstar. However, you’d be hard-pressed to find any as massive in scale as the books bearing the Infinity banner.

Cosmic Crisis Writer Jim Starlin illustrated this 1991 promo poster to the Marvel crossover The Infinity Gauntlet.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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by

Chris Brennaman

Starlin Returns (left) Jim Starlin’s Infinity Saga began to unfold in the pages of The Silver Surfer. Issue #34 (Feb. 1990) cover by Ron Lim and Joe Rubinstein. (right) The master of multiple characters and crowd scenes, George Pérez, joined Starlin in this first issue of The Infinity Gauntlet (July 1991).

Cover by Pérez.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

They’re not only a Who’s Who of Marvel’s early-’90s superhero roster, of pure logic. This sounds all well and good on the surface, but it actualbut of all its cosmic characters as well. By the time The Infinity Crusade ly gives renewed form to Adam Warlock’s evil persona, the Magus. The concludes, readers have seen the likes of everyone from Galactus and Magus, justifiably angry at Thanos and Warlock for being removed from Eternity to the Living Tribunal and Infinity, and literally everyone in between. existence in a Warlock arc from the ’70s, sets his sites on subduing the entire If a character was alive and kicking during the time these books were being universe. Meanwhile, Adam Warlock is put on trial to see if he’s worthy of published, chances are they made at least a cameo somewhere in the saga. godhood. Since this is a major Marvel event, Earth’s heroes can’t help but Put simply, The Infinity Gauntlet, The Infinity War, and The Infinity be pulled into the fray, with none other than Thanos at their side. Thus it’s once more into the cosmic breach. All that, and doppelgangers.

Crusade are big stories and like all big stories, putting them together The Infinity Trilogy concludes with The Infinity Crusade and was a big endeavor. But before we talk about how such a largesports an even more massive cast than The Infinity War. scale book came about, let’s first take a quick story recap: Published in 1993, where the previous installment saw the Things kick off when the Silver Surfer bears witness heroes of both Earth and space united to thwart Adam to the resurrection of none other than Thanos himself in Warlock’s darkness given form, this time out the threat the pages of the third volume of his ongoing series, is the living embodiment of Warlock’s goodness in the The Silver Surfer #34 (Feb. 1990). Seems Death is under form of the Goddess. Just as dangerous as the Magus, the impression that too many people are currently the Goddess creates an entire planet called Paradise alive and needs someone with Thanos’ particular skill Omega and even manages to brainwash many of the set to change that. The story runs for a few issues and more religious of Marvel’s superheroes. Once again, then carries over into the two-issue miniseries Thanos Thanos fights as a hero, atoning for sins past and Quest. There the Mad Titan battles or just outsmarts preserving his new status quo. the various possessors of the six Infinity Gems. Each So, how exactly did this epic come together?

Infinity Gem—Space, Mind, Soul, Reality, Time, and Power—holds sway over a different facet of the universe, jim starlin PUTTING THE PROJECT TOGETHER and when brought together give the wielder nothing By the time 1990 rolled around, Jim Starlin was back at short of omnipotence. The series concludes with Photo by Pat Loika.

Marvel after a stint at DC Comics. He was assigned to Thanos victorious, the first person to ever unite all six gems.

We next see Thanos and the Infinity Gems in 1991’s The Infinity The Silver Surfer as the book’s writer, and to say that Starlin was no stranger Gauntlet #1 (July 1991). The Infinity Gauntlet follows the war against to Marvel cosmic, even in the late 1980s and early 1990s, is beyond understatement. In the ’70s, Starlin made a name for himself as both the Thanos. The story begins as Thanos prepares to execute his dark, oddly romantic plan: to kill half of all life in the universe as a gesture of love writer and artist of perhaps the most iconic cosmic stories comics had seen to Death. And he succeeds. With the snap of his fingers, half of all life then up till then (and maybe even up till now). In the pages of Captain in the universe is snuffed out, including most of Earth’s superheroes. Marvel and Warlock, Starlin explored both other worlds and other realms What follows is all-out cosmic war that sees a small band of Earth’s far beyond the confines of tiny, little planet Earth. So upon his return to Marvel, it made a sort of sense that he would be put on the book superheroes (and various cosmic deities) united under the leadership of starring the character most associated with the company’s farthest a resurrected Adam Warlock do their damndest to thwart the Mad Titan.

The Infinity Gauntlet ends with Thanos defeated and retired to a farm cosmic reaches. But it also made a sort sense that he would revisit two cosmic characters most associated to him: Adam Warlock and Thanos. and Adam Warlock the possessor of the all-powerful Infinity Gauntlet.

There was one slight problem, though—Adam Warlock and Thanos Next up is 1992’s The Infinity War. In one of his first acts upon becoming omnipotent, Adam Warlock uses the Infinity Gauntlet to cast out the good had been dead since 1977 (Warlock in Avengers Annual #7, and Thanos the next month in Marvel Two-in-One Annual #2), both killed by Starlin himself. and evil aspects of his personality in an effort to become a being (deity?)

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The Things We Do for Love Thanos receives courting tips from Mephisto on this astoundingly gorgeous Pérez/Rubinstein original page from Infinity Gauntlet #1. Courtesy of Heritage Comics Auctions (www.ha.com).

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

Well, maybe “problem” is an overstatement. This being comics, death is always more inconvenience than problem and raising the dead is all just a matter of clever writing.

Deciding to resurrect Thanos wasn’t that hard of a decision for Starlin. The character has such close ties to the creator and besides, that character had died never achieving his goals. But Warlock, on the other hand, had been given peace and happiness in death, probably the first time in his existence. His story had a proper ending.

“Every time I go back, I do Thanos,” Starlin says. “But back then, in Warlock’s case, another writer was pushing for him and I was told if I didn’t bring him back then that other writer was going to.”

It should be noted that the decision to bring Warlock back from the dead wasn’t just that another (unnamed by Starlin) writer had his eyes on the character; rather, it was that this other writer was someone Starlin wasn’t much of a fan of.

“I brought Adam Warlock back because I knew I could handle it right.”

Along with artist Ron Lim, Starlin reintroduced readers to Thanos in the pages of Silver Surfer #34. For the next few issues he would interact with the Silver Surfer off and on until his story continued in the pages of Thanos Quest limited series. And once he had collected all the Infinity Gems, this would lead to Starlin bringing back Adam Warlock.

SPINNING OFF AND BREAKING AWAY Looking back at The Infinity Gauntlet, The Infinity War, and The Infinity Crusade, it’s hard to imagine that all of that, at least in some form, was initially intended to be an arc in The Silver Surfer.

“It all starts in the Silver Surfer run,” Starlin says. “When it was found out that Surfer was selling well, they decided to squeeze everything they could out of it, and if something could be spun off, it was spun off.

So that Thanos story was spun off.”

The “they” Starlin is talking about are investor Ronald Perelman and his group MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings, Inc. In 1989, the group purchased Marvel, and a mandate came down seemingly overnight to exploit any and all intellectual properties to their fullest. Stories in the past that would have been contained to a single series were spread out into other books and spun into events and mega-events.

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The story of the returned Thanos left the confines of Silver Surfer and continued into the pages of the two-issue miniseries The Thanos Quest.

Still, even then the idea at the time was that the story would dovetail back into Silver Surfer. Then, the sales figures came in.

“The Infinity Gauntlet happened because Thanos Quest sold so well,” Starlin says. “They didn’t want the story to circle back to The Silver Surfer.”

At that moment, an event was born.

It’s important to remember that this was a time when events were still relatively new. Because an event like The Infinity Gauntlet was something editors weren’t quite used to, many at Marvel were hesitant to loan their characters some strangely named cosmic epic.

According to Starlin, thenX-Men group editor Bob Harras was among those against loaning characters to the story and didn’t want any X-Men turning up in The Infinity Gauntlet. In the end, he allowed just a few, namely Cyclops and Wolverine, to be used. Still, that kind of editorial resistance kept the cast to a minimum.

“That’s why in The Infinity Gauntlet the group of heroes that goes up against Thanos is relatively small,” he said.

“When Thanos killed half the universe, a lot of the heroes had to go as well.”

Small cast or not, the book was a success. A big one, in fact. So big that once the numbers started coming in, those same editors who had scoffed at taking part in the event now wanted in.

“It sold well and that meant the books connected to it sold well,” Starlin says. “So by the time The Infinity War came around, everybody wanted their characters to pop up in it.”

The comparison between cast size between The Infinity Gauntlet and The Infinity War is striking, as is the comparison between the cast size between The Infinity War and The Infinity Crusade. To join in on an Infinity outing meant increased sales, and everyone wanted a bump.

Despite all that—the spin-offs, the added characters, the tie-ins— Starlin never really planned to make a massive, three-part, multi-seriesspanning saga. His intention from the start was to just tell a good story about Thanos.

“No one had any idea The Infinity Gauntlet was going to be as successful as it was,” Starlin says. “When it ended, that was supposed to be it. I thought I might be telling the last Thanos story, at least for a while.”

CRAFTING A SAGA There are more than a few similarities between Starlin’s ’70s Marvel work and the work he produced for the company in the ’90s. Thanos and Warlock, for starters. Cosmic stakes are another. There is, however, one key difference between the creator’s two stops at the publisher: the distinct lack of artist’s credit. In the ’70s, Starlin was as famous for his art (maybe even more) as he was for his writing. In the years between stints, though, his tastes as a creator were changing.

“I didn’t want to draw as much,” he says. “I just wanted to be a writer at that point.”

Since Starlin didn’t want to pencil, someone else was needed to tackle the art.

That someone else was Ron Lim. Lim joined Starlin on Silver Surfer, and Starlin said he was immediately happy with the work Lim produced.

“Ron always gives exactly what I want to see on the page exactly as I envisioned it,” Starlin says. “He’s always been really great to work with.”

For fans who came of age in the 1990s, Lim is just as synonymous with Warlock, Thanos, and all things cosmic as Jim Starlin. He was there from the start on The Silver Surfer and was there till the end of The Infinity Crusade.

He was not, however, there for first half of The Infinity Gauntlet.

Instead, artist George Pérez was tasked with penciling that book. His pencils can be seen for the first four issues. However, midway through the series, Pérez disappears from the book with Lim circling back onto the story.

“After George started drawing, he decided he wanted to become an actor,” Starlin said. “He gave up comics. He stopped, so we got Ron in there. He was familiar with the characters and he always gave me what I wanted. It made sense.”

There was concern among editorial that a shift in art was bound to hurt the book. That fear, according to Starlin, was quickly put to rest.

“The issue where Ron came in, sales figures went up,” Starlin says. “They went up, kept going up and never went down.”

Lim was now part of the team for the long haul.

For Starlin’s part, scripting and keeping track of an ever-increasing story was no small task.

“I had this big piece of plywood,” he says. “I took 3x5 note cards and put story points on them. I structured the story on the board and kept moving the cards around. I plotted [DC Comics’ Batman:] The Cult and all the Infinity books in that manner.”

From the start of The Infinity Gauntlet, other writers had the option of piggybacking off the events of the main book. It was, for the most part, a relatively painless process largely because it was a process that he wasn’t interested in taking to committee.

“I wrote in a plot and then people could come in and do stories off of them,” Starlin says. “That’s the way it should be done.

There should be one main story that the others play off of and they don’t screw up the main story. The worst that happened was the more popular we got, the more characters we had to add, and some of them I didn’t even know who they were, like Sleepwalker.”

ON MENTAL ILLNESS AND RELIGION Mad Titans and artificially created paranoid schizophrenics aren’t the only things Starlin regularly revisits. Look a bit deeper into his cosmic ron lim epics, and you’ll see there are almost always two underlying themes Photo by Pat Loika. to the cosmic works of Jim Starlin: mental illness and religion.

When he took over chronicling the adventures of Adam Warlock in the 1970s, Starlin abandoned most of what had come before with the character. He didn’t write him a typical hero, nor did he write him as a savior. Instead, he went with a more unconventional route. “[I decided to] turn him into a suicidal paranoid/schizophrenic, which was the way I was feeling at the time,” Starlin said in a 2006 interview with Newsarama.

“I’ve always used my work to examine what is currently going on in my own life.

It’s cheaper than going to a shrink.”

That sentiment can be seen in the Magus. Not just any adversary, the Magus is actually Adam Warlock’s dark side. Initially from a far future in which Warlock has given into to his inner turmoil, the Magus is every negative thought the hero ever had given form.

“The Magus is Adam Warlock’s mental disorder,” Starlin says. “We can deal with our mental disorders. We can treat them and confront them, but I think they’re always there with us.”

The Magus, like most of the main players of the Infinity Saga, had also met his end in the 1970s. An evil version of Adam Warlock from the far future, the Magus was defeated when Warlock excised the timeline that would lead to the creation of the villain. The Magus was defeated, as the Magus had technically never existed.

The More the Merrier Starlin gathered another gaggle of Marvel characters—despite some internal editorial grousing—for 1992’s The Infinity War. Covers to issues #1 (June 1992) and 2 by Ron Lim and Al Milgrom.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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Thanos in Transition Quasar wheels and deals with Thanos, despite the Avengers’ hesitation, on this powerful splash page to Infinity War #5 (Oct. 1992). By Starlin/Lim/Milgrom.

Original art courtesy of Heritage.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

That changed after the events of The Infinity Gauntlet.

When Adam Warlock comes into possession of the titular Infinity Gauntlet, one of his first acts is to purge himself of all emotion, both light and dark, and the dark takes to the form of a newly reborn Magus.

The last time Starlin had spent any time with the Magus, or even Warlock himself, for that matter, he had been battling some demons of his own. Returning to them almost two decades later, things were different the creator.

“Coming back, I was much more stable that time,” he says. “As a result, the characters themselves progressed.

I was in my 40s at the time and they say that’s a time in your life when you’re building things up. I think in the those stories, that’s what Thanos and Warlock did; they started to build.”

Throughout the Infinity Saga, Adam Warlock definitely builds. He builds confidence he’d never had before and he builds an army, first in the form of a superhero task force, then in the form of the Infinity Watch.

“He builds,” Starlin says. “He creates. That’s something I was interested in at that time.”

Thanos, too, was interested in building.

“He was interested in building up his power,” Starlin says. “At least he was at the start.”

At the same time, Starlin started to once again examine religion. In The Infinity Crusade, the antagonist isn’t some power-hungry demigod or some hero’s dark side, but rather the opposite.

“In the Goddess, I was playing against expectation,” Starlin says. “I wanted something unexpected for the heroes to go up against.”

Where the Magus is everything dark in Adam Warlock given form, the Goddess is the purity of Adam Warlock, all of his good intentions, his righteousness given form.

And she’s even more dangerous than the Magus.

“She’s an extreme,” Starlin says. “And extremes are always dangerous.”

The Infinity Saga wasn’t the first time Starlin had taken a hard, critical look at religion. In his ’70s Warlock series, the Magus is the head of a despotic, bureaucratic, and corrupt galaxy-spanning theocracy, the Universal Church of Truth, and uses religion as a tool for evil.

“Religion is such a major thing in people’s lives,” Starlin says. “I was raised Catholic. I was in parochial school and all the teachers were rabid John Birch nuns.

There was a pack of them, and one of them was taken away in my sixth grade year for getting crazy and attacking a girl in my class. Things like that, they make you question your faith. Once you question your faith, you question all faiths.”

Curses! Foiled Again!

The Goddess takes center stage on this goldfoil gimmick cover to The Infinity Crusade #1 (June 1993). Cover by Lim and Milgrom.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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The Mad Titan A signed commissioned illo of Thanos done by Starlin and Rubinstein in 2012. Courtesy of Heritage.

Thanos TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

became, for all intents and purposes, “God”—wearing work clothes while his old, iconic costume is used as a scarecrow.

“A quiet life,” Thanos tells his friend-turned-foe-turned-friend-again Adam Warlock, “will allow me to digest and incorporate the lessons the past has forced upon me.”

Had the story of Thanos ended there it would have been a pretty good, fulfilling one. It didn’t end there, though, and Starlin had to immediately tear Thanos away from life on his farm. Yet from that moment forward, at least under Starlin, Thanos would remain a changed person.

“Thanos realized he wants a quiet existence,” Starlin says.

“But sometimes he has to come off the farm and do certain things to make sure that he can have that quiet existence.

He used to only want power. Now, power for him is now just a tool to use in preserving that quiet existence.”

In The Infinity War, the Magus forces him back into the fray and in The Infinity Crusade, it’s the Goddess that spurs him to action.

However, in both cases, Thanos stands as threat to the threat.

“We all grow as people,” Starlin says. “Me, you, Thanos, Warlock, Drax, and Gamora. Everyone changes. Except Pip the Troll. He never changes.”

A LEGACY OF COSMIC IMPORT

THE EVOLUTION OF THANOS Doyle and Holmes.

Hammett and Spade.

Rowling and Potter.

Starlin and Thanos.

“I always come back to Marvel for Thanos,” Starlin says.

First appearing in Iron Man #55 (Feb. 1973), of all comics, Thanos, as readers would eventually come to expect, might turn up in any Starlin comic. Inspired by an odd combination of psychology classes and Jack Kirby’s New God Metron, Thanos would antagonize first Captain Marvel and then Adam Warlock.

Before his reappearance in the pages of The Silver Surfer, the last time readers saw Thanos was at the end of Marvel Graphic Novel #1: The Death of Captain Marvel (Apr. 1982), when he escorts the fallen hero into the afterlife. Thanos himself had died at the conclusion of Marvel Two-in-One Annual #2 back in 1977 in a failed bid to destroy Earth’s solar system. [Editor’s note: For a “Bring on the Bad Guys” villain history of Thanos, see BACK ISSUE #9.]

When he turns back up in Starlin’s Silver Surfer, he’s not much changed from the last time he made a massive power grab. He’s still the Death-obsessed, genocidal space tyrant he always was. He hadn’t changed much except for maybe becoming even more evil than before.

But midway through The Infinity Gauntlet, this dyed-in-the-wool supervillain actually makes a change for the good. It may happen after he’s killed trillions of trillions and done untold damage to the very fabric of the universe, but he does change. He joins the fight help bring down a new threat (his alleged daughter, Nebula, now wielding the Infinity Gauntlet), and at the series’ conclusion, the once-consort of Death even retires to live a nice, quiet life down on a farm.

“Thanos evolved organically while writing that series,” Starlin says.

“Somewhere while writing The Infinity Gauntlet, it became obvious to me that he was going to become an anti-hero, that he had decided that it wasn’t ultimate power that he wanted after all. At the end of The Infinity Gauntlet, he’s on his farm and he’s a different person.”

There’s something oddly affirming in seeing the biggest bad guy in Marvel’s vast universe—the guy who killed half the universe, who

By the time The Infinity Crusade came around, there were already some employees within Marvel griping about, as Starlin puts it, “those Infinity books.” And while The Infinity Crusade was yet another big seller, Starlin would not come back for a fourth installment. It had been a big, massive, cosmically fun ride, but the ride had come to an end and Starlin would walk away from the characters for another decade.

In the years since first being published, The Infinity Gauntlet and its sequels have only grown in popularity. All three installments have proven to have lasting staying power and all three installments remain in print to this day.

“I think they’re still in print because I tried to make them different,” Starlin says. “You look back at books that are still in print 20, 30, 40 years later, and I think it’s because people made them different.”

Starlin wouldn’t return to Thanos or Adam Warlock until the early 2000s with The Infinity Abyss and Marvel: The End. In Starlin’s absence, Thanos would revert back to his pre-quiet life persona and return to his overtly villainous ways as other creators were left to do with the character as they pleased. Starlin eventually addressed this in The Infinity Abyss, where he famously retconned all non-Starlin penned Thanos stories as featuring … clones. These days? These days he takes a softer, more diplomatic stance to how others handle the character.

“Now I say there are three different characters named ‘Thanos’ running around,” he says, “mine, Marvel’s, and the one from the movies.”

The movies.

If you want to talk about the lasting legacy of The Infinity Gauntlet and its sequels, then look no further than Marvel’s hugely successful film franchise.

In 2012’s The Avengers, fans learned it was Thanos acting as puppet master from the shadows of the Marvel’s cinematic universe. Then, in 2014’s Guardians of the Galaxy, not only did Thanos appear [with an uncredited Josh Brolin in the role—ed.], but we learned he was after, yep, the Infinity Gems. To top that off, later in the summer of 2014, Marvel released a teaser trailer for Phase 3 of its cinematic franchise and that trailer culminated in a sweeping shot of Thanos wielding the Infinity Gauntlet.

Thanos is set to appear as the antagonist in 2018’s Avengers: The Infinity War–Part I and again in 2019’s Avengers: The Infinity War–Part II. A multi-billion-dollar film franchise centered around a work over two decades old.

How’s that for lasting impact?

CHRIS BRENNAMAN is an award-winning freelance journalist and lives in Atlanta, Georgia. You can follow him on Twitter via @chrisbrennaman.

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BACK ISSUE • 73

Send your comments to: Email: euryman@gmail.com (subject: BACK ISSUE) Postal mail: Michael Eury, Editor-in-Chief • BACK ISSUE 118 Edgewood Ave. NE • Concord, NC 28025

Find BACK ISSUE on

CATCH-UP DEPARTMENT By the vaunted verbiage of Vartanoff! By the roving ruminations of Rozakis! “Back Talk” has been quieted as of late due to space limitations, but this issue we’re back, with loads of letters—including two from Jovial Michal Jacot. So I’ll stop yapping and let you have your say…

WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE I came across this comic in my collection and it brought back some fun memories of a convention. Who knows, these types of things might be good for an article on interaction with legends in a future issue....

Back in 1985 I attended the Atlanta, Georgia, comic convention, Atlanta Fantasy Fair. I was in Artists Alley having my issue of the then-new miniseries Squadron Supreme #1 signed by the writer, Mark Gruenwald.

(Backstory: For those who may not know, the Squadron Supreme team was created by Roy Thomas originally as the “Squadron Sinister,” for Marvel Comics’ The Avengers #70, Nov. 1969, as a pseudo-crossover with DC Comics’ Justice League of America.)

Anyway, after Mark signed it I moved a few tables over to have something else signed by legendary DC Comics editor Julie Schwartz.

Julie noticed the Squadron Supreme comic, and he and Mark exchanged some friendly jokes. Julie then says to me, “Here, give me that book!” and he signed it “Julie Schwartz – Original Creator.”

Mark then laughs and says to me, “Here, give me that book!” and then proceeds to add next to his signature, “– New Look Creator!”

Unrelated, I then moved over to Mike Grell to have him sign something else. I guess he had witnessed the exchange between Julie and Mark, and you guessed it, he says to me, “Here, give me that book!” and proceeds to not only sign it and write “– Who Junked it Up!” but draws a Jon Sable mask and gun holster (with my permission) on the main character, Hyperion. Great memories and a one-of-akind memento!

– John Coates BI readers, don’t miss John Coates’ highly recommended biography, Don Heck: A Work of Art, also from TwoMorrows. (And to learn more about Squadron Supreme plus DC’s unofficial JLA/Avengers crossovers of the Bronze Age, we refer you to BACK ISSUE #58.)

WORLD’S MIGHTIEST MORTALS Thank you so much for publishing the great article on the Bronze Age appearances of Mr. Atom, as written by my friend and editor Paul C. Hamerlinck, for the May issue of BI [BACK ISSUE #72]. It was a very informative and entertaining piece.

Years ago, a British fan hailed me as “the world’s greatest Marvel Family expert,” but I’ve since passed that title on to Paul, who is now much more deserving of it!

– John G. Pierce

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

WHITMAN SAMPLER

74 • BACK ISSUE • Bronze Age Events Issue

I have a clarification to a statement made in John Wells’ “Buried Treasures in DC’s Reprint Digests” article in BI #76.

In his brief history of digest comics published prior to DC entering the field, Mr. Wells cites an article contained in The Comic Reader #122 (Sept. 1975) which had reported that Whitman was to take over distribution of Gold Key’s digest line. He then states that this did not occur as planned and that the digests after Gold Key’s final issues “never came back under the Whitman imprint or anything else.”

But, in fact, they did sort of anyway. What happened was that already-published Gold Key digests, which had also been given an additional printing with the Whitman name replacing the Gold Key name on the covers, were being distributed to stores in 1976.

The Comic Reader #129 (Apr. 1976) reported the following about the digests: “Whitman apparently has no plans to reprint any material that hasn’t already been reprinted, instead choosing to recycle stuff that is already at digest size.” That statement is somewhat confusing, one reason being that it probably was meant to read “no plans to print any material,” not “reprint.”

Deciphered, the statement meant to say that all Whitman digests on sale in 1976 were previously published digests which were still in distribution. So, the truth is that digests did appear with the Whitman imprint for a while after the Gold Key digest line was canceled.

THE WASP IS A FLIRT! Loved the Ant-Man and Wasp article by Ian Millsted in the latest issue of BACK ISSUE [#76]. It was a very interesting read and the research was very in-depth.

There is one thing, however: in the early issues of The Avengers, the Wasp flirted with Thor, Iron Man, and Captain America in order to make Ant-Man jealous. Why he never figured that out is beyond me.

I still didn’t like what Jim Shooter did with the character in the early 1980s, having him court martialed from the Avengers, framed by Egghead, and then sent to prison and then finally giving up his superhero identity … at least for a little while. I really preferred the way John Byrne handled the character in the late 1980s in West Coast Avengers.

I don’t really believe, though, that Marvel ever gave the character his rightful due. Now I’ve heard that not only is Dr. Henry Pym not going to be Ant-Man in the upcoming movie, but the criminal/ ex-convict Scott Lang will be Ant-Man, and the villain will be Yellowjacket. Why does Marvel allow the bastardization of their characters on the silver screen?

Please tell Ian Millsted how much I loved his article!

– Christopher Krieg

Yellowjacket TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

Ian Millsted thanks you for you for feedback, Christopher.

And it looks as if Marvel is giving Ant-Man his “rightful due,” from its new Ant-Man comic that debuted in January to the Ant-Man movie, which is scheduled to hit theaters the week before the release of this issue of BI. Now that you’ve seen the movie, has your impression changed?

(Mr. Krieg, by the way, is a major Yellowjacket booster, as evidenced by his photo as the character, below.)

HOORAY FOR RAY PALMER To John Trumbull: Congrats on your two great “Atom” articles in the latest BACK ISSUE! I really enjoyed those Action backups and it was neat to read about that wacky Dr. Adrian again since he was almost the Tiny Titan’s Bronze Age arch-nemesis! Luckily the Secret Society never came a’callin’!!

– Philip Portelli

WHAT’S UP WITH WOLVERINE? The Wolverine story, while interesting, what did it have to do with “small”?

– Gary [last name unknown], via email Wolverine was created to be short in stature ... even John Romita’s character roughs state that, as seen below. That didn’t stick for long, as artists in later years drew him taller.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

These Whitman digests were sold in outlets which handled other Whitman merchandise—department stores, toy stores, and similar locations (whereas Gold Key product was sold in newsstand-type outlets).

It’s really too bad that Gold Key gave up on the digests when they did, because after all it was they who had first developed the format as a success with Walt Disney Comics Digest #1 (June 1968).

After Gold Key abandoned digests, they really took off in popularity, especially for the Archie line, which has a very successful array of digests published to this day.

– John Fishel

SMALL TALK Michael, when I saw the “Let’s Get Small” theme for this issue, I wasn’t sure I’d like it. I’ve always harbored a great hatred of toddler versions of superheroes, having had to suffer through the ’60s with DC’s inexplicable fascination with Superbaby stories (“Me used heat vision and incinerated farm! Baww!” Please kill me now). And I was afraid your coverage of this weird sub-genre might suck all of the fun out of the good stuff. But thankfully, you kept your coverage of this disturbing facet of comics on the back burner. Thank you for that.

The Ant-Man/Wasp article was great. I like these detailed history/timeline features that trace a character’s growth. The Marvel Value Stamps feature was a hoot; I saw these things appear in all my comics and I couldn’t figure out exactly what their purpose was. Now I know … cut up all of your best comics and pay for a trip to California, and you too can win a photo op with Roy Thomas! Um … yay?

The Wolverine article was good, particularly with mention of the FOOM Character Contest. I, too, entered that contest, although the only proof of that is my name in tiny print somewhere on that list.

I always wondered about the characters that were showcased in that issue; some of them seemed to have potential, and I was blown away by the artistic talent of some of the contributors, much better than my meager offering.

I never read Sword of the Atom or Micronauts, so both of these features were fun to explore new areas. And the list freak in me is really thankful for the digest index Chris Marshall provided.

Oddly enough, I have never seen Super Jrs. anywhere, in comics or products. Since it looks like they rank right up there with Superbaby, I probably was subconsciously avoiding them. Although I thought it was amusing to see that even a toddler version of Wonder Woman can’t escape bondage. That girl can’t catch a break no matter what age she is.

I’m looking forward to the “When Comics Were Fun” issue.

Finally, a question regarding the inside back cover. What the heck is Comic Book Fever all about?

– Michal Jacot Bronze Age Events Issue

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BACK ISSUE • 75

THE MACRO CHARMS OF THE MICRONAUTS

Jackson Guice and his little friends on the cover of Marvel Age #3. Marvel Age TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc. Micronauts TM & © Takara LTD/A.G.E., Inc.

I was thrilled to read James Heath Lantz’s BI #76 article, “Inter-Space Opera: A Look at Marvel’s Micronauts Comics.”

The author did a fine job recounting Takara’s and Mego’s respective productions of the original Microman/Micronauts toys and Bill Mantlo’s and Michael Golden’s hard work in ensuring the Marvel series’ success during its first year of publication. I likewise enjoyed reading Jackson Guice’s thoughts on his synergistic collaboration with Mantlo for issues #48–58 of the series, which satisfyingly closed out the writer’s impressive run with the characters.

Well-researched BI articles such as Lantz’s illuminate the sadly neglected pockets of the Marvel Universe. I am also surprised by the fact that Marvel has not once more secured the rights to Micronauts (or, for that matter, ROM, another great Bill Mantlo book) so that the full cast of original characters can be reunited in new comic-book adventures and younger readers can enjoy collections of the longout-of-print material.

In this cinematic age where superhero movies are thriving at the box office, particularly offbeat sci-fi concepts as the Guardians of the Galaxy, it is not too difficult to imagine the possibility of the beloved Micronauts gracing the big screen!

– Tom Powers

76 • BACK ISSUE • Bronze Age Events Issue

MANTLO BOOSTER I finished reading BACK ISSUE issue #76 the other day and as someone who’s read his fair share of Micronauts comics and is in general quite familiar with Bill Mantlo’s career, I gotta say, well done.

In a way the James Heath Lantz’s article was an expanded version of the Micronauts chapter of the Bill Mantlo: A Life in Comics benefit magazine. But it also offered up a lot of interesting extras such as the in-depth but compact history of the Japanese toy line that spurred the comic series as well as the later Micronauts incarnations by other publishers. Also, thanks for the ROM: Spaceknight mentions, especially in regard to Jackson “Butch” Guice’s ghost-penciling of a ROM Annual; even as a huge ROM fan, that certainly was news to me.

– David Holsey

A CHRISTMAS WISH Thank you very much for publishing my letter in BACK ISSUE #73. It was a great issue. I might just have the page my letter was on framed.

I encourage you to do an expanded article on the “Best Christmas Comic-Book Stories,” a really, really big, two-part, two-issue spectacular. Perhaps you could cover 100 comic-book stories and rank them. Everybody seems to like lists these days.

(You might want to exclude all the versions of A Christmas Carol.

That story has been done to death.)

Call in your best comic-book scholars and think back to the best Richie Rich/Harvey/Disney/Donald Duck/Archie/early DC/early Marvel Christmas stories, stories that made you laugh, cry, and be glad to be alive during the holiday season.

Even now, there have been critics of popular culture who are pointing out how violent comics are, and I might even agree with them. There’s way too much emphasis on demons, vengeance, and dark material going on in pop culture. I know that’s part of the human condition, but maybe we need to take a few steps back.

It doesn’t hurt to do feature articles pointing out the good stories, and in particular the Christmas stories, the ones we favored when we were children and made us feel good to be alive, and feel there was hope for humanity. In these politically correct times, this topic might scare off some individuals.

Hopefully, BACK ISSUE writers are made of sterner stuff.

Stories I would include: several of Carl Barks’ Christmas tales. He was the master, and I’m sure other great comic-book writers did some fantastic stories. A few early ’70s Denny O’Neil Batman stories come to mind. Mr. O’Neil did a fantastic job balancing the tragedy of crime and the hope of Christmas. Alan Brennert’s late-’80s Deadman/Supergirl story never fails to bring a tear to my eye, although I would be hesitant to include that particular take for any collection for children.

Such an article might also point us to a story we aficionados may have missed and might stand being introduced to. Did Walt Kelly write any seasonal tales? Were they any good? Should DC and Marvel do Holiday paperbacks every year? Who else besides Carl Barks was great in writing Christmas tales?

C’mon, guys, contact Andy Mangels, Roy Thomas, and other BACK ISSUE contributors and get your brain cells working.

When times are tough, people need to hear about the positive.

If I had such an article, I would be armed with evidence that there were times when this four-color form of entertainment could help lift the soul.

– James Smith III November’s BACK ISSUE #85 looks at Christmas comics of the ’70s, ’80s, and early ’90s! And before that, there’s an interview with Alan Brennert in BI #84.

TM & © DC Comics.

According to Comic Book Fever’s Facebook page, “Comic Book Fever is a book by George Khoury. It relives that timeless era of 1976 to 1986, when comics offered fun to any kid with a pocketful of coins.” Where it differs from what we do eight times a year here in BACK ISSUE is, CBF is a nostalgic look through Mr. Khoury’s perspective.

A BELATED THANK-YOU TO DAN MISHKIN I got the digital edition of BI #77 and noticed that I left Dan Mishkin’s name out at the end of the Blue Devil article when I thanked the people responsible for helping me. I apologize for that major oversight.

Please make sure Dan receives proper credit in the next available issue. Thank you.

– Daniel DeAngelo

CARREY ON, PLASTIC MAN! The following is an email sent to Bryan Stroud, author of BACK ISSUE #77’s Plastic Man article, by one of its participants: Got the online version of the new BACK ISSUE and printed out your article so that I could read it last night. Great stuff. You did well by Plas.

I did wonder if I’d sent you that photo of me. I look addled in it … and as if I’ve developed some sort of weird skin disease.

A couple of things: Glad that you got in that “W. Argyle Nelson” Plas drawing. But ... the “Smith” part of it is actually Bob Smith, who inked the drawing. I’d forgotten that until I was talking to Bob about it. For some reason, I thought that it’d been inked

by Steve Mitchell. I remember showing it to Steve up in the DC production department. I took the Nelson name from the credits for I Love Lucy … and probably a batch of other TV shows from that time period. Such a great name.

And there’s an interesting story about yet another movie that was never made. Sometime in the late 1980s, I got a call from Bhob Stewart at DC. Bhob had taken over half of my job at DC and was working a lot with Joe Orlando. Bhob told me that Steven Spielberg had optioned Plastic Man as a live-action movie and had asked to see some stuff that would give him an idea of the possibilities of the character. I told Bhob that he just had to dig out a copy of a DC Special from the late ’60s or early ’70s that featured wonderful reprints of Jack Cole Plastic Man stories … including the origin and the initial meeting with Woozy. He did that and sent it on to Spielberg.

One of the editors at DC was pushing a young comedian as a live-action Plastic Man. His suggestion for the part was Jim Carrey.

When you look at Carrey in The Mask, you can get an idea of what a fantastic Plastic Man he would have made.

Someone should write a book about all the amazing things in the form of movies and comics that were proposed but never completed.

That late-’70s Spirit movie with James Garner as the Spirit … and music by Paul McCartney … is a good example. In comics, there’s always “Captain Stone and the Dinosaurs.”

– John Workman Bryan, thanks for sharing Mr. Workman’s message, and John, thanks for the info. Way back in BI #3 (Apr. 2004), I wrote a “Greatest Stories Never Told” article about the Plastic Man movie that wasn’t—which originally had Paul “Pee-wee Herman” Reubens attached. The article featured a faux movie poster (shown in background) with my casting preferences: Jim Carrey as Plas and Chris Farley as Woozy Winks!

DOES EVERYTHING HAVE TO BE WORLDTHREATENING? Mr. Eury, I just read your editorial in the latest issue of BACK ISSUE, and even before reading the issue, I had to write.

Like you, I am one to mourn the innocence of the superhero comics of my youth. It seems to be totally gone, probably never to return. I too remember heroes who were HEROES in the best sense of the word. They gave us an ideal to look up to and were GOOD! No ambiguities, no moral lapses. Now, before people say, well, that wasn’t really realistic, today they are more like real people. Wasn’t that the point? I don’t see anyone flying through the sky today or running across the lake or … insert your favorite superpower here.

The simple fact of the matter is that superheroes are fantasy.

Plain and simple. What they do cannot be done in the world we live in, and that’s just talking about the superpower aspect of the whole thing.

The sociological ramifications of superheroics are, I believe, where a large part of the problem really lies. For the most part, it began with Watchmen and Marvelman. We can, however, in no way lay all of this at the feet of Alan Moore. He has repeatedly stated that he did not set out to change an entire genre, and has many times written stories much more in the vein of those we love. The two titles stated above took a hard look at what the world would be like and how society and the very structure of human existence would change if superpowers really existed. We would end up in a world totally unrecognizable compared to the one we live in now.

They would change everything from politics on down to how we make our morning coffee.

The problem arises when you try to reflect these sorts of ideas in the average issue of Superman. When we grew up reading comics they basically had our heroes living in the same world we live in, except it had superheroes. Other than that it was exactly the same. Now, they (comic creators and companies) seem to pick and choose which real effects superheroes have on their universe. As an example I use Civil War by Marvel. (No prejudice, just an example.)

If there were an incident that provoked society to force superheroes to have to register themselves, the changes on society would be significant. Not to mention that there would most assuredly have been events previously that would have had huge repercussions. The fallout from all of this is that your superheroes would have to end up living in a totally alternate reality that would have its own structure and rules. This is far too convoluted and involved for a genre that still, I believe, sets out to tell simple adventure stories.

You can’t have it both ways, yet superhero comics today seem to want it that way. If it comes from a desire to be more relevant, or to gain more mainstream acceptance, or a combination of these and other factors, it has all added up to the comics we have today.

The old trope about comics showing the illusion of change when they really always revert back to the status quo would have to be totally thrown out the window if your entire social structure is changed by a significant event.

The way this has affected the genre is that everyone has seen the success of harderedged superheroes. Everyone wants superheroes to be accepted by the average person. We have seen this happen with many successful movies. Since our heroes have to be played by real people, however, they have to act more like real people. At least that seems to be the perception.

Christopher Reeve played the Superman we all knew and loved and I challenge anyone to say they did not believe in him up on that screen. But times have changed.

Do people not want a superhero that is truly good?

Have we all become so cynical that we cannot believe in someone like that? You mention

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BACK ISSUE • 77

Superman TM & © DC Comics.

Superman: The Movie © 1978 Warner Bros.

78 • BACK ISSUE • Bronze Age Events Issue

THIS READER REMEMBERS WHEN COMICS WERE FUN As a longtime comic-book reader who grew up on ’70s and ’80s Marvel and DC, I thoughtfully enjoyed BACK ISSUE #77, the “When Comics Were Fun” spotlight.

This was a bittersweet look back for me. I finally stopped collecting modern comics in 2011 after first becoming disenchanted with the way publishers were handling their characters around the mid-’90s.

There used to be a time when kids had an ample variety of genres to choose from. When I first began reading, Marvel and DC still competed with companies like Whitman, Harvey, Archie, and the independents. You had digests and B&W magazines, along with reprint titles of earlier fare from more innocent times, including the late, lamented Treasury format. Not to mention coloring books, storybooks, paperbacks, book and record sets, Big Little Books, Little Golden Books, giveaway comics, and so forth. Kids were the target audience for many of these niche markets and the print industry was all the richer for it. To say that I miss those days would be one major understatement.

I loved the articles on Owen McCarron and Star Comics in particular. I once picked up The Mighty Marvel Superheroes Fun Book #4 at a Pic ’N’ Save store in the early ’80s and enjoyed the heck out of it! I was glad to hear that Scott Edelman enjoyed putting it together and that he had carte blanche to fill its pages with vintage Marvel artwork and covers. I’m sorry that Owen McCarron didn’t get to produce those last beloved Fireside tomes of yore, but reading his biography alone has made me a lifelong fan of the gent. I wish I could have met and thanked him for putting so much love and skill into his interactive comics, right down to featuring some of my all-time favorite B-listers such as Stingray and even long-departed ones like Torpedo, Blackout, and Thunderbolt. Owen clearly knew his Marvel history and did his research superbly. I expect that his work can be found in many a Gold Key or Whitman children’s book of my youth (fresh off the press from Racine, Wisconsin!), just like the ones depicted in this wonderful hidden gem of an article.

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

examples of societal stress from back in the time of the simpler superhero, so I hope that is not the case. I really believe it comes from that desire for superheroes to be more accepted. A truly good hero is now perceived as a childish notion.

And I find that infinitely sad.

I would be happy if everyone could just do superhero stories without all of the gravitas. Every story seems to have to have world-shaking ramifications. Is this so they can collect them in trade paperbacks? I still equate this back to the superhero movie where you have to have a problem big enough to justify a two-hour movie. Same logic about justifying a story collection. But I’m sure you remember Steve Englehart’s run on Justice League of America. Wouldn’t that make a wonderful trade paperback? Truly interesting stories, great characters, and a whole bunch of heroes acting heroically. Once again, I would challenge any superhero fan not to enjoy those stories.

Unfortunately, little human-interest stories do not make great trade paperbacks. Harlan Ellison wrote a wonderful issue of Detective Comics years ago where Batman spent the night not being needed and went home kind of frustrated. A great story, but not really collectable as part of a trade. This in no way diminishes the enjoyment of the story, just it’s marketability in a different form.

The Power Girl series DC did just before the New 52 was a good example of a lighthearted series that worked. It may have been even a bit too far on the funny side to have every hero presented that way, but again, I guess I just wish we could get rid of that weight-of-theworld feeling all of the time and just tell simple heroic adventure stories.

The problem does just seem to center around superheroes, though. There are a lot of lighter, enjoyable series out there, just not a lot of them feature flying people in longjohns.

All this being said, of course, I still read at least a few comics each week, superhero included, that I put down and go, “Wow, that was a great comic.”

I, like you, just wish that not every superhero would have to live in the “real world” these days.

Maybe we will have to be content with going back and reading our old comics again.

Sorry about the rambling note, I really started out to send a short note, but I guess I just had to get this stuff off of my chest. Hey, that would make a great column … oh, wait, you already thought of that.

Lastly, keep up the great work. I truly do get enjoyment out of every issue.

– Brian Martin

MY FAVORITE ISSUE TO DATE This [#77] was my favorite BI to date. I remember picking up that issue of Peter Parker #86 [recreated by Hembeck as our cover] fresh off the shelves in 1983 and enjoying it immensely. After all, it was Assistant Editor’s Month! How could you NOT love Assistant Editor’s Month??? Comics were truly fun and wholesome entertainment back in those days??

– Joe Castro

“IT’S COMICS, NOT BRAIN SURGERY!” Thanks for a look at when comics were FUN, dadgum it! Not to sound like the old guy that chases kids off his lawn, but there’s a reason why I prefer my Silver and Bronze comics over today’s offerings. Of course, comics had their silly moments. I’m reminded of a quote from Jenette Kahn: “It’s comics, not brain surgery!”

I enjoyed the retrospective on Plastic Man. little circular photos of the artist to accompany fred Hembeck’s knees This was a character I was first introduced to in his the article. Unless he really does look like his ’60s revival run, so I had a hard time figuring out © Fred Hembeck. caricatures. If that’s the case, I’d like to see his the whole “He’s Back!” ads. It wasn't until some little curlicue knees. [You got it!] time later that I discovered his Golden Age roots. I always liked Plas The article on Star Comics brought back memories. As a teenager, because he eschewed the standard facemask for big ol’ goggles. I spent probably more time than I should have drawing my own comic That was just cool. books. The name of my “company” was Now that DC is finally getting around Star Comics. So imagine my amusement to doing something in the movie franchise years later when I saw comics with the same department, they’d do well to consider a imprint on the newsstand. comedy-adventure Plastic Man film. Imagine Finally, the never-to-be-realized Batman/ the special effects in that one. Imagine Jim Dick Tracy team-up: the heart aches thinking Carrey as Plas… of the missed possibilities…

Re: Superman's Bronze Age silliness: it's Keep doing what you’re doing! Great all in the eye of the beholder. I remember the work!

1960s Batman TV show as being the height – Michal Jacot of dramatic adventure when I was a kid. And Next issue: International Heroes! Alpha while the infamous Don Rickles two-parter in Flight, the New X-Men, Global Guardians, Jimmy Olsen had its moments of insanity, it is Captain Canuck, Captain Britain, and Justice also a fast-paced, turbo-charged story as League International, plus Spider-Man in the only Jack Kirby could tell it.

UK and more. Featuring an exclusive interview “Prince Street News”: I love this guy’s with cover artists STEVE FASTNER and RICH stuff. I'm eagerly waiting for his trade LARSON and the work of JOHN BYRNE, paperback collection, so let’s get working CHRIS CLAREMONT, DAVE COCKRUM, MIKE on that, Mr. Heitmueller.

COLLINS, RICHARD COMELY, KEITH GIFFEN, I liked Hembeck’s cover pastiches, but KEVIN MAGUIRE, and more. Don’t ask—just I would have liked to see one of those BI it! See you in thirty!

Your friendly neighborhood Euryman X-Men, Alpha Flight, and all related characters TM & © Michael Eury, editor-in-chief Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Bronze Age Events Issue

•

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

TM & © Cosgrove Hall.

Star Comics filled a void for me until Gladstone brought back my beloved Barks Duck reprints in the mid-’80s. I collected titles from the Star line well after they had been folded into the Marvel family proper. I was a teenager by then but still loved reading Count Duckula. We need this kind of material out there nowadays if we are going to get kids back into reading comics, not because of sales potential per se, but also to keep them from missing out on the sense of joy and wide-eyed wonder that we enjoyed as youngsters, back in the good old days.

Thanks again to the entire BI crew and yourself for all the great stuff found in this ish. We got Superman going on a burger binge, Fred Hembeck homaging the greats, mention of Marshall Rogers’ winning smile and dedicated draftmanship, Blue Devil’s origins and early days, and a Plastic Man career overview. Truly, this one brought it all home for me!

– Joe Castro

BACK ISSUE • 79

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A TRIBUTE TO A COMICS LEGEND:

THE INCREDIBLE HERB TRIMPE

From running the first photostat machine at Marvel Comics to being the first to illustrate Wolverine, no other member of the Marvel Bullpen had such a varied and remarkable career as HERB TRIMPE. He drew licensed characters based on toys such as G.I. Joe, Godzilla, and Transformers, which went on to become blockbuster movies. He drew runs of super-heroes like Iron Man, Defenders, Captain Britain, and even Marvel’s flagship character Spider-Man. But he’s best known for his definitive eight-year stint drawing the INCREDIBLE HULK. This book, produced with Herb’s full cooperation just prior to his passing, chronicles the life and art of Trimpe through his own voice, as well as the voices of friends and colleagues like STAN LEE, TOM DEFALCO, ROY THOMAS, JOHN ROMITA, BILL PECKMANN, SAL BUSCEMA, JOE SINNOTT, LARRY HAMA, DOUG MOENCH, ELIOT BROWN, LEN WEIN, RON FRENZ, STEVE ENGLEHART, and his son ALEX TRIMPE. Their testimony to his talent and his legacy of artwork leave no wonder why he has been dubbed “The Incredible Herb Trimpe.” By DEWEY CASSELL and AARON SULTAN. NOW SHIPPING! (160-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $34.95 • (Digital Edition) $7.95 • ISBN: 9781605490625

GO TO www.twomorrows.com NOW FOR A FREE PREVIEW!

All characters TM & © their respective owners.

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KIRBY COLLECTOR #65

ALTER EGO #135

ALTER EGO #136

ALTER EGO #137

ALTER EGO #138

LEN WEIN (writer/co-creator of Swamp Thing, Human Target, and Wolverine) talks about his early days in comics at DC and Marvel! Art by WRIGHTSON, INFANTINO, TRIMPE, DILLON, CARDY, APARO, THORNE, MOONEY, and others! Plus FCA (Fawcett Collectors of America), MR. MONSTER’s Comic Crypt, the Comics Code, and DAN BARRY! Cover by DICK GIORDANO with BERNIE WRIGHTSON!

BONUS 100-PAGE issue as ROY THOMAS talks to JIM AMASH about celebrating his 50th year in comics—and especially about the ‘90s at Marvel! Art by TRIMPE, GUICE, RYAN, ROSS, BUCKLER, HOOVER, KAYANAN, BUSCEMA, CHAN, VALENTINO, and others! Plus FCA, MR. MONSTER’s Comic Crypt, AMY KISTE NYBERG on the Comics Code, and a cover caricature of Roy by MARIE SEVERIN!

Incredible interview with JIM SHOOTER, which chronicles the first decade of his career (Legion of Super-Heroes, Superman, Supergirl, Captain Action) with art by CURT SWAN, WALLY WOOD, GIL KANE, GEORGE PAPP, JIM MOONEY, PETE COSTANZA, WIN MORTIMER, WAYNE BORING, AL PLASTINO, et al.! Plus FCA, MR. MONSTER, BILL SCHELLY, and more!

Cover art by CURT SWAN!

Science-fiction great (and erstwhile comics writer) HARLAN ELLISON talks about Captain Marvel and The Monster Society of Evil! Also, Captain Marvel artist/ co-creator C.C. BECK writes about the infamous Superman-Captain Marvel lawsuit of the 1940s and ‘50s in a double-size FCA section! Plus two titanic tributes to Golden Age artist FRED KIDA, MR. MONSTER, BILL SCHELLY, and more!

(84 FULL-COLOR pages) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $3.95 • Ships August 2015

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(84 FULL-COLOR pages) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $3.95 • Ships Feb. 2016

KIRBY COLLECTOR #66

BACK ISSUE #83

BACK ISSUE #84

BACK ISSUE #85

ANYTHING GOES (AGAIN)! Another potpourri issue with a comparison of Jack Kirby’s work vs. the design genius of ALEX TOTH, a lengthy Kirby interview, a look at Kirby’s work with WALLY WOOD, MARK EVANIER and our other regular columnists, unseen and unused Kirby art from JIMMY OLSEN, KAMANDI, MARVELMANIA, Jack’s COMIC STRIP & ANIMATION WORK, and more!

DOUBLE-TAKES ISSUE! Features oddities, coincidences, and reworkings by both Jack and Stan Lee: the Galactus Origin you didn’t see, Ditko’s vs. Kirby’s Spider-Man, how Lee and Kirby viewed “writing” differently, plus a rare KIRBY radio interview with Stan, MARK EVANIER and our other regular columnists, unseen and unused pencil art from FANTASTIC FOUR, 2001, CAPTAIN VICTORY, BRUCE LEE, & more!

“International Heroes!” Alpha Flight, the New X-Men, Global Guardians, Captain Canuck, and Justice League International, plus SpiderMan in the UK and more. Also: exclusive interview with cover artists STEVE FASTNER and RICH LARSON. Featuring the work of JOHN BYRNE, CHRIS CLAREMONT, DAVE COCKRUM, RICHARD COMELY, KEITH GIFFEN, KEVIN MAGUIRE, and more! Alpha Flight vs. X-Men cover by FASTNER/LARSON.

“Supergirl in the Bronze Age!” Her 1970s and 1980s adventures, including her death in Crisis on Infinite Earths and her many rebirths.

Plus: an ALAN BRENNERT interview, behind the scenes of the Supergirl movie starring HELEN SLATER, Who is Superwoman?, and a look at the DC Superheroes Water Ski Show.

With PAUL KUPPERBERG, ELLIOT MAGGIN, MARV WOLFMAN, plus a jam cover recreation of ADVENTURE COMICS #397!

“Christmas in the Bronze Age!” Go behind the scenes of comics’ best holiday tales of the 1970s through the early 1990s! And we revisit Superhero Merchandise Catalogs of the late ‘70s! Featuring work by SIMON BISLEY, CHRIS CLAREMONT, JOSÉ LUIS GARCÍALÓPEZ, KEITH GIFFEN, the KUBERT STUDIO, DENNY O’NEIL, STEVE PURCELL, JOHN ROMITA, JR., and more. Cover by MARIE SEVERIN and MIKE ESPOSITO!

(100-page FULL-COLOR mag) $10.95 (Digital Edition) $4.95 • Now shipping!

(100 FULL-COLOR pages) $10.95 (Digital Edition) $4.95 • Summer 2015

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DRAW! #31

FREE 2015 TWOMORROWS CATALOG

COMIC BOOK CREATOR #9 COMIC BOOK CREATOR #10

BRICKJOURNAL #36

JOE STATON on his comics career (from E-MAN, to co-creating The Huntress, and his current stint on the Dick Tracy comic strip), plus we showcase the lost treasure GODS OF MOUNT OLYMPUS drawn by Joe! Plus, Part One of our interview with the late STAN GOLDBERG, why JOHN ROMITA, JR. is the best comic book artist working, we quiz PABLO MARCOS about the days of Marvel horror, plus HEMBECK!

The Broadway sci-fi epic WARP examined!

Interviews with art director NEAL ADAMS, director STUART (Reanimator) GORDON, playwright LENNY KLEINFELD, stage manager DAVID GORDON, and a look at Warp’s 1980s FIRST COMICS series! Plus: an interview with PETER (Hate!) BAGGE, our RICH BUCKLER interview Part One, GIANT WHAM-O COMICS, and the conclusion of our STAN GOLDBERG interview!

Microscale Building! LEGO builder JUSTIN McMILLAN’s micro house and other buildings, a look at the MICROSCALE Standard

by TwinLUG, and featuring some of the best microscopic LEGO work from around the world, plus JARED K. BURKS’ minifigure customizing, step-by-step “You Can Build It” instructions by CHRISTOPHER DECK, BrickNerd DIY Fan Art, MINDSTORMS robotics lessons by DAMIEN KEE, and more!

How-to demos & interviews with Philadelphia artists JG JONES (52, Final Crisis, Wanted, Batman and Robin) and KHOI PHAM (The Mighty Avengers, The Astonishing SpiderMan, The Mighty World of Marvel), JAMAR NICHOLAS reviews of art supplies, JERRY ORDWAY demos the “ORD-way” or drawing, and Comic Art Bootcamp by MIKE MANLEY and BRET BLEVINS! JG Jones cover! Mature readers only.

Features all available back issues and books! Download the INTERACTIVE PDF DIGITAL EDITION (click on any item, and you’ll automatically be taken to its page on our website to order), or for a FREE PRINTED COPY, just call, e-mail, write us, or go online to request one, and we’ll mail it to you at no cost (customers outside the US pay a nominal shipping fee)!

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(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $3.95 • Summer 2015

(36-page FULL-COLOR catalog) FREE (Interactive PDF Digital Edition) FREE

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