Marvel Comics In The 1980s by TwoMorrows Publishing

Marvel Comics in the 1980s:

An Issue by Issue Field Guide to a Pop Culture Phenomenon by Pierre Comtois

TwoMorrows Publishing Raleigh, North Carolina

Marvel Comics In The 1980s

An Issue by Issue Field Guide to a Pop Culture Phenomenon

Written by Pierre Comtois Edited by John Morrow Designed by Richard J. Fowlks Proofreading by Scott Peters and Rob Smentek

TwoMorrows Publishing 10407 Bedfordtown Drive Raleigh, North Carolina 27614 www.twomorrows.com • e-mail: store@twomorrows.com © 2014 Pierre Comtois and TwoMorrows Publishing First Printing • December 2014 • Printed in the USA Softcover ISBN: 978-1-60549-059-5

The views expressed in this book are solely those of the author, and do not necessarily relect those of TwoMorrows Publishing or its employees. Also available: Marvel Comics in the 1960s and Marvel Comics in the 1970s.

Dedication

Dedicated to those last editors, writers, artists, inkers, colorists, and letterers who worked to hold up the Marvel Comics standard even as the darkness descended.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Contents Introduction

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

The Dark Ages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Creator Spotlights: Roy Thomas

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Gene Colan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Stan Lee

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Mike Zeck . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 Herb Trimpe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110 John Buscema

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

Don Heck . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .223

Key Marvel Moments: The New Universe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169 The Wedding of Spidey and Mary Jane . . . . . . . . . . . . .187

The Dark Ages

Copyrights

The following images (as indicated by the page number each appears on) are TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.:

Marvel characters (4-) Spider-Man (11-36-62-74-78-82-93-97-99-113-154-185-186-194-212) Fantastic Four (43-52-57-67-81-88-98-129-126) X-Men (13-20-24) Thor (85-206) Epic Illustrated (16) Daredevil (26-33-50-51-115-129-138-148-152-155-166) Bizarre Adventures (29-40) Dr. Strange (35-68) Moon Knight (38) Iron Man (45) Silver Surfer (54) Wolverine (61) Captain Marvel (65) Shang Chi, Master of Kung Fu (70) Alpha Flight (101) Power Pack (103) New Mutants (104-157) Avengers (108-118-134-140-159-163-179-183-190-195-207) Machine Man (111) Cloak and Dagger (125) Punisher (143-197-222) X-Factor (147) Secret Wars (150) Squadron Supreme (161) Elektra (167) Star Brand (170-181) The ‘Nam (174-178) Hulk (201) Speedball (204) West Coast Avengers (210-214) Coldblood (217) She-Hulk (220)

Crisis on Infinite Earths, Legion of Super-Heroes, Batman, Ronin, Metal Men, Superman, Adam Strange, Shazam, Captain Atom, Blue Beetle, Watchmen, Who’s Who, Super Powers, Swamp Thing, V For Vendetta, Our Fighting Forces, Animal Man, New Gods, Ronin, Shade the Changing Man, Infinity Inc., Slash Maraud, Wildcats TM & © DC Comics

Sin City, 300 TM & © Frank Miller

Barry Windsor-Smith Storyteller TM & © Barry Windsor-Smith Captain Canuck TM & © Comely Comics Conan, Kull TM & © Robert E. Howard Rom TM & © Parker Bros.

Next Men TM & © John Byrne

Youngblood TM & © Rob Liefeld

Ditko’s Package TM & © Steve Ditko and Robin Snyder X-O TM & © Valiant Comics

Eternal Warrior TM & © Valiant Comics

Tarzan TM & © Edgar Rice Burroughs Inc. Hellboy TM & © Mike Mignola

Astro City TM & © Kurt Busiek

Tales From the Crypt, Crime Suspenstories TM & © William M. Gaines Estate Blue Velvet TM & © Delaurentis Entertainment Group Deer Hunter TM & © Universal Pictures Vietnam Journal TM & © Don Lomax

Solar Man of the Atom, Magnus Robot Fighter TM & © Dreamworks Classics Wetworks TM & © Whilce Portacio Spawn TM & © Todd McFarlane Sabre TM & © Don McGregor

Platoon TM & © Orion Pictures

Jason and the Argonauts TM & © Columbia Pictures Bionic Woman TM & © MCA Universal

Battlestar Galactica TM & © ABC Television Avengers TM & © ITV

Alien TM & © Twentieth Century Fox

Godfather TM & © Paramount Pictures Wait Until Dark TM & © Warner Bros.

Comics Journal, Amazing Heroes TM & © Fantagraphics Books Shogun TV movie TM & © Paramount Television

Saturday Night Live TM & © NBC Television/Broadway Video Six From Sirius TM & © Doug Moench and Paul Gulacy

Bibliography

Alter Ego Magazine, Roy Thomas, ed. (various issues); TwoMorrows Publishing. Back Issue, Michael Eury, ed. (various issues); TwoMorrows Publishing. Marvel Comics the Untold Story (2012) by Sean Howe, Harper Collins. American Comic Book Chronicles: the 1980s (2013) by Keith Dallas, TwoMorrows Publishing. Marvel Comics Group (various comics and magazines) Various on-line sources 4

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Author’s Note

never planned to write a Marvel Comics in the 1980s book. In fact, I never planned to write a Marvel Comics in the 1970s book either. Originally, all four phases of Marvel’s history (the Early Years, Years of Consolidation, Grandiose Years, and Twilight Years) were all supposed to be included in a single volume, but due to the exigencies of the publishing world, it was decided to split the book in two. All well and good...until the question from readers began to come in both to myself and my publisher asking if there was going to be a volume covering the 1980s (each decade, it seems, is someone’s favorite). When I replied to those queries that I’d not planned on writing such a book, the questions soon became demands, forcing me to actually give the idea serious thought. Right off, however, I knew that my approach to a Marvel Comics in the 1980s book would have to differ somewhat from the first two volumes. The problem was twofold: the number of titles released by Marvel in the Eighties was enormous when compared to past decades and unfortunately, much of it wasn’t very good. I say that with much reluctance as I realize art is subjective: what might be one person’s dross could be another’s favorite. In these volumes, I make no attempt to speak definitively for every reader but only myself. In doing so, however, I’ve tried to at least give what I hope are convincing arguments for my conclusions. That said, it was easy to be less critical in the Early Years and through the Grandiose Years and Years of Consolidation when almost all the work discussed was written by a handful of good writers and drawn by a few solid professionals under the direction of a single editor. It became less so in the 1970s when Marvel began to expand its line of comics and hired many new but often inexperienced writers and artists to pick up the slack. Luckily, many of those quickly developed into exciting creators in their own right. Others, unfortunately, became stuck in second gear. My philosophy

early on had been that if I couldn’t say anything nice about someone, I wouldn’t say anything at all. But as time went on and the project passed among different prospective publishers, I was asked to add to the entries to the Twilight Years in order to form a more complete picture of the era. As a result, I ended up including entries on books I didn’t feel measured up and was forced to be more critical about them than I’d preferred. In short, I ended by saying those not nice things that I’d tried to avoid. Which brings us to the 1980s, that I’ve attempted to separate from the 1970s as the earlier and later Twilight Years. When I began to write the earlier books, I’d never intended to cover the 1980s as I thought there just wouldn’t be enough quality material there to fill up a book (at least not if I wanted it to consist of issues from more than three or four titles). But in proceeding to write the entries, I was pleased to rediscover that there was much more to like about Marvel in those years than I remembered. However, the sheer amount of uninteresting material was still enough to stagger a reviewer with any idea of drawing a complete picture of the era. And so, in order to provide that balance, I arrived at the difficult decision to include far more of the product that I felt just did not measure up to the level of quality and even greatness of earlier years. That meant there would be more critical commentary in this volume than in previous ones and if some readers don’t like that, so be it. There is always room for more books analyzing the whys and wherefores of Marvel comics in every era and every opinion is equally valuable. In short, if you disagree with the opinions expressed in this and previous volumes, consider writing your own books making the case for the comics I didn’t care for. I’ll be the first in line to buy a copy! Pierre V. Comtois April 2014 The Dark Ages

Introduction

n the two previous volumes of this series, Marvel Comics in the 1960s and Marvel Comics in the 1970s, the development of the company was traced through four successive phases: the Early Years, the Years of Consolidation, the Grandiose Years, and the Twilight Years with the latter phase assumed to have concluded at the end of the 1970s. That ending however, was always considered somewhat arbitrary as the Twilight Years, like the Grandiose Years before them, did not conclude with an easily identified marker, let alone the too convenient year of 1970. There was a lengthy petering-out period extending through the following decade with some top-flight comics intermingling with a good many more of lesser quality until the former eventually dwindled away. By the end of the 1980s then, it was easier to tell that the Twilight Years as a definitive phase was coming to an end, and another beginning. For the purposes of this volume that next phase has been designated as the “Dark Ages,” a period extending to the present where the content of comics was geared more to the adult reader than readers of every age and where creators and Marvel editorial seemed determined to squander the heritage bequeathed them by their peers in earlier phases. Also marking the 1980s or the later Twilight Years, was the start of Marvel’s becoming a corporate football. It all began in 1968 when Magazine Management, owned by Marvel’s founder Martin Goodman, was sold to Perfect Film & Chemical Corp. Renaming itself Cadence Industries, Perfect Film then sold its Marvel Entertainment Group to New World Pictures in 1986. Three years later, New World sold Marvel to McAndrews & Forbes owned by Ron Perelman who then steered Marvel Entertainment into bankruptcy 6

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

and a tangle of corporate infighting that ultimately resulted in Marvel being bought by the Walt Disney Company in 2009. While all that was going on, the Marvel bullpen was also in flux, running through a succession of editors-inchief until finally settling on Jim Shooter, who took the job in 1978. At the time, Marvel’s offices were in turmoil with little editorial leadership. Books shipped late, reprints were used when deadlines were missed, and a maze of editors and editor/writers led to confusion that was often reflected in sloppy or selfindulgent scripting. Shooter managed to sort out the mess but at the cost of alienating many employees and freelancers. As the 1980s advanced, more and more of

Jim Shooter in the bullpen. His success at course-correcting the editorial office was followed by an exodus of talent that invigorated the competition.

them would quit Marvel for the competition with the result that a moribund DC became resurgent and once again began to rival Marvel in sales and the quality of its product. Meanwhile, Shooter fought with the company’s corporate bosses for better working conditions for employees, such as sharing in royalties and ownership of characters published under a separate imprint than Marvel Comics. But despite his efforts, Shooter eventually found himself with few friends both in the bullpen and in the corporate offices and he was forced out in 1987. He was succeeded by his deputy, Tom DeFalco. More insidiously, a streak of darkness began to infiltrate itself into the comics themselves. Writers like Frank Miller and even Shooter himself

This illustration of a family friendly Marvel Comics by artist Michael Golden belies the creeping darkness and negativity that infiltrated many of the company’s titles in the 1980s. The infection would spread in the following decade until, in the new century, little would remain that anyone who had once loved comics would recognize.

infused characters, such as Daredevil and Star Brand, with broad strains of cynicism, negativity, and “mature” themes that were completely out of keeping with the spirit of the Comics Code Authority, which began to lose ground as the decade progressed. As creators began to write more for each other than for their readers, unit sales of individual comics slipped; at first slowly, then more precipitously, following a “bubble” that grew in the late 1980s until bursting later in the 1990s. The aftermath would not be a pretty sight, leaving behind a moonscape of anemic sales and comics the general public just had no interest in reading. But there was no hint of that as the 1980s began. At that time, Stan Lee and the great artists who had propelled Marvel’s success in the 1960s were mostly gone from the scene and many of their 1970s acolytes, the fans turned pros, had either moved on to a growing independent market or defected to DC. Although there remained a few holdouts from the past, such as Roy Thomas, John and Sal Buscema and Herb Trimpe (and later Steve Ditko), they were replaced by new faces such as writers Roger Stern, Bill Mantlo, and Chris Claremont, and a pair of writer/artists who would come to dominate the later Twilight Years, each attracting their share of fans and casting their influence over two distinctive wings of up-andcomers. First on the scene was John Byrne, who broke in with a story in Giant-Size Dracula #5 (1975). Byrne’s slick, detailed, exciting, perfect-for-super-heroes art style quickly caught the attention of readers as he moved from title to title until finally settling on the X-Men in 1977 just as that book was taking off on its rise to pop culture icon. Byrne’s star rose with that of the X-Men (to mix a Introduction

metaphor) until he left that title to both write and firmly in place. It was left for those few remaining draw the Fantastic Four. There, he proved himself in comics readers to stumble amid the wreckage until both capacities producing wild and imaginative stories comics gained a different kind of respectability issue after issue that rivaled the heyday of Stan Lee when Hollywood unintentionally gave them a new, and Jack Kirby. His contemporary, Frank Miller, if anemic, lease on life. arrived at Marvel in 1978, debuting as penciler of But the damage had been done. Even though the the John Carter, Warlord of Mars strip. After serving names of Spider-Man, Captain America, Thor, and a quick apprenticeship on a handful of titles, Miller Iron Man would finally become well and truly housemanaged to convince his employers to give him a hold names, never again would comics themselves regular assignment on Daredevil. There, over the next hold the kind of position in pop culture they enjoyed few years, Miller, first as artist and then as both in the 1960s. With the abandonment of the Comics writer and artist, would proceed to revolutionize not Code, the industry had turned its back on being a only the way comic stories were expected to be true mass medium and became satisfied as a niche written and drawn, but their very content. In short phenomenon appealing to an ever-shrinking base for order, the venerable Comics which only constantly increasing Code Authority, for decades the cover prices could make up for guardian of good taste in the subsequent losses in earnings. comics industry and defender of But it would take years for the reader sensibilities, came under company to reach that point. For increasing pressure with Miller most of the 1980s, sales remained constantly testing its limits. By relatively healthy as demonstrated then, however, the Code had lost by a vast expansion of the number much of its mojo and offered of titles Marvel put out each year, little resistance so that by mida significant portion of which decade, it was being routinely involved licensed products such ignored by comics produced as toys, movies, rock and roll exclusively for a rising independent groups, and even biographies comics marketplace and then by of John Paul II and St. Francis. newsstand versions as well. It Unfortunately, most of this output was a process that ended at the would prove less than stellar. turn of the new century when first For that reason, the format of Marvel, and then DC, abandoned this volume will be different from the Code entirely. its predecessors in that there will By the end of the 1980s, however, be less first-rate material reviewed Increasingly irrelevant as the both Byrne and Miller would do in comparison with that of lesser 1980s moved on, Marvel some abandoning of their own, merit. This was necessary in order would officially jettison the leaving Marvel for DC. They to form a more complete picture Comics Code Authority in 2001. But long before then, joined a number of the company’s of Marvel Comics in the 1980s as, Authority members had become most popular creators who preparadoxically, the quality of story even lonelier than the Maytag ceded them there when growing and art declined even as production repairman. dissatisfaction with editor-in-chief values improved. Thus, though the Jim Shooter nearly emptied book may be heavy with entries Marvel’s offices before a new tide of rising artists for long runs of such consistently well done titles as appeared to take their place. Todd McFarlane, Jim Lee, Daredevil, Avengers, X-Men, and Fantastic Four, there and Rob Liefeld would more than compensate for the will also be just as many entries for such mid-range loss, as their new, manga influenced art styles grabbed books as Star Brand and Squadron Supreme and bottom readers where they lived and inspired a fanatical feeders like US1 and Kitty Pryde and Wolverine. loyalty never seen before in the history of comics. With As with previous volumes, however, the format of unit sales of the titles they worked on skyrocketing, the Marvel Comics in the 1980s remains the same with the artists were joined by others in a subsequent exodus text broken up into scores of separate entries, each from Marvel to go into business for themselves as analyzing a particular comic book but able to be Image Comics. But despite record sales generated by read in isolation from the rest or in conjunction, Image, which every other publisher also shared, that forming a complete history/overview of Marvel bubble eventually burst, leaving only a new Dark Age Comics across that tumultuous decade. 8

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Conan the Barbarian #114 “The Shadow of the Beast” Roy Thomas (script); John Buscema (pencils); Ernie Chan (inks) Was it only coincidence that the year 1980 marked the divide between the first and second halves of the Twilight Years? That was the year when Roy Thomas, longtime writer and former editor-in-chief of Marvel Comics, finally called it quits with his longtime employer. By then, Stan Lee had ceased being a dayto-day presence in the bullpen, and Thomas himself had moved 3,000 miles away to California after having given up the editor-in-chief’s chair to Len Wein back in 1974. Since then, the position had been passed along to a number of people before Archie Goodwin in 1978. But over the years, the position of editor-in-chief had become less distinct with a number of former holders granted semi-independence and designated as “writer/editors.” Such was the case with Thomas as the fateful year 1978 rolled around. “One day late in 1977 it suddenly occurred to me that Archie (Goodwin) had been editor-in-chief for a year and a half, and I just felt he wasn’t likely to stick around much longer,” recalled Thomas in an interview with Jim Amash. “Since they’d always promoted the next-in-line assistant editor to the editor-in-chief job, that meant Jim Shooter would be taking over.” For years, Thomas had enjoyed near independence as his own editor on books such as Conan the Barbarian. And why not? After being the sole guide of the battling Cimmerian’s career since 1970, both in the color comics and the black-and-white magazines, as well as being

The literary works of Conan creator Robert E. Howard provided an alternative to super-heroes and had propelled Marvel’s successful foray into outright fantasy through the 1970s. They would continue to do so, offering fertile ground for writers in the 1980s.

editor-in-chief himself, Thomas knew the character, as well as the rules of the game, better than anyone. But after colleagues, such as Marv Wolfman, who also enjoyed the status of writer/editor, were relieved of their privileges, Thomas became justifiably concerned about his own. For his part, Shooter was determined to bring every area of comics production under one roof and that was the roof over the bullpen at Marvel’s New York City headquarters. For years, the company had been too loosely led, resulting in many missed deadlines and haphazard production methods. As part of his mandate, Shooter felt he needed to consolidate all editorial responsibilities where he could properly oversee them. Unfortunately, there was a failure to communicate, culminating with Thomas feeling that Shooter had not lived up to a verbal assurance that he could continue as his own writer/editor; the upshot being that an angry Thomas immediately turned to rival DC Comics, signing an exclusive three-year contract with them. And so, after an association with Marvel Comics of 15 years and being responsible for writing any number of classic titles, inventing scores of characters, and developing whole lines of new titles, Thomas was gone. In some ways, however, his departure may have been for the best. After 114 issues of Conan the Barbarian and any number of issues of Savage Sword of Conan, even the stellar team of Thomas and John Buscema were growing somewhat stale. Take Conan the Barbarian #114 (Sept. 1980) for instance. Although the art team of Buscema and Ernie Chan was still on the job (the latter had been inking Buscema’s power-packed pencils since issue #26 and in the process helping to create some of the most beautiful swordand-sorcery comics ever), their work was definitely beginning to look tired. Buscema’s panels could still pack a wallop here and there, but as with most artists as the end of their career approached, his powers were beginning to wane. More was left to Chan to firm up, perhaps explaining the two men’s co-credit this issue as “illustrators” rather than penciler and inker. In many places, Buscema’s figure work took all too familiar poses and details were dropped from backgrounds, with Chan picking up the slack. For his part, Thomas too seemed to be mailing it in as the script (though apparently based on a short story by Conan creator Robert E. Howard) was solid but overly familiar to longtime readers. After so many issues, there were no new supernatural menaces with which to challenge Conan, so that this time, readers are left with only a big talking dog that walks on its hind legs like a man. As things turn out, the dog’s body has been inhabited by the spirit of an evil sorcerer (naturally!) who wants to keep Conan and his latest squeeze around for puppy chow. Naturally Conan handles the Introduction

Roy Thomas

hen Roy Thomas left Marvel in 1981, he signed a three-year contract with DC Comics for whom he scripted many different titles from Wonder Woman to Legion of Super-Heroes. But his greatest claim to fame, and the feature that was closest to his heart, was All-Star Squadron, where he was able to continue the adventures of the Golden Age characters he loved. Other strips he created for DC included Arak, Son of Thunder; Capt. Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew; and Infinity, Inc. At the same time, Thomas made various attempts to break into screenwriting, collaborating with Gerry Conway on the script for Conan the Destroyer starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. By the late ’80s, Thomas returned to Marvel for a time before doing work for other, independent publishers. Finally, in 1999, he revived his old fan magazine Alter Ego on a regular basis and has been editing it ever since. As the new century progressed, Thomas returned to regular comics from time to time penning such features as Dracula and new adventures of Conan and Red Sonja.

situation after a little bit of running around and all’s well that ends well. Yeah, it all looked and read well, but...there was nothing new here. Thomas’ final issue would be #115, promised as a double-sized edition but by this time, neither his nor Buscema’s hearts seemed to be in it. With Thomas’ departure, the Conan book would go on under other writers and other artists, but never again would it electrify readers as did those first few issues, or so thoroughly entertain as it continued to do through its 100th issue. Thomas’ leave-taking marked the end of an era, just as Stan Lee’s did in the previous decade. With the loss of talent that had produced or grown up reading Marvel comics of the Early to Grandiose Years, and who had produced their most memorable successors in the first half of the Twilight Years, there would be no institutional memory left in the bullpen to advise and perhaps halt the slide into the Dark Age to come. All of it formed an inauspicious beginning to Marvel Comics in the 1980s.

Amazing Spider-Man Annual #14 Denny O’Neil (script); Frank Miller (pencils); Tom Palmer (inks) Now here’s something you don’t see every day: Frank Miller being inked by Tom Palmer! It was a once-in-alifetime pairing and if it had to happen, then what better place than Amazing Spider-Man Annual #14 (1980)? And what better artist to draw a 40-page blockbuster story starring Spider-Man and Dr. Strange than Frank Miller? Actually, at the time this book came out, Miller 10

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

wasn’t such a strange choice to pencil it, as early in his career, elements of his art style were noted for their similarity in places to that of Steve Ditko, co-creator of this issue’s two stars. In fact, even after Miller’s name had become synonymous with Daredevil later in the decade, when it was announced at one point that he would be taking over the art chores on the Dr. Strange strip, fans sat up and took notice remembering the work he did here as well as Amazing Spider-Man Annual #15. In that case, all Miller ended up doing was a full-page ad heralding his imminent arrival on the Dr. Strange feature, something that didn’t end up happening. Still, the reason for the initial excitement can be traced back to this issue where Miller unabashedly channels the spirit of Ditko in a story ripped from the pages of the Book of the Vishanti! In it, Dr. Doom, sometime dabbler in the mystic arts, and Dormammu, ruler of the Dark Dimension, team-up to create the “bend sinister,” an interface between science and sorcery. Using a hapless dupe as their tool, the two masters of menace create a robotic thing that attacks Strange in his sanctum sanctorum, leaving him only enough time to summon Spidey for help before being captured. Then things really get weird as writer Denny O’Neil and Miller add a rock ’n’ roll group into the mix whose music is used to whip the inhabitants of New York into a frenzy. All that was needed to complete the spell and create the bend sinister was for Dr. Strange to be sacrificed; something Spidey manages to avoid at the last minute of course. Looked at too closely, the plot turned out to be rather

Amazing Spider-Man Annual #14, pages 16-17: Miller does Ditko... and how! Art on display in the spectacular upper panel almost makes the rest of the story superfluous! This is why fans stood up and took notice when Miller burst onto the scene as the ’70s became the ’80s.

simple with the attendant action filling out the majority of the pages, but what pages! Again and again, Miller comes through with incredible shots and vistas more than worthy of Ditko himself while not sacrificing his own style in the process. From its splash page done in the style of a medieval woodcut, to opening pages presaging Miller’s future work on DC’s Ronin as well as old issues of Strange Tales, this issue serves up pure eye candy for the comics connoisseur. Why, pages 8 and 9, panel 1 alone is worth the 75¢ price of admission! There, Miller perfectly captures the midnight moodiness of the early Ditko with a view from beneath a rain-soaked cornice looking over to Dr. Strange’s Bleeker Street residence with its distinctive Ditko designed skylight. Fast forward to pages 14 and 15 where Miller breaks the

pages down into nine-panel grids, a favorite of Ditko, and proceeds to give a tour of rain-swept cityscapes and a night-time rendezvous between Peter Parker and his date by way of angering Dean Jastrow. Cut to a doublepage spread across pages 16 and 17 with a spectacular action shot of Spider-Man in full-bore Ditkoesque style limned against a background of skyscrapers and lightning bolts! Whew! But there’s no rest for the stunned reader as the POV shifts to a series of panels at the bottom of the same two pages showing Spidey among rooftops suddenly infested with creeping gargoyles. Pages 18 and 19 is action all the way with inker Tom Palmer not shy at all in spotting blacks and laying down shadows that give weight to Miller’s figures that sometimes came off as a little light. The whole sequence ends in a nice coda on page 20 as a final panel shows Spider-Man catching his breath and posing with his hand, middle fingers bent inward in Ditko’s signature style. From there, Miller’s layouts become more his own with lots and lots of the long, narrow panels that he’d employ on much of his later work. The whole issue was a tour de force and a heck of a way to open the Twilight Years. It held the promise of more of the same great stuff that readers had The Dark Ages

gotten used to over the previous decade with no indication that it represented just the opposite, the last hurrah of the way traditional comics were produced and the opening act in the industry’s looming implosion. Fun Fact: Did you know that the rock band featured in this issue’s story was for real? It’s true! Apparently Shrapnel was a punk band of some kind. Their shtick circa early 1980s was to wear plastic helmets, dress in khaki uniforms, and combat boots à la American troops of the time and sing such questionable dirges as “Combat Love!” An advertisement whose art was provided by Miller himself (Hey, he initialed it!) urged readers to send $3 to “Salute Records” for a copy of their song.

X-Men #129 “God Spare the Child...” Chris Claremont (script); John Byrne (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) By X-Men #129 (Jan. 1980), it was obvious that Marvel had a hit on its hands. After being revived in 1975 as part of a wave of new team books that also included The Champions, Defenders, and Invaders, the new X-book had a slow start as a bi-monthly under writer Chris Claremont and artist Dave Cockrum. At the time, the two tried to balance the book between breaking new ground with added members and Marvel Girl being changed to Phoenix, as well as bringing back old characters from the original series such as Magneto, the Sentinels, even the Eric the Red! No doubt some excitement had been generated with Claremont’s characterizations and art by Cockrum that was somewhat improved from earlier work at DC, but the real potential of the strip had never really been tapped. Something was holding it back; something that proved to be a more acute awareness of the title’s history and how to reintegrate that with a modern artistic sensibility that Cockrum’s stodgy work could not capture. Then lightning struck. The art chores on the X-Men suddenly opened up and John Byrne, who’d been busy putting in his bona fides on a zillion other books (including a team-up with Claremont on Iron Fist that served as a warm-up for the main course), jumped in. “I had begun making it known that if ever Dave left the book, I would love to take over the penciling,” Byrne said in an interview. With plans to increase the book’s frequency to monthly, it was found that Cockrum could not keep up with the new schedule so initially, it was Byrne’s speed that got him the job rather than any skill or familiarity with the characters. That soon changed, however, as the artist’s love for the original series came to the fore and invested his work. “There was something about the X-Men that spoke to me from the first issue,” said Byrne of his love affair with the characters. “I was already a die-hard 12

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Chugging along under writer Chris Claremont (left) and artist Dave Cockrum, it was only after the latter was replaced by John Byrne (right) that the X-Men really took off going from a successful relaunch to genuine pop culture phenomenon.

Marvel fan, but reading X-Men #1, the book was not yet called Uncanny X-Men, I was turned into a permanent addict.” Byrne’s affection for the characters was such that eventually, he couldn’t help but begin putting his two cents’ worth into the stories. Soon, his relationship with Claremont became more of a true partnership with the two often at odds over the direction the book should go. According to Byrne, because editor Roger Stern sided with him more often, he won most of those battles. Such an outcome ought not to have been a surprise, as both he and Stern shared an interest in Marvel history and continuity as their subsequent writings were to show. Likely then, stories during Byrne’s tenure on the book that brought back Angel and Beast and starred the likes of Sauron and the Savage Land, Magneto and Mesmero, the Sentinels, Alpha Flight, or Mastermind as featured this issue, came about due to his influence. Need more proof? After Byrne left the book, the wheels came off Claremont’s cart as the X-Men faced off against a succession of inappropriate menaces including Alienlike monsters, space pirates, and an army of sewerdwelling mutants while undergoing oddball transformations such as Storm turning into a punk rock princess, Prof. X leaving Earth to become the “consort” of a space queen, and marrying off Cyclops to an alternative/future timeline version of the presumed dead Marvel Girl. Ugh! If the X-franchise continued on its upward trajectory after all those missteps, it was likely due only to the huge boost given the X-Men by Byrne’s near classic turn on the characters. That began in issue #108 when he came on board having to finish one of

Claremont and Cockrum’s outer-space mixups. But once that tale was concluded, the artist settled in for the long haul, quickly grounding the series in the mutant sub-culture that had been its forte in the Grandiose Years. First up was the return of Magneto. Oh sure, Claremont and Cockrum had brought him back briefly before, but that visitation didn’t add

up to much...not like the multi-part extravaganza offered by Byrne who restored the villain to his proper place in the hierarchy of evil and his near-impossible-to-overcome powers. It was a knockout of a story that set every X-fan back his heels saying “Whoa! That story was awesome!” After that, it was only onward and upward as each succeeding issue seemed to top the last, finally finishing the 1970s with the two-part Proteus saga that filled in some of the backstories of Prof. X and mutant researcher Moira MacTaggert. This issue would prove no different, beginning right where the Proteus story left off. More of a “day in the life” type issue than the usual hero/villain slugfest, readers are allowed to catch up on the private affairs of the characters, meet new ones like Kitty Pryde and Emma Frost, and receive hints of future menaces such as that of Jason Wyngarde, who flirts dangerously with Jean Grey’s mind, and the Hellfire Club that, by issue’s end, manages to capture Wolverine, Colossus, and Storm!

The Savage She-Hulk #1

X-Men #129, page 4: As interesting as the stories and characterizations were in the X-Men book, they likely would not have been enough to draw the numbers of readers the book did without the amazing artwork of John Byrne, who was obviously lavishing his full attention on the strip. But adding another layer of complexity to the art was inker Terry Austin, who put the visuals over the top.

“The She-Hulk Lives!” Stan Lee (script); John Buscema (pencils); Chic Stone (inks) The question is: did the world really need a female version of the Hulk? The answer for Stan Lee and the suits at Marvel Comics was yes! It was the start of a new decade, the third since the Early Years when Fantastic Four #1 launched the Marvel Age of Comics. It took a while, but at last the company’s roster of new heroes began their climb into the public consciousness, which kicked into high gear with the debut of the Hulk television The Dark Ages

show on the CBS network (1977-1982). Its success would inspire a less-than-stellar attempt by the network to do the same for Spider-Man (1977) but that show ended up falling flat. But Spidey himself bounced back on PBS with guest appearances on The Electric Company before moving on to a pair of animated series in 1981. By the end of the 1980s and into the ’90s, Marvel’s characters would be all over the cable TV landscape with a variety of animated series. It was the growing popularity of Marvel characters outside the small pond of comics fandom that concerned the company’s corporate owners. The kind of money that could be made in television and film dwarfed that earned by comic books themselves making protection of copyrights of increasing concern. (It was this concern that no doubt explained why Jack Kirby, co-creator along with Stan Lee of many of the company’s best known characters, was given a hard time in the return of his original artwork.) That said, when it occurred to Marvel that CBS might follow the example of NBC’s Bionic Woman spinoff with a female Hulk, Lee was instructed to come up with one in the comics first, thus securing the copyright for such a character. Or at least so the story goes. In any case, Lee got to work and the result appeared in The Savage She-Hulk #1 (Feb. 1980). Bursting on the scene with...well, not a clap of thunder anyway...but bursting (it was illustrated by John Buscema after all, even though his heart didn’t seem to be in it), Lee’s initial tale told the story of attorney Jennifer Walters, a cousin of

Bruce Banner (the real Hulk, natch) who comes to her for help. But just as Jennifer agrees to give Bruce shelter, she’s shot by a hoodlum and Bruce is forced to give her a transfusion of his own blood to keep her alive. Well, at that point, comics fans didn’t need to have a piano fall on their heads! With Bruce’s gamma-irradiated blood in her veins, Jennifer soon finds herself transformed into a seven-foot-tall, green-skinned powerhouse. But where her cousin’s alter ego is ugly, she remains attractive, in fact, it might even be said that she becomes the apex of female pulchritude! So much so that over time, she completely stopped reverting back to her real self and chose to remain permanently as the more extroverted She-Hulk. Which was the way most subsequent writers would choose to play her...when they weren’t playing her for laughs, that is. Amazingly, The Savage She-Hulk series would go on for another 24 issues and despite the eventual cancellation, Marvel editorial refused to let her go away (or the suits wanted to make sure the company retained their copyright!) guest-starring her all over the place including long stints in the Fantastic Four and Avengers, a few limited series, and a graphic novel before awarding the character her own book again near the end of the decade. She-Hulk’s popularity among creators from Roger Stern to John Byrne would be a head-scratcher for many if she hadn’t turned out to be the forerunner of many new female characters created as time went on. As the late Twilight Years continued (and political correctness stole a march on common sense), it became a popular pastime in the comics industry to replace or duplicate male super-heroes with female counterparts. At Marvel, those included Ms. Marvel, Spider-Woman, Yellowjacket, Her...well, you get the idea; She-Hulk, as it turned out, was in good company.

Tomb of Dracula #3 (Vol. 2)

T V’s Bionic Woman paved the way for physically powerful female characters in the 1970s which included Wonder Woman starring in her own television show. A by-product of copyright fears surrounding the Bionic Woman led to the creation of the She-Hulk who almost, but not quite, made it to the small screen herself. Luckily the world was able to dodge that bullet!

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

“And From Order Will Come Chaos!” “The Soul of an Artist” Marv Wolfman (script); Gene Colan (pencils); Tom Palmer (inks) No! Your eyes do not deceive you! This issue is the Tomb of Dracula, but not the classic Tomb of Dracula color comic that was discontinued in 1979, but the Tomb of Dracula black-and-white magazine version launched only a few months later. It did, however briefly, represent something of a return to greatness as it featured a number of stories, including two here in Tomb of Dracula #3 (Feb. 1980), by vampire scribe supreme Marv Wolfman and classic art team of Gene Colan and Tom Palmer. It was a dream come true for diehard fans of the original color comic who had managed to keep that book alive past Marvel’s initial monster craze well into the midTwilight Years. But the book did finally succumb to slowing sales and perhaps even some ennui on the part

Gene Colan

ne of the second wave of mainstays hired by Stan Lee when the Marvel Age of Comics had really begun to pick up steam, Gene Colan became the man to beat in the 1970s when his, at times exciting, at times moody, work dominated the early Twilight Years on strips as diverse as Daredevil and Tomb of Dracula. Like many of his peers, however, he became dissatisfied with Marvel under the leadership of editor Jim Shooter and migrated to DC, where he fulfilled many a fan’s dream by penciling Batman through the early to mid-1980s. In addition, Colan drew many other features for the company including Wonder Woman; The Spectre; Jemm, Son of Saturn; and Nathaniel Dusk; the latter with art reproduced directly from Colan’s fluid pencils. Branching out to the independents, the artist later teamed with scripter Don McGregor on Ragamuffins and Detectives, Inc. In 1991 he returned to Dracula, reteaming with Wolfman on the strip which was unrelated to their classic run of the seventies. Because of his eye problems, Colan’s work became less frequent as the years passed, with a short return to Dracula for Dark Horse and finally a triumphant single-issue return to Daredevil, filling in on issue #363 in 1997, possibly the highlight of his later years.

of Wolfman and Colan. By the time it all ended with Tomb of Dracula #70, the two had woven a complex tapestry involving a male lead of subtle and conflicting impulses, a cast of interesting supporting characters, vampire lore, and intertwining plot threads. That tapestry was finally torn asunder in the final issue when it seemed that Dracula had at last been destroyed. But like any good villain or vampire, it was hard to keep him down, so that only a few months later, as Marvel editorial cast about for new features to stock its faltering black-and-white line, he was resurrected yet again. To accomplish it, Wolfman and Colan were brought back to help launch the first issue. But this go-round would feature a different approach to the character. Instead of a continuance of the color comic’s themes and structure, the new tales would be stand-alone stories in the life of Dracula but with continued emphasis on characterization and heavy concentration on story development. For instance, this issue’s main story, “And Out of Order Will Come Chaos,” is a mammoth 35 pages long and tells the tale of Anna Reynolds, who is bitten by Dracula but not killed. Time passes, she marries and has a child who is somehow tainted by the bite that Dracula put on her mother. A connection between the two becomes apparent as Dracula can’t seem to get enough blood as the child transforms into an evil imp. In a bit of an anti-climax, the ending draws too much

from The Exorcist as the child is freed of possession. A saving moment comes after Dracula goes back to his normal vampiric life and, in a final panel, seems to regret it (“...my damnable eternal thirst...”) Unlike other adaptations of Dracula, Wolfman and Colan once again prefer to take the time to build three-dimensional supporting players, so that when the inevitable horror is visited upon them, the reader has actually come to care about what happens. A second story “Soul of an Artist,” is shorter at 14 pages, but with no less attention given to a supporting cast that includes art promoter Carl and artist Amber. As the story unfolds, we learn that Carl, of course, has fallen in love with Amber, but Amber is devoted to her art...or so it seems. One day, Carl sees Amber go off with a tall dark stranger (Dracula, natch!) and soon after, the subjects of her paintings turn from beautiful to ugly. The reason, of course, is that Amber’s perspective has changed from that of the living to the undead! Trailing her out of the city, Carl discovers that she has been raped by and placed in the thrall of Dracula. In a final, misguided effort to save her, Carl ends up being the one who is saved as Amber resists feeding on him and instead uses the burning daylight to free herself from the curse. Throughout, Wolfman chooses to tell the story with captions alone, eschewing word balloons. The results seem to make it all more personal, reading more like a short story than a comics The Dark Ages

story. And what is there to say about the art of Colan and Palmer? Even this late in the Twilight Years, they manage to turn in first-rate work that like Amber’s paintings, is equal parts beauty and horror. But Colan may have reached his personal peak with these issues. Like Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, his artistic powers were doomed to wane as the Dark Ages progressed; but here at least, they shone with airbrushed, 3-D-quality worthy of anything he’d done in the past.

Epic Illustrated #1, page 2: Rudy Nebres’ inks almost but doesn’t quite take the shine off John Buscema’s powerful pencils in this new tale of the Silver Surfer scripted by Stan Lee. The reuniting of the classic team that produced the Surfer’s original run of the late 1960s was a come-on no dyed-in-the-wool Marvelite could resist!

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Epic Illustrated #1 “The Answer” Stan Lee (script); John Buscema (pencils); Rudy Nebres (inks) “Metamorphosis Odyssey” James Starlin (script/pencils/inks) It was 1980, the dawn of a new decade when Marvel Comics was still bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and could still boast having editor/ publisher Stan Lee around its Madison Avenue offices. Poised to strike off for H-wood, leaving the insular world of comics behind him, Lee still dreamed of breaking out of the Comics Code straitjacket and into the wider world of magazine publishing. To some extent he’d succeeded in doing that following the departure of Martin Goodman, the company’s former owner, by entering the black-and-white magazine field with a raft of monster and science fiction books. But that experience had its ups and downs as magazines came and went so fast, hardly anyone could keep up with them (except for Savage Sword of Conan, which just kept going and going). But Marvel’s black-and-white magazines nevertheless remained in the shadow of the Comics Code with definite guidelines regarding the depiction of “adult” fare. In 1974, Lee tried to get out from under those restrictions by publishing a magazine called The Comix Book, which was to have included more uninhibited material written and drawn by underground artists whose work had hitherto only been accessible through cheaply produced comics sold in head shops and the like. But that experiment foundered after only a couple of years. Meanwhile, the dream of producing a comic magazine geared strictly to the adult market

continued to haunt Lee until someone came up with the idea of doing a fully colored, high-end magazine with top-quality paper in direct challenge to Heavy Metal, an American knock-off of a French mag called Metal Hurlant. “Forgive us if we sound presumptive,” trumpeted Lee in the first issue’s editorial, “but Epic Illustrated is more, far more, than merely another new magazine. Epic heralds the dramatic start of a new era in publishing.” That may have been the idea at the beginning, but as can be seen in Epic Illustrated #1 (spring 1980), Lee was taking no chances with a lead feature written by himself and illustrated by John Buscema. Starring the Silver Surfer, it was sure to attract a certain amount of sales for the debut issue from fans eager to see the Surfer team supreme revisit the skyrider of the spaceways nearly 10 years since their original run on the character. Similarly, another fan-favorite in the shape of Jim Starlin was also lured back to the fold (here credited as “James” Starlin, in keeping with the mag’s lofty ideals) to present the opening chapters of “Metamorphosis Odyssey,” a new strip he’d come up with (that however, ended up offering the same tropes as the artist’s classic runs on Capt. Marvel and Warlock). The rest of the issue was rounded out by a stream of artists and writers (mostly unfamiliar to Marvel’s rank and file) who contributed various tales of fantasy or SF laced here and there with a bit of naughtiness. With few exceptions over the magazine’s six-year life span, such exercises in self-indulgence would prove to be the norm with little to recommend them. It speaks volumes for the magazine’s reputation that its best remembered tale was the ground-level “The Last Galactus Story,” written and drawn by John Byrne and left unfinished when the artist absconded to DC. Fun Fact: Epic Illustrated must have had some success as it later spawned Marvel’s creator-owned line of comics called naturally enough, Epic Comics. Launched in 1982, the line featured a string of forgettable titles (well okay, Groo had its fans!), but its main claim to fame was in mainstreaming creators’ rights. Unlike Epic Comics, which allowed creators to retain ownership of their work, Marvel’s regular, Code-approved comics did not. Eventually, however, creators there were given incentives such as profit sharing while artists were allowed the return of their original art.

of director George Lucas’ creation. That said, real money was spent on the two-hour pilot, and the final premise of the show was unique enough to discourage comparisons with Star Wars (human survivors of a war with robotic Cylons flee their home world to seek a legendary lost tribe of fellow humans who have settled on a planet called Earth). The TV series was also noted for a religious sub-text that was mostly abandoned by the Marvel comic starting after issue #5, the final adaptation of one of the TV episodes (“Lost Planet of the Gods”). After that, Marvel was forbidden by ABC to adapt any more episodes and writer Roger McKenzie was free to follow his own course with the series. McKenzie was first associated with the Galactica feature when he scripted a magazine-sized adaptation of the pilot that was reprinted in the first three issues of the regular ongoing comics series. After those issues, he was joined by Marvel newcomer Walt Simonson on the art (interspersed with an occasional fill-in issue by the likes of Rich Buckler). Simonson, having gained fan approval for his efforts on DC’s Manhunter strip, was very much a work in progress style-wise with his strengths being in layout and design rather than actual penciling. That was okay for his work on Battlestar Galactica though, as for the most part, he’d be inked by Klaus Janson as he is here for Battlestar Galactica #13 (March 1980). This issue, for instance, Simonson plays to his strengths as he merely lays out the issue (although at times crowding the action in too-small panels as he does on page 11),

Battlestar Galactica #13 “Collision Course!” Roger McKenzie (script); Walt Simonson (layouts); Klaus Janson (finishes) Following its successful licensing of the Star Wars franchise, Marvel moved quickly to secure the comic book rights for Battlestar Galactica, an ABC television show obviously intended to cash in on the popularity

Although cashing in on the Star Wars phenomenon, ABC’s Battlestar Galactica turned out to be a somewhat original take on space opera with a comics adaptation that also differed markedly in tone and style from George Lucas’ brainchild.

The Dark Ages

leaving the detail work to Janson who, while falling short in places, makes up for it with liberal use of moody blacks. There would be much better-looking efforts by the team in other issues, but McKenzie’s script here packs a lot of plot in 17 pages!

Daredevil #164 “Expose” Roger McKenzie (script); Frank Miller (pencils); Klaus Janson (inks) Just seven issues after Frank Miller’s unimpressive debut as the regular DD artist with issue #158, the low selling book was well on its way to sheer, unadulterated improvement...until #168 anyway, when the artist also took over the scripting chores only to stumble out of the gate with the introduction of Elektra who would prove both overrated and unsuited for the DD strip. That said, the inklings of greatness only hinted at in a few panels of #158 blossomed immediately with the next issue and Miller became an overnight sensation...and deservedly so. The newcomer took over the strip from DD veteran Gene Colan, who had returned to the strip as fill-in artist until a permanent replacement could be found. Only a few months before, Miller had drifted over to Marvel after doing a few things for DC where he was unappreciated. However, something in the young man’s art style

Frank Miller (left) would become half of Marvel’s unidentical twin juggernauts of the ’80s (the other was John Byrne). Both were among the company’s earliest writer/artists yet represented totally opposing visual and storytelling styles. Nevertheless, they both claimed fervent fan followings with subsequent careers that seemed to rocket along on the same high flying trajectory (even ending up sharing control of their own comics company called, appropriately enough, Legend). Through much of his career, Miller’s art style would be informed by inker supreme Klaus Janson (right).

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

caught the attention of editor-in-chief Jim Shooter, who hired and eventually assigned him to Daredevil. Already on the scene was writer Roger McKenzie, who had been moving the character into a darker, more serious place when the new artist took over. But Miller’s noir sensitivities seemed to mesh with McKenzie’s intentions for the strip and almost immediately, following the disposal of the long-running Death-Stalker sub-plot, Daredevil was thrown into a different world of hit men, crime lords, and drug pushers. Settings shifted from daylight street scenes to dark alleys, rain-swept streets, and gloomy bars, the typical settings of any number of 1950s era crime movies. This issue is no exception as McKenzie and Miller take the reader into the shady world of low-rent boxing and a scenario reminiscent of any number of classic movies from The Set Up to Body and Soul. In Daredevil #164 (May 1980), the two retell DD’s origin and, while not straying far from the source material as first presented in DD #1 back in the Years of Consolidation, they manage to tighten the screws on certain scenes, squeezing all the oomph out of them they can. For instance, when Battling Jack Murdock signs that fateful contract with the Fixer, he doesn’t just sign it, he’s forced to get on his knees and sign it as it’s being held down to the floor by the Fixer’s foot. Later, Miller takes a full two pages to show Murdock’s last fight, wringing all the emotion out of it as he can. “This one’s for you, Matt,” mutters Murdock upon winning the bout, a panel that is immediately followed by one showing him being shot in the back by vengeful crooks: “This one’s for you, bum!” Daredevil’s appearance later in his original yellow and red fighting togs is equally dramatic and violent as he exacts vengeance on the Fixer and his mob. Then, as the topper, the issue ends with Matt Murdock finishing the story of his origin as told to Daily Bugle reporter Ben Urich, who has discovered his secret ID. There, DD tells Urich that if he prints the story, it will be the end of his career, and realizing the super-hero’s importance to the city, Urich burns his notes saying “This one’s for you, Matt...” It was another tour de force for the writer and artist, a creative combo that was due to end within a very few issues, and though Miller on his own would continue to produce some incredible issues, they never quite came up to the peak achieved when he was teamed with McKenzie.

X-Men #134 “Too Late, the Heroes!” Chris Claremont (script); John Byrne (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) Perhaps the most famous and talked-about series of comics in all of the later Twilight Years was that of the Dark Phoenix Saga, and justifiably so. It all began innocently enough when, in a burst of misguided

feminism, writer Chris Claremont and artist Dave Cockrum came up with a story simply intended to up-power Marvel Girl. Crashing to earth in a space shuttle, she emerges from the debris in a new full body leotard with a golden sash in place of the green mini-skirt she’d been wearing since the Grandiose Years. With a bird’s head emblem on her chest, she declares herself Phoenix, and immediately displays far greater power than she had as Marvel Girl. For a while, things go well as Jean Grey’s long-standing relationship with Scott Summers (aka Cyclops) matures. But then, a mysterious throwback to the eighteenth century named Jason Wyngarde makes the scene and through the use of mind powers, he manipulates Marvel Girl’s psyche to the point where she becomes confused about her identity. Wyngarde, you see, is Mastermind, the old villain from Magneto’s Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, who has switched his allegiance to the Hellfire Club, a group of wealthy mutants pledged to...what else? Take over the world! But first, they have to eliminate the goody goody competition and that means the X-Men. And what better way to do that than from the inside? Thus, Mastermind plays mind games with Phoenix until she’s convinced that she’s not only his lover, but the Black Queen of the Hellfire Club! All goes according to plan when Phoenix helps to defeat the X-Men, and as our tale opens in X-Men #134 (June 1980), Mastermind is caught gloating over his seemingly beaten foes. But not all is as he thinks. Unknown to him, Jean has freed herself from his mental hold and does the same for her teammates. Instantly, the tables are turned on the Hellfire Club members and battle ensues. When the dust clears, Mastermind is reduced to a blithering idiot (by the simple expedient of Phoenix having exposed his consciousness to the wonders of the universe...it was too much for his feeble human brain to take in, you see) and as an unintended consequence of his attempt to manipulate Jean Grey’s mind, her dark side has been released and comicdom would never be the same again! Fun Fact: Did you know there was a real Hellfire Club in eighteenth century England? But that’s not where Claremont and Byrne drew their inspiration for the mutant version of same. They got theirs from an infamous episode of British TV show, The Avengers, which had been banned in America. In it, heroine Emma Peel (Emma Frost, the White Queen, get it?) infiltrates the club and assumes the role of their Black Queen, and gets dressed up in the same leather bodice and heels that Jean Grey does this issue! The nephew of the founder of the real-life Hellfire Club even began something called the Phoenix Society...but it may be stretching coincidence too far to suggest a connection between that group and the X-Men’s Phoenix!

Banned in America. The Avengers television episode “A Touch of Brimstone,” featuring series lead Emma Peel (played by Diana Rigg) was deemed too hot for stateside viewers. Infiltrating the Hellfire Club, Emma ends up in leather underwear complete with whip and spiked dog collar (an outfit Rigg designed herself)! Naturally, by the time of X-Men #134, it was all deemed good clean fun for the kiddies by the Comics Code Authority!

X-Men #136 “Child of Light and Darkness!” Chris Claremont (script); John Byrne (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) As we saw in previous issues, Jean Grey aka Marvel Girl aka Phoenix, had transformed into the Dark Phoenix after having her evil subconscious unleashed by former Brotherhood of Evil Mutants member Mastermind. Then, going off on a tear, Dark Phoenix, in the deeps of space, destroys a sun along with a populated planet in its orbit. That deed did not go unnoticed as we discover in X-Men #136 (Aug. 1980) when a self-righteous Lilandra Majestrix of the Shi’ar Empire declares that for her crime, Dark Phoenix “must be destroyed!” Meanwhile, Phoenix has returned to Earth where she drops in on her parents. There, unable to hold her mind-reading powers in check, she becomes angered at their deepest thoughts, which include fear of her mutant nature. Suddenly, the part of her that is still Jean Grey is submerged with the personality of Dark Phoenix taking over. Then, just as things seem to be moving in a dangerous direction for the Grey family, the other X-Men arrive on the scene dropping a “mindscrambler” onto Jean’s head. Naturally it doesn’t work (that would’ve been too easy!) and Dark Phoenix wins out. A last ditch attempt to win her over by Cyclops, who appeals to her better nature, is interrupted by a mind blast from Prof. X. It fails. Instead, it triggers the ultimate manifestation of Dark Phoenix: “I am what The Dark Ages

was, what is, what will be...the black angel, chaos-bringer!” Finally, in a power-packed page drawn by John Byrne, Prof. X and Phoenix enter into a contest of wills “waged simultaneously on all the infinite planes of existence” finally ending in a vast cosmic burst of released energy that culminates with Jean being returned to normal. But a happy ending is denied her when she and the rest of the X-Men suddenly disappear! Where did they go? Anxious readers had to wait 30 excruciating days to find out!

X-Men #137, page 44: Writer Chris Claremont and artist John Byrne work together to successfully transmit the emotional intensity of the characters as they build to this issue’s shattering climax.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

X-Men #137 “The Fate of the Phoenix!” Chris Claremont (script); John Byrne (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) Surely the high-water mark for the Claremont/Byrne run on the X-Men was X-Men #137 (Sept. 1980), as it climaxed the Dark Phoenix saga that had begun, sort of, all the way back in issue #101. To mark the occasion, this issue features an extralength story in which Claremont and Byrne manage to squeeze in practically every X-team member that had yet appeared in the book. (They could still do that in those days!) In a story that Byrne would emulate somewhat during his later run on the Fantastic Four (“The Trial of Reed Richards”), the X-Men find themselves transported to a spaceship belonging to the Shi’ar Empire. There, they’re told of how Phoenix destroyed five billion lives when she consumed their sun as well as a Shi’ar patrol ship. For that, says Shi’ar ruler Lilandra, Jean Grey must die. But former boyfriend Prof. X has learned the customs of the empire and demands a “duel of honor!” After consulting with allies the Kree and the Skrulls (hard to believe that those two stellar powers could be pushed around by the upstart Shi’ar, but they seem to be here), the challenge is accepted. After an obligatory interlude giving each character a page or two of development (and for Jean to slip into her old and much-missed Marvel Girl costume), the team is transported to the Blue Area of the Moon, where a breathable atmosphere allows members to go into one-on-one action with their counterparts in the Imperial Guard. Battle ensues until, after seeing Cyclops fall, Marvel Girl loses it again and

manifests her Phoenix powers. But in a moment of would be overturned a few years later when it was lucidity, she explains that the Phoenix power is a decided to revive the original X-Men in their own book, separate entity from herself and that the only way to including Marvel Girl. That story is a tale for another free the universe from its threat is to kill her. Naturally, time. For now, numbed readers had only X-Men #137 the X-Men refuse that alternative, and in an unexpected to mull over. Over the few years since the revival of the denouement, Marvel Girl uses her telekinetic power to X-Men title, credit Claremont for managing to make unlimber a nearby ray gun and zap herself into dust! readers care about his characters, much more than they Even mid-way through the ever did in the original series. Twilight Years, a character To many, Jean Grey was almost committing suicide was a a living, breathing person, in pretty shocking event whom readers had invested (although such violence would much of their own emotions become all too common as the and interest. Thus, when she years moved on), something took her own life at the that many readers (the ones conclusion of this issue, it came who didn’t read the fan as a genuine blow. It was a magazines anyway) didn’t see testament to the power of coming, and in a way, neither comics to move readers just as did the creators. And thereby much as other more respected hangs a tale. According to the media could. Just as readers story, Claremont and Byrne rejoiced when Reed and had planned for a happy Sue Richards gave birth to ending to the Dark Phoenix baby Franklin during the saga with Marvel Girl being Grandiose Years or mourned returned to normal and going the death of Gwen Stacy at back to her life on Earth. The the start of the Twilight Years, story was supposed to have so too were readers moved been cleared with the book’s and saddened at the abrupt editors, but when the final departure of a character that, pages of the story arrived in despite themselves, they had the Marvel offices, editor-ingrown to love. It would prove chief Jim Shooter didn’t like to be the last time anyone could them. His strong sense of be made to care so deeply justice compelled him to insist about a comics character. In the that Jean Grey be punished years to come, violence, death, Crisis on Infinite Earths #7: Iconic for the crime of genocide; she and raw exploitation would cover that became emblematic of the couldn’t just be allowed to become the coin of the realm decade’s turn toward the dark side as walk away. As a result, the and define comics as simply a major characters were killed off (Supergirl and the Flash in DC’s final pages of the story were medium that supplied readers Crisis; Captain Marvel in Marvel re-drawn with the ending with the kind of shallow and Graphic Novel , and Marvel Girl in as presented this issue. Was fleeting thrills they’d come to the X-Men) and as the ’80s became it the right decision? Maybe. expect from much of the rest the ’90s, any number of innocent It was true that as the Dark of the entertainment industry. bystanders. Not least among the Phoenix, Jean had killed an Fun Fact: This issue just missed victims, comics fans themselves as the industry lost its hold on the casual entire planet full of aliens, but an opportunity to reunite the reader. as the incident was presented original X-Men featuring as in issue #135, it was an acciit does Cyclops, Marvel Girl, dent. There was no indication Angel, and the Beast. Only that Dark Phoenix was aware that a populated Iceman was missing. But Bobby Drake would finally planet was nearby when she consumed its sun. be on hand when the team officially came together And in this issue we discover that the Phoenix force as X-Factor, a book that, unfortunately, never really is a separate entity from Jean Grey, so that in got off the ground. The team would have to wait effect, Jean could plead innocence having been forced another 10 years before John Byrne found a way to to go along for the ride. In any case, Shooter’s verdict make the idea work in X-Men: The Hidden Years. The Dark Ages

X-Men #138 “Elegy” Chris Claremont (script); John Byrne (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) In an epilogue to the epochal events in X-Men #137, a grieving Cyclops recalls the life of Marvel Girl, who killed herself the issue before in order to protect the galaxy from the Dark Phoenix. X-Men #138 (Oct. 1980) proves to be a delight for longtime fans (as well as a showcase for Byrne’s deep knowledge of Marvel history...was it his idea to wallpaper the background on the cover with the covers of past issues of the title?) as Cyclops’ thoughts are thrown back to his first days at Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters and his first meeting with fellow teammate Marvel Girl. The entire issue is taken up with these recollections until the final pages, where Jean Grey’s funeral

ends and Cyclops informs Prof. X that he is leaving the X-Men. At the same time, the too-cute-for-words Kitty Pryde shows up on the school’s doorstep ready for her first day. Kitty was an attempt by the creative team to return the X-Men to something of its roots as a learning environment for young mutants unsure of their powers. And though no other youngsters would join Kitty in her studies for some time, the idea would eventually bear fruit with the New Mutants, introduced in one of Marvel’s earliest graphic novels before spinning off to their own four-color comic of the same name. Overnight, Kitty would be joined by a whole group of new super-powered characters who would share her black and yellow X-Man-intraining uniform. The New Mutants, though a good idea, would unfortunately prove to be the vanguard of a veritable explosion in mutant characters over the coming years until, even with a score card, readers would be hard pressed to keep track of who was who. Fun Fact: Dig the way-cool retro-ad that follows page 5 this issue! Based on those that ran during the Years of Consolidation, it features covers of many of Marvel’s titles on sale in 1980 (during the Years of Consolidation, all of the company’s titles could fit in the ad!). “Now hear this!” screams the familiar copy at the top of the page. “It can’t be a mildly magnificent Marvel mag unless it says Marvel up in the cover trademark!” Shades of Stan Lee! It was as if nothing had changed over the fifteen years or so since the Years of Consolidation...but of course that wasn’t true. The shame of it was that in not too many years’ time, such a bouncy, chummy ad would become wholly inappropriate in a world where the company was churning out dark, humorless, even cynical product.

Rom Spaceknight #13

Legion of Super-Heroes #300: It had been rumored at the time that the Imperial Guard introduced in X-men #107 were doppelgangers for DC’s Legion of Super-Heroes. If they were, only writer Chris Claremont and artist Dave Cockrum knew for sure!

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

“Peril, Thy Name is Plunderer!” Bill Mantlo (script); Sal Buscema (pencils) It was the unlikeliest source material for a series that nevertheless turned out pretty good and surprised many, due in no small part to the imagination and skill of writer Bill Mantlo. Based on a Parker Bros. toy, the first issue of Rom debuted with a cover by pre-fan-favorite Frank Miller and a blank slate for a background. But over the course of an amazing 75 issues, the character was endowed with an interesting backstory and a rich history...with most of it taking place before the series even began! See, Rom’s homeworld of Galador was being threatened with invasion by an alien race of evil magic-wielders called Dire Wraiths. To stave them off, a call went out for volunteers to undergo an operation that would transform them into cyborgs that were more metal than flesh. Our hero, Rom, was one of those

volunteers and, through a long war, saw the Wraiths defeated. But tricked by them at the last, he ended up stranded on Earth where this first ish opens. Befriended by Earth woman Brandy Clark, Rom carries on the war against the Wraiths, now defending Earth against their threat. Over time, the character would be woven through the larger Marvel continuity with guest appearances in other titles and visits by heroes and villains in his own. But throughout, it’s Rom’s characterization that carries the book. Trapped in his cyborg body as well as on a strange world, the reader soon sympathizes with him as does Brandy who comes to hold strong feelings for him. This tragic, often pointless seeming existence was developed with skill and feeling by Mantlo, a writer who has never been given much of a spotlight in fan circles, even dismissed at times. Largely due to what became his expertise, i.e. taking on licensed properties and making something out of them, Mantlo, when given the opportunity, could really come through on more mainstream assignments such as his work on Spider-Man or Deathlok. A Brooklyn boy, Mantlo expressed an early interest not in writing but in art, attending first the High School of Art & Design and then the prestigious Cooper Union before getting into photography. After that, he got a lucky break (and lucky for comics fans too) by getting a job as an assistant to Marvel production manager John Verpoorten. Breaking into scripting, Mantlo began writing for the Deadly Hands of Kung Fu black-and-white before specializing in stories intended as fill-ins to cover up missed deadlines on various of the color titles. Earning the trust of his editors, Mantlo never looked back. Although he was recognized by the industry for his work on the Micronauts, a toy line he convinced Marvel to license (and on which he was teamed with artist Michael Golden), it was with another, less promising toy, that he’d enjoy his greatest success. In an era of sagging sales, Marvel was eager to expand its comics line into other areas including licensing of rock groups, movie and television adaptations, and toys. Over time, toy adaptations would include those for US1, Team America, GI Joe, and Shogun Warriors, in addition to the Micronauts and Rom. But Rom would outstrip all the others (with the exception of Star Wars [107 issues] and GI Joe [155 issues]) as Mantlo built upon the germ of a backstory provided by its owners (who lost interest in the toy almost as soon as its comic book counterpart hit the stands) and expanded it to include both the intimate world of Rom and Brandy Clark as well as the whole blamed Marvel Universe! All of which can be seen at work in Rom Spaceknight #13 (Dec. 1980).

Disappointed with sales, Parker Brothers canceled production on its Rom action figure almost as soon as its comics namesake was launched, but that didn’t stop writer Bill Mantlo from building a rich history around its cold, robotic figure, even endowing it with an air of genuine humanity.

X-Men #141 “Days of Future Past” Chris Claremont (script); John Byrne (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) Penciler John Byrne and inker Terry Austin were born for each other. Or so it seemed when the two were finally paired as the new art team on the X-Men book. Over the years, Byrne has been inked by just about everybody in the field from Bob Layton and Joe Rubenstein to Al Gordon and Jerry Ordway, even himself! And although many didn’t turn out to be a good fit, Byrne’s style was such that like Jack Kirby in earlier years, it was strong enough not to be obscured beneath any inker’s pen. But of all the inkers who handled Byrne’s pencils over the decades, none seemed to play into his strengths, or intuitively understand what Byrne was driving at, as Terry Austin. Perhaps it was no coincidence that The Dark Ages

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Wolverine here becomes the star of the resistance movement. It was a set-up that indicated the growing popularity of the character, one that would come to dominate the later Twilight Years and the Dark Ages beyond as the epitome of “cool” ie a humorless, vicious, anti-hero.

Austin apprenticed with the best at Neal Adams’ Continuity Associates where he joined the “Crusty Bunkers,” a catch-all title for anyone who happened to be on hand at the Continuity offices when deadlines loomed and help from whatever quarter was needed to get the pages out on time. In the late 1970s, Austin found regular work at DC where he immediately gained recognition providing the inks over Marshall Rogers’ classic run on Batman in Detective Comics. From there, he segued over to Marvel, where he bounced around until his serendipitous pairing with Byrne on the X-Men. The two found themselves on the book just as sales justified upping its frequency from bi-monthly to monthly, a pace that regular artist Dave Cockrum couldn’t keep up with. Right off the bat, any reader could tell that the visual calibre of the book had just been ratcheted up several notches as Byrne’s slick, hyper-modern style (that sometimes seemed to have been influenced by Neal Adams, but now generations removed from the original source) was accentuated by Austin’s almost maniacal attention to detail. That symbiosis is on prominent display in X-Men #141 (Jan. 1981) for the first part of the “Days of Future Past” story, wherein due to the passing of a “mutant control act” in the past, mutants of the future end up being hunted down by Sentinels and either taken into custody or killed resisting arrest. Foreshadowing one of the prominent aspects of the Dark Age in which grim, dark heroes who are more likely to kill than respect human life,

X-Men #141, page 19: Over the years, the “Days of Future Past” story has assumed proportions in fans’ minds much greater than the original two-part story (which spent most of its pages in the present) justified perhaps, by this dramatic page by artist John Byrne and inker Terry Austin. A big-budget film adaptation in 2014 has only reinforced those fond memories.

Slippage in the quality of the X-Men could already be detected in John Byrne’s final issue on the title. Without him, writer Chris Claremont, with continued inspiration offered by 20th Century Fox’s popular SF film series led off by 1979’s Alien, would unfold a sad tale of body bursting alien changelings in future issues wholly inappropriate for the X-book.

X-Men #142 “Mind Out of Time!” Chris Claremont (script); John Byrne (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) X-Men #142 (Feb. 1981) concludes the two-part “Days of Future Past” storyline as the X-Men battle a reconstituted Brotherhood of Evil Mutants (a group of baddies that includes the self-explanatory Pyro and Avalanche, the shape-shifting Mystique, and our old pal the Blob, who first appeared way back in issue #3) who are attempting to assassinate one Senator Kelly. If successful, they change the future into one where mutantkind is doomed. Luckily, however, the mind of Katherine Pryde, the adult version of the present-day Kitty, has managed to occupy the mind of her younger self to warn the X-Men of the unintended consequences and to help fight the future so to speak...a future that takes place way off in time in the distant year of 2013! Hoo boy! Unfortunately, most of the action takes place in dull 1981 as heroes and villains mix it up with readers actually seeing very little of the more interesting future. Maybe it was just as well. The real future would be disappointing enough as Byrne would be around for only one more issue, and a virtual Kitty Pryde solo issue at that has the sickeningly saccharine heroine going up against a double of the insectoid star of Alien, which became a blockbuster film in 1979. Worse still, the appearance of the alien would signal a multi-part “epic” written by Claremont taking place over upcoming issues that ended badly for the X-Men strip as a whole (with various X-Men being implanted with

Brood eggs and...but the less said about that mess the better!) It was likely a lucky thing that Byrne bailed when he did...what a waste of his talent that and subsequent storylines about the Brood, Starjammers, Morlocks, and New Mutants would have been! But then, like the future that might have been in “Days of Future Past,” who knows how things would have ended up if he’d stayed? As it was, the X-book, despite sales that went on strongly on the impetus given it by Byrne, would veer seriously off course under the sole guidance of Claremont until finally crashing and burning in the Dark Ages. By then, the X-Men would mutate into a completely different animal and, like the Brood, spawn dozens of related titles and endless numbers of characters (most of whom were interchangeable and seemed to carry big guns). Fun Fact: This issue features a full-page advertisement for a book that was eagerly awaited by Marvel zombies everywhere...but that never came out. “Buy this book!” screamed the copy for a new Dr. Strange feature that was to be written by Roger Stern and drawn by Frank Miller. Unfortunately, all fans would end up getting was the ad itself, which included some Miller art to whet the appetite; but the team-up itself, never happened. It turned out to be the great missed opportunity of the later Twilight Years. What fans did get, however, was a new title announced in another ad printed only a few pages later: a new Spider-Woman comic...ugh!

Daredevil #169

“Devils” Frank Miller (script/pencils); Klaus Janson (inks) After taking over Daredevil as both writer and penciler, Frank Miller was finally able to cut loose with the strip not only exploring the literal dank rooftops and garbage-strewn streets of New York, but also the figurative landscape of his characters’ minds, which were often scarier than any dark alley in Hell’s Kitchen. Case in point: Bullseye. Invented by former DD scripter Marv Wolfman (who said once that he found the Daredevil book uninspiring, leaving him with no story ideas to go on) and artist at the time Bob Brown, nothing was ever really done with Bullseye, leaving him just another generic villain cluttering up the DD landscape. But, in a sort of a throwback to the Grandiose Years when formerly lame villains would be brought back more powerful and dramatic than ever, Miller took Bullseye (whose power was an uncanny aim making any object he picked up into a deadly weapon) and turned him into a psychotic murderer with no concept of right or wrong. In Daredevil #169 (March 1981), he’s intent only on killing Daredevil. As shown on the cover and pages 2 and 3, Bullseye hallucinates, seeing DD everywhere, the result of a tumor in his brain that intermittently causes him The Dark Ages

unendurable pain. The situation sets up a conflict between the need to stop Bullseye at any cost and DD’s innate sense of justice. In stopping Bullseye, even saving him from an oncoming train, Daredevil inadvertently sets himself up for tragedy when the criminal later goes free. Something that is foreshadowed at the end of this issue’s story when police Lt. Manolis

Daredevil #169, page 26: What would become one of artist Frank Miller’s specialties: a brutal fight between DD and villain Bullseye. The good news is that though Miller seemed to revel in violence, it was frequently tempered with larger moral questions. In the case here, Daredevil must decide whether or not to save Bullseye’s life knowing that a subsequent operation could result in future victims at his hands...victims whose blood would then be on Daredevil’s conscience.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

tells him that he should have let Bullseye die because if the operation he is to undergo is successful, he will kill again. “And next time, it’ll be your fault.” But DD has a strict personal code he must live by: “If Bullseye is a menace to society, it is society that must make him pay the price, not you. And not me. I... I wanted him to die, Nick. I detest what he does...what he is. But I’m not God...I’m not the law...” With that, a final coda is sounded over an intercom from the operating theater: “Gentlemen, the operation is a success. The patient will live.” In numerous medical dramas, that line has always sounded a note of hope for the future, but as Daredevil walks into the shadows in the final panel, the reader knows that in this case, it is just the opposite. It was a fine example of how Miller could write stories and sculpt characters to make them far more interesting than anyone thought they could be. On the other hand, this approach to rehabilitation could fall flat too, such as turning a once great DD villain into a laughing stock when Miller has a goofy hood take over the armor of the Stiltman or when he does the psycho turn again with the Gladiator, changing him into a childlike giant and changing his costume to resemble more the Roman gladiator that he was originally fashioned after. The mistake there is that when artist John Romita first envisioned the Gladiator way back in issue #18, he was darn scary enough! Together with his creation of Elektra, whom he retrofitted onto DD’s origin and his reducing Foggy Nelson from a somewhat serious DA to comic relief, Miller showed that he wasn’t always firing on all cylinders.

Looking back nearly three decades since this run was produced, many of its elements can be seen as either off-key or simply tiresome, making the Millerera Daredevil a less than perfect opus.

Captain America #255 “The Living Legend” Roger Stern (script); John Byrne (pencils/inks) Mid-way through the Twilight Years, fans had the unique opportunity to catch both a writer and an artist working together on a single title who later, would loom large over Marvel of the 1980s. Before either man’s classic runs on Avengers and Fantastic Four, writer Roger Stern and artist John Byrne teamed up on Captain America with the avowed goal of turning around a strip that had long been mired in dull routine. The advantage they had over their immediate predecessors was a shared love and deep knowledge of Marvel continuity and a willingness to mine its history to find springboards for new stories. The two did that almost immediately when they took over the book with issue #247, bringing back a raft of classic villains including Dragon Man, Batroc, and Mr. Hyde, before segueing into a retelling of Cap’s origin in Captain America #255 (March 1981). But Stern and Byrne’s intentions for the strip had always involved more than a simple revival of old villains or to relive past glories. They wanted to permanently cure the strip of its doldrums by setting up Cap with a whole new life. They set the foundation for that by giving him a new romantic interest and retconning his personal life by explaining that many of the things he took for granted about his life were false memories

implanted in him by a security conscious US military as far back as his origin in 1941. The process of rebuilding the life of Steve Rogers kicks into high gear this issue when we learn that (like co-creator Jack Kirby) he’s always had an interest in art and became an orphan early on. The well-known origin follows with Byrne doing a good job in getting visual details of the 1940s comics right, such as Cap’s triangular shield and headpiece that is separate from the rest of his costume (not to mention having Cap slug Hitler in the opening splash page just the way he did on the cover of Captain America #1!) A quick, double-page spread recaps the years since his being found frozen in ice by the Avengers as the issue ends on a note with Cap deciding that despite the changed times, the United States still represented an ideal worth fighting for. Throughout, Byrne presents a sometimes sparse panoply of images covering 40 years of history in a clear, succinct style that, we are told, were reproduced direct from his pencils without benefit of inks (until inker Joe Rubenstein steps in to do the honors on the last few pages). Stern’s script is crisp, with natural, easy-toread dialogue, serving a story that fits seamlessly into established Marvel continuity while, at the same time, clearing up “a few discrepancies which have crept into past retellings of the origin” as a special note from Stern tells us on the letters’ page. Overall, the story serves as a satisfying climax to the previous eight and foreshadows subsequent issues. Unfortunately, it was not to be. According to Stern, editor Jim Salicrup, fearful that he and Byrne would not be able to keep up the pace, decided to commission a fill-in issue to keep the book on schedule in case a deadline was missed. Incensed, Stern stood his ground insisting that none was needed. Salicrup, with new editor-in-chief Jim Shooter breathing down his neck on the issue of missed deadlines and reprints, played it safe and went with the fill-in, precipitating Stern’s resignation from the book. Although their short run would be recalled with fondness and what-might-have-beens by disappointed readers, many of Stern and Byrne’s innovations would be picked up and expanded upon by later writers. As for Stern and Byrne, they went on to bigger and, one might say, better things, most notably Stern on Spider-Man and Avengers and Byrne on X-Men and Fantastic Four.

Bizarre Adventures #25 Three guys who provided much of what was great at Marvel during the 1980s: Terry Austin (left), Roger Stern (center), and John Byrne.

“I Got the Yo Yo, You Got the String” Ralph Macchio (script); Paul Gulacy (pencils/inks) “By Virtue of Blood” Chris Claremont (script); Michael Golden (pencils/inks) “Safe Streets” Chris Claremont (script); Marshall Rogers (pencils/inks) The Dark Ages

Ralph Macchio (left) often went unsung in fan lit but delivered the goods when he had to. And boy did he for Bizarre Adventures #25! In company with artist Paul Gulacy (right), who was at the height of his powers in the 1980s, he redefined the Black Widow for decades to come!

Whatever the reasoning for calling this mag “Bizarre Adventures,” often, as it turned out, there was nothing bizarre about it unless you considered the standard happenings in mainstream comics bizarre! Case in point, Bizarre Adventures #25 (March 1981), which featured stories of martial arts action, the mystical arts, and espionage, the catch being that each tale starred one or more female protagonists. Come to think of it, some of the physical feats performed by the nonsuper-powered heroines just might be considered bizarre enough to live up to the mag’s title! Take, for instance (please!), this issue’s third feature “Safe Streets” starring the “Daughters of the Dragon” aka detectives Colleen Wing and Misty Knight (this was the era when black characters had to have clever names that easily identified them as members of the African American community, as if readers might not catch on!) Scripted by Chris Claremont, this, and the issue’s previous tale starring Lady Daemon, was obviously done in the full swing of the author’s bid to justify his reputation among progressive fans as a “women’s writer” (which was somewhat undermined here as artist Marshall Rogers manages to draw in female nipples straining beneath tight tops as often as he can). In tales starring the female duo, readers were required to believe that 112-pound women can whip four times their weight in male adversaries without even breathing hard (no matter their training in the martial arts or Misty’s “bionic right arm” attached to a very flesh and blood shoulder). But even those advantages are put to the test in a dreary story here of 28

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

vampirism laced with hints of lesbianism, both of which were no doubt intended to live up to the mag’s exploitational-sounding title. A few rungs up the ladder is “By Virtue of Blood!” in which Claremont creates a distaff version of Dr. Strange named, what else?, Lady Daemon! (As with black characters, the word “lady” is included so that slow-on-the-uptake male readers can be notified of the gender bending nature of the heroine). Illustrated by Michael Golden, this story gives Claremont a major asset in that artloving readers arrive on the first page ready to give the strip the benefit of the doubt; unfortunately, they’re greeted almost immediately with child nudity as the youthful Megan Daemon (oh, see how cleverly the writer uses the character’s last name to justify her later heroic sobriquet!) undergoes a ritual of power “On my night, the first full moon after I became a woman...” Hoo boy! The clichés come fast and furious after that! Murder and butchery of Megan’s father quickly follows, even as her younger sister succumbs to the dark side! The inevitable confrontation ensues with the expected defeat of the evil sister with the equally inevitable promise to return on her dying lips! The whole predictable mess is saved by the often beautiful art by Golden (who cleverly combines it with 1930s-era photography, including the Hindenburg disaster) falling short mostly on characters’ faces which come off as cartoony in the wide eyed, manga style. The good news is that before reaching these last two stories, the purchaser of Bizarre Adventures #25 was more than likely to have read the lead tale first, by far the issue’s greatest triumph. There, writer Ralph Macchio and artist Paul Gulacy, turn in a 25-page masterpiece of mystery, subterfuge, and betrayal that doesn’t strain credibility too far, while at the same time suggests a more mature approach to the material than that of Lady Daemon or the Sisters of the Spear (or whatever it was called!) “I Got the Yo Yo, You Got the String” (admittedly, not the most appropriate title for such a great story) opens with a pre-credit sequence as an agent of MI-6 is killed by a squad of nameless commandos. Cut to: Natasha Romanoff aka the Black Widow waking up in her apartment apparently after a previous night’s bout with a lover named only “Mr. Langley” (headquarters of the CIA...get it?) Ordered to infiltrate and destroy a secret arms installation, the Widow heads to Africa where she is contacted by an American agent who looks an awful lot like actor Michael Caine! A train headed in the direction of the secret base is attacked and in subsequent scenes, the Widow is given action, but not so over the top as to be unbelievable for so slight a figure. Finally, the Widow confronts her nemesis, Irma Klausvichnova, only to learn it wasn’t her at all, but a S.H.I.E.L.D. imposter named

Stacy Cromwell who is killed by the Michael Caine lookalike! Only it turns out that Caine himself was a double agent! Hoo boy! Could things get any more complicated? Answer: they certainly could! Caine is then shot down by “Mr. Langley,” a dead ringer for Humphrey Bogart (which Macchio has fun duplicating the actor’s speech patterns in a lengthy dialogue sequence wrapping up the whole mystery...or almost the whole mystery!) It seems that the mission was a set-up using the Widow to

Bizarre Adventures #25, pg 21: The Black Widow learns the hard way that no one can be trusted in the deep frozen world of cold war espionage. As if to underscore the story’s moral relativism, artist Paul Gulacy eschews strict black-and-white for tones of gray.

expose the Caine character. And why didn’t Langley act sooner to save Cromwell’s life? “Take it easy. You know the final word...we all do. Everyone’s expendable, everyone.” It is an incredible, fast-moving, intricate yarn of pure espionage sporting some of the best artwork of Gulacy’s career enhanced by a liberal use of graytones. With it, characters stand out in stark relief against hazy backgrounds and facial features betray every nuance of emotion (with the artist’s penchant for including favorite actors as characters in his stories, as he did on Master of Kung Fu with Sean Connery and Marlon Brando, their inclusion here only accented those emotions with the built in expectations of readers already long familiar with the screen personas of Michael Caine and Humphrey Bogart). Adding to the enjoyment of this tale was Macchio’s take on the Black Widow, which comes off as far more realistic and honest than that of Claremont, who for some inexplicable reason was considered Marvel’s go-to guy for writing strong female characters. Macchio here proves that Claremont had nothing on him, since Claremont’s take on women often seemed to be based on some male readers’ fantasies (indeed, something Chris Claremont and partner John Byrne would literally tap when they turned Marvel Girl into a leather-clad, whip-wielding dominatrix). Unfortunately, it would be Claremont’s version of the super-heroine who won out, morphing into the overly endowed heroines of the Dark Age who sported as little costuming as possible, helping to push the boundaries of taste so far that the The Dark Ages

industry would choose to abandon the Comics Code. But right here, in Bizarre Adventures #25, Macchio and Gulacy managed to pull off one of the greatest stories of the later Twilight Years, while at the same time, coming awfully close to depicting a real, breathing woman. Unfortunately, their triumph was doomed never to be repeated with further adventures of the Widow. More’s the pity.

Daredevil #170 “The Kingpin Must Die” Frank Miller (script/pencils); Klaus Janson (inks) There’s a contract out for the former crime boss of New York, a fellow named the Kingpin! That’s right, that Kingpin! The one first introduced in Amazing Spider-Man #50, but who’d fallen on hard times ever since starting upon his return as the Brainwasher and the bulldozing thief who stole the tablet that held the secret of eternal youth. Since those Stan Lee-penned tales though (marking a decline from the pure mob boss he was when first introduced), the villain had been reduced to hardly more than a roly poly caricature of himself. He was due for a makeover and he gets one, and how, in Daredevil #170 (May 1981)! Already having turned the book into a film noir fan’s dream (save for an unfortunate digression with an Elektra/ ninja running sub-plot), Miller was ready to throw DD into an underworld tale filled with merciless mobsters, waterfront dives, and brutal beatings. The Kingpin, it seems, has been living abroad, his life as the boss of New York’s mobs seemingly behind him, until he’s forced to return when the men to whom he left his illegal empire get nervous about evidence he

Under the guidance of Stan Lee, the Kingpin had always been more of a hands on villain than your typical underworld boss, but Frank Miller changed all that (for the most part) by keeping him behind the scenes like the shadowy, menacing Marlon Brando in The Godfather (1972).

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holds that could send them all to jail. They kidnap his wife to force him back to town where they expect him to be picked off by none other than Bullseye, now fully recovered from his brain operation. But the mob has reckoned without the Kingpin’s savvy, he foils their murder plot and becomes their worst nightmare because now the tables are turned and they become the hunted! Miller’s rehabilitation of the Kingpin as a scheming, cold blooded, untouchable crime lord would foreshadow another more famous rehabilitation, that of Lex Luthor by John Byrne. So powerful was the work done on these characters by their respective writers that their revamped personalities remained unchanged for decades, making the transition from comics, to animation, to film, thus imprinting them on the consciousness of a much wider general audience than the small pool of comics fans. And this issue was only the beginning. It was the first of a multi-part mini-epic that set up the Kingpin as a permanent supporting member of DD’s cast and ultimately the catalyst for Daredevil’s darkest journey.

Bizarre Adventures #26 “Demon in a Silvered Glass” Doug Moench (script); John Bolton (pencils/inks) Lightning strikes twice for Bizarre Adventures! Two issues in a row! In the previous issue, it was Ralph Macchio and Paul Gulacy’s incredible Black Widow story, and now in Bizarre Adventures #26 (May 1981) it’s a 60-page Doug Moench and John Bolton novel. Fans at the time must have thought they were just living right. And maybe they were! Anyway, imagine having this veritable graphic novel fall out of practically nowhere, filled as it was with some of the most stunning artwork ever seen this side of the Atlantic? Where did Bolton come from? The most exciting artistic talent of the mid-Twilight Years attended East Ham Technical College in England before finding work in such local mags as House of Hammer and Warrior, but nothing there gave any hint of the sheer power inherent in the man’s art. Maybe it took just the right subject matter to show it off to best advantage and the brooding, atmospheric world of Robert E. Howard’s King Kull did just the trick. One of Howard’s primary interests was history, in particular medieval history, the age of knighthood and Crusades for which he wrote dozens of stories of warfare and adventure featuring armored heroes wading through seas of blood, which was all made to order for Bolton who took to it like a duck to water. In his all too short career at Marvel, the artist would spend much of his time in the dank castles and creeping shadows of Kull’s Valusia with perhaps “Demon in a Silvered Glass” being his masterpiece. Aided by the not inconsiderable talents of Doug Moench, who provides a script that

Doug Moench (left) managed to capture the spirit of Robert E. Howard as no one had other than Roy Thomas, but was aided in no small part by artist John Bolton whose ominous, brooding panels often exploded into brutal, Hyborian violence.

would have made Howard proud touching as it does on a number of themes favored by the Lone Star wordsmith, including enchanted mirrors, strange conspiracies, supernatural menaces, and of course, beautiful women. And beautiful women just happened to be a specialty of Bolton’s! Did any other artist ever draw such realistic females whose flesh looked firm enough to touch and with features seemingly sculpted from real life? Likewise, in Kull, Bolton seemed to capture the face of an older, world-weary conqueror, the former warrior struggling not to sink to the level of his debauched subjects. But the shadow kingdom is being stalked by a new menace in the form of Sekhmet the sorcerer, whose daughter Jeesala proves too tempting a morsel for the king to resist. Captivated by Jeesala’s charms, Kull’s senses are dulled and he fails to notice the slow brutalization of his subjects until the girl reveals herself as one of the Serpent folk, those creatures who ruled the Earth before the rise of man. Kull confronted their conspiracy to reclaim their rule in the first couple issues of his own color comic years before, so this turnabout was a nice tie-in to those early issues when Marie and John Severin created the definitive version of the character. Here, however, they were getting a real challenge in the form of Bolton, whose pencils and accompanying inks conveyed the same power and majesty as the Severin siblings but also a sense of horror even those two legendary artists could never match. Although the team of Moench and Bolton would reunite spectacularly a couple years later for another tale of Kull called “The Blood of Kings,” that story appeared in color and on high-quality Baxter

paper, which made a big difference in presentation. Somehow, the black-and-white format here, as well as the use of old-fashioned newsprint, brings out the nuances of Bolton’s work much more distinctly while adding emphasis to the story’s many weird elements. What it comes down to is that you could hardly find anything done in the whole of the Twilight Years as solid as this tour de force! Fun Fact: Bolton would stick around at Marvel for a little while, working on such features as The Black Dragon and Marada the She Wolf with writer Chris Claremont. Also with Claremont, the artist spent much of his time on such X-Men-related fare as a back-up feature in the Classic X-Men reprint title (which no doubt proved more lucrative for him than his work on other features). More satisfying to fans of his work was his on-again, off-again teamups with artist/writer Bruce Jones for Twisted Tales and Alien Worlds, anthology books written and produced by Jones and published by Pacific Comics, to which Bolton contributed a number of beautifully drawn tales of horror and outer-space weirdness!

Daredevil #171 “In the Kingpin’s Clutches” Frank Miller (script/pencils); Klaus Janson (inks) The gang war heats up! After their failed attempt at killing the Kingpin, New York’s mobs are on the defensive as Daredevil #171 (June 1981) opens with a gangland hit signaling the rotund villain’s intention to bring the war to his former allies. More significantly, it was the unofficial starting gun for a trend in comics kickstarted by writer Gerry Conway with his creation of the Punisher in Amazing Spider-Man #129 that brought a new kind of grittiness to the industry. One, in fact, that would dovetail nicely with what writer Roger McKenzie and Frank Miller were doing with Daredevil. In fact, the two characters were brought together early in a hard-edged story dealing with angel dust (an illegal drug popular in the 1970s for recreational use but in decline by the 1980s) that was pulled from publication until changes could be made to satisfy the Comics Code Authority. The devolution of the industry’s standards would need a bit more eroding before it was deemed safe to present that tale, which it did the next year in DD #s 182-184. In the meantime, having taken over the writing chores on DD, Miller was doing his best to push the limits of the Comics Code, something that another writer over at DC would also do with quite different results. There, Alan Moore’s outside-the-bounds storytelling on the Swamp Thing would prompt the company to run the book without the Comics Code stamp, the first to do so on a regular basis but not the last. Later, DC would create the Vertigo imprint in part to facilitate the The Dark Ages

Swamp Thing book and begin publishing a whole line of similar titles outside the auspices of the Code. Although Marvel would establish its own separate line (called Epic), in the early 1980s, Miller was permitted to continue pushing the envelope in the mainstream DD comic and inadvertently, dragging the rest of the industry along with him. Soon, “grim and gritty” would become the order of the day (helped along by future Miller projects such as “Batman: Year One” and Batman: The Dark Knight Returns at DC, the “Born Again” storyline on his return to Daredevil in 1986, and projects, such as Sin City, that he did for independent publishers), setting the stage for some of the worst excesses in comics history during the Dark Ages. But it all began with Miller’s run on DD, where in this issue, the Kingpin is thrust over the edge of madness when negotiations for the return of

After leaving Marvel, Frank Miller continued to explore themes of violence and gore in his Sin City stories for dark horse comics. A nihilistic, as well as creative dead end for the writer, it would signal a coming age of self-indulgence for many comics creators.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

his kidnapped wife go awry and she’s apparently killed (“The Kingpin must make them pay...”). Our tale of woe ends with a cliffhanger as Daredevil, defeated by the Kingpin when he’s caught trying to break into his safe, is bound hand and foot and shoved into the city’s sewer system to drown!

Daredevil #172 “Gangwar!” Frank Miller (script/pencils); Klaus Janson (inks) The three-issue return of the Kingpin story comes to a somewhat low-key end in Daredevil #172 (July 1981). Sure, it sports a slam-bang battle between DD and Bullseye (and an epilogue that promises more Kingpin to come), but the real finish of the story is a quandary handed Daredevil: the Kingpin gives him the evidence he needs to shatter the leadership of the mobs, but in doing so, leaves them open for takeover by the rotund one. It would be the sort of graytoned denouement that littered Miller’s dark world, a world much like our own where the hero’s victory over the villain isn’t always as clear cut as it had been in earlier years (even earlier years that often featured the villain coming back for rematches). To do it, Miller tells his story on a number of different levels, beginning from the POV of DD himself as he escapes from the watery trap set for him last ish and encounters the grotesque denizens of the sewers that the writer (and later, fellow scripter Chris Claremont) would later build a similar army of shambling lost souls. Then, as Daredevil seeks information about the Kingpin in places like Josie’s Bar, the point of view shifts to a bodiless voice like the narration in some crime novel or voiceover from your typical film noir (“There are eight million stories in the naked city...”) “Yeah, that’s right, this is New York City,” Miller writes. “But if you’re thinking it’s all bright lights and big money and all that glittery junk you seen in the movies, well, you’re in for a shock.” Confined to narrow opening panels that stretch down the length of the page, the voiceover narration serves to set the different scenes of our tale taking the reader from the gleaming downtown towers of lower Manhattan to the water tank topped neighborhoods of Brooklyn. But the gleaming, ethereal towers are contrasted with the dirty business going on inside them as mob leaders meet with Bullseye, ordering him to do what it takes to find the Kingpin. Then, after a series of panels on page 7 that show the brutal lengths to which Bullseye goes to get his information, the action shifts to another tower, this one darkened, its shape suggested only in shadowed surfaces: the headquarters of the Kingpin. But Bullseye fails and the Kingpin turns the tables on his foes, including Lynch, an aid whom he discovers

was responsible for the death of his wife. Easily stripping himself of the suave veneer he displayed through most of the story, the Kingpin becomes the brutal beast of the mean streets he actually is when he pounds Lynch to death with his bare hands. “Yes, sir. It’s a lively town, all right. And it’s got a lot to offer. May be the only place in the whole world that’s got just what you want. But it’s up to you to get it. And if you screw up? Well, somebody’s sure gonna let you know...”

Daredevil #172, page 20: Hey kids! Comics! A climactic scene from Frank Miller’s Kingpin epic. Film noir and mean streets meet as comics drift away from family-friendly fare.

Daredevil #173 “Lady Killer” Frank Miller (script/breakdowns); Klaus Janson (finished art) In another giant step toward the darkness, Miller followed up his Kingpin trilogy with a tour through the mind of a sexual predator. How this one got past the censors is anyone’s guess, but it was indicative of the fast eroding power of the Comics Code Authority that a super-hero comic book, a form of media still largely considered as children’s literature (Hey Kids! Comics!), could be a vehicle to explore such themes as rape and violence toward women in such stark terms. For the first time, in mainstream comics at least, readers were presented with a bad guy decked out in the trappings of sado-masochism complete with leather mask and spiked regalia. By all rights they should have been shocked, but by this time in Miller’s run, it was almost expected. The oppressive darkness of the DD strip had become unrelenting with one horror piled atop the next, a process that would continue for the remainder of Miller’s run with the coming degradation of Vanessa, the Kingpin’s wife; the cold blooded murder of Elektra; Daredevil descending into near madness in his morbid attachment to the dead Elektra; and his playing at Russian roulette with a hospitalized Bullseye. Therefore, it would come as something of a relief, even to many of his admirers, when Miller finally left the Daredevil strip for other pursuits. Little did they know that the darkest of Miller’s stories was yet to be told! In the meantime, in Daredevil #173 (Aug. 1981), we have Michael Reese, a misogynist who decides to go after the lady psyThe Dark Ages

Blind Audrey Hepburn in a scene from Warner Bros’ Wait Until Dark (1967).

chiatrist who is treating Melvin Potter, the Gladiator (who has been reduced by Miller to a shadow of his former self despite the very cool close-up of the villain on page 6). In a scene reminiscent of the film Wait Until Dark, Reese attacks the psychiatrist in her darkened apartment but escapes when a crowd gathers. Of course, DD catches up with him and he’s captured, but then it’s up to Matt Murdock’s secretary Becky Blake to provide the testimony that will send him to jail. Will she do it? Turns out she was a victim of the same man who years before, attacked and crippled her (by all rights, she and Matt would have been a natural pair rather than he and the useless Heather Glenn who had stepped in to fill the slippers of the departed Karen Page). Despite the rather too-adult subject matter, it was undeniable that Miller had done it again: produced another engrossing, wellwritten tale of the underside of humanity but was nevertheless tinged with a neo-conservatism that would get under the skins of many of his fans who were considerably more...shall we say...liberal?

Dr. Strange #48 “The Power of Dr. Strange” Roger Stern (script); Marshall Rogers (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) On the face of it, Dr. Strange #48 (Aug. 1981) should have been a great book...Roger Stern would become one of Marvel’s top writers of the later Twilight Years and Marshall Rogers had just come off a classic run on DC’s Detective Comics where his version of Batman made his name a household word. (Well, in the homes of comics fans anyway!) But somehow, the two creators didn’t quite mesh, making this issue a solid effort but falling short of great. Unfortunately, the major share of 34

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the fault must lie with Rogers, whose layouts proved too restrictive, even claustrophobic, for a strip that begged larger images and more fluidity in layout (Strange co-creator Steve Ditko’s wild imagining of alien dimensions overcame the use of the former and Gene Colan’s ability to illustrate outside the box allowed him to accomplish the latter). Furthermore, Rogers’ figure work left much to be desired with small, stiff characters sporting awkward body language (perhaps due to his early training in architecture rather than art). In short, what was a virtue with his Batman work became a liability with Dr. Strange. On Batman, his trademark had been the ease in which he captured the creature of the night aspect of the strip, using attributes of Batman’s costume such as his cowl and cape to create iconic imagery that struck deep in every reader’s sub-conscious. As a result, Rogers’ version of the hero was able to do the seeming impossible: replace Neal Adams’ version as the definitive look for Batman. (It helped too to have a writer like Steve Englehart doing the scripts, an area in which Adams had never been well served). And although inker Terry Austin did wonders with such artists as John Byrne and oddly enough, Rogers himself on his Batman work, his meticulous style here seems to hold Rogers back, accentuating the inherent stiffness of his figures when they should have been set free. That said, there was still a lot to like about Stern and Rogers’ short run on Dr. Strange. This issue, for instance, begins by hitting readers right between the eyes with a cover featuring Dr. Strange and extra-dimensional girlfriend Clea being struck by a colorful barrage of mystical force drawn with a lack of holding lines. The featureless, all white background only emphasizes the two characters bringing them into sharp relief (and no doubt popping them right off the comics racks). Inside, Stern supplies a solid story beginning with a routine bank robbery and ending with a rescue of Brother Voodoo (remember him?) from the threat of Damballah. Picking up some threads from Br’er Voodoo’s late lamented strip in Strange Tales, the story provides Rogers with plenty of opportunity to drop more holding lines to better simulate spirit forms and odd goings on, but it’s in his depictions of alien dimensions where the artist (aided by Austin) manages to really plug into the strip’s traditional Ditkoesque (look that up in your Funk & Wagnalls!) extra-worldly ambiance. Overall, the plot manages to cover a number of bases and locales as was likely intended, seeing as this issue was planned as a relaunch, a return to greatness, if you will, of the Strange book, which, like many of the flagship titles, had lapsed into routine since the glory days when Englehart and Colan had last ruled the roost. Although Rogers would not remain for very long (barely a half-

dozen issues), Stern was destined for a lengthy stay on the book, one that would follow a steady upward path until crashing on the rocks of an uninteresting, overlong epic involving Clea’s becoming ruler of the Dark Dimension. But that was in the future; for now, there was more mystical mayhem and a return to Dr. Strange’s roots with Stern, Rogers, and later Paul Smith (with a dash of Michael Golden) in the offing!

Dr. Strange #48, page 11: A busy page by artist Marshall Rogers. He and Dr. Strange were a less than perfect fit as quirky mannerisms in Rogers’ art that perhaps suited Batman work to less effect here: witness the odd posturing of Brother Voodoo in panels 4, 5, and 6, not to mention Clea’s peekaboo ’do in panel 4.

Amazing Spider-Man Annual #15 “Spider-Man: Threat or Menace?” Denny O’Neil (script); Frank Miller (pencils); Klaus Janson (inks) One good turn deserves another, so they say, and after the previous year’s Amazing Spider-Man Annual barn burner, could an encore be far behind? Not necessarily, as creator assignments went at Marvel in the later Twilight Years, but sometimes the stars lined up and fans got lucky. In this case, it was Amazing SpiderMan Annual #15 (1981) where writer Denny O’Neil and artist Frank Miller reunited for another extra-length adventure of everyone’s favorite wall crawler. And although this time around, Miller didn’t place himself as much in Steve Ditko’s shadow as he did before, there are definitely some spinetingling moments of deja vu that managed to satisfy even the most die-hard Silver Age fanatic! Case in point: page 25, which features a fullpage splash of Spidey laying one on to Doc Ock, recalling for all the world those incredible full-page splashes Ditko did for the first Spider-Man Annual! But for most of the rest of the issue, Miller relies on the layout pattern he’d been developing over on Daredevil, usually based on an establishing vertical panel placed opposite a series of action-oriented horizontal panels stacked to the side. The story by Denny O’Neil is broken down into chapters, with each headed by a yellow-tinged tear sheet from the Daily Bugle, with the first featuring another anti-Spidey editorial by J. Jonah Jameson topped by a wild, toothy image of a threatening wall crawler. Of course, the irony is that Spidey’s alter ego Peter Parker is employed by Jameson as a photogThe Dark Ages

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

up the story’s coda: the same “Spider-Man: Threat or Menace?” headline that opened the issue! It was another fine entry for O’Neil and Miller, who unfortunately were unable to do it again as the latter’s plate became too full and the former left for DC. In any case, darker times looming ahead would make this traditional mix of action and characterization heavy story telling as out of fashion as high buttoned shoes. Fun Fact: Further dating this issue

rapher, who’s been assigned to cover a magic show. But no sooner does Peter show up than the performer is shot by the Punisher. A quick melee follows as Spidey and the Punisher get on the scent of Doc Ock, who is behind the crooked magician. Seems Dr. Octavius has been waiting for delivery of a poison he intends on slipping into the ink used to print the Daily Bugle and kill “5 million” people if the city doesn’t pay him $20 million in gems. Needless to say, the boys catch up with him before his evil scheme can be implemented and mayhem ensues. Throughout, O’Neil and Miller keep their various players in character and even manage to develop a characterization that would be further explored over the course of the 1980s, one that Miller would complete in his “Born Again” series within a series on Daredevil: that of the serious side of J. Jonah Jameson. Here we see him looking on as the presses roll: “Big, greasy, beautiful monsters! They’re our voices. They let us give the news to five million souls...old, young, good, bad, angry, sad, and happy... the whole teeming city...the folks of New York...they may foul up a hundred times a year...but not because they don’t know what’s happening. We tell ‘em...through the presses. I never get over loving this moment.” The issue ends with another screaming headline (and a return to form for Jameson): “Publisher Saves City!” accompanied by a close-up of Jameson’s grinning face that’s right out of the Ditko playbook! (cf the splash page of Amazing Spider-Man #17) But wait! If people find out about a plot to put poison in the Bugle’s ink...even if it was foiled... it could still ruin sales! Jameson is forced to cancel the edition setting

Amazing Spider-Man Annual #15, page 15: Miller previews the Punisher for his career altering guest shot in Daredevil a few months later. That subsequent depiction of Frank Castle would launch the character on a trajectory that would rival Wolverine in late ’80s popularity.

was the fact that it also sported a bunch of extra goodies including pin-up pages of Spidey villains such as the Jackal, Man-Wolf, and the Tarantula; a 3-page “who’s stronger?” feature showing where Spidey stood in comparison with his peers (he comes in the super-mediumweight class in which belong Valkyrie, She-Hulk, and...the Silver Surfer? “To blazes with you all!” exclaims a frustrated Ghost Rider); and a tour (with schematic, yet) of Peter Parker’s low-rent apartment! Unlike later years that would employ gimmicks like trading cards, bagged comics, alternate silver and gold embossed covers, ashcan copies, and higher grade paper at extra cost (not to mention greatly inferior art and stories), fans received all this extra wonderment for the regular price for annuals of 75¢!

Power Man and Iron Fist #73 “Wraith, Color or Creed” Mary Jo Duffy (script); Greg LaRocque (pencils); Ricardo Villamonte (inks) If anyone had a notion that Marvel Comics could do no wrong, they’d certainly be disillusioned...in a hurry...by taking a gander at Power Man and Iron Fist #73 (Sept 1981). Crudely drawn by Greg LaRocque, this issue’s art shows little sign that the penciler taught art before beginning his professional career in the advertising industry. Helping to make the pencils barely palatable were the inks by Ricardo Villamonte, a Peruvian import at Marvel best known for his work on DC’s short lived Beowulf. Villamonte’s brush, however, likely enhances LaRocque’s art here, giving it a bit of a Bill Sienkiewicz feel, particularly on the opening splash. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to keep this title’s nose above water, something luckless creators that had been assigned to it over the years also failed to do. The brainchild of writer Archie Goodwin, Luke Cage, Hero for Hire appeared full-blown in his own comic in 1972 and limped along for ten years, suffering through mostly low-level talent with the most highprofile team being writer Chris Claremont and artist John Byrne when the two teamed up midway through the title’s run for a couple of issues. Much heralded at the time, the pair left the book almost as quickly as they joined it, leaving Luke Cage in the hands of less talented creators. They’d been the latest effort by editorial to help lift the book from its doldrums with earlier attempts including bestowing Cage the “Power Man” sobriquet and then forcing him into an unlikely team-up with a kung fu fighting Iron Fist. But none of that helped when there never seemed to be any top-flight creators available to helm the book. Instead, poor Luke usually got stuck with the likes of LaRocque and scripter Mary Jo Duffy. Here, Duffy cranks out a familiar tale about guest-star Rom being mistaken for a bad guy as he apparently

Mary Jo Duffy (left) was assigned the thankless job of trying to keep the Power Man feature off life support over her almost thirty-issue run. She had some help on issue 73 from inker Ricardo Villamonte (right) who struggled to make artist Greg Larocque’s pencils passable.

disintegrates innocent bystanders at random. But in keeping with that old reliable science fiction chestnut (start with the Invaders TV show), he’s really eliminating alien invaders disguised as humans who are plotting to take over the planet. It’s only unfortunate for him that one of his victims (actually he’s just banishing the disguised Wraiths to limbo) is a prostitute named Polly Griffith. Angered at the apparent killing of one of his “girls,” local pimp Solace hires Cage to go after Rom. Naturally a fight ensues before the parties realize that Rom is a good guy and the action continues into Rom’s own title. Duffy’s stiff dialogue matches LaRocque’s equally stiff penciling (although he does attempt some experimentation with layout design that largely fails) to produce one of the many bottom-feeder titles that Marvel would publish in the 1980s, books that nevertheless had their fans and by their sheer longevity (the Power Man and Iron Fist title, for instance, would make it all the way to issue #125) managed to stick around long enough to enter the public consciousness.

Moon Knight #12 “The Nightmare of Morpheus” Doug Moench (script); Bill Sienkiewicz (pencils/inks) Never a very interesting character (although some readers thought so, as the character bounced around various titles until finally getting his own book in 1980), Moon Knight nevertheless had potential. How could it not with co-creator Doug Moench, the man behind Master of Kung Fu, guiding his career? The Dark Ages

Conceived as sort of Marvel’s answer to Batman, but burdened by having his initial appearance in Werewolf by Night when monster-starring vehicles were still a going concern at Marvel, Moon Knight’s origin was necessarily rooted in the horror genre. You see, as mercenaries, Marc Spector and Raoul Bushman become involved with an Egyptian archeological dig supervised by a Prof. Alraune and daughter Marlene. Greed gets the best of

Moon Knight #12, page 15: On his way to evolving into one of the truly innovative artists to emerge in the 1980s, Bill Sienkiewicz here displays a hint of his Neal Adams influenced beginnings while stretching himself experimentally in the form of panel layout, dynamic figure work, and even some special visual effects.

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Bushman, who wants to steal some artifacts, and he and Spector have at it, with Spector getting the worst of it. Left unconscious, his body is found by roving worshipers of Konshu, even as Spector has a vision of the god himself. Offered a second chance at life in exchange for becoming Konshu’s representative on Earth, Spector takes it, gets even with Bushman, and launches his career as Batman wannabe Moon Knight. Simple, huh? But not satisfied with aping Batman (like Bruce Wayne, Moon Knight is a creature of the night while his alter ego is a rich guy living in a big mansion), our hero also cribs from the Shadow, building up a stable of aides while taking on a third identity for himself, that of cab driver Jake Lockley. First appearing in Werewolf by Night #32, Moon Knight was soon spun off into Marvel Spotlight before making the usual rounds of guest appearances until finally landing his own strip in Rampaging Hulk. And there, he got real lucky. Don Perlin, who drew his first appearances in Werewolf and Spotlight wasn’t available to handle a regular monthly book so instead, newcomer Bill Sienkiewicz was given the assignment. With some formal art training via the Newark School of Fine and Industrial Arts, Sienkiewicz managed to catch the attention of editors at DC when he was only 19 years old. Impressed by his faux Neal Adams style, DC art director at the time Vince Colletta put him in touch with Adams himself, who in turn, referred him to Marvel editor-inchief Jim Shooter. The next thing he knew, Sienkiewicz had been given the Moon Knight assignment and then burst onto the scene with issue #1 of his own title. But little did

Bizarre Adventures #28

Bill Sienkiewicz (left) lucked out when Don Perlin (right) failed to follow-up on his co-creation of the Moon Knight by taking on the art chores on the character’s regular title. Perlin made up for it though when he took on a successful revival of Solar, Man of the Atom at the turn of the decade.

unsuspecting readers know at the time that this initial foray would soon break the bounds of its Adams style and, like many of the artists who had debuted in the 1970s, Sienkiewicz would improve quickly, turning into one of the most exciting new talents of the later Twilight Years. It took about a year before it became obvious, with portions of Moon Knight #12 (Oct. 1981) providing the first hints of the artist’s evolving style, a style that would soon enough stake out a new radicalism and outgrow its super-hero roots. Meanwhile, though, this issue’s splash page still displays Sienkiewicz’s artistic influences with a pair of detailed, expressionistic faces (albeit one of them being of the monstrous variety), a hallmark of Adams’ style. Elsewhere, action scenes also recall Adams’ Batman work, but compared to his first few issues on the title, Sienkiewicz’s art is now far more detailed with stray hints of something else going on. Take page 2, panel 3, for instance, which displays an abstract approach that only suggests the presence of traffic and rain-soaked streets. Unfortunately, the story he’s given to illustrate here is a rather pedestrian one of vengeance and monstrous transformation, elements that would have been right at home back in Werewolf by Night. Still, given all that, with an artist whose style could alter so much in only a year’s time, where would he be in another year or even two? Stay tuned! Fun Fact: Evidence that the title was at least a hit among a core base of readers, if not the general public, with issue #15 Moon Knight became one of three books that Marvel decided to sell only to comics shops. It was official: the book had become an acquired taste!

“Unlikely Heroes” (featuring Elektra) Frank Miller (script/pencils/inks) One innovation that had its beginning in the later Twilight Years but its full flowering, if you want to call it that, only during the Dark Ages (coinciding perfectly with the growing opinion at the time that writers were dispensable) was diminution in importance of captions and thought balloons as tools in the scripting of comic books. Comic books inherited the caption box from comic strips, where they were used extensively not only to fill in readers about ongoing storylines, but to describe action that was taking place in only a handful of panels. Some strips, like Hal Foster’s Prince Valiant, had no dialogue and were told purely through captions. (To be sure, there were some strips that did just the opposite using no words at all such as Carl Anderson’s Henry) Thought balloons were often used to inform readers on the emotional state of the characters. Since the first comic books were merely reprints of comic strips, these writing tools were transferred to the new medium lock, stock, and barrel. Then, when comic books began to feature new material, the same format as the preceding comic strips was followed. Thus, captions, thought balloons, word balloons, even sound effects, were all used in comic books from the earliest years without a second thought. But from time to time, others did give the whole scheme a second thought among them Frank Miller who, upon taking over the scripting chores on Daredevil (in addition to the pencils) began to think of how he could tell his stories with fewer words. As an artist, Miller thought in visual terms and in illustrating his own stories, he was in a unique position to arrange his art such that it could be in perfect synch with the plot. Taking his ideas to the limit, Miller wrote and drew a solo Elektra story for Bizarre Adventures #28 (Oct. 1981) in which he not only eliminated captions completely, but thought balloons as well. Surprisingly, he found that properly done, neither were needed and gradually, they were eliminated from his repertoire on Daredevil (where captions were reduced to one or two words either indicating a scene change or character with all other information given the reader through spoken dialogue or action). If captions were used at all, it was usually due to the story being told in first person by one of the characters. Carrying this new, bare bones scripting style to other projects, such as his work on Batman at DC, Miller inadvertently set an example that others would soon follow, laying the groundwork for a revolution in the way stories would be told in the coming Dark Age when 20+ page books would barely hold 100 words in the entire story. Under less talented creators than The Dark Ages

Miller, this led to plots becoming more and more sparse and spread out over more and more issues. Where once writers could routinely tell a complete story in a single issue or even half a dozen pages and a fan might take a full hour to read his favorite comic, now he could whiz through the same number of pages in a couple of minutes. Under such conditions, it would come as no surprise when some pencilers felt that writers were not even needed. After all, with the art having come to dominate the storytelling, how hard could it be to throw in a few lines here and there to let readers know when there was a change in locale? What resulted, however, were stories that were increasingly confusing as costumed characters proliferated and artists ignored the basics of panel-topanel progression and layout. All that, added to ever spiraling price increases (sometimes it could feel that the price of a book was in inverse proportion to the number of words there were to read in it) there was the sense in many readers that they were not getting their money’s worth of entertainment from comics. When that realization finally struck, it would hit the comics industry especially hard.

Avengers #213 “Court Martial” Jim Shooter (script); Bob Hall (pencils); Dan Green (inks) Pity poor Hank Pym! The only original character created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby from the dawn of the Marvel age who never really clicked. Beginning his career as Ant-Man, he soon became Giant-Man, then Goliath and Yellowjacket, then back to Ant-Man, and then Yellowjacket again. Whew! And those different identities don’t even count all the costume changes along the way! Adding to the confusion have been a number of character beats, many of them inexplicable, except in the way writer Jim Shooter finally interpreted them and put them all together in Avengers #213 (Nov. 1981). Throughout those early years, no deeper meaning was ever attached to all of Pym’s identity switches and with the exception of the time when he first became Bizarre Adventures #28, page 2: Writer/ artist Frank Miller had all of his strengths on display in this impressive page. Experimenting with the idea that less was more, Miller leaves plenty of negative space among this arrangement of panels designed to take the reader downward not only while following the action on page but in Elektra’s progress aboard ship. And all with a minimum of text, something that would come back to haunt readers in future years.

Bob Hall (left) and inker Dan Green (right) provided serviceable illustrations to stories like those in Avengers #213 that required little action and plenty of talking heads.

Yellowjacket (in which he clearly developed a split personality), even the usually more perspicacious Roy Thomas never followed up on the potential psychological ramifications of Pym’s trail of multiple identities ending in mental breakdown. For years after the events that culminated in issue #60, nothing was done with Hank Pym except his on-again, off-again participation with the Avengers as a regular member of the team. Eventually Shooter decided to look back at the character’s previous appearances and drew the obvious conclusion that Pym was mentally unstable, a condition that stretched back to the beginning of his career when he had feelings of inadequacy when compared to Avengers teammates Iron Man and Thor. It was only one interpretation, however (certainly, this was not the same take charge Hank Pym of Avengers #32-33), but the one Shooter chose to follow ending in issue #212 when Yellowjacket jumped the gun and zapped the Elfqueen in the back just as she was about to cease hostilities. For that ungentlemanly act, this issue begins with Pym brought up on charges by Captain America. What follows is a groundbreaking story with little super-hero action but with plenty of shocking events that foreshadowed the coming Dark Age. Presaging a trend that would later become all too common, Shooter takes a long-established character and destroys him, taking him apart and robbing him of his dignity. Doing everything in fact, short of throwing him in jail (that was saved for later issues). It was a story that was not entirely appreciated by fans, who cried foul. But according to Shooter, sales of the Avengers had been growing by 10,000 copies a month so he decided to ignore the complaints and The Dark Ages

forge ahead. This issue for instance, opens with hints of Pym’s emotional unbalance, something that is reinforced when the Wasp’s popularity grows and he disappears in her shadow. Where once he was the dominant personality in their partnership, now he’s more like the junior partner. To restore the balance, Pym retreats to his lab where he works on his latest project, a robot powerful enough to defeat the Avengers. His desperate plan, as he tells Jan, is to unleash the robot on his teammates and save them in the nick of time to re-establish his credibility as a valuable member of the team. More level-headed, Jan begs him not to do it, at which point he strikes her down, blackening her eye and forcing her to go along with the scheme. Later, at his court martial, Pym’s breakdown is complete as he defends his actions by accusing Captain America of trying to take attention from the fact that he was secretly attracted to the Elfqueen and wanted to exact revenge on the man who took her down. “Hank, for heaven’s sake...stop!” begs Iron Man as the panel looks on in embarrassed silence. Finally, Pym orders Jan to back him up but instead, she removes a pair of concealing sunglasses to reveal her blackened eye. “Odd’s blood! Her face... What is the meaning of this? Did...he strike thee, woman?” asks an incredulous Thor. At that point, Pym orders his robot to attack and, adding insult to injury, he not only fails to stop it as planned, but the Wasp does it for him. “Why? Why did it have to be Jan? If...if I couldn’t do it...why her? Why? Why?”

The case of Francine Hughes (left) was in the news during the 1980s and was instrumental in drawing attention to domestic violence against women. Her story became the subject of a T V movie called The Burning Bed (1984) starring Farrah Fawcett Majors.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

His breakdown complete and his duplicity exposed, Yellowjacket is found guilty and expelled from the Avengers. No bones about it, it was a powerful story. So powerful in fact, that it even withstands the wholly inadequate art of Bob Hall, one of Marvel’s lesser lights in the later Twilight Years. Inked by Dan Green, Hall’s work here was, well, crude at best but the story survives as a seminal reinterpretation of a classic character much in the way the “Demon in a Bottle” story forever reconfigured Tony Stark as an alcoholic. From this issue on, Shooter’s re-set of Hank Pym as mentally unstable and lacking self-confidence would be the defining element of the character. Likewise, it put the once “winsome” Wasp on the road to independence and feminist empowerment. According to Shooter, before writing the story arc of Pym’s breakdown, he researched the character thoroughly. “Before I embarked on the storyline that led to the end of Hank Pym and Janet van Dyne’s marriage, I reread every single appearance of both characters,” said Shooter. “His history was largely a litany of failure, always changing guises and switching back and forth from research to hero-ing because he wasn’t succeeding at either. He was never the Avenger who saved the day at the end and usually the first knocked out or captured. His most notable ‘achievement’ in the lab was creating Ultron. Meanwhile, his rich, beautiful wife succeeded in everything she tried. She was also always flitting around his shoulders, flirting, saying things to prop up his ego.” Regardless of the story’s origins, it was a far cry from Peter Parker’s romantic problems or even the birth of Franklin Richards in earlier years. In fact, the real importance of this issue was less its shocking content than the meaning of that content: it marked a point when mainstream Marvel comics became a medium written by adults for adults and ceased to be the province of all ages reading. As the remainder of the Twilight Years concluded and the Dark Ages began, young readers, the backbone of the industry in previous years, would virtually disappear from the field. As venues where comics were sold dried up, so did younger readers. Instead, most comics would end up being sold in messy, often dimly lit specialty stores where back issues of Playboy and x-rated comics were sold likely as not, side by side with old copies of Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen. They were not places that seemed welcoming to kids. Not so Fun Fact: In a surprising bit that escaped the notice of the Comics Code, after Hank and Jan return home from the court martial proceedings, Jan offers to sooth her troubled husband with some sex: “Oh, Hank! Let’s just sneak off to bed and cuddle and kiss and...and let me show you how much I love you!”

“Terror in a Tiny Town” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) When John Byrne took over the Fantastic Four midway through the Twilight Years with issue #232, it was truly an epochal event for many fans. At the time, his star could hardly have risen any higher. Arriving at Marvel in the late 1970s with an art style that was far more polished than other pencilers who were already working professionally, Byrne hit the ground running with his first assignment on Marvel Premiere, which then featured martial arts hero Iron Fist. Then, more fatefully perhaps, he found himself teamed up with writer Chris Claremont, who was already scripter of note on the new X-Men title, which had just begun catching fire with readers. Byrne followed Iron Fist when the character was promoted to his own title, but as the artist’s speed and skill were recognized by editors, other assignments came fast and furious and at times it seemed as though the newcomer was everywhere at once: a long stretch on Marvel Team-Up, taking over for George Tuska on the Champions, filling in on the Avengers, and a lengthy Star-Lord story for blackand-white magazine Marvel Preview that undoubtedly served as an audition for the strip that would grant Byrne “rock star” status, a phenomenon that would only come into much more prominence in subsequent decades and for much less deserving personalities. That book was the X-Men, of course, which up to issue #107 had been penciled by Dave Cockrum, a DC alumnus who provided serviceable though unspectacular art for the series. Therefore, when Byrne took

over with #108, smack dab in the middle of a space opera plot featuring a zillion costumed characters, his ability to pull it all together was a major factor in making readers sit up and take notice. But over the years he worked with writer Claremont on the book, creative tensions developed until Byrne decided he needed to leave and prove himself on his own. The opportunity came in the form of the Fantastic Four, a title that had long

Fantastic Four #236

Fantastic Four #236, page 19: John Byrne’s enthusiasm for his new assignment is evident on this page as every detail of the scene is rendered by the artist in both pencils and inks. Byrne would spend more time on developing the character of Dr. Doom than any other over his long tenure on the strip.

The Dark Ages

since lost the luster that had made it “The World’s Greatest Comic Magazine.” In a burst of enthusiasm, Byrne took over the book with issue #232 doing all the writing, penciling, and inking himself. Turning the clock backward, he attempted to recapture the Stan Lee/Jack Kirby glory days not only in the style of his art (which depicted the characters in their early, scrawny period) but also in revisiting classic villains such as Diablo, Rama Tut, and especially Dr. Doom, who takes center stage in Fantastic Four #236 (Nov. 1981). This special, double sized 20th anniversary issue opens with a recap of the team’s origin before settling in on our heroes as they live contentedly in a tiny town called Liddleville. But despite the apparent normalcy, not all is perfect. In a variation of Lee and Kirby’s story for FF #s 84-87 where the team was held captive in Latveria, it turns out their minds have been transferred to “miniature synth-clones,” allowing them to live in a tabletop model town and brainwashed to forget their former lives as super-heroes. But of course, they prevail only to learn that Dr. Doom is behind the whole thing. Only four issues into his run of the book, and Byrne hit the ground running with a story that not only works as fantasy adventure, but also displays a deep understanding of the characters themselves, which is what made Byrne’s run on the FF so successful and so deeply satisfying to read. It wasn’t his action sequences primarily (although those were great too), but his portrayal of Reed and Sue Richards, Ben Grimm, and Johnny Storm. Notwithstanding a few missteps down the road, Byrne would succeed in completely revitalizing a title that had lain fallow for almost a decade, while at the same time, demonstrating how anyone else could do the same elsewhere. The sad thing was how few of his peers or successors ever followed his example.

Invincible Iron Man #152 “Escape From Heaven’s Hand!” David Michelinie (plot/script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Bob Layton (plot/finished art) By Invincible Iron Man #152 (Nov. 1981), the team of writer David Michelinie and inker Bob Layton were still on the job, now joined by neophyte penciler John Romita, Jr. Although earlier issues such as #128’s “Demon in a Glass Bottle” story might have been different, even groundbreaking, they were frequently hampered by Layton’s awkward, stiff artwork that would not improve much as the years went on. Worse still, his too literal interpretation of Romita’s art this issue involved little nuance and with the exception of some Zip-a-Tone here and there, his inks only underlined the beginning artist’s tentative layouts. Still, enough of Romita’s style comes through to make 44

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Still a little rough around the edges, John Romita, Jr. (left) began his professional career on Iron Man, helped somewhat with inks by Bob Layton (right).

this issue’s solid but humdrum story about Iron Man needing to sneak into a hidden compound named Heaven’s Hand somewhat interesting. It seems that Bethany Cabe, our hero’s latest squeeze, has been seized by the bad guys and taken inside their headquarters. There, Bethany discovers that her husband, a former West German ambassador with knowledge of sleeper agents stationed in Europe, is being harshly interrogated for the information. But the main claim to fame this issue has its the introduction of the idea that Tony Stark possesses more than one kind of armor. Besides the red and gold suit everyone knows about, he also has a suit of “stealth armor” that he uses here to infiltrate the enemy stronghold (but fails!) The existence of specialized suits of armor was first suggested in issue #118 when the war machine armor or the “Variable Threat Response Battle Suit” was worn by Jim Rhodes, Stark’s pilot. In subsequent issues, the idea would take off and eventually get out of control with all kinds of specialized armor coming in for their own turns in the spotlight from undersea armor to space armor. Eventually, the whole concept of multiple suits of armor would be reduced to parody with the appearance of “the Iron Legion,” composed of everyone who ever knew that Tony Stark was Iron Man each wearing various suits of armor. From that point, whatever it was that had made Iron Man a unique character ended. Luckily, however, that was farther along into Marvel’s Dark Age and beyond the scope of this volume. In the meantime, this issue ends in a cliffhanger with the surprise appearance of an old Avenger’s enemy named the Living Laser! Fun Fact: The Living Laser would make a much more dramatic

return during Romita’s second run on Iron Man when he was teamed with John Byrne on scripts, also taking place after the start of the Dark Age. That run turned out to be one of the few exceptions to that era that proved the rule (nothing is absolute after all!) when Romita’s art style had evolved to its most refined point and Byrne, newly returned from DC where he’d turned Superman’s world upside down, still had no lack of story ideas.

Invincible Iron Man #152, page 27: An action packed page by John Romita, Jr. shows somewhat pedestrian layouts and generic objects such as tanks and soldiers but the artist definitely had the inherent qualities needed for a successful career at Marvel.

Daredevil #179 Spiked!” Frank Miller (script/breakdowns); Klaus Janson (finished art) Aside from Tom Palmer, Klaus Janson continued to be the most exciting inker in comics, not least for his work over Frank Miller’s pencils on Daredevil. Although he had his share of uninteresting artists to contend with in his career at Marvel (like Palmer, he had the ability of making even the worst artist’s work look good), he had many triumphs turning Rich Buckler’s Deathlok, Gil Kane’s Daredevil, and even John Buscema’s Tarzan into things wonderful to behold. And even as Palmer would end up meshing beautifully with John Buscema on later issues of the Avengers, taking his pencil breakdowns and turning them into finished art, so too would Janson do with Miller. Beginning with Daredevil #173, the credits in the book would begin to acknowledge Janson for the “finished art,” a description of his role in the book that would be altered this issue with a credit line that compressed both his and Miller’s contributions together, in effect giving them equal credit (along with editor Denny O’Neil). In fact, by issue #185, Miller had abandoned the art entirely with Janson taking over both pencils and inks. By that time, however, Janson had been working over Miller’s breakdowns so long that when he finally took over entirely, no one would have noticed if not for the credit on the splash page! However, as the issues progressed to the end of Miller ’s run, Janson’s pencils would suffer, becoming increasingly sketchy, until he left Marvel, briefly following Miller to DC where he The Dark Ages

once more collaborated with him on Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. But here, in Daredevil #179 (Feb. 1982), his style was still heavily influenced by Miller with the two almost indistinguishable as the cover leaves it in no doubt that fan-favorite Elektra is back (the shot of Elektra’s spike piercing DD’s hood is reminiscent in its unlikelihood of Gene Colan’s cover for issue #29 when Daredevil’s mask is pulled off to reveal the fact that he’s wearing his blind man’s glasses underneath). Told from the point of view of reporter Ben Urich, the story begins with the murder of a Kingpin informant by Elektra. It’s followed by a pair of pages that could very well have been laid out by Miller showing the darkened offices of the Daily Bugle and Urich’s meeting with DD. Cut to: Urich’s unknowing encounter with Vanessa, the Kingpin’s wife, who is still wan-

dering around in a daze after almost being killed in issue #171. From there, Miller and Janson give the reader an unaccustomed peek into Urich’s domestic life, something that most comics had managed to avoid ever since Peter Parker left home to share an apartment with Harry Osborne. Later, following up on a tip, Daredevil investigates an apartment and falls into a trap that has Elektra waiting to jump him. Again, readers are treated to a fight between the two in which they are to believe that Elektra can actually hold her own against DD. The issue ends with Daredevil defeated, and Urich seemingly killed by Elektra. It was the beginning of a final trilogy of tales that would pull together story threads that Miller had been lying about ever since taking over the strip, one that would prove to be the creative climax of his historic run on the title.

Marvel Fanfare #1

Dark Knight #1, page 47: Inker supreme Klaus Janson puts the shine on a challenging page by artist Frank Miller. Many choices needed to be made by the inker in rendering this important scene giving insight to Batman’s psyche.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

“Fast Descent Into Hell!” Chris Claremont (script); Michael Golden (pencils/inks/colors) “Snow” Roger McKenzie (script); Paul Smith (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) For a first issue of a new magazine that was intended to appeal especially to comics fans, it was hard to beat a line-up that included Chris Claremont and Michael Golden on an X-Men/Spider-Man team-up and Roger McKenzie and Paul Smith doing Daredevil! But then, that was the idea behind Marvel Fanfare, to create a comic not only designed specifically for Marvel insiders, but one that would be targeted at comics specialty stores that fans in the later Twilight Years were increasingly turning to for their purchases. Even as traditional outlets such as supermarkets, variety stores, and newsstands were drying up as venues for comic book sales, comics specialty stores began to pop up like mushrooms all across the United States. Aided by a new direct distribution system that was duly embraced by the publishers, comic stores were not only able to get new comics to sell weeks ahead of street-level outlets, but at a deeper dealer discount than your average 7-Eleven. With those elements in place, the comics industry was able to nurture the new specialty stores and encourage their proliferation as fans turned into would-be entrepreneurs and went into business for themselves, opening storefront shops in the less well-heeled parts of town, near college campuses, or in local strip malls. But even as the spread of comic shops continued, overall sales of comics declined. The casual buyer slowly disappeared to be replaced by more hardcore but older fans. The transition in clientele, however, was balanced out by the fact that older readers had jobs and more money to spend than the nickels and dimes younger kids used

Michael Golden’s (left) work was sporadic through the 1980s before disappearing almost completely by the end of the decade but what there was, was choice! Al Milgrom (right) graduated from inking chores over buddy Jim Starlin to penciling in the 1970s. In the following decade, he divided his time between a drafting table and an editor’s chair.

to scrape together. As DC and Marvel assigned sales teams to monitor the new direct market, they learned more about the changing demographics; how customers frequently bought every title that came out, had pull lists so that they wouldn’t miss a single issue of their favorite comics, and even bought multiple copies of certain books in the hopes of making a profit if they proved collectible. When word came back about these new kinds of customers, the companies began to think about ways they could be exploited. Soon, new, more expensive kinds of product and initiative began to appear. At DC, it was a hardcover/softcover program in which its most popular titles would be printed in “hardcover” deluxe formats with higher quality paper, cardstock covers, increased cover price, and sold only to comics shops. Appearing in more traditional markets a year later, the “softcover” version was published in the traditional format but reprinting the stories that had been featured earlier in the hardcover version. For its part, Marvel launched its “graphic novel” program featuring its most popular characters in a pricey, oversized volume printed on glossy paper and stiff covers. Another tactic was to produce regular comics designed to be sold only in comic shops (an advertisement this issue trumpeted books featuring Ka-Zar, Moon Knight, and Micronauts that were direct only titles). It was from that type of direct market initiative that Marvel Fanfare #1 (March 1982) was born. Aimed directly at the hardcore fan, its contents were geared to readers’ interests, which often didn’t

coincide with the casual buyer (who could still be found in the later Twilight Years). Stories would be written and drawn by fan-favorite creators and feature characters popular with Marvel insiders but lacked general appeal to support their own books. But for this first issue (which, priced at $1.25 was more than twice the cost of a regular 60¢ comic), editor Al Milgrom and editor-in-chief Jim Shooter decided not to take any chances, and chose X-writer supreme Chris Claremont to script the first of a twopart story that teams up lesser X-Men hero Angel with the ever popular Spider-Man. Making this entry really special though was the art of Michael Golden, who both pencils and inks the story in the style that rocketed him to the top ranks of fan-favorite artists within months of his debut at Marvel drawing the Micronauts product tie-in. And as if that wasn’t enough, fans were also treated to a Daredevil back-up tale by DD scripter Roger McKenzie and rising star artist Paul Smith. Top it all off with a back cover pin-up of Daredevil by Frank Miller and what fans got was a book they’d likely always dreamed about but thought would never happen!

Marvel Tales #137 “Spider-Man!” Stan Lee (co-plot/script); Steve Ditko (co-plot/pencils/inks) The first of Marvel’s reprint magazines from the Years of Consolidation, the venerable Marvel Tales began as a multi-feature, double-sized title before its squarebound format was eliminated and the last man standing turned out not too surprisingly to be SpiderMan. Long since having outstripped Marvel’s other characters in popularity, it was a no brainer that when Marvel Tales was trimmed back to a single feature, with issue #34 that feature would be Spidey. For years after that, Marvel Tales reprinted Spider-Man’s past adventures in chronological order but as page counts for regular-sized comics were trimmed back, so too did Marvel Tales lose pages. As a result, many of Spidey’s original stories ended up missing pages with new fans trying to catch up unknowing. That situation was finally corrected when it was decided to end the ongoing reprint schedule and start all over again with Amazing Fantasy #15 reprinted in Marvel Tales #137 (March 1982). This time, however, original page counts would be preserved with the added bonus that they’d be accompanied by the original letters pages with readers’ comments on that particular issue. Not only that, but eventually the books would also feature a second letters page with new letters by current readers! (The downside was a controversial decision by editorial to update some of the original dialogue to make it sound more contemporary; in other places, The Dark Ages

more black faces were said to have been added to crowd scenes). It was an interesting concept and one that was well timed as the later Twilight Years gave way to the Dark Ages when the institutional memory of past editors, writers, artists, as well as readers began to fade or were even deliberately marginalized. With the advent of a new flock of young artists destined not only to shake the comics industry to its foundations but to actually change the way most readers and even creators looked at the modern comic book, the seminal creations of such people as Stan Lee, Steve Ditko, and Jack Kirby would come to be seen as quaint and creaky with their old-fashioned ways of storytelling. The new corporate owners and editorial team in charge during the Dark Age would look with open disdain on Marvel’s creative heritage, undermining it, changing it, and replacing it wherever it could until it bore hardly any resemblance to the universe built by their forebears. The irony, however, was that while they were turning their collective backs on Marvel’s heritage, that heritage would be preserved for the future in a number of ways, each more upscale than the last. As things turned out, the deluxe treatment given Spidey in his revamped Marvel Tales gig, would only be the beginning of the character’s relentless march into the public consciousness. Next, he, along with his super-hero contemporaries, would be featured in the Marvel Essentials line (low-priced, black-andwhite trade paperbacks that featured long runs of Marvel’s earliest titles in each book), Marvel Masterworks (expensive hardcover books reprinting runs of 10-20 issues of Marvel’s earliest titles in full

color and on high-quality slick paper (succeeding editions would be reprinted in softcover for the bookstore trade), and the super deluxe Omnibus editions (again, reprinting the earliest issues of the Marvel Age of Comics in hardcover, color, and on slick paper, but this time in runs of 40-50 issues along with original letters pages, unused covers and page art, and introductory text pieces). In addition, all of Marvel’s past comics would also be available on the Internet for anyone to access. Thus, as the twenty-first century dawned, comics from Marvel’s Early Years, Years of Consolidation, Grandiose Years, and early to midTwilight Years would all be available in different formats and in different venues, challenging the bleak, often nihilistic contemporary vision offered by the company since the late Twilight Years.

Daredevil #180 “The Damned” Frank Miller (script/breakdowns); Klaus Janson (finished art/colors) Daredevil #180 (March 1982) is essentially a waste of paper dominated as it is by a story of degradation, an army of moldering sewer dwellers, and an obese villain more monster than man of a type Miller would return to again and again in his work away from Marvel (later exemplified by the Persian hordes in the movie adaptation of the 2006 film 300). Page after page of this issue is taken up with DD’s search to find Vanessa, the Kingpin’s wife, and his seemingly endless fights with the underdwellers. Finding her, he offers her whereabouts to the Kingpin in exchange for the villain giving up support for political tool

Stan Lee

tan Lee began a slow retreat from comics in the 1970s, first by becoming publisher, then moving himself to Hollywood, where he represented Marvel in getting its properties in front of the cameras. From there, he continued to script the long-running SpiderMan newspaper strip and made occasional forays into regular comics by guest scripting here and there. In the 1990s, he formed the ill-fated Stan Lee Media before trying again with the more successful POW Entertainment, which was aimed at developing multi-media properties. Since then, Lee has embarked on numerous below-the-radar comics/super-hero related projects but mostly, he has become the Disney-like public face of Marvel Comics, due mostly to his regular appearances in Marvel Studios’ immensely successful line of films based on many of the iconic characters he co-created.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

later done professionally in books such as Lost Girls by writer Alan Moore). Although able to tell good stories, many comics creators could not find within themselves the restraint to keep the medium within reach of all readers. Instead, they preferred to indulge their own buried adolescent fantasies. It seemed as though there was something eating away at the rising generation of creators that drove them to take the wholesome characters and heroes of their own youth and reduce them to the level of crack whores worse than anything seen in the blackest of film noir. It was unfortunate that comics became the victim of these prurient interests because they slammed the door on attracting new youngsters to the medium. With no rising generation of readers, comics were doomed to extinction or at least confinement in the dark basement of a wider mass media.

Daredevil #181

The hunchbacked traitor in Frank Miller’s 300 limited series was typical of the grotesque lengths the artist needed to go to by the late ’90s in order to hold the attention of a by then jaded readership.

mayoral candidate Randolph Cherryh. But what rises to the surface here is less this issue’s story than its treatment of Vanessa. What happens to her foreshadows what Miller will later do to Karen Page. At the time, these twists on longtime characters held the fascination of fans, but in the hindsight of decades, they have been exposed merely as the objectification of women. Despite super-heroines gaining much greater powers than in earlier years, often making them the equal of their male colleagues, it was canceled out by exaggerated body parts and costuming that amounted to little more than ladies’ lingerie. All of it intended to delight the arrested adolescents who increasingly populated comics stores and convention floors (where fan art depicting female characters in compromising situations was often seen for sale, something that was

“Last Hand” Frank Miller (script/breakdowns); Klaus Janson (finished art) After a forgettable issue 180 (proving, if the whole Elektra arc didn’t, that Miller was far from perfect), Daredevil #181 (April 1982) comes back strong with an unforgettable story of blood and mayhem that would change the landscape of comics for ever (or at least into the present day as there is no sign that its influence has at all abated over the 30+ years since it was first released on an unsuspecting world). In fact, after Miller had become a hot property in Hollywood, when his star there was still in the ascendant, this issue’s story would become the basis for a DD movie in 2003, which did its darnedest to capture the darkness of the writer’s work in scenes that were adapted quite literally from the comic. However, lacking the months-long build-up and character development, the grim and grittiness, the ongoing, unrelenting gloom that Miller had infused in the strip, the film could only approximate the shocking events in this issue. And those events were foreshadowed quickly on the first page as the reader is presented with Daredevil being shot in the head with black-colored blood splattering outward beneath the cross hairs of an unseen gunman. To the reader’s relief, the scene turns out to be only a fantasy in the twisted mind of Bullseye, now being held in prison. It’s from his point of view (the mind of a psychotic killer) that the subsequent tale will be told and in a way, explaining why it is depicted in such raw, violent, cold-blooded terms. With an ever-increasing body count, Bullseye escapes from jail intent on killing DD but not before doing the same to the person who replaced him as the mob’s top torpedo: Elektra. He catches up with her and a fight ensues in which Bullseye gets the best of Elektra (comic book physics here; in real life, no woman, no The Dark Ages

matter how physically fit or trained could last more than a few minutes against a male antagonist of anywhere near roughly the same age and fitness; height, weight, stamina, even the length of arms and legs would give him an overwhelming advantage in any given situation). In the end, the fight concludes in a blood soaked climax where Bullseye cuts Elektra’s throat with a well-aimed playing card before impaling her on one of her own knives. With black-colored blood literally pouring from her wounds, Elektra stumbles to Matt Murdock’s front door and dies. Meanwhile, having concluded that Murdock is Daredevil, Bullseye gives the Kingpin information that will prove crucial in another turning point story by Miller later in the decade after he returned to Marvel from DC. Finally, in a climactic battle with Daredevil, Bullseye falls from a height and breaks his back but it does not kill him. That’s

the point where the reader is hit by the story’s biggest twist: Bullseye has been telling his tale while in traction from a hospital bed, paralyzed from the neck down! The numerical stretch from issue #159 to 181 doesn’t seem to be much on the face of it, but in terms of how far Miller had taken comics from their predominantly Code-approved environment to one where such brutal, cold-blooded action on display this issue could be depicted (with a Code stamp on the cover to boot!), represented a sea change from which the comics industry has yet to recover. Now, over thirty years on, can it be said that Miller did the industry any favors? Some might argue that he did, releasing comics from their family-friendly straitjacket into the world of creative freedom where writers and artists controlled the direction of titles and not editors. But in the final analysis, circulation figures tell the tale: a steep decline over those same decades until at this present writing, comics really should have gone the way of the dinosaur with only constantly increasing cover prices and the need for them as idea factories for future blockbuster movie franchises keeping them alive. In short, although it could be argued that video games and other highspeed distractions would have doomed comics anyway, it likely would have taken much longer if the industry itself had not so fully embraced the “grim and gritty” elements that proved so wildly popular under Miller. Thus, as great as this issue undoubtedly was, it sounded the death knell for an industry, at least in terms of its being considered any kind of a mass medium.

Daredevil #182

Luckier than most, Miller’s work has been more or less faithfully translated to film including Daredevil, Sin City, and 300. But when he had the chance to do it himself bringing Will Eisner’s Spirit to the screen, he dropped the ball.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

“She’s Alive” Frank Miller (script/breakdowns); Klaus Janson (finished art/colors) In the run up to the “Child’s Play”/angel dust story that begins in earnest next issue, Miller sidesteps briefly into the mind of Matt Murdock and deeper into the darkness he’d been exploring since his advent as writer of the Daredevil strip. Just when readers thought things couldn’t get more bleak than DD #181 or even 180, they do as Matt Murdock, for some reason obsessed with Elektra (we’re told that he loves her...shrug), refuses to accept the fact of her death at Bullseye’s hands. (And though he finds her dead body lying in its grave, a few issues down the line, readers would discover that he was right the first time...Elektra is somehow resurrected... don’t ask how, the storyline is too absurd to accept anyway). Therefore, he spends Daredevil #182 (May 1982) chasing down friend Foggy Nelson to have her grave dug up and the Kingpin to admit that Elektra is still alive. Both think, with justification, that he’s crazy, and they’re right. It was the last nail in the coffin (forgive the pun) of Matt Murdock’s personality that finally skewed the character in a direction wholly unrelated to the one

established in the Years of Consolidation and Grandiose Years. Long-time readers no longer recognized this pathetic neurotic wallowing in self-delusion. Unfortunately, Miller wasn’t done with him yet as he would return to finish the job of deconstructing the character in a later, shorter run that leaves Murdock a shattered wreck, a blank slate upon which subsequent writers could (thankfully!) build a new structure. In the meantime, though, this issue also features a sub-plot involving the Punisher as he hunts down dealers in a dangerous drug called angel dust...

Daredevil #182, page 24: The Punisher opens a new front in his war on drug dealers while at the same time taking his first steps toward super-stardom later in the decade.

Fantastic Four #242 “Terrax Untamed” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) In a tour de force issue, Fantastic Four #242 (May 1982) shows John Byrne at his creative peak, touching every aspect of the FF’s lives while effortlessly rolling in a cosmic scale menace and super guest-stars galore! After ten issues on the job, there was little doubt in anyone’s mind of the fertility of Byrne’s imagination or his ability to spin a yarn. By contrast, the book he abandoned to take on the FF was floundering as Chris Claremont veered the X-Men from solid stories soundly based on the group’s history and character back stories to riffs on such popular films of the time as Alien, armies of sewerdwelling mutants, and shenanigans having something to do with Scott Summers’ father being an outer-space freebooter! Ugh! As a result, little more evidence was needed there to prove who was actually responsible for the quality of that long Claremont/ Byrne run on the book. So while the X-Men was spinning out of control under Claremont, the Fantastic Four was doing just the opposite under Byrne. There, the writer/artist was capturing the essence of each character as Reed and Sue share a post-Christmas domestic scene with a hint that son Franklin might have super powers of his own; the Thing mopes about in Central Park, his form covered up the way he used to do in the very earliest days of the Lee/Kirby era; and Johnny and new squeeze Frankie Raye visit a theater where a mutual friend is rehearsing (and incidentally passing by the flophouse where Johnny first discovered an amnesiac Sub-Mariner way, The Dark Ages

way, way back in FF #4!) After spending an economical 7 pages getting readers up to date with the book’s soap opera elements, Byrne abruptly shifts the focus from quiet domesticity to outrageous cosmic consequence, as bad guy Terrax returns to Earth to get back at the FF (it seems he blames the team for his becoming the latest herald of Galactus). The

aforementioned Terrax makes his appearance riding an asteroid and opening a space warp over New York City, something you know the FF can’t ignore! Action immediately follows as the four (plus an enflamed Frankie Raye) attack. They get nowhere until the Invisible Girl (whom Byrne will work on over the coming months, transforming her into one of the most powerful characters in Marvel’s stables) makes visible a force barrier that Terrax has thrown over the city. The resulting phenomenon catches the attention of a number of guest-stars including Spider-Man, Thor, Iron Man, and Daredevil...we told you this issue had it all! Then, as if all that wasn’t enough, Terrax rips all of Manhattan from the Earth and hurls it into orbit! On top of that, threatening to remove the barrier and expose the trapped New Yorkers to the rigors of space, Terrax forces the FF into fighting Galactus for him! Hoo boy! Can things get any worse for our harried heroes? Stay tuned and find out!

Daredevil #183

Fantastic Four #242; page 22: Writer/artist John Byrne raises the stakes in a jam-packed issue placing a series of events in motion that will end up redefining Galactus and restoring the space god to his proper place in the Marvel universe. By the time that happened, Byrne will have proven that he was more than just a great artist, he was a master storyteller too.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

“Child’s Play” Roger McKenzie/ Frank Miller (script); Frank Miller (breakdowns); Klaus Janson (finished art/colors) The credits for this issue are somewhat confused in that the angel dust story was written by McKenzie over a year before but was delayed when Marvel editorial grew skittish over its unvarnished content. At the time, McKenzie had been the writer of the Daredevil strip, before he was removed and the book was given over to Miller, who complained to editor Denny O’Neil that he and McKenzie were not seeing eye to eye. It seems that to prove his

Silver Surfer #1 Vol. 2

By the mid-1980s, use of illegal drugs had grown from a counter cultural pastime of the sixties into a major problem for the United States as their use filtered downward in the population, even drawing in grade school children. A fact that writer Roger McKenzie and artist Frank Miller were eager to use for a hard hitting story beginning in Daredevil #183.

ability, Miller was asked to write a spec script that passed muster with O’Neil. At that point, according to editor-in-chief Jim Shooter, O’Neil had had enough of Miller’s badgering and removed the hapless McKenzie from the book (one to which he had contributed many solid scripts and began the transformation of DD into more of a creature of the night/scourge of the underworld type). Miller’s first script was the infamous issue #168, where he quickly introduced Elektra as a long-lost former girlfriend of Matt Murdock’s. Now, as writer, Miller was presented with an earlier story written by McKenzie and faced the prospect of trying to integrate it into a new continuity that he’d been pursuing with DD for over a year. And for the most part, the melding of the two scenarios is well done with scenes from the older intertwined with new scenes from the ongoing storyline. The difference in Miller’s style of art however, is noticeable, and it becomes interesting to compare how much it evolved over the preceding year or so since he took over the writing. Anyway, in Daredevil #183 (June 1982), our hero becomes involved when visiting a local school and a girl in the throes of a powerful drug called angel dust, leaps from a window to her death. Between bouts with the Punisher, who is also on the trail of those dealing in the deadly drug, Matt Murdock pursues his relationship with heiress Heather Glenn (another ill-fitting romantic match-up for our long suffering blind attorney) ending the issue asking for her hand in marriage!

“Escape...to Terror!” Stan Lee (script); John Byrne (plot/pencils); Tom Palmer (inks/colors) By the later Twilight Years, Stan Lee’s role in the comics end of Marvel Comics was pretty minimal. Oh, sure, he still held the title of publisher as listed in the indicia of every comic, but mostly his attentions were focused elsewhere, most notably in Hollywood, wheeling and dealing with movie and television execs trying to bring the super-heroes he helped create to the big and/or small screen, whichever he could get. In fact, his first big success, the Incredible Hulk TV series starring Bill Bixby and Lou Ferigno that began in 1978 would enjoy its final season the same year Silver Surfer #1 (June 1982, Vol. 2) appeared in local comic stores and 7-11s. Since relinquishing his last regular scripting jobs in the early 1970s, Lee found himself the chief beneficiary of years of self-promotion as his name became a household word, almost like Walt Disney. As a result, the corporate owners of Marvel Comics saw fit to top the splash page of all their comics with the bold “Stan Lee Presents” label, with Lee himself becoming an ever-diminishing presence in the bullpen’s day-to-day affairs. Quite aside from the comics themselves however, Lee amused himself by scripting the Spider-Man newspaper strip, something he did for years beginning in 1977, and making occasional forays into regular comics, such as his late-innings team-up with Jack Kirby on a Silver Surfer graphic novel. Over the years, he would return to script special projects, such as Amazing Spider-Man Annual #18 and a Silver Surfer mini-series drawn by French artist Jean Giraud. The Silver Surfer in fact, held a special interest for Lee, who gave the character the royal treatment during the Grandiose Years when he teamed with artist John Buscema to produce a Silver Surfer series, whose first five issues each had 52 pages of content. The series petered out by issue #18 though and in the years since, there was an informal dictum that no one could write the character except Lee, who always hoped that a regular series could be revived. That never happened and over time the reins were loosened, allowing others to use the character in their own stories. Still, it didn’t take much to lure Lee back to the fold if the Surfer were involved. Thus, his scripting of the Giraud mini-series and this special volume 2 , #1 of the Silver Surfer. For this issue, Lee was paired with the hottest artist in the business and one of the best...the best, at least, that the Silver Surfer could hope for! Uniquely suited to the task, Byrne had taken over writing and penciling the Fantastic Four only the year before and proved that he had a feel for what made the strip tick. Obviously in the FF groove, Byrne came up with a plot for a Surfer The Dark Ages

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

the ruins of an ancient civilization; a vista showing the ruined planet of Zenn-La; a portrait of the evil Mephisto as he gloats over the tearful Shalla Bal; and a suitable-for- framing final shot of the Surfer soaring through the skies of Earth. The Surfer’s arrival and trials in hell are also extremely well done. Surely, this issue was one of the unsung and near forgotten gems of the late Twilight Years!

story in which Norrin Radd finally escapes the imprisoning field that has kept him trapped on Earth and travels back to his home planet of Zenn La only to find it destroyed. With crushing irony, the Surfer discovers that after he sided with the Earth against Galactus, the space god returned to Zenn La to exact his revenge. Meanwhile, Shalla Bal, the girl who the Surfer loved and whom he was forced to give up in order to save his world, has been kidnapped by his old foe, Mephisto! Lured back to Earth (where he knows he will be trapped again as the device used by Mr. Fantastic to free him will only work once), he confronts Mephisto who sends Shalla Bal back to Zenn La now that the Surfer is once more trapped on Earth. But before he’s parted from her again, the Surfer manages to imbue Shalla Bal with some of his cosmic power, enabling her to restore the devastated Zenn La back to fecundity. It was an extra-length story (48 pages!) worthy of the giant early issues of the Surfer’s first series with a plot that was more fairy tale than science fiction adventure with scripting by Lee every bit as lilting as that produced in his heyday. (“Here I dwell...amidst the stench and decay of a once-proud civilization! I, too, had once been proud...hungry for life, lusting for love, thirsting for bold adventure! Is this the way it must always end? Is this how it must ever be?”) And the art! Byrne was at the height of his powers in these years, but his work was enhanced greatly by the as yet undimmed skill of Tom Palmer, who helped to create a number of full-page masterpieces for this issue, including the opening splash of the Surfer reclining amid

Silver Surfer #1 Vol. 2, page 18: Marvel godfather Stan Lee returned briefly to the fold in 1982 to team-up with John Byrne, the hottest artist on the scene, to produce a one-shot classic that harked back to the glory days of the Surfer’s original title.

Fantastic Four #243

“Shall Earth Endure?” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Any reader worth his salt should have known last issue that with a herald of Galactus around (even a former one), the big man himself couldn’t be far behind, right? Well, those readers’ judgment is proven right in Fantastic Four #243 (June 1982) as Galactus returns to Earth. Oh, sure, he’d been around off and on over the years, but the character was never really treated right since Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and some might say even they didn’t get him quite right since his initial appearance in FF #48. But all that changed this issue when Byrne took his first swing at the character. As readers will recall, in the previous issue, Terrax returned to Earth and, scooped up Manhattan, and set it to ram Galactus’ orbiting ship unless the FF helped him to destroy his former master. Terrax, you see, thinks that because Galactus is low on energy, he can be defeated, but he’s soon proved wrong. Galactus defeats Terrax with a wave of his hand then proceeds to set up the apparatus (familiar to any dyed in the wool Marvelite) needed to drain the Earth of its elemental energies. At that point, he’s interrupted by Thor and soon a fullblown donnybrook ensues between a weakened Galactus and pretty much all of Marvel’s Silver Age era heroes. But the big G manages to hold his own until Dr. Strange forces him to confront all those he has killed in his ages-long pursuit of energy and, screaming in mental anguish, his giant form collapses unconscious in a full-size second-to-last panel where Byrne manages to visually sum up all the drama of the previous 20. Having maneuvered his cast to this point, Byrne now confronts them with a dilemma that challenges their values of right and wrong (not to mention their code against killing...a long-standing comics tradition that was already being challenged by Frank Miller over in the Daredevil strip and would be swept aside completely in the coming Dark Age): with Galactus dying for lack of “feeding,” do they save the Earth and countless other inhabited planets in space by simply standing by and letting him die or do they save his life? Hinting at a plot thread that would begin to unravel in future issues, Byrne allows Reed Richards and Captain America to act as the collective conscience of mankind: “Galactus may be the greatest menace we’ve ever faced, but he is also a living being,” Cap reminds everyone. “We have no choice,” concludes Mr. Fantastic, “we have to save Galactus!” This issue would prove to be only the first chapter in a storyline that Byrne would return to a number of times over his tenure on the FF, developing, rebuilding, and restoring Galactus to the exalted, awesome status

he enjoyed when Lee first asked Kirby to create a god for the FF to fight after they’d met and defeated every other kind of villain. In one of the greatest comics of the Twilight Years, the writer/artist would even come close to matching Lee and Kirby themselves in a reset of Galactus, giving him a purpose in the great scheme of Creation itself. Then, beyond that, in a final project for Marvel, Byrne would attempt “The Last Galactus Story,” which sadly for fans, he’d never get to finish. But for now at least, readers though they may not have known it with this issue, were in a position to catch one of the most interesting and inventive story arcs in comics as it unfolded over the following two years. Fun Fact: This issue’s title was cribbed from FF #76, also a Galactus-based story!

Marvel Super Hero Contest of Champions #1 “A Gathering of Heroes!” Bill Mantlo (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Pablo Marcos (inks) Distinguished mostly as Marvel’s first limited series, Contest of Champions was originally conceived as a vehicle to promote the 1980 summer Olympics to be held in the Soviet Union. That concept fell through when the United States decided to boycott said games over the host country’s invasion of Afghanistan. Unfortunately for Marvel, production of Contest was already well under way with news of the project having already appeared at the end of a treasury-sized special called Spider-Man and the Hulk at the Winter Olympics. Contest was to have followed up that first entry using the same format, but with the boycott in

Russia, as part of the Soviet Union, played the part of international killjoys by invading Afghanistan in 1980 and spoiling plans for Marvel’s first limited-series, the Contest of Champions. As of 2014, the country is still at it.

The Dark Ages

place, plans had to be changed. Two years passed before the project finally re-emerged as a three-issue limited series entitled Marvel Super Heroes Contest of Champions #1 (June 1982). Overall, the story (cooked up by a committee that included Mark Gruenwald, Bill Mantlo, and Steven Grant) proved a dull affair, recalling for the umpteenth time the plot of Fredric Brown’s classic science fiction tale “Arena” in which an Earthman and an alien counterpart must battle with the winner saving his respective planet from destruction. In the case of Contest, that meant having all of Earth’s heroes kidnapped by the Grandmaster and Death who pit them against each other. The heroes do it to save the Earth while the Grandmaster wants to win to save the Collector, a fellow “elder of the universe” and old-time Avengers bad guy. Artist John Romita, Jr., very early in his career, manfully churns out the pages for this over-crowded opus that really has only one interesting feature (besides giving the kiddies a thrill by having all their favorite super-heroes gathered in a single story): the introduction of leftover characters from the comic’s original concept as a shill for the Olympics. And so, meet the Peregrine (France), Defender (Argentina), Shamrock (Ireland), Sabra (Israel), Collective Man (communist China), Arabian Knight (Saudi Arabia), Blitzkrieg (West Germany), and an aboriginal hero from Australia called Talisman, all of whom, naturally, will get starring roles in the action to come. As for the established Marvel Universe, everyone is there too including non-powered characters like Shanna the She-Devil (if she was qualified, why not just draft the entire U.S. Marine Corps?) Although the Contest of Champions limited series was likely received well by young readers captivated by the idea of all their favorite heroes collected in a single vast story, the true significance of the series lay in its role as a forerunner of a similar, far more successful and better known project released a few years later called Secret Wars.

a relatively smooth transition. But still, he wasn’t Miller, and as the series continued to the end of Miller’s run (and a few issues beyond), Janson’s own style would begin to emerge, one that was far from satisfying. Janson, though a great inker (the best, in fact, since Tom Palmer), like his colleague, he never did quite cut it as a straight artist. His figures were too stiff, his layouts often unexciting, his detailing weak, and his backgrounds often non-existent. But over the right artist, he could be spectacular, as he was in the previous decade over Rich Buckler on Deathlok or if handed good layouts such as those given him by Walt Simonson on Battlestar Galactica. But this issue, devoid as it is of whatever contribution Roger McKenzie might have given the original tale (his name was removed from the writing credits for this chapter), is the beginning of the true end of Miller’s exceptional run on the book. With an unprecedented deal awaiting him over at DC (that would culminate in Ronin, a deluxe mini-series printed on high-quality paper in which Miller would have carte blanche and even share in the profits), the writer/ artist would coast to his final appearance in issue #191. Taking over from there, editor Denny O’Neil would make a brave attempt to maintain Miller’s spirit but his efforts would mainly fall flat until he was finally teamed with an artistic newcomer who, like Miller, would improve quickly to become one of the most exciting new talents of the late Twilight Years.

Daredevil #184 “Good Guys Wear Red” Frank Miller (script/breakdowns); Klaus Janson (finished art/colors) Beneath an in-your-face cover depicting a close-up of DD holding a huge-sized revolver directly into the reader’s face, Daredevil #184 (July 1982) concludes the angel dust story in by-now-typical hard-hitting Frank Miller style. Unfortunately, Miller himself seemed to be AWOL in the penciling department as he handed over more of the art chores to inker Klaus Janson. (In fact, in the next issue, Miller would be credited only as “scripter/storyteller” and Janson as “penciler, inker, colorist). Not that Janson was bad; in fact, he managed to capture Miller’s style quite well, making for 56

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

The hottest creator in comics at the time (well, he was neck and neck with John Byrne), Frank Miller won a sweetheart deal with DC, who lured him from Marvel with promises of highquality production values and carte blanche for whatever project he wanted to take on plus retaining ownership of his own characters, and massive royalties. The result was the groundbreaking but dull Ronin.

Fantastic Four #244 “Beginnings and Endings” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Although Byrne did almost everything right with his FF run, he did make a handful of serious mistakes, among them ending the Thing’s long relationship with Alicia Masters (and in one issue suggesting that she and Johnny were sleeping together), revealing Aunt Petunia as a real person, powering up Franklin Richards, and having She-Hulk join the team. The first of them, however, was here in Fantastic Four #244 (July 1982), when he fixes it to make Johnny’s girlfriend, Frankie Raye, the latest herald of Galactus. Of course, the job of herald of Galactus had long since been cheapened, turned into cliché even, since the introduction of the Silver Surfer in FF #48 with one after another oddball character trying out for the position, Terrax only being one (there was an idea going around that each herald needed to represent one of the four elements—air, earth, water, and fire— and if it were an operative theory around the Marvel offices at the time, then of course, the Frankie Raye character with her ersatz flame powers, would’ve been an obvious choice). But did anybody really care about the Frankie Raye character? Byrne did try hard to give her a distinct personality over the months since he took over the book, including adding a best friend, a group of theater folk hangers-on, and even, as Reed says this issue, making her a de facto member of the FF. None of it worked to convince readers that she was anything but a fly-by-night character, especially as her flame powers copied those of the Torch, making him redundant in his own adventures! Meanwhile, as we rejoin our story continued from last ish, Galactus lay dying and led by Reed Richards, the gathered heroes agree to try and save his life. Powered by Thor’s uru hammer, a sort of dialysis machine is set up and revives Galactus. Temporarily mollified by the mercy shown him, the space god holds off destroying the Earth as Reed tries to identify some uninhabited planets for him to consume. But they’re too far away. Enter Frankie Raye, who volunteers to be cosmically empowered and search out worlds closer by. And for the first time since the universe was born, Galactus feels...gratitude. “Perhaps Galactus has learned an important truth this day. Earth shall never more need fear me...for perhaps here, on this tiny whirling mote alone in all the cosmos has Galactus truly found those he might dare name...friends.” Then, just as Lee and Kirby had done when they first introduced Galactus, Byrne provides a contrast between the incomprehensibly cosmic and the familiarity of every day life as the balance of the issue is given over to our heroes’ daily

Much to the chagrin of fans, the robotic H.e.r.b.i.e. replaced the Human Torch in the Fantastic Four cartoon show of 1978. Legend had it that producers of the show were fearful that clueless kids would light themselves on fire in imitation of Johnny Storm but in reality that the Torch had been optioned separately to another licensee.

travails, including Johnny getting over the loss of the girl he loved (and setting him up for Julie D’Angelo to grab on the rebound), Reed’s supervising the rebuilding of the FF’s top floor HQ at the Baxter Building (which he flat-out buys by simply writing out a check to the owner!), and Franklin’s growing super powers (much to the delight of readers, he destroys the H.E.R.B.I.E. robot that Byrne had reintroduced from the old FF cartoon show as Franklin’s baby sitter!) Finally, Byrne even squeezes in a hint of the next Dr. Doom story! But the bottom line is that despite the Frankie Raye bit, this issue succeeds in putting across the first major story arc of Byrne’s FF run, one that manages to tell the first great Galactus story in well over a decade and one that manages to reset the character as a majestic, cosmically removed being. In short, he made Galactus something special again. A feat not easily accomplished, but the writer/artist would continue to surprise readers who might have had the feeling that he was a good artist but not necessarily a writer. But a re-estimation would soon be forced upon them as Byrne went on to do what he did for Galactus and Dr. Doom to the FF strip as a whole.

Team America #2 “Fear and Loathing in Montana” Jim Shooter, Denny O’Neil, Bill Mantlo (script); Mike Vosburg (pencils); Vince Colletta (inks) The Dark Ages

For a book that most fans and even its unusual team of scripters likely thought would be dead on arrival, Team America proved surprisingly readable. Not that it was anything to brag about or even recommend to a friend, it was a pretty nowhere concept (one might even say it was a ripoff of the classic Speed Racer cartoon) about a trio of auto racing fanatics as they compete in various “unlimited class” competitions where there are virtually no rules. Based on a line of action figures and vehicles belonging to the Ideal Toys company and licensed to Marvel (which was charged with coming up with a comic book tie-in), Team America first appeared in Captain America #269 (writer J. M. DeMatteis and artist Mike Zeck took the blame that time) before graduating to their own short-lived title. There, members Honcho, Wolf, and Reddy learned they shared some kind of mental link that in times of crisis came together in the form of the Marauder, a masked motorcyclist in the mold of the Infinity Man from Jack Kirby’s old Forever People comic. It seems that the trio’s parents were part of a Hydra experiment to create its own army of super-powered mutants, thus explaining their mutual interconnectivity. The three were joined by new members Wrench and Cowboy in Team America #2 (July 1982) just in time to fend off an attempt by Hydra to kill them and end their nascent career. Competently drawn by artist Mike Vosburg, whose work was no doubt hampered by inker Vince Colletta, this issue’s story is made tolerable mostly by the presence of Hydra and the internal struggle between the ambitious agent Marcus (a woman anxious to take on the role of the next

US1 was part of a push by Marvel in the 1980s to expand into the licensed product market, a strategy that yielded mixed results when it came to toys: titles such as Rom, Transformers, and GI Joe were successful while others like Team America...and US1 were not.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Madame Hydra) and the current Supreme Hydra; certainly, it wasn’t the cookie-cutter personalities of the Team members themselves (except maybe for mechanic Wrench and his girlfriend Georgiana who seemed the most three-dimensional of the group). Amid all this, it’s with some difficulty that the roles of Jim Shooter, Bill Mantlo, and Denny O’Neil can be teased out but between the three of them, they manage to scrape together a serviceable script that surely would have kept the younger set interested...if they could’ve found the book before it was summarily canceled with issue #12. (It was rumored that the first issue was rewritten and redrawn over a single night and that this issue represented a complete departure from even that deathless debut!) With the cancellation of the book (and its license with Ideal), Marvel kept the Team around for a little while longer renaming them the Thunderers and adding the Thing...that’s right, the Fantastic Four ’s Thing...to the team. Hoo boy! I The wild and wooly world of Marvel licensing didn’t get any goofier than this! (On the other hand, didn’t the Thing once drive a souped-up Formula-1 race car in Strange Tales #127?) Fun Fact: Ideal’s original toy line was based on then-popular daredevil stunt rider Evel Knievel before a brush with the law ended the relationship. Shifting gears, Ideal relabeled the action figures and vehicles as Team America and licensed the whole shebang to Marvel to make of it what they could!

Bizarre Adventures #32 “Sea of Destiny” Alan Zelenitz (script); John Bolton (pencils/inks) In an encore presentation, artist extraordinaire John Bolton returns, following up his triumphant Kull story in issue #26 with this somewhat less hefty 19-page tale in Bizarre Adventures #32 (Aug. 1982). Teaming up with scripter Alan Zelenetz, who eventually became Marvel’s go-to guy for barbarian lit after writer/ editor Roy Thomas quit Marvel for greener pastures, Bolton delivers his usual incredible job managing to bring a genuine Nordic feel to a tale of Thor that takes place before his assumption of the Don Blake persona. Bolton catches the reader’s eye with an opening splash page showing a raging sea before segueing to the gods at play. There, Zelenetz forecasts his later work on the King Conan title by including a Brule the Spearslayer lookalike as well as a Ridondo-ish minstrel. Meanwhile, Bolton slips in a couple curvaceous female hangers-on and a close-up of the Warriors Three, whose faces glow in a kind of still-life-connoting a creepy strangeness the artist would cultivate later for a series of horror stories he’d execute for Pacific Comics. As the story unfolds, we see Thor in the days

Alan Zelenitz (left) became Marvel’s de facto sword and sorcery scribe after Roy Thomas left the scene. Meanwhile, tip-top artist Val Mayerik (right) began to slip as the 1980s wore on.

of his hubris, defy Fate and go to the aid of one Runolf, a Viking who has prayed to the God to save him from drowning. Despite all warnings, Thor feels an obligation to his worshiper and seeks to interfere, battling a giant seahorse creature in some truly outstanding action panels by Bolton. In the end, even the god of thunder can’t alter the course of destiny, and as a result of his battle with the sea creature, Runolf’s boat is overturned and he drowns anyway. It was a nice, low-key story by Zelenetz made to seem much more significant than it really was by Bolton’s soaring art, but well worth the price of entry for all that. By comparison, the rest of the issue is forgettable with various entries intended to be humorous takes on the subject of God but failing mightily. Not much more interesting was a story called “The Prophet” scripted by Mark Gruenwald, essentially an SF tale where Earth is abandoned with the exception of the prophet of the title. What makes this tale worthy of at least a casual glance were some occasional close-ups by Val Mayerik. The rest of it was unusually weak for an artist who showed much promise earlier in the Twilight Years. The feeling here is that Mayerik’s heart wasn’t in it. In any case, Bizarre Adventures wasn’t long for this world along with the rest of Marvel’s black-and-white line whose own fate pointed to extinction.

Fantastic Four #245

“Childhood’s End” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Lots of things goin’ on in Fantastic Four #245 (Aug. 1982), not least of which is an early clue to Byrne’s later decision to break up the long-running romance

between the Thing and Alicia. Somewhat late on arrival though was Byrne’s explanation of his philosophy in approaching the FF, that of taking the team back to its Stan Lee/Jack Kirby roots. That approach is formalized in an introductory scene as Susan Storm confronts a thinly veiled stand-in for long-time television foil Barbara Walters, here named Barbara Walker. As a guest on Walker’s TV show “Woman to Woman,” Sue is forced to defend traditional values in general and her own role as the distaff member of the FF in particular against snarky feminist digs by her self-righteous host. “Welcome, Ms. Storm,” opens Walker. “That’s Mrs. Richards, Barbara...” corrects Sue. “‘Mrs. Richards? It’s true then, Susan, that you have accepted a subservient role to that of your husband, Professor Reed Richards?” “I’d hardly call it subservient, Barbara,” replies Sue. “I love my husband very much, and I know it makes him proud that I have chosen to take his name, just as I am proud to bear it.” “Those do not sound like the words of a modern liberated woman, Susan. Nor does your title the Invisible Girl.” “Really? I know who I am, so I’m not a prisoner of words or labels.” Next, Walker raises such traditional objections to Sue’s inclusion on the team, such as always needing to be rescued and having useless powers. After putting those concerns to rest, Sue concludes the interview in a summation of Byrne’s take on the FF: “We of the Fantastic Four did not choose to become ‘superheroes.’ We are just ordinary people who fate selected to be made more than human. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, we did not lose our human foibles when we gained our powers. And being the Invisible Girl has not deprived me of being a wife and mother, the role I love the most.” In interviews at the time, Byrne was taken to task by some for being “conservative” particularly on the issue of creators’ rights. (There was a growing campaign at the time to get Marvel to return Jack Kirby’s original art, something the company was reluctant to do in fear that doing so would somehow be interpreted as tacit agreement that the artist had a copyright claim on the characters he had a hand in creating. But in signing a work-for-hire contract during those years, Kirby willingly gave up any claims to ownership, a result that Byrne defended from a purely legal standpoint. Others in the fan community disagreed and excoriated the artist for his position.) By having Sue defend her code name as well as the traditional role of wife and mother, it could be interpreted as more evidence of Byrne’s conservative leanings but as would be seen in later issues it was far from being conclusive. (In fact, much of Byrne’s non-Marvel work would belie the notion of his being conservative The Dark Ages

robot that took the place of the Human Torch in the 1978 FF cartoon show, is finally destroyed in this issue! It’s true! Early on Byrne and writer Marv Wolfman consternated fans by including the character in the former’s earlier run on the title. That was bad enough, but when Byrne brought the robot back for his solo run as writer/artist, it was too much. That said, in H.E.R.B.I.E.’s role as babysitter for Franklin Richards, Byrne seemed to have found the perfect solution for keeping it around. H.E.R.B.I.E. however, met its end this issue when its circuits were overloaded after a burst of energy turned Franklin into an adult. Unfortunately, one of the things that would make the Dark Age a little darker would be the return of H.E.R.B.I.E.....about which the less said the better!

Wolverine Limited Series #1 John Byrne effectively lampooned celebrity interviewer Barbara Walters in FF #245 as Sue Storm’s values were called into question by “Barbara Walker” who represented the era’s brand of increasingly intolerant feminism.

although much of it had the ring of someone who was trying too hard to join the liberal club.) Anyway, as this issue moves along, Sue returns to a strangely quiet Baxter Building (in the process of being rebuilt into one of the most unique architectural designs ever seen in comics...and one guaranteed to give headaches to any artist who took over the strip after Byrne left). There, she finds her teammates unconscious with a long-haired galoot with super powers raging in their headquarters. The requisite action follows until Sue realizes that the guy is her own son, a grown up Franklin Richards! It seemed that readers’ speculations had finally been answered: Franklin would have super powers at some point. It was disappointing news in a way, as a normal member of the FF family would have offered much potential for character development and personal conflict in the future. Alas, it was not to be! Meanwhile, before reverting himself back into a child, Franklin attempts to cure the Thing and turn him back to human form permanently but for some reason fails (instead, the Thing is transformed from his original slagged rock look that Byrne had reinstituted in an earlier issue, to his later, more famous plated rock look). In the final few panels of the issue, Reed (and thus Byrne) finally explains why all the attempts to cure the Thing failed in the past: because subconsciously fearing that it’s the Thing that girlfriend Alicia really digs and not the bland Ben Grimm, he himself did not want to be cured! Fun Fact: H.E.R.B.I.E. (Humanoid Experimental Robot, B-type, Integrated Electronics), the much reviled 60

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“I’m Wolverine” Chris Claremont (script); Frank Miller (pencils); Josef Rubinstein (inks) Chalk it up as one of the biggest disappointments of the Twilight Years. On the face of it, the math looked good: take the hottest character in the Marvel stable, the writer of the most popular comic book on the market teamed up with the most exciting rising star on the art scene, and the total should have added up to the coolest project this side of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby coming together again to do an original Silver Surfer graphic novel...except we know how that turned out! The format was to be one of Marvel’s earliest attempts at the limited series concept and it was going to star Wolverine, the breakout character from the wildly popular X-Men book. Further guaranteeing that the feature would be one of the most eagerly awaited series of all time was the fact that it would be scripted by X-Men scribe Chris Claremont and drawn by Daredevil guiding genius Frank Miller. How could a combination like that fail? Unfortunately, the reality is that it did, as both men came to the project not with their strengths but with their weaknesses. What resulted was a story out of character for Wolverine and uninteresting to boot. Over the years since his throwaway appearance in Incredible Hulk #181, the character of Wolverine had been built up, slowly at first under Claremont and Cockrum on the X-Men where his personality was largely confined to smoking cigars, calling people “bub,” and being short (resulting in a compensatory feistiness). It wasn’t until artist John Byrne replaced Cockrum that the cool factor really began to attach itself to Wolverine. Due in no small measure to Byrne’s more dynamic art style, the character suddenly became more vicious than feisty with hints, not only of representing real danger to his opponents, but of a background dealing with government experimentation,

action shifts to Japan where our hero has gone in search of the missing woman. Mariko, as it turns out, has since married which doesn’t please Wolverine. He ends up fighting her father and is surprisingly, defeated and dumped in an alley. There, he’s saved from local thugs by a mysterious woman who also hints of a past relationship between them... ho hum. What makes the whole thing even more dreary is Claremont’s

the Canadian secret service, a mutant healing factor that might have extended his lifespan to over a 100 years, and even a kinship with another similarly vicious villain named Sabretooth (which Byrne suggested might be his father!) A controversial scene in X-Men #115 that suggested Wolverine was not bound by the super-hero code against killing, cemented his reputation for coolness among fans. Thus, all the ingredients were in place for a Wolverine solo outing that many hoped would address his tantalizing backstory. But it was not to be. First, Byrne was to be nowhere in sight having by that time left the X-Men for the Fantastic Four, and second, Claremont chose to ignore ideas championed by hix ex-partner, instead creating for Wolverine a virtually unsuspected history in Japan. Add to that, a growing fascination by Miller for all things Japanese martial arts and in particular those of samurai, senseis, and shoguns, and what eager fans ended up with was four issues of Wolverine fighting hordes of sword-wielding ninjas while fending off the specter of past romantic encounters. Where was the secret Canadian project that gave him his adamantium skeleton? Where was the showdown with his “father,” Sabretooth? Where was the backstory between himself and Alpha Flight? Where was the origin of his mutant ability to heal quickly? None of it was present in Wolverine Limited Series #1 (Sept. 1982), instead fans got cliched closeups of the “feisty” Wolverine on the cover and again on the opening splash page along with rather heavy-handed metaphor for his bestial nature as he pits his fighting skills against a grizzly bear. A nice half-page portrait of Mariko Yashida, Wolverine’s lost love, dominates page 8 before the

The worst of both worlds? The Wolverine Limited Series included both writer Chris Claremont’s by now overly familiar literary tropes as well as artist Frank Miller’s already tiresome infatuation with ninjas and the martial arts in general.

The Dark Ages

by now all too familiar scripting tropes that he delivers in bite size nuggets the more to sound dramatic and weighty: “I’m Wolverine,” notes the script on the opening page. “I’m the best there is at what I do. But what I do best isn’t very nice” or “I’m here on business. To hunt. To kill. Like I said...what I do best.” Want more? “Wind shifted during my climb. He knows I’m coming. He’s confused. Probably a little scared...He roars, a challenge. I smile. Won’t be long now. It isn’t.” It would be Claremont’s signature style for many, too many, years to come. Meanwhile, Miller lays out the book in much the same style he developed over on Daredevil. Rubinstein, however, is credited as “finisher” rather than simply inker suggesting that he served in the same capacity here as Klaus Janson was doing over Miller on DD. If so, he does a rather nice job over the artist’s sometimes awkward figure work while lending real impact to such shots as a close-up of Wolverine on page 9, panel 4. Overall, the series was not so much painful to read as it was disappointing. This was just a new version of Wolverine and not the one fans had laid down their 60¢ x 4 an issue to see.

Saturday morning television with a couple cartoon series and then on prime time with a live-action TV show, the book was helmed by a succession of second-string writers and artists (after an initial launch scripted by Gerry Conway). But the dull regularity was interrupted for a time when artist Ed Hannigan arrived on the scene. Hannigan sneaked in under fans’ radar

“The Great Cloak and Dagger Hunt!” Bill Mantlo (script); Ed Hannigan (pencils); Al Milgrom (inks) In a run noted for few, if any, outstanding issues, Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man managed to limp along largely on the popularity of its title character. (In fact, it’d be hard to come up with 260-some-odd issues of a single title that could be any more bland than this series turned out to be). Aided no doubt by a growing public awareness of Spidey, following his debut on 62

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Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #70

For a time, artist Ed Hannigan managed to inject some life into the Spidey sub-verse title Spectacular Spider-Man with interiors that attempted to recapture some of the old Steve Ditko magic but mostly with effectively designed cover layouts that made the books eye-grabbers.

Marvel in the mid-Twilight Years (before he moved on to DC to perform the same services there and take on a few interior penciling jobs as well). For instance, this issue’s cover showing Silvermane holding a defeated Cloak and Dagger beneath a torn curtain in the form of Spidey’s mask, is a perfect example of his eye-catching style. One thing’s for sure, Hannigan’s attention-grabbing covers likely boosted sales in those dismal last years when comics could still be found by impulse buyers at their local newsstand.

Avengers #224

Ed Hannigan (left) migrated from Marvel to DC where he provided more impressive cover art for books like the Best of DC: Metal Men and, with interior work, helped launch Green Arrow in a new series as well as the longrunning Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight.

screen in the late 1970s, doing thankless work on the moribund Defenders strip until copping onto Spectacular with issue #60. Once teamed with writer Bill Mantlo, the two proceeded to churn out some decent issues avoiding use of Spider-Man’s usual cast of supporting characters and concentrating instead on his life at college and sometime girlfriend, Debra Whitman. As of Peter Parker, Spectacular Spider-Man #70 (Sept. 1982), Hannigan’s art still wasn’t much to write home about, the dynamism that comes through on the layouts however were good examples of the kind of verve he’d bring to his better known work as a cover artist. This issue for example, features Cloak and Dagger, a pair of teenaged super-heroes that Mantlo and Hannigan came up with earlier in their run. Characters whose powers of dark and light provide good opportunities for some dramatic shots which Hannigan duly presents on pages 7 and 8 combining silhouette and simplified, almost representational art on one page and monochromatic effects on the second. His art on those pages dealing with a mechanized Silvermane, however, suffers in comparison. Curiously, on the pages that don’t feature Cloak and Dagger, Hannigan’s art, though rough, seems to be a deliberate combination of Steve Ditko (mainly the book’s opening pages which seem torn directly from Amazing Spider-Man #23 and Ross Andru (see for example, Peter’s profile in panel 3, page 12 and one scene readers could have lived without: seeing Peter Parker in his whity tighties...ugh!) Be that as it may, Hannigan’s real strength was in his layouts which happily for fans, were on frequent display at

“Two From the Heart” Jim Shooter (plot); Alan Zelenetz (script); Mark Bright (pencils); Brett Breeding and Crew (inks) Avengers #224 (Oct. 1982) continued the downward spiral upon which writer Jim Shooter had placed Hank Pym/Yellowjacket months before. But since issue #213, things had changed. Since promoted to editor-in-chief, Shooter was forced to cut back on his workload, including writing scripts for the Avengers. But the ramifications of the events he set in motion there would continue to effect the direction of the book and its characters. Take Yellowjacket for instance. In the intervening issues since his expulsion from the team, things had not improved for the diminutive hero. Following his mental breakdown in issue #213 that included striking his wife (something that Shooter said had not been his intention; although he’d intended for Pym simply to thrust Jan aside, harming her by accident, miscommunication with artist Bob Hall made the scene look as if he hit her on purpose thus branding him forever after as a “wife beater”) and endangering his colleagues in a failed scheme to prove his worth, Pym was duped by his old archenemy Egghead and framed for an attack on the Avengers. Defeated, he was tried and sentenced to jail where we find him this ish languishing in a prison cell. Could things get any worse? Answer: they could! At this point, following what was happening to the Pym character was like coming across a particularly bad auto accident: you couldn’t keep from looking. It wasn’t a good precedent to be setting for comics, but it was definitely a novel one at the time. They say that the road to hell is paved with good intentions and the same might be said for the various signposts that would dot the landscape of the later Twilight Years. Signposts, such as this issue’s story, one of the earliest instances of Marvel devalueing its own creations in order to tell interesting stories, but in reality setting off down a path that would lead to the company’s own destruction and presage a time when nothing would be held sacred, least of all the legacy bequeathed to readers everywhere by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and Steve The Dark Ages

Ditko. But at the time, no one could predict the depths to which the movement would go, and so, Shooter’s lead (preceded somewhat by David Michelinie on Iron Man) would be followed in later years by Frank Miller’s “Born Again” arc on Daredevil. But for now, no character had ever been put through the kind of wringer that Hank Pym was. Now, behind bars, his final degradation awaits as newspaper reports filter in telling of former wife Jan/Wasp’s flirtation/affair with millionaire Tony Stark. But what the frustrated Pym doesn’t know is that he’s been further betrayed in that Stark is his former teammate Iron Man! Outside prison, we see Tony and Jan conduct their affair in a public way, even as Captain America realizes the irreparable harm that the affair could do if Hank and Jan ever found out that their emotions were trifled with by someone they thought they could trust. With growing concern, he lectures Stark about the danger. “Tony,” Cap tells Iron Man. “She’s...Hank’s wife...” Stark rationalizes his actions by reminding Cap that the two are divorced and that he’s paying all the bills for Pym’s lawyers, psychiatrists, and detectives. “But it’s not more than a month, man!” insists Cap. “How can you do this to him...Where’s your sense of responsibility? This...affair...it’s just plain cruel to a longtime friend like Hank.” Shamed into acting, when next Stark meets Jan, he tells her that he’s Iron Man and the affair is ended. “Oh, Tony, this isn’t what I needed... not a member of the team. Not Hank’s friend...” The final scene in the issue (that features barely a single panel of action) is a close-up of Pym’s face behind bars as another prisoner taunts him from off panel: “Looks like Stark chewed up yer lady friend an’ spit ‘er out, eh, Pym?” Things did not bode well for the future both for Pym and for comics, but it can’t be denied that all these developments—Yellowjacket’s breakdown and expulsion and how it ends up affecting all the other Avengers—made for extremely interesting, if ultimately disappointing, reading for long-time Ant-Man/ Yellowjacket fans. Throughout, guest writer Alan Zelenetz does a good job with the dialogue, spoiled only by yet another lackluster penciling job, this time by Mark Bright. With the vastly increased number of titles that were being churned out by Marvel in the 1980s, many more pencilers were needed to fill up all those thousands of pages with art. Unfortunately, that meant hiring many that were not up to the standards that fans had grown to expect over the years. Each may have had different strengths, but many titles nevertheless suffered as the quality of visuals failed to keep up with the dramatic demands of stories (not that a lot of the stories were so hot either...the same problem of needing to fill pages plagued Marvel’s stable of writers too). Meanwhile, back in jail, Pym refuses an opportunity to 64

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bust out and prove his innocence. “I’m not going to make any more mistakes,” he declares; but how long can he resist while his world continued to crumble around him? Stay tuned!

Marvel Graphic Novel #1 “The Death of Captain Marvel;” Jim Starlin (script, pencils, inks) After a swift rise in popularity during the 1970s working on such features as Warlock and Master of Kung Fu, Jim Starlin left Marvel, dissatisfied in dealings with the latter and creative frustrations with the former. Moving over to DC, he picked up work here and there, most notably on a handful of Batman stories he wrote and a short string of tales for DC Comics Presents, teaming Superman up with various of the company’s heroes. There, he continued to explore the same themes he addressed in his Marvel work, peaking with issue #36 in which he repeated the successful formula used for Captain Marvel, turning Starman, a minor spacefaring hero, into a cosmically aware being. Lured back to Marvel with promises of retaining control of his creations by way of Epic, the company’s new creatorowned line of comics, Starlin came up with Dreadstar, a series that he would continue to work on intermittently for different publishers as the years went by. Unlike Dreadstar, however, which revisited the same tired themes Starlin had by now run into the ground, the artist’s concurrent project would prove far more interesting and immediate. Titled “The Death of Captain Marvel” and featured in Marvel Graphic

By the time Jim Starlin (left) capped his early career at Marvel with its first graphic novel, he’d already begun to moonlight at rival DC writing and penciling a short run of memorable issues for DC Comics Presents before becoming a scripter only on a number of other less memorable features.

battle with Thanos after Marvel loses consciousness for the final time. There, he struggles against the inevitable until finally, accepting death, he and Thanos together walk into eternity. At that point, Starlin the iconoclast, seems to soften his position regarding faith and presents the possibility of there being something more. “...this is not the end,” Thanos tells Marvel,

Novel #1 (1982), the project involved Starlin’s return to his fan-preferred roots working with the character that had first gained him recognition. According to Starlin, he was asked to end the good captain’s career because plans were afoot to introduce a new female version with the same name. Be that as it may, exciting fans even further about the project was the new format in which the 63-page story would be presented, what Marvel dubbed a “graphic novel.” Priced at $5.95 when regular comics were still only 60¢, the book was squarebound and oversized, and featured high-quality, glossy paper that accentuated the four-color medium. What’s more, unlike many later graphic novels, Starlin’s story was worthy of the format! In it, Captain Marvel, through his cosmic senses, discovers that he is dying of cancer contracted from exposure to nerve gas following an encounter with Nitro in the final issue Starlin produced in the character’s regular series. In the graphic novel, a somber tone of inevitability pervades the story even as every effort to find a cure is made by the likes of Reed Richards and Dr. Strange. Interludes in which Marvel meets with long-time friends and associates in effect to say goodbye effectively convey a sense of loss and failed opportunities even as his health begins to sink. Finally, with Earth’s heroes gathered at his bedside, the sickened Marvel, just like any other mortal, dies. So well-crafted is the story that the reader is genuinely moved, finding himself actually caring for this fictional character that spent much of his career in red and blue tights. To be sure, the book has its quota of action, including a representational

Marvel Graphic Novel #1, page 59: Writer/artist Jim Starlin does what he does best: giving readers a slam-bang fight sequence that’s actually representational of the hero’s inner turmoil! Starlin enjoyed putting his characters through their philosophical/selfdiscovery/internal angst/what have you paces, a trick he would use often through the 1980s and beyond.

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What Starlin began for The Death of Captain Marvel became something of a tradition in comics and beyond as super-hero crowd scenes from one company began to feature “uncredited” appearances of characters from another. this shot from the funeral of Dan Turpin (who looked an awful lot like Jack Kirby) as shown in Superman: the Animated Series. That’s Nick Fury, Reed and Sue Richards, and Johnny Storm among the mourners.

“...only the beginning!” It was Starlin’s magnum opus, his masterpiece, topping a stellar career that flamed out all too soon because he never again produced anything even close to this powerful and moving story (which was inspired, as he’s said in interviews, by the experience of his own father who also died of cancer). Ironically, Captain Marvel’s death here seemed also to foreshadow the creeping doom that would leave Marvel Comics itself an anemic shadow of its former self. But unlike the fallen Kree soldier, would there be anyone left to mourn at the company’s graveside as the heroes do in this story’s final scene? Fun Fact: In an early example of sneaking in the competition’s characters in superhero crowd scenes, Starlin has invited Superman to attend Captain Marvel’s burial services! Can you spot him on the back cover (which also serves as the story’s final panel)?

Fantastic Four #246

“Too Many Dooms” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Now that Byrne had finished restoring Galactus to his proper place in the Marvel Universe, he was ready to do the same with the FF’s, and Marvel’s, biggest, baddest, super-villain. The last we saw Victor von Doom at the peak of his characterization was in FF #s 84-87 and though he hadn’t been mishandled since (later appearances in Thor and the FF scripted by Stan Lee 66

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and drawn by John Buscema and a solo tale by Gerry Conway and Gene Colan for Astonishing Tales largely preserved his dignity), nothing really stood out as capturing his larger-than-life personality. Beginning with Fantastic Four #246 (Sept. 1982), Byrne would begin to change all that, not only restoring Doom to his menacing, cultured best, but also deepening his characterization by placing him in situations calculated to reveal his human side. Byrne had got off to a good start in issue #236 but that was only an appetizer, with the main course being served this issue as the action picks up where that other issue left off, in Liddleville. There, Doom’s mind is still trapped in the figure of a puppet created by the Puppet Master but is rescued by...another Doom? Meanwhile, a third Doom is at the Latverian embassy in New York making arrangements for the delivery of a fourth Doom held in stasis by the FF. What was going on here? It was all an elaborate contingency plan by Doom in case of his defeat to have his various robot replicas rescue their master from whatever fate had befallen him. In this case, the robots manage to transfer Doom’s mind trapped in the tiny puppet into his inert body delivered by the FF. And what about the FF? As telegraphed by a cool cover reminiscent of Kirby’s for FF #17 that shows the four members of the team being threatened by four separate traps, they arrive at the Latverian embassy only to fall into Doom’s clutches: the Torch is covered in “fireproof glop,” the Invisible Girl falls into a “vertigo beam,” Mr. Fantastic is entangled in a “spinning grappler,” and the Thing is electrocuted. Of course, they all manage to escape and each defeats a Doom robot while doing so. Their individual battles are expertly choreographed by Byrne who conveys the action in hectic fashion with a diverse but simple panel layout, the standout being those big, quarter-page panels on page 15. After everything comes out in the wash, the FF are placed between a rock and a hard place when they discover that Doom’s ultimate game was to whisk them to Latveria, where it seems the tiny country has suffered greatly since he lost his throne to a claimant named Zorba! Not So Fun Fact: And what was it with Marvel in these years? Abandoning the page numbering system that the industry had used for decades, namely placing the numbers in the bottom corners of every story page, it first numbered all the pages including advertising pages then stopped numbering pages entirely. Was it a scheme to confuse readers as actual story page counts were reduced? This issue for instance has 22 story pages for 60¢, roughly the same number as when the books were at 12¢. But not to worry! Page count would continue to shrink and prices not only rise but skyrocket in the Dark Ages, placing comics well beyond the reach of a typical kid.

Fantastic Four #247

“This Land is Mine!” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Continued from last ish, Fantastic Four #247 (Oct. 1982) opens with a shot of Dr. Doom waving his arms in the air and crying out the title of this issue’s story (was Byrne channeling George Perez?). The FF have been taken to Latveria by Doom in order to get them to help in restoring the postage

Fantastic Four #247, page 7: Riffing on hints scattered from FF #84-87 and other past sources that the Dr. Doom character wasn’t all evil tyrant, writer/artist John Byrne added shades of gray by depicting him as a benevolent father figure to his people who were grateful for the safety and prosperity his genius has bestowed upon Latveria.

stamp-sized country back to him. But why should they? The people are better off without a merciless dictator lording it over them, aren’t they? Not so fast! As it turns out, Doom hadn’t been such a bad guy after all. Strict but fair, his people do hold some affection for him and as the FF discovered, things under Zorba haven’t exactly been a democratic paradise either. And the worst of it is that it was the FF themselves who helped overthrow Doom back in ish #200. Zorba, it seems, has been more lenient than Doom, allowing crime and want to return to the land, free elections have been canceled, and Doom’s robot secret police unleashed on the public. “...we knew not how happy, free of all the strife which so troubles the rest of the world,” recounts a local peasant woman. “Under the rule of Doctor Doom each man and woman had all they could desire...” Then, as she finishes her list of woes, she’s killed by the robots right before the eyes of Doom and the FF. With the proof of how things were right in front of them, the FF have no choice but to fight at Doom’s side. The end, of course, is never in doubt. Doom disposes of Zorba and releases the FF only to once again vow that next time will be different! Next time, he intends on destroying them! But in the meantime, Byrne has done it again! As he did with Galactus, he managed to hit the re-set button (to coin a phrase!) and restore Doom to the top of the villainous heap while at the same time emphasizing what had once been a hallmark of Marvel: villains who were neither completely black nor completely white. Something the writer/artist would continue to explore more deeply in coming issues. The Dark Ages

Dr. Strange #55

“To Have Loved...and Lost!” Roger Stern (script); Michael Golden (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) The Dr. Strange strip had fallen on hard times since the days when Steve Englehart was riding high and Gene Colan and Tom Palmer had reunited on the art. Since then, a succession of less-impressive artists had taken over until Marshall Rogers crossed over from DC to team-up with writer Roger Stern for a return to greatness. Stern, like John Byrne, had an

Dr. Strange #55, page 1: Behold the magnificence of artist/inker team supreme Michael Golden and Terry Austin! Their highly detailed art in this issue mightily recalled some early efforts by Steve Ditko himself during his Atlas and Warren years in which he’d knock himself out rendering his own pencils in the same overly articulated style.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

encyclopedic memory for Marvel history and a respect for what Stan Lee and others had accomplished in the Silver Age and often used events from past stories as the basis for expanding continuity into the future. That attitude, coupled with Rogers’ willingness to recapture some of the weird visuals of strip founder Steve Ditko, became the springboard for a brief renaissance of the Dr. Strange strip beginning with issue #48, which would continue after Rogers left under fellow artist Paul Smith. But in between another of the era’s most popular artists, also an alumnus of DC, filled in for one incredible issue. It had often been rumored at the time that Michael Golden would be taking over this book or that, often accompanied by much anticipatory excitement among fans, but the elusive Golden never came through, leaving behind him a stellar reputation but with precious little work for readers to enjoy. Beginning his career at DC, mostly with fillin work spanning everything from Batman to the Demon, Golden’s art began somewhat cartoonish and two-dimensional but quickly added weight with an increased use of blacks. It was the latter style he brought with him when he came over to Marvel in 1978 where he became the regular penciler on the Micronauts, one of Marvel’s many product tie-ins at the time. And although the stories were marginal to the Marvel Universe at large, they solidified the artist’s reputation with fans who eagerly looked forward to his taking over more substantial strips. That never happened, at least on a continuing basis. Instead, Golden performed largely fill-in work on such projects as Avengers Annual #10, Marvel

The less said about the 1978 Dr. Strange T V movie, the better!

Fanfare, and Howard the Duck. In 1986, he finally did land a regular gig but one with nary a costumed character in sight. The ‘Nam was an attempt by Marvel to launch a late-innings war book and though well-received, title lasted years and for Golden fans, was something of a disappointment as his art there seemed a retrogression to his more cartoony efforts on display at the beginning of his career. But before all that, Golden did do one fill-in job that more than made up for all the false starts, Dr. Strange #55 (Oct. 1982). Here were all the hopes and dreams fans had held for the artist fulfilled! Teamed with Terry Austin, the hottest inker at the time with his work over Byrne on the X-Men and Marshall Rogers on Batman, Golden’s art finally fulfilled the promise it had always shone! Channeling the spirit of Steve Ditko (indeed, two characters in the story would be named Les Tane and Ted Tevoski, anagrams for Stan Lee and Steve Ditko, introduced as the writer and artist of Dr. Strange’s adventures!) Golden, following Stern’s script, fills the story with close-ups of Strange’s agonized features, much as Ditko used to, to convey thought and emotion (you can’t top panels 2 and 3 on page 6, which show a shocked Dr. Strange held in an insane asylum and bound in a straitjacket for sheer disbelieving shock, or panel 2, page 4 depicting Doc’s shadowed face much as Ditko did in the doctor’s now classic origin story from Strange Tales #115). Golden also took the opportunity to recapture such Ditko set pieces as the Ancient One’s monastery high in the Himalayas or his Bleeker Street sanctum sanctorum. Overall, the story is one of those that Marvel writers like Jim Starlin and Steve Englehart used to do every now and then, recapping the hero’s career in a format

where the hero is either being driven insane or forced to re-examine his values to emerge at the end changed in some psychological way. In this case, it’s the former in the shape of Dakhim the Enchanter, who in turn is revealed as D’spayre, another of those conceptual personifications that had become a hallmark of the Strange strip. Anyway, Dakhim leads Strange through a number of scenarios that along the way cover his past career and super-heroic colleagues until D’spayre is revealed, and there follows a knock down, drag ‘em out battle between he and Strange. The good doctor must fight despair as well as D’spayre in a magical duel by Golden and Austin that makes readers believe powerful arcane forces are actually being unleashed right off the page! It was a tour de force rarely encountered in comics and one that would be wholly gone by the end of the decade as traditional comics art of pencil and ink wizardry gave way to kinetic but undisciplined manga-influenced styles made colder by computer-generated coloring and lettering made even more garish with the use of slick paper stock. But the more immediate calamity for fans was Golden’s subsequent departure from comics for the more lucrative animation industry.

Master of Kung-Fu #118 “Flesh of my Flesh” Doug Moench (script); Gene Day (pencils/inks) A lot of water had gone under the bridge since artist Paul Gulacy left the Master of Kung Fu strip with issue #50, and as the years passed, it became increasingly clear that the book peaked there as well. Oh, the book and writer Doug Moench carried on for years afterwards under a succession of artistic partners until finally running out of gas with issue #125. But it wasn’t just that Gulacy was a hard act to follow (an impossible one in fact!) but also that as soon as he left the strip, Moench decided to change direction, scuttling the book’s James Bond trappings and having the characters go into business for themselves. Bad idea. Out of the blue, Moench and Gulacy had struck on the perfect vehicle for telling tales of Shang Chi and crew. But once it was abandoned, the book began to flounder. Not helping was art by Jim Craig, who at first tried to ape Gulacy’s style to little success. He was followed in issue #64 with the slightly more interesting but no less bland Mike Zeck, whose inflated, balloonish figure work was often painful to look at. Then, along about issue #76, a newcomer to Marvel’s ranks began inking over Zeck’s pencils. His name was Gene Day, and he soon carved out a reputation for himself that was as inexplicable as it was predictable. Day had been around for some time before coming to the notice of the general comics reader, having begun The Dark Ages

Master of Kung Fu #118, page 34 and 35: A beautiful example of what was good and bad about Gene Day’s art: overall imaginative layout distracts from the artist’s struggle with the human figure as can be seen in stiff, illproportioned examples featured in the vertical row of panels on the right.

his career in the mid-1970s with the underground and independent scenes. At first supplying the inks over Zeck’s pencils, he soon began doing the finished art before taking over completely with issue #102. It was likely Day’s attempts at creative page layout (see pages 20 and 21, 28 and 29) and over-rendered backgrounds (check this issue’s splash page depicting a fantastically detailed Buddha before which the characters’ are parachuting) that endeared him to some fans. But that fervor was definitely not as widespread as it had been for earlier artists like Craig Russell, Barry Smith, Mike Ploog, or even Gulacy himself. What kept Day from breaking out of his MOKF niche were page designs that acted more as set pieces than fluid storytelling. In addition, his figure work was often stiff and unnatural looking (for instance, 70

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

characters would have their heads turned but their bodies remained facing straight ahead), facial features sometimes were a little too broad, heads too big for their bodies (see page 9, panel 7 this issue). Overall, however, Day’s style was such that a reader wanted to like it no matter the drawbacks. It was pleasing to the eye after all, and definitely more individualistic than many of his peers. Whatever it was that grabbed fans of his work was on ample display here, in Master of Kung Fu #118 (Nov. 1982), a double-sized edition detailing the end of the characters’ long-running battle with Fu Manchu. The issue would prove to be a kind of last hurrah however. Despite Day’s best efforts (no one can deny the work was a labor of love for the artist), sales continued to decline as the initial interest in the martial arts that had inspired the book finally petered out. As a result, the book’s frequency was reduced from monthly to bi-monthly and soon after this issue’s personal triumph, Day died suddenly of a heart attack. Moench himself quit the title with issue #122. The book, however, didn’t last much longer then he did, and was canceled with issue #125. But shed no tears for its demise. When it all began at the height of the kung fu mania, no one could have guessed that it would go on as long as it did. Credit that with

the ability of Moench (with some early input from Gulacy) to find the book’s footing and create something that was unique and different, wholly apart from the temporary fad that initially inspired it. He made readers care about his characters regardless of their origins on the small screen or in pulp literature, a quality that would be in ever shorter supply as the years went on.

Marvel Fanfare #6 “Switch Witch” Mike W. Barr (script); Sandy Plunkett (pencils); P. Craig Russell (inks) “The Showdown!” Roger Stern (script); Charles Vess (pencils/inks) Craig Russell still had it. (Or P. Craig Russell as the artist began signing his work). Having broken in at Marvel earlier in the Twilight Years and quickly building steam from crude but promising beginnings on strips featuring Morbius and Ant-Man, Russell flowered on “War of the Worlds,” where he turned in incredibly beautiful work and rocketed to fan-favorite status. Unfortunately, when the “War of the Worlds” strip was canceled, Russell dropped out of mainstream comics to spend the next several years among Marvel’s creator-owned publications doing stray stories for Epic Illustrated and a graphic novel adapting Michael Moorcock’s Elric of Melnibone to comics. That work saw a slight erosion of his art style, a bit of a comedown from “War of the Worlds,” which would prove to have been his peak period. As the Twilight Years progressed, Russell’s work would suffer with figures becoming less distinct and backgrounds and settings more representational. But that was down the road a ways. For now, in Marvel Fanfare #6 (Jan. 1983), the artist still had his chops, first on a nice cover and then with inks over penciler Sandy Plunkett for the book’s lead story “Switch Witch” by Mike W. Barr. And like Russell, Plunkett himself wasn’t a piker in the art department! Arriving on the scene in the late 1970s, Plunkett debuted with a fully formed art style reminiscent of such EC greats as Al Williamson and Angelo Torres that was strengthened by a willingness to break panel borders and look beyond traditional layouts. Never settling on a regular strip, his assignments from both DC and Marvel were rare but choice, including this issue’s story, which at 17 pages was quite long for Plunkett. Still hedging their bets, editors Al Milgrom and Jim Shooter continued to gueststar Spider-Man in stories wherever they could and “Switch Witch” is one of them. Here, Barr concocts a tale that reintroduces Xandu, a rival of Dr. Strange, who made his first appearance way back in Amazing Spider-Man Annual #2. It seems that Xandu intends to wed even if his prospective spouse is unwilling. The

Artists Sandy Plunkett (left) and Charles Vess each sported unique and interesting styles that had their fans. Unfortunately, both eschewed regular assignments and so were not seen as often as they should have as the ’80s progressed.

twist involves the Scarlet Witch (who has by this time become associated with magic powers seemingly only because the word “witch” appears in her name) whose soul Xandu has transferred to would-be wife Melinda while the soulless husk of the Scarlet Witch becomes his to command! After some mystical shenanigans with Spidey out of his element, the true spirit of Melinda returns, thwarting Xandu’s plan. And while Spidey and the two women are returned to Earth, Xandu is apparently stranded in a world he never made. It was a pretty good story, expertly weaving all of the characters together in a tale at once reminiscent of many an inter-dimensional romp by Dr. Strange originator Steve Ditko and Plunkett’s own interpretation of same (with a dash of Torres/Frank Frazetta as Wanda Frank aka the Scarlet Witch is spotlighted early on in a skimpy bathing suit). The back-up feature by writer Roger Stern stars the man himself, Dr. Strange in a little tale that no doubt had its origin in films such as The Gunfighter (Twentieth Century Fox, 1950). There, fast gun Gregory Peck is shot and killed by a youthful rival who then learns that the curse of being known as the best is having to forever fend off the challenges of others eager to prove themselves against him. In Stern’s tale, Dr. Strange’s challenger is one Ian McNee, who luckily learns his lesson without having to kill the good doctor. Underlining the story’s inspiration, the story ends with some kids in the street playing cowboys and discovering the futility of being “top gun.” Art for the story was supplied by Charles Vess, another The Dark Ages

newcomer to the later Twilight Years who, like Plunkett, was not prolific, but whose work was quite good if a bit elastic and somewhat cartoony at times. With material like this, Marvel Fanfare was indeed living up to the expectations of its audience by continuing to provide stories aimed directly at the hardcore fan.

Epic Illustrated #16 “The Beguiling” “A Path of Stars” Barry Windsor-Smith (script/pencils/inks) Barry Smith was back! And even though he was going by the sobriquet Barry Windsor-Smith now, it was the same guy and that’s all that mattered for fans desperate for a fix after too many years since his troubled leave-taking of the industry back in 1975. Since then, he’d busied himself perfecting his art style and designing a series of paintings/posters that left anyone who saw them breathless with amazement and delight. And that went double for fans who’d followed his career since those first fumbling efforts on X-Men and Daredevil. Now, having honed his art to a fine point, Windsor-Smith seemed ready to re-introduce himself to the comics industry. As detailed in this issue by editor Archie Goodwin, following an interview with the artist in issue #7, Windsor-Smith expressed an interest to “edge back into the comics medium” and offered a story called “The Beguiling” to do it with. Hiding his eagerness, Goodwin jumped all over it and when the story was delivered, it was found to have increased by a couple of pages! A low-

key tale of a doomed love between a lonely knight and an angelic imp, the story itself is more of a framework upon which to hang 38 meticulously executed panels. Each one is an individual painting as delicate as gossamer and colorful as a stained-glass window. It was the kind of work, awesome in its detail, that had made Windsor-Smith’s increasingly complex style uneconomical for mainstream comics. It just took too much time to create this kind of art to make a page-rate worthwhile. So if he had any intention of returning to comics on a regular basis, Windsor-Smith would need to find a compromise between the artistic sensibilities that first drove him from Marvel and what he would need to do to make his re-entry now a profitable one. But “The Beguiling” wasn’t only the Windsor-Smith work this issue would feature. There was also an older, two-page tale called “A Path of Stars” to follow-up the initial story. A good deal less impressive than “The Beguiling,” “Path of Stars” amounted to hardly more than a visual joke with a bad punchline. Its humor very much in keeping with later examples of Windsor-Smith’s scripting, such as a Thing solo tale featured in Marvel Fanfare, Archer and Armstrong, or Young Gods, attempts at humor that fell flat. Like many comics artists, Windsor-Smith was better served when he didn’t write his own material. Finally, in what was swiftly shaping up to be a special Barry Windsor-Smith issue of Epic, Goodwin decided to take an unused drawing showing what looked like King Conan and Valeria of the Red Brotherhood fighting off a horde of sword-welding baddies and use it as the springboard for a prose story he’d write himself titled of course, “The Horde!” Throw in a stunning cover featuring one of the artist’s mythological subjects called “Self Portrait With Wings,” and Epic Illustrated #16 (Feb. 1983) made for one heck of an impressive start to Windsor-Smith’s second career in comics! By comparison, the rest of the stuff in this issue pales to nothingness.

Kull the Conqueror (Vol. 2) #2

In the 1980s, Barry Smith (left) returned to the fold as Barry Windsor-Smith, gradually working his way into mainstream comics (while still pursuing independent projects such as Barry Windsor-Smith Storyteller) until becoming creative director for Valiant Comics in the early ’90s, filling a similar role there that Jack Kirby did for Marvel in the Early Years.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

“The Blood of Kings!” Doug Moench (script); John Bolton (pencils/inks/colors) Wow! Bolton does it again! The Kull feature may have had its high point with its first legendary run with the Severin siblings on the art, but it continued to be more than well served into the 1980s with Bolton providing the art on two extra-length tales that truly captured the claustrophobic, even paranoiac, atmosphere of Robert E. Howard’s Atlantean hero. That atmosphere was present from the start with the feature’s first storyline, which involved the hidden serpent men and then the ongoing feeling that plotters, assassins, ambitious generals, and resentful nobles all were looking for the

small life that at least knew a momentary taste of greatness...before the inevitable end.” Doug Moench, who had distinguished himself in the early Twilight Years on Master of Kung Fu and Batman while working for the Distinguished Competition, managed to come up with one of the best Kull stories ever written, even taking into account those by Robert E. Howard himself. It perfectly captured the oppressive undercurrent

chance to betray Kull at the first opportunity. It all made for wholly different kinds of stories than those of the footloose Conan, who could just move on if he felt like it, but Kull could only sit and brood and sometimes even philosophize on responsibility and the burdens of kingship. The best Kull stories then were those that touched on most if not all of those points, and by that yardstick Kull the Conqueror Vol. 2 #2 (March 1983) succeeded... in spades! Although somewhat reminiscent of the aforementioned serpent men storyline, this issue’s tale of werewolves infesting Kull’s castle with him not knowing who among his retainers they might be still packs an unsettling wallop. And if having to solve the riddle of the werewolves wasn’t enough, the king also has to contend with politics. In that arena, Kull is counseled to wed an Atlantean princess named Sareena in an arranged marriage. At first he refuses to have anything do with Sareena, but after meeting her, they fall in love and decide to go through with the wedding after all. But as the nuptials are set to begin, Sareena is killed by a maddened citizen (who turns out to be a werewolf!) and Atlantis declares war in retaliation. But not all is at it seems; behind it all are the werewolves whom Kull eventually defeats after prolonged battle that also includes a resurrected Sareena, changed into a werewolf. In a bloody climax, Kull is forced to slay the girl he loves in order to save her from werewolfism. Kull triumphs against his foes, but his victory is a hollow one. “...for me... there is now but the whiff of weary melancholy...and a glimpse of slow, liquid dreams...waiting beyond. A

Kull the Conqueror #2, page 29: Color for this issue was nice but superfluous when it came to pulse-pounding panels such as these from artist John Bolton! Writer Doug Moench’s script wasn’t bad either, effectively capturing the literary cadences of Kull creator Robert E. Howard.

The Dark Ages

that the strip demanded. It was also a triumph for John Bolton, who, although not well served here in the coloring department, still managed to produce a comics masterpiece. (He was credited for the coloring along with Christie Scheele, but neither seemed able to contend with the way Baxter paper always made colors come out looking flat or garish). Adept at the depiction of such quiet moments as Kull’s garden interlude with Sareena and a bedside visit with the girl after she’s bitten by a werewolf, Bolton is equally at home with action, from large-scale shots of combat at sea to hand-to-hand fighting as Kull and Brule hold off tides of attacking warriors on a stairway or when Kull wades into a horde of enemies with a blood-streaked axe. Later, at the climax of the story, Bolton dresses scenes using shadow and light to illustrate the nightmarish final battle with the werewolves (involving some of the scariest interpretations this side of Mike Ploog!). Yesirree bob! Readers would have to go far to find another book to equal this one for sheer, unadulterated comics perfection!

signal a season for silliness even as Stan Lee, stung by fans’ reaction to the death of Gwen, ordered Conway to bring her back. Casting about for some way to do it, the writer settled on having her, as well as Peter Parker, being cloned by Miles Warren, sometime college professor and part-time Jackal. And though it solved the problem for a while, it would all come back to haunt everyone during the Dark Ages when the cloned

“Shadow of Evils Past!” Roger Stern (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); John Romita (inks) A lot had happened to the SpiderMan strip since the days when John Romita and Gerry Conway took readers through the deaths of Gwen Stacy and Norman Osborn, but there was still not much to write home about. When Romita left the strip for good, leaving its direction up to Conway, the latter went too far astray in taking an interesting sub-plot dealing with Aunt May employed as housekeeper for Dr. Octopus and ruining it by having May’s hand in marriage being fought over by Octopus and Capone wannabe Hammerhead. That seemed to 74

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Amazing Spider-Man #238

Father and son team-up to introduce the Hobgoblin (fittingly, himself an amalgamation of past and present) with John Romita, Sr. inking John Romita, Jr.’s rendition of a character whose mystery identity would have fans buzzing for years.

characters returned). Anyway, all of it paved the way without stretching reader credibility to the breaking for one of the most spectacular collapses of a flagship point, Stern struck on the idea of having someone title during the early Twilight Years. What was once discover one of the villain’s old hideouts where his one of the most unique, interesting, and especially costume and weapons are stored. Thus begins a story realistic comics series ever was reduced to moribundity that would unfold slowly, step by step over the next as a string of inappropriate writers and artists tried 25 issues as readers are kept in suspense as to the their collective hands at it. The sense of drift and identity of the Hobgoblin (just as Lee and Ditko had boredom was only enhanced by a decision to increase done with the Green Goblin in the early days), creating Spidey’s exposure first with Marvel Team-Up, then suspense and anticipation in them not felt with the the Spectacular Spider-Man (a color comic not to be Spider-Man book for many a moon. And it all starts confused with the black-and-white here, in this landmark issue, as an magazine of earlier years), and Marvel escaped bank robber accidentally finds Tales (which at this time had started one of the Green Goblin’s cachés. reprinting Amazing Spider-Man from Knowing the value of his find, he the first issue...which, ironically, gives the information to a mysterious made the stuff being churned out figure who promptly has the hapless during the Twilight Years look sick). crook killed. Then, wasting little time, The slide was only halted when the figure creates a new orange and writer Roger Stern took over the title mauve costume for himself based and began to institute changes to on the Goblin and quickly declares the strip...many not very interesting himself the Hobgoblin. The art or simply wrong, but at least they throughout is serviceable with a succeeded in shaking things up a young John Romita, Jr. (still somewhat little. For instance, once Aunt May shaky on pencils and layouts) inked survived issue #122’s death of Gwen over and firmed up by his father, Stacy, it was decided somewhere Spidey artist deluxe John Romita, Sr. along the line to youthen her a bit The cover, in fact, though attributed By the late 1980s, and finally take her off the critical list. to both men, looks for all the world John Romita, Sr. had She was given a boyfriend of sorts in like a Romita Sr. solo job! So, it long since served wheelchair-bound Nathan Lubenski looked like good times were definitely Marvel as its art director, finding little time and a new job, turning her home into ahead for ole Spidey...except for the to pencil any regular a boarding house for the elderly. Liz black costume...a sad story best left feature (aside from the Allen was brought back and married for another time! Spider-Man newspaper off to Harry Osborne, now head of his strip). Sadly, he would Captain America #280 father’s company and still shaky from mostly confine himself “Sermon of Straw!” J.M. DeMatteis the psychological and drug-addiction to doing promotional and marketing material (script); Mike Zeck (pencils); traumas of earlier issues. Peter Parker, connected with John Beatty (inks) meanwhile, has found competition at Marvel’s expanding Except for a brief hiccup when writer the Daily Bugle in the form of fellow product tie-in activities. Roger Stern and artist John Byrne photographer Lance Bannon, while teamed up briefly for a memorable managing to become a hunky pin-up half-dozen issues in 1980, the Captain of the Playgirl variety (he’s lusted over by every siren at the pool parties he attends at America strip was one of Marvel’s flagship titles that the Osborn mansion...a far cry from the Hard Luck languished for years with nothing-to-write-homeCharlie of the Lee/Ditko era). But beyond the Twilight about stories and serviceable but humdrum art. That Years, worse was to come, as Marvel (at Lee’s insistence), changed suddenly when a new artist named Mike made the disastrous decision to marry off Peter to Zeck took over in issue #263. Not in the “rock star” diva Mary Jane, tying the strip to an anchor that category as other artists at the time, such as Byrne or would all but sink the very elements of personal Frank Miller, Zeck nevertheless carved out a fansuffering and bad luck that made Spider-Man tick). favorite niche for himself along with such other All of these elements are in place in Amazing Spider-Man second-tier pencilers as Gene Day and John Romita, #238 (March 1983) as Stern really hits gold with a new Jr. with solid, above-average work on the handful of super villain called the Hobgoblin! Realizing that the projects he executed during the later Twilight Years. Green Goblin couldn’t be brought back yet again With the rise in popularity of the comics limited-series The Dark Ages

(usually about four issues long), Zeck managed to become a semi-hot commodity as the artist on an early four-color solo Punisher book as well as on “Kraven’s Last Hunt,” a mini-series within two regular series that appeared in consecutive issues of Amazing Spider-Man and Spectacular Spider-Man. Both series drew much attention from readers and consequently to Zeck, who, nevertheless, had already generated some heat for himself with earlier stints on Master of Kung Fu and Captain America. It was on the latter that the quality of his art really came to the notice of readers as Zeck added a semblance of depth to his style that was relatively simple but often dramatic with the use of Zip-a-Tone (which may or may not have been the contribution of inker John Beatty). As a result, the first few pages of Captain America #280 (April 1983) are quite good, as the villainous Scarecrow makes his way across night-darkened rooftops seeking out his latest victim. A close-up on page 3, panel 2 works well as a climax to the opening scenes. However, as soon as the special FX stop, so too does the seeming complexity of the art, revealing Zeck’s actual style as somewhat dull and pedestrian (especially in non-action scenes). Zeck’s interest seems to be reignited only midway through the story when the focus shifts back to the Scarecrow on page 11 and for a few pages of action before lapsing back into the realm of nothing special. But at least Zeck and Beatty deliver solid, professional work here in service to a standard 1980s story of psychotic villains plagued by childhood traumas. It would all seem so

As disappointing as it was, the Captain America T V movie released in 1979 by Universal Studios at least had the saving grace of being psychologically uncomplicated unlike the issues his comic book counterpart often had to deal with.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

much better in retrospect as the Captain America feature, as well as many others, slid downhill into the Dark Ages where stories and layouts made books difficult if not impossible to follow or even tolerate. Way back in the Early Years, editor Stan Lee noticed that the flow of fan letters coming into the Marvel offices had markedly increased since the company began its line of new super-hero books. Naturally, letters invited responses and soon Lee was providing them adopting a jokey, familiar tone that created a sense of friendly camaraderie between readers and himself. That intimacy quickly grew to include artists such as Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, whom readers addressed in their letters as “Jack” or “Steve” along with the already in their corner “Stan.” As the line of super-hero features grew in number and readers realized that there was a certain connectivity to them all, it became necessary to list each month’s releases to make sure kids didn’t miss any of the issues. And so, casual mentions of upcoming issues scattered here and there in Stan’s responses to letters was formalized in a “Mighty Marvel Checklist” that listed all of the Marvel comics on sale that month along with short, pithy descriptions of their contents. The list and accompanying news grew such that by the Years of Consolidation, Stan had separated the company-wide news into its own page called the Bullpen Bulletins. That feature ran for decades, eventually to including a “Stan’s Soapbox” where each month, the editor related his thoughts on Marvel in particular and the comics industry in general. That worked until the mid-1980s, when the number of comics and related magazines Marvel was publishing became too much for a single Bullpen Bulletins page (most of which was taken up with an exhaustive list of every Marvel title on sale each month, a list that was far in excess to the company’s modest beginnings in the Early Years). To solve the problem, and to satisfy the craving of fans for more information on their favorite comics, as well as to perhaps control the flow of information that was making its way to the fan press, Marvel decided to launch its own newsmagazine in the form of Marvel Age #1 (April 1983). At last, fans who wanted to know what plans were afoot in coming months for their favorite characters and titles would have a steady and reliable source for the information in the “Coming Attractions” and “Newswatch” departments of Marvel Age. Then there were the articles by creators themselves, exclusive interviews with writers and artists, advance peeks at production art, original comic strips, and even its own letters

Marvel Age #1

Limited distribution magazines such as the Comics Journal and Amazing Heroes filled a need in the fan community by keeping the history of the industry alive while also providing critical analysis of the contemporary comics scene, one that had begun to dream of being taken more seriously by the wider public.

page! Marvel Age went on for an incredible 140 issues (including annuals...go figure!) and although it seemed that an endless round of X-news sometimes threatened to take it over completely, it served its purpose well in keeping fans informed of Marvel doings in a mostly harmless and upbeat manner. Fun Fact: These were the years in which the primitively produced fanzines of olden times were replaced with a growing number of professional and semi-pro fan magazines such as the Comics Journal, Comics Interview, Amazing Heroes, and the Comics Buyers Guide where, in addition to the expected creator interviews and news about upcoming comics, they became mills for rumors, leaks, and information picked up at comics conventions and from grumpy creators. It was all then recycled, expounded upon, and often magnified to create mini-controversies (the comics industry was still a pretty small pond) and promote tensions in editorial offices. That said, the plethora of such magazines was a virtual cornucopia for information-starved comics fans.

Amazing Spider-Man #239 “Now Strikes the Hobgoblin!” Roger Stern (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Frank Giacoia (inks) Beneath another fine cover by John Romita, Jr. and Sr., Amazing Spider-Man #239 (April 1983) opens with a clever splash page by the former that involves a chain-link fence pattern set over background action of an armored van crashing through a wall. It was an early sign that artistic talent

would indeed run in the Romita family as John Romita, Jr. rose quickly in the later Twilight Years to become a dominant artistic force in the 1990s. From his humble beginnings as a sketch artist for Marvel’s UK operations (not counting his input for the creation of the Prowler, a sometime Spidey villain of the Silver Age), Romita’s style evolved relatively slowly (at least compared to the more rapid development of earlier greats such as Barry Smith, Craig Russell, and Paul Gulacy) with a first, early assignment on Iron Man exhibiting a merely competent approach to his art. From there, he moved on to the Amazing Spider-Man, the strip that granted his father comics immortality years before. At the time, it seemed an inevitable turn of events, as was the presence of Romita, Sr. (since promoted to art director), who occasionally inked his son’s work on the title. Romita, Sr.’s inks did wonders to shore up his son’s weaker pencils but that soon changed. When the training wheels came off, Romita, Jr. showed that he could indeed fly on his own (to mix a metaphor!) as, teamed with writer Roger Stern, he helped turn around a strip that had grown quite dull over the years. They did it with a number of memorable stories that included a mix of classic villains and newbies such as WillO’-the-Wisp, and an unlikely face off that pitted Spidey against the unstoppable Juggernaut! Finally, with the introduction of the Hobgoblin, Romita, Jr’s reputation with fans seemed sealed. Luckily, Romita was not held to blame for the strip’s predictable fizzle as proven by his promotion to artist on the super-hot X-Men book. There, his style continued to evolve, becoming more eclectic while leaning to the “chunky” side. The artist took that style with him to a forgettable run on Daredevil (with writer Ann Nocenti) where it was just barely suitable. As the years passed, his style continued to improve albeit growing even bulkier. But that proved to be a good thing, when early in the 1990s, Romita returned to Iron Man for an alltoo-short run with writer John Byrne to bring back a sense of excitement that the strip hadn’t had since...well, since Gene Colan left it way back in its first issue! By that time, Romita’s chunkiness proved an asset. When Marvel and DC teamed up to produce Amalgam, a series of comics that merged various concepts from both company’s stable of heroes, Romita was assigned to do “Thorion” (a mix of Thor and New Gods character Orion) that proved to be a dry run for a new Thor book written by Dan Jurgens. There, Romita, it seemed, had finally arrived onto the strip he was born to do. The larger-than-life style that he had evolved, proving The Dark Ages

to be perfect for the outsized adventures of Thor. In fact, he was the first and so far the only artist to have really captured the titanic scale set for the series in the Grandiose Years by its legendary co-creator Jack Kirby. Unfortunately, while perfect for Thor, Romita’s style seemed to have evolved beyond the needs of more down-to-Earth heroes and the artist hasn’t done much of interest since: a Daredevil mini-series done

with writer Frank Miller proved a disaster; various fill-ins such as a few issues of a revived Black Panther; and other Dark Age disappointments not worthy of his skill rounds out his post-Twilight Years career. But back to better times! This issue sees Romita, Jr. still on the upward trajectory artwise, as Spidey contends with a Hobgoblin still unprepared to face a super-hero in battle. Just managing to escape, he’s left wondering how the original Goblin could hold his own against someone as powerful as SpiderMan. That question would form the basis of his next couple of appearances as Stern would continue to unfold the Hobgoblin storyline well beyond Romita’s presence on the book.

Fantastic Four #257

Amazing Spider-Man #239, page 21: By the time of the Hobgoblin saga, John Romita, Jr. seemed to have sealed his reputation at Marvel. He would soon move to bigger, more high profile projects including a post-Miller Daredevil, the surging X-Men, and then back to DD again teamed up with scripter Frank Miller himself.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

“Fragments” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Two and half years into his historic run on the FF, and John Byrne was still writing, penciling, and inking the entire book on his own. But production wasn’t the only thing under his complete control, so too has the FF themselves as he continued to direct their resurgence and prove to readers that he wasn’t a fly-by-night talent but one with true staying power. Issue after issue, he managed to come up with one interesting story, new villain, or new twist on old characters after another with little sign that his imagination was approaching exhaustion. Just the opposite in fact, as the strip embarked on a storyline that has proven to be one of the best, most significant in all of the later Twilight Years, one that would cement Byrne’s reputation as a

comics creator of the first rank. This reputation would propel him to superstardom after DC offered him the opportunity to redevelop Superman for the 1980s. But all that was still a few years off. Right now, Byrne was still heavily committed to the FF as Fantastic Four #257 (Aug. 1983) proves. With his overall art style showing a tad of slippage from its peak in the first dozen issues of the run, Byrne opens this ish with an impressive full-page head shot of Galactus who informs readers that he’s “dying.” A double-page spread quickly follows of the big G surveying a planetary system as he ruminates upon compassion and how it has weakened his resolve and cost him worlds to consume. The scene shifts and in a pair of split frames, Galactus holds a dialogue with the personification of Death who explains their places in the universe, which are much the same: “You and I are but the shepherds who guide (the universe) to its proper purpose,” says Death. “Or, more precisely, it is a tangled garden and you and I must ever weed.” Having been reminded of his role in the scheme of things, Galactus puts compassion aside and decides to consume the first planet he comes to which, as it happens, turns out to be the Skrull home world! What follows are three pages of patented Byrne cosmicism as Galactus submerges himself in the fires released from the planet’s core and the world comes to an end, the fate of its billions of inhabitants represented by Princess Anelle as she and

By the 1980s, the Superman titles were in bad shape. Limping along on sub-par artwork and dull stories occasionally broken up by the likes of Gil Kane and George Perez, they were in dire need of a jump start; something management at DC realized all too well. To do it, they took the same long chance they did with Frank Miller: they reached out to Marvel superstar John Byrne giving him carte blanche to turn the franchise around.

her mother admit death is unavoidable and perish with the rest of their people. From these grand scenes, the locale shifts to prosaic activities of the FF as Johnny meets with Julie D’angelo to show her and new friend Sharon a loft apartment he intends to rent. (Johnny sports his new uniform colors, changed due to an effect of the Negative Zone; Byrne changed the black areas to white...not a bad change compared to some others). Meanwhile, not only we learn that Franklin Richards does indeed have mutant powers of some kind, but that Susan Richards is expecting a second child! For the welfare of their growing family, Reed and Sue decide that a home in the suburbs would be a better environment than the Baxter Building, so picking up where she left off way back in issue #s 88-89, Sue begins house-hunting. Reed, meanwhile, visits Avengers mansion to check on a comatose Vision where things end not with a whimper but with a bang as a hole is blasted through a wall and Mr. Fantastic is taken who knows where! It was another jam-packed issue in which Byrne seemed to give readers far more than their money’s worth, even as he prepared the ground for his most spectacular story yet!

Alpha Flight #1

“Tundra!” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Introduced in X-Men #120, the Canadian super-hero team Alpha Flight became an instant hit with fans who immediately clamored for the group to be awarded its own series. That took some time, according to John Byrne in a message at the end of Alpha Flight #1 (Aug. 1983). The team had its tentative origins in an earlier issue of X-Men in which leader Vindicator first appeared on a mission from the Canadian government to retrieve Wolverine. It seems that Wolverine, known as Weapon X to the Canadians, was a product of a secret government research program that wanted him back. Failing the first time, Vindicator came back with an entire team of Canadian super-heroes to back him up, including brother and sister speedsters Northstar and Aurora, strongman Sasquatch, Indian magician Shaman, and Eskimo goddess Snowbird. They had no more luck than Vindicator had the first time and retreated to the wilds of Canada to begin making guest appearances in other books across the Marvel Universe, which, as any experienced Marvelite knew, was a warm-up to getting their own title. And sure enough, that finally happened this issue in a 38-page special priced at a whopping one dollar. According to Byrne, Vindicator had his origins in the artist’s fannish past (where he was called Guardian) before almost bringing him to life at Marvel when a storyline in Captain America demanded the creation of his Canadian counterpart. Those plans fell through, but Byrne didn’t The Dark Ages

forget “Guardian,” reviving the concept as soon as he could after taking over as the artist of the X-Men. There, he finally appeared as the rechristened Vindicator, and since a team was needed to fight the X-Men, Byrne went ahead and dreamed up the other members (some of whom were also throwbacks to his fan days). Aided by writer Chris Claremont, who came up with the name Alpha Flight (as well as Vindicator, which Byrne disliked), the concept was up and running. By the time their own series was given the green light by Marvel editorial, Byrne had departed the X-Men and taken over the Fantastic Four, where he soon proved he had what it took to be a writer/artist. That was enough to win him the same control over the fate of Alpha Flight, where he both wrote, penciled, and inked their adventures. Kicking things off on a down note, Byrne’s story opens with the dissolution of Alpha Flight and Vindicator’s efforts to keep the team together

(as well as the fact that there are two other teams in-waiting: Beta Flight and Gamma Flight!) An engaging series of character profiles follow (featuring the introduction of new members, the tumbling Puck and water-logged alien Marrina) until the issue’s menace finally makes its appearance on page 21...the aptly named Tundra. Give Byrne credit for coming up with heroes and menaces like Tundra that have a uniquely Canadian feel to them, giving the Alpha Flight strip an identity all its own. Describing himself as a “Canadian expatriate” in his lettercol opening remarks, Byrne seems to have made no effort to disguise some national pride for his native country (although it was true he was born in England before moving when still a child to Canada). The next step was to provide the book with its own rogues gallery and, despite all too frequent crossovers with established Marvel characters such as Invisible Girl and Sub-Mariner, Byrne made a good start with the Master, the team’s new archenemy who debuted in issue #2. Ironically, Byrne has since poohpoohed his involvement with the series saying that he never had much interest in it: “Alpha Flight was never much fun,” he said in an interview. “The characters were created merely to survive a fight with the X-Men and I never thought about them having their own title. When Marvel finally cajoled me into doing Alpha Flight, I realized how incredibly two-dimensional they were and spent some twenty-eight issues trying to find ways to correct this fault. Nothing really sang for me. If I have any regrets, it would probably be that I did the book at all! It was not a good time for me.” Some of that ennui could be seen this issue with the artist seeming to have spread himself a bit too thin. His art lacked background detail and the lengthy story is told in simple, uncomplicated layouts. But despite his avowed disinterest, the overall effect still works due to strong scripting, interesting characters, and just enough hints of a larger story to hook readers and get them to come back for more. And come back they did, since the book went on for over ten years under a number of different creative teams (Byrne left the book with issue #28 to take over the Incredible Hulk).

Fantastic Four #258

Political Correctness had yet to become a global scourge when the first issue of Captain Canuck was issued in 1975; otherwise would the good captain’s name have ever passed muster on the offensive meter?

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

“Interlude” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) As the title of Fantastic Four #258 (Sept. 1983) implies, this issue readers are provided a breather between epics with what amounts to a Dr. Doom solo story out of his days starring in Astonishing Tales (it even features the return of faithful servant Boris from Astonishing #8!) It was a measure of the character’s popularity...or the popularity of the book’s writer/ artist...that such a thing could be done or even allowed by editor Carl Potts (or editor-in-chief Jim Shooter for

that matter) but it was and very successfully too. Doom’s character had been developed so well over the years (and enriched by Byrne himself), that even his daily routine could be made compelling source material for a story that didn’t feature the FF in a single panel! Opening with an

Fantastic Four #258, page 5: Writer/artist John Byrne has it both ways as he continues to explore the two halves of Doom’s personality: his benevolent monarch side that was on public display and his twisted, evil side that forms the disturbing undercurrent in this scene as Doom plays nice with Kristoff even as he plans to exploit the innocent child as part of his evil plans.

imposing splash page of Doom standing atop his castle, Byrne then shifts the focus to groundlevel looking up at the castle in a double-page spread where contented workers busy themselves restoring a ravaged village. “...there is no crime, no hunger, no unemployment in all the land,” muses Doom as he oversees the work. “The process of rebuilding Doomstatdt goes quickly. The people are happy and content. As I have commanded they be...” Next, we are quickly reminded of Doom’s non-scientific interests as he’s filled in on the activities of Dr. Strange, followed by the reintroduction of Kristoff, a little boy that was orphaned in issue 247. It seems that in a moment of sympathy, Doom has adopted the boy and has begun teaching him about his ways. Or does he have an ulterior motive in mind? In a number of vignettes, Byrne takes us on a typical day in the life of Doom as he dispenses justice to his people, reviews his robot soldiers, and avoids falling into a trap set by one of his minions (a machine set in an incredibly detailed panel that displayed the amount of time Byrne was still dedicating to the book in this period). Finally, Doom sets the stage for next ish by launching into a new scheme to defeat the FF. This time, he reenergizes Terrax with the power of the Silver Surfer (using a machine based on one Doom used in issue #s 57-60 to give himself that selfsame power). But there’s a catch! Terrax’s power will last only five hours before it eventually kills him but hopefully, not before he has time to do the same to the FF! The Dark Ages

Amazing Spider-Man #244

“Ordeals!” Roger Stern (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Klaus Janson (inks) Beneath another nice cover by Romita, Jr., is another exciting chapter in the ongoing Hobgoblin sub-plot that finds the titular villain operating from the shadows while henchmen steal special chemical ingredients needed to recreate the experiment that turned Norman Osborn into the Green Goblin. As he managed to do in many of his assignments in these

Amazing Spider-Man #244, page 21: Inker Klaus Janson channels frequent collaborator Frank Miller in this job over John Romita, Jr. that shows he was one of the top inkers of the era!

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

years, Stern takes his in-depth knowledge of Marvel history and uses it to find springboards for new stories. In this case, he gathers up stray details of the Green Goblin’s origin and many encounters with Spider-Man to pace the new Hobgoblin’s evolution. To wit: how could an otherwise normal guy in a fright mask armed with gimmicks ever have been any kind of challenge to Spider-Man? Answer: he had greater than normal strength bestowed on him by the chemical accident that also drove him crazy, as first depicted in Amazing Spider-Man #40! The current storyline is aided immensely this issue with an interesting combination of art between penciler John Romita, Jr. and Klaus Janson, who was still one of the best inkers in the business in the late Twilight Years as he had been when he first burst on the scene in the last decade. After years of being a virtual co-artist with Frank Miller on Daredevil, Janson likely had more than enough self-confidence to put more of himself into the art than less experienced inkers. The results were quite impressive, especially over Romita’s work, which was improving quickly from its awkward beginnings with every book he drew. In this issue, however, Janson seems to be working over the artist’s layouts rather than full pencils, adding detail and shadow to a tale of growing menace. Janson’s contributions culminate in a dramatic scene on page 21 that reveals an injured Hobgoblin sitting in a darkened room. Vowing to undergo the experiment that transformed his predecessor into the Green Goblin, the Hobgoblin says he has no intention

of suffering from the same debilitating side effects! But in more upbeat scenes, the team of Romita and Janson prove that they’re equally at home with the personal travails of Peter Parker, whose challenges always kept readers coming back to find out what happens next. In the case of Amazing Spider-Man #244 (Sept. 1983), it’s an unlikely romance between our hero and heroine-villainess Black Cat, a meeting between a returning Mary Jane and potential matchmakers Harry Osborn and Liz Allen, and, in a humorous interlude reminiscent of his first day at college in issue #31, Peter is forced to find his way through a bureaucratic maze, seeking a leave of absence from his scholarship classes. In between all that, Peter still has to find the time to tackle one Lefty Donovan who’s apparently leading gangs of crooks in a series of mysterious break-ins. Hoo boy! It all adds up to some exciting storytelling that actually harked back to the halcyon days of Stan Lee and Steve Ditko!

Amazing Spider-Man #245 “Sacrifice Play!” Roger Stern (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Dave Simons (inks) The Hobgoblin unmasked! Or is he? That was the question in Amazing Spider-Man #245 (Oct. 1983) as Stern continued to stretch out the Hobgoblin storyline for all it was worth, keeping readers in suspense and begging for more! In fact, this issue’s letters’ page is littered with fan speculation as to who the Hobgoblin can be: is he Jack O’Lantern? Lance Bannon? Kraven the Hunter? J. Jonah Jameson? (C’mon! Really?) Anyway, in this latest chapter, common crook Lefty Donovan is bamboozled by the Hobgoblin into recreating the experiment that turned Norman Osborne into the Green Goblin. Hobby needed his assistance to make sure the experiment was safe. Meanwhile, Lefty goes through the same effects that Osborne did, gaining added strength at the expense of his mental health. Acting on pre-set orders, Lefty dons the Hobgoblin’s costume and ends up in action against Spidey, who manages to defeat and unmask him only to find out that someone else was behind Donovan’s antics. In his hideout, the real Hobgoblin expresses satisfaction that all went well. When he undergoes Osborn’s experiment himself, he’ll make sure to avoid the mental side effects...or so he thinks. In between all that, Peter Parker’s life continues to get complicated as Betty Leeds (nee Brant) drops onto the scene along with Mary Jane. (And behind the scenes, we learn in the Bullpen Bulletins that things there are as unsettled as they are in Peter’s life: Al Milgrom does no one any favors by cutting back on his editorial duties to devote more time to...gulp! writing and drawing; Carl Potts takes over as editor for Milgrom’s lost books; Tom

In 1982, Marvel published The Life of Pope John Paul II (it was a different world then). In an eerie parallel to the increasing violence on display in American comic books, the world was also becoming a more dangerous place to live with first Pres. Ronald Reagan being shot by a would-be assassin in March of 1981 and then the Pope just two months later on May 13.

DeFalco is promoted to executive editor in charge of such special projects as The Life of Pope John Paul II (which we are told was one of Marvel’s best-selling books of the last twenty years!); Danny Fingeroth has moved up to being editor of all the Spider-Man titles (four in all!); and that the assistant editors will be left in charge during convention season as the regular editors take off on a PR run). But closer to home, Romita, Jr. continues on the art chores in Spidey #245 displaying a growing skill at pacing and panel-topanel progression that he’d later take with him to the Iron Man and X-men titles among others (although the inks of Dave Simons left something to be desired, especially in characters’ facial features).

Fantastic Four #259

“Choices” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Okay, break’s over and it’s time for action! Fantastic Four #259 (Oct. 1983) starts innocently enough with a bewigged Susan Richards still house-hunting in the wilds of Belle Port, Ct. Cut to the Thing (returning from an adventure in his very own self-titled comic book which Byrne was also writing), as his arrival at the airport is interrupted by the cosmically powered Terrax or, as he prefers “Tyros the Terrible!” What follows is six pages of bombastic Byrne action somewhat reminiscent of the Thing’s solo fight with the Hulk way back in issue #24...with the same results... ending in a double half-page spread in a “WHOOM” The Dark Ages

shaped panel showing our hero crashing through a busy supermarket. Now that’s the way to get a comic book started! Meanwhile, Johnny Storm is showing friend Sharon around his cockroach-infested loft. Then, just as the plain-looking girl puts the moves on him, that old FF signal lights up the sky...just in the nick of time! Then, even as the Torch speeds to the Thing’s rescue, the Invisible Girl is intercepted on her way home by Dr. Doom, whose flying craft is hidden in a cloud bank over the city. What follows is a brief exchange that prefigures Byrne’s slow build up of the Invisible Girl’s powers, culminating down the road with a symbolic name change to the “Invisible Woman.” “Do I have to come after you?” Sue threatens Doom. “Do I have to take this whole ship apart to find you?” “I applaud you Susan Richards,” replies the villain. “You have become a true warrior in your own right!” It was Byrne’s response to former partner Chris Claremont’s reputation in the small pond of comics fandom for being a “women’s writer” due to such up-powered female characters as Storm, Phoenix, the White Queen, Colleen Wing, and even Ms Marvel. Ironically, though, it would be Byrne who would end up portraying more believable empowered women whose characters remained largely feminine and genuine while those of Claremont’s were contrived. But back at the supermarket, the battle rages on even as, in space, the Silver Surfer, sensing the use of cosmic power like his own, decides to check things out for himself...

Fantastic Four #260

“When Titans Clash” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Beneath a rather nicely composed cover by Byrne (evocatively colored with a light green background contrasting nicely against the FF’s flashy blue and white uniforms), it’s action all the way in Fantastic Four #260 (Nov. 1983). The real action starts on page 4 as the Thing, Torch, and Invisible Girl face off with a cosmically powered Terrax nee Tyros. Convinced that they can’t defeat Tyros by themselves, Sue sends a signal for Mr. Fantastic, not realizing that he’d been kidnapped a couple issues before! Meanwhile, Dr. Doom is waiting in the wings for Reed’s arrival too. But (dare we say it?) doomed to disappointment, he takes the field himself to stop Tyros from killing the other members of the FF. Seems Doom wants a complete set or none at all and steps in to stop the former herald of Galactus but ends up fused in his armor even as a deus ex machina in the form of the big G’s other former herald makes the scene! Grabbing Tyros by the beard (!), the Silver Surfer hauls him off and throws him aside like a sack of potatoes. Meanwhile, Doom gets out of his predicament 84

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

In the real world, space travel was hardly less dangerous than in the comics as the Challenger disaster of 1986 proved. Riding the spaceways like the Silver Surfer did would have to wait until the shuttle program was restarted in 1988.

by transferring his mind to that of a bystander’s (where readers are treated to another big time Marvel guest-star crossover as Aunt May scolds a punk rocktype dropout). Then everybody’s bacon is saved when Tyros self-destructs thanks to a built-in flaw in the cosmic power given him by Doom. And what of the not so good doctor? Seems he was blown to smithereens along with Tyros with only his mask remaining! “The greatest evil the world has ever known is...dead!” declares Sue. But if anyone really believed that, there was a bridge in Brooklyn they could buy! And even though everyone breathes a sigh of relief over the fate of Dr. Doom, one thing still nags at Sue: Mr. Fantastic never responded to her emergency signal. What happened to him? The amazing answer to that question would have to wait till the following issue (and a side trip for the Invisible Girl to Alpha Flight #4) before readers were treated to one of the greatest comic stories of the late Twilight Years!

The Mighty Thor #337 “Doom!” Walter Simonson (script/pencils); John Workman (letters) It’s hard to believe now that so many years have passed since the excitement that greeted artist Walt Simonson’s arrival on Thor. It was a testament perhaps to how moribund the book had become since the Grandiose Years when Stan Lee and Jack Kirby guided its destiny (and to a lesser extent when John Buscema took over the art after Kirby left Marvel for DC) that

carte blanche,” said Simonson in an interview.) Of course that approach had been done before, most notably in a short run by Roy Thomas, John Buscema, and Tom Palmer, but enough water had gone under the bridge since those issues for readers to have forgotten all about them. In any case, Simonson tries it again here and by all accounts did it successfully as his run on the strip proved. (Simonson stayed on the book quite a longtime extending to issue #382, by which time he’d handed over the penciling

even a second- or third-rank artistic talent like Simonson could make such a big splash. (Not in the same ranks as Frank Miller or John Byrne, Simonson’s peers were more like Gene Day or Mike Zeck). Oh, Simonson had had his moments, but they were rare with very little to show since. (His early work with Archie Goodwin on DC’s Manhunter showed promise and his later efforts on Marvel’s licensed Battlestar Galactica property were even better, although that time, most of the credit might have been due to inker Klaus Janson). The problem was due to the artist’s style, which mostly appeared half finished as though he was satisfied with laying out his books with partial pencils and then in the inking stage, never added anything else to them. This final, unfinished look would be exacerbated over much of his career when he teamed with inkers like Bob Wiacek who tended to play up his weaknesses (as opposed to strong inkers like Janson who could make even Simonson’s pencils something to behold) or, worse yet, when he inked himself as he does here in Mighty Thor #337 (Nov. 1983). The secret of Simonson’s popularity among some fans was likely due to his layouts that were often bold if somewhat undermined by weak penciling. (“When he first started out, his work was extremely meticulous and very slow,” said editor Len Wein in an interview. “By the time he was doing Thor, he could pencil the entire book in four days.”) That approach is much in evidence this issue as Simonson (who both writes and pencils) attempts to take the Thor strip back to its basics in the Norse myths. (“Basically, I had

Thor #337, page 3: Artist Walt Simonson at his most pretentious; but simple page layouts like this somehow caused fans’ hearts to pitter-pat and their blood to pulse wildly.

The Dark Ages

chores to veteran artist Sal Buscema). Beginning this issue would be a plot involving the fire demon Surtur and later stories would explore the strip’s cast of characters from Balder the Brave and Odin, to Volstagg and others. Then would come the fatal missteps: the alien Beta Ray Bill, who becomes the new possessor of Thor’s hammer. Thor being turned into a frog. Thor’s bones turning brittle forcing him to don a suit of armor (and growing a beard!) Not good. But much of Simonson’s weakness in storytelling was covered up with those bold layouts mentioned previously. Take for instance, pages 2 and 3 this issue in which readers are treated to a shadowy figure working at some cosmic forge. Suns crash and worlds collide, ending in a borderless, downward smash on a single ornately lettered word: DOOM! (In future issues, that word would be repeated at the bottom of pages as a sort of intimation of danger to come; apparently a laughable attempt by the writer to give the coming story a sense of heaviosity). Cut to Thor’s alter ego Don Blake walking in a park (where apparently everyone has heads too small for their bodies!) before Simonson attempts to dazzle readers again with an oversized panel showing S.H.I.E.L.D.’s helicarrier. Next, there’s a crude attempt at depicting foreboding with a close-up of Thor’s face in heavy shadow before reader’s are finally treated to the Thunder God himself in full flight (with more disproportioned body parts).

An interlude with Loki follows before another definitely odd close-up of Thor’s face greets us on page 15, panel 2. There, readers are given their first look at Beta Ray Bill (“I am called Bill...Beta Ray Bill!”) Simonson next follows Thor’s battle with Bill with a nice page laid out in a six-panel grid, but unfortunately, it’s filled with figures that once again sport small heads on overlarge bodies. Anyhoo, the battle ends when Thor transforms to his Blake identity and Bill picks up the hammer (likewise transformed into a walking stick) and in a shock ending, becomes the new Thor! In a near final panel, Odin mistakes Bill for his son and whisks him away for some “urgent need” in Asgard. Meanwhile, Don Blake is left behind for a last page splash adorned with a single gigantic word balloon: “Father!” Layout wise, Simonson managed to keep his story moving at a fast clip, fast enough hopefully, that no one would notice the rushed-looking art that filled his panels. The bottom line was that Simonson’s Thor was an acquired taste, one whose stories had better be attention-grabbers at all times because they risked losing readers momentarily fooled by the artist’s flash. Fun Fact: Of equal importance to the art was the book’s lettering by John Workman, who would often collaborate with Simonson over the years. On Thor in particular, the two worked closely together to integrate the lettering with the art to create effects that intended to emphasize dramatic points or lend atmosphere to stories. Lettering style might look archaic to simulate the overblown language of the gods, or word balloons merge, disregarding panel borders in very un-Marvel like manner, or captions break apart seemingly by the force of whatever action might be taking place in a panel, or sound effects (“DOOM!”) become part of the art. Good or bad, on Thor at least, it at least helped Simonson’s art look snazzier than it really was.

Fantastic Four #261

While fans embraced Walt Simonson’s take on Thor in the comics, the opposite happened to Hollywood’s first attempt at portraying the thunder god on film. In 1988, NBC released The Incredible Hulk Returns, featuring a barely recognizable Thor; a version so reviled that it made the character persona non grata on celluloid for the next quarter century.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

“The Search for Reed Richards” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) This is it! The peak of the second decade of the Twilight Years and even ranking among the many peaks of the first during the 1970s (but naturally, not quite reaching the rarefied heights of the Years of Consolidation or Grandiose Years...let’s not be silly now!) Fantastic Four #261 (Dec. 1983) would also mark the high point of Byrne’s sterling career and cement his reputation as a writer for good. In fact, one might cleanly divide Byrne’s long career in the comics industry with this issue (and the next) with everything that came before and everything that came after. This story was that amazing. Besides the number of surprise guest-stars, the buildup over the last 30 issues or so, the clever

Years before a similar beam whisked Reed Richards off planet in the Fantastic Four, the zeta beam was providing the same service for Adam Strange over in DC’s Mystery in Space.

way in which Byrne manages to squeeze himself into the action, the drama he wrings from an essentially courtroom setting, and the flawless manner in which the writer/artist weaves together the by now vast panoply of Marvel history and continuity, it re-defines Galactus in an important new light, one that should have been made apparent by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby when they were handling the character but never seemed to get around to. Oh, sure, they hinted at it (and because of some miscommunication between the two or maybe even separate visions for the character), but were never able to quite get it. So credit must be given to Byrne for taking the hints of vast age and purpose suggested by Lee and Kirby, the various details dropped by other writers who handled the character over the years, his own set up in previous issues of the FF, putting them all together, and coming up with a definition of Galactus that transcended time and space and even bordered on the metaphysical, much like the direction physics had taken in the real world where theory reached the point where words and numbers failed and the language of philosophy became the only framework in which concepts could be expressed. But here in this issue, things begin prosaically enough (not counting the Sub-Mariner putting the moves on Sue Richards following her solo adventure in Alpha Flight #4) with the Invisible Girl walking the empty rooms of FF headquarters and discovering that Mr. Fantastic is still missing (as he’s been for the last few issues). With the help of the recuperating Silver Surfer (who says he noticed a beam from space strike the Earth a few issues back...sort of like the zeta beam that transports DC’s Adam Strange to Rann) she visits

Avengers mansion where Mr. Fantastic had last been known to be visiting, only to be told by the Scarlet Witch that he vanished mysteriously. The Surfer, however, guesses that he has been taken into space, and following a meeting with the Torch and the Thing, Sue recklessly decides to go and find him despite the danger in which she may be placing her unborn child (not to mention the possibility of leaving her first child an orphan!). A quick visit to the Blue Area of the Moon follows to enlist the aid of the Watcher who then whisks them into the deeps of space and an alien armada whose denizens are busy putting Mr. Fantastic to death for saving the life of Galactus (who went on to destroy the Skrull homeworld). Then, hinting that more is at stake than even the life of Mr. Fantastic, the Watcher intervenes, transporting everyone to another ship where a council of alien beings who agree to reconsider their decision to execute Reed. In an impassioned defense of his actions, Reed defends himself on moral grounds: “...it would have been easier to allow (Galactus) to die, and there were those who argued for that. But who are we to make such a decision? To allow another living being...any living being...to die, when ours is the power to prevent it?” The Watcher throws in his two cents: “...there is about Galactus much, much more than mere mortal minds can ever comprehend. My race has known of him since his very beginnings yet we understand only a tiny fraction of his overwhelming power and purpose.” But just as the judges are wavering, who makes her entrance but that intergalactic buttinski Lilandra (Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum’s boring interstellar queen bee) who demands that “Reed Richards must die!”

Fantastic Four #262 “The Trial of Reed Richards” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) It was called “assistant editors’ month” and maybe it was the reason why Byrne was allowed to get away with a book that had no action to speak of and was text-heavy to boot. Assistant editors’ month was something promoted by the Marvel bullpen in the later Twilight Years, which by all accounts could sometimes be a very informal place to work (an attitude that was slowly overtaking many office workplaces of the era). Stan Lee, of course, had promoted the bullpen The Dark Ages

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

a month while their editors were presumably off somewhere, were expected to screw things up. All of it was preposterous of course, but that didn’t stop anyone from going along with the gag. Take this issue, for example. The story opens with a split panel ostensibly showing Higgins on the phone with Byrne, complaining that the writer/artist is about

during the Silver Age as a funfilled, informal environment but the reality was that for most of those years, there was no bullpen to speak of. The Marvel Comics portion of Magazine Management, the publishing company built by Martin Goodman, was a relatively small operation with freelancers working from home. But with the arrival of the 1970s, the offices were moved to roomier quarters and freed from the distribution straitjacket that it had been forced to endure, the number of titles published exploded. Suddenly, there was a need to expand editorial so that by the time the 1980s rolled around, Marvel’s offices, or bullpen, could actually boast quite a few staffers, including multiple editors and assistant editors (as well as the editor-in-chief of course), production and marketing people, comics shop liaisons, as well as an inhouse artist or two. In addition, freelancers were always coming and going as well as various suits representing whichever corporation owned Marvel Comics that week (which by Fantastic Four #262 [Jan. 1984] included Cadence Industries’ president James Galton and vice president Michael Hobbs). Be that as it may, company policy was to continue promoting Marvel in general and the bullpen in particular as fun places to work, not your usual stuffy corporate institution (like the Distinguished Competition across town for instance) and part of that was the promotion of assistant editors’ month, during which, if the hype about it was to be believed, anything could happen. The assistant editors (which in the case of FF #262 was Michael Higgins) were characterized as children of sorts who, left in charge of the books for

Fantastic Four #262, page 2: Writer/artist John Byrne provided this off-kilter opening as his contribution to “assistant editors month” at Marvel. As Stan Lee and Jack Kirby used to do in the Years of Consolidation, Byrne insinuated himself into the story and like them, did it without detracting from the dramatic events featured in “ The Trial of Reed Richards.”

Despite the suits and ties, editor-in-chief Jim Shooter (left) and Cadence Industries president James Galton wanted everyone to believe that the Marvel offices were still the fun filled bullpen that Stan Lee had always made it out to be.

to miss his deadline. Byrne, however (taking a cue from Lee and Kirby who sometimes placed themselves within their stories), explains that he can’t help it, his calls to FF HQ are not being returned, but if he can’t get through, he’ll “invent a story!” What to do? Byrne doesn’t realize that at that very moment, the FF are deep in space with Mr. Fantastic about to stand trial for saving the life of Galactus and, by extension, being responsible for the subsequent destruction of the Skrull homeworld by the space god! But Byrne is saved from the dreaded deadline doom by the Watcher who, arriving amid some cool photo-collage effects by the artist, whisks him off in order to witness the coming trial. “What the heck are you doing here, Byrne?” demands the Torch when the writer/artist shows up. “Hmph! Maybe he’s come ta try an’ get th’ story right this time!” quips the Thing. Thus, we have the unlikeliest of openings for one of the most important, cosmically entertaining stories of the Twilight Years as Bryne brings on a star-studded list of witnesses any trial has ever featured, including Odin, Eternity, and the Watcher himself, who acts as Mr. Fantastic’s defense counsel! Hoo boy! Pleading guilty to the charge of saving the life of Galactus, Reed goes on to defend his action on the belief that Galactus fulfills an important function in the scheme of the universe, one that would not be fulfilled without him. Calling his first witness, the Watcher has Odin recount the events every dyed-inthe-wool Marvelite should have known already, the

events depicted in various Grandiose Years’ issues of Thor that unveiled the “origin” of Galactus (but as things turn out, were not the full story). “Remind me ta be impressed,” exclaims the Thing upon Odin’s arrival. “When I get over bein’ flabbergasted!” Odin concludes his testimony by revealing that Galactus is a “natural force” that weeds out the universe with the strong surviving his passing and others who don’t. But the jury of aliens remains unconvinced. Then, enter Galactus himself on a page where Byrne explains why he appeared so absurdly in Marvel comics as a giant humanoid with a big letter “G” on his chest (which, admittedly, hadn’t been seen in a while): his appearance is interpreted differently by every alien race! But testimony given by Galactus (“I...bring justice for that mortal I name friend. Reed Richards is a noble spirit, untainted by the pettiness of fear and hate. His deed was honorable and good.”) But Galactus’ profession that he and Mr. Fantastic are friends only worsens Reed’s case until a final witness is called: Eternity, the personification of the universe itself. Referred to by Galactus as “father,” Eternity opens the minds of all those present, revealing that Galactus serves the universe, which in turn is revealed to have a grand purpose for which Galactus is an integral part. Without him, that purpose would be thwarted. In short, Mr. Fantastic did everyone a huge favor by saving the space god’s life! In the end, the Watcher tells Byrne to hurry up and write this issue of the FF because the memory of the trial will soon fade, leaving him with one last thought: though every sentient being in the universe retains their free will in the ultimate destiny of time, Galactus, tragically, is the only one who has no choice in what he does!

The Jack of Hearts Limited Series #1 “Murmur of the Heart” Bill Mantlo (script); George Freeman (pencils/inks) Like other oddball characters Marvel kept coming up with in these years, the Jack of Hearts had two things in common with a lot of them, Bill Mantlo as a writer and a second-string up and comer on the art, which, in the case of The Jack of Hearts #1 (Jan. 1984), was one George Freeman. Freeman broke in to the business professionally drawing the adventures of Comely Comics’ Captain Canuck before moving up to DC Comics. From there, he migrated to Marvel, where he picked up the assignment for the Jack of Hearts limited series. Freeman was one of a new crop of comic book artists who had something about his style that suggested the potential for excitement if only it had a year or two more to evolve, much as happened to an earlier generation of artists such as Barry Smith and Craig Russell. The Dark Ages

Disappointingly, like many of his peers at the time, far out of his weight class Spider-Man, it’s a rare he seems to have reached a certain point and then for Marvel back-up tale that steals the spotlight stalled, leveling off at proficient and never quite this issue. (According to a blurb on the letters’ breaking through to exciting. And that’s where we page by editor Bob DeNatale, readers were expected find him this issue as the Jack of Hearts gets his to believe that the idea for a back-up was inspired own strip after starting off in Marvel’s black-and- by “assistant editor’s month!”) Again, deftly written white magazine Deadly Hands of Kung Fu of all by Stern, the story concerns itself with little Tim things. From there, he bounced around to whatever Harrison, who is stricken with leukemia. But what book creator Bill Mantlo happened to be writing at sets Tim apart from other ailing children is that the time. Somewhat capturing the spirit of early he’s also the biggest Spidey fan since Flash Marvel super-heroes in that he’s stuck with a Thompson. Reading in the newspaper that Tim’s power that is more curse than blessing, Jack Hart greatest wish is to meet his idol in person, Spidey (Jack of Heart’s real name...get it?) opens this story makes a secret, late night visit to the boy’s bedroom with an attempt at killing himself where the two end up in a bit of and ending an existence that sees a heart to heart, ending with him trapped in a bubble when not Spidey removing his mask and running around in a suit designed revealing his identity to Tim. to contain his destructive energies Unfortunately, Tim’s promise not to (if the suit just happens to look like reveal the secret is never put to the he’s wearing a jack of hearts playing test as he is destined to succumb card so much the better). Enter to his disease only weeks after Marcy Kane, Jack’s old flame from meeting his hero. The story is given his college days, hired by S.H.I.E.L.D. added depth with excerpts from the to help deal with his psychological aforesaid newspaper article, which problems. Marcy has just begun to gives running details about Tim’s convince Jack that he could use his obsession with Spider-Man until powers for good when his home is the final entry in the last panel attacked by parties unknown (don’t informing readers that the boy has you hate it when that happens?). only a few weeks to live. Adding Jack fends them off only to discover immeasurably to the lingering that he’s actually of half-alien heritage sadness of Tim’s story is the art by Bill Mantlo was the and his powers are needed to save newcomer Ron Frenz, who became unsung hero of Marvel his mother’s homeworld (Contraxia) an expert at mimicking the styles of scripters in the late by reigniting its sun. Hoo boy! past Marvel greats such as Jack ’70s and ’80s. The only way to explain ancillary Kirby (whom he emulated for a characters like Jack of Hearts being long run on Thor) and Steve Ditko given solo spotlights is that Marvel, hoping to (for whom he’d do the same for a number of issues maintain its market dominance, was throwing all of Spider-Man after taking over from Romita). But kinds of things at the wall to see what would his imitation of Ditko was especially fine and stick. Some things did, some didn’t, but the limited appropriate for “The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man,” series concept itself provided the perfect vehicle particularly aided and abetted by the inks of Terry for the process. Austin. Here, Frenz perfectly captures the Ditko look for Spidey with a number of panels showing Amazing Spider-Man #248 our hero in action poses greatly reminiscent of And He Strikes Like a Thunderball” Roger Stern those by his co-creator (on page 3, panel 2, a shot (script); John Romita, Jr. (breakdowns); of Spidey ruffling Tim’s hair looks exactly like a Brett Breeding (finishes) panel from issue #17 with Liz Allen ruffling Peter “The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man” Roger Stern Parker’s hair!) Other panels recalling Spidey’s origin (script); Ron Frenz (breakdowns); Terry Austin (finishes) seemed lifted directly from Amazing Fantasy #15, Although the main story in Amazing Spider-Man and some shots of harried Peter Parker capture the #248 (Jan. 1984) was a fun confrontation between way the character looked in the Ditko era. The an Asgardian powered Thunderball (one member final page of the story becomes particularly of a similarly empowered three-man Wrecking poignant as a shadowed Spider-Man pauses head Crew who were in turn led by the Wrecker) and a in hand atop a wall with a plaque stating “Slocum 90

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Ron Frenz (left) took some heat from critics over his career for spending too much time drawing in the style of favorite artists like Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, but it was a bum rap. Fans loved his stuff. Bob DeNatale (right) was one of a small legion of editors and assistant editors that filled the Marvel offices in the ’80s as the company’s line of comics expanded far beyond even the early Twilight Years.

Brewer Cancer Clinic” as Tim’s sad fate is brought home to the reader. It was a true tour de force artwise evoking in long-time fans a yearning for the return of the real thing to the strip, but Ditko, even though he ended up finishing his professional career at Marvel in these years, declined to revisit his most famous creation. And although Frenz himself would produce more issues that had a touch of Ditko, never again would he come as close in capturing the strip’s glorious Early Years as he did here. But it was enough. He and Stern had managed to create a wonderful little gem that could stand up to anything produced in the later Twilight Years and in fact, even set a standard of excellence for others to follow.

Kull the Conqueror vol 2 #4 “Framework” Alan Zelenetz (script); Charles Vess (pencils/inks) “Brule’s Tale” Alan Zelenetz (script); Ernie Chan (pencils); Joe Rubinstein (inks) “Ridondo’s Tale” Alan Zelenetz (script); John Bolton (pencils/inks) “Tu’s Tale” Alan Zelenetz (script); Butch Guice (pencils); John Beatty (inks) “Kutholos’ Tale” Alan Zelenetz (script); Bill Sienkiewicz (pencils/inks) By Kull #4 (Feb. 1984), sword and sorcery at Marvel had been a going concern for well over a decade.

Unfortunately, by this time in the later Twilight Years, the bloom had started to come off the rose. The heady days of Barry Smith and the early John Buscema/Ernie Chan on Conan and Marie and John Severin on Kull were long since past even though the genre they launched went on albeit with slowing momentum. Still, titles such as Conan, King Conan, and Savage Sword of Conan all continued to be published in the mid-1980s. Obviously, the creations of pulpsmith Robert E. Howard continued to inform Marvel’s sword and sorcery franchise, but even his name didn’t automatically translate into successful features, with those starring Red Sonja and King Kull having fallen by the wayside over the years. Nevertheless, the powers that were at Marvel never stopped trying to find different ways to re-present Howard’s characters hoping to hit the magic formula that would make them as successful as the Conan books had been. The leading figure in those efforts was Kull, Howard’s second most famous barbarian. Kull began strong back in the early Twilight Years with scripts by Gerry Conway and art by Marie and John Severin but sales never really picked up. A change in format with art by fan-favorite newcomer Mike Ploog and scripting by Conan scribe Roy Thomas failed to turn things around and the title was eventually canceled. The character was revived in his own blackand-white magazine, but there too, uninteresting stories and the failure to find an exciting artist who would capture the imagination of readers doomed the feature to early cancellation. Then, with someone obviously believing that the third time was the charm (and maybe with strong sales of Kull starring issues of Bizarre Adventures), Kull was revived again in the form of a four-color comic and with numbering starting over with #1. Sporting a snazzy illo of the barbarian king by Kull artist supreme Marie Severin in the upper left hand ID box, the new series was launched with extra-length stories illustrated by an overworked John Buscema, who seemed unable to supply more than layouts finished by other artists. The results were serviceable if visually unexciting stories. This issue, however, held a bit of a surprise for the diligent fan who hadn’t yet given up on the series. A compilation of stories all written by Alan Zelenetz, they each featured different artists who occupied varying places in the hearts of discerning fans: Charles Vess had a rubbery, Mike Kaluta-esque style; Ernie Chan, after inking John Buscema on a zillion issues of Conan had adopted an ersatz Buscema style of his own; Butch Guice, whose Ploogish pencils were still evolving; and Bill Sienkiewicz, whose abstract, shock corridor, illustrative manner had yet to fully emerge. But the hidden gem among these otherwise unexciting efforts was that of John Bolton! A British comics artist, Bolton The Dark Ages

was discovered by Marvel editor Ralph Macchio who had the prescience to scoop up this incredible talent before DC did! (The Distinguished Competition had to settle for the less talented Dave Gibbons and Brian Bolland). In an era when British comics creators were being actively recruited by American companies, Bolton didn’t need any warm-up time as his already highly evolved, even painterly, style made him instantly one of the company’s top talents of the later Twilight Years. As if his two monumental long-form Kull stories executed early in his career at Marvel weren’t enough to establish him as a major force on the American comics scene, his later work illustrating stories for Bruce Jones would surely have done it eventually. It was only unfortunate that early on, his talents were wasted on a Black Dragon mini-series and Marada the She-Wolf feature for Epic, a pair of promising but ultimately disappointing strips dreamed up by writer Chris Claremont. Worse still, Bolton would later abandon his drawing style in favor of painted work that would end up being a good deal less satisfying than his earlier efforts. But that was a few years down the road, for now, there was the ten-page “Ridondo’s Tale” in this issue of Kull; a low-key tale of love, murder, and just deserts as a tree planted on the grave of a murder victim bears fruit filled with deadly “hellworms” that eventually do in his killers. It was the type of weird story that Bolton would become adept at after he moved on from Marvel to Pacific Comics’ Twisted

Like George Freeman, Jackson “Butch” Guice (left) was one of those newcomers at Marvel who appeared to be an artist to watch but fans would have to check out his work on Action Comics at DC to find out how it ended up. Less interesting was Dave Gibbons (right) who nevertheless made his mark as the artist of Alan Moore’s Watchmen maxi-series also produced by DC.

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Tales and Alien Worlds where some of his best work would be on display. Fun Fact: Although the new Kull book would not feature any other stories worth mentioning, it did surprise fans with a couple really great cover images executed by Barry Smith when the artist returned to regular comics in the mid-’80s. In the first for issue #9, Smith draws and colors an eyecatching portrait of Kull and then follows that up on #10 with the exact same image except Kull’s head is replaced by that of a serpent man! Oh, if only Smith had gone on to do a story to go with those images too!.

Amazing Spider-Man #249 “Secrets!” Roger Stern (script); John Romita, Jr. (breakdowns); Dan Green (finishes) Amazing Spider-Man #249 (Feb. 1984) had another interesting and successful pairing of artist John Romita, Jr. with a new inker, this time Dan Green. Although the figure of Peter Parker in the opening splash page is downright awkward, the two manage to render a good story for the rest of the book’s 22 pages. In fact, the two more than make up for that first page with some nice panels later on that more than once echo past work by John Romita, Sr. himself! (Check out page 19, panel 6 if convincing is needed!) This latest chapter in the Hobgoblin saga opens at a pool party hosted by Harry Osborn at his palatial country estate, and right away, the reader is plunged into the soap opera elements of Peter Parker’s personal life that have always been a mainstay of the strip...sometimes quite successful and at others not so much so. This pool party interlude, however, displays an interesting mix of good and not so hot. Sure, Pete’s navigating between his relationship with old pal Harry and wife Liz and a returned Mary Jane is fun, but his new hunky image (he walks around the party with cut offs and a metrosexual type shorty top with the word “animal” across the front) makes it hard for anyone to believe that this is the same ole hard luck Spidey they’ve known and often identified with...particularly after he marries super model Mary Jane later in the decade. (And was it coincidence that the Bullpen Page had once identified John Romita, Jr. as the sexiest guy in the bullpen?) But as Peter’s new looks catch the eyes of the ladies, the Hobgoblin has been busy. Seems among the secrets he’s purloined from Norman Osborn’s old hideouts is embarrassing dirt on a number of New York’s most powerful men, including the fact that Harry’s father had been the original Green Goblin. Meeting with them all at a private club, he intends to blackmail them when Spidey interferes and spoils the game. However, a twist ending has our hero rescued from imminent death by none other than

the Kingpin, who happened to be having lunch in the club’s grill room! This Hobgoblin business was getting more interesting all the time (kudos to writer Roger Stern in keeping things at a high pitch, including this issue’s tale of attempted blackmail that manages to tie in events from issues going all the way back to #20!) but all good things must end and so does Hobby’s career of crime in the upcoming issue 250...or does it? Stay tuned!

Amazing Spider-Man #250, page 18: Artist John Romita, Jr. and inker Klaus Janson do it again for the penultimate issue recounting the end of the Hobgoblin...or maybe not.

Amazing Spider-Man #250 “Confessions!” Roger Stern (script); John Romita, Jr. (breakdowns); Klaus Janson (finishes) By the late Twilight Years, marking anniversary issues had become something of a staple in the comics industry begun really, with Fantastic Four #100. After that, the pace seemed to pick up as such special occasions were expanded to include the fifty mark as well. Case in point: Amazing Spider-Man #250 (March 1984) (“Special normalsized 250th issue!”) in which writer Roger Stern and artist John Romita, Jr. present the first part in a two-part story that ostensibly spells the end of the long-running Hobgoblin storyline. Adding luster to this special event are the inks of Klaus Janson, who does a great job enhancing Romita’s pencils (which are in any case, mere breakdowns as they have been for many previous issues). Pages 10, 16, 17, and 21 are particular standouts. Even better, they appear in service to a solid story by Stern that includes such elements as J. Jonah Jameson deciding to go public about his involvement with the creation of the Scorpion by publishing a confession in the Bugle, Peter digging out the old tracking device he invented before relying on his natural spider sense to find bad guys, Spidey’s knock down drag ‘em out fight with the Hobgoblin that is reminiscent of a similar final battle with the Green Goblin in issue #40, and even a back-to-basics scene where Spidey has to sneak past his landlady to get out of his apartment unseen! A blurb on the splash page called this book “Possibly the best issue of Spider-Man ever,” a boastful blurb that may not have been far from The Dark Ages

the truth! Anyway, if this ish was intended to whet readers’ appetites for a final showdown with the Hobgoblin in issue #251, it worked! Fun Fact: An image of a maniacal Hogoblin taking the place of Spidey on the cover’s corner box adds to the issue’s special nature as he paraphrases Abbie Hoffman telling readers: “It’s great! Steal it!”

Amazing Spider-Man #251 “Endings!” Roger Stern (plot); Tom DeFalco (script). Ron Frenz (breakdowns); Klaus Janson (finishes) It was “Endings” in more ways than one in Amazing Spider-Man #251 (April 1984) as the long-running Hobgoblin saga concluded (sort of) but also with the departure of the equally long-running writer/artist team of Roger Stern and John Romita, Jr. According to Stern, it was ordinary, everyday creative reshuffling periodically suffered by Marvel staff that resulted in his leaving the strip, but the writer has also mentioned difficulties working with new editor Danny Fingeroth. Coincidentally, Romita had also begun having his own second thoughts about the book. For months he’d been dividing his time between Spidey (where he’d only been doing breakdowns rather than full pencils) and the X-Men and had finally decided to leave the former to concentrate more on the latter. Romita’s decision coincided with Stern’s dissatisfaction and the two finally chose to leave the book at the same time. It would mark the end of one of the late Twilight Years’ most successful runs of comics, and although the Spider-Man feature would enjoy some decent art by newcomer Ron Frenz, story quality with ongoing issues (especially after Spidey was given a new, mostly black, costume following events in the concurrent Secret Wars maxi-series) would become increasingly spotty. But for this issue, however, there was no noticeable fall-off as Tom DeFalco (who would turn out to be another writer like Stern and John Byrne, with deep knowledge of and willingness to use Marvel’s rich history as a springboard for new stories) scripted over Stern’s plot while Frenz (who did such an excellent job on “The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man”) took over the art chores. Frenz not only continued in his Ditkoesque style, but was aided immensely by the inks of Klaus Janson, who accentuated the Ditko elements of Frenz’s pencils. Fans looking for any indication of a return to greatness, needed to look no farther than page 10 where Frenz’s figures of Spider-Man could well have been drawn by the master himself! The delight continued on page 13 and page 20, which feature Peter Parker getting into costume and swinging off through the trees. Throughout, Frenz mixes up panel size and layout, frequently aping his predeces94

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Tom DeFalco (left) had the unenviable task of relieving Roger Stern on the writing chores for Spider-Man but ended up doing a commendable job anyway. Danny Fingeroth (righ t) took over the title’s editorial duties when DeFalco surrendered them in order to do the writing.

sor in the use of smaller, narrow panels but not shying away from the more traditional six-panel grid. But it’s the artist’s story pacing that impresses the most. With a lot of ground to cover, Frenz manages to balance scenes of Spidey in hand-to-hand combat with the Hobgoblin, careening through the streets atop the ‘goblin’s souped-up van, and the villain’s final, apparent defeat at the bottom of the Hudson River. Frenz was equally at ease in the offices of the Daily Bugle. In a scene reminiscent of one in issue #10 where J. Jonah Jameson explains why he hates Spider-Man, our hero learns that Jameson has publicly admitted his responsibility for the creation of the Scorpion and has stepped down as editor-in-chief of the paper. “I love this newspaper!” declares Jameson. “I won’t see its journalistic integrity questioned because of my mistake...so I’m stepping down as editor-in-chief!” Beautifully rendered by Frenz and Janson, the scene underscored a subtle change in how Jameson was depicted in various Marvel books at the time. From almost a purely cartoonish character of sputtering outrage, suddenly, a different side of his personality was revealed: the crusading, fearless publisher who only happened to have a blind spot where super-heroes were concerned. This issue was a tour de force for the new creative team and one that deserves a place of honor among the achievements of the later Twilight Years, the kind of achievement that would come less and less frequently as the Dark Ages loomed. Not so Fun Fact: The high level of satisfaction provided by this issue was only marred by the final

two pages that tied in with the otherwise uninteresting Secret Wars maxi-series. Although it was surely every fan’s dream to see all his favorite super-heroes sharing one grand adventure, the reality as visualized in the pair of Secret Wars series (even though it contained a number of “irreversible” changes to some of the characters) served mostly to undermine the credibility of the Marvel Universe. It was a shame that orders from above would force creators of regular series to interrupt ongoing storylines to wedge in issues devoted to the Secret Wars shenanigans. This practice was especially painful on series such as the Stern/Romita/Frenz Spider-Man and the Stern/Buscema/Palmer Avengers when every issue of those great runs was precious due to the knowledge that their creative teams could break up at any moment.

Secret Wars #1 “The War Begins” Jim Shooter (script); Mike Zeck (pencils); John Beatty (inks) It was a good idea gone horribly wrong. Ever since the Early Years of Marvel, fans realized that their favorite super-heroes actually shared the same universe. In Fantastic Four #4, a connection was made between the present and the company’s Golden Age, in Fantastic Four #12 the FF met the Hulk, and in Amazing Spider-Man #1 Spidey applies to the FF for a job. But things really came together in the classic two-part story of the FF’s battle with the Hulk and the Avengers in Fantastic Four #25-26. After that, what had been idle speculation among readers became a demand that a story be written that grouped all of the company’s superheroes together in a single adventure. That finally happened in Fantastic Four Annual #3 when the heroes attended Reed and Sue’s wedding and were attacked by virtually every super-villain there was at the time. Fast forward to the later Twilight Years. By the time of the 1980s, the same Marvel Universe had grown too big...too unwieldy for every super-hero and villain to appear in any single comic or even annual. What had been believable in 1964, when all of the company’s super-heroes lived in New York City, was now unlikely if not impossible. To bring them all together in one story would not only stretch the bounds of credibility but threatened to overdose fans and spoil them for big crossovers in the future. Unfortunately, it was Roy Thomas who provided the means that would allow large bodies of super-heroes to get together other than by natural means. In books like Avengers #70, Thomas invented such cosmic entities as the Grandmaster who could snap their fingers and assemble any set of heroes they wanted for whatever purpose. Those stories served as a precedent for what

was called Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars (or just plain Secret Wars for short). Conceived by editor-inchief Jim Shooter after conferences with the big brains at toy manufacturer Mattel, the series was to be geared around a licensing deal for Marvel’s characters but only if certain changes were made. For instance, Mattel asked for a special “publishing event” that would involve all of the company’s heroes and villains in a single book that had to include the words “war” or “secret” in the title...both would be even better. Also, the setting of the story had to be somewhere that would allow Mattel to sell specialized playsets to go with the action figures of the heroes and the heroes and villains themselves needed to use different kinds of weapons, vehicles, and other equipment that could be sold as accessories. As the project grew and became more complicated, Shooter decided that instead of finding someone who needed to have everything explained to them and put it all together, it would be easier to do it himself. After all, who (besides Stan Lee that is) had more experience in

Any resemblance between the Marvel SuperHeroes Secret Wars toys and their comic book counterpart is purely intentional.

The Dark Ages

Mike Zeck

A better designer than actual comic book artist due to his

penchant for puffy, balloon-limbed figure work, Zeck often included characters who took overly melodramatic poses in order to project maximum menace. It was an affectation that had many fans and would become a progenitor for the work of such artists as Whilce Portacio later in the 1980s and many others in the Image stable. Zeck began to cultivate his style early with his work on Master of Kung Fu and Captain America culminating in a plum assignment on the Punisher’s initial solo limited series. Before that came Marvel Super-Heroes Secret Wars, which the artist considered less than up to snuff. But he made up for it with his job for the popular but bleak “Kraven’s Last Hunt” storyline for the Spider-Man titles. Zeck later left Marvel for DC where he finished out the century doing mostly fill-in work.

writing stories that juggled dozens of super-heroes at once? Shooter, after all, had cut his eyeteeth writing DC’s Legion of Super-Heroes for years before migrating over to Marvel. What resulted was Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #1 (May 1984), the first issue in a 12-part limited series; a series that ads soon boasted would include big, permanent changes in the Marvel Universe, the most famous (or infamous depending on which side of the fan fence you were) was a costume change for Spider-Man. Out would be the iconic red and blue web-patterned outfit first designed by artist Steve Ditko and in would be an allblack outfit with a big white spider emblem on the front. Surprisingly, the change did last for quite a while before the status quo was inevitably reestablished. Other changes involved the creation of some new characters like a new Spider-Woman and feminist strong ladies Titania and Volcana, the break-up of the X-Men’s Colossus and Kitty Pryde (Aww...), and the Thing leaving the FF to be replaced by the She-Hulk (ugh!) Casting about for an art team that could handle a zillion super-powered characters at once while keeping their costumes straight, Shooter settled on up-and-comer Mike Zeck and his regular inker John Beatty. As it turned out, both men do a creditable job on the art turning in professional work that does what it’s supposed to, such as a double-page splash on pages 2-3 that includes 20 super-heroes in a single shot (which was done a second time in the next panel at the top of page 4...and immediately followed by a panel showing 13 villains!). Right off the bat, anyone could tell that this series was going 96

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to be a hit with younger readers at least, if not their more sophisticated older siblings. The tale itself is easily summarized: a cosmic being (thanks Roy!) named the Beyonder (‘cause he’s from beyond our universe, get it?) becomes fascinated with all the super-characters on Earth and decides to transport them to a place called Battleworld (playsets!) to set the heroes against the villains. (An interesting aside to the confrontation is the quandary the scenario places on such hero-villains as Sub-Mariner and Magneto... who do they side with?) Zeck and Beatty attempt some cosmic drama on pages 6-7 with near fullsized splashes of a galaxy being destroyed and Battleworld being formed. Notwithstanding being awed by the sight, the villains fall among themselves and begin to fight; but not for long. “Slay your enemies and all you desire shall be yours!” says the Beyonder. That’s all the urging the villains need as the issue ends with their all-out attack on the good guys. Next issue: “First blood!” Sales of the following 11 issues would only prove that the suits at Mattel (and Shooter) had known what they were doing after all, as books sold like hotcakes and the whole limited series became a huge success for Marvel (unfortunately inspiring a sequel in Secret Wars II). Overall, it was a fun exercise in getting all those characters to interface with one another and though Shooter does a good job finding nice bits of action for each of them (while managing to individualize their voices in his dialogue), the series is ultimately unsatisfying for the serious fan due to the sheer artificiality of the concept.

Amazing Spider-Man #252 “Homecoming!” Roger Stern (plot); Tom DeFalco (script); Ron Frenz (breakdowns); Brett Breeding (finished art) With Amazing Spider-Man #252 (May 1984), readers were confronted by an unfamiliar figure on the cover (albeit presented in a very familiar pose patterned after that of Amazing Fantasy #15). But as they soon learned from an accompanying blurb (“The rumors are true! Introducing...the new Spider-Man!”) the black-clad being on the cover was actually ole Spidey himself, back from the Secret Wars limited series, whose first issue came out the same month. You see, last issue ended with

The more things change, the more they stay the same. So it was with Spidey’s new costume, presented to the world on this tribute cover to Amazing Fantasy #15. Luckily, cooler heads prevailed and the switch in costuming turned out to be one of the most short-lived “permanent” changes ever!

our hero mysteriously vanishing only to return to Earth at the start of this issue. In the month between issues, Spidey participated in the Secret Wars where he picked up the black costume. But how it came about was something curious readers would have to pick up the Secret Wars series to find out. The idea for the gap between issues was that of editor-in-chief and Secret Wars scribe Jim Shooter, who was also looking for ways to make the limited series more than just a tie-in with Mattel’s line of Marvel-based action figures. To do it, he decided to turn Secret Wars into a showcase whose effects would ripple all through the “real” Marvel Universe. Consequently, changes such as the She-Hulk replacing the Thing on the FF and the Hulk breaking his leg (!) were duly instituted and carried over into the regular comics. And then there was the biggest change of all: Spidey dumping his iconic red and blue costume for what the editors considered “a sleeker, more mysterious, more spidery” look (as explained in this issue’s letters’ page). The new costume was sleek all right and came with a number of strange properties including being able to morph into street clothes whenever Peter willed it, being able to hide stuff like Peter’s camera and wallet on his body without any indication that they were there, shoot webbing without mechanical aid, and even slither onto Peter’s body from across a room when he needed it! All that and the big, white stylized spider on the chest added up to a pretty cool outfit...but it wasn’t the original. Something that readers began to clamor for after it began to seem that Marvel was serious about it being a permanent change. In the meantime, though Peter himself had reservations about the new costume, his happiness in being back home after fighting in the Secret Wars overrides his concern about the new costume’s weird attributes. What follows is a somewhat average story with little action other than Peter catching up with the strip’s cast of supporting characters, and as Spidey, teaching a couple of kids the value of living in the greatest city in the world. Luckily for everyone though, Marvel editorial eventually came to its senses and restored Spidey’s original costume by the interesting expedient of declaring the new outfit a living creature with malevolent intentions. In later years, it would attach itself to others and seek revenge on Spidey as Venom. Fun Fact: The origin of the black costume has a twisty history going back to a fan who once suggested that Spider-Man change his costume The Dark Ages

and offering his version of what it might look like. Attracted to the idea, Shooter had Marvel buy the rights to the design, assigned Secret Wars artist Mike Zeck to fiddle with it some and introduced the result in Secret Wars #8.

Fantastic Four #267, page 30: An unusual page design as Mr. Fantastic learns that all his efforts to save his unborn child were not enough. A lost opportunity for writer/artist John Byrne to push the boundaries of what it meant for superheroes to live in the real world. Lost, too, was the chance to present a hopeful, uplifting story of love, devotion, and family in a comics industry that was increasingly preoccupied with violence, negativity, and pessimism.

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Fantastic Four #267 “A Small Loss” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Well into his legendary run on the Fantastic Four, writer/artist John Byrne was still moving the ball forward with new twists and turns that underscored his original belief when he first took over the book: that a flagship title like the FF should be at the top of Marvel’s most exciting, best-selling titles. For the most part, he succeeded in doing that with a nimbleness and creativity that took many fans by surprise. In hindsight, after he switched gears from the X-Men to the FF, there was definitely a palpable transfer of energy between the two books, as Claremont took the the X-Men down increasingly uninteresting paths (carried forth by the momentum of the Byrne years) while Byrne reached back to Marvel’s Early Years for inspiration. Taking what Stan Lee and Jack Kirby had established as a starting point, Byrne soon began to add his own wrinkles to the FF including breaking up the Thing/ Alicia romance, introducing Aunt Petunia, substituting She-Hulk for the Thing, updating the team’s costumes from blue and black to a jazzier blue and white pattern, and having the Invisible Girl (whose code name he would alter to Invisible Woman) become pregnant with her second child. It was easily the most interesting development of his run on the book and the most exciting since...well, FF Special #6, when Reed and Sue’s first child was born. Immediately, vistas of an extended super-hero family opened up with readers charmed by the idea of super-powered parents having more than one

child, maybe two, or more! What would the married life of comicdom’s most famous parents be like under those circumstances? The potential for future developments in the characters’ private lives was limitless, especially under Byrne’s guiding hand. Alas, none of that was meant to be. Instead, the writer/artist chose to take the predictable route of having Sue lose the baby through a miscarriage. Huge disappointment... and a misstep for the strip. Yes, readers were the recipients in Fantastic Four #267 (June 1984) of a poignant tale of parental trauma and loss as a desperate Mr. Fantastic recruits the aid of radiation expert Dr. Octopus to help his ailing wife only to return 30 minutes too late to save their baby. The final page of the story underscores the sadness of the moment by presenting a single panel surrounded by a thick border of black as Reed receives the bad news. It was a genuine, moving moment for the characters that still came as something of a surprise even to jaded comics fans who knew really big, permanent changes in their favorite strips were hardly likely...but even this late in the Twilight Years, the cynicism of the coming Dark Age had yet to take firm root. It was still possible to dream and hope that maybe big things could still happen. Big things like Reed and Sue with a growing family. But perhaps in an unintended metaphor for the coming night, Byrne had struck a truer note than anyone at the time realized. There would be little joy in Mudville, and Marvel, in the coming years with no room for the innocence of a child, the shelter of a home, or the comfort of a family. Not so Fun Fact: The decision not to allow Sue to give birth a second time may have been one not made by Byrne. In Incredible Hulk #360 (Oct. 1989), Bruce Banner’s wife Betty was to give birth to a child but like Sue Storm, suffered a miscarriage instead. According to writer Peter David, he had intended the character to have the baby but his plans were nixed by editorial which believed that to allow her to do so would make the characters seem too old for the kiddies that were still presumed to be reading the book!

with a general makeover as a crusading newspaperman, publicly admitting his involvement with the creation of the Scorpion, and now getting married to Marla Madison. And though the plot of this annual revolved around the unsettled issues of the second item on that list, it was the third item that becomes the focus for a number of scenes centering on Spidey’s by now large cast of supporting characters. And who better to give them voice than the co-creator of most of them? By the mid-1980s, Stan Lee had long since been shunted off to Hollywood where he was happy to finally be able to hobnob with celebrities and studio bigwigs, making deals and trying to get any number of Marvel properties onto the screen, big or small. With mostly disappointing if not outright embarrassing results, it can be argued that his role as H-wood mogul had been something of a failure but that didn’t stop him from persevering or keeping up his ever bubbly personality. Thus, from time to time, he could be cajoled into dipping his toes back into the comic book waters if a project proved special enough. He did so when he teamed up with Jean Giraud for a Silver Surfer mini-series in 1988 and here, with this special Spider-Man Annual. The only drawback was that being away from the scene for so long, Lee wasn’t up to snuff on the regular book’s doings so that this tale was plotted by Tom DeFalco and broken down by Ron Frenz. From there, presumably, it was an easy

Amazing Spider-Man Annual #18 “The Scorpion Takes a Bride!” Tom DeFalco (plot); Stan Lee (script); Ron Frenz (breakdowns); Bob Layton and Jackson Guice (finishes) It was like old home week in Amazing Spider-Man Annual #18 (1984), sort of, when artist Ron Frenz in pretty much full Steve Ditko mode teamed up with none other and Stan Lee to produce 39 pages of late Twilight Years wonderment as J. Jonah Jameson prepares to enter the holy bonds of matrimony for at least the second time in his life! Jameson had been going through some major changes in this period beginning

Slowly but surely, Marvel Comics and Spider-Man were creeping into the public consciousness. The early ’80s Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends cartoon show, though unimpressive on a creative level, marked one more step in a conquest that would end with a billion dollar film franchise in the next century.

The Dark Ages

thing for Lee to step in and dialogue the pages, a manner of working that he’d become accustomed to earlier in his career. The results are a lot of fun, even a bit nostalgic, as Frenz’s artwork continued to be majorly influenced by Ditko, who happened to be Lee’s original partner on the strip. From the opening splash page to those of Spidey in action with the Scorpion (who is out to ruin Jameson’s wedding plans as part of his ongoing mania against the man who bankrolled his creation), Frenz manages to help capture the spirit of the early years of the strip (perhaps going a tad too far when he has Spidey take Jameson in his arms and kissing him...yech!) Frenz is served well by the inks of Jackson (nee Butch) Guice who early on showed much promise at Marvel as a penciler. Also throwing in his two cents was Bob Layton, who had gained a modest bit of attention through his work on the Iron Man strip. It had been a long-time since a Spider-Man Annual had measured up to the gold standard of the 1960s when such once-a-year events were expected to feature extra special stories spotlighting such events as weddings, births, supervillain team-ups, or major revelations. The annual tradition fell on hard times when they became exclusively reprint vehicles, and when original material returned, there wasn’t much to brag about. But with its somewhat eclectic all-star lineup of talent, extralength story, and plethora of character moments, Spider-Man Annual #18 manages finally to pick up where the original annuals left off or in Spidey’s case, at least where Annual #5 left off!

Fantastic Four #268 “The Masque of Doom!” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) Faced with the same dilemma as Stan Lee and Jack Kirby after they completed the original Galactus trilogy, Byrne now had to figure out how the heck you follow-up as mind-blowing a story as that in issue #262? Answer: with an intensely personal storyline leading into a new Dr. Doom thriller! As did Lee and Kirby when they followed up their own Galactus tale with a single issue story of a nameless scientist consumed by jealousy over Mr. Fantastic who plots to kill him only to change his mind in the face of Reed’s selflessness, Byrne takes up the thread of Sue’s new pregnancy only to have her lose the baby in a miscarriage. Thus, Fantastic Four #268 (July 1984) opens on a scene of tragedy as Reed and Sue agonize over the loss of their baby the issue before. But as tenderly as Byrne’s words treat the scene, things move on with the Torch deciding that with nothing more he can do, he might as well give teammate She-Hulk (and readers) a tour of the new Baxter Building. But between the 100

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epochal events in issue #262 and 268, the FF have gone through some changes, not for the good. Besides the illadvised sundering of the long-standing relationship between the Thing and Alicia Masters (and Johnny catching the blind sculptress on the rebound or did he just steal her away?), Byrne brought in the She-Hulk to replace the Thing, who has quit the team in anger. And who can blame him? But trading the execrable She-Hulk for the Thing couldn’t be anything but a bad deal for fans even if for some reason, Byrne insisted on revisiting She-Hulk over the years as if trying to prove his creative chops by making something of the nowhere Hulk knockoff. Over the remaining issues of his run on the FF, this would prove a challenge as the She-Hulk’s belligerent personality (as if suffering from an inferiority complex of some kind) made her essentially unlikeable (did she have any fans at all besides male writers seeking to prove their feminist bona fides?) forcing Byrne into farce as she and Johnny’s college pal Wyatt Wingfoot become an item. It was painful to watch as She-Hulk began to treat the once noble Wyatt with playful disdain, hauling him around under her arm like a pet Pekinese. It was all very embarrassing and signaled that the end was near for one of the most consistently entertaining runs on any title in the later Twilight Years. (Another signpost on the way to the end would be Byrne’s decision to transform the Invisible Girl into an evil, leather-clad dominatrix!) From this point on, stories would begin to skew away from character development based on a natural progression of their personalities that Byrne had followed so well in past issues and veer off into head

An early foray by John Byrne into the world of independent comics was the cleverly titled Next Men, a science fiction series dealing in super-heroes combined with hot topics of the day.

scratching territory. In addition, Byrne would also give up inking his own work even as his pencils became sketchier and more sparse. All of which was disappointing (if not inevitable) having controlled the FF’s destiny for two years. Throughout that time, Byrne’s imagination never faltered (at least with established characters; his work on self created strips like Next Men and others were less successful), coming up with stories and wrinkles that never seemed to flag even as he was doing the same on

other titles such as The Thing, Hulk, and Alpha Flight. And the ideas would keep on coming, even if at times some didn’t quite work out, first with his stint at DC retooling Superman and then back at Marvel where he took over the West Coast Avengers and well into the Dark Ages when he launched X-Men: The Hidden Years. It was friction with Marvel’s changing editorial vision in those depressing later years that forced Byrne off those series just when he was really gathering creative steam.

Alpha Flight #12

Alpha Flight #12, page 37: The untimely death of Guardian took much of the wind out of Alpha Flight’s sails leaving the book populated with what amounted to a colorful group of supporting players.

“...And One Shall Surely Die” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) This one should be listed under “daring moments in comics!” Whoever heard of killing off a book’s main character within the first dozen issues? Well it happens here in Alpha Flight #12 (July 1984) and Renaissance man John Byrne is the one who does it! There was no question that James MacDonald Hudson, Guardian by his code name, leader of Alpha Flight, was the book’s headliner, right? He was what Captain America was not only to the good ole US of A, but to the Avengers as well. And yet, Byrne seemingly had no compunction about getting rid of him barely before the title had got off the ground. From the start of the series, he’d concentrated not on writing the strip as a team book but as a group of individuals who started out together once but now had their own individual life issues to deal with. Consequently, the first 11 issues of Alpha Flight rarely if ever featured the entire team together. That inconsistency seemed to fit with Byrne’s confessed lack of enthusiasm for a title he The Dark Ages

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found himself saddled with. But making a go of it, he managed to make the characters interesting in their own right (while introducing new ones created in his fan days), raising questions about each that would linger for months to come. Just the same, he’d barely begun sketching out Guardian’s profile when he decided to off him this issue. It happens this way: a former colleague of Hudson’s, who blames him for ruining his life, gathers a group of renegade members of Gamma Flight and attacks. During the fight, Hudson gets some wires crossed in his super-suit resulting in an explosion. In the room with him to witness the event is his wife, Heather Hudson, who watches her spouse as he’s reduced to a hunk of ash in the final, shocking, full-page panel. To complete the surprising turn of events, Byrne would eventually have Heather take up the Guardian identity and continue leadership of Alpha Flight. “I did that particular story because I felt Mac was the least interesting of all the members of Alpha but realized that from his death I could generate a whole flock of interesting subplots and arcs,” explains Byrne. “In my constant quest to make the members of Alpha more three dimensional, I was always looking for anything that could be used to generate depth in their personalities. Mac’s death...and their reactions to it...was such a way.” Empowering Heather in a way also paralleled what Byrne was doing in the Fantastic Four, finding ways to empower the Invisible Girl. There, however, it would be far more difficult to kill off Mr. Fantastic and have Sue Richards take over the group (although Byrne did manage to do just that on a temporary basis). But with Alpha Flight, a book with fewer credentials than the FF, he could go the distance and replace the traditional male lead with a female counterpart. It was a bold move that unfortunately took the wind out of the book’s sails. Although the series would soldier on well past 100 issues, it never managed to set the world on fire even with Byrne remaining at the helm for another year or so. Fun Fact: Byrne was smack dab in the center of his most creative years with this issue. Not only did he seem to be an inexhaustive fount of story ideas, but as writer and penciler (and inker too!) he was better able to integrate the art with his storytelling to produce such interesting effects as that on page 36 where the layout is divided into 9 panels of equal size, each shaped like a number counting down from 9 in the first to 1 in the last. In each, Guardian is shown fighting the clock as he works to repair his suit before it blows up. At “0” his wife steps into the scene at the top of the next page interrupting the repair process resulting in tragedy. 102

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Louise Simonson (left) began her career at Warren Publications while then husband Jeff Jones was a contributor. She eventually became senior editor before moving on to Marvel to perform the same duties and marrying artist Walter Simonson. Artist June Brigman (right) left few footprints in comics before taking over the Brenda Starr comic strip in 1995.

Power Pack #1 “Power Play” Louise Simonson (script); June Brigman (pencils); Bob Wiacek (inks) Midway through the later Twilight Years, Marvel made a belated attempt to reconnect with younger readers by launching its Star Comics line, which featured among other things, Harvey Comics-esque characters, cartoon based characters such as Bullwinkle and the Flintstones, comic strip characters like Heathcliff, and a homegrown feature called Peter Porker (of which the less said, the better!) Unfortunately, by that point, the comics industry had progressed such that most of its younger readers had already been lost and ultimately proved impossible to lure back again (especially with comics distribution relying more and more on specialty shops that most younger kids didn’t patronize). Thus, by 1988, the Star Comics line was no more. As the black curtain of the Dark Ages descended on the stage, there would be a few half-hearted, intermittent attempts over the succeeding years at getting kid-friendly comics off the ground, but few would last. By the end of the 1980s, the comics industry had evolved into a form that was distinctly unfriendly to kids. With extreme violence, perversion, and death everywhere, there was little room for anything else. Still, for a short while in the mid-to-late Twilight Years, a noble attempt to produce something different that bucked the oncoming trend spearheaded by the likes of Frank Miller, would prove mildly successful while

providing readers seeking alternatives to grim and gritty with a haven to catch their collective breathes. That haven was Power Pack, created and written by Louise Simonson (former editor at Warren Publications before moving to Marvel to perform the same services most notably for the popular X-Men title) and drawn by newcomer June Brigman. Not to be mistaken for anything that would set the world on fire, Power Pack nonetheless featured characters that Simonson managed to make appealing in naturalistic dialogue closely approximating what children at different ages might say to one another. For children were to be the focus of Power Pack which starred the four Power children: Alex (age 12), Julie (10), Jack (7), and Katie (5), whose parents are kidnapped by evil aliens (the Snark, who look like lizards, natch) even as a good alien (Whitey, who looks like a frothy colored horse...shades of Hasbro’s My Little Pony, a popular toy

While many artists tended to draw children looking like small adults, artist June Brigman seemed to possess an affinity for them, a skill on display here in a later sketch of the Power siblings.

of the time) shows up to stop them. Nothing original here as the dying Whitey bestows his powers on each of the children (whose ages make them the youngest superheroes in the Marvel Universe) enabling them to stand up to the Snark and eventually rescue their parents. It seems that father Power has come up with a formula for anti-matter conversion that could be used as a deadly weapon...and the evil Snark want it! Such is the set-up as our saga begins in Power Pack #1 (Aug. 1984). Star Wars-like, the story opens with a splash page depicting ships at war in nearEarth space before shifting scenes to the oh so ordinary domestic life of the Power family. Throughout these early scenes, Simonson succeeds in capturing the banter expected of siblings as dishes are cleaned up after supper. Later, the kids cajole their parents into letting them sleep on the porch and the sighting of Whitey’s ship as it crashes into the nearby surf signals the strip’s departure from reality to fantasy. Brigman’s art throughout is serviceable without being splashy or even eyecatching. Nothing that would place her in danger of becoming a fan-favorite. But that doesn’t matter as her main job is to keep the children looking like the little kids they are (something many artists find difficult to manage) while also keeping the strip grounded in the kids’ relationship with each another, their parents, and friends (they decide to keep their powers a secret). And Brigman does that. The down-toearth feel of the strip would become more important as its 62-issue run progressed and Simonson began to introduce such contemporary issues as bullying, missing children, and drug abuse The Dark Ages

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into the stories (hinted at this issue with the somewhat unlikely feminist attitude of 10-year-old Julie and 5-year-old Katie: “Listen! You girls hide behind the seats and don’t come out until I say it’s safe,” says 12-year-old Alex. “Hey, wait a minute! ‘Hide behind the seats?’” wonders Julie. “Give me a break!” replies Katie. “Male chauvinist pigs!” sneers Julie. “Oink! Oink!” jeers Katie.) Launched as an extra long 36-page special, the issue ends with the fate of the kids’ parents still in doubt and the deadly anti-matter converter about to be tested against the Earth! Overall, it was a solid book designed to appeal to younger readers (and some older ones too no doubt!) marred only by a somewhat disconcerting full-page ad at the end depicting an angry Luke Cage, Hero for Hire pointing at the reader and shouting something about buying the latest issue of Power Man and Iron Fist or else.

though. Remember how when he first arrived at Marvel and was assigned the Moon Knight feature? His stuff was okay if warmed over Neal Adams was preferred. Then, something happened. His style began to evolve, veering away from the more literal tropes of comics storytelling into the farther reaches of pop art where it became less determinate, even abstract. There, suggestion and representation ruled the day and Sienkiewicz’s art followed suit using the familiar tools of comics artists like Zip-a-Tone while also exploring collage and photo-realism. The result

“Death-Hunt” Chris Claremont (script); Bill Sienkiewicz (pencils/inks) “We’d like to welcome Bill Sienkiewicz...as the new artist for the New Mutants,” reads the blurb on the letters’ page of New Mutants #18 (Aug. 1984). “We think that Bill’s work gives the New Mutants the dynamism it deserves...” Well, d’uh! That intro had to have ranked as the understatement of the year! And if Sienkiewicz’s arrival on the book wasn’t sensational by itself, imagine how much more jarring it was following as it did the hohum efforts of Bob McLeod and Sal Buscema! By comparison, Sienkiewicz was Mr. Excitement himself! It wasn’t always like that 104

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New Mutants #18

New Mutants #18, page 25: Like night and day. Compare this page by artist Bill Sienkiewicz with the sketch by June Brigman on the previous page. In the 1980s, there was still room in comics for different tastes and totally different skill sets.

was one of the most exciting if not so easily accessible styles in comics and one that proved difficult to adapt to mainstream super-heroes. A brief stint on the Fantastic Four underscored the point when teamed with veteran FF inker Joe Sinnott, Sienkiewicz’s work there turned out to be an ugly flop. Bouncing back, however, the artist found an unlikely fit with the New Mutants, a book that began life as just another spin-off of the popular X-franchise but whose characters were just quirky enough to be comfortably re-interpreted in Sienkiewicz’s unique style. And though Chris Claremont remained as writer on the book (as he’d been since the team was first introduced via one of Marvel’s early graphic novels), even his by now formulaic dialogue was made more than tolerable by the incredible art that seemed to burst anew on every page. Readers were given notice of Sienkiewicz’s arrival on the book by the first of a series of painted covers featuring the book’s Amerindian member Danielle Moonstar, codenamed Mirage. (A popular parlor game of the 1980s was forming groups with as much ethnic balance as could be squeezed in; the New Mutants was no exception boasting members who were Amerindian, Vietnamese, Brazilian, Scottish, and even a token white male). The story inside is typical Claremont, based around female character development with plenty of angst. (Claremont would go on to do the same thing ad nauseum with the monthly X-Men Classics reprint title that was sweetened for fans with backup stories focusing solely on character development). Here, Mirage must defeat a spirit bear that haunts her dreams due to deep-seated guilt about being the cause of her parents’ death. Trite as the set up is, the symbolic nature of the bear-threat made for a perfect introduction to Sienkiewicz’s style: in a full-page splash, the bear appears to Mirage, its unearthly claws and black and spiky fur dominates the borderless panel and threatens to swallow the young girl in its looming bulk. A series of action panels follows with wooded backgrounds reduced to stray lines and snow-covered landscapes are featureless expanses of negative space. It all climaxes in a final, full-page shot of the small figure of Mirage, apparently dead, dwarfed by the base of a massive tree that dominates the page as much as the bear did previously. But as impressive and exciting as was this parade of imagery, it was topped by the issue’s centerpiece, the introduction of Warlock, who possessed maybe one of the most radical designs for a “super-hero” ever. Warlock was Sienkiewicz’s abstracticism personified. A character with an indeterminate shape and form, he never looked the same from panel to panel, his appearance changing almost to suit the whim of the artist’s own moods. Warlock was one of those rare characters that could only be

illustrated by their creators; no one else could do him justice. Such would prove to be the case with Warlock and Sienkiewicz, with Warlock providing such strong imagery that the New Mutants book would forever after be identified with him. After Warlock, readers would be left asking: Mirage who?

Epic Illustrated #26 “The Last Galactus Story: Part 1” John Byrne (script/pencils); Terry Austin (inks) It turned out to be one of the great, maybe the greatest, teases in comics history. Riding high at the peak of his fame, John Byrne was called in to help save a sinking Epic Illustrated, which began life as a direct competitor to Heavy Metal magazine and ended up being a potpourri of mainstream Marvel creators trying to break out of the mainstream, independent creators looking to move up to more prestigious venues, and an oddball assortment of underground artists and other outsiders recruited to lend the magazine an air of edginess. The combination of material presumably geared to more mature tastes worked for a while, but by the mid-1980s, the world of comics was already beginning to devolve toward the Dark Ages when comics would backslide from the hope and promise inspired by Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns, Alan Moore’s Watchmen, and even Art Spiegelman’s Maus to the mindless juvenilia of Todd MacFarlane’s Spawn, Jim Lee’s WildC.A.T.s,

The darkness just around the corner. Titles such as Wildcats and Youngblood, influential though they might have been, would signal the end of any illusions fans had of the critical acceptance of comics as media fit for adult consumption. Though such media darlings as Alan Moore, Frank Miller, and Grant Morrison would be drafted to help, even they would not be enough to lend legitimacy to Image’s product.

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and Rob Liefield’s Youngblood (to name but a few). Thus, the idea of bringing in a mainstream giant like Byrne to do a serial likely struck Marvel editorial as a good idea. If only a portion of the writer/artist’s diehard fans crossed over to buy some copies of Epic, it could be enough to save the prestigious magazine from cancellation. And what could be better conceived to attract those mainstream readers than Byrne doing a story about mainstream characters that had starred in some of his most memorable stories in the very mainstream Fantastic Four? Conceiving a tale involving Galactus at the end of time, Byrne began telling his story in Epic Illustrated #26 (Oct. 1984), which did manage to draw in a few more readers. Unfortunately, as it became obvious that his “Last Galactus Story” would not end anytime soon, those readers likely fell by the wayside, not inclined to pay the exorbitant price of $2.50 for a slick magazine that contained only 6 pages of story they were actually interested in. Sure, if they’d stuck around, they would have been on the ground floor for one of Byrne’s most cosmic tales, but that pleasure would be more than over balanced in frustration as the story was cut short with Epic’s cancellation at issue #34. As a result, “The Last Galactus Story” became one of those legendary “lost” tales of the later Twilight Years doomed never to be concluded. Over the years since, fans often speculated whether Byrne would finish the story in some other format, but time and the ever-changing Marvel Universe ended that possibility. Meanwhile, back in the pages of Epic Illustrated #26, there’s ample evidence for the magazine’s failure: an assortment of tales by the likes of Tim Conrad, Dave Sim, Dean Motter and Ken Steacy, et al that were largely more painful than entertaining. Fun Fact: In later interviews, Byrne revealed how his “Last Galactus Story” would have concluded: Galactus would battle a rogue Watcher before serving his ultimate purpose: absorbing the last ergs of energy in a dying universe and then releasing it in a second big bang, thus creating a new universe (no relation to the New Universe dreamed up by editor-in-chief Jim Shooter). Pretty good, until we learn that Nova would become that universe’s Galactus...Ugh!

Kitty Pryde and Wolverine Limited Series #1

“Lies” Chris Claremont (script); Al Milgrom (pencils/inks) Wolverine shared only second billing this time, but that would soon change...and how! Even more amazing is that Logan only appears in a couple panels in the whole issue, the rest of which is devoted to top-billed Kitty Pryde, who was added to the X-Men roster after it was discovered that she had the mutant power to pass through solid matter. In Kitty Pryde and Wolverine #1 (Nov. 1984), the ‘tween heroine discovers that her 106

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Shogun, a Paramount television mini-series released in 1980 and starring Richard Chamberlain, was a hit at the time and likely only accelerated interest in Asian martial arts in general and the Japanese brand in particular. Certainly, shoguns, samurai, ninjas, and whatnot would litter the comics landscape for years to come.

banker father is in cahoots with Nipponese gangsters and follows him to Japan. This first issue then, is merely a set up for the remaining six installments of the series but is made enjoyable by the first-person narrative that writer Chris Claremont chooses to employ. Having the tale told in Kitty’s voice forces Claremont to abandon his usual cloying style, which adds to the book’s readability as Kitty overcomes one obstacle after another in pursuit of her father. But finally, events catch up with her and she’s forced to call for help, which is where Wolverine comes in. The book itself is drawn by the usually inept Al Milgrom in a way that evokes Frank Miller in places (the opening splash page for instance) but fails to maintain the pretense over the rest of the story. A major weakness, and one that proves crucial to a story with a pre-teen protagonist, is Milgrom’s difficulty with faces. Often, Kitty looks like an older woman rather than a young girl, her age given away only by her height relative to the people around her. As for the story itself, subsequent issues would follow the expected pattern: Wolverine arrives on the scene, mayhem ensues, characters are brainwashed, ninjas attack (located in Japan, the story is obviously intended to connect with Wolverine’s own earlier mini-series), Kitty’s father is cleared, and Kitty emerges a stronger character. A clear attempt to cash in on Wolverine’s growing popularity, the series is harmless but not overly original.

Roy Thomas in Dr. Strange #178 (the book’s original run late in the Grandiose Years). A ramp up of sorts “Sword and Sorcery” Roger Stern (script); Paul Smith to Stern’s Avengers run where the Black Knight (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) In the later Twilight Years, a number of artistic new- would join as a regular member of the team, this comers arrived on the scene, most to shine brightly issue sees Strange summoned to England by longfor brief stints on different titles or fill-ins before time friend Victoria Bentley to help Dane Whitman vanishing by the end of the 1980s, among them pencilers overcome the curse of his ebony blade. In a Michael Golden, David Mazzucchelli, and Paul Ditkoesque otherworld, the Knight and Strange Smith, whose clean, straight-forward style, often battle as the former works through psychological enhanced by inker Terry Austin, instantly attracted demons and the latter suffers a sneak attack by the attention of fans. Smith began his career in Umar, sister of the dread Dormammu. Finally, animation with no formal art training before breaking coming to his senses, the Knight is returned to his castle where he “cleaves the brazier into comics at Marvel. After bouncing of truth” and ends the curse. around from title to title, he finally Throughout, Stern ties up all the settled for a time on the best-selling Knight’s loose ends from his lost X-Men book, following up Dave years fighting in the Crusades to Cockrum’s second stint on the title. his being turned to stone by the Over the course of about a dozen issues, Enchantress to his ties with the original Smith earned himself a reputation Atlas-era Black Knight while Smith among readers who came to appreciate keeps everything from collapsing under his traditional layouts and no-frills its own weight with easy-to-follow artwork that seemed to emphasize panel layouts (that nevertheless take characters over action (although he the action from floating platforms in handled that well too, often using empty space to giant, detached jaws, big, bold panels to do it). Smith’s to extradimensional whirlpools and rising popularity with readers came sinkholes). The whole thing is finally just in time for a sea change in how wrapped up in a big, half-page panel comics companies treated their showing a redemptive Black Knight artists and writers, as first DC then kneeling in a ray of sunlight before Marvel instituted profit-sharing Paul Smith swooped a huge tapestry displaying the incentive programs that gave creators onto the comics scene Whitman family crest. They don’t a percentage of the royalties earned from animation and make ‘em like that any more, but by books they worked on. At Marvel with his clean, unclutworse still, neither would Stern and for instance, if sales crossed the tered art style and Smith. A few more promising issues 100,000-copy threshold, royalty open layouts like the individual cells in a would lead into an uninteresting, payments kicked in, and for a book strip of film, made an seemingly endless multi-part tale of that sold as well as the X-Men, the immediate splash with Strange girlfriend Clea’s fight to extra income earned could really add fans. overthrow Umar and become leader up. The change came in the wake of of the Dark Dimension. Ho-hum. separate lines of books begun by both Marvel (Epic) and later DC (Piranha Press) that allowed creators to retain ownership of their own work. Avengers Annual #13 From there, it was a short step to offering a royalty “In Memory Yet Green!” Roger Stern (script); scheme on the companies’ regular line of comics Steve Ditko (pencils); John Byrne (inks) and bringing the industry into line with the rest of Steve Ditko’s return to Marvel in 1979 had not been as the publishing world. Thus, Smith’s arrival on the heralded as Jack Kirby’s return earlier in the decade X-Men, even as that book was continuing its upward perhaps because the disappointment of what happened climb, likely proved quite lucrative for the young with Kirby served to lower fan expectations. Or artist. Still, he didn’t stay long on the popular series maybe it was simply that the times had changed so before jumping over to Dr. Strange where Roger much that even the return of one of the titanic trio of Stern was scripting. The two formed a solid team, artists who co-created the Marvel Universe wasn’t seen here in Dr. Strange #68 (Dec. 1984) as Stern enough to break through dimming memories and a revives a pairing between the good doctor and the growing cynicism that would soon engulf the entire Black Knight, who were first brought together by industry. Be that as it may, Ditko’s reputation was still

Dr. Strange #68

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tangling with the Fixer, the return of Hank Pym (aka Ant-Man/Giant-Man/ Goliath/Yellowjacket, natch), and Arnim Zola...well, how bad could it be? It was 30 pages of non-stop fun of the kind that would be served up less and less frequently as the decade wore on, but for now, there’s a stay of execution as fans were treated to old-fashioned but never out of style

such that many of his peers, mostly younger artists who were inspired with the man’s work before they became professionals themselves, were eager to partner with the legendary co-creator of Spider-Man and Dr. Strange. For that reason, even though, like Kirby before him, he refused to revisit scenes of past glory and was often relegated by editors to fill-in work or low-level features such as Machine Man and Capt. Universe, Ditko was often sought out by topranked artists for the privilege of inking over his pencils. Craig Russell did beautiful work over Ditko on Rom Spaceknight of all things while here, in Avengers Annual #13 (1984), John Byrne does the honors. Their team-up, though not perfect due to Ditko’s style having suffered some degeneration that with age comes to most artists, even the great ones, is a fun match. Byrne, while trying to keep from smothering Ditko’s art beneath inks that sometimes seem heavy-handed, manages to preserve the quirkiness of the older man’s style including facial features, hand signals, and water splashes (even drawing the underside of feet, as we see on the story’s first page...a “fault” that supposedly resulted in Ditko’s original cover for Amazing Fantasy #15 being yanked in favor of one by Kirby!) In the meantime, the two artists are allowed to romp gleefully through a plot dreamed up by writer Roger Stern that just happens to star the Incredible Hulk. It may be remembered that it was Ditko who helped revive the character in Strange Tales after his original six issue run fizzled during Marvel’s Early Years. And any story that opens with Captain America

Avengers Annual #13, page 22: Inker John Byrne helps to welcome back Marvel founding father Steve Ditko in grand style. Unlike Kirby who preferred hand-picked inkers when he came back in the ’70s, Ditko would be more open to collaboration and found that there was no shortage of top flight pencilers and inkers eager to collaborate with the legendary creator.

Writer/artist Steve Ditko kept busy before he returned to Marvel with a number of independent projects featuring such characters as Mister A and the Missing Man. Many dealt with the application of his objectivist philosophy to comic book heroes.

Marvel super-hero storytellling. Fun Fact: Is it coincidence that on an ad page midway through this issue, a quarter-page section is inexplicably given over to a shot of Spider-Man (in a posture once used for posters in the silver age), drawn in classic Ditko style? You be the judge!

Amazing Spider-Man #259 “All My Pasts Remembered!” Tom DeFalco (script); Ron Frenz (pencils); Josef Rubinstein (inks) Even by the mid-1980s, the sad sack bio of Mary Jane whose details were revealed in Amazing Spider-Man #259 (Dec. 1984) had become a cliché as fictional characters in every medium it seemed became the products of childhood abuse. Ho-hum. Unfortunately for Spidey fans though, that news hadn’t yet reached writer Tom DeFalco, who continued to helm the book following the departures of Roger Stern and artist Ron Frenz, whose own art style had slipped mightily from earlier efforts in which he’d captured wonderfully the old Ditko feel. As revealed this issue though, Frenz’s true style looked more like Sal Buscema than anything else (unless, of course, that too was an affectation?) making page after seemingly endless page of Mary Jane’s backstory excruciating to endure. Luckily, however, that stuff was broken up here and there with the current doings of a revived Hobgoblin (who apparently didn’t die in the climactic action of issue #251). Hobby, it seems, allied with a new crimelord called The Rose (cut from the same cloth as Spidey crime bosses such as the Big Man, the Crime Master, and the Kingpin),

lays plans to attack the hapless Harry Osborn whom he holds responsible for spoiling his blackmail scheme back in ish #249. In the meantime, what readers had been assured would be a permanent change finally ended when Spidey discovers that the black uniform he’d picked up during the Secret Wars maxiseres is actually a living creature! Proudly proclaiming that “The Original is back!” this issue’s cover features a layout by Frenz based on that of Tales of Suspense #39, showing Spidey getting dressed in his classic, red and blue Ditko designed duds. Whew! The long nightmare was over! (Okay, Spidey only adopted the new costume in issue #252 but it seemed longer!) The new situation was further underlined on pages 20 and 21 where Frenz sets the action in a darkened room as Peter Parker pulls his old costume from mothballs and suits up. Done in silhouette with close-ups as he checks his spider signal (remember that?), automatic belt camera, and of course, his trusty web shooters, the Ditkoesque sequence ends in a dramatic close-up of the iconic mask being pulled over Peter’s face. A final splash panel of Spidey going into action and vowing to get the Hobgoblin, again recalls a similar classic scene from the last pages of issue #18. After all those pages featuring Mary Jane’s backstory, it sure would be a relief to get back to some down home action next ish!

Daredevil #214 “The Crumbling” Denny O’Neil (script); David Mazzuchelli (pencils/inks) Wow! Was the Daredevil strip the luckiest book in Marvel’s lineup or what? For some reason, more than any other of the company’s flagship titles, it managed to latch onto one good penciler after another with hardly any down time between each. First there was Bill Everett, Joe Orlando, Wally Wood, and John Romita during the Years of Consolidation; then it was Gene Colan and Barry Smith through the Grandiose Years; then Colan again, Gil Kane, and Frank Miller in the Twilight Years; now in the late Twilight Era, we have David Mazzucchelli! Like most great comics artists, Mazzucchelli started off unimpressively in issue #206 with crude inks by Danny Bulanadi. Quickly, however, he began to improve, perhaps consciously taking on aspects of Colan’s style along the way. At the same time, even Bulanadi began to conform his inks to Mazzucchelli’s changing style. Maybe Mazzucchelli was good from the get go and it was only Bulanadi’s inks that hid the fact, but for the first time here in Daredevil #214 (Jan. 1985), he finally gets to ink himself, making all the difference! Although the artist would continue to improve over the coming year (with a huge leap forward as soon as The Dark Ages

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the next ish!), already here, he begins to show the subtlety of facial expressions, detail in backgrounds, and use of light and shadow to convey both mood and emotion that would infuse his work over the next several months, culminating in a landmark pairing with Frank Miller on the “Born Again” storyline. With art that amazes more and more with each succeeding page, Mazzucchelli transforms writer Dennis O’Neil’s ground-level story of the Kingpin and the end of villain Micah Synn into something with far more weight than appears on the surface. Although the artist would have at least one more triumph following the Born Again series, again with Miller, on DC’s “Batman: Year One,” by then, already past his peak, his style would begin to simplify before he left mainstream comics for good. But that would be some years off, in the meantime, here was the artist’s start, at the point where he really began taking off!

Machine Man #4 “Victory” Tom DeFalco (plot/script); Barry Windsor-Smith (plot/pencils/inks/colors) It had been a slow buildup beginning with his first tentative appearances in Epic Illustrated in 1983 where his art seemed better than ever with hardly a drop off at all since his last glory days on Conan. But soon enough, fans learned that although Barry Smith was back under the new monicker of Barry WindsorSmith, there would actually be no going back. The elaborate, delicately beautiful style of art he’d developed during his tenure on Conan and then in his Gorblimey Press years was unsuitable for monthly comics with their unrelenting deadline pressures. If he was going to make a serious attempt to re-enter the field and make some decent money at it, Smith would have to simplify his style and, in his own estimation, actually re-learn the kinetics of super-hero

action. Dipping his toes into the water, he drew a few fill-in stories for Marvel Fanfare and the top-selling X-Men book, and in doing so, realized that he’d grown rusty over the years. Enter Marvel mainstay Herb Trimpe. “...way back in the mid-’80s when I grabbed some old yellowed Marvel comics paper and tried to think sequentially and draw dynamically I found I couldn’t,” explained Smith in an interview with Gary Groth. “I just couldn’t make it happen. So my good friend Herb Trimpe bailed me out on that by letting me work over his layouts for Machine Man. Then I picked it up again really bloody fast, a little bit too fast for H.E.R.B.I.E. because by the second or third issue I’d be erasing his layouts and putting in my own work. But it was really like a whole re-learning process because I had become a civilian for a decade or more. I became one of those people who can’t understand comics.” Machine Man #4 (Jan. 1985) was the last of a four-issue limited series devoted to possibly one of Marvel’s lamest characters supported by a new cast of even more forgettable hangers-on in a mixed up futurescape of which the less said the better. The main interest of the series was that it marked Smith’s full, hands-on return to mainstream comics in an extravaganza of baroque detail all-out of proportion to the subject! Smith’s enthusiasm for the series grew as the four issues unfolded and as his confidence grew. At first providing finishes and even coloring over Trimpe’s breakdowns, his work overwhelmed the penciler’s style until, by this issue, he’d completely taken over. Although the series was scripted by Tom DeFalco, plotting credits were being shared by the fourth chapter, something Smith would be loath to do on future projects. By his own admission, the artist said that upon his return to comics he found that the only way he could do his best was if he controlled the

Herb Trimpe

Trimpe made his mark in the Silver and Bronze Ages primarily as

the regular artist on the Hulk. As the 1980s rolled around, he took on the mostly thankless task of adapting non-Marvel properties to comics such Godzilla, Shogun Warriors, and GI Joe. When assignments dried up in the ’90s, Trimpe returned to college, earned a degree, and became a public school art teacher. Since then, he’s made only sporadic appearances in comics.

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whole package himself: writing and art. That was an unfortunate conclusion, as unlike others such as Frank Miller and John Byrne, Smith was not that good a scripter and indulgences like the multi-part Weapon X serial that would appear later in Marvel Comics Presents would only prove the point. Still, with the art on display this issue, it was exciting just to have such a great talent back in comics on any kind of a regular basis.

Machine Man #4, page 13: Taking over the Machine Man series from penciler Herb Trimpe, artist Barry Smith relearns the basics of comics story telling while dialing back on the subtleties that had previously defined his style.

Amazing Spider-Man #260 “The Challenge of the Hobgoblin!” Tom DeFalco (script); Ron Frenz (pencils); Josef Rubinstein and Brett Breeding (finishers) Ron Frenz was back in fine form in Amazing Spider-Man #259 (Jan. 1985), beginning with a nice cover in Ditkoesque style and continuing it inside with page after page of action. The artist loses control somewhat as the action progresses, particularly in sub-plot material relating the doings of supporting characters, but overall, this issue is a much more satisfying experience than the previous. Storywise, DeFalco keeps the readers’ interest (while hinting at further menace from the thing that used to be Spidey’s black costume). Although he likely didn’t realize it at the time, DeFalco had almost reached the top tiers of Marvel’s bullpen with only a couple years left before slipping into the job of editor-in-chief. Beginning his career at Archie Comics, DeFalco did some work for DC before moving over to Marvel where he helped launch the much maligned Dazzler comic and later worked with Herb Trimpe on a Machine Man mini-series (whose most important feature was that it proved to be the vehicle that reintroduced artist Barry Smith to regular comics). As the 1980s rolled along, DeFalco worked with Hasbro to revive its GI Joe franchise, then took over writing The Amazing Spider-Man, his highest profile assignment yet. That job came about when writer Roger Stern refused to cooperate with new rules imposed by editor-in-chief Jim Shooter to cut down on continued stories. The irony was that eventually DeFalco would end up replacing Shooter himself. At the time, there The Dark Ages

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was growing opposition in the bullpen against Shooter with employees and freelancers breaking down into those who supported him and those who didn’t. Over the years since taking over the whole shebang, Shooter had whipped the once chaotic Marvel offices into shape, some might say even into a well-oiled machine. But to make the omelet, he had to break some eggs, leaving simmering resentments in their wake. Many of the company’s most popular creators began to jump ship including mainstays such as Roy Thomas and Gene Colan, and despite successes like the Secret Wars series, there were failures too like the much vaunted New Universe. “Shooter had been great for the first two or three years,” recalled John Romita, Sr. in an interview. “He got the creative people treated with more respect, got us sent to conventions first-class with our ways paid, and we thought the world of him. Then his Secret Wars was a big hit, and after that he decided he knew everything and he started changing everybody’s stuff. Secret Wars II didn’t make much of an impact. And eventually, because of that and maybe the ‘New Universe’ fiasco, things started going downhill for him, and we had some bad years.” Thus, by 1987, Shooter’s record had definitely become spotty. But the tension wasn’t all one-sided. Shooter himself was in a constant tug of war with company executives higher up who thought they knew how to run a comics outfit better than the professionals. Eventually, it all came to a head and on April 15, 1987, Shooter found himself out of a job, and his protégé, the man he’d hired away from Archie Comics, was in. It would be DeFalco’s turn to deal with the suits and hold on to the editor-in-chief’s

After acclimatizing himself to the mainstream comics grind, Barry Windsor-Smith would take the ultimate step into editorial by becoming creative director for Jim Shooter’s new Valiant Comics line.

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chair for the next seven years. Fun Fact: The ever resourceful Shooter didn’t remain out of the picture for long. He was soon back on the scene with partners making a bid to buy out a nearly bankrupt Marvel Comics. Failing that, he found investors and teamed with former Iron Man artist Bob Layton to found Valiant Comics in 1989. Securing the rights from defunct comics publisher Gold Key for such classic characters as Magnus Robot Fighter and Solar, Shooter scripted the two features while hiring superstar artist Barry Smith to play a similar role to that of Jack Kirby at early Marvel. Taking the lead in such innovations as the inclusion of free trading cards with its comics, coupons that could be returned for free #0 issues of the company’s popular titles, the insertion of a multipart origin story on sturdy high-quality paper in the first ten issues of Solar, and adopting computer coloring to enhance the visual look of its books, Valiant began slowly; but after the launch of Image in 1992, Shooter’s well-written books were soon discovered by collectors and sales skyrocketed. Again, however, disagreements with partners would force Shooter out of Valiant and subsequent attempts to get back into the comics industry were less successful.

Rom Spacenight #63 “Space-Race!” Bill Mantlo (script); Steve Ditko (pencils); Brett Breeding (inks) The team of writer Bill Mantlo and penciler Steve Ditko really deliver with this fast-paced entry in the surprisingly entertaining Rom feature. In Rom #63 (Feb. 1985), the Dire Wraiths make a desperate bid to stop Rom and his mutant-inventor ally Forge from building a king-size version of Rom’s own neutralizer gun that, if completed, could bathe the entire world in its beam, banishing every Dire Wraith to limbo. If successful, it will also save the Earth from “worldmerge” with the Wraith’s home planet. Along the way, Mantlo and Ditko provide a touching interlude as Rom’s romantic interest Brandy Clark recovers from her experience as a converted spaceknight and bonds with little Cindy Adams, who lost her family to the evil Wraiths. All in all, another fun read from one of Marvel’s more successful entries in the licensing game! Fun Fact: Not only does this issue offer lots of super-hero action, it also serves as parable for an abuse of power that holds curious resonance in the aftermath of the Internal Revenue Service, Environment Protection Administration, Justice Department, and other governmental scandals of the mid-2010s. Distrustful of handing his knock-off of Rom’s neutralizer to the government, Forge is fearful that its power would be misappropriated. “Just remember,” says Peter Henry Gyrich, the government’s man on the orbiting neutralizer project, “that it

will be the governments of Earth who determines how and against whom it will be used!” “That’s exactly what I’m afraid of,” thinks Forge, recalling how the government had already used the neutralizer to target certain individuals it considered a threat. In the case of the Rom comic book, that meant super-heroes, but in the real world where people give power to the government trusting that it will be used in a non-partisan manner, it could just as easily have meant groups with unpopular political ideas.

Amazing Spider-Man #261, page 15: Less satisfying with pencils closer to his own style, Ron Frenz (with the help of inker Josef Rubinstein), yet manages to capture the feel of the street-level Spidey strip.

Amazing Spider-Man #261 “The Sins of My Father!” Tom DeFalco (script); Ron Frenz (pencils); Josef Rubinstein (inks) Behind a pretty good painted cover by artist Charles Vess, the latest Hobgoblin saga once again ends inconclusively with the villain foiled in his plans to force information from Harry Osborn and limping off into the sunset to strike another day. With much of Amazing Spider-Man #261 (Feb. 1985) devoted to scenes of Harry, wife Liz, and Mary Jane being held captive by the Hobgoblin, there wasn’t much room this ish for Frenz to let loose with more Ditkoesque wonderment, but what he does manage satisfies. What doesn’t work would prove to be the ultimate identity of the Hobgoblin, which readers had been trying to figure out since his first appearance in issue #238. If creator Roger Stern had had an idea for Hobby’s secret ID, it was lost with him when he was replaced on the Spider-Man feature by DeFalco. At various times, subsequent scripters tried to identify Hobgoblin from clues left in previous issues but many of them conflicted. At one point, James Owsley eliminated reporter Ned Leeds from contention, killing off the long-running character in, of all places, a Spider-Man vs Wolverine comic. But that only narrowed the field of suspects until writer Peter David was assigned the task of settling the issue once and for all. In a double sized issue #289, David confirmed that the original Hobgoblin had been Leeds and that the Hobgoblin that had been appearing ever since Leeds’ death was someone else called Jason Macendale aka Spidey villain Jack O’Lantern. But as it turns out, even Macendale was not the real thing. The Dark Ages

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More than fourteen years after he created the Hobgoblin, Stern returned to the character with a threeissue mini-series called Spider-Man: Hobgoblin Lives in which he finally revealed his original intention of having rich guy Roderick Kingsley unmasked as the original villain. Whew! But by then, was there anyone left who cared? Nineteen Ninty-seven was deep into the Dark Ages, by which time, Marvel was hemorrhaging readers. It would have taken the most thick-skinned of fans to have hung around long enough to read Hobgoblin Lives. But for a while there in the late Twilight Years, Stern and Romita, Jr. primarily, then Frenz and DeFalco, had managed to keep a little of the magic alive at a company whose product was fast losing its cachet.

Daredevil #215 “Prophecy” Denny O’Neil (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) Wow! Talk about your giant leaps forward! Was this the same Mazzucchelli who drew those okay but nothing to write home about issues only a few months ago? Answer: it was! From Daredevil #215’s (Feb. 1985) stunning opening splash page (where the artist takes liberal use of Zip-a-Tone to create an almost 3D image of an Indian medicine man conjuring up figures of Daredevil and the Two-Gun Kid) all the way through to the last panel showing DD looking off over Monument Valley to the ghostly image of the Kid, this issue is a stunner no matter how you look at it. A cross-time teamup of sorts, the first half of O’Neil’s story might as well be an untold tale of the Two-Gun Kid as Daredevil doesn’t figure in it at all. Depicted completely in the Zip-a-Tone style (or whatever it is...wash tones?), Mazzucchelli manages to capture a feeling of timelessness, of bygone days, as we learn evil white men (natch!) are trying to find a Presidential letter that proves that certain land has been given over to the Indians. Without that proof, of course, the evil white men can simply take it with impunity. But the letter is never found and Two-Gun’s story ends there. Cut to DD who has just dreamed the preceding story and then finds himself with a legal case involving the descendants of the evil white men and kindly Indians who as it turns out, were not so imaginary after all. But one hundred years later, the descendant of the original evil White man is still evil, this time because he wants to build a nuclear power plant on the land in question, which threatens fishing in a nearby lake. (Shades of O’Neil’s Green Lantern/Green Arrow social commentary lead balloons of the 1970s!) But of course, if any readers are out there who don’t automatically cringe at mention of nuclear power, the bad guy is set up as a straw man by the appearance of hired toughs come to beat some sense into the opposition. Cutting to the chase, DD finds the letter proving the land belongs 114

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Good at mimicking other writers’ styles, Denny O’Neil (left) succeeded in filling the big shoes left by the departure of Daredevil scribe Frank Miller. Aiding him in no small part was newcomer David Mazzucchelli (right) whose moody pencils shined most bright under his own inking.

to the Indians and saves the day. Although the cliché of setting up establishmentarian forces such as big corporations as the bad guys threatens to derail an otherwise well-written, concise single-issue tale, what really puts this one over the top is the art, placing Mazzucchelli firmly in the small circle of exciting up and comers. Fun Fact: Did you know that back in the prehero days of Marvel, the Two-Gun Kid was set up as a sort of early version of DD? It’s true! They had the same first name, Matt; they both had red hair; both were attorneys; and both had super-hero identities they kept secret from the blonde-haired damsels they admired!

Daredevil #216 “The Second Secret” Denny O’Neil (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) Mazzucchelli was back again on both pencils and inks in Daredevil #216 (March 1985) to both dazzle and delight his growing legion of fans...and how! Seems the Gael, former Irish Republican Army hitman (“who went bad...” guess being a hitman is supposed to be good!) has escaped jail by the extreme expedient of sticking his head into an industrial press machine while in prison! But the Gael has gone beyond his profession as an IRA hitman and graduated to simple “homicidal maniac” with a mad on for Glorianna O’Breen, who knows his real identity and helped put him in jail. The Gael leaves a trail of bodies before capturing Glori and poses as an old woman to lure DD in for the kill. A fight ensues and, of course, our hero comes out on top with the girl in his arms. It’s not certain how much

Following his team-up with Mazzucchelli, O’Neil went back to DC to become writer on a revival of Steve Ditko’s Question. Unfortunately, he seemed to have lost the inspiration he had with DD, cranking out a long series of leaden scripts before the title was finally put out of its misery after 36 issues. But be that as it may, readers can be thankful at least not only for O’Neil’s classic half dozen issues of the Shadow, but also for his impressive run on Daredevil in tandem with David Mazzucchelli!

Mazzucchelli contributed to these tales but it’s undoubted that they showed a marked improvement for O’Neil, who never managed to be too compelling a writer over the years. His early career at Marvel after being recruited by Roy Thomas was fair with him doing a good imitation of Stan Lee’s scripting style on features such as Dr. Strange and even Daredevil. Moving quickly on to DC, he teamed with artist Neal Adams on a series of well-received Batman tales that managed to turn the darknight detective’s fortunes around by taking him back to his shadowy roots. But in hindsight, many of those tales were not well developed, needing to be told in only 15 pages or so. After pairing with Adams on a celebrated run of Green Lantern/ Green Arrow that again have not held up well on rereadings, O’Neil had better success with the Shadow, where he did a good job capturing the pulp style of writer Walter Gibson while being aided in no small fashion by artist Michael Kaluta. Returning to Marvel late in the Twilight Years, he became an editor, helping to bring along a young Frank Miller on Daredevil before taking over the title himself. After a slow start (with villains such as Crossbow and Micah Synn), he seemed to get the hang of the strip, and managed to bring DD back from the edge of the nihilistic abyss that Miller had brought him to. Introducing a number of more apropos villains such as the Gael and the Council, O’Neil generated ground-level stories that were given a veneer of deeper significance by Mazzucchelli’s rich pencils and lush inks that kept the strip enveloped in shadows more appropriate to a blind super-hero.

Daredevil #216, page 18: Capturing something of the styles of both Gene Colan and Frank Miller, artist David Mazzucchelli’s pencils and inks here effectively underscore the lingering threat facing DD.

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Rom Spaceknight #65

“Doomsday!” Bill Mantlo (script); Steve Ditko (pencils); Craig Russell (inks) After too many years away, Marvel founding father Steve Ditko finally returned to the House of Ideas in 1979. But as it was with Jack Kirby when he came back a few years earlier, Ditko disappointed many fans by refusing to revisit either Spider-Man or Dr. Strange, the two characters he was most closely associated with during the silver age. Also like Kirby, by this time, much of Ditko’s stylistic energy had dissipated making his style of art even more inaccessible to modern readers than ever. (Ditko’s style had always been on the quirky side which made it highly suitable for horror or idiosyncratic strips like Spider-Man and Dr. Strange, but less so for others in the superhero genre). Perhaps sensing this, editors at Marvel chose to shunt the artist to features like Machine Man, Captain Universe, and Godzilla that barely registered

Rom #65, page 11: Ditko does the Marvel Universe... but where’s Spidey?

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on fans’ radar screens. Editor-in-chief Jim Shooter said of that era that Ditko himself did not want to work on any strip whose main character did not measure up to his definition of a hero. “Steve refused to work on ‘flawed’ heroes,” Shooter has said. “No feet of clay permitted. His philosophy was...that heroes should be noble. Period.” Which, to Shooter’s mind, qualified him for taking over the art chores on Rom, who was the closest thing to a flawless knight in shining armor hero Marvel had at the time. But when Ditko started penciling Rom regularly with issue #59, a funny thing happened. People began to take notice. In no time, the biggest names in Marvel’s artistic stable, recognizing the living legend in their midst, began to request the opportunity to ink over his pencils, and over the course of a dozen or so issues, Ditko’s sagging but still bold in their way pencils, were bolstered by a variety of fellow artists including Steve Leialoha, John Byrne, and Craig Russell. But of them all, it was Russell’s inks that seemed to be the most compatible, adding not only weight and delicate detail to Ditko’s work, but somehow tapping into the otherworldliness that was always a distinctive part of it. Nowhere does Russell’s work over Ditko shine more brightly than on Rom #65 (April 1985), beginning right off with the introductory splash page that shows a rampant Rom limned in a bubble of light against a stark, Zip-a-Toned background. Wow! That’s followed up by a double-page spread of a devastated Galador under the threat of a black sun being eclipsed by a looming Wraithworld! Then, page after page is a delight to the eye as Ditko and Russell take the reader to Earth in another full-page scene of Forge and Peter Henry Gyrich stationed on an orbiting neoneutralizer (don’t ask, just enjoy!), a double-page shot of Rom surrounded by a howling mob of angry Wraiths, and a vertiginous full-pager as Rom is circled in the air by Wraiths of every form and description! But that’s not all! Let’s not forget the wonderful story and script by Bill Mantlo who must have been particularly inspired when he sat down to write every new issue of Rom because this penultimate tale of the end of the Wraith War is filled with crisp prose and dramatic scenes, many involving difficult moral choices for the noble spaceknight (something that no doubt pleased Ditko). The issue ends when the neoneutralizer cuts off the dark magic that allowed Wraithworld to exist and disappears the planet from reality and concludes the war. Meanwhile, the hand-to-hand battle with the Dire Wraiths on Earth is brought to an end when Rom is joined by practically every super-hero in the Marvel Universe. (Alas! Ditko still declined to include Spider-Man or Dr. Strange in the group). Art, script, characters: all of it added up to Rom

being one of the most satisfyingly fun titles in Marvel’s lineup for the later Twilight Years, one that only a few others could match!

Avengers #255 “The Legacy of Thanos!”Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (inks) Somewhere beneath this issue’s funky Tom Palmer painted cover there lies a return to greatness! Call it serendipity or just luck, but somehow Marvel managed to bring together one of the best scripters of the ’80s with two of the best artists of the 60s and ’70s for one last hurrah with the mighty Avengers. In Roger Stern, the Avengers had a writer with both an encyclopedic memory of Marvel history and continuity while in John Buscema and Tom Palmer, the book would have top-of-the-line super-hero artwork that combined action and excitement with a sheen of hardedged science fiction. The team supreme would remain on the book for a good 35-issue run (with Buscema and Palmer staying on for another few issues after that) that encompassed a number of memorable story arcs interspersed with stand-alone stories that nevertheless managed to cover important details of the Avengers’ unfolding story. And for die-hard fans of the strip, it was a long-time coming. It’d been nearly 15 years since Roy Thomas gave up the reins of the Avengers; by then, the book’s artistic

chores had been handled by a succession of legendary figures from Jack Kirby and Don Heck to Barry Smith and Neal Adams to say nothing of John Buscema himself, then at the height of his powers. But after that, the book fell into humdrum mediocrity with art chores handled by a number of professional but unexciting pencilers from Bob Brown to Sal Buscema to Al Milgrom. For years, the book, like Marvel’s other flagship titles, plodded forward on the inertia built up over the heady years of the 1960s, suffering through one misstep after another including the introduction of Mantis (a Vietnamese prostitute who becomes “the Celestial Madonna”), Moondragon (a bald-headed woman with delusions of godhood), and the Beast (ex-X-man turned comedy relief with overtones of Doc Savage’s Monk Mayfair). Add to that such unlikely marriages involving ghosts and androids officiated by the limbo-dwelling Immortus, the conversion of founding member Henry Pym into a wife-beating turncoat, and even killing off every member of the team and resurrecting them again... you begin to get the idea. It was a sad time to be sure, but with Avengers #255 (May 1985) that was all over! First to arrive on the scene back in issue #227 was scripter Roger Stern, who slowly began to pull the book out of the doldrums, but hampered by the awkward art of Al Milgrom, failed to drag it past the finish line. Completing a multi-part story where the

John Buscema

ohn Buscema returned to Marvel during the Grandiose Years along with fellow veterans John Romita and Gene Colan, immediately making a mark for himself on such strips as Sub-Mariner, Avengers, and Silver Surfer. In the early Twilight Years, he successfully took over Thor and Fantastic Four from Jack Kirby and his work became the defacto house style with Marvel’s best-selling How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way. But to many fans, Buscema was most regarded for his long stint on Conan the Barbarian. Taking over from Barry Smith in 1973, he remained on the feature until 1987, almost to the book’s 200th issue. In addition, the artist drew Conan for innumerable black-and-white magazines including Savage Tales and Savage Sword of Conan, as well as Kull in the color editions. Buscema remained a Marvel workhorse throughout the ’80s working on everything from Wolverine to St. Francis (Francis, Brother of the Universe). The artist continued to work steadily throughout the 1990s, including reunions with Conan scribe Roy Thomas for a new run of stories in Savage Sword and old boss Stan Lee on Just Imagine Stan Lee and John Buscema Creating Superman.

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android Vision goes haywire and attempts to take over the world and run it the way he sees fit, Stern used this issue to clear much of the debris of the past and launch the strip on what would prove to be a second golden age with a near perfect team of Avengers. First, the Vision and the Scarlet Witch were bustled off to Washington for debriefing, then Wonder Man (who was returned from the dead back around issue #152) takes his leave, and Eros with his “feel good power” will exit the scene in an upcoming issue. Meanwhile, the foundation of a new story arc is laid with the new Captain Marvel stranded in deep space. Those scenes aboard a giant alien craft once belonging to Thanos are real knockouts as Buscema and Palmer go to town designing a machine-filled interior that is every SF fan’s dream: with pages 3 and 9 standouts. Held back from perfection only by an undercurrent of misplaced feminism, the lengthy run beginning this issue would prove a fond farewell for the title even as the shadows began to lengthen on the Marvel Age of Comics.

something pretty close to it. Sure, on the surface, Rom’s backstory might resemble that of a certain skyrider of the spaceways, but the similarity ended there as the man imprisoned in the cyborg’s armor is stranded on Earth and becomes more involved in the lives of some of its residents than that other sentinel of the spaceways ever did. The main reason for that was because Mantlo had a surprising run of 75 issues in which to develop his hero whereas Stan Lee had only 18 disjointed regular issues followed by a scattering of guest appearances over a couple of decades for Norrin Radd. Making the most of his opportunity (one given him by

“The Day After!” Bill Mantlo (script); Steve Ditko (pencils); Steve Leialoha (inks) It was the end of the Dire Wraiths! Yeah, right. So what, you might ask? Why all the fuss over a comic about a toy? And a defunct toy at that? Might as well get excited over any of Marvel’s other licensed properties like Godzilla, GI Joe, US1, or Shogun Warriors. What’s the big deal? The deal was Bill Mantlo, who took as unpromising a property as Rom and turned it if not into gold exactly, then 118

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Rom Spaceknight #66

Avengers #255, page 1: Spectacular opening splash by penciler John Buscema and inker Tom Palmer proved the team still had it! This issue marked the start of an uninterrupted run of top-drawer epics dreamed up by writer Roger Stern from “the Legacy of Thanos” to the Cross-time Kangs, the Siege of Avengers Mansion, the Assault on Olympus, and the Heavy Metal Horde.

editor-in-chief Jim Shooter who figured the low-level Rom might be a good fit for a writer he thought was dependable and creative if not a strong plotter), Mantlo poured all his energies into the strip and eventually molded Rom, Brandy Clark, and others of the supporting cast into three dimensional people that readers came to care about. Readers of Rom may have been relatively few compared to other Marvel books (Shooter has said that it sold on the lower end of the scale, just enough to keep it from being canceled), but they were dedicated and Mantlo rewarded that dedication in Rom #66 (May 1985) when he ended the Wraith war and freed Rom to roam the spaceways the way that other silver guy never really did. And coming in just in time to help chart the book’s new direction was veteran artist Steve Ditko. (In a prelude to his taking over the inks in coming issues, penciler Craig Russell executed this issue’s stunning cover). Inside, Ditko was inked by guest embellisher Steve Leialoha, who, unlike Russell, does a slightly too literal job over the pencils but good enough to deliver some really striking images, including page 5, panel 1, which shows Rom striding purposefully toward a bunch of cowering wraiths; page 6, which features a full-page splash recounting much of the book’s story over the past 65 issues; page 8, panel 1, as Rom banishes the Wraiths to limbo; page 9 with Rom moving to join his friends for a last, moving farewell; and an issueending, two-page spread of Rom flying through space with suns burning, meteors zooming, and worlds a’borning as only Ditko could depict them. But all that, as good as it was, was only the icing on the cake. The real focus this issue is on Rom as he winds down

Both Craig Russell (left) and Steve Leialoha did good service over Steve Ditko’s pencils on Rom but it would end up being Russell’s inks that have since proved the most enduring.

from the war only to face his own inner turmoils. It all comes to a head after Rom finally finds himself alone with Brandy, Rick Jones, and little Cindy Adams and tells them that he intends to leave Earth now that the war is over. Shocked and disappointed, Brandy confesses her love for him and her willingness to be transformed into a robotic form to travel the spaceways with him forever. But the more realistic Rom turns her down: “I could condemn no one,” says Rom, “...and certainly not one whom I love with all my cyborg heart as I love you...to share the endless eternity of loneliness and solitude that is the lot of one doomed forever to exist within this unfeeling spaceknight steel.” Instead, Rom points out to her that with Rick and Cindy, she has a new family, each having lost loved ones during the war but managing to find one another amid the carnage. “But...what of you Rom?” asked Brandy. “Where will you go? What will you do?” Turning to face the beautiful world he’s helped to save, Rom replies: “I will stay but a brief moment more, to cast my cyborg eyes out over the green hills of Earth, a planet I would, more than any other, call my home. I will drink in deep drafts of this world of yours, trying to impress upon my spaceknight circuitry what it means to be alive. I will observe life...I will encode it. I will reduce it to abstract symbols comprehensible only, as such, to my memory banks. I have not forgotten what it means to be alive. I have not forgotten what it means to be human. But when I look upon my own armored hands, those selfsame memories of happiness seem no more than a scornful reminder of all that I have sacrificed, of the humanity I have left behind, I am a mockery of a man...trapped in this unfeeling body, my touch as cold as death.” Throughout this soliloquy, readers are shown the world as seen through the eyes of Rom with images of the wonders of nature, the love of a man and a woman, and finally the tearful face of Brandy caressed in his own robotic hands. “Yes, weep for me, Brandy Clark,” concludes Rom. “Weep for one incapable of crying for himself.” “I’m not crying out of pity, Rom,” replies Brandy. “But because I love you...for now...for always.” “Then you have done for this cyborg that which would have seemed impossible! You have made me...happy.” With those words, Mantlo sealed his reputation among the legendary comics writers, those gifted few who could take cold print and simple drawings on cheap newsprint and turn them into something so much more, something that could inspire his readers, make them think, make them feel, make them care. It was only tragic irony that a few years after his work on Rom, Mantlo was struck by a hit-and-run driver and, suffering brain damage, has been hospitalized The Dark Ages 119

ever since. Like Rom, Mantlo found himself trapped in a situation that appeared to have no solution. But hopefully, like the hero upon which he lavished so much effort, his spirit may yet remain free. Free to roam the infinite byways of time and space until finally, some day, finding peace at last.

Fantastic Four #278

“True Lies” John Byrne (script/pencils); Jerry Ordway (inks) All good things must end and so, eventually, did Byrne’s run on the FF. With the high-water mark having been reached with the trial of Galactus, the book began on the down slope soon after with the first visible sign being Byrne’s forfeiture of the inking chores, handing them off to the likes of Jerry Ordway who does a serviceable job here on Fantastic Four #278 (May 1985). Serviceable in that, though good, the inker seemed to be reluctant to spot blacks. Instead, he relied more on cross hatching and feathering, preferring a lighter touch on the pencils that gave the art an overall look of being washed out. This may have been due to Byrne himself easing back on the pencils and providing the inker with little to work with in terms of visionary direction. Indeed, panels have the look of being mostly Ordway and less of Byrne. This was also the period when Byrne’s take on the strip veered most wildly from the Lee/Kirby source material he originally drew inspiration from, with dire results. In this issue for instance, Victor von Doom is declared dead and a new Dr. Doom replaces him, based on the mind of the child he rescued back in issue #247. Meanwhile, the long-standing relationship between the Thing and Alicia Masters has been sundered, the She-Hulk is still on the team, and the Invisible Woman is about to be remade into a feminist nightmare. Not good. By the time it all came to an end with issue #295, many readers who’d first rejoiced at Byrne’s advent on the strip, would breathe a sigh of relief that he was leaving. And whatever the reason, whether rumored editorial interference or as Byrne himself once said of being burned out on the strip (which would not be hard to believe by the time the end came), none of it could take away from the triumph of those first couple of years’-worth of stories Fantastic Four #278, page 1: A good example of how John Byrne’s pencils (like those of Kirby’s before him) were strong enough to survive under most any inker. Not that Jerry Ordway does a bad job here, but his reluctance to spot blacks leaves the art too open and airy, lacking weight and restricting it to a twodimensional frame; a fate this striking image of Dr. Doom cries out to avoid.

Jerry Ordway (left) began his career as a penciler for DC with, among other things, Roy Thomas’ All Star Squadron before moonlighting at Marvel to ink John Byrne on the FF. He traveled back to DC in the 1990s and was picked to write and draw a Captain Marvel graphic novel that was followed by the launch of a regular series also masterminded by Ordway.

when the writer/artist singlehandedly restored a flagship title back to vibrancy and demonstrated that any book, no matter how long-running, could be revitalized by the simple expedient of going back to the Lee/Kirby/Ditko/Heck toolbox and pulling out whatever was needed to do the job.

Fantastic Four #279 “Crack of Doom!” John Byrne (script/pencils); Jerry Ordway (inks) The slide downward continues in Fantastic Four #279 (June 1985) as Ordway again inks over Byrne’s pencils and a revived Dr. Doom destroys the Baxter Building. But even as the energy of his FF run began to ebb, Byrne could still throw some interesting curveballs at the reader, including the revelation here that Doom isn’t back after all, but he turns out to be the child Kristoff whose life he saved and had since been raising in his castle. Seems Doom’s robots, acting on pre-programmed instructions, have instilled their master’s memories in Kristoff, who now believes he really is Doom and thirsts for the FF’s blood! Then, on top of that, with the Baxter Building gone, a new tower must be built in its place, and here Byrne would outdo himself in upcoming issues, designing a truly unique headquarters skyscraper topped with a fourway numeral four that must have been a nightmare for future artists to draw! It would prove to be Byrne’s final legacy for his successors on the strip as fandom The Dark Ages

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rocked with the news that after issue #295, he was seems to have latched onto an episodic format to leaving Marvel for DC. But the news should not have Rom’s journey across the galaxy, presenting singlecome as too much of a surprise as Marvel’s best and issue, stand-alone stories that often ended as little brightest had been migrating to the competition for morality tales much in the vein of Marvel’s pre-hero years; many chased away, they said, by their inability era anthology titles such as Tales of Suspense and to live with the leadership style of Marvel editor in Strange Tales. This issue, for instance, Rom finds chief Jim Shooter. In fact, Byrne himself had briefly himself on some far-off world that at first appears tested the waters at DC in 1980 when he penciled completely dead. As it turns out, he has arrived at the first part in the Untold Legend of the Batman that moment, once in every thousand years, when mini-series. But by 1986, Byrne had become one of the the the planet comes alive turning into a virtual top creators in the industry, more than earning the garden of Eden for a few hours before lapsing back carte blanche he was given to retool Superman for the into aridity. What’s more, its inhabitants spend each 21st century (while proving his superstar status by thousand years in suspended animation until that crashing the March 14, 1988 issue of Time magazine!) one day when they’re revived singing in praise of In Crisis on Infinite Earths, the house life no matter how brief or fleeting it that long-time DC editors Mort may be before going back to sleep for Weisinger and Julius Schwartz built another millennium. “Then, the had been demolished and the empty tortured and tormented warrior from lot that remained wiped clean of another world soars from the surface decades of conflicting or unrelated of the bleeding planet...and as he soars, stories and titles leaving the DC he sings. He sings a song of gratitude, universe with a single ill-fitting a song of thanks...for he has learned continuity. It would be in that context that even life as a cyborg is precious, that Byrne was charged with creating and it is too rare a gift to be despaired a whole new backstory for the Man of of or denied. It is a lesson taught Steel and along the way, any other him by the inhabitants of this far-off characters (like the Doom Patrol) he world who wake but once every felt like doing. Down the road, Byrne millennium to give thanks for even would return to Marvel briefly in less of life than that possessed by 1987 to work on Star Brand and in Rom...” the writer’s touching script 1989 when he took over writing and is reinforced by Ditko’s energetic drawing the West Coast Avengers and a layouts enhanced by Russell’s fine inks, In a preview of a later new She-Hulk title while also providing culminating in a final full-page illo era when comics news scripts for Iron Man. After bouncing that not only underscores the soaring would routinely break into the larger media, around between publishers and his message of the story but captures John Byrne’s takeover own independent projects, the perfectly the overall optimistic of the Superman legacy writer/artist would finally settle in exuberance of Mantlo’s Rom. But even made national headlines, for a longish turn on X-Men: The amid a story of other worlds and including this spotlight Hidden Years in 1999 where he would galaxies, the creators never forget in Time Magazine. prove again that he hadn’t run out of the human dimension, opening the ideas. But a final run-in with the book with a down-to-Earth scene of new powers that ruled Marvel in the Brandy Clark still pining for her lost depths of the Dark Ages proved the last straw, and as of Rom amid the wreckage of the Wraith war (and the this writing, Byrne has concentrated on independent symbolic wreckage of her own life). For this scene, projects for IDW comics. Ditko and Russell create an opening splash page that’s the equal of the book’s final page in its ability Rom Spaceknight #67 to move the reader but where one is celebrational, “Lifesong” Bill Mantlo (script); Steve Ditko (pencils); the other is contemplative; where one is busy, the Craig Russell (inks) other is quiet; where one is rendered in detail, the The Rom team supreme does it again with Rom #67 other is presented more simply; where one touches (June 1985) as writer Bill Mantlo, penciler Steve upon the cosmic, the other emphasizes the familiarity Ditko, and inker Craig Russell continue to guide our of home. Any way you look at it, the Rom strip wandering hero homeward to golden Galador in the continued to deliver the goods even as it was rushing aftermath of the Wraith war. In doing so, Mantlo to undeserved cancellation. 122

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Daredevil #219 “Badlands” Frank Miller (script); John Buscema (pencils); Gerry Talaoc (inks) He’s baaack! Miller that is, Frank Miller! As in grim and gritty Frank Miller! Fresh from a stint at DC, it seems there were no hard feelings between the writer/artist and Marvel management as Miller stepped in to do a fill-in job for Daredevil #219 (June 1985). Or was it a simple fill-in job? Was Miller just getting his feet wet before his return big time with issue #s 227-233? According to editor Ralph Macchio, Miller volunteered to fill-in for regular writer Denny O’Neil when the latter was unable to come through due to overwork. In an explanatory note on the book’s letters’ page, Macchio said he challenged Miller to come up with something different: “I wanted more than a one issue interim story,” said Macchio. “I wanted something so offbeat the DD fans would be talking about it for years.” What Miller came up with was a bit of a throwback to Marvel’s pre-hero westerns in which the lone hero would wander into a town and free it from outlaws before grateful turned distrustful citizens forced him to move on. In any case, with this brief tale (one in which the names Matt Murdock and Daredevil are never mentioned) Miller showed that he hadn’t lost his edge while on sabbatical with the Distinguished Competition. In it, DD goes undercover as a refugee from The Wild Ones to investigate a small New Jersey town rife with murder and corruption, sort of a precursor to Sin City, a later project Miller would create for Dark Horse Comics whose influences likely included Dashiell Hammett’s bullet-riddled Red Harvest. Or was it simply a stand-in for Camden, New Jersey, one of the worst-run cities in the country? How else to explain such opening prose as “Broken Cross is a bleary-eyed, cotton mouthed hangover of a town. It’s curled up like a wind off a shut-down exit of the New Jersey Turnpike, in the shadow of an oil-black refinery that coughs oil-black smoke into the bourbon New Jersey sky. The refinery had let out its nightly death rattle and an overcooked sun was surrendering to the smoke and the diesel fumes when the stranger came walking.” And walking is what the “stranger” does again at the end of the story as we see him moseying off into the night: Katie will “...tell you about old crimes and old hates. About two men who stood tall and smiled warmly and brought something close to justice to the darkest corner of New Jersey.” Though artist John Buscema likely provided only breakdowns for this issue, his at times understated scenes coupled with instances of fast-moving action, keeps the story from getting out of hand and never allows it to stray too far from its hard-boiled roots. Aided and abetted by the inks of Gerry Talaoc, the

Among a wave of Filipino artists recruited by American comics companies in the 1970s, Gerry Talaoc (left) hung on into the 1980s primarily as an inker. Dashiell Hammett’s Red Harvest could have been a primer for Frank Miller’s stories about crime and corruption in the big city.

overall mood is one of oppression and weariness among characters obviously weighed down by the circumstances of life and who’ve given up on hope. Truly a bit of an oft overlooked gem! Fun Fact: Despite the “offbeat” nature of this issue’s story, one where DD or Matt Murdock never appear, someone at Marvel editorial must have developed cold feet as Matt Murdock appears in costume on the Frank Miller-drawn cover!

Avengers #256 “This Power Unleashed!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) The wonder continues in Avengers #256 (June 1985), the second of the glorious Stern/Buscema/ Palmer run as, in an old-time Marvel tradition dating as far back as the Years of Consolidation, a number of plotlines are pursued simultaneously while also featuring a cross-over with jungle power couple Ka-Zar and Zabu....only kidding! That’s Ka-Zar and Shanna (the She-Devil)! As the reader will discover, Marvel’s male/female jungle stars have tied the knot and are expecting a little bundle of joy (not so’s you could tell by looking at Shanna as drawn by big John Buscema next ish!) It seems we pick up the couple directly from their own unlamented series (Ka-Zar the Savage, which actually managed to limp along from 1981 to 1984) in which writer Bruce Jones radically updated the jungle lord by ditching the formal speech patterns he’d had for nearly 20 years and giving him a contemporary patois instead. (“I was all about dialogue and relationships The Dark Ages

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Despite the slow death of adventure strips in the nation’s newspapers, the venerable Tarzan continued a tenuous existence holding the jungle lord banner high thanks to veteran artist Gray Morrow as witnessed in these panels from August 27, 1987.

then...” admitted Jones in an interview.) Big mistake! In doing so, he inadvertently gave the new feature a sense that it was all done tongue in cheek and not to be taken seriously, thus fatally undermining the whole strip from the get go. And like Spider-Man later in the decade, marrying him off to Shanna may have seemed natural, but instead, it only served to domesticate a character who worked best in the savage wild man mold. Unlike Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan, who had 26 novels of prose to work with, the short-hand of the comic book format didn’t have the depth or the space to make it a convincing scenario. Luckily, however, Stern’s scripting is up to the task and manages to make Ka-Zar’s appearance this issue (and even Shanna’s in #257) palatable...well, almost! (“...should I call you Ka-Zar?” “Whatever you prefer, Dr. Smythe...I’m easy.”) Unfortunately for the pair, the improvements will come too late as the whole Savage Land is destroyed in the following issue! But before that happens, Stern expertly juggles a raft of other details, including Hercules getting a new set of Olympian designed togs (his best look since he was introduced by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby way back in Journey Into Mystery Annual #1!); the Black Knight getting better acquainted with the Wasp who is asked to fill out her interrupted term as chairman; Captain Marvel being held captive by space brigands; and the Avengers discovering that a giant alien named Terminus (left over over from FF #269) is threatening the sea lanes!

Cloak and Dagger #1 “Sinners All!” Bill Mantlo (script); Rick Leonardi (pencils); Terry Austin (inks) Call this one a miss for the usually dependable Bill Mantlo. Quintessentially ’80s in its approach and outlook, Cloak and Dagger #1 (July 1985) was true to 124

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form: a minor attempt to create some street-level characters who never managed to generate much heat among readers before falling between the cracks in a comics industry dominated by mutants. (After cancellation of this series and its continuation in a new Strange Tales format, it was revived again in its own book but renamed The Mutant Misadventures of Cloak and Dagger!) First introduced by Mantlo and artist Ed Hannigan in Spectacular Spider-Man #64, Cloak and Dagger guest-starred with Spidey a number of times before graduating to their own limited series which recapped their origin as test subjects for a new kind of drug before loosing them on the pimps and pornographers inhabiting the mean streets of New York City. See, something went wrong with that drug and instead of dying, Tyrone Johnson and Tandy Bowen became super-powered with Tyrone (Cloak) becoming a human gateway to a dark dimension who feels an inexplicable hunger for people’s souls and Tandy able to radiate light daggers. Somewhat deranged from their experience, they determine to use their powers first to get even with their kidnappers and then to all others who exploit vulnerable children. Mantlo added a racial edge to the duo by making Cloak a black man and Dagger White, still an unusual combination in the mid-1980s but otherwise, nothing much was ever made of the fact. The limited series was deemed successful enough to grant Cloak and Dagger their own regular series, which is where we find them this issue (along with the art team of Rick Leonardi on pencils and Terry Austin on inks; together, they manage to do a respectable job if a tad overdetailed in places). Readers, however, might be excused for thinking they’d picked up the first issue of the limited series by accident though as much of this ish rehashes the same action found there: Cloak and Dagger’s origin, the seedy streets of New York, tough-as-nails police detective Brigid O’Reilly, and compassionate Fr. Francis Delgado. The major difference between the two series is an extended argument between Cloak and Delgado on the morality of the heroes’ vigilantism culminating in a scene where Cloak condemns the worshipers in Delgado’s church to the dark dimension. They’re retrieved by

but now leaving the inking to Jerry Ordway who manages a commendable job this issue (particularly with little touches like the front-lit She-Hulk on page 14). Fated to leave the book with issue 293, Byrne had already instituted a number of changes on the FF, many not so hot (not least of which was Johnny Storm’s funky haircut this issue...what’s up with that?), including breaking up Alicia and the Thing (and pairing off the blind sculptress with the younger Johnny), revealing Aunt Petunia, altering the color scheme of the team’s uniforms, changing the Invisible

Dagger, who in the process begins to question she and Cloak’s actions. It was a nice attempt to inject a measure of heaviosity into the strip but instead creates confusion about who Cloak and Dagger are: were they heroes or villains? Was the strip a comment on race relations or a treatise on religion? Was it a super-hero romp or social commentary? Uncertainty about which way their heroes would jump had been a staple of Marvel comics ever since FF #1 so such uncertainty wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, but for this strip, more clarity would’ve helped. As it was, the feature never really clicked with readers, limping along in different formats until giving up the ghost with Mutant Misadventures etc #14. Not so Fun Fact: With a Comics Code stamp nowhere in evidence on the cover, this issue features all kinds of adult material, dealing as it does with young runaways becoming involved in prostitution, drugs, pornography, and pedophilia (“XXX Girls! Mud wrestling, exotic dancers, 24 hrs,” “Adult live show,” “Sex!” scream signage on the book’s splash page). Meanwhile, ads elsewhere in the book clearly expect kids to be buying it, tempting them with Reeses Pieces, Oreos (“Imagine all the fun you can have with Oreo cookies!”), Tootsie Roll (“Swap a joke sweepstakes! Win a Schwinn bike!”), and Marvel’s Star Comics line.

Fantastic Four #280 “Tell Them All They Love Must Die..” John Byrne (script/pencils); Jerry Ordway (inks) By Fantastic Four #280 (July 1985), John Byrne was still at it...still doing the writing as well as the penciling 125

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Cloak and Dagger #1, page 7: Attractive page by penciler Rick Leonardi and inker Terry Austin as they seem to channel Frank Miller’s noir style. And is that an Eisneresque tribute in panel 4?

Girl’s code name to the Invisible Woman, and last but certainly not least, bringing in the She-Hulk to sub for the departed Thing (but to be fair, this last might have been forced on Byrne by the requirements of editorin-chief Jim Shooter’s Secret Wars project). But one change that Byrne himself seemed intent on doing was up-powering the Invisible Girl. (Perhaps in a misguided attempt to prove that he could write “strong women” as well as his former X-Men partner Chris Claremont,

Fantastic Four #280, page 17: The Invisible woman comes into her own just in time to join the dark parade that was leading Marvel down the road to ruin. Perhaps the “Shumf” sound effect in panel 5 should have read “Shame” instead.

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who reputedly tried to do a sadomasochistic drag thing with Prof. X but was nixed by Shooter, who somehow failed to do the same here with Sue Richards). Throughout his run on the book, Byrne had taken every opportunity to extend Sue’s powers (while also designating her deputy leader in the absence of Mr. Fantastic, thus also cementing her leadership qualities) until she was transformed from the weakest member of the team to its most formidable, culminating this issue when the evil Psycho Man brings out her hateful side. Immediately, Sue sheds her FF uniform, replacing it with some kind of dominatrix outfit revealed in all its glory on page 14 (including spiked dog collar). From there, she proceeds to clobber She-Hulk without hardly even breathing hard. But the problem here is not in the story (which is of the usual Byrne quality, ie solid) but in his portrayal of Sue as some kind of leather-clad dominatrix, making the book a definite signpost of things to come; the beginning of the dark road down which Marvel and the rest of the comics industry would soon follow with far too much enthusiasm until, by the 1990s, all of it would splinter on the reefs of over indulgence. It was all the more disappointing because this early on, it was Byrne who was doing it. Over the years since arriving on the scene late in the 1970s, Byrne as an artist and then as a writer had built up a reputation based on how well he handled Marvel’s characters, keeping them true to their heritage while telling new and exciting stories that yet remained within the paradigm established for the company’s superheroes. It was all a thoroughly

satisfying continuation of the storytelling quality expected by Marvel’s fans (who, as a result, helped keep the company’s unit sales healthy even as those of its competitors lagged far behind). But as the growing pressures of political correctness and the need to prove himself among his peers and critics in the industry mounted, Byrne was compelled to tear himself free from the “conservative” label he’d come to be associated with (due to his defending Marvel’s business practices among other things) by upsetting the status quo. (Continuing in this vein, Byrne would go on to DC where he’d create lesbian policewoman Maggie Sawyer for the Superman titles). It was an industry-wide trend that boded ill for readers, many of whom would not stick around for the finish. Fun Fact: Coincidentally or not, the same month this issue of the FF came out, Byrne was pursuing the same female empowering agenda in Alpha Flight #12. There, however, he manages to kill off team leader Guardian, only to replace him with his wife in following issues!

now). In either case, the result was the same in Daredevil #220 (July 1985): another hard-hitting episode in the noir life of Matt Murdock. In this case, Heather, whose father at one point had been imprisoned for murder and whose company was wrested from her by scheming board members, has nowhere to turn for help and advice but ex-fiancé Matt. But Matt is too busy at the office and chasing down crooks as DD to give her the attention she needs. In a last desperate attempt at consolation, she convinces Matt to come to her but upon arriving, he finds her in an alcoholic stupor, wallowing in self pity. Unwilling to remain and console a hopeless drunk, he leaves her with the admonition to solve her problems by herself. Then, as Daredevil tackles a man who has just murdered his wife, Heather calls him again, begging for help. He refuses to give it, yanking the phone from the wall. In the end, it’s his friend Foggy who goes to her, but it’s too late, she’s killed herself. In an attempt at selfconsolation for not helping Heather when he could have, DD goes after Silvio Gulio whom he thinks murdered her and made it look like suicide. But though he catches up to the guy, and though he was involved in crooked dealings relating to Heather, it turns out he didn’t kill her. She really did commit suicide. So the weight of Heather’s death once again must weigh heavily with Matt. It was a powerful story that nevertheless seemed laid back and restrained, aided hugely by Mazzucchelli’s pencils and inks. Taking the story’s fog motif, the artist uses it to create moody panels of office towers vanishing in mist, characters wandering streets where only the dim glow of streetlights is visible, and silhouettes suggesting more than they do. In a book filled with fine layouts, page 3, showing a full-length vertical panel of DD leaping from an upper story window into the fog-shrouded city below, is fantastic as is the quieter but no less effecting page 11 as the action follows Matt wandering the fogbound streets after he learns of Heather’s death. In terms of the sheer number of Marvel titles released in the later Twilight Years, there were few top-rank books to compare with earlier years of the 1970s, but “Fog” at least, can definitely be counted among them as a true late-period classic.

Daredevil #220

Rom Spaceknight #69

“Fog” Denny O’Neil (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) This issue’s credit line includes a “special thanks to Frank Miller” who either helped with the plot or had Heather Glenn’s end in mind back when he was the regular writer of the book (Heather’s desperate situation here foreshadows the fate of Karen Page, which Miller was to explore only a few issues from

“This World Alive!” Bill Mantlo (script); Steve Ditko (pencils); Craig Russell (inks) With the end of the Wraith war, Rom became a free agent, a situation that scripter Bill Mantlo took full advantage of to turn the Rom strip into a throwback of sorts to Marvel’s pre-hero days when such books as Strange Tales and Amazing Adventures featured short, stand-alone morality tales dressed up to read like

In the 1980s, the specter of political correctness began to haunt every aspect of American life. Suddenly, every aspect of western civilization was being questioned and turned on its head. Comics did their part with creators eager to promote the new groupthink giving as little thought to the consequences as the nation’s political leaders.

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science fiction. The change in storytelling came just in time to take advantage of the strip’s new artist, Steve Ditko, who took over the book from Sal Buscema with issue #59. In the years since abruptly quitting Marvel in 1966, Ditko had been sojourning at rivals DC and Charlton Comics, where he’d been given more freedom to do what he wanted. As those places began to dry up as sources of revenue, he returned to Marvel but with the stipulation that he refused to work on the company’s bread and butter superheroes. “When Steve Ditko came around looking for work, I made it a priority to find him something,” said editor-in-chief Jim Shooter in an interview. “After all, he was a founding father, and though I couldn’t set right all the injustices of the past, I could make sure he had work if he wanted it. Rom seemed like a natural. Sal had plenty to do, so no worries there. The reason Rom was right for Steve is that Steve refused to work on ‘flawed’ heroes! No feet of clay permitted. His philosophy was (and probably still is) that heroes should be noble. Period. I asked him about Spider-Man, some of whose flaws were Steve’s ideas. He explained that when he drew Spider-Man, Spider-Man was still a kid, still learning, and therefore, allowed some foibles. Fine, then. Rom, the noble knight it was.” As it turned out, Ditko’s arrival on Rom was a double blessing for Mantlo. Not only did he get a veteran Silver Age artist to work with, but it

More freedom... and it showed. Ditko was better able to express his objectivist ideas while at Charlton, especially in the latter issues of Blue Beetle. Unlike Kirby at DC, he learned the value of injecting personality and some soap opera into his characters’ lives, but unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to get the Beetle and Captain Atom noticed in years that Marvel was surging.

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soon became apparent that younger artists, excited by Ditko’s return, fell over themselves for a chance to ink his work. “We’re positively ecstatic over the enthusiastic reception to Steve’s penciling prowess in the pages of Rom,” stated a reply to a letter in Rom #66. “As we expected, it has taken the world by storm. But what’s wrong having everybody ink these masterworks? There certainly has been no shortage of embellishers knocking at our door for a chance to work with a man whose name is legend within the comic field. We want to give ‘em all a chance.” But among the artists who guest inked over Ditko, Craig Russell managed to settle in on a semi-permanent basis or at least until the book was finally canceled with issue #75. It was a match made in comic book heaven, the kind that if fans could fantasize about potential dream teams of pencilers and inkers, they’d choose Russell over Ditko! While it was true that by this time, like many of his peers, the force and verve of Ditko’s art had passed its peak, his basic style had not changed and only needed the bolstering of a strong yet sympatico inker to recapture its fading glory. Russell did that, in spades! Take Rom #69 (Aug. 1985), for example. The first page, the opening splash, features a finely rendered landscape of the surface of Ego, the living planet. Although devoid of busy detail popular at the time with such artists as George Perez, Russell’s choice to resist over-rendering Ditko’s simple layout actually works to bring the page into sharper relief with just a bare suggestion of 3D-ness. After that, well...every page is a sheer delight for the eyes as Rom makes his way across the ever shifting bio-sphere that is the face of Ego. On page 3, he wades through forests of waving tendrils, on page 6 he finds himself inside an arterial intersection before being absorbed into a cell wall, and on pages 9-11 he’s attacked by humanoid antibodies (the same ones that once attacked Thor in the now classic first appearance of Ego). On page 12, Rom is confronted by a nightmarish scene in Ego’s stomach where Dire Wraiths are in the process of being digested! Finally, our hero makes his way to the planet’s living brain on a psychedelic page 14 as Ditko and Russell unload on readers with scenes of dripping, viscous passages before presenting them with the bulbous, tentaculoid brain itself, which, upon tilting upward in a full reveal on page 15, turns out to have the visage of Ego himself stamped upon it! The climax comes on page 19 with a series of panels focusing on Ego’s face as it displays a full range of emotions, once a signature element of Ditko’s style. So far as the story goes, if Ditko wanted to work on a hero without feet of clay, surely he found it in Rom. Rescuing two fellow spaceknights from capture by Ego, his fellows

waste no time in singing his praises: “You were first and foremost among the Galadorian people, Rom...and thus first and foremost among spaceknights!” Page 21, panel 3 presents Ego as a patchwork world on the go as only the team of Ditko and Russell could have envisaged him while the final panel on the last page, presents our three spaceknights as they soar through space surrounded by nebulaic gases and solar systems designed like molecular clusters! The whole issue

was a true tour de force for the two artists whose pairing could not have been more serendipitous and readers who had stuck with Mantlo and Rom for the book’s entire run were rewarded with what turned out to be a cluster of really amazing final issues.

Daredevil #221

Daredevil #221, page 20: Mazzucchelli on Mazzucchelli! It was striking work like this that convinced many a fan that there could indeed be life with DD post-Miller!

“Behold My Vengeance” Denny O’Neil (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) In a way, David Mazzucchelli was a throwback to the days when most comic book artists were graduates of art schools of one kind or another before they took their first jobs in the industry. John Buscema attended the Pratt Institute, Gene Colan went to the Art Students League of New York, Gil Kane graduated from Manhattan’s School of Industrial Art, even a wild talent like Steve Ditko went to the Cartoonists and Illustrators School (later renamed as the School of Visual Arts). During the early Twilight Years of the 1970s, even newcomers to the industry, mostly fans turned pros, likely served time under the wing of some professional or other such as Dan Adkins or Neal Adams (the singing sons of the Crusty Bunkers!) But as the Twilight Years moved into the 1980s, both of those circumstances were left behind as fans turned pros were more likely to be self-taught with the only experience gained being that of the amateur world of fanzines. Frank Miller and John Byrne (who dropped out of art school), for instance, the two biggest stars of the era, emerged from that dubious training ground. But Mazzucchelli appears to have bucked that trend having The Dark Ages

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earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the Rhode Island School of Design where courses included “3 dimensional kinetic anatomy,” advanced drawing and painting, cinematic storytelling, and even something called comic book storytelling! That experience seems to have served him well, enabling him to evolve quickly as an artist in the pressure cooker atmosphere of monthly comics with their constant deadlines. Take the opening splash page of Daredevil #221 (Aug. 1985) for instance, a monochromatic stilllife of Matt Murdock in a cemetery visiting the grave of Heather Glenn. Atmosphere is created by having the shapes of objects such as gravestones and bare tree branches suggested with shadows and dropped holding lines. A few strokes of the pen suggest wind and a light rain. Forced perspective is achieved with foreground objects placed well forward in the frame with smaller, more distant stones hinting at deep focus photography. There was little of this kind of craft going on in these years, a skill that would all but vanish in the coming Dark Ages when in their hubris, hot young artists with nary a formal education among them would declare the age of the writer dead. Meanwhile, back in this issue’s tale (reminiscent of a similar story way back in DD #9) Daredevil has followed Silvio Gulio’s trail to Venice where he storms a medieval castle, fights robotic suits of armor, and combats the Council of Ten and its leader, Emilio Reuss. By the last page, Mazzucchelli’s elaborately detailed Venetian settings give way back to the monochromatic graveyard of the earlier splash page, where we learn that vengeance is not enough to wipe away guilt. “What I did in Italy wasn’t enough,” muses Matt. “Nothing will ever be enough. So what will I do? What people always do. Go on. Just go on living.”

Squadron Supreme #1 “The Utopia Principle” Mark Gruenwald (script); Bob Hall (pencils); John Beatty (inks) A full year before both Alan Moore’s more celebrated Watchmen mini-series (Sept. 1986) and editor-in-chief Jim Shooter’s New Universe debuted with Star Brand #1 (Oct. 1986), Mark Gruenwald was there. There being Squadron Supreme #1 (Sept. 1985), in which Gruenwald presents an alternative world where super-powered beings, tired of being nickel and dimed to death chasing after villains while the rest of the world went to the dogs, decide to take matters into their own hands and run things themselves. To be sure, the 12issue maxi series, of which this issue is the opening act, is a bit more complicated than that, but essentially, what Gruenwald does is what Moore and Shooter would explore months later: if they actually existed as 130

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Both Mark Gruenwald (left) and John Beatty might be said to have led unexceptional comic book careers...until striking gold with the Squadron Supreme limited series.

human beings, what would super-heroes really be like? “...What really carried (the series) was that initial concept, that initial premise that Mark had, which was like a ‘What If?’” explained series editor Ralph Macchio in an interview. “What if these characters really existed and they really made that decision to make the world into a Utopia, what would be the result of that and where would that carry it?” Although a precedent for setting characters in a realistic environment had first been set by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby with Fantastic Four #1 and more to the point, Stan Lee and Steve Ditko with the Amazing Spider-Man back in the Early Years, even they never took things as far as they could have. That would have to wait for a more permissive age, one that had finally arrived by the mid-to-late Twilight Years. Thus, Gruenwald’s members of the Squadron Supreme would struggle with issues of sexual obsession, the temptation of power, crises of conscience, and psychological motivation. And many of those elements are introduced quickly this issue as readers are introduced to the parallel world where the Earth of the Squadron Supreme is located. There, they find the nations of the world in turmoil following a scheme by the Overmind to use the Squadron to take them over. That plan was ultimately defeated in recent issues of the Defenders with this issue picking up in the aftermath where people blame the Squadron in general, and President Kyle Richmond (aka Nighthawk) in particular, for the disastrous consequences. As the story opens, Squadron members express their feelings of helplessness after touring the world and seeing the chaos first-hand. Out of

frustration, they conclude that the only way things can improve is if they provide leadership whether the world wants it or not. A vote is taken and the decision is made to move ahead with the plan, beginning with a press conference in which they announce their new brand of benevolent dictatorship. In a show of commitment, they also reveal their secret identities at the same time. The only holdout is Nighthawk, whose conscience will not allow him to go along with the plan. No matter how altruistic the goals, feels Nighthawk, (“...abolish war and crime, eliminate poverty and hunger, establish equality among all peoples, clean up the environment, cure disease, and even cure death itself!”) power will corrupt. Even if they had the means, the Squadron

didn’t have the right to impose its will on the rest of the world. A series of vignettes follow as readers are introduced to the private lives of Squadron members culminating in a last ditch effort by Hyperion to mend fences with Nighthawk. He fails. Then, in a development that would later become a cliché in the wake of Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Returns mini-series for DC (also released in 1986), Nighthawk is revealed to be in possession of the one element against which Hyperion is defenseless. (Hype is the Squad’s answer to Superman just as Nighthawk is a stand-in for Batman). Shaping it into a bullet and loading it into a gun, Nighthawk plans to kill Hyperion at the same ceremony in which he announces his resignation from the presidency and the Squadron announces its world takeover. “I’m the only person on Earth who has any Argonite,” thinks Nighthawk. “I’m one of the few people who could get close enough to him without arousing suspicion. The question is, do I have the guts to kill my best friend, in order to keep the world free?” The answer to that question is no. When the moment comes, Nighthawk cannot bring himself to do the deed, setting into motion all the events detailed in subsequent issues. Gruenwald had a lot of ground to cover in this first installment and had double the page count to do it in. Throughout, information and backstory are imparted in a smooth and painless manner, and though Bob Hall’s art is unspectacular, it’s nevertheless adequate for story purposes. Hall, who would never be mistaken for a “hot” artist, still manages to deliver some nice panels bolstered by dramatic lighting effects provided by inker John Beatty. In words that would soon prove ironic, Hyperion ends the issue by declaring to the people of Earth: “With this act, I hope you will all join us in ushering in a new age of trust and friendship and unity for all the Earth!”

Avengers #259

Alan Moore’s Watchmen may have received all the recognition, but Mark Gruenwald’s Squadron Supreme was there too, covering much the same ground. It was only Gruenwald’s misfortune that he lacked the reputation Moore had built up with a steady outpouring of edgy material prior to Watchmen’s release.

“Duty Over All!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Behind this issue’s rather sedate cover image lurks a spectacular splash page where it seems that inker Tom Palmer was inspired to really knock himself out! There, the reader is met by the sight of space pirate leader Nebula as she gazes at a giant-sized monitor screen showing the ruins of a recently plundered planetoid, a scene rendered by Palmer in Zip-a-Tone that gives the whole panel an eye-catching 3-D effect. It was the opening shot in Avengers #259 (Sept 1985), an issue largely devoted to the developing Skrull Civil War arc, the first such arc to be conducted by the team of Stern/Buscema/Palmer, but definitely not the last! The team would go on to produce a number of The Dark Ages

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them, all equally great including the siege of Avengers mansion, the cross-time Kangs, the invasion of Olympus, and the heavy metal horde. But readers impatient to get to the outer-space action this issue had to wait, first having to endure more scenes with the boring Firelord as he makes amends back on Earth for property damage suffered in his battle with Spider-Man (that’s another story). Soon enough, however (saved by the bell!), the Avengers receive a distress call from Captain Marvel and are soon following her coordinates to a distant Skrull colony. There, Nebula is busy propping up a pretender to the vacant Skrull throne. But allying themselves with a Skrull imperial armada, the Avengers finally meet up with Captain Marvel and prepare for battle!

Longshot Limited Series #1 “A Man Without a Past” Ann Nocenti (script); Arthur Adams (pencils); Whilce Portacio (inks) It’s hard to believe now but when artist Arthur Adams debuted as the penciler for the Longshot Limited Series #1 (Sept. 1985), he struck fandom with the force of a bombshell. Something about his superdetailed art style touched a nerve with readers who, later in the decade, would just as enthusiastically welcome the likes of Todd McFarlane, Rob Liefeld, and Jim Lee. As it turned out, Adams would later be revered as a precursor of the movement initiated by those artists, whose influences were grounded more in the Japanese manga school of art than Jack Kirby. A self-taught artist, one of Adams’ biggest influences was the work of Walter Simonson as

Inker Dan Green (left), writer Ann Nocenti, and penciler John Romita, Jr. (right) formed the team that kept the Daredevil strip chugging along through the mid-to-late ’80s.

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inked by Terry Austin on The Uncanny X-Men and the New Teen Titans, not the best example to follow but which explains a lot when looking at this issue’s sometimes awkward figure work and mass of detail. In fact, one might be forgiven for being overwhelmed when confronted with the detail Adams lavishes on his work here. One’s first instinct is to be charitable, wanting to reward the artist’s work by admiring the results, but on closer examination, reason must assert itself and find that the flash is all surface with little underneath with real staying power. Not helping Adams is a trite, overwritten tale by Ann Nocenti (who must have been paid by the word) about another dimension ruled by Mojo called (what else?) the “Mojoverse.” There, Mojo keeps slaves, forcing them to fight each other in gladiatorial combat for his entertainment. One of those slaves possesses probability-altering powers and escapes into the Marvel Universe proper where he acquires the name of Longshot. The whole thing is a mish-mash of different concepts previously explored by Marvel including Don McGregor’s “War of the Worlds” strip and powers once sported by the Scarlet Witch (she gave them up more or less to concentrate on being a distaff Dr. Strange, making her mutant probabilityaltering powers available for some other character to use). And is Mojo himself a stand-in for Star Wars’ Jabba the Hutt? The balance of the six-issue limited series concerns Longshot struggling with amnesia and making a living as a stuntman in Hollywood as things go from unpalatable to treacly: our hero makes a pet out of an ugly-looking but somehow cute “hound” called Magog that had been sicced on him by Mojo. Finally, the whole mess ends when Longshot returns to the Mojoverse to free his fellow slaves. (But don’t worry, he’d lose his memory again and be back later to join the X-Men!) Meanwhile, Adams’ overly rendered art demanded too much time for him to work on a regular monthly comic, forcing him onto such one-shots and as an X-Men Annual and New Mutants Special Edition. For DC, he did an Action Comics annual and for Comico, a Gumby Summer Fun Special before moving on in later years to his own creations. Although he eventually displayed more confidence in his figure work, overall, his style peaked early and failed to evolve. That said, Adams still managed to join that elite company of artists (like Dave Stevens and Michael Kaluta) who sometimes burst on the scene, captured the imagination of readers, and then produced little thereafter. But though Adams never managed to do many projects over the course of the later Twilight Years, what there was, for good or ill, was influential.

Rom Spaceknight #70

“The Hidden God” Bill Mantlo (script); Steve Ditko (pencils); Kim DeMulder (inks) Writer Bill Mantlo continued to crank out decent little morality tales à la Marvel’s pre-hero fantasy anthologies as the Rom feature went into a holding pattern pending the climax of the series in issue #75. (He’d do

Rom #70, page 7: Inker Kim DeMulder was one of the lesser lights who worked over Ditko’s pencils on the Rom feature. Unlike others such as Craig Russell, DeMulder seemed intent on preserving the artist’s every line with little enhancement. Sometimes that worked as it does here in panels 1 and 5, but panels 2-4 are left somewhat denuded.

the same over in The Incredible Hulk with his series of “crossroads” stories). In Rom #70 (Sept. 1985) for instance, Rom and two fellow spaceknights rescued from Ego in #69 arrive on an uncharted planet only to discover that one of their own is behind a scheme to enslave now powerless Wraiths by preying on their superstitions. It seems that Unam the Unseen has been using his power of invisibility not only to play at being a “hidden god” to the Wraiths, but a vengeful god as well. Shocked at Unam’s blatant violation of the spaceknight code of honor, the others rebuke him. In his defense, Unam claims that he was given a useless power, one that only emphasized his feelings of cowardice and inadequacy. Given a chance to restore his selfesteem by forcing his enemies to fear and worship him, he took it. In reality, however, Unam was himself a casualty of war. “Unam was once as noble as any spaceknight, Rom,” observes Scanner. “Left in peace upon Galador he might still be so, Scanner,” replies Rom. “But this Wraith war tore him from his homeworld, demanded that he surrender his humanity in exchange for a power he could not wield with respect. Some of us were made warriors... becoming stronger and harder... in the heat of battle! Others, like Unam...were broken in body and in soul!” But Unam’s tragic story was not over as its ramifications spilled over into the following issue...

Avengers #260 “Assault on Sanctuary II!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Joining the Marvel bullpen in 1975, Roger Stern began his professional The Dark Ages

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it seems things have caught up with the scheming villainess as the Avengers, along with their Skrull allies, find Sanctuary II and attack. What follows is a well-choreographed space battle with Stern giving balance to the action while affording each character a turn in the spotlight. Helping mightily is Buscema, whose layouts make what would otherwise be downright confusing, easy to follow until the enemy’s defenses are breached by Captain Marvel and

career not as a writer but as an editor. By then, he’d gained quite a bit of experience first by publishing his own fanzine called the somewhat grandiose-sounding Contemporary Pictorial Literature then being hired by Charlton Comics to edit and produce an in-house fanzine titled Charlton Bullseye. From there, he was recruited by Marvel and eventually began writing, teaming up with John Byrne (whom he featured in CPL before the artist hit the big time) on a few but wellreceived issues of Captain America. Stints on the Amazing Spider-Man and Dr. Strange followed until he landed the Avengers with issue #227. There, Stern’s familiarity with Marvel history and continuity served him well and, like Byrne, he used that knowledge to dig up past storylines and expand on them, fleshing them out, moving them forward, or giving them new, interesting spins. Such is the case here in Avengers #260 (Oct 1985) wherein Stern reaches back to the Jim Starlin-era Captain Marvel/ Warlock stories of the 1970s and takes the opportunity to revisit their “legacy”, which, in this case, is Nebula, who claims to be the granddaughter of Thanos, the mad titan who worshiped Death. In this issue’s storyline that will grow into the Skrull Civil War arc (itself, another tie in to the landmark Kree/Skrull War issues of Avengers #91-97), Nebula takes control of Sanctuary II, a powerful spaceship abandoned by Thanos. A vicious pirate, Nebula terrorizes her followers (although it’s never made clear what hold she has over them) and is not above genocide if it furthers her goals. This issue,

Avengers #260, page 2: An economical page by scripter Roger Stern, penciler John Buscema, and inker Tom Palmer as they recap events from the previous issues.

Roger Stern moved quickly from fan scribe to Charlton editor to top Marvel writer for which he soon proved uniquely suited.

Sanctuary II boarded. A satisfying ending is avoided by the untimely (and unwanted, both by the Avengers and the readers) appearance of the “Beyonder,” an all powerful being created by editorin-chief Jim Shooter as the menace in Marvel’s ongoing Secret Wars II maxi-series. Unfortunately, it was the beginning of a future trend in comics (that would spin completely out of control in following decades) in which practically every title in the company’s line-up would have to tie in to whatever big maxi-series was being featured in any given year. For the Avengers, this meant the deus ex machina appearance of the execrable Beyonder who whisks away our villains at the last minute. (Readers would have to pick up Avengers Annual #14 to find out who wins the Skrull Civil War!) Worse, the Secret Wars tie-ins would keep on coming, next in issue #261 (which at least had the virtue of readers seeing the departure of Firelord and Eros...no loss there!) and then in #265 and 266 (the latter a double-sized issue). They would prove to be a colossal waste of pages by a team of creators that would be on the Avengers for all too short a time!

Rom Spaceknight #71 “Shame” Bill Mantlo (script); Steve Ditko (pencils); P. Craig Russell (inks) Continuing directly from events in the previous issue, Rom #71 (Oct. 1985) opens immediately with a low-angle shot of the humiliated Unam the Unseen on his knees as Rom and his fellow spaceknights are seen walking away in the extreme foreground. Seeking forgiveness from

Rom for violating the spaceknight code of honor, Unam claims that there was nothing else he could do with the Wraiths, lacking a limbo-banishing neutralizer gun such as that wielded by Rom. “He was a man of peace who questioned his own resolve to become a spaceknight,” reads a narrative block. “Having had such doubts about himself, how can (Rom) condemn Unam, who learned... too late...that he was not cut out to be a soldier?” “Rom, forgive me!” begs Unam. “Rise, Unam! Rise!” says Rom. “There is nothing to forgive.” But being forgiven and feeling forgiveness are two different things and when the quartet of spaceknights alight on yet another planet in search of one of their own, Unam sacrifices himself in an ultimate act of atonement. It comes about when the group discover that one of the most powerful of the spaceknights, Raak the Breaker, is using an army of Wraiths to overcome the planet’s population as a stepping stone for the conquest of Galador itself. “Sometimes my faith in my fellow spaceknights makes me seem the fool,” laments a sorrowful Rom. “Scores of volunteers sacrificed their humanity to become spaceknights, some for noble reasons, some merely to possess power,” soothes Scanner. “Not all deserved the power thus obtained and, once granted, we could have no guarantee that all would wield their powers wisely or well.” For a moment, Rom’s confidence in his mission wavers as he remembers those colleagues, such as Raak, who succumbed to the lure of power. But then, recalling the greater majority who lived up to the code and acquitted themselves with honor, his spirit is bolstered. “For (those who lived up to the code) my soul floods with pride, while toward traitors such as Raak, I feel nothing but pity and the desire to hunt down any who would sully the noble name of spaceknight by such base lusting after power!” Battle between Rom and Raak is thus enjoined but when it seems that the latter has the upper hand, Unam steps between them and takes the blow meant for Rom, being killed in the process. “Scanner said I had courage,” says a dying Unam. “In order to overcome my shame...I had to prove to myself that she was...right!” Then, refusing to kill Raak outright, an angered Rom banishes both the villain and his Wraith allies to limbo. “By sacrificing his life to save mine, Unam reminded me that spaceknight power must be wielded honorably... no matter what the cost! At that moment, Unam overcame his dishonor...and spared me the shame I would have felt over Raak’s execution for all my days!” The Dark Ages

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without a country, Subby mopes about at loose ends until Hercules, seeking to knock him out of his lethargy, “Many Brave Hearts;” Roger Stern (script); attacks and throws him into a palm tree! What follows John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Taking a breather between story arcs, Avengers #262 is a few pages of patented Buscema/Palmer action, (Dec 1985) is kind of a day-in-the-lives story as writer whose actual tenor is given away by this issue’s cover Roger Stern catches up with the various characters’ blurb calling the clash “When Titans Tussle!” The fight personality beats while introducing guest-stars and is finally broken up by partypoopers Captain Marvel new sub-plots that will lead to upcoming tales. All and the Black Knight but too late! Herc’s reverse classic elements of Marvel storytelling that would psychology works and Sub-Mariner has been snapped become all too rare in coming years. For now though, into a good mood...good enough to provide the the first image the reader is hit with upon turning the provender for an old-fashioned clambake later that cover is that of Stingray (aka Walter Newell) whom we evening! The issue ends in a well-crafted final scene now find, along with his curvaceous wife, Diane (nee with old friends Captain America and Sub-Mariner Arliss, sister to Sub-Mariner villain Tiger Shark), to be walking along the beach talking about old times the owner of Hydrobase, an artificial island built by... during World War II and finishing with Cap inviting Namor to join the Avengers! It was who else? Dr. Hydro! Hydro’s, as well a virtuoso issue by a writer perfectly as Stingray’s, story could be found in conversant with Marvel history as well various issues of Sub-Mariner, just the as the way the company traditionally sort of dangling tidbit that Stern liked told comics’ stories, a skill that all but to pick up and make use of...as he does vanished as the later Twilight Years with this issue’s menacing sub-plot gave way to the Dark Ages. involving the three evil scientists (Morlak, Zota, and Shinski) left over Marvel Saga #1 from Fantastic Four #66-67, way back in “The Saga Begins..!” Peter Sanderson the Grandiose Years. It seems that the (script); Ron Frenz/Al Milgrom three heavy thinkers are up to no good (original pencils/inks) again and will figure incidentally in You can’t tell the players without a the momentous events of Avengers scorecard...or at least a 25-part #263. In the meantime, the team limited-series that retells, in chronohas been ordered by the federal logical order, the entire story of the government to ground their airships Marvel Universe beginning millions and not fly them within the limits of Tom Palmer, who of years in the past to the present day became a star inker in New York City. Casting about for the Grandiose Years and (circa 1985 AD that is!) The Marvel some place nearby where they can maintained that position Saga project came about not only as access them quickly, they receive an through the early a way to celebrate Marvel’s 25th offer from the Newells, whose floating Twilight Years, continued anniversary but also a nifty way to island proves ideal. Throughout, his heroic service to bring any reader up to date on his Stern’s dialogue flows smoothly and Marvel in the later Marvel history. Hired to put it all Twilight Years by naturally from one character to another, bolstering the pencils together was Peter Sanderson, a filling in the reader with back stories of lesser talents and comics super fan with an encyclopeand everything he needs to know, enhancing greater ones dic knowledge of both Marvel and while Buscema depicts each with an such as John Buscema DC. That knowledge was first put easy familiarity. But this is a Marvel and John Byrne. to use when he was hired by DC to comic natch, so there can’t be a whole conduct the vast research needed to issue without any action right? (Even though Ditko broke that wall way, way back in the prepare its landmark Crisis on Infinite Earths and Years of Consolidation with the landmark Spidey #18). Who’s Who in the DC Universe series (including Still, action has always been the name of the Marvel having to read every DC comic ever published!). game and Stern reminds us of that on page 14 when Those jobs put him on the map as an archivist par Hercules lays into a moping Sub-Mariner who excellence so that it was likely a no brainer for dropped in to say “Hi” to his friends the Newells. The Marvel to hire him as a researcher for The Official Atlanteans, it seems, had finally reached the limit of Handbook of the Marvel Universe. Based on the their patience with the short tempered Subby and research he did for that project, Sanderson waded forced him to abdicate his royal throne. Now a man through decades of comics, likely keeping charts

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and graphs and voluminous notes that he then used to write the text of his follow-up series which begins here with Marvel Saga (the Official History of the Marvel Universe) #1 (Dec. 1985). Essentially, the Saga tells the entire story of the Marvel Universe by intertwining events from all of its comics in sequential order. Therefore, each issue might include scenes from a score of different comics titles and even different eras. And though newly produced art might be used here and there to bridge scenes that were never shown in any comic, most of the Saga would be illustrated using panels reprinted directly from the original comics themselves. “In the pages of this monthly series, you will embark on a journey through the wondrous history of the Marvel Universe in a way that no one ever has before,” promised editor Danny Fingeroth in the book’s introduction. “Now, for the first time, the entire sprawling body of events that is Marvel History, events that you’ve been clued in to in bits and pieces over nearly twenty-five years of comics, is finally available in a sequential narrative form.” And so, beneath this issue’s original cover by Ron Frenz and Bob Layton (which does a good job echoing the styles of Kirby, John Buscema, and John Byrne), are five pages of new art by the same team running quickly through Galactus, the Celestials, and the early Kree/Skrull rivalry. Next come panels that move events from prehistoric times, the origin of the

Peter Sanderson did yeoman service in the name of comics documentarianism. In addition to his work on Marvel Saga, Who’s Who in the DC Universe, and Marvel Universe Handbook, Sanderson also wrote a number of groundbreaking in-depth analyses of individual comics for Amazing Heroes and other comics oriented mags. He crowned his archival career in 1996 with the publication of the coffee table sized book Marvel Universe.

Inhumans, the Norse and Greek gods (even Conan’s Hyborian Age), the American West (Rawhide Kid, Two-Gun Kid, et al), and comics’ Golden Age with the origin of Captain America and the exploits of Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos. Years go by and the story again picks up in the months immediately preceding the origins of the most famous of early Marvel heroes, including the FF, Spider-Man, and Dr. Strange. Finally, we learn that Reed Richards had been partially inspired to take that famous rocket ride into space by an early encounter with some pre-hero Atlas monsters! From there, major portions of the origins of the Fantastic Four, Ant-Man, and Alpha Flight are covered. As a bonus, a trio of classic covers of comics spotlighted in the issue are presented on the inside of the back cover. Overall, it was a pretty neat package (albeit for a $1 cover price) and one designed to get any die-hard fan’s blood coursing more swiftly through his veins!

Daredevil #225 “...and Then You Die!” Denny O’Neil (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) Why didn’t anybody think of it before? DD vs Spidey’s old foe, the Vulture? It’s a natural! But hindsight is 20/20 they say, so let’s just be thankful that writer Denny O’Neil had the idea and ran with it in Daredevil #225 (Dec. 1985). Unfortunately, O’Neil decides to take the same tack more or less as Frank Miller did during his run on the title: take an old, established villain and give him a new psychological spin based on his alter ego. Miller did it with the Gladiator and now O’Neil does it with the Vulture (albeit to a less extreme degree). Here, the Vulture convinces himself that after suffering numerous defeats at the hands of Spider-Man, the only thing left to do is to live up to his namesake, take a less glamorous route than robbing banks or helicopters, and go looting the dead instead. In this case, of course, it would be Heather Glenn’s grave, where he believes the deceased was buried wearing valuable jewels. Cut to Matt Murdock coming to visit the gravesite, stumbling across the Vulture digging away, and going into action as DD. What follows is a nicely choreographed fight scene by Mazzucchelli where again, as in the events of Amazing Spider-Man #63-64, the Vulture inexplicably smashes masonry with his bare feet with nary a broken bone. He even smashes a gravestone with his bald head! An interlude follows as Matt and Foggy work out ghosts of the past and even the Vulture contributes a pessimistic bon mot or two about the meaning of life and death before DD finally defeats him in an encore bout. Not so Fun Fact: Midway through this otherwise solid issue, readers The Dark Ages

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are unfortunately reminded of Stick, an abrasive martial arts character invented by Miller as the man who taught the young Matt Murdock all he knew about using and controlling his heightened senses. The character was irritating to say the least, robbing Matt of much of the aura of individuality he had in the first 150 issues of his book. With the introduction of Stick [who uses a stick to inflict corporal punishment on an otherwise dense Murdock...get it?], Miller gave DD a beholdenness unbecoming of our hero.

Daredevil #225, page 5: Artist David Mazzcchelli’s stellar performance here on both pencils and inks almost makes us forget that this was DD’s first encounter with the Vulture!

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Rom Spaceknight #74 “The Bargain!” Bill Mantlo (script); Steve Ditko (pencils); John Byrne (inks) Writer Bill Mantlo just kept the good story material rolling out in Rom #74 (Jan. 1986) as the spaceknight concludes his journey to Galador and arrives on his home planet only to arrive too late to stop the final tragedy in his ill-starred career. After defeating the Dire Wraiths back in issue #65, Rom left Earth to return to Galador with the good news. On the way, he meets other spaceknights who join him for the trip home. But their joy at the news of victory is short lived as they discover that in their absence, the people of Galador have commissioned a new, more powerful breed of spaceknight. Thinking themselves superior to mere flesh and blood, the new recruits went mad, killing nearly every human being on Galador. As this issue opens, the rogue spaceknights are on the point of slaughtering the last remaining humans when Rom and the others arrive (including girlfriend Brandy Clark), horrified to find that not only has the world they sacrificed so much for been destroyed, but their human bodies as well, so that they must remain trapped in their spaceknight armor forever. Driven underground, they resolve to fight to the end no matter what, but when the dust clears, no humans survive. In a final confrontation with Dominor, the leader of the rogue spaceknights, Rom is presented with a devil’s bargain: surrender his cyborg life and his fellow spaceknights will be spared along with that of Brandy, who will become the mother of a new race of Galadorians by Dominor after he reacquires his own body,

which he has managed to save. “For Brandy, Galador, and my fellow spaceknights to live, all I need sacrifice is my love, my honor...and my life,” muses a crestfallen Rom. But in a final panel, he rejects the offer, choosing instead to duel Dominor to the death. It was another strong entry by Bill Mantlo for a book that most fans likely considered unworthy of their attention. But the writer does such a good job that, by now, anyone who’d been following the book for the past several issues would likely have been won over by his characterization of Rom, his deepening relationship with Brandy, and their impossible love for each other. A good example of Mantlo’s storytelling is a montage presented across pages 8-9 depicting a dozen vignettes of the slaughter of the last humans on Galador. With a tearful Brandy looking on, each shot is accompanied by only one or two words that convey the full range of emotions and motivations of men in the heat of battle: “senseless slaughter,” “barbarism,” “retribution,” “demoralization,” “and finally defeat!” And as had been the case since issue #59, Mantlo’s story is graced by the art of Steve Ditko, who seems to have been re-energized with the material he had to work with. And though Ditko had to do without the fantastic inks of Craig Russell this issue, those of John Byrne were nothing to sneeze at either! Byrne provides a sheen of solidity for the many metallic characters in the story as well as an air of ancient decrepitude for those scenes taking place in the catacombs beneath Galador. At the same time, Byrne was not shy about pouring more of himself into shots of explosions such as an impressive and shocking panel 6 at the bottom of page 5. At the other end of the spectrum, for the last two pages of the issue, Byrne’s inks mightily recall the more delicate lines Russell preferred to use over Ditko. But despite the kind of stellar work that was on display this issue and those that immediately preceded it, Rom’s days were numbered with the final issue of the little series that could arriving with #75.

like doing. Case in point was the Hulk strip beginning with Incredible Hulk #315 (Jan. 1986). After having talked the idea over with editor-in-chief Jim Shooter whom Byrne said had approved story concepts he had in mind for the book, the creative teams of the Hulk and Alpha Flight were switched with Byrne and inker Keith Williams replacing writer Bill Mantlo (who had managed to give the Hulk something of a psychological sheen over the previous 70 odd issues) and artist Mike Mignola on the former. Byrne had his own thoughts on how the Hulk character should be treated and approached the strip the same way he did the FF: he took it back to basics. Gone was the goofy, child-like Hulk who was quickly replaced with the raging, angry persona he had way back when Stan Lee and Jack Kirby handled him during the Early Years of Marvel. Byrne also relocated the action to the American Southwest where Hulk’s earliest stories were set, including those by Lee and Steve Ditko during the Years of Consolidation. But Byrne wasn’t just retooling old storylines, he was also venturing into new territory as Doc Samson managed to physically separate Bruce Banner from the Hulk. Unfortunately, by doing so, he removed the only moderating influence on ole greenskin, making him even more of a threat than ever. It was a solid start to what promised to be another exciting star turn by Byrne, when suddenly, the plug was pulled on the whole project. According to the artist, after he began the series, Shooter reneged on his assurances that Byrne could pursue his story ideas.

Incredible Hulk #315 “Freedom!” John Byrne (script/pencils); Keith Williams (inks) If someone were looking for evidence of John Byrne’s increasingly troubled tenure at Marvel, they’d need look no farther than his short but promising run on the Incredible Hulk. By that time, the writer/artist had long since proven his bona fides as a scripter and idea factory with his work on the Fantastic Four and Alpha Flight (as well as books like the Thing solo series, where he only did the writing) being the prime examples. In addition, he’d become a genuine superstar in the Marvel stable with popularity among fans such that he likely could pick and choose whatever projects he felt

Mike Mignola, whose stand-alone cover art was often stronger than his interior work, nevertheless built himself a modest fan following much as had such second-tier artists as Gene Day and Mike Zeck. But Mignola would really make his mark with the independently produced Hellboy comic, later to be made into a pair of big-budget films.

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wrenching moment for most, made all the more poignant as long-time boyfriend Cyclops (aka Scott Summers) looked on in horror. It was an outcome dictated by editor-in-chief Jim Shooter as the only way that Jean Grey could make up for destroying a whole world of sentient aliens.

That was likely the final straw because Byrne gave up the book after only a half-dozen issues and left Marvel entirely soon after. Over the years since Shooter took over as editor-in-chief, Byrne had remained loyal to the company and quite logical in his approach to his position as a contract worker for Marvel. Even as others lost patience with Shooter’s editorship, and one by one abandoned the company for rival DC or the slew of independent comics companies that had sprung up in the 1980s, Byrne hung on. Finally, even he had had enough. But by then, he was the biggest name in comics (his only possible competition being Frank Miller). Byrne quit because Marvel wouldn’t let him work for DC while writing FF; he was scooped up by DC and given carte blanche to revamp the Superman franchise in any way he saw fit. And the Hulk? Unfortunately, it was back to mediocrity for the not so jolly green giant: a fate from which it never recovered (despite some buzz generated by the likes of writers Peter David [gray Hulk] and Bruce Jones [Return of the Monster], sales continued to decline making whatever success they had strictly relative).

Avengers #263 “What Lurks Below?” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) It was with mixed joy and anger that readers greeted the return of Marvel Girl from the dead in Avengers #263 (Jan 1986) after apparently witnessing her selfimmolation back in X-Men #137. At the time, seeing her use her powers to turn an alien weapon on herself to spare the universe from the ravages of Dark Phoenix was a 140

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Avengers #263, page 9: Fans didn’t know whether to be happy or angry after it was learned the mysterious cocoon shown here turned out to hold the presumed dead Marvel Girl. On the one hand, when characters died in the Marvel universe, they usually stayed dead. On the other, the death of Marvel Girl had been so embroiled in controversy and dissatisfaction that right from the start, it never seemed proper.

Writer Kurt Busiek would rocket to comics stardom on the shoulders of artist/painter Alex Ross when the pair teamed up to produce the immensely successful and influential Marvels mini-series in the 1990s. From there, Busiek was able to write his own ticket beginning with his own long-running Astro City title.

But as it turned out, Shooter was not beyond being reasoned with and was presented with a way that would allow Marvel Girl to live without violating his original dictate; he was perfectly willing to go with it. Enter bigtime fan and wannabe Marvel writer Kurt Busiek who came up with the idea that the Phoenix wasn’t Jean Grey after all but only an alien entity that duplicated her form, leaving Marvel Girl’s still-intact body stored at the bottom of Jamaica Bay where the space shuttle carrying her and fellow X-Men had crashed following the events of X-Men #101. Busiek had approached Roger Stern with the idea who then took it to John Byrne. Liking the idea, they ran it past Shooter. Perhaps coincidentally, a new X-book was in the planning stages at the time, one that would reunite the original X-Men as X-Factor but with a new female member to replace the missing Marvel Girl. Why not use Busiek’s idea to revivify Jean Grey and have her take her rightful place with X-Factor? It was pure serendipity and plans were laid to bring back Marvel Girl in a two-issue crossover between this issue of Avengers and FF #286. Remember that dastardly trio of scientists from last ish (Morlak, Zota, and Shinski)? Well as it turns out, their latest scheme leads to the discovery of what looks like a cocoon on the same spot where the X-Men’s shuttle came down. From it emerge a range of arcane forces as well as a voice warning the Avengers to stay away. Of course, they don’t and eventually manage to strip away the covering to reveal a metallic container beneath. Taking it back to their

headquarters for study, the team is diverted by another emergency before they can inspect the container more closely. The final page of the issue reveals a woman inside the capsule along with a blurb for FF #286 that hints at the resurrection of Marvel Girl! To be sure, there were many at the time who bewailed the fact that once again, in the world of comics, characters who’d apparently been killed in some past storyline could never really be expected to be out for the count. But while there was plenty of truth to that belief, in the case of Marvel Girl, with years, even decades, of development invested in her character and its evolving relationship with Cyclops from its earliest fumbling beginnings to its near full flowering since the revival of the new X-Men, it was justified. Having her killed in X-Men #137 was a bad decision from the start (to be fair however, Shooter should never have been put in the position of having to make that call by Claremont and Byrne when they left no doubt that Phoenix had killed...a blatant violation of the superhero code, not to mention the Comics Code Authority.) Further, that decision gave Claremont a path down which he would take Cyclops, ending in a tangle of nonsensical and unsatisfying character threads that ruined any pretense to credibility. Not that he did any better after Marvel Girl had returned, but that’s a story better left to the Dark Ages. For now, with the imminent return of Jean Grey and her reuniting with Scott, all seemed right again in the Marvel Universe! Fun Fact: Were the “asparagus people” killed by the Dark Phoenix in X-Men #135 the same kind of aliens as the one who found himself stranded on Earth way back in Avengers #4? You be the judge!

Avengers #264 “Stings and Sorrows” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) How low could a classic character created by no less than Stan Lee and Jack Kirby fall? If it’s Henry Pym, the Ant-Man, pretty far it seems. Disrespect for the character could be traced back to an infamous skit performed on the Saturday Night Live television show back in 1979 in which Ant-Man is made the butt of jokes at a superhero party. After that drubbing, regaining the respect of readers and writers proved virtually insurmountable as Pym was portrayed first as borderline psychotic, then a wife beater, and finally, he was jailed as a traitor to his fellow Avengers and ejected from the team he helped found. Stripped of his role as a hero, the various personas he created over the years were taken over by others, first by ex-con Scott Lang who stole his Ant-Man garb to take over that identity (who then spent many of his appearances fighting his way out of bathroom drains and the like) and then by The Dark Ages

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Dan Akroyd (Flash) and Garrett Morris (AntMan) do their best to destroy Ant-Man’s rep in this 1979 Saturday Night Live skit. The bad feeling it left with Ant-Man fans may finally be on the verge of being erased as Marvel Studios prepares to launch a big-budget AntMan starring vehicle in 2015.

bad girl Rita DeMara who likewise stole Pym’s Yellowjacket costume to take over that identity as well. And as if all that weren’t enough, the final insult came from the Wasp in Avengers #264 (Feb 1986), his own former partner in peril and wife (whom Pym had divorced since his court-martial). Over the years since Pym’s breakdown and humiliation, the Wasp became a work in progress so to speak for the creeping forces of political correctness in the form of transforming all of Marvel’s once likeable female characters into humorless Amazons whose constantly expanding powers seemed to have no limits. Pioneered by the X-Men’s Chris Claremont, other writers at Marvel became eager to prove that they too could be “women’s writers.” Thus John Byrne toughened up the Invisible Girl over in Fantastic Four (symbolized by a name change to the Invisible Woman) while Roger Stern took it upon himself to do the same with the “winsome” Wasp. The results of his efforts are depicted this issue as Dane Whitman (aka the Black Knight) conducts experiments on the Wasp in order to determine exactly what her powers are. He soon finds out: She can bend a 2 inch metal bar in her bare hands while at insect size (once upon a time she didn’t even retain her full sized normal strength as had the Ant-Man), she can shrink to any size she wants (not just insect size) while retaining use of her wings at virtual full size (once they only sprouted when she became insect sized), and her Wasp’s sting, once no more powerful than a Taser blast, 142

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can now blast a hole through the hull of a space cruiser! At this point, if Pym ever returned in any of his former identities, the Wasp could literally squash him like a bug! Adding insult to injury, Stern has also grafted a whole new persona on the Wasp, making her a battlehardened combat leader for most of his run on the Avengers. Unlikely as it all appeared, the situation truly became laughable after the Black Knight (who survived years battling in the Crusades) begins to have feelings for her but soon finds he’s not man enough for her. “You don’t really need any help, do you?” he thinks after falling behind the hard-charging Wasp in the upcoming siege of Avengers mansion. Once a colorful, heroic figure, the Black Knight is reduced to a fawning, self-deprecating metrosexual. That, and Stern’s over-the-top depiction of the Wasp became one of his few missteps in what was otherwise one of the best runs of comics in the later Twilight Years.

Punisher Limited Series #2 “Back to the War” Steven Grant (script); Mike Zeck (pencils); John Beatty (inks) It’d been building for a long-time, ever since the Punisher first appeared in Amazing Spider-Man #129 back in 1974. Over the years since, the character reappeared frequently in Spidey’s various books as well as in others most notably in Daredevil, where artist Frank Miller finally made literal what had always been merely implied in the character’s presentation. Nevertheless, there was still a way to go before the anti-hero could evolve into his final form. But for that to happen, comics themselves would have to change beginning with a loosening up of the Comics Code. Fortunately for the Punisher, if not for comics fans, that evolution began in earnest over the course of the 1980s as the direct market became more and more important to publishers, who in turn began to create product specifically aimed at comics specialty stores, product that didn’t need to brandish the Comics Code stamp on their covers. In coming months, it would lead to such groundbreaking projects as Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns at DC and Squadron Supreme at Marvel. As a result, by the mid-80s, two forces came to a head: more freedom in the presentation of violent and off-color material...and the popularity of the Punisher. Sensing the change in climate toward more gritty material, editor-in-chief Jim Shooter finally green-lighted Frank Castle for a title of his own. But hedging his bets, Shooter held the new series to a limited series of five issues. Initially, there was to be a comfortable cushion in the scheduling that would allow artist Mike Zeck plenty of time to lavish on his pencils...something he looked forward to doing after what he felt was a sub-par job on Secret Wars. Unfortunately, best laid plans and all

underworld. He gets the idea after a failed attempt at killing the Kingpin. But it seems that the Kingpin of crime wants everyone to think he’s dead anyway so Castle goes along with the scheme, setting off a bloody war of succession among local mobsters. What follows is one of the most bloodsoaked comics ever to appear beneath a Comics Code stamp of approval... and there is such a stamp on this issue’s cover believe it or nuts. (The stamp, however, is pretty small and will continue to shrink as the years

that. Seeking to take advantage of the summer sales period, suits in Marvel’s marketing department moved up the series’ debut, permanently placing Zeck behind the proverbial eight ball. Managing to crank out the first four issues, Zeck was forced to drop out before the fifth. Loyal to his storytelling partner, writer Steven Grant chose to leave with him, resulting in a final issue being written and drawn by other, less talented hands. It was surely a disappointment to Zeck’s growing number of fans (the artist would solidify his reputation with his next project, “Kraven’s Last Hunt,” which was serialized between a couple of Spider-Man titles). But here, as exemplified in The Punisher #2 (Feb. 1986), with the help of frequent inker John Beatty, Zeck turns in a solid if not overly spectacular job. That’s because although his storytelling skills are good, leading readers unerringly along with the flow of the action, his figure work is often distorted, with the Punisher in particular depicted as if seen in a funhouse mirror. His large heads and bull necks can be off-putting when not softened by the occasional dramatic portrait, which the artist prefers be taken from a low-angle with plenty of shadow highlighting the driven Frank Castle’s hardened facial features. This, however, fits the material well as Grant sets up a story guaranteeing a high body count, something that was believed to be at the root of the Punisher’s popularity. It may not have been pretty, but it was not far wrong either. There was a growing impatience among readers (whose median age was moving upwards) with heroes who played by traditional rules including the one that prevented them from killing people. Here, Grant gives them what they want, telling a story that has the Punisher looking for a shortcut in crushing the East Coast

Mike Zeck’s overwrought art for the cover of the Punisher Limited Series #1. Zeck’s take on the character would set the tone for the Punisher in all of his subsequent appearances as fans learned to expect bigger guns, more blood, and more extreme action.

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pass until Marvel and DC both dropped it completely... by then, the battle for restraint in comics would be over and the medium given over to the worst instincts of creators). This issue for instance, boasts a number of gruesome underworld hits, the slaughter of a dozen mobsters by machine gun, the shooting of bystanders on a subway train, and even a beheading. On top of that, the Code inspectors turned a blind eye to a scene on pages 9 and 10 that has Castle sleeping with a woman not his wife. “Everything I have is yours,” the woman says as she drops her robe. “Everything.” It marked a turning point that the industry had taken. A turning point in which the industry chose to turn its back on appealing to a broad audience in favor of a much more restrictive one: older males with money to spend on product whose cover price would have to be continually increased in order to preserve profits in the face of collapsing unit sales. (Ironically, the back cover of this issue advertizes Marvel’s mainstream, and presumably kid-friendly, books including Secret Wars II, Amazing Spider-Man, and Avengers.) But it seemed that Marvel had its finger on the pulse of the times because the Punisher limited series turned out to be a monster seller, guaranteeing the company healthy profits for years to come as the character graduated to not one but two ongoing series, any number of crossovers, and became the inspiration for a wave of

The Punisher was featured in at least three motion pictures, which improved slightly over the years as producers slowly figured out that the character was about more than big guns and mass killings. Still, in an era when viewers seemed to become jaded to violence, it was a pardonable assumption to suppose that the Punisher’s penchant for mayhem would go over big with moviegoers.

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cynicism that would engulf comics over the coming decade and beyond. Fun Fact: Although this limited series went five issues, it wasn’t advertized that way on the covers, which announced that it would be a four issue limited series; all that is, except this issue, which actually got it right!

Rom #75 “The End!” Bill Mantlo (script); Steve Ditko (pencils); P. Craig Russell (inks) It was bound to happen and fans of the little book that could had to console themselves with the fact that in going on for 75 issues, the Rom feature lasted far longer than it had a right to. Let’s face it, its origins as an adaptation of a soon-to-fail action figure were as inauspicious a basis for a comic book as could be expected and the assignation of utility infielder Bill Mantlo as writer and dull but professional Sal Buscema as penciler didn’t seem to add much to the odds of survival. But over time, Mantlo managed to combine a deepening characterization of the strip’s cyborg hero, an interesting supporting cast, an unlikely romance, and an overall mythology to create a storyline that was not only moving but even elegiac in places. All elements (along with the unexpectedly solid art pairing of Buscema and the inking team of Brian Akin and Ian Garvey through much of the book’s run) that he managed to combine in Rom #75 (Feb 1986) to create a satisfying if somewhat abrupt conclusion to the spaceknight saga. Aided by penciler Steve Ditko (whose work on Rom ended up being the most memorable of his second stint with Marvel), inker Craig Russell (the best and most sensitive of Ditko’s embellishers on Rom), and even a surprise appearance by artist Kevin Nowlan on the lettering (which was a marked improvement over previous issues’ often too-small-to-read printing), Mantlo concludes Rom’s battle with Dominor even as spaceknight colleagues Scanner and Trapper give their lives to summon last-minute help in the form of the rest of the Spaceknight Squadron. Defeating Dominor, Rom is invited to join the rogue spaceknights in one final act intended to obliterate Galador. The maneuver backfires and they destroy themselves instead. Dazed, a stunned Rom dreams of an impossible life with Brandy until awakened, he discovers that he has not only been rescued by the Spaceknight Squadron, but that his humanity that he thought lost forever has been found intact. Breaking down in tearless sobs, Rom suffers guilt that he might become a man again even as his fellow spaceknights must be forever trapped within their cyborg bodies. “The humanity contained within this globe is yours, and you have won the right to reclaim it,” declares one

of the spaceknights. “Accept your humanity, greatest of the spaceknights! With your woman beside you, reach out and embrace the future, that in days soon to come golden Galador might teem with life again!” Then, in a final two-page sequence, Rom sheds his armor to become a man again (although his hippie-like, shoulder-length hair does present a jarring note when compared to his image as a battling spaceknight). Finally, as the

remaining spaceknights pledge to continue to defend Galador as it struggles to regain its lost glory, Rom and Brandy walk away from the rubble of the past into a more promising future, one that seems to begin with Russell’s solo cover for this issue depicting a man and woman standing amid ruins but boldly looking upward as a hopeful flight of birds pass across the face of the sun...and the symbolic figure of Rom looms among the clouds. Considering the sheer number of titles released by Marvel in the 1980s, relatively few rose to the level of quality reached by those in previous years but of those few, Mantlo’s Rom was surely one of them.

Daredevil #227

Rom #75, page 20: Not everything in the 1980s was doom and gloom or even grim and gritty! In the final issue of Rom, there was a happy ending for the greatest of the spaceknights and sweetheart Brandy Clark courtesy of writer Bill Mantlo, penciler Steve Ditko, and inker Craig Russell.

“Apocalypse” Frank Miller (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) Frank Miller returned to Daredevil this issue and picked up right where he left off. Namely, by plunging our hero back into the noir world where the writer had left him when last he was on the book, except this time, he would finish the job but good, stripping Matt Murdock of everything he had including his dignity. But showing a little mercy, Miller would leave DD a small opening through which to escape and when he finally does, he is stripped to the bare essentials, a shadow of a man satisfied with his life in New York’s Hell’s Kitchen defending its downtrodden inhabitants. But he wouldn’t be there by himself. By his side would be another character, equally as ruined, equally in need of redemption, perhaps more so, as she, unlike Matt Murdock, had plenty to feel guilty about. That person opens this first chapter in The Dark Ages

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the six-part “Born Again” mini-series within a series and up to that time, one of the most shocking scenes ever encountered in mainstream comics. The last longtime readers of the strip had seen of Karen Page, she had left Matt Murdock to pursue a career in Hollywood, and though she had been revisited for a few issues back in the Grandiose Years (when Murdock traveled west to try and heal the breach between them), there was nothing to suggest that her career as an actress was not going anywhere. How wrong was that assumption, as readers in the late Twilight Years flipped the cover to Daredevil #227 (Feb. 1986) and began reading. There, on the first page, Mazzucchelli once again employing the wash tone effect he used so well in issue #215, presents readers with a wasted shell of a woman they quickly learn is none other than Karen Page, who apparently is at the end of her rope. A dope addict, her career reduced to starring in stag films and likely turning tricks in Mexico, Karen is desperate for cash and is ready to do anything to get it, including selling out Daredevil, whose secret identity as Matt Murdock she gives away to a cheap hoodlum. “Take it to the states and you’ll get a million for it,” she says. Which is exactly what the hood does. The information eventually finds its way into the hands of the Kingpin who knows exactly how to use it. Soon after, things begin to go wrong for Matt Murdock: his girlfriend breaks up with him; his bank insists that he’s behind in his mortgage payments; the IRS has frozen all his accounts pending an audit; he’s framed for “bribery, perjury, and misconduct;” and just barely escapes jail. Finally, the last straw, with nothing left, his home and everything he owns is blown to bits. But the whole setup was just too perfect, too much for mere chance. By the end, DD knows the Kingpin has been behind the whole affair. Meanwhile, Foggy moves in on Matt’s sometime squeeze, Glori O’Breen and Karen escapes an assassination attempt only to come running for help from the man she betrayed. Whew! And all that’s besides Mazzucchelli’s incredible art: pages 2 and 3 are masterpieces of subtlety and oppressive foreboding (underlined with deep maroon and pink coloring by Christie Scheele) as the Kingpin learns DD’s secret identity; page 12 is drop dead gorgeous as DD leaves his apartment through a skylight to run along high tensions wires in the middle of a snow storm; page 13 where Foggy and Glori, sitting by a fire, suggest a budding romance; and page 18 showing the Kingpin in his lair like a spider in its web. Miller had returned all right, and better, it seemed, than ever. But as the decade ended, it would be seen that he did the comics industry no favors, even with a story as powerful and memorable as this one was destined to be. 146

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X-Factor #1 “Third Genesis” Bob Layton (script); Jackson Guice (pencils); Bob Layton, Jackson Guice, Josef Rubinstein (inks) It’s hard to put a finger on exactly why this book fell flat. After all, it had lots going for it, including the longheld dream of old-time fans of seeing the original X-Men team back together again. They were disappointed years before when the X-Men were first revived and discovered that only a few members would stick around (including Prof. X) and then had to wait a number of years before the other members eventually dropped in. But there were problems in reuniting the old team, the biggest being the fact that Jean Grey, Marvel Girl, had been killed off after she became the Dark Phoenix. What to do? Getting wind that a reunification was in the works and that of all characters, Dazzler was being considered as Marvel Girl’s replacement, writer/artist John Byrne reminded fellow writer Roger Stern of a suggestion made by a fan named Kurt Busiek about how Marvel Girl could be revived, and together, the two brought the idea to editor-in-chief Jim Shooter. The point was that Marvel Girl never became the Phoenix, which was some outer-space sentient force that assumed her shape and personality. The real Jean Grey still lay in stasis at the bottom of Jamaica Bay where her shuttle originally crashed. Shooter approved the “out” and soon, a twopart tale beginning in the Stern-scripted Avengers and concluding in the Byrne-produced FF brought the character back to life. None of it happened in a vacuum

Left holding the bag: Marvel became stuck with the Dazzler character after Casablanca Records pulled the plug on plans to produce a movie version starring either Grace Jones or Bo Derek in the title role. Although general audiences managed to dodge the bullet that time, comics fans weren’t so lucky.

where they hire themselves out as sort of an emergency mutant response squad. That’s just a cover though for their real purpose: find and recruit mutants and train them the way Prof. X did them. It all sounded good on paper, but the final results on display this issue turned out to be quite a disappointment. Butch Guice, who’d shown some promise in earlier work on strips like the Micronauts, fell flat here with art more sterile than

however, as fans were divided over the new development with some feeling it invalidated the events in X-Men #138 (whose emotional scars were still fresh) while others (never enamored of her “death” in the first place) were delighted to have a favorite character return. But solving the Marvel Girl problem was one issue that needed to be handled before the original team could reunite. There was also the problem of Cyclops, whom writer Chris Claremont had, in the meantime, married off to a Jean Grey lookalike and shuffled off to Alaska. That question was settled quickly by simply having Scott Summers abandon his family for X-Factor, an action that weakened the character and undermined the satisfaction of having Marvel Girl back. So right from the start, the new X-Factor book was off on the wrong foot with the discovery that Marvel Girl still lived and Cyclops agonizing over his love for Jean and his marriage to Madelyne taking up much of the space in the double-sized X-Factor #1 (Feb. 1986). There, scripter Bob Layton (who up until now had only had some experience co-plotting Iron Man with David Michelinie and scripting a couple of less-thanspectacular Hercules limited-series) manages to bring readers up to date on what the individual members have been doing. It seems the Angel, Iceman, and Beast have been suffering under a collective inferiority complex following failed attempts to keep in the super-hero game, but the revived Marvel Girl, untainted by the events since her disappearance (much of it masterminded by X-scribe Chris Claremont who managed to surround Marvel’s mutant community in doom and gloom), convinces them not to give up on Prof. X’s dream of homo sapiens and homosuperior living together in peace. So they form X-Factor in a scheme

The much-anticipated reunion of the original X-Men proved a bust in the long run. Both art and concept fell somewhat flat. Fans would have to wait for the return of John Byrne in the following decade to get an idea of what might have been.

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vibrant. Characters lacked warmth and seemed to simply go through the motions with layouts that did nothing to highlight important moments in the story. That may have been the fault of the script, which was heavy in talking heads (there was a lot of catching up to do) and light on action. Not helping were the costume changes for the X-Men, which consisted of a giant X design across their torsos with a different primary color for each character. Although their first costume change from their old yellow and blue togs wasn’t that inspired, they were better than these outfits. Even the cover logo was boring! (Why not a variation of the original X masthead from the Years of Consolidation?) The basic problem though was not the fault of Layton or Guice, it was Claremont’s, whose convoluted character arcs drained team members of much of their color and excitement. In short, they were pale shadows of their former selves and it would take someone with greater skill and imagination than the inexperienced Layton to make them interesting again.

Kingpin receives reports of Murdock’s every stumble, wringing every bit of enjoyment out of his enemy’s predicament. Meanwhile, others tangential to the action are in motion: Karen Page avoids underworld torpedoes in her quest to find help from Daredevil and reporter Ben Urich pleads with an unusually sober J. Jonah Jameson to let him prove Murdock’s innocence on court charges. Finally, Murdock confronts the

“Purgatory” Frank Miller (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks/colors) Matt Murdock’s descent continues in Daredevil #228 (March 1986) in the aptly named “Purgatory” as Miller takes him to the verge of madness. Now living out of a vermin-infested hotel room, Murdock begins to suffer hallucinations and paranoid suspicions of everyone around him (although in the case of friend Foggy, who has been hosting Glori O’Breen at his apartment, there might have been something to it). Meanwhile, in his ivory tower, the 148

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Daredevil #228

Daredevil #228, page 7: Together, for the first time! Writer Frank Miller and artist David Mazzucchelli put DD (and alter ego Matthew Murdock) through his paces...and how! The “Born Again” storyline would turn out to be a kind of dry run for the team’s Batman Year One mini-series done the next year for DC.

Kingpin in his lair and in a bloody fight, is defeated by the fat fury. The issue ends after Murdock is plunged into the East River inside a taxi (while being framed for the murder of the driver) and left to drown. But for the first time, the Kingpin makes a mistake. When the taxi is discovered, there is no body inside... down a notch, but only a notch, from the previous issue, (this issue’s cover for instance, is not so hot) Mazzucchelli’s art matches the relentlessly grim developments being choreographed by Miller. There’s a beautiful cityscape in the final panel of page 9 and page 20 is once again done in wash tones showing the sunken taxi. An interesting detail, however, is the extensive use of blood throughout the story. From Murdock’s encounter with hoods on a subway car to his battle with Kingpin, a liberal amount of red ink is used to illustrate the natural consequences of such fighting. One of the rules of the Comics Code was the prohibition of showing blood. That stricture was finessed a bit earlier in the Twilight Years when Roy Thomas and Barry Smith had first shown blood in issues of Conan, but in those cases, they stopped short of coloring it red (leaving it as black instead which somehow made it seem worse) but in ominous anticipation of things to come, Miller and Mazzucchelli go farther and color it here in a more lifelike red. Not so Fun Fact: Although the Comics Code stamp of approval was still used by the major comics companies in these years, the rise of the direct market enabled them to bypass the code in comics sold in comic shops. Therefore this issue, with its violent, often bloody, content was left to stand without a Code stamp on the cover. Flouting of the Authority’s rules would become so flagrant in the coming years that comics that still displayed the stamp would almost come to seem as a poke in the eye to the venerable organization rather than a boast to parents that a comic was fit reading material for the whole family.

characters, natch) as the nine-issue series moves along. The whole thing culminates this issue, in the extra-length Secret Wars II #9 (March 1986), whose central feature involves the Beyonder building a machine that will allow him to incarnate as a man, going through the entire fetal gestation period and adolescence in a few seconds even as he’s separated from his godlike powers. And godlike is the operative word as Shooter attempts an obvious parallel between the Beyonder and Jesus Christ. “If I’m going to do it, I guess I should do it like everyone else...by being born into a human body,” says the Beyonder in

Secret Wars II #9 “God in Man, Man in God!” Jim Shooter (script); Al Milgrom (pencils); Steve Leialoha (inks) On the heels of the immensely successful Secret Wars limited series, Marvel editor-in-chief Jim Shooter was back again in the role of scripter for...what else? Secret Wars II! (Shooter has said that this series had been planned ever since the blockbuster sales figures came in for the debut issue of the first Secret Wars). This time, the all powerful being of the first series appears in person calling himself the Beyonder (because his original realm is from beyond...get it?) and fascinated by the diversity and limitations of the corporeal world, manages to get himself into different scrapes (that involve any and all of Marvel’s costumed

DC had its own “Secret Wars” type project going on in 1984 called Super Powers, based on a line of Kenner action figures derived from many of the company’s super characters. Less successful than Secret Wars, Super Powers did have the virtue of providing comics legend Jack Kirby with some extra work at a time when his presence in the field was virtually nonexistent.

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the absence of thought balloons. “I suppose I could get some human woman for the purpose, but that’d be complicated, messy, and it’d take too long!” Entering the birthing machine, the Beyonder is then born as an adult human being with the knowledge of his “godhood” but divorced from his power until he decides that he needs to reacquire it. This comes in a hurry after he’s caught helpless by Mephisto. Luckily, he escapes the devil’s clutches and once again claims his power. Next, he’s challenged by the Molecule Man (remember him

Marvel Secret Wars II #9, page 28: Interesting layouts for this issue’s climactic battle distract the eye from the details of artist Al Milgrom’s pencils which fall somewhat short of awesome. He gets an A for effort though.

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from way back in FF #20?) whose power to manipulate matter is the only one that can truly challenge the Beyonder. They battle with the Beyonder apparently winning. Sure now that he prefers to be human, he re-enters the birthing machine, but before he can be reborn, the Molecule Man destroys the mechanism, killing the fetus. Then, unknown to the super-heroes assembled at the scene, the power unleashed by the death creates a new universe where, following a familiar evolutionary course, men eventually reappear. And as it was in our universe, each bears a spark of the “god” that created them. Although Shooter succeeds in an attempt to produce something more than a mob slugfest, the story is somewhat less than satisfying. Where events in the series have no problem introducing the Beyonder to all kinds of human foibles (some previously banned by the Comics Code), his search for the one factor that humans possess and that allows them to carry on despite the knowledge of their own mortality never leads to such obvious places as religious belief. Where are the scenes with the Beyonder talking to the Pope or the Dalai Lama? Or to any of the world’s great theologians? Why doesn’t he visit those like Mother Teresa, working in the world’s slums or in leper colonies? For that matter, why doesn’t he simply travel back in time to talk to Jesus himself? Be that as it may, Shooter’s interesting sub-text is not helped by the art of Al Milgrom, which comes across this issue as awkward, flat, and simplistic...just compare this effort with that of George Perez (not a world beater in the

art department either) on DC’s Crisis on Infinite Earths. His attempts to portray cosmic conflict at the climax of the story suggest far more than his ability as an artist can depict, thus short circuiting much of its intended drama. Be that as it may, Shooter has expressed satisfaction with Milgrom’s performance with the final word being spoken by readers who once again made a Secret Wars series a sales hit for Marvel. Not so Fun Fact: Intended as a promotion for manufacturer Mattel’s line of Marvel based toys, Secret Wars II was obviously aimed at younger readers who were expected to buy the action figure tie-ins. That fact, however, didn’t stop Shooter from letting readers of all ages know that Marsha Rosenberg (aka Volcana) and Owen Reece (the Molecule Man) had lived together before the events of this issue. It was a small detail in a much larger story of course and likely went unnoticed by most, but to any reader paying attention, it was there. Tellingly, this issue doesn’t feature the Code stamp on the cover, but it and other more egregious lapses in other titles would finally catch the attention of those outside the small pond of comics fandom causing real trouble for comic shop owners like Lansing, IL’s Friendly Frank’s. In that case, store manager Michael Correa was brought up on charges for displaying obscene materials. With the new Code-free environment of comics specialty shops, publishers had grown cocky, presenting more and more material with mature content in their books until it began to spread even to such obvious all-ages fare as Secret Wars II. From then on, parents would need to keep careful track of every comic book their children read...at least those among the dwindling number of youngsters who still read them.

Squadron Supreme #7 “Love and Death;” Mark Gruenwald (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Jackson Guice (inks) Just as the early, formative years began with Fantastic Four #1, which became the measure of everything that came before and everything that came after, Squadron Supreme #7 (March 1986) turns out to be one of the transition points between the way traditional comics were written and produced and those that came afterward as the Dark Ages loomed. On the surface, there’s nothing remarkable about the visuals in this issue (unless you count the totally satisfying team-up of fillin artists John Buscema on pencils and Jackson Guice on inks!), the book is laid out in the traditional panel-topanel manner with generally five and six panels per page. And despite the lack of a Comics Code stamp on the cover, the story isn’t littered with the increasingly graphic content of comics that would emerge later in the Dark Ages. Instead, the radical elements quietly

Alan Moore spearheaded the influx of British writers who migrated first to DC in the mid80s then to Marvel in the next decade. He also left the biggest footprints. His work on the Swamp Thing title opened a lot of eyes to the untapped potential not only of such creations as the muck monster, but also to DC’s goofier concepts (Animal Man for instance), concepts that his American colleagues had been quick to dismiss in the post-Crisis era.

introduced here stand on their own merits as story points anticipating more celebrated tales by the flood of British writers hired by DC beginning with Alan Moore in 1983. Here, for instance, writer Mark Gruenwald begins with a situation that would later become de rigeur with Batman as Squadron member Nighthawk rebels against his teammates’ plan to take over the world and run it themselves. Frustrated with the inability of mankind to get together and do the right thing, the superheroes decide to take matters into their own hands and create a utopia on Earth whether the world wants it or not. Feeling that the team has no right to assume that kind of responsibility, Nighthawk walks away and begins a campaign to recruit his own team to combat them, one that he hopes will even include Master Menace, the Squad’s arch-foe. But the evil doctor has other plans afoot and turns him down. Those plans involve plucking a double for the Squad’s most powerful member from limbo, and after disappearing the real Hyperion, have the double replace him on the team. But things go awry when Gruenwald has the faux Hyperion fall hard for Power Princess and lose interest in his original mission. (Hype, of course, is the Squad’s answer to Superman while the Princess is Wonder Woman; but unlike her DC counterpart, the Princess has married her Steve Trevor, who has grown old over the years while the The Dark Ages

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immortal Princess has remained young). Eager to claim the Princess for his own, the limbo-Hype murders her husband, allowing him to move in on the grieving widow. Hype, however, becomes fearful that Master Menace will betray him to the Squad when he finds out that he’s abandoned their plan to destroy the team. Fearful of losing the Princess, Hyperion attacks Master Menace, intending to kill him, but the evil doctor manages to escape just in time. The issue ends with the false Hyperion and Power Princess sharing an embrace, Hype’s scheme apparently successful. This longwinded summation is needed to point out elements of the story that, in previous phases, would never even have made it past editor Ralph Macchio, let alone reached the Comics Code for review. At this late date, however, such themes were being explored quite openly in a Marvel comic, and although presented here in a relatively benign fashion (the murder of Power Princess’ husband and the quick fade out of she and Hype’s final embrace for instance), were actually explosive in their implications becoming part of the growing foundation upon which greater and far more heinous trespasses on good judgment were to be made.

against criticism and to keep the government from imposing its own regulations on the industry. And for many years, it worked. Not only did the Code keep critics at bay, it helped to improve the content of comics themselves. Yes, there was some tradeoff in terms of the depiction of more serious subject matter and a general perception of comics as kids’ stuff, but what did the industry really lose? Explicitly gory tales of the EC Comics variety mostly. Otherwise, where were the serious, hard-hitting tales of mature subject matter before the institution of the Code? Answer: with the exception of Simon and Kirby’s romance comics and some of EC’s war stories and tales of social dysfunction, much of which would likely have survived Code scrutiny, there was none...and precious few after the Code was loosened as well. In fact, it was more or less back to

“Pariah!” Frank Miller (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) Although industry officials and some fans crowed with its demise, comics lost far more than it gained with the loss of the Comics Code Authority. Begun as a reaction to public exposure of excesses by some publishers in the 1950s, the Code was created and instituted as an attempt to inoculate comics 152

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Daredevil #229

Daredevil #229, page 6: DD/Matthew Murdock hits bottom on this busy page by artist David Mazzucchelli.

Two of EC Comics’ most notorious covers. They didn’t help to make the case for the entertainment value of comic books when publisher William Gaines testified before the Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency. It took Frank Miller and a bit later Alan Moore to begin the process that would eventually loosen the grip of the Comics Code Authority and allow the industry to pick up where EC left off.

business as usual with more tales of gore, extreme violence, degradation, and perversion. Where was all that so-called mature subject matter that the comics would then be able to present? (The irony was that during the 1960s and ’70s, Marvel had already proven that working within the Code, comics could be produced that appealed to all ages while at the same time addressing issues of adult concern). In point of fact, a tale like the one presented here in Daredevil #229 (April 1986) was a rare example of a truly mature approach to comics, as it seeks to explore the basic core of a character’s being, his soul if you will. Matt Murdock is stripped of everything that had accrued to the character over the ten years or so since his creation leaving him a blank slate on which to rebuild a life. As the story unfolds, the reader is forced to go through Murdock’s travails along with him, perhaps learning along the way about what things in life are truly important and which of them aren’t. In any case, there is some kind of lesson to be learned, a mature point of view to be taken. That, however, is counterbalanced by the expected comic book action and the shocking reduction of the once innocent Karen Page to creeping drug whore. But despite the plot’s exploitative shortcomings, it does stand out as one of the few comics stories that at least attempts to say something more subtle than the victory of good over evil. As the late Twilight Years dawned at the start of the 1980s, the

Comics Code had already been amended once in 1971 in the aftermath of Amazing Spider-Man #s 96-98 in which among other things, illegal drugs could be used in stories but only if they were not depicted as anything positive as well as permitting such traditional monsters as vampires and werewolves. But the liberalization, as could be expected, was the proverbial camel’s nose under the tent. Soon more abuses followed including most prominently, Miller’s first successful run on Daredevil as well as Alan Moore’s concurrent work at DC. At the same time, the expansion of the direct market allowed publishers to sell and even create new titles especially for comics shops that could be sold without Code approval. By the end of the 1980s, the Code was being violated so openly that it became all but superfluous. Hurriedly, it was changed again, this time opening the door to positive depictions of homosexuality, the use of sex, and the outright exploitation of women: all overlaid by a veneer of political correctness. In effect, the Authority had abdicated whatever power it had left to regulate the content of comics. (In a truly strange twist of fate, the defunct Authority sold the intellectual property rights of its Comics Code seal to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, a group that had been dedicated to combating efforts to prosecute comics store owners who peddled non-Code approved comics). It sounded the official death knell of traditional comics (which had been dying the death of a thousand cuts anyway as sales shrank and content disintegrated). By 2001, full of hubris, Marvel withdrew from participation in the Code, and DC and the rest of the industry did the same in 2011. But that was deep into the Dark Ages and very few readers remained to take notice. Comics, as millions of readers of past years had known them, were dead. Regular price hikes would put them out of reach of youngsters, and their empty, confusing, and often morally bankrupt content made them unappealing to anyone but a relative handful of young adults.

Amazing Spider-Man #276 “Unmasked!” Tom DeFalco (script); Ron Frenz (layouts); Brett Breeding (finished art) Finally! The saga that began back in Spidey #238 comes to an end here in Amazing Spider-Man #276 (May 1986)...sort of! If you’ll recall, the Hobgoblin made his first appearance under the able guidance of writer Roger Stern, who wanted to bring back Spider-Man’s greatest foe but without raising Norman Osborn from the dead or using Harry Osborn after he was on the road to mental rehabilitation. What to do? He hit upon the idea of having someone else find one of the Goblin’s hideouts and take his place, but with a slightly different look and name. Thus, the The Dark Ages

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Hobgoblin was born, and even better, Stern managed to restore the air of mystery that surrounded the original villain by keeping his identity from readers. From that point on, the Hobgoblin’s identity became a popular pastime with readers even to this issue’s letters’ page where fans were still trying to guess who he was. And although this issue ends the career of the Hobgoblin for a while, it still keeps his identity under

Amazing Spider-Man #276, page 21: In a scene somewhat reminiscent of the classic Amazing Spider-Man #40, Spidey is seen amid smoke filled rubble following a battle with the Green Goblin inspired Hobgoblin. But is the threat of the Hobgoblin ended? If you’ll recall, issue 40 didn’t end up being the last word on the Green Goblin either!

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wraps. But writer Tom DeFalco does manage to throw readers a bone by eliminating at least one of the suspects: Flash Thompson! Now, admittedly Thompson was a longshot candidate for the role but DeFalco does a neat job here having the Hobgoblin frame him for the role, fooling everyone including Spidey himself who now must deal with the fact that his oldest friend has apparently been trying to kill him for months! The rest of the issue is padded out with vignettes such as Spidey bad guy the Human Fly being bumped off by Scourge (a mysterious villain who wandered the Marvel Universe in those days killing off minor superpowered characters), Spidey kept from getting into his apartment by women hanging around his rooftop, Flash Thompson being on the outs with girlfriend Sha Shan (they’ve apparently been living together with the blessing of the Comics Code), and Spidey switching from his new black costume to his classic red and blue duds midway through the story with no explanation. The art is ably handled by Ron Frenz but with a noticeable lack of the ole Ditko pizazz that he put in his work in earlier issues resulting in visuals that were nothing to write home about. As for the real identity of the Hobgoblin, it would seem that readers were eventually given a choice, they could either accept Ned Leeds as the villain (revealed in later issues of the regular continuity) or Roderick Kingsley (as originator Roger Stern had it in a special 1997 mini-series, which postulated that as with Flash, the Hobgoblin had also framed Leeds). Hoo boy!

Daredevil #230

“Born Again” Frank Miller (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) The action heats up in Daredevil #230 (May 1986) as the various plot threads begin to come together beginning with a new wrinkle that has an injured Matt Murdock picked off the street by a nun and taken to a clinic (Miller hints that the nun may or may not be Murdock’s mother!) Next, Karen Page, after selling her body for protection and safe passage from Mexico, gets closer to delivering her warning to Murdock that his secret

Daredevil #230, page 10: Ben Urich is ripped a new one by J. Jonah Jameson in this atmospheric scene. Frank Miller and David Mazzuchelli expand on a mostly unseen side of the Daily Bugle publisher first hinted at in Amazing Spider-Man Annual #15, which, not coincidentally, also involved Miller.

ID has been blown. The Kingpin, once so confident that he’d finally destroyed Daredevil, is plagued by growing doubts after losing track of him. Foggy Nelson and Murdock’s former girlfriend Glori O’Breen continue to move toward becoming an item. And finally, reporter Ben Urich, after having his fingers broken by a nurse “the size of your average truck” as a warning to lay off his search for Murdock, recuperates at home, forcing himself to not even THINK the name of...you know who! But far from marking time until next issue’s shattering climax, Miller continues to twist the screws on his characters as Urich is lectured by J. Jonah Jameson about what it means to be a reporter: “There are things you just don’t let happen in this racket,” Jameson says. “Number one is you never get scared away from a story. Not while you’ve got the most powerful weapon in the world on your side. This is five million readers worth of power. It can depose mayors, it can destroy presidents. And it’s been due to get aimed at the Kingpin for years now. But it needs you to do it.” But Urich is thoroughly frightened. He refuses to live up to Jameson’s stirring words. Then, leaving the office, he’s addressed by the janitor who congratulates him on not having more of his fingers broken. Meanwhile, Karen is being beat up by her john who threatens to kill her if she deserts him. Back to Urich on the phone, talking to Lt. Manolis (in traction after the same nurse who attacked Urich got through with him, except she’s not finished yet...) and listens as the bed-ridden man is murdered by the nurse. (“My employer would like you to hear this, Mr. Urich.”) The Dark Ages

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Writer/artist Frank Miller often touched upon Catholic imagery and themes in his work (particularly on Daredevil) while avoiding getting into specifics. Despite his influence on the genre, however, many comics creators have chosen to emulate the violence in his work rather than his infusion of religion into his characters’ lives.

Then, even as the nun who rescued him prays for Murdock’s recovery, Urich finds new courage and speaks the name...Matt Murdock! The level of violence, tension, degradation, and redemption in this issue alone was like nothing ever seen in comics before as Miller expertly blends all the elements of cinematic film noir into a brew so potent that nothing in comics since has ever been able to come close to it, not even the writer’s own later work on Batman. Something about the character of Matt Murdoch managed to touch Miller in ways no other could, drawing out not only his artistic influences but influences of his own Catholic upbringing that most other writers might find embarrassing or feel uncomfortable in putting on display. By making Murdock’s religious faith explicit (though it’s not clear if he is a practicing Catholic), Miller is clearly walking in the footsteps of Stan Lee, who broke similar religious barriers in comics back in the Grandiose Years when he had Captain America refer to Jesus and the Watcher to God in general. Unfortunately, his example was not one that was generally pursued by comics writers after him who preferred to follow Miller’s lead on violence instead with results that left their stories significantly less informed of meaning and sub-text.

Avengers #267 “Time...And Time Again!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) 156

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After the last few issues that seemed to mark time between major story arcs, the Stern/Buscema/Palmer team must have figured that readers had had the opportunity to catch their breaths because now it was time to launch the second major storyline of the run. And what a follow-up to the Skrull Civil War it was! While that earlier story began in fits and starts and then seemed to chug along with its own ups and downs, culminating in both Avengers and FF annuals, this new arc would be shorter and more concise but strike with more impact, focused as it was on a single villain that Stern managed to rehabilitate in a single stroke! We speak of Kang the Conqueror of course, the Avengers’ archenemy (yes, surpassing even Ultron, whose animosity after all was primarily driven by hatred of Henry Pym rather than the Avengers in particular). After a strong start in Avengers #8 under Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, Kang’s story expanded in issue #s 23 and 24 but stumbled a bit with the introduction of a lost love in the form of the lady Ravonna. It was the same set-up that Lee would later use for the Silver Surfer, whose own Shalla-Bal managed to soften the character’s harder edges. So too with Kang. However, following those two issues, Kang appeared only in issue #s 69-71 before being revisited well into the Twilight Years where he was not as well served. And so, by the time of Avengers #267 (May 1986), the villain was ready for a rehabilitation and scripter Roger Stern supplied that in spades with this issue’s story! Here, we discover that over the years, Kang’s time traveling has created numberless alternative timelines, each occupied with inferior versions of himself. Insulted at their reckless stupidity, the real Kang becomes a member of a triumvirate called the Council of Cross-Time Kangs, made up of three other Kangs from different timelines. Their goal is to eliminate all the inferior Kangs until only they remain. But one member, acting independently, kills off his colleagues. Is he the original Kang? Who knows? It’s an element of mystery that only adds to the arc’s twists and turns. But Stern isn’t through! Adding to the brain twisting goings on, he sends the Avengers into limbo where they encounter versions of the original Avengers as they appeared in issue #2! It seems that time has no meaning in limbo, and so the team has arrived concurrently with events in that previous story and readers are treated with renditions of GiantMan, Iron Man (still in his original robotic looking armor), and the Hulk (still in the tight-fitting purple shorts he wore through the original six issue run of his own book way back in 1962)! In a plan to maneuver the Avengers into killing off his one remaining rival, this issue ends with Kang explaining to Ravonna that if all goes accordingly, he’ll finally become the continuum’s one and only Kang the Conqueror!

“Into the Abyss” Chris Claremont (script); Bill Sienkiewicz (pencils/inks) It was a story supposedly about David Haller, a patient in Moira MacTaggert’s mutant research lab and illegitimate son of Prof. X, whose suppressed emotions have caused all kinds of psychic damage to the lab and everyone in it including the New Mutants. But who cared about Claremont’s tortured storytelling when there was all that cool art to drool over? Yeah, Sienkiewicz was still on duty, nearly a year after debuting with issue #18. How he managed to stick to an assignment that long and at the level he was working is anyone’s guess, but the beneficiaries were the readers, fans who came to appreciate his wild, crazy artwork that seemed to get more disjointed, more complicated with each issue, until by New Mutants #27 (May 1986), it seemed to have been reduced to the basic elements of illustration with just enough to suggest objects and differentiate among characters. Fittingly, much of the action takes place on the psychic plane as Prof. X struggles to make sense of David’s inner landscape, one littered by images of chaos and destruction centering on a giant, black dome under Zip-a-Tone skies. Visually, Sienkiewicz kicks the story into high gear with an incredible double-page spread on pages 11 and 12 showing the dome that represents David’s true essence, crushing memories of the Eiffel Tower and a palm treed Beirut at its base. Things get weirder when an aspect of David’s personality manifests itself as Jack Wayne (another flamboyant swashbuckler like that of [ugh] Corsair, that for some reason Claremont favored) and proceeds

to guide Prof. X through a world of shattered buildings and piled rubble depicted by Sienkiewicz in slashes of black, photorealistic close-ups, and a minimalist final full-page image of Prof. X holding a knife. The artist even employs a device not seen since George Herriman’s Krazy Kat comic strip when he uses dashed lines to show where a character’s gaze is aiming! There was no letters page this issue, but it’s safe to assume that most

New Mutants #27

New Mutants #27, page 8: What happened to the right side of Prof. X’s face in panel 4? Who cared? Not when artist Bill Sienkiewicz was in the white heat of creation, coming up with visuals like those in panel 1 (what the heck?!) and the minimalist spirograph effect in panel 5. It was only too bad that the wonderment would all come to an end by issue #38. Who knew where the artist’s style would have ended up if he’d continued?

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By the mid-1980s, the Lebanese Civil War had been raging for over ten years, laying waste a once wealthy and prosperous nation. Using it as the backdrop to the events in New Mutants #27 served as a metaphor for the condition of David Haller’s mental landscape.

casual readers of the New Mutants didn’t know what to make of it all, likely yearning for the glory days when Bob McLeod drew the book. But the feature in all probability had more readers who preferred Cannonball, Karma, and Mirage over the less familiar Warlock (Krazy Kat’s anarchic descendant), so it was probably a good thing for them when Sienkiewicz left, otherwise the book may not have gone on as long as it did. As it was, the strip fell on hard times with Claremont being replaced by Louise Jones and the art being handled by a succession of lukewarm pencilers, finally hitting bottom when Rob Liefeld arrived on the cusp of the Dark Ages. By that time, the book had, in a testament to the whole X phenomenon that dominated comics in the 1980s and into the 1990s, reached its 100th issue and then morphed into the X-ecrable X-Force. As for Sienkiewicz, New Mutants would prove to be his final stint on a continuing series, after which he worked on a number of covers, stand-alone projects, and limited series, where his art style would continue to evolve, becoming ever more inaccessible to the casual reader. It was ironic then, and somewhat disappointing, that Sienkiewicz’s star turn at Marvel turned out to be on a book as doggedly average as the New Mutants.

Avengers #268 “The Kang Dynasty!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) The action picks up in Avengers #268 (June 1986) as the old Avengers who keep taking each others’ place in limbo are finally replaced by the Space 158

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Phantom, the outer-space villain who started all the trouble way back in Avengers #2! However, the poor guy is quickly dispatched by Kang even as the Avengers are next threatened by hordes of...Dire Wraiths?! Okay, we’ll grant Stern was an ace at weaving elements of Marvel history into new stories (he did a great job of tying part of this story in with Avengers #2 didn’t he?) But...the Dire Wraiths? They were merely the recurring threat in Rom, a book Marvel produced as part of its efforts at licensing toy-based characters... a title no one could be expected to take seriously as connected to the regular Marvel Universe. Or could they? Good only for swarming their enemies, the Wraiths do just that here, keeping the Avengers busy while their teammates in the present find a way to join them in limbo. But the castaway Avengers manage to shake off the Dire Wraiths and find Kang’s stronghold where the villain sics the Growing Man on them! Reaching back again to past Marvel history, Stern pulls the robotic Growing Man from the pages of Thor #140. He was an exciting menace then and he is this time too, as Hercules whales into him and he goes into his act: growing bigger with every blow that strikes him! By the time Herc knocks him out of commission with a final haymaker that throws him from Kang’s castle, he’s as big as a skyscraper! By then, the rest of the Avengers have shown up as reinforcements, but too late! They all end up captured by Kang and their lives threatened...hoo boy!

Daredevil #231 “Saved” Frank Miller (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) Mazzucchelli’s climactic appearance in Daredevil #231 (June 1986) sealed his reputation as one of the late Twilight Era’s most exciting artists, assuring that his subsequent teaming with Miller on “Batman: Year One” in 1987 would be an industry-wide event. At the same time, that latter triumph would mark the artist’s retreat from mainstream comics as he began to focus instead on personal projects for the independent market. And though they would prove to be critical successes, they Avengers #268, page 6: This beautifully realized page showed that if anything, penciler John Buscema had lost none of his artistic verve over the years, even after being snapped back by Stan Lee from his most experimental period during the Grandiose Years. Of course, he’s aided and abetted here by inker supreme Tom Palmer whose confidence with the brush gives Buscema’s pencils a virtual three-dimensional quality that can be most readily observed in panel 2.

Moving immediately from their triumphant pairing on the Daredevil “Born Again” mini-series within a series, Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli went from Marvel to DC to repeat their amazing feat with “Batman: Year One.” Also a mini-series within a series, that story, like “Born Again,” would become an instant classic, redefining the Dark Knight in comics, film, animation, and television for decades to come.

were largely uninteresting and ultimately a frustrating loss for comics in general. But for this issue at least, readers could only stand amazed at the artist’s swift evolution over the past couple of years. That said, there were disturbing signs that Mazzucchelli’s style may have passed its peak. In DD #230 for instance, his work seemed in places unfinished or rushed and this issue too, details, especially the use of shadow and blacks are cut back with the result that in some panels, characters and objects appear to float in space instead of standing on a floor or hanging on a wall. In quieter scenes, with characters standing around or talking, details are few with the human form suggested with a minimum of line work as if reduced to its basic shape. Luckily, this 160

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seeming devolution of his style was only a temporary one as he returned to form with his Batman work. But in an odd way, this new minimalist style worked okay with this issue’s final chapter of what has since been called the “Born Again” storyline. It opens as reporter Ben Urich tells the police about Lt. Manolis’ murder and Lois, the musclebound nurse. Angry at her employers who wish to hustle her out of town, Lois decides to revenge herself on Urich and attempts to kill him and his wife but ends up running into a maddened Matt Murdock instead. From there, the plot divides with one branch following Karen Page and Foggy Nelson as they deal with Paulo, the maddened john who’s seeking to kill Karen for deserting him, while the other concerns itself with Murdock as he fights a homicidal maniac in a Daredevil costume. It seems the lunatic has been let loose by the Kingpin in an attempt to frame DD for Foggy’s murder. Anyway, everything comes to a head when the real DD defeats the fake DD, Paulo is shot by the Kingpin’s men, Murdock and Karen find each other again, and Ben Urich vows to continue looking for the still missing Murdock. Overall, it was a pretty incredible and high-octane thriller by Miller who proved he still had the stuff even after misfires like the Wolverine mini-series, Ronin, and Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. He’d do it again one more time next ish and for “Batman: Year One”; after that, his career would become a patchwork of personal projects of interest to hardly anyone but enlivened for a short time in the 2000s when Hollywood came calling for an adaptation of 300. For a brief, shining moment, Miller became the hottest property in tinsel town... until his true colors were revealed in a cinematic version of Will Eisner’s Spirit, which he wrote and directed. Filled as it was with Miller’s by then well-known excesses, the picture flopped and little of note has been heard from the once great comics writer since.

Squadron Supreme #11 “Betrayal” Mark Gruenwald (script); Paul Ryan (pencils); Sam DeLarosa (inks) Squadron Supreme #11 (July 1985) presents the penultimate issue in the groundbreaking 12-issue limited-series in which writer Mark Gruenwald has assembled all of the story’s moving parts (in the shape of dozens of super-heroic characters) together, including placing a conscience-stricken Nighthawk at the center of a moral dilemma that threatens to undermine everything he’s been fighting for. In fact, at almost every step of the way, Nighthawk has had to make small compromises with his scruples that cast doubt onto the purity of his whole campaign. As the series progressed, Gruenwald followed his many characters along their individual story arcs through love and death

why the project never grabbed the attention of critics the way later series such as Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns did. Which was a shame because the Squadron Supreme deserved the same kind of recognition. Take this issue for example, as Nighthawk’s allies, made up mostly of supervillains, infiltrate the Squadron Supreme to steal what they call a behavior modification device, which Squad members use to alter the personalities of those who oppose their Utopia Program. Succeeding, Nighthawk turns the information over to the evil Master Menace, who then builds a machine that

and disillusion and unintended consequences, forming a final product that he considered his personal magnum opus, the capstone to a long career in comics that began when he was just a fan publishing a little zine called Omniverse. It was Omniverse’s concentration on the shared universe concept first promoted by Marvel and later embraced by DC that eventually snagged Gruenwald his first job in the industry. He started by writing articles for The Amazing World of DC Comics before being hired by Marvel as an assistant editor in 1978. A few years later, he was promoted to full editor, where he became familiar to fans for his “Mark’s Remarks” commentary pieces in the various titles that he controlled. When he wasn’t overseeing books produced by others, he managed to do some penciling work and to produce The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe. He also filled an impressive 10-year stint as writer for Captain America from 1985 to 1995 and did his duty regarding the New Universe by scripting DP-7. But of all his projects at Marvel, whether he realized it or not at the time he took it on, the Squadron Supreme maxi-series became a dream assignment for him and the one that assured him his place in comics history following his untimely death in 1996. At first teamed with artist Bob Hall, who did a pretty good job, the penciling chores soon devolved to Paul Ryan whose barely serviceable work at least managed to help tell this issue’s story while adding little else. It would be a major disappointment for fans that the series’ artistic presentation never amounted to much and was likely the reason

Squadron Supreme #11, page 20: The fallout (no pun intended!) that could happen when super-heroes decide to take matters, great and small, into their own hands. If anything, Mark Gruenwald’s Squadron Supreme explored the limits of what it meant to be a super-hero.

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can reverse the process. But when they begin to restore the minds of those whose personalities had been wiped, the Blue Eagle is captured. He knows what Nighthawk and his allies are planning so they can’t let him go. Killing him is out of the question. But something must be done and Nighthawk is forced to agree that the only thing to do is to wipe the Eagle’s memories, using the same process that Nighthawk has been railing against the Squadron for. “It doesn’t matter if this crime I’m participating in is only a small one, a temporary one,” thinks a guilt-racked Nighthawk. “It is still a crime against human rights, against free will. Somehow I feel as if I’ve lost the war right here and now...that by selling out my principles I’ve rendered our fight meaningless. I think I’ve just sold my soul.” That sentiment turned out to be the theme of the whole series as the heroes realize that there are limits to their powers and if pushed beyond those boundaries, only disappointment and failure remain.

Daredevil #232 “God and Country” Frank Miller (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) Despite the seemingly clean break with the end of the “Born Again” storyline, there apparently was more story to tell, particularly loose ends that needed to be tied up, so Miller and Mazzucchelli returned for an encore with Daredevil #232 (July 1986). And though it

continued the Code-bending violence and drug abuse that became a major contributing factor to the overall decline of the comics industry in the coming Dark Age, it demonstrated again, if any proof were needed, that at the time, Frank Miller was literally the most exciting writer in comics. Alan Moore may have had his fans over at DC with his equally revolutionary scripts for Swamp Thing, but even his work was still rooted in an essentially fantasy milieu. Miller’s was firmly embedded in the real world, maybe a too real, world that may have existed in the worst neighborhoods of the country’s cities and maybe even behind the David Lynchian facades of suburbia. But did comic books need to wallow in its worst aspects? For instance, this issue introduces Nuke or “agent Simpson” as he is called by a corrupt Army general in the pay of the Kingpin. Nuke is another pill-popping madman like the one we saw last issue whose murderous tendencies can barely be controlled. Set loose on Daredevil by a revenge-craving Kingpin, he succeeds in practically destroying the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood where Matt Murdock lives, and in the process almost kills Karen Page, who is in the throes of withdrawal from her heroin addiction. Meanwhile, reporter Ben Urich is visiting nurse Lois in prison when Blanders, an associate assigned to him, and a corrupt prison guard in the employ of the Kingpin, open fire and kill Lois in cold blood then turn on Urich’s bodyguard. In a two-and-half page choreography of violence, blood and brains are spattered everywhere and when it’s over Urich is left alive (after killing Blanders himself with the butt of a pistol)...along with Glori O’Breen, present as a photographer for the Bugle. Back at the Kingpin’s ivory tower, the underworld leader is playing up to Nuke’s paranoiac notions of patriotism, cleverly using the truth about an America whose traditional values were fast eroding (ironically, as in the real-world Marvel offices themselves, which, like other American institutions, were fast being overwhelmed by a rising tide of political correctness). The whole thing sets up the appearance of next issue’s guest-star and the wind up of Miller’s reforging of DD that began all the way in issue #158.

Avengers #269 Blue Velvet, a mid-80s film by director David Lynch, represented a growing cynicism among the nation’s elite in the nation’s traditional values and what Americans believed about themselves. It became a tenet of the growing PC movement that in order to build a bet ter future, the past, as it existed in the public’s mind, must be discredited.

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“The Once and Future Kang!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) The final chapter in the Kang trilogy begins in Avengers #269 (July 1986) with a painless rundown of the villain’s long and tangled career from the suggestion that he was actually a descendant of Reed Richard’s father (the latest addition to the Kang canon courtesy of John Byrne!) to Kang’s pampered life in some indeterminate future to his posing as the pharaoh Rama-Tut to his initial encounter with the Avengers way back in issue

#8 to his final reunion with Ravonna. But here and now, it’s Ravonna who proves the weak link in Kang’s plans as we discover that she’s been loyal to another all along: Immortus! Who turns out to be yet another persona of Kang, one he was destined to assume in the future after he grew tired of his wicked ways and decided to settle down as a simple keeper of the timestream...a keeper who decided that his past-conquering self was making his

Avengers #269, page 4: Another gorgeous page by penciler John Buscema and inker Tom Palmer. Scripter Roger Stern does what Marvel’s staff was good at doing in those last golden days before everything spun out of control: reminding readers of the company’s rich history and the often intimately connected nature between its characters across scores of titles and over many years.

job a lot tougher than it needed to be. In the end, one Kang remains, whether the original one, who can say? The main thing is that scripter Roger Stern came through with a wonderful story that at once straightened out much of the sometimes contradictory nature of Kang’s biography while at the same time delving deep into Marvel continuity, tying in events from as long before as the Early Years to books that came out only months before! But could this series be anywhere as exciting as it was if the likes of Al Milgrom were still on the art chores? Not likely! Throughout, John Buscema, even only doing pencil breakdowns, was artist enough to provide the dynamism in his figures and dramatic set pieces within the traditional five- and-six panel grid format to make these tales far more sensational than they otherwise would have been. But even Buscema’s art might not have been enough if inked by anyone else but Tom Palmer (even though Jackson Guice also served Buscema well back in Squadron Supreme #7!) whose good judgment filled in needed details and dramatic nuance so that different settings from Kang’s headquarters to limbo each had their own feel. All this though, was but prologue! Or rather, the prologue to the bigger, perhaps biggest multi-part Avengers saga of all beginning next issue when SubMariner decides to finally answer for his crimes against humanity!

Avengers #270 “Wild in the Streets!” Roger Stern (writer); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Now an official member of the Avengers, the Sub-Mariner makes news, but not the kind that helps the The Dark Ages

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team’s image! Marvel’s first anti-hero or hero-villain (take your pick), Sub-Mariner set the tone for the company’s unique approach to its characters, even the bad guys, when Stan Lee first decided to give them nuances and shades of gray, something he started with the Mole Man way back in the still revolutionary Fantastic Four #1. He took that concept even farther with FF #4 when he re-introduced Sub-Mariner into the nascent Marvel Universe along with by implication, the company’s earlier heroes of comics’ Golden Age. Suddenly, Namor had a history, one that at the time, wasn’t necessarily a good thing: in such landmark issues as Marvel Mystery Comics #7-10, he battled the original Human Torch and destroyed much of New York City in the process. That didn’t endear him to people anywhere despite later siding with the Allies in World War II. Worse, practically the first thing he did upon being revived by the modern Human Torch in the aforementioned FF #4, was to invade the surfaceworld with his newfound Atlantean hordes (FF Annual #1). Not good! Later, Namor attempted to have his day in court, hiring Matt Murdock as legal counsel in Daredevil #7. That deal fell through (after Subby made his situation worse by again doing damage to New York and battling with the Army) and he became an on-again, off- again hero-villain in all the years following. But let’s face it, mostly he was a good guy, albeit a short-tempered, often unlikeable good guy who finally seemed to have made it when he joined the high profile Avengers. No problem, right? Not hardly! People in the Marvel Universe, it seemed, had long memories (how could you forget your homes being destroyed in one of Namor’s attacks on mankind?) and many of them appear as demonstrators in front of Avengers Mansion as Avengers #270 (Aug 1986) opens. Meanwhile, super-villainess Moonstone shows up in the crowd after being spotted by the Wasp is pursued into the sewer system. Captured, she’s led away into a police van occupied by two more familiar faces: the Absorbing Man and Titania in the guise of police officers. The two, we learn later, are working for someone else and seek to recruit Moonstone for some bigger operation... Meanwhile, Sub-Mariner, facing legal action by irate insurance companies who are finally able to pin him down with a summons, decides to meet them in court. Unfortunately, readers eager for a slam-bang legal fight as dueling lawyers throw objections back and forth were doomed to disappointment. That battle royal was one clash Stern never got around to. Instead, the courtroom showdown would have to wait for one of the few bright spots amid the Dark Age when the character was once again awarded his own series and John Byrne was able to give the sea prince his day in court. 164

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Paul Ryan’s lackluster art prevented the climactic scenes in the final issue of Squadron Supreme from having the impact inherent in the script. Perhaps lack of really dynamic art throughout the limited series was one reason why it failed to register as strongly with critics as more well-received efforts such as Alan Moore’s V for Vendetta.

Squadron Supreme #12 “The Dregs of Victory” Mark Gruenwald (script); Paul Ryan (pencils); Sam DeLarosa (inks) After building up over a year’s time with some frankly groundbreaking issues in terms of characters and motivations (it was released a month before the debut of Watchmen, whose first issue was cover dated Sept. 1986) Squadron Supreme #12 (Aug. 1986) turned out to be somewhat anti-climactic with an ending that seemed somewhat rushed. With the team infiltrated by Nighthawk’s freedom fighters and its behavior modification machine compromised, the Squadron is vulnerable to attack, which comes when its members least expect it. Having just informed government officials that they intend keeping their promise to relinquish power at the end of a year (the twelve issue limited series took place in real time), the Squadron is taken by surprise when they encounter Nighthawk at their headquarters. “We are here to relieve you of all the authority you have usurped from the federal government, surrender peaceably and there need be no incident,” declares Nighthawk, leader of what he terms “America’s Redeemers.” Despite suddenly finding themselves outnumbered following the revelation that half their members are traitors, the Squadron refuses to surrender and the battle is on. The balance of this extra-length issue is taken up with the big fight, which includes many unexpected turns and casualties, but which artist Paul Ryan falls short of making thoroughly exciting. With the action confined into too-small-panels, figures

are necessarily shrunk to fit and detail lost. To be sure, the artist attempts dramatic close-ups now and then but they’re not enough to make up for what ought to be exciting match-ups between the dozen or so characters whom readers have been waiting an entire year to see tangle. That said, Gruenwald does make some of those confrontations interesting with a bloodlust unaccustomed in most comics of the time. For instance, Power Princess is beaten near to death when Inertia transfers Hyperion’s blows against Redstone to her; labor is induced when the pregnant Arcanna is crushed under an illusion supplied by Moonglow (who, in another revelation turns out to be not the beauty she appears to be but a chunky middle-aged woman); Black Archer is fatally struck on the head by Blue Eagle’s mace; Blue Eagle suffers a broken neck after his antigrav wings give out; Pinball dies of a shattered spine; Nighthawk is killed by a heart attack induced by Foxfire, who in turn is stabbed to death in retaliation. It was the kind of real-world fight that the Avengers could have had with any number of evil super groups over the years but never could under the stricture of the Comics Code (which, by the way, was absent from the covers of this limited series). Before his death and only four pages from the end, Nighthawk manages to reiterate to a weakened Hype his reasons for opposing the Squadron’s Utopia Program: “All of the things you’ve given the world...only work for the good of society as long as you basically good-intentioned people oversee them,” explains Nighthawk. “But what happens when you’re gone? Can future generations be trusted to use what you’ve created as nobly as you did? I think not. Your utopian system is a failure because it requires beings as powerful and good as you to prevent its abuse. Today’s utopia could be tomorrow’s totalitarian state...all because you gave men the means to create it. Better to dismantle your ‘perfect’ system and let the government of that imperfect species...man...be an imperfect system he is capable of handling.” With the conclusion of Nighthawk’s speech and his assassination by Foxfire, Hyperion abruptly surrenders in the name of the Squadron and in the third of five panels on the next and final page, he admits that Nighthawk was right all along. “We began to believe that we always knew what we were doing...that our noble ends justified our ignoble means,” says a chastened Hyperion. “Before he died, Nighthawk made me see that in our haste to save the world, we never considered the long range consequences of our deeds.” Written almost three decades ago, Hyperion’s...and Gruenwald’s... conclusions seem all the more true in a world that had been caught up in the false promises of “hope and change.” The irony is that while the Squadron Supreme limited series has flown mostly under critics’

radar, the warnings of those such as Watchmen or V For Vendetta that have not have proven to be hardly more than their writers’ personal fantasies. Ending on a hopeful note, the final panel of this issue’s story shows Arcanna with her new born baby, the “inheritor of the future.” Fun Fact: Like Nighthawk, Gruenwald died of a heart ailment in 1996, and in keeping with his wish that his ashes be used somehow in the production of comics, they were mixed with the ink used in the first trade paperback reprinting of the Squadron Supreme limited series.

Daredevil #233 “Armageddon” Frank Miller (script); David Mazzucchelli (pencils/inks) Miller and Mazzucchelli wound up their historic team-up on DD with Daredevil #233 (August 1986), an issue that guest-stars Captain America. The action begins on page one as Miller cuts loose with some action in the form of an exploding water tank, and that pace continues for page after page as a reinvigorated Daredevil goes hand to hand with an out of control Nuke, a fight that leaves the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood a veritable war zone. It only ends after the Avengers make the scene and take Nuke into custody. But though the title of this book is Daredevil, the story is as much about Cap as it is DD. Displaying an intrinsic understanding of the starspangled Avenger, Miller goes on to demonstrate that he

Films such as 1978’s Deer Hunter gave soldiers a bad rap and encouraged a general acceptance among the public for many years that the nation’s veterans were mentally unstable and unable to adjust to civilian life. It was a meme that even Frank Miller would play into in his final issues of Daredevil.

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knows what makes him work at least as much as he does DD (insight that he’d also bring to Batman a few months down the road). In only a few words, he does more to define Cap’s essential spirit and meaning than all the verbiage written about him since Stan Lee last gave the character one of

Daredevil #233, page 23: But where Miller failed to be entirely original in his use of military veterans, he was in top form with his portrayal of Captain America. Not since Stan Lee had scripted the character in the Grandiose Years had anyone so completely captured the star-spangled Avenger’s personality. As Alan Moore was doing with many of the lesser inhabitants of the DC universe, Miller was proving that there was a lot of life left in even the most established of Marvel’s characters.

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his dazzling, inspirational speeches. When DD asks Cap why he’s interested in Nuke, Cap simply replies “He wears the flag.” And when DD as Matt Murdock replies that he never noticed, Cap is depicted in a panel showing him as a lonely figure in silhouette against a dying sun. A caption expressing his thoughts reads: “It doesn’t mean anything to them, thinks the soldier. To them, it’s just a piece of cloth. Sometimes I feel so weak.” It was a single panel, but one that defined the character’s solitary vigil in a nation that seemed to be suffering from collective amnesia as the values that made it great were slowly forgotten. Later, that feeling is reinforced when Cap confronts the general responsible for Nuke’s behavior. After being complimented by the general for his loyalty, Cap takes the flag in hand and replies “I’m loyal to nothing, general... except the dream.” Throughout, Miller maintains a melancholy mood in regards to Cap as the hero reflects on his own origins, the horror of World War II, his struggle not to resent elements of the modern world, and finally the loss of trust in the government. But in the end, Cap succeeds in holding on to his ideals, he keeps fighting, resisting the temptation to give up and in doing so allows Miller to give the reader a happy ending of sorts as the Kingpin’s involvement in Nuke’s rampage is exposed and in a fullpage final panel, even restores a measure of happiness to a smiling Matt Murdock as he walks along hand in hand with a redeemed Karen Page. It was a fitting coda to one of the most hard-driving, intense storylines in comics history, one that changed the industry forever but unfortunately, not for the better.

“Hell and Back” Frank Miller (script); Bill Sienkiewicz (pencils/inks) It was visually exciting and contextually heavy, but was it comics? As far removed from the first three phases of Marvel...the Early Years, the Years of Consolidation, and the Grandiose Years...or even the early Twilight Years...Elektra Assassin #1 (Aug. 1986) pointed to the future of comics...but as things turned out, only the immediate future. The Elektra Assassin eight-issue limited series was part of a wave of comics projects in the later Twilight Years that seemed to herald the longawaited moment among fans yearning for the time when their favorite medium would at last be accepted by the outside world as a legitimate form of entertainment, even art, commensurate with film, music, and novels. Such projects as Alan Moore’s The Killing Joke and Watchmen and Frank Miller’s own Dark Knight Returns attracted the serious attention of mainstream critics and made their creators stars outside the insular world of comics. The launch of DC’s Vertigo and Marvel’s Epic line of “mature” comics also reinforced the sense that the four-color medium had finally transcended the childhood ghetto to which many felt they had long since been condemned. Reprinted in graphic novel format or even as hardcover collections, comics at last broke out of dingy specialty stores and began to make their earliest appearances in bookstores such as Barnes & Noble or multimedia chains like Newbury Comics and Tower Records. But though the more mature comics that received all the praise in the

late Twilight Years became permanent fixtures in stores everywhere, the tide of projects like them dried up quickly as the comics industry became swept up by a collectors’ mania that supported brainless action romps of colorfully clad empty costumes pounding each other in a symphony of violence and gore. As standards of taste and decency were abandoned, so too was the institutional memory of how comics stories were told. A belief arose that writers were not even necessary for comics to be successful and for a number of years that seemed to be true as books

Elektra Assassin #1

Elektra Assassin #1, page 20: On the backslope? Was Frank Miller already past his peak when he scribed the artistically dazzling but contextually confusing Elektra Assassin Limited Series?

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produced solely by artists sold in the millions whether they sported stories or not. Swiftly, comics descended into a juvenile jungle where extreme violence, sex, foul language, crudity, and bad taste ruled the day. Then all at once, customers who’d bought comics by the truckload suddenly seemed to come to their senses. The madness left them and comics sales fell to their natural level, a level where 100,000 copies was a top seller but that the sales for the average title was only a few tens of thousands. But the damage had been done. The euphoria of mainstream acceptance that once gripped fans in the late Twilight Years was over and what was left was a ruined landscape of comics that were far more juvenile in their interests than they were before the appearance of books like Elektra Assassin. But even there, the seeds of the industry’s self-destruction were obvious. Where writer Frank Miller serves up violence and bleak cynicism this issue (albeit in a well-produced package with its raw edges smoothed over by Bill Sienkiewicz’s visually dazzling tour de force), others would try to follow in his footsteps, sadly taking away only the surface elements of Miller’s work rather than his subtleties. (To be sure, the story that begins this issue would turn out to be a confusing mess made up of equal parts origin story, resurrection tale, and world-saving thriller made all the weirder by the artist’s use of watercolors, abstracticism, and child-like dream images). Thus, books like Elektra Assassin, while pointing to a more mature evolution of comics, merely opened the door for less-talented creators to focus

Luckier than most comics creators, Miller has been fortunate in Hollywood’s adaptations of his work. The Daredevil movie, released in 2003, though loathed by many, was actually pretty faithful both to the writer/artist’s DD run and the overall spirit of his work.

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solely on their exploitative elements. (Or worse, creators of equal talent squandering the legacy of past creators by dwelling on the baser emotions and exploding what was thought to be the myth of goodness and positive values). As an exercise in artistic expression within the four-color medium, Elektra Assassin is a bold entry but as a comic book is ultimately a failure. Readers trying to make sense of it will be doomed to disappointment. Fun Fact: As sort of a warm-up to this issue, Miller and Sienkiewicz had previously teamed up on the Daredevil: Love and War graphic novel, which continued themes begun during Miller’s tenure on the regular DD comic. Frequently overlooked, it’s a little less confusing than Elektra Assassin but still not all that interesting.

Avengers #271 “Breakaway!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) In Avengers #271 (Sept 1986), writer Roger Stern gives readers a mix of old and new characters as events continue to build up to the point where things explode. In fact, they sort of do right off the bat in the first few pages as Hercules’ patience with team leader Wasp finally snaps. As he storms off, the stage is set for later events that’ll allow the new Masters of Evil to seize Avengers mansion and give the team a challenge that it hasn’t had in many a day. The balance of the issue catches up with various other team members and hangers-on, including soldier of fortune Paladin (who, for some reason, actually had his own fans among Marvel readers) as he drops in for a date with the Wasp and semi-regular FBI agent Derek Freeman who has similar designs on Capt. Marvel. In Freeman’s office, it’s revealed dangerous super-villains such as Mr. Hyde, Whirlwind, and the Grey Gargoyle have all recently broken out of stir...coincidence? Not likely! Meanwhile, dropping by the Passaic County Jail, the Wasp and Paladin meet with Rita DeMara (the new Yellowjacket, remember?) only to encounter the Grey Gargoyle and Screaming Mimi (who she?!). The odd couple have shown up to spring Yellowjacket and recruit her for the Masters, but the Wasp and Paladin manage to put up some spirited resistance. One thing you have to hand to Stern, he showed marked cleverness in finding ways for otherwise outclassed heroes to win tangles against more powerful foes. (But it helps if you’ve amped up their powers, as in the case of the Wasp who blows out the tires of a heavy truck with a single blast of her stinger!) The heroes don’t quite do it here but that’ll be corrected in upcoming issues.

The New Universe

t was supposed to depict what super-heroes would be like in the real world but creator Jim Shooter forgot that the real world holds dangers undreamed of even by super-heroes. In the case of the New Universe, which was supposed to have been part of a celebration of Marvel’s 25th anniversary, those dangers came in the form of the powers that were at Marvel who lost interest in the project and decided to focus the company’s efforts elsewhere. With promised funding cut, Shooter’s ambitious plans for the line were shortcircuited and the New Universe stumbled out of the gate. Not long after, it suffered its first casualties when half the line was canceled and the Shooter-scripted Star Brand was demoted to bi-monthly status. Radical surgery failed to save what was left and the New U experiment ended in 1989.

Star Brand #1 “The Star Brand” Jim Shooter (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Al Williamson (inks) Intentional or not, Ken Connell’s origin story is uncomfortably close to that of the Silver Age Green Lantern (a dying alien on the run from unspecified enemies, escapes to Earth and, finding Connell worthy, bestows on him an object that grants him great powers), scenes from which open Star Brand #1 (Oct. 1986) and at the same time launches Marvel’s New Universe. The brainchild of editor-in-chief Jim Shooter (aided and abetted by editors Archie Goodwin, Tom DeFalco, and Mark Gruenwald among others), the New Universe was conceived as the start of a line of comics completely separate from the established Marvel Universe, arriving full-blown at local newsstands and comic shops. The conceit behind them being that they would take the idea first popularized by Stan Lee in Marvel’s Early Years of super-heroes living in the real world and taking it to the next level. In the New Universe, events would take place in real time and most heroes would not have any “super” powers. They would face everyday issues arising from their heroic careers in a realistic fashion, and for the most part, never encounter aliens, magic, super science, or living myths. The obvious exception to the rule was Star Brand, Shooter’s own creation and the one he would script himself, setting the pace for the rest of the new line which included Mark Hazzard: Merc, Kickers, Inc., and Nightmask among others. But beyond the comics themselves, the New Universe was emblematic of Shooter’s sometimes controversial

career at Marvel, which on a professional level was quite successful in getting the editorially troubled company back on its feet and the trains to run on time. In doing so, he made the company more profitable than ever before, but to do it, he had to step on some toes incurring the enmity of creators. Outside editorial, he also knocked heads with upper management to effect such policy changes as granting royalty payments for creators on best-selling books, allowing creators to retain ownership of characters and concepts under the Epic Comics imprint, and the return of original artwork. Along the way, he just happened to write Secret Wars, the best-selling comics series of the 1980s, a success that enabled him to persuade management to back his plan to create the New Universe. Timed to coincide with Marvel’s 25th anniversary, the new line of books was to have boasted top creators but when management got cold feet, the budget was cut, forcing Shooter to make do with lesser lights. As a result, when it finally debuted, the line as a whole was a good deal less than impressive with the sole exception being Star Brand. There, Shooter showed how a wellwritten comic book should be done (something he constantly tried to drum into his writers during his tenure as editor-in-chief and one of the things that veteran scripters resented him for) as it became far and away the best-produced entry of the line. Penciled by John Romita, Jr. fresh off assignments on the X-Men and Daredevil where his style had continued to improve, and inked by comics great Al Williamson, the book immediately established itself not only as the best in the New Universe lineup but The Dark Ages

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balloons, an important tool soon to be abandoned by the industry. Nice little touches thrown into the story that subtly bolster the New Universe premise that the stories take place in a real-world environment is the scene where Connell rolls his motorbike through the sliding doors of his apartment and standing it up on some pieces of cardboard on the living room floor. Others include Connell’s taking down the alien menace in a

one of the best comics being produced by the whole industry. Moving past the familiar origin, the book diverges quickly from its source material and immediately establishes Shooter’s criteria for this new environment: how Ken Connell deals with his newfound powers. At first unsure of what to do, he confides in a psychiatrist friend named Myron and together they decide to keep his power a secret for the time being. Just then, one of the aliens that had been chasing the Old Man who gave him his powers (in the form of a Star Brand imprinted in the palm of Connell’s hand) attacks and in defeating him, our hero begins to realize just how powerful he is. The incident prompts thoughts on the responsibility of the proper use of such power, a theme that will dominate the first few issues of the title. In the meantime, readers are introduced to such supporting characters as wouldbe girlfriend Debbie the Duck (the two have a charming and down-to-Earth relationship characterized by a shtick in which they end every other comment to each other with a “quack”); girlfriend of the moment, single mother Barbara Petrovic; and John, a fellow worker at the auto reconditioning joint Connell is employed at. Throughout, Romita provides clean but forceful imagery quietly confined in a traditional panel-to-panel layout that never intrudes on Shooter’s storytelling. For his part, Shooter displays his mastery of natural sounding dialogue as he moves Connell from one supporting cast member to another while at the same time showing how character development can be accomplished with the artful use of thought

This unused cover for Star Brand #1 amply demonstrates the eclecticism of artist John Romita, Jr.’s evolving style. Why it was rejected in favor of the image chosen is a mystery... well, except for those feet!

slag dump outside Pittsburgh; Connell remembering that he has to replace his license and credit card after they were destroyed in his encounter with the alien; and the presence of a locksmith’s truck in a scene where Connell is waving goodbye to Debbie after she helps him get back into his apartment. All serve to ground the story and its characters in a realistic setting. Though the other New Universe titles would prove to be mostly uninteresting and expendable, the shame of the line’s coming to an early finish was the discontinuation of Star Brand, a sharp, well-done book that deserved to be continued. That said, who knows if the quality displayed in this first issues could have been maintained as Shooter himself abandoned the book with issue #7 and was gone from Marvel itself long before the New Universe came to an end in 1988.

Mark Hazzard: Merc #1 “Bad for Business” Peter David (script); Gray Morrow (pencils/inks) In a nutshell, the original idea behind Marvel’s New Universe wasn’t a bad one: a new line of comics completely unrelated to the regular Marvel Universe in which there would be nothing supernatural or otherworldly going on. Just comics about real-world people doing extraordinary things. That initial concept however, was quickly compromised after it was decided that a handful of people in the New Universe would be given paranormal powers created by a mysterious “white event.” Of the new line’s eight initial offerings, Star Brand would end up the most obviously supernatural with the others being relatively low-key, among those Mark Hazzard: Merc, which coincidentally or not, also turned out to be the most creatively successful of the group (again, except for the Jim Shooter scripted/John Romita, Jr. penciled Star Brand) drawn as it was by veteran artist Gray Morrow and written by newcomer Peter David. Unfortunately, Merc would end up with a haphazard history (no pun intended!) with Morrow only illustrating the book intermittently and David quitting after issue #4. Created by Marvel editor Archie Goodwin, Merc tells the adventures of mercenary Mark Hazzard as he travels the world with colleagues Mal and Treetop, lending their services to the highest bidder. As mercenaries, the team did what would be expected of typical mercenaries, such as rescuing hostages, overthrowing petty tyrants, etc, the latter of which forms the basis for Mark Hazzard: Merc #1 (Nov. 1986). Surprisingly, however, the book isn’t all shooting and explosions and mindless violence as would be expected going in to the Dark Ages; it has a human side too, one that David does a pretty good job of highlighting as we learn about Hazzard’s 171

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Peter David (left) rose from direct sales assistant manager to one of Marvel’s most prolific writers. He had his admirers but except for the occasional weirdism (like employing the Hulk as a Las Vegas bouncer), his comics are now primarily used to stock 50¢ bargain bins at comics conventions. Artist Gray Morrow had a more distinguished career but mostly elsewhere than Marvel.

dismal personal life (he’s estranged from his parents, divorced, has a son he barely knows, and for reasons unexplained, dropped out of West Point to serve as a common soldier in Vietnam). David manages to interweave these personal elements through the story as Hazzard strays from the mission parameters to try to save the daughter of the dictator he just killed from a fate worse than death. But instead of thanks, all he gets is canned anti-Americanisms from the ungrateful girl who ends up being killed by her own people when she refuses to be rescued by Hazzard. Not your typical Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos style ending! Morrow, who’d been working in the comics field since the 1950s, had a lush, detailed art style that emphasized mood and atmosphere but fell short of the bombastic requirements ushered in by the Marvel Age of Comics. Largely for that reason, he was never able to excite most fans (despite doing an outstanding job drawing the origin of Man-Thing in Savage Tales #1). Like his friends and fellow artists, Angelo Torres and Wally Wood, Morrow also specialized in sultry femmes (on display among other venues when the artist edited Red Circle Sorcery for Archie Comics in the mid-1970s), a skill that’s on display this issue. All that aside, Morrow, good as he was, never managed to connect with fans the way other Marvel artists did and so was unable to draw much attention to Merc. So, even though the book was much stronger creatively and

conceptually than the majority of the New Universe line-up (the others ranged from mediocre to just plain crummy), it failed to generate any heat. Eventually, Morrow left the strip and David was replaced by Doug Murray. Such early changes were not good signs for the book and were compounded later when Murray killed off the book’s star! With that, Merc was canceled with issue #12 and the rest of the ill-fated line followed over the course of the following year.

The issue ends on an ominous note as Zemo gathers the Masters for a final briefing before attacking Avengers mansion in the last pages of the book. With only Jarvis on duty, it’s a cinch and the Masters become masters of the mansion!

Star Brand #2

“Taking Charge!” Jim Shooter (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Al Williamson (inks) There was no slip in quality between the first issue and Star Brand #2 (Nov. 1986) as writer Jim Shooter Avengers #273 continued to hammer away at the underlying theme “Rites of Conquest!” Roger Stern of the New Universe. If anything, (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Ken Connell’s struggles with his Tom Palmer (finished art) new-found super powers only Beneath a wonderful cover portrait intensify as he discovers flying of the Black Knight by artist John high above the world only makes it Buscema (who considered Dane harder to find wherever it is he Whitman one of his favorite characters, wants to go. Of course, many such at least so far as super-heroes went) issues were first explored long ago and inker Tom Palmer (it was in the Early Years when Stan Lee framed by a host of Marvel’s most and Steve Ditko made Peter Parker’s popular heroes drawn by John life more miserable than it already Romita as part of that month’s was by giving him the proportionate celebration of the company’s 25th strength of a spider. But over the anniversary) almost all of Avengers years, the revolutionary nature of #273 (Nov 1986) is turned over to that idea had been dulled so that by Zemo and his Masters of Evil as the ’80s most super-heroes seemed to they prepare for their planned be content with their powers. Here, One of the most heralded and talented artists assault on Avengers mansion. Shooter manages to recapture that in comics history, Al Meanwhile, what glimpses we get earlier feeling as Connell begins to Williamson ended his of the heroes, they’re blissfully realize that having the power to fly career mostly as an unaware that anything is in the or lift automobiles with one hand inker for Marvel, offing, having failed in past issues to isn’t everything its cracked up to be. working over such put together such pieces as reports More, it also gives rise to questions of fellow artists as Gene Colan, John Romita, Jr., of escaped villains and unexpected morality and personal responsibility and John Buscema. The combinations of same suddenly that he hadn’t considered before. results, however, were teaming up: Hercules is busy getting For instance, while experimenting disappointing as he drunk in a local bar (urged on by an with the limits of his power of flight, seemed reluctant to undercover Wrecker); Capt. Marvel he ends up at girlfriend Barbara’s overlay too much of his own style over those is visiting the moon in the form of a house. Looking into her bedroom of others. beam of light; and the Black Knight window, catches her undressing. is escorting Janet Van Dyne to a “Whoa...so nice...yum...” he thinks society function. The villains, however, before stopping himself. “What am have not been idle as we discover upon visiting I doing? This isn’t...right!” Back at home, he Zemo in his headquarters (needless to say, the continues to be bothered by his behavior. “It’d be so original Zemo is still dead at this point with the easy to become a total slimeball with this power.” current version being his son out for revenge for But continuing along those lines, he begins to the death of his father at the hands of Captain wonder what he should do with his power...should he America and, by extension, the Avengers). Zemo, it fight terrorists? The very fact that he feels compelled seems, has everything figured out, including a to ask such a question makes him instantly more way to neutralize Captain Marvel’s almost limitless human than most other super-heroes at the time. powers. The only fly in the ointment is Moonstone, Later, deciding that with his powers he could save who hungers to take control of the Masters herself. a child trapped in a well, he heads for the site but 172

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soon finds how difficult it is to tell where he’s going from a mile overhead. But at treetop level, he still needs to stop and check a map for directions every now and then. Arriving at the scene, he’s suddenly confronted by another set of problems: he could get the child out of the well, but what if he was injured and moving him would only make things worse? What about his identity? If he was recognized, he’d likely become a celebrity without a moment’s peace. The problem is solved for him when the child is rescued by Jenny Swenson in her robotic armor (aka Spitfire and the Troubleshooters), the book’s first crossover. On the way home, another dilemma strikes Connell: there were likely children in need of help elsewhere in the world, every time of day. Was it right for him to just sit around knowing he could help? Connell doesn’t know it, but that’s the same problem heroes like Superman have faced for years but never managed to address in their own books. The issue ends with Connell attempting to stop a terrorist hijacking of an ocean liner. A series of trial and error follows as he continues to get the hang of being a super-hero, but when he hesitates, not sure what to do about a terrorist holding a kill switch to an A-bomb, the problem is again solved for him when special forces board the ship overcome the terrorists and throw the bomb overboard. With seconds to act before it explodes, Connell dives into the water, dragging the bomb deep into the seabed where it explodes doing little harm. The incident gives him new confidence in himself and the issue ends with a confrontation with the Troubleshooters as Connell warns them of the consequences of precipitous action. Great powers require careful thought before being employed. “If you’re going to take charge of some situation,” Connell tells them, “...just be aware of all that can go wrong...all the potential consequences and who’s going to bear them.” Again, the story builds nicely to the climactic scene aided muchly by John Romita, Jr.’s clean, easy-to-follow art. Devoid of the busy-ness that would become popular later in the decade, his style manages at once to convey the lead character’s tentativeness, while at the same time, the boldness required of straight-ahead action. Romita is also good at showing the ordinary lives of the book’s supporting characters, this time introducing single mother Janet, another of Connell’s apparently long list of lady friends. All in all, it was another really strong entry in the new series, one that proved that the first issue was no fluke and that maybe, just maybe, the New U did have something new to offer after all.

The ’Nam #1 “’Nam: First Patrol” Doug Murray (script); Michael Golden (pencils/coloring); Armando Gil (inks) On the backside of the Twilight Years, Marvel attempted a late-innings re-entry into the once-popular war comic genre. For decades, war stories had been a mainstay of popular culture from movies and television to pulp magazines and comic books. In full swing during the 1950s, the genre lumbered on into the 1960s as the generations that grew up during the World War II and Korean War eras transitioned out of comics and were replaced by younger readers whose only exposure to combat was an increasingly unpopular war in southeast Asia. Although DC would continue to publish war comics through most of the Silver Age, Marvel got by with only a couple titles: Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos and later, Captain Savage and His Leatherneck Raiders and Combat Kelly. Eventually even those few titles had run their course as superheroes came to dominate the comics market. By 1984 then, war comics had long been an extinct species until editor Larry Hama asked sometime fantasy nonfiction writer Doug Murray to tap into his experiences serving as a soldier in Vietnam and write something about it for Savage Tales Magazine (which had long since been cut off from its Hyborian Age roots). Teaming up with artist Michael Golden, Murray came up with stories involving “The 5th of the 1st.” Soon

By the mid-1980s, the Vietnam War was mostly a memory to older readers and something they read about in history texts for the younger set. But the war’s legacy lived on in the imagination of writers who continued to mine it for the lessons of combat as was done with The ’Nam or if a plot called for a crazed veteran as in the Frank Miller scribed DD #232.

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convoy of APCs that pass a military salvage vehicle as it recovers a downed medivac. Scenes of the firebase itself are presented in meticulous detail, including a shot of a crowded motor pool. But all of it would’ve been wasted if there wasn’t a good script to go with it and here Murray succeeds in the book’s original intention of capturing the feel of what it was really like to serve as a grunt in Vietnam. Throughout, details for survival imparted to Marks by his fellow squad members ring true as the men conduct a search and destroy mission highlighted by a dust off

after, editor-in-chief Jim Shooter suggested a regular comic about the Vietnam War to be called The ’Nam and Hama suggested that Murray be given the assignment. Murray pitched the idea of a maxi-series told in real time in which the comic would follow the military career of one Private Edward Marks as he goes from green recruit to veteran soldier. To Murray’s surprise, his idea was accepted and the comic green lighted with his “5th of the 1st” partner Michael Golden to provide the art. The result was The ’Nam #1 (Dec. 1986) and within the first few pages any reader could tell that the story rung with an air of unmistakable authenticity from its opening scenes in boot camp, to the petty corruption among the lower ranks, to Marks’ first patrol. There was even a glossary at the end of the book with definitions for slang words used by soldiers in the story. Meanwhile, Golden, who by this time had become a fan-favorite due to work on DC’s Batman and Demon as well as Marvel’s Micronauts, was putting 100 percent of himself into the art, and although the faces of his characters could be a bit rubbery and cartoony at times, the detail he lavished on the equipment of war was astonishing. Not since Jack Kirby had done the same in the old Sgt. Fury strip had an artist gone to the lengths Golden did this issue starting right off with a shot of an American airport heading up the splash page. That scene was juxtaposed against its counterpart in Vietnam as the Air Force transport carrying Marks and fellow soldiers is fired upon as it makes its descent into Saigon. Later, as Marks is driven to his firebase, Golden treats readers to a

The ’Nam #1, page 19: A lovely example of artist Michael Golden’s busy art for The ’Nam, a place and time remote from readers’ experience even by 1986.

Depictions of the Vietnam War were markedly different in tone than the triumphalism that had been on display in the thousands of comics about World War II published over the decades.

showing a flurry of helicopters coming in to take the squad back to base. Peppered with genuine sounding terms used by soldiers, Murray’s script is sparse, maybe too sparse, leaving an impression of insubstantiality, or a feeling that something was missing. Reading it, a reader is left with an indefinable sense of needing to know more about a world almost as alien as any found in a book of science fiction. Characters’ individual personalities tend to be mostly surface with little of real importance to individualize them. On the other hand, Murray did intend that the series go on for 8 years, affording ample time to develop the cast further. Unfortunately, he’d end up not having that time, leaving the book with issue #51.

Strikeforce: Morituri #1 “Though Some Have Named Thee So...” Peter Gillis (script); Brent Anderson (pencils); Scott Williams (inks) The premise introduced in Strikeforce: Morituri #1 (Dec. 1986) held promise but ultimately failed to deliver. A stand-alone science fiction concept taking place in Earth’s near future, under a more creatively daring hand, it had the potential to be another “War of the Worlds” for Marvel, but writer Peter Gillis’ matter of fact scripting style and insistence on sticking to the then emergent rules of political correctness kept the strip from transcending the average and becoming something of power and wonder. For sure, its theme that all glory is fleeting as characters granted super human powers to give them an edge in battle must in the end die as a result of the bestowal of those powers is a compelling one and fraught with potential drama.

Unfortunately, it’s undercut by a crucial lack of realism when we see the war effort, an effort for Earth’s very survival mind you, that involves the recruitment of women for the Morituri program. Apparently, the goals of egalitarianism, as they do in our own time, supersede Earth’s survival so maybe things aren’t as dire as the story leads the reader to believe. Certainly, in domestic scenes, life on Earth seems pretty much normal even in the shadow of occasional alien raids and the evidence of such ruined cities as artist Brent Anderson depicts in this issue’s opening splash page. In fact, it’s Anderson’s art that turns out to be the strongest argument for anyone to have given this book a try. A self taught artist, Anderson moved quickly from fandom to professionalism when he became the regular artist on a revived Ka-Zar strip before moving on to what would become the most high profile assignment of his career: penciler on the X-Men graphic novel “God Loves, Man Kills.” Anderson would later do some good work for the independent market, but before that, he worked on Strikeforce off and on for its first 20 issues or so. But back to this issue where the artist’s detailed splash (that includes use of Zip-a-Tone on foreground objects that give the scene added depth) is followed by a second page presenting some nice panels of a rescue team searching the rubble for victims of the latest alien attack. Unfortunately, Anderson may have been on a tight schedule as he displayed more confidence with large set pieces than with quieter moments, which often seem unfinished or rushed. (Indeed, according to the credits, pages 5, 6, and 10 were drawn by another artist). The story itself follows the career path of young Harold C. Everson who, influenced by the glorified adventures of the era’s version of war comics starring “The Black Watch,” is inspired to join the Morituri program. The catch is that although the program grants volunteers super-powers, it’s only temporary until they burn out and die within a year’s time. It’s that conceit which gives the series its unique spin: characters will come and go at different points, granting the strip a builtin drama that should have given it a brooding atmosphere of loss and regret, its characters a keener appreciation of life, and a view of Earth that could be a garden if not for the ongoing war, but doesn’t. And although a little of that is touched upon this issue, Gillis and later writers were not of the calibre of such forebears as “War of the Worlds’” Don McGregor or Master of Kung Fu’s Doug Moench, or even Deathlok’s Bill Mantlo, each of whom could delve into the emotions and psychologies of their characters’ minds while at the same time evoke an almost elegiac appreciation of the worlds they inhabited. Ultimately, Strikeforce: Morituri would fail on both counts. Fun Fact: The The Dark Ages

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Brent Anderson, given enough time, could produce beautiful work. The artist would eventually find a permanent home in the 1990s working with writer Kurt Busiek on Astro City, a book whose erratic release schedule has denied fans a greater body of his work to admire.

book’s sub-title “We Who Are About to Die,” refers to the phrase “Ave Imperator, morituri te salutant” (“Hail Caesar, those who are about to die, salute you”) supposedly uttered by gladiators in the Roman arena.

Avengers #274 “Divided...We Fall!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Zemo, Goliath, Mr. Hyde, Titania, Absorbing Man, Moonstone, Tiger Shark, Yellowjacket, Blackout, the Fixer, and the Wrecking Crew! How can a divided Avengers led only by the winsome Wasp stand a chance? The answer is, they don’t! In a jarring turn of events, the Masters of Evil have taken over Avengers mansion, commanding the figurative high ground against our heroes! But first the good news: Avengers #274 (Dec 1986) opens with another eye-popping, patented Buscema/Palmer splash page showing beautifully shadowed figures of Zemo and the Fixer as they scheme in a super-detailed control room that has every bolt and switch on full display! Meanwhile, up the front walk comes the Black Knight, unaware of the danger that waits for him behind the front door. He soon finds out as he’s quickly subdued by Mr. Hyde, whose viciousness quotient has been upped about a dozen notches from his days spent primarily as a Thor villain way back in the Years of Consolidation. Next Captain Marvel is taken out of action by the simple expedient of trapping her in the null-universe of Blackout’s Darkforce (where she’ll remain for most of the series). Finally, in a coup de grace, Zemo’s plan 176

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to deaden Hercules’ judgment by getting him drunk pays off when the Prince of Power barges into the mansion and is jumped by a half dozen of the most powerful villains in the Marvel Universe. At first he holds his own, but then grabbed by Goliath and swung around like a rag doll, his head is pounded against the walls again and again until even Hercules’ godly strength can’t keep him from being rendered unconscious. Then, while Captain America is captured in turn, Herc’s body is dumped outside the mansion where he’s mistaken for dead by the Wasp! Fun Fact: By the way, have you noticed the jazzy new ID block in the top left hand corner of the cover (it was actually begun with #263, but what the hey)? Designed by Buscema and Palmer with a hint of stars ‘n stripes in the background, it more than did justice to this top-flight run of books....maybe the best of Marvel ’80s; yes, better even than the X-Men, DD, or FF!

Star Brand #4 “The Fight!” Jim Shooter (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Al Williamson (inks) After an issue’s hiatus, John Romita, Jr. was back on the pencils for Star Brand #4 (Jan. 1987) with more evidence that his style had continued to evolve perhaps to a peak in his career. In this and later issues of the title, his art would display a new design sense as well as simplicity of line where less was definitely more in a book that relied more heavily than typical super-hero fare on character development and quiet scenes between members of the supporting cast. As things turned out, this was crucial, as writer Jim Shooter kept the strip heavily grounded in the realistic approach he wanted as the basis of the entire New Universe project. So far, for instance, Ken Connell, the Star Brand, had yet to adopt a costume, fight any super-villains, or even decide what to do with his newfound powers. In fact, Shooter seemed more interested in exploring how Ken’s personality would change after acquiring the Star Brand. Right off, this issue especially, readers learn that his origin, which had seemed so similar to that of Green Lantern, turns out to be only a springboard for a completely different take on that event. Where Hal Jordan was chosen by Abin Sur because he was the most worthy man on the planet (which was subsequently proved by Hal’s spotless personal life and heroic persona), Ken was chosen merely because his alien benefactor thought he was most like him...and as events unfold, it begins to look like that wasn’t necessarily a compliment. As readers discovered in earlier issues, Ken was far from perfect. In fact, he was something of a lazy, selfinterested jerk, getting by on good looks that enable him to seemingly slip into any woman’s bed.

(Sleeping simultaneously with single mom Barb and doormat Deb the Duck, Star Brand, needless to say, did not feature the Comics Code stamp on its covers!) Readers who were disappointed in this “hero’s” rather large feet of clay, were relieved to find that acquiring a super power has raised Ken’s consciousness so that he begins thinking about the morality of his actions. But before he gets to that point, he ends up fooling around with Duck (with some indication that they have done this before). Shifting gears, he scoots Deb out of his apartment when Barb unexpectedly shows up at the door. He seems to reconnect with her, forgetting all about Deb (while simultaneously lusting after Barb’s 17-year-old babysitter). Finally, seeing Barb with another man seems to confirm Ken’s intent on settling with the mother of two. But before he can do anything about it, he meets a couple of asylum escapees with super powers of their own who proceed to hand him a confidence-shaking defeat. The beating teaches him a lesson and on the last page of the story, we see Ken begin a journal of sorts, and in his first entry, Shooter surprises us, having Ken recognize his faults and decide to change his ways. Only he has the power to say yes or no to temptation. He can change and regain his self-respect, but only if he wants to. “I can be ‘worthy’ (of the Star Brand) or not. That’s the same choice I had before the Star Brand. However...we all have ‘powers’ and we all have to decide what to do with them.” Then, in a symbolic parallelization to his new resolution, Ken begins to lift weights to rebuild muscles that had gone flabby after he came to rely on his super powers too much. With this issue, Shooter had managed to create one of the most complicated, conflicted, human characters in comics, confirming that the Star Brand strip had far more to say about real people than any regular costumed super-hero since the earliest days of Spider-Man.

direction. Whether intended or not, Murray’s script and storytelling during the action is confusing in places, just as real combat can sometimes be. When it’s over, Marks learns how to clear an LZ to make way for medivacs to swoop in to take out the wounded. Back at the base, another kind of war is being waged, that between squad leader Sgt. Polkow and the unit’s corrupt top sergeant. To get even with Polkow for pushing around Top favorite Spc. Kakas, Polkow’s squad is ordered out without enough rest to clear a road of mines. It was the sort of behavior those back on the homefront were unused to associating with their heroic service men but a theme that such antiVietnam War films as Apocalypse Now, The Deerslayer, and Platoon preferred to dwell upon. Throughout the issue, Golden again pays attention to detail, maintaining the strip’s integrity as a vehicle Murray wanted to use to impart the lessons of the war to a younger generation. Although it was Murray’s intention to stay on the book for a full eight years, during which time, he’d cover Marks’ entire tour of duty, circumstances in the form of editorial differences conspired to force him out by issue #51, long after Golden himself had abandoned the feature. And although the book did go on for an amazing 84 issues (amazing for an era in which war comics were supposed to be a dead letter), the realism of the book’s original premise was fatally undercut later in the run when members of Marvel’s super-hero community began to guest-star in a desperate attempt to rescue the series from cancellation. Nevertheless, for a number of years, The ’Nam managed to challenge the market dominance of super-

The ’Nam #2 “Dustoff” Doug Murray (script); Michael Golden (pencils); Armando Gil (inks) With its first issue, The ’Nam hit the ground running with the most sales of any Marvel book the month it was released. That accomplished, the planned eightyear run moves on immediately with The ’Nam #2 (Jan. 1987) as Pfc. Ed Marks continues to learn the ropes this time lying in wait to ambush an unsuspecting enemy column. Following the opening splash, Golden presents a two-page sequence as the squad fights boredom, and colorist Phil Felix keeps the night-time scene darkened in muted purples and greens. Suddenly, the enemy is spotted and the boredom of the detail is shattered by a few minutes of intense battle as bombs explode and bullets scream in every

By 1986, the year Oliver Stone’s Platoon was released, the stereotype of the psychotic or post traumatic stress disordered Vietnam veteran was already firmly established.

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heroes and demonstrated that despite a growing trend at DC and among independent publishers, quality comics with mature themes could be produced that appealed to all age groups without resorting to exploitation. Fun Fact: The ’Nam’s success led to a brief flowering of war comics at Marvel when it inspired a second title called Semper Fi which was sold as

a direct sales only title. Written by Michael Palladino and drawn by veteran EC war comics artist John Severin, the series related “tales of the Marine Corps” from different time periods, an anthology format that likely doomed the book to less than a dozen issues.

Avengers #275

The ’Nam #2, page 4: It was hit-or-miss with artist Michael Golden’s work on The ’Nam as can be seen here in panel 1. Characters’ faces are at once cartoony and exaggerated while panel two is somewhat confusing with a difficult perspective and force lines obscuring some figures that seem only partially illustrated. in other places, the artist acquits himself, stressing an unusual level of detail for the equipment of war and in illustrating quieter moments when the men are not in action.

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“Even a God Can Die!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Up to now, great as it was, the Stern/Buscema/Palmer run on the Avengers had been somewhat disjointed, even that of the Skrull Civil War ended up meandering into the Avengers and FF Annuals. But the Masters of Evil storyline would be the first arc to really present itself as a cohesive, selfcontained Avengerscentric story. In fact, the siege of Avengers mansion storyline was arguably the best of the run, maybe even of Marvel’s entire 1980s output! It would truly be the last hurrah for the Marvel Age of Comics set in motion by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, and Don Heck way back in the Early Years when they took the traditional way of presenting comic book stories and infused it with a heightened sense of drama by giving their characters realistic personalities and down-to-earth problems. The aura of realism thus generated was only made more palpable with the creation of a shared universe among the different titles that excited two generations of readers. But this issue would mark the beginning of the end of all that. The year Avengers #275 (Jan 1987) appeared, Jim Shooter’s contentious reign as editor-in-chief came to an end, launching a period of uncer-

tainty under replacement Tom DeFalco that saw an exodus of talent and the ruinous rise of “rock star” artists that would lead directly into the Dark Age when the wholesale abandonment of the company’s proud heritage would take place. Meanwhile though, fans still had another year or so of top-flight Avengers issues to enjoy, this one among them despite a spotlight being shone on the annoyingly up-powered Wasp as she and the new Ant-Man, (still uncertain in his role as super-hero, making him a perfect foil for writer Roger Stern to accentuate the Wasp’s leadership role) must prevent the Absorbing Man and Titania from finishing off the recuperating Hercules. Got to hand it to Stern, though, he was good at coming up with new twists on established character’s powers that allowed him to make readers believe that the Wasp could actually beat a Thorclass villain! As the rightly nonplussed Ant-Man remarks when it was all over “You’re a lot tougher than I thought.”

a tried and true formula for the company dating back almost to the dawn of the Marvel Age). For instance, in Avengers #276 (Feb 1987) we have the Wasp, caught outside of an Avengers mansion encased in a block of darkforce, rounding up a new team of Avengers to replace those captured or missing. Already teamed up with Scott Lang (the new Ant-Man who has replaced her husband in the role), she also manages to recruit Thor (newly bearded by writer/artist Walt Simonson over in his own book and suddenly acting far more aloof than ever). Meanwhile, Captain Marvel,

“Revenge” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) As the siege of Avengers mansion moves along, Roger Stern’s strengths as a writer become more apparent than ever as he expertly balances dozens of characters, creating a complex web work of relationships that expertly play off established personalities and rivalries. Thus, enjoyment of the story arc isn’t derived solely from its action (although there’s plenty of that!) but with the mix of characters and seeing what happens when they come together (which after all, was

Avengers #276

Avengers #275, page 13: Was Mr. Hyde ever this maniacal? A rough patch for Captain America during a low point in the “Siege of Avengers Mansion.”

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still trapped in the darkforce created null-verse, finally escapes by coming out through the “body” of the Shroud, who apparently possesses properties similar to the darkforce! (The Shroud made his first appearance way back in the Bronze Age book Super-Villain Team-Up #5). And picking up psychic emanations from the Black Knight, who still remains a prisoner of the Masters, Dr. Druid decides he is needed and rushes off to help out. (Stern had to reach way back to find Dr. Druid, nee Dr. Droom, who might technically qualify as Marvel’s first super-hero of the Silver Age as his introduction in Amazing Adventures #1 predated Fantastic Four #1 by about five months!) On the other side of the darkforce barrier, Moonstone is still scheming for control of the Masters by trying to regain mastery over a dazed and confused Blackout while Zemo, the Fixer, and Yellowjacket form a core group of actors amid the larger Masters of Evil ensemble. The group of course has not been idle, living up to their name by torturing Jarvis (physically) and Captain America (psychologically) and systematically trashing the mansion looking for valuables and secrets. Balancing all these competing interests and finding a way to give each character their moment in the sun (not to mention drawing in some nowhere characters from hither and yon and actually making them interesting to watch) was not an easy task, but Stern sure makes it seem so transforming this story arc into one of the most satisfying as well as the most thrilling in Marvel’s long history of continuing stories.

Star Brand #5 “Crossing the Line” Jim Shooter (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Al Williamson (inks) Right off the bat in Star Brand #5 (Feb. 1987), Ken Connell’s resolution to change his ways, grow up, and use his powers responsibly was put to the test with this issue’s opening splash page as Duck throws herself at him the moment he opens his front door. “Happy Birthday!” she declares, and apparently unable to resist the up close and personal greeting, Ken levitates them both down the hall and past the half-closed door to his bedroom. Later, as Duck serves him breakfast in her underwear, he invites her to visit a friend. On the way, however, he decides to drop in at his parents’, only to be subjected to a surprise birthday party. “Eighty-one minutes later...” he leaves in company with steady girlfriend Barb, relieved that Duck has hidden herself beneath the dash of his car. “Man, that’s too much devotion, Duck,” thinks Ken as they drive off. “It’s...not right. Not good...” After a visit with a friend, Ken finally makes up his mind to settle with Barb and, taking a break, flies off to Laguna Beach for a swim. While 180

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With the New Universe, Jim Shooter (left) tried to recreate the magic of the Early Years of Marvel when Stan Lee (right) started it all with the notion of an interconnected line of super-hero comics; unfortunately, Shooter’s concept would be short-circuited when the rug was pulled out from under him.

there, he encounters a woman on the beach and is invited to her home for a quickie. The contrast in his behavior this issue to his seemingly sincere decision to clean up his life in #4 would, in other books, seem like a problem in continuity rather than human failing. But Jim Shooter’s Star Brand wasn’t like other comics. His hero was flawed and, like real people, he had the very human trait of backsliding and then rationalizing his personal failures. And those failures have real consequences as well, as Ken discovers later after he tells Barb that he’s ready for a serious relationship with her. That done, he decides that it would not be right to continue seeing Duck, even as friends, but his visit with her doesn’t go anywhere near as well as the one with Barb. Duck breaks down, begging him not to cut her out of his life. “I want’cha to do whatever makes you happy, Kenny,” she says. “I don’t care if you have other girls, I don’t even care if you get married...but you gotta come and see me sometimes...once in a while...or...or you’re killin’ me! I mean it!” Shaken by Duck’s desperate plea and fearful of her hint at suicide (“Kenny, I...I meant it, okay? About not surviving, please... please believe me”), Ken promises to see her “once in a while.” Thus the issue ends with Ken’s resolutions still seemingly beyond reach as he fails to cut himself off from Duck and be completely truthful to Barb about the Star Brand (he’d decided to tell her about it but fearing her rejection, changed his mind after

being reminded that Barb’s young daughter has been displaying growing psychological problems triggered by her having been controlled by an alien back in issue #1). Caught in a trap of his own making and unable to break free, the issue’s final, wordless panel finds Ken in a darkened bedroom, separated from Barb literally and figuratively, as she sleeps alone behind him.

Beneath this issue’s weak cover lurks one nice job by artist John Romita, Jr. The addition of color was almost superfluous what with Romita’s blacks and expert use of cross hatching to supply shade and tone. Or was that due to Al Williamson’s inks? In either case, these issues would be well served even if they were reprinted in black-and-white.

Avengers #277 “The Price of Victory” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Have we sung the praises of artist John Buscema enough over the course of the best run of Avengers comics since Roy Thomas left the strip with issue #104? Answer: there can never be enough praise for John Buscema, even though by 1987 he’d been in the business for almost 40 years and was clearly nearing the end of his career. Beginning at Marvel when it was still known as Timely Comics, Buscema left comics for a while to work in advertising before being lured back by editor Stan Lee in the mid-sixties when the company (that had since changed its name to Marvel Comics) was clearly on the upswing. After a shaky start, Buscema quickly got the hang of the new action-oriented Marvel style and became a fan-favorite on such strips as Sub-Mariner, Silver Surfer, and the Avengers. But then something happened, and the exciting, flashy, in-yourface personal style he’d been developing in those books suddenly stopped and the artist reverted back to the traditional but lessimaginative five- and-six panel page layouts. But within those confines, his art remained as beautiful and dynamic as ever. Justly called “the Michelangelo of comics,” Buscema continued to delight fans with work on Thor and Fantastic Four but reserved his best work for Conan the Barbarian, the strip he loved best and which he remained attached to for years. But for all that, he never quite abandoned super-heroes. His coming back to the Avengers after a long absence along with his The Dark Ages

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avowed disinterest in super-heroes came as a surprise to fans...a surprise made all the more sweet when he was teamed up with Tom Palmer, the inker who had made his peak period stuff on the book during the Grandiose Years some of the most stunning in comics. And, as he does here in Avengers #277 (Mar 1987), the artist continued to confine himself to traditional layouts, his work is no less exciting! Just take a gander at the splash page that spotlights the evil Goliath holding Thor in his oversized fist. Surrounding the scene with the wreckage of Avengers mansion, Buscema’s sense of drama unerringly places the figures to their best advantage while creating a sense of 3D depth in having Goliath’s arm outstretched toward the reader. Over the following pages, human figures are depicted as if in constant motion. When Thor strikes Goliath and the giant falls against crumbling masonry, we feel the blow. And when Thor’s hammer hits Goliath’s head...ouch! You could feel that too! Aiding and abetting Buscema is Tom Palmer, whose lush inks serve to fill out Buscema’s breakdowns, giving them depth and a physicality lacking in most other art of the period. Truly, so late in the Twilight Years, this run of Avengers would never be matched again for artistic quality and professional polish. Afterwards, there would be a general slow-down in skill level among lesser pencilers, a rise in the popularity of “painted” books, and the final victory of a new group of artists

unaffected by those of the Silver and Bronze Ages and influenced instead more by messy Japanese manga than such art school trained classicists as Jack Kirby, Gene Colan, or...John Buscema.

Star Brand #6

“Dead Duck” Jim Shooter (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Al Williamson; Rick Bryant; Al Milgrom (inks) Behind one of the worst comic book covers ever drawn (the perpetrators will go nameless), lies another solid entry in the short but impressive Star Brand run. Star Brand #6 (March 1987) begins where the last issue left off, with Ken Connell still trying to figure out how to tell girlfriend Barb about his super-powers. It seems also that Ken has decided to postpone his resolution to clean up his life as this issue we discover that he’s since moved in with Barb, playing house with her even with two small children living under the same roof. At the same time, unable to keep away from Deb the Duck for fear that she might commit suicide if he did (which doesn’t stop him from being tempted to visit her on the sly: “Wanna come over to my house an’ I’ll show ya?” asks Duck about modeling a new bikini she bought. “Yes,” thinks Ken, before dismissing the thought from his mind). This issue, he meets her at the local Denny’s when their conversation is interrupted by the Old Man who gave Ken the Star Brand. Only thing is, he’s supposed to be dead! Turns out he’s not, and more, he wants Ken to go into space to fight in an interstellar war. Like that was going to fly! Back at Barb’s, Ken gets a taste of domestic bliss with unruly children and a partner who needs to know where he is all the time. But before anything else can happen, the Old Man shows up again in company with a hypnotized Duck. Barb interrupts and gets the wrong idea. Getting rid of the Old Man, Ken learns later that he has possibly hurt or even killed Duck. Angry and frustrated, Ken flies off and confronts the old gent and a battle ensues with the action swiftly moving into outer space. There, Ken manages to drive off the Old Man and the issue ends with him stranded in space with no idea how to find the Earth. After six issues, there still seemed to be no danger that Although artist John Buscema reserved his greatest affections for his work on Conan, he must have enjoyed Shooter would allow Star Brand to his all too brief time doing Tarzan in the late 1970s as descend into a monthly slugfest. Instead, well. That strip too, lacked the colorful spandex that the there was every indication that the realartist disdained so much. In this sketch for example, a hint world complications that have plagued of Hyborian exoticism seems to betray Buscema’s interest Ken’s life from the beginning would in Marvel’s take on the iconic character. continue and maybe get even more

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tangled than they already were. A strong supporting cast and a main character who still had a massive job to do in sorting out right from wrong guaranteed that. It was only too bad that this promising title wouldn’t last long beyond Shooter’s direct participation (issue #7 would be his last) despite its being one of the factors that helped to push Marvel into a Dark Age from which it has yet to emerge.

Avengers #278, page 8: Don’t let this scene fool you! Behind these suits, ties, and masks, lies another installment of writer Roger Stern’s legendary run on the Avengers. With too many responsibilities weighing her down, the Wasp steps down as team leader opening the way for the far more interesting Capt. Marvel to take over.

Avengers #278 “Pressure” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) The siege of Avengers mansion is over but the fallout continues in Avengers #278 (April 1987) as we open again with another gorgeous splash page by artist John Buscema and inker Tom Palmer! Reminiscent of the style they used for Avengers #82, the night when Zodiac took over New York City, cutting it off from the outside world (long before Bane did it in the 2012 film The Dark Knight Rises!). An issue of transitions, some good, some bad, readers are finally relieved to find that the Wasp resigns as team leader (whew!) but learn that the equally annoying She-Hulk joins up to take her place (Ugh!) Readers no doubt chuckled at the Black Knight’s desperate protest over the Wasp’s departure: “But, Jan, you can’t just...!” Over Stern’s run on the book, the poor guy was on the receiving end of some of the writer ’s most embarrassing dialogue that often left the character with seemingly no self-respect at all. But the Wasp’s departure didn’t mean any relief for fans not as keen on the feminist revolution as some up at the Marvel offices were because she was replaced as team leader in the next issue with Stern favorite Captain Marvel. Stern had a proprietary interest in Monica Rambeau, having created her for Amazing Spider-Man Annual #16. She was serving as a captain in the New Orleans Harbor Patrol when she was exposed to some kind of extradimensional force that left her with the ability to transform her body into any kind of energy from light to neutrinos. The Dark Ages

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Stern retained a special liking for the character and brought her into the ranks of the Avengers as soon as he could. Just as he’d done with the Wasp, Stern proceeded to enhance her powers to the point where she became just about the most powerful super character in the Marvel Universe. She could do almost anything (even challenging Zeus himself as will be seen in upcoming issues) with virtually nothing to stop her. It became a challenge for Stern to find imaginative ways to limit her powers so that her teammates could have something to do besides just stand by and pick up the pieces! That said, Stern did manage to make her a far more interesting character than the hapless Wasp, giving her a home life, a potential romantic interest in FBI agent Derek Freeman, and providing her with some self-doubt in her new role as a super-heroine. It would be the selfdoubt part that later figures in her shaky leadership of the team and its eventual dissolution after Stern left the strip. One factor in Captain Marvel’s travails also makes his reappearance here, that of Dr. Druid, who decided to stay on as a member of the group after playing a key role in the defeat of the Masters of Evil the previous issue. Druid, despite ending up being the fly in the ointment, is actually one of the more interesting characters to join the run making the new configuration of the team including Captain America, Thor, and the Black Knight, one of the most interesting as Stern takes the group into its next story arc.

Star Brand #7 “The Reckoning!” Jim Shooter (plot); Roy Thomas (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Art Nichols (inks) If it had to end it might as well have ended here. As time would soon tell, the New Universe, Marvel’s attempt to recreate the success of the comics world begun by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, and Don Heck in the Early Years, would fail to ignite the imagination of readers and with editor-in-chief Jim Shooter’s departure from the company, ended in the ignominy of cancellation. To be fair, the whole effort that had begun with so much ambition was given short shrift by Marvel’s owners who suddenly decided to put the company up for sale. But out of that fiasco, a few good books were produced with Star Brand being far and away the best of them all. For seven issues, ending here with Star Brand #7 (May 1987), writer Jim Shooter had succeeded in creating a book that fit perfectly into the New Universe theme of being like a “world outside your window” presenting a deeply flawed main character who finds himself bestowed with limitless power who not only has to find a way to use it efficiently, but needs desperately to have his consciousness 184

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At Valiant, Jim Shooter successfully rebooted two of Gold Key’s star characters: Magnus Robot Fighter and Solar. He was joined on the first by artist Art Nichols and Don Perlin on the second. Valiant’s books were differentiated from those of other companies due to their early use of computer-generated coloring techniques.

raised to the point where that could be done. But so long as he was mired in immature desires and a deep seated laziness, he was doomed to failure. As Ken Connell’s story unfolded, his new-found power forced him to mature, consider the consequences of his actions, and how he could end up hurting those he cared for whether due to the Star Brand or his own personal decisions that he would have made whether he had the power or not. And though, as real people often did, he failed in living up to his resolutions to do better, he clearly had the potential to eventually do so. A small step in that direction takes place this issue for instance, as circumstances force him to give up living with Barb and her two children, and, by story’s end, forming a more genuine relationship with the hospitalized Duck. Ironically enough, however, this issue’s script was not provided by Shooter but by his predecessor as editor-in-chief and someone whom he was at least partially responsible in chasing away from Marvel earlier in the decade. But in taking hold of Shooter’s plot, Roy Thomas does a good job not only in providing a seamless transition, but in writing in a voice so much like Shooter’s that it’s hard to tell that it wasn’t written by the outgoing editor himself. (It was doubly ironic that it was Thomas who stepped in to take over, as years before he’d quit Marvel over a dispute with Shooter involving his status as a writer/editor: “It’s not so much that the things that were done to me were the worst things in

the world...It’s just that I didn’t feel I was dealt with honestly by Jim Shooter, to put it mildly.”) Stepping in for the last time on the art chores is John Romita, Jr., whose style reached its peak on the series and who didn’t hold back here even though the writing for the New Universe must have already been on the wall. Besides handling all the little things as well as usual, Romita manages to sign off in a slam-bang manner with an FX-laden, no-holds-barred fight between Ken and the Old Man, who first gave him the Star Brand. The issue ends with the death of the Old Man, and Ken at Duck’s bedside telling her “I love you, Duck. Quack.” If the series had been planned as a selfcontained limited-series ending with this issue, well... it works as well as could be expected: with sub-plots sort of resolved and on a hopeful note for the future. Beyond that, who knows where Shooter might have taken the book? There certainly was more room for developing the book’s many supporting characters, not to mention Ken Connell’s personal evolution. Unfortunately, it was not to be (not by Shooter, anyway) but at least there remained Star Brand #1-7, a group of comics that definitely belong among Marvel’s very best of the 1980s. Fun Fact: After Marvel, Shooter landed on his feet early in the next decade with a new company called Valiant. There, while also acting as editor, his evolution as a writer continued with revivals of Gold Key titles Magnus, Robot Fighter and Solar, Man of the Atom, with which he would again explore to good effect, real-world themes in a super-hero context. Joining him on Magnus by the way, was this issue’s inker, Art Nichols whom Shooter first hired after seeing his work in the Official Marvel Comics Try-Out book!

Amazing Spider-Man #290 “The Big Question” David Michelinie (script); John Romita, Jr. (pencils); Vince Colletta (inks) The last time it happened, Gwen Stacy ended up dead. But that was almost fifteen years before Amazing Spider-Man #290 (July 1987) and a lot of water had gone under the bridge since then including Spidey’s graduation to a successful career as a newspaper comic strip character written by co-creator Stan Lee. It was Lee, independent of whatever was going on in the regular comics, who had the notion of having Peter Parker marry glamorous model and party girl Mary Jane Watson. The idea was run past editor-in-chief Jim Shooter who had no objections, and plans were laid to have the event occur simultaneously in the newspapers and the regular Spider-Man title. That schedule was soon blown, however, as events for the wedding proceeded. In the real world, stand-ins for Spidey and Mary Jane were wed on June 5, 1987 at Shea Stadium while in the Marvel Universe, the banns were exchanged on the steps of New York’s City Hall (!?) in Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21. But commensurate with the Shea Stadium event, this issue of Spidey was released while Peter Parker was only getting around to proposing. Beneath a strikingly simple cover by Al Milgrom lay a tale that was equally striking for its compelling content and nice art by the team of penciler John Romita, Jr. and inker Vince Colletta. In it, despite being happy, Peter feels unaccountably empty, as if there were something important missing in his life. He wanders about visiting Mary Jane and Aunt May, and chases after cherished memories of Uncle Ben and reminisces about his teenage years until coming to the realization that his

Stan Lee missteps. It migh t have made sense for the newspaper strip but for the regular SpiderMan comics, having Peter Parker get married, and to Mary Jane no less, was a bad idea. It undercut the entire premise that made Spidey tick and made it harder for subsequent writers to come up with personal life issues that couldn’t be made all better the second he came home to his supermodel wife!

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identity as Spider-Man has overshadowed is life as Peter Parker. It was time to do something to reassert himself, to move on to the next level. Finally, in a full-page panel recalling the one used by his father when he first introduced Mary Jane in issue #42, Romita has Peter pop the fateful question. Throughout the book as a matter of fact, Romita’s art is understated and lacking in background detail but that only served to accentuate the

Amazing Spider-Man #290, page 22: Vince Colletta’s romance comics background doesn’t hurt this John Romita, Jr. full-pager that somehow reflects the full-page illo his father did at the conclusion of Spidey #42 when Peter (and the rest of us) finally set eyes on the elusive Mary Jane Watson!

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characters, especially Peter Parker himself. (Romita’s style was in transition during this period between his first stint on the title when his work was more low key and restrained, and his later work featuring grander, harder-edged figures that would make him the best interpreter of Thor since Kirby). In a nice display of compatibility, the inks provided by Colletta are tasteful with remarkable restraint shown in the issue’s impactful final panel. In fact, it may not have been an accident of scheduling that Colletta was chosen as the inker for such an important book when one considers his reputation for drawing beautiful women. If Mary Jane needed to look her best, Colletta was likely the best man for the job, with the possible exception of fellow romance comics vet John Romita, Sr. All that said, was it a good idea to have Peter Parker get married at all? Setting aside the question of Mary Jane’s suitability (sure, she was beautiful, but was she the type of person that someone like Peter would really end up with? On the other hand, marriage to a supermodel seemed to be the logical end to Peter’s evolution from nerdy outsider to handsome hipster to hunky girl magnet). What advantage could there be for storytellers to have Spidey tied down in marriage? Sure, they could continue his hard-luck batting average with typical marital difficulties complicated by his dangerous occupation as a superhero, but how far could that go before either the couple made up and restored the status quo or suffered the ignominy of divorce? Would readers stick around for the inevitable spats over who does the dishes or who’ll stay home to watch

The Wedding of Spidey & Mary Jane

On June 5, 1987, after the event was announced in The New

York Times, stand-ins for Spidey and Mary Jane were wed by Stan Lee himself on the pitchers’ mound at Shea Stadium. Captain America, Hulk, and the Green Goblin among others were witnesses and everyone in the packed stadium received a goody bag with memorabilia of the nuptials. It was wacky, it was tacky, it was even embarrassing for comics fans, but it was the eighties, when pop culture began to dominate the American consciousness and institutional memory started to fade. In a way, the treatment of Spider-Man at Shea Stadium was emblematic of a larger malaise epitomized by the rise of “reality TV” that also blurred the line between reality and fantasy while promoting the notion that not only could anyone be a celebrity, but that they deserved nothing less.

junior? It was the same quandary faced by Gerry Conway and John Romita, Sr. fifteen years before when there seemed to be nowhere to go with Gwen Stacy but to have her marry Peter and put an end to many story possibilities. Ultimately, marriage undermined the basis for Spider-Man’s appeal as an average guy facing the problems of everyday life made more complicated by his isolating career as a super-hero; something that was eventually realized some years down the road when Marvel editorial belatedly ended the marriage by simply declaring that it never happened with some help from Mephisto. (An earlier, more intriguing, attempt to fix the marriage problem by having Peter Parker turn out to be a clone had been abandoned). But by then, it was too little too late. The damage to Spider-Man’s character had been done. Maybe it was time to bring in Speedball and start all over again?

Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21 “The Wedding” Jim Shooter (plot); David Michelinie (script); Paul Ryan (pencils); Vince Colletta (inks) The drama continued in Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21 (1987) as Peter Parker and Mary Jane tie the knot. As readers may or may not have known, Peter popped the question back in Amazing Spider-Man #290. Issue #291 opened with Mary Jane declaring a firm “No!” but with things having been ordained by Stan Lee, she soon relented, and in #292 finally gave in to the inevitable. With that settled, this issue opens with some requisite action scenes of Spidey putting Electro

away for the umpteenth time (and sort of finishes with action too as Peter dreams that a rogues gallery of former villains interrupts his coming nuptials in traditional Marvel style) before moving on to a series of scenes as the happy couple go through the usual pre-wedding paces, including living arrangements, bachelor parties, buying the engagement ring, lastminute doubts, pep talks with Aunt May, recollections of Gwen Stacy (the girl Peter should have married!), picking up the wedding dress, and a last-minute attempt by an unseen admirer to convince Mary Jane not to go through with it. The script is realistic enough (plotted by Jim Shooter just before he was eased out as Marvel’s editor-in-chief), catching the spirit of pre-wedding planning and jitters (the one out of place line coming as Peter wishes for a “rub down” after a work out as Spider-Man...not something our shy, insular hero would ever consider when Ditko was in charge!) and though the art by Paul Ryan is serviceable, its flat, unexciting nature goes a long way to drain the story of much of its mounting drama. It was only saved (despite a number of shots where characters still sport heads too big for their bodies) by inker Vince Colletta who manages to keep Mary Jane and Gwen looking the way they should. The one really odd note in the story is that for some unexplained reason, the happy couple exchange their vows on the steps of New York’s City Hall (even though in Peter’s dream, it takes place in a church). Peter Parker’s wedding didn’t seem like such a good idea to long-time fans who were proven right in The Dark Ages

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the long run, but as the Dark Ages progressed, it often seemed that the only ray of light came from what proved to be one of comics’ really happy marriages so maybe it turned out that Stan had something after all.

Conan Saga #3 “The Lurker Within,” “The Keepers of the Crypt,” “The Garden of Fear” Roy Thomas (scripts); Barry Smith (pencils); Tom Sutton, Sal Buscema, Tom Palmer, et al (inks) In the late Twilight Years, comics fans were jolted by the return of one of the medium’s greatest artists: Barry Smith. But this wasn’t your older brother’s Barry Smith, the one who rocketed overnight from Kirby wannabe to pre-Raphealite golden boy. No, this time it was Barry Windsor-Smith, the artist who left comics behind to pursue more lofty personal goals such as self-publishing and producing some of the most beautiful mythologically-based poster art of the late seventies (the favorites of head shops and hip-type emporiums selling such things as Tarot cards, incense, and crystal balls). With a clientele not usually known for having pockets full of cash, Windsor-Smith likely was compelled to seek other sources of income and the handiest was a return to the comics medium he’d conquered a decade before. Whatever the reason, his work suddenly began appearing here and there, beginning with a few things in Marvel’s Epic Illustrated magazine. From there, WindsorSmith found his way to mainstream comics with fill-in stories for Daredevil, X-Men, and Iron Man. Finally, his return to comics was made in a big way with lavish inks over Herb Trimpe pencils for, of all things, a Machine Man mini-series. At the very least, the man was living up to his eclectic reputation! But many wondered: why was a talent as gigantic as his being wasted on such dull, lowbrow fare? It was only natural that what fans really wanted was to see the artist return to the character that had made his reputation: Conan. But like Steve Ditko and his greatest creation, Windsor-Smith avoided that obvious assignment perhaps wary of having his current work being compared less favorably with his earlier efforts. But he needn’t have worried as could be seen on the cover of Conan Saga #3 (July 1987). On all his mainstream comics work during this second stint with Marvel, Windsor-Smith had employed a new kind of penciling style, one less ornate and meticulous than the one he developed late in his original Conan run. Still detailed, it yet relied on thick ink lines that suggested a more economical approach that, at the same time, preserved a Windsor-Smithesque uniqueness to the pencils while allowing the artist to get the work done quickly. The results were wonderful to look at, much more interesting than the bulk of artists employed in the industry during the late Twilight Years, but still unsatisfying to fans who recalled the glory days 188

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encompassing Conan the Barbarian #24 and the Gorblimey Press years. But concern that the artist may have lost his creative edge was dispelled when he became “editorial and design consultant” for the Conan Saga, which reprinted the Conan series in a black-andwhite magazine format. And though fans would find nothing different in the reprints themselves (anyone worth their salt would have long since collected the original comics!) each issue’s cover was adorned by a brand new Windsor-Smith illustration that more than reassured readers that the artist had not lost his mojo! Previewed on the inside cover of the previous issue, the illos were first revealed in the breakdown stage with the fully penciled versions printed on the inside cover of the issue where the completed masterpiece was featured. Typical of the kind of work Windsor-Smith was doing for these covers was this issue’s stunner depicting Conan on horseback looking over a wall whose interstices are crammed with skulls. If nothing

No matter what he called himself, whether Barry Windsor-Smith or just plain Barry Smith, this incredible illustration made before his reappearance at Marvel in the 1980s shows clearly that the artist had lost none of his verve during the intervening years since quitting the regular Conan color comic.

else, the artist wasn’t scrimping on the kind of lush detail that had first driven him from mainstream comics! Those covers alone were enough for anyone to pay the measly $2 price of the magazine but sometimes there was a bonus or two lurking inside its pages. Take this issue for instance: without fanfare or advance notice in either the previous issue or in that month’s bullpen bulletins, one of the three stories featured, “The Lurker Within” (adapted from the Robert E. Howard original “The God in the Bowl”), is reprinted from Windsor-Smith’s original penciled pages! Imagine the surprise and delight of fans at a time when there was little outlet for such displays of pencil art (this was long before the advent of such outfits as TwoMorrows Publishing...free plug!) Page after page of WindsorSmith when he was just “Barry Smith” in the raw, without the masking inks of Dan Adkins or Sal Buscema (as nice as their work was on the original comic) and even adorned with the artist’s margin notes: “Human interest dept: Conan gets stuck in a traffic jam!” Oh, man, this was great stuff! But disappointment quickly followed as Windsor-Smith’s pencils were never used again for subsequent stories. But ‘twas enough, the half-dozen masterpieces plus one that the artist managed to produce for the covers ‘twould do. Unfortunately, nothing lasts forever and any chance of Windsor-Smith doing anything else Conan-related disappeared when he left Marvel a second time, lured away in 1991 by the company’s former editor-in-chief Jim Shooter who offered him the position of creative director for his new Valiant Comics start-up. There, Windsor-Smith would gain new laurels by illustrating the origin of Solar in a multi-part saga, drawing key covers, and helping to design and draw early issues of new characters such as X-O and Archer and Armstrong. But nothing he did from his return to Marvel and beyond would come close to the other worldly, evocative beauty of those seven cover images executed for the Conan Saga.

Avengers #282 “Captives” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) The Sub-Mariner returns this issue as Zeus, maddened by the fact that son Hercules was injured during the Masters of Evil storyline, orders the seizure of the Avengers for condign punishment in Hades! Actually begun in earnest last ish, the Olympus storyline in Avengers #282 (Aug 1987) presents the near start of the next great arc in the Stern/Buscema/Palmer run. Developing naturally out of the events of the earlier story, Stern again shows how writing a Marvel comic needs to be done: stories that grow organically out of past events sprinkled liberally with old characters plucked from near obscurity (further tightening

Father Neptune made his screen debut in a scene from the classic Jason and the Argonauts (1963) before becoming a regular guest in the Sub-Mariner half of Tales to Astonish. He returned with a prominent role during the Assault on Olympus storyline kidnapping Namor and sending him to Hades!

continuity among Marvel’s different eras)! In that last regard, this issue opens with old father Neptune himself (whose earliest appearances date way back to Subby’s time co-starring in Tales to Astonish) before moving on to the re-introduction of Jack Kirby’s version of Cerberus, guardian of the gates of Hades. Then, of course, there’s the ruler of Hades himself, Pluto (whom we first met way back in the Lee/Kirby Thors of the Grandiose Years) as well as Ares, who popped up among other places in Avengers #99. Anyway, last issue, the current team of Avengers were captured by the forces of Zeus, including the Black Knight, Captain America, Captain Marvel, Thor (now suffering under a brittle-bone curse courtesy of Walter Simonson), Dr. Druid, and She-Hulk (who for some reason became a darling of ’80s writers...maybe they welcomed the challenge of making such a nowhere character interesting, who knows?) This ish opens with Neptune’s capture of Sub-Mariner, who, after being taken to Hades, frees himself and makes the acquaintance of a mysterious stranger (later revealed to be Prometheus) who shows him where the rest of his teammates are being held prisoner. They in turn escape (apparently the gods have gotten a lot weaker since the Grandiose Years because they get mopped up pretty handily by our heroes) only to end up cut off from Olympus proper when Pluto blasts a gap in the bridge leading upward from Hades! Overall, it was a pretty exciting, jam-packed story in which Stern The Dark Ages

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expertly mixes Greek mythology with Marvel’s own interpretation to create another fast-moving chapter that left readers impatiently waiting those long four weeks before the next issue went on sale!

Avengers #283, page 1: A fantastic splash page by the art team of John Buscema and Tom Palmer only marred by the presence of the She-Hulk (and to some extent Capt. Marvel, who sported one of the worst looking costumes ever). In the waning days of the Twilight Years, such issues as this would become less frequent as institutional memory was lost and new ownership preferred to tear down and start again rather than protecting the inheritance bequeathed them by Lee, Kirby, Ditko, and Heck.

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Avengers #283 “Whom the Gods Would Destroy!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) And speaking of sales (as hinted at in the entry for Avengers #282), more and more of them were being racked up in the comic store phenomenon that arose around the country in the wake of a sweetheart deal struck between Marvel and Seagate distributor Phil Seuling. Seuling managed to get Marvel to sell him comics at a 60-percent discount that he in turn would sell to comic store clients in the New York area in exchange for no returns of unsold copies. Not understood at the time, but the direct sales arrangement would save the comics industry from flatout going the way of the dinosaur. Increasing prices and fewer pages were making comics less of an attractive buy for kids with a growing interest in the emerging video game market. By the end of the decade, comics were being seen less and less frequently in supermarkets and local 7-Elevens and more and more in specialized comics stores that were at the same time less handy for kids to visit, usually being located in lowrent parts of town. But for fans, being able to get their latest X-Men comics a week or so earlier than anywhere else was enough of a draw that they were willing to brave neighborhood thugs to do it. And so, by the end of the decade, comic stores had spread across the country, numbering in the thousands, a perfect breeding ground for unscrupulous marketing practices by the industry. Soon, fans would be confronted with the need for Solomon-like wisdom

Before the rise of the comics specialty store in the 1980s, collectors had to rummage through stacks of old, unbagged and unprotected comics in local used book and record stores. Most of the time, if they wanted comics in decent condition, they had to use a mail-order service. Comic specialty stores professionalized the hobby, standardized pricing, and turned collecting into something to be taken for granted.

having to decide between the regular issue of a comic or the special edition with the alternate cover, the embossed cover, the foldout cover, or even the bagged comic with one-of-a-kind trading card! But such gimmicks would really come into their own in the Dark Ages. During the 1980s, the excitement lay with limited series, maxi-series, direct only sales, Baxter paper, square-bound graphic novels, and what have you. With the extinction of newsstand sales and their replacement with comics specialty stores, publishers began to focus their product more and more on fans rather than the casual reader and so, the content of comics began to slowly become more “adult” i.e. its traditional elements of action and soap opera remained the same but now foul language and sexual content would be included in the mix. For instance, by 1984, DC’s New Teen Titans comic would be split between “softcover” and “hardcover” editions with the hardcovers being sold only in comics shops. Away from the newsstand, the Comics Code could be safely ignored, and in the first hardcover issue, Robin the Boy Wonder was seen sharing his bed with Starfire, an overly endowed alien beauty from outer space. Adding to the trend for more adult content in comics was an independent comics market that sprung up almost overnight during the 1980s. Cheaply produced black-and-white books written and drawn by single

creators or a couple friends working out of their basements, they mostly followed whatever trend was popular at the time with Marvel and DC, and so there were a lot of Howard the Duck-inspired funny animals (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles says it all!) or dull slice-of-life comics that would have been underground comics in the 1960s if the underground comics movement had survived into the ’80s (think Love and Rockets) or both (Fritz the Cat or Omaha the Cat Dancer). It was not a pretty sight. Where once kids would run to the old spinner rack while mom picked up some milk and a loaf of bread for supper and needn’t have worried about anything their young ones might encounter there (except sheer unadulterated wonderment), by the late ’80s a parent would be deemed irresponsible to let their children wander around a typical comics shop! But at least here, in Avengers #283 (Sept 1987), all was still well! The Comics Code stamp of approval was still on the cover, and our heroes were still fighting the good fight against an enraged Zeus and his Olympian minions. (Well, okay, Buscema’s rendition of Venus on page 12, panel 1 was pretty sultry!) The creative team here was doing a great job in upholding the high standards set during the first three phases of Marvel history!

Star Brand #9 “Where Walks the True Believer!” Cary Bates (script); Keith Giffen (pencils); Bob Wiacek (inks) No sooner had writer Jim Shooter given up the scripting chores on the Star Brand title than it stumbled. Since the first issue, the book was a solid read with an interesting hero and ensemble supporting characters. It all made for compelling storytelling with a basis in reality upon which Shooter would rely the next time he built a comics universe from scratch. But that was some time in the future, after the editor-in-chief was released by Marvel management. That would happen soon enough, barely before the New Universe line itself had covered half its eventual lifespan. Sadly, Shooter was compelled to give up writing the line’s flagship title with issue #7 (along with artist John Romita, Jr.) and in keeping with the sense of apartness the New Universe had sought to capture from its inception, a pair of Marvel outsiders were hired to continue the strip with Star Brand #9 (Sept. 1987). New writer Cary Bates had been a DC veteran of years’ service, having done little or no work for Marvel, while artist Keith Giffen, though he’d begun his storied career at Marvel, early on moved to DC where he’d been working ever since. Together, they formed an odd team on an odd assignment and turned in a script that was part serious and part satire...but maybe more satire than serious. It seems that Ken Connell is The Dark Ages

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yielded seven issues of a Shooter/Romita Star Brand that could stand beside any group of comics in the late Twilight Years. Not so Fun Fact: The Pitt, scripted by John Byrne (as were issues #11-19 of the Star Brand title itself) was a thinly veiled rap against Marvel’s former and generally unliked editor-in-chief as it turned Shooter’s hometown, the general setting of the Star Brand comic, into a big hole in the ground!

Avengers #284

Over at DC, writer/artist Keith Giffen was a big wheel, having turned the venerable Legion of Super-Heroes title into the company’s second best-selling book and helped to successfully relaunch the moribund Justice League. When Marvel lost Giffen earlier in the Twilight Years, they lost a valuable resource.

having bad dreams due to guilty feelings at not living up to a dying 10-year-old’s conception of him as the kind of super-hero he read about in his Marvel comics. Seeing a psychiatrist to help rid him of his bothersome dreams, Connell is unknowingly examined by fellow New Universe hero Nightmask, who enters his dreams the better to treat him. Turns out that Connell’s dreams are all based around a strange super-hero cosmogony based on the Stan Lee/Jack Kirby Marvel Universe complete with Lee-style stentorian dialogue and illustrated by Giffen in a faux Kirby art style (exemplified by a Higgins/Wiacek cover based on that of Thor #166). Needless to say, the therapy works but not without Connell walking away knowing that there’s another super-hero out there. Overall, the issue was all right (the latest iteration of Giffen’s art was good with Bates’ scripting purely workmanlike) but fell far short of what readers had come to expect from Shooter’s scripts. Boding ill for the future of the New Universe, the emphasis of the book was less on characterization and sub-plots and more on straight-ahead action, a formula that editor Tom DeFalco would pursue after taking over from the departed Shooter. From there, the whole line would abandon its original premise and embrace traditional super-hero shenanigans culminating in a John Byrne scripted special titled simply The Pitt and a four-part mini-series called The War and. It was a project that had great potential before falling victim to corporate sales and take overs and one that at least 192

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“Battleground: Olympus” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Things go from bad to worse in Avengers #284 (Oct. 1987) as our heroes continue their struggle to escape Hades only to end up face to face with Zeus himself...and he’s not a happy camper! A peer of Odin, Zeus is in that rarefied class of beings in the Marvel Universe that comprise only a small handful of members including Galactus, Ego, Eternity, and... (well, there isn’t anybody else!) whose power is incalculable. So imagine the Avengers, not lacking in power of their own with Thor, Sub-Mariner, and She-Hulk on their side, going up against the king of the Greek pantheon. The contest starts on page 5 when Captain Marvel tries to fry Zeus but is swatted away, then Thor tries his luck and he gets swatted away, but comes back to trade a few more blows with Zeus before being flattened but good. Next, Captain Marvel returns for a rematch with Buscema and Palmer managing wonderfully to depict her attack for the catastrophic blow it’s supposed to be: an explosion that dwarfs Olympus the city and saps the color from all of page 19! The results clearly rattle the captain: “I don’t believe it! I hit you with as much energy as I expended on Nebula’s starship! H-how can you still be standing!” Then Stern, who has already proved his smooth handling of dialogue throughout his run on the Avengers, does himself almost as good as Stan Lee used to do back in the Grandiose Years by having Zeus reply: “None can defeat the lord of Olympus! By my own will am I invincible!” Wow! Never before, no not even all through the Years of Consolidation and Grandiose Years had Zeus ever been depicted in this light! Always playing second fiddle to Odin, he never got much action let alone the chance to show what he could do in battle. But in this ish, Stern pulls out all the stops making this Olympus storyline one for the Marvel history books! But it wasn’t over yet, as first Johnny-come-lately Sub-Mariner tries to pitch in but ends up being pitched himself, and finally, the everobtuse She-Hulk, full of herself as usual, tries to lay her hands on the king of the gods by use of a crude bear hug only to be knocked into next week. With his comrades fallen, it’s left to the Black Knight to put

into words what readers must have been asking themselves: “How could things possibly get worse than this?” How about Hercules, newly wakened from his coma, out of his mind and thirsting for the Avengers’ blood? Yeah, that’ll do it.

Avengers #285 “Twilight of the Gods!” Roger Stern (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Avengers #285 (Nov. 1987) leads off with a great symbolic cover image showing an enraged Zeus that’s followed up with an equally great splash page depicting a fullfigure of Black Knight in all his armored glory as he stalks the tangled remnants of an Olympian forest laid waste by the Avengers’ hopeless battle against the king of the gods! Cut to Hercules now wakened from a coma and under the mistaken assumption that his former teammates are his enemies. About to squash the Wasp in his fist, Hercules is stopped by Captain America, hampered by a pair of broken legs who nevertheless grabs the demi-god, begging him to let the girl go. As Cap gets dragged around like a rag doll, Dr. Druid goes to work on Herc’s mind, forcing his memories back. Meanwhile, led by the Black Knight, the Avengers and Zeus go for round two, and for a few seconds, by piling on, our heroes manage to pummel him to his knees. But as usual, the obnoxious She-Hulk goes too far: “...I wouldn’t mind knocking him down a few more times!” That did it! Zeus has had enough, he’s done fooling around and with a single gesture, defeats all of the Avengers in a trice. Enter Hercules to save the day, but in his wrath, Zeus fails to recognize his son and nearly beats him to death before being stopped by the now-revived Avengers. Coming to his senses at last, a regretful Zeus sets things aright, vowing Olympus will never have anything to do with the Earth again...well, hopefully not for too long anyway, because this latest story arc was so good it would have been a shame not to see the Greek pantheon again! Here, writer Roger Stern has succeeded in doing what no one else had yet done: making Zeus and the other Greek gods as interesting as what Marvel had done with their Norse counterparts. Despite having to have the She-Hulk and the Wasp in the mix, the story manages to rise above those hindrances to become what it deserved to be, a new epic that could stand beside those classic tales by Lee and Kirby when Thor first battled Hercules in Journey Into Mystery Annual #1 or when Thor battled for Hercules in Hades in Thor #127-130. But there’s no rest for the weary because no sooner is this great arc concluded than the next and last of the Stern/Buscema/Palmer run begins, one that would end in victory for the Avengers but in frustrated departure for Stern.

Amazing Spider-Man #294 “Thunder” J. M. DeMatteis (script); Mike Zeck (pencils); Bob McLeod (inks) There’s not much to say about what later became known as “Kraven’s Last Hunt,” except that it was a major contributing factor to the looming Dark Ages to come. In a six-part story stretching over the three major Spider-Man books, Amazing, Spectacular, and Web, sometime DC scribe J. M. DeMatteis teamed with artist Mike Zeck in an attempt to create a brooding tale of self-destruction with psychological overtones and a touch of literary license. Unfortunately, in an unstated competition with what fellow writers Alan Moore and Grant Morrison were doing at DC (that is, taking thirdstring characters like Swamp Thing and Animal Man, and making them interesting by weaving them into more mature stories that also displayed an awareness of pop cultural trends and deep familiarity with the whole range of western literary tradition), he largely fails. Capsule synopsis: Kraven the Hunter, one of Spidey’s oldest foes, is back and this time he’s gone off his rocker after being defeated so many times by the wall crawler. (His altered psychological state is easily identified in the form of a funky new jungle version of his traditional costume...for those readers who needed such visual cues). This time, however, he apparently succeeds and kills Spidey. But Spidey’s not really dead, just buried alive, and as he struggles to dig himself out, Kraven dons his black costume and tackles the cannibalistic Vermin to prove to himself that he’s better

In the race to find new blood, DC beat Marvel to British shores, hiring the best of its comics writers including Alan Moore (Swamp Thing), Grant Morrison (Animal Man), and Neil Gaiman. When Marvel finally got around to visiting England, the low-hanging fruit had already been picked and the company had to settle for sloppy seconds.

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Avengers #286 “The Fix is On!” Roger Stern (plot); Ralph Macchio (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) The Stern/Buscema/Palmer Avengers run kept the spirit of previous phases alive almost to the end of the late Twilight Years when the era of grim and gritty would become the new norm chasing out every other

than Spider-Man. Later, after Spidey is free again, Kraven declares himself the winner in their contest and shoots himself by the simple expedient of placing a rifle under his chin and pulling the trigger. Again, in case readers didn’t get it, the blood-spattered corpse is shown lying in a prepared coffin. Nice! (And for nitpickers, yes, this issue, the fifth chapter in the arc, sports the Comics Code Authority stamp on the cover!) A bone is thrown to traditionalists who still needed characterization with their comics stories with a few brief scenes of Mary Jane worried about new husband Peter Parker, who is out on the prowl. (Mary Jane gets to star in such exciting scenes as chasing a rat in her apartment and running from some unwanted admirers). Clearly, with little else to recommend them, the main point of these six issues is exploitation of the story’s darker elements: being buried alive, cannibalism, potential rape, and finally suicide. Adding to the shallowness of it all, DeMatteis anticipates one of the major faults with comics of the Dark Ages when he subordinates words to pictures. That is, whole pages fly by with hardly a dozen words of text or dialogue and when words do appear, they’re minimal. In coming years, such bare bones storytelling would convince many that writers weren’t necessary to good comics, that artists alone could do it all. It was a belief that would lead to the highest percentage of unreadable, disposable junk ever cranked out by the comics industry. And here, in Amazing Spider-Man #294 (Nov. 1987), DeMatteis was leading the way. Fun Fact: Although DeMatteis never did produce much in the way of comics that was interesting, he did manage to find his niche back at DC when he teamed with writer/artist Keith Giffen for a humorous and quite successful revamp of the Justice League.

Losing the kids: Artist Mike Zeck’s intense cover for Amazing Spider-Man #286 was just the sort of family unfriendly look that fans (whose median age was getting older) were looking for in the late Twilight Years.

adjective for his first name!) When the dust clears, the android is knocked out, Marina (the aquatic alien former member of Alpha Flight whom somebody had the bright idea of marrying off to Subby in a quickie wedding) is captured, and Dr. Druid is showing disturbing signs of a power grab from team leader Captain Marvel. And to top it all off,

kind of reader (what few of them were left by that time) leaving room only for the arrested but aging adolescent who thrived on senseless action; as few words to read as possible; and big, brash illustrations with busty babes to match. Their desires would lead comics deeper and deeper into a Dark Age from which, even at this writing, it has yet to emerge. But for now, readers could savor the last golden days of a classic run whose end was almost in sight. The beginning of the end starts in Avengers #286 (Dec 1987) with the start of Roger Stern’s final story arc, one that would feature the hallmarks of his approach to writing Marvel comics: good character interaction, making use of some of the thousands of characters that the Marvel Universe had lying around in abundance, and telling a story deriving from past Marvel history. More to the point: this issue brings back the Awesome Android that made its first appearance way, way back in FF #15 and the Fixer who first showed up in Strange Tales #142! As the story unfolds in upcoming issues, those two stalwarts would be joined by Mentallo, the Super Adaptoid, and the Sentinel (we won’t count Machine Man because the less said about someone with a worse moniker than Paste Pot Pete, the better!) Anyway, our story opens with the Fixer ’s mysterious plan to “triumph over his human enemies...” Huh? What does he mean by that? The answer of course, will come in upcoming issues. Meanwhile, the Avengers find themselves drawn to the midwest where they encounter a revived Awesome Android (you gotta love a bad guy with an

Avengers #286, page 2: The Heavy Metal arc would be the last in writer Roger Stern’s long string of triumphs on the Avengers. but even though scripter Ralph Macchio took over on this ish, there was no sign that Stern would have lost steam if he had stayed with the title. Note the empty space at the top of the page; a colored image of Druid’s face sans holding lines would be placed there on publication.

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in the final panel of the story, readers get to drool over a beautiful shot of the Fixer in a patented Buscema action pose! It was a great start to another great story arc, but one tinged in sadness as it represented Stern’s farewell to Avengers.

Avengers #287 “Invasion!” Roger Stern (plot); Ralph Macchio (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Once again, artist John Buscema provides us with a cool triptych of a cover showing the Avengers in trouble, an imprisoned Mentallo, and at the bottom, with the three illos seeming to radiate from his head, is the “Fixer” with one of the most maniacal looks any villain has ever sported before or since! His clutching hands and wide open mouth were a stock pose often used by former Avengers artist George Perez supposedly to depict deep emotional turmoil, but here Buscema actually makes it chillingly convincing. Turn the page and we get yet another impressive shot, a splash page dominated by a super close-up of the Sub-Mariner! Like the Fixer, he too has his features contorted, but instead of madness, he’s shouting in desperation for Marina who disappeared at the end of last issue. The image is made all the more striking for inker Tom Palmer’s use of cross hatching instead of his usual solid blacks, lending Subby’s face a 3D, almost photographic effect. Anyway, our story moves along as Subby finds Marina (whose unnecessary insertion in these Avengers stories certainly qualifies as the proverbial ball and chain...as does She-Hulk!) and Mentallo drops in on his old partner the Fixer. But something is not quite right with the latter, who opens his mind to Mentallo, and what his former partner finds there sends him into a fearful frenzy. Wildly, his mind reaches out for help and finds a receptive Dr. Druid who’s able to pinpoint where the cry for help is coming from, and in due course the Avengers find themselves invading the Fixer’s lair. Later, back at Avengers HQ, our heroes discover that the Fixer has been replaced by the Super-Adaptoid whom we catch up with just before Avengers #287 (Jan. 1988) concludes recruiting Machine Man for the formation of Heavy Metal, a team of all-artificial bad guys culled from every era of Marvel history!

The Punisher #6 “Garbage” Mike Baron (script); David Ross (penciling); Kevin Nowlan (inks) At first blush, one would think that with Kevin Nowlan, Marvel had discovered a new inking talent on the scale of Tom Palmer and Klaus Janson, but what they really found was a solid artist in his own right. 196

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As his career progressed, Nowlan would move from inking to penciling and back again to become one of the new shining lights of the later Twilight Years. But for The Punisher #6 (Feb. 1988), it’s his inks that grace David Ross’ pencils to produce one of the sharpestlooking books of the period. In a comics world soon to be dominated by the likes of Jim Lee, Wilce Portacio, and Todd McFarlane, Nowlan’s slicker, more sophisticated style would be overshadowed by work noted more for over rendered, crowded, poster-sized page layouts than actual artistic craft. David Ross, whatever his original style, is likely buried beneath Nowlan’s lush inks so that all that’s left is his layouts (which aren’t bad), keeping writer Mike Baron’s plot moving relentlessly forward as the Punisher tracks gunrunners to a hazardous waste dump where weapons are being sold to Mid-East terrorists. Not usually associated with quality production all around, this issue of the Punisher might even be described as beautiful in a bloodsoaked, repulsive kind of way (right off, the first panel of the second page features a mass of bodies in the back of a garbage truck with blood dripping from the interior; a spatter of blood is splashed across the story’s title and more is smeared over the front seat of the truck) as our hero takes out bad guys, uses them as human shields, and blows them to kingdom come with hand grenades and rocket launchers. But as Punisher adventures go, this is only the beginning as the tale ends with a small army of thugs attacking him in jeeps! Throughout, the action is interspersed with eye-catching panels by Ross and Nowlan beginning

Writer Mike Baron (left) didn’t leave much of a footprint in mainstream comics but he did a commendable job on the Punisher’s regular series, staying with it for a number of years. Kevin Nowlan was a great artist in his own right and like Tom Palmer, his inking was magic!

Avengers #288 “Heavy Metal!” Ralph Macchio (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) All good things must eventually come to an end and they finally did so here with Avengers #288 (Feb 1988) when it was learned that writer Roger Stern, who had guided the title through some of its most exciting

on page 4, panel 2 showing the Punisher hitting the ground after vaulting over a fence. Page 5 is a textbook example of the proper use of shadow and light as are pages 9 and 10, which depict the Punisher on approach through the dump. Baron’s script is sparse but to the point as he follows the by now expected first-person narrative style of Punisher stories that at once places the reader in the middle of the action and in the mind of the hero. That conceit began with the Punisher Limited Series, whose success led to an ongoing title beginning with Klaus Janson on the art. But contrary to expectations, Janson’s moody work fell short for a series that required art that was more hard edged. This issue was a strong start in that direction and though newcomer Wilce Portacio would be a definite step down from the Ross/Nowlan team, his style would prove nearly perfect for the strip as Baron launched the Punisher into a multiissue struggle with the Kingpin. In what would prove to be a serendipitous conflation of writer and artist and a growing culture of violence, the Punisher’s popularity would skyrocket over the next few years, resulting in his being featured in multiple titles and venues and eventually being among the first Marvel characters to star in big-budget Hollywood movies. It all happened due in no small part to well-produced, exciting issues like this one. Fun Fact: Did you know that this issue’s striking cover was done by Mike Mignola? Well, it was one of many the future fan-favorite would do for Marvel in these years. Specializing in covers that more or less symbolized story content, Mignola was a recent graduate of the fan magazine circuit as well as the California College of Arts before making the jump to professional in 1983. He never looked back.

Penciler Mike Mignola and inker Kevin Nowlan made a great team on this cover of Punisher #6! Interestingly, Mignola and Nowlan were one of the few penciler/inker teams that would have been just as good if their duties had been reversed!

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adventures in years, was to be removed from the book. The news was broken by editor Mark Gruenwald in this issue’s letters’ page hinting at “irreconcilable differences” between himself and Stern over the direction future stories should take. Deciding that the team needed a more high-profile member to lead it, Gruenwald met with Stern and thought they had agreed to ease Captain Marvel out of the leadership role and replace her with Captain America. Later, however, Stern contacted Gruenwald notifying him that he could find no way to make the change work without “doing injustice” to some of the characters, to wit: Captain Marvel. “It was suggested to me that I should have Captain Marvel screw up badly and turn the chairmanship over to Captain America,” said Stern in an interview. “Needless to say, I thought that was a bad idea.” Captain Marvel, it will be remembered, was created by Stern for Amazing Spider-Man Annual #16 and for that reason he was likely reluctant to give her the axe. But in his argument to preserve the status quo, Stern unfortunately raised the spectre of political correctness. “I sent my editor a memo pointing out that dumping Captain Marvel in such a way couldn’t help but look both racist and sexist.” But Gruenwald had the moral high ground in this argument, it would have been “racist and sexist” to treat the character with any more consideration than any white or male character under the same conditions. For Gruenwald to accede to Stern’s

High-profile figures like Jesse Jackson (left) and Al Sharpton did their best to make race relations a hot-button issue in the 1980s. With his work on the Avengers, writer Roger Stern bucked any patronization trends and made Captain Marvel interesting in and out of uniform, giving her a family life and a romantic interest in the form of FBI agent Derek Freeman.

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argument would actually have been the “racist and sexist” thing to do! Sure, Stern had also argued that it would be unrealistic for Captain Marvel to “screw up” since she had led the Avengers successfully against Zeus, but these are stories about fictional characters after all, whose careers are fashioned and altered by writers and editors every single issue, thus that argument could not hold water either. But what it all boiled down to was that in the end, Gruenwald and Stern could not agree on the matter and Stern was, in his own words “fired from the series.” He was replaced temporarily by Ralph Macchio, who did a bang-up job completing Stern’s last story arc with the removal of Captain Marvel from the strip left to new permanent writer Walter Simonson, who had her de-powered and hospitalized thereby dropping her in as painless a way as possible. The move cleared the way for a plot in which the team would be betrayed by Dr. Druid after being seduced by Nebula, back in another of her evil schemes!

Solo Avengers #4 “The Great Escape” Tom DeFalco (script); Ron Lim (pencils); Josef Rubinstein (inks) “Knight’s Errant” Roger Stern (script); Paul Ryan (breakdowns); Bob Layton (finished art) Some time in the later Twilight Years, as sales sagged, it was discovered that though the number of comics readers weren’t increasing much, more sales could still be squeezed out of them by releasing spin-off titles of popular books, in effect getting people who were buying the Uncanny X-Men say, to also pick up X-Men Classics, the New Mutants, and any number of limited series. (It was a scheme taken to absurd lengths by the end of the decade and off the rails during the Dark Ages). Besides the super popular X-Men, to a lesser extent, the strategy was also applied to Spider-Man and the Avengers. And while not as successful as the X-Men in spinning off multiple titles, the Avengers did manage to pick up Avengers West Coast, limited series such as The Vision and Scarlet Witch, and Solo Avengers, the latter a throwback to the Years of Consolidation when, due to limitations in its distribution network, Marvel had to double up some of its heroes in such books as Tales to Astonish and Tales of Suspense. Attempting to kickstart the career of perennial Avengers favorite Hawkeye, it was decided to feature him regularly in the front half of the new split book with the rest of the pages given over to a rotating roster of other Avengers or related hangers-on. Although the Hawkeye feature never generated much heat (it suffered from lackluster art and so-so stories) as did many of the back-ups, the title did manage to produce a few hidden gems over the course of its surprisingly lengthy run. Take Solo Avengers #4 (March

1988) for instance. It features a quick little tale of the Black Knight as he experiments on his magic sword. When Dr. Druid offers to help, he triggers a psychic attack that results in the Knight’s trading places with his future self, the Last Knight! A knight-on-knight battle ensues for possession of the sword with Dane Whitman winning through. Here at last, out from under the shadow of the Wasp, a bit of the old Black Knight’s heroic spirit is on display as he shows his opponent what’s what! And though the Paul Ryan/ Bob Layton art is nothing to write home about, they manage to do a creditable job on a story carried largely by writer Roger Stern’s scripting. It was a tale that by rights could only be regarded as a filler, but for long suffering Black Knight fans, it was enough!

Avengers #289 “The Cube Root!” Ralph Macchio (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) By Avengers #289 (March 1988), writer Ralph Macchio was an experienced hand at Marvel, having started out as a letter hack in his younger days before making the acquaintance of another former letter hack, Don McGregor, he of “War of the Worlds” and Jungle Action fame. It was through McGregor that Macchio made his way to the Marvel offices and ended up as an editorial assistant on the company’s surviving black-and-white magazines. From there, it was an easy step for the English Lit major to snag some freelance writing gigs doing everything from Marvel Two-in-One (a team-up book starring the Thing) to Thor. By 1981, Macchio had been promoted to full editor specializing in books based on licensed products such as the Rom action figure. As a scripter, he provided unexciting but dependable work until finally landing the assignment of taking over the Avengers from Roger Stern. As it turned out, Macchio would act only as an interim replacement until a more permanent writer could be given the book, but in the few issues he scripted, he shone, managing to adapt himself to Stern’s easygoing style and bringing to its climax, Stern’s final story arc of the run. No easy task that, as it featured a rather complex if not cosmic ending that also included a match-up between Captain America and the SuperAdaptoid reminiscent of the classic verbal confrontations that Stan Lee used to write for the Cap/Red Skull faceoffs of earlier years. Aided and abetted by the still great team of Buscema and Palmer on pencils and inks respectively, Macchio this issue moves the plot toward its electrifying conclusion as the “heavy metal horde” attacks Hydrobase and Machine Man has a crisis of conscience. Meanwhile, the Fixer, who is actually the Super-Adaptoid, succeeds in his ultimate plan, to find the Cosmic Cube and adapt its near godlike power for

Fans had Don McGregor (left) to thank for getting fellow letter hack Ralph Macchio (right) into the comics business and onto those last golden issues of the John Buscema/ Tom Palmer run of Avengers. Macchio broke in via Marvel’s in-house fan mag FOOM before turning scripter.

itself! To his surprise, however, what he gets is Kubik, the personification of the Cube! Turns out that when the AIM scientists created the cube they took Kubik from another dimension and used his essence to energize the Cube with his power. Even better! Having been created with a “sliver” of the cube in his makeup, the Adaptoid is able to replicate Kubik and banish him from reality, leaving him the sole possessor of the creature’s near infinite power on earth making the Adaptoid, “The master of all reality!” Hoo boy!

Avengers #290 “The World According to the Adaptoid!” Roger Stern (co-plot?); Ralph Macchio (script-co-plot); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) It ends here. Although the art team of Buscema and Palmer would continue to issue #297 (and Palmer remain on as inker for a good deal longer), the serendipity ended with Avengers #290 (April 1988), the last chapter in the final major story arc begun under Roger Stern. Beneath a nice cover by Buscema and Palmer depicting the Avengers trapped in a number of force cubes with a background made up of spattered red ink (that could be construed as blood), Ralph Macchio does a creditable job providing a script that is not only pretty seamless between himself and Stern’s prior work, but one that rises to the occasion when the story calls for a one-on-one battle between Captain America and the Adaptoid. As you’ll recall from last issue, the Super Adaptoid has taken on the form and powers of Kubik, the personification of the Cosmic Cube The Dark Ages

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and is now all powerful (to coin a phrase!) His plan: Incredible Hulk #342 first to change his name to the Supreme Adaptoid (!) “No Human Fears” Peter David (script); Todd and then create copies of himself that will eventually McFarlane (pencils/inks) replace mankind. (“The day of the organics is It begins here. Or around here anyway. The beginning passing...!”) Meanwhile, Kubik frees himself from the of the end of a nearly fifty-year run in which comics, black hole where the Adaptoid thought he’d imprisoned inheriting its form and language from newspaper him, travels to Earth and decides a direct confrontation comic strips, had been produced in the same way for with the Adaptoid would likely wreck all reality. all that time, i.e. story plots building over a number of Instead, he finds Captain America, now garbed in a pages in the form of panels depicting elements of black version of his costume (don’t ask!) and transports action with a script composed of narrative blocks and him to the scene of the action. There, he confronts the dialogue balloons tying it all together and smoothing Adaptoid, reminding him that he was created to defeat over any rough spots. That traditional Captain America and never completed form of comics storytelling began that programming. Ordering one of his to break down during Marvel’s Early duplicates to attack Cap, the two have Years and Years of Consolidation at it with good dialogue from Macchio when writer Stan Lee began feeding that wonderfully recalls similar words of his artists story summaries instead of inspiration by Stan Lee in many battles fully prepared scripts. That allowed he supervised between the Sentinel of pencilers more freedom in how they Liberty and foes such as the Red Skull: laid out a story and controlled its “No machine can imitate a man’s pacing. Jack Kirby was the first to take fighting heart, the spirit that pushes advantage of the changed environment him on and on though the odds are but soon, fellow artists, especially hopeless. And that is why you and Gene Colan, would begin stretching your kind must finally fail, and free things to the limit. Throughout that men prevail!” Sadly, such sentiments time, however, tight scripts kept would prove a last haunting echo of confusion to a minimum and in fact, the Grandiose Years for as Marvel helped make stories flow more entered its Dark Age, a pervading smoothly than ever. It wasn’t until the Starting out as a cynicism (matched by that of the early Twilight Years when fans turned penciler for Marvel country as a whole) would not only professional artists began to experiment before transmuting into discourage such sentiments, but even farther with page layouts culminating a mini-mogul, Todd McFarlane became such mock them as useless artifacts of with Frank Miller’s work on Daredevil. a hit with fans that he some prehistoric past. But, as Cap says Still, most comics continued to be prowas able to break away here after defeating the Adaptoid’s duced in the traditional way with panelfrom the company and duplicate (“...what I stand for cannot to-panel progression and scripting branch out on his own. be crushed...”), nothing lasts forever, helping to keep stories clearly underHe founded Image not even the darkness that both Comics with a number standable and easy to follow. That of his colleagues before Marvel and the United States (and by style is clearly visible here in Incredible forming Todd extension, the rest of the world) found Hulk #342 (April 1988) as artist McFarlane Productions, themselves overcome by in the new Todd McFarlane lays out the issue then McFarlane Toys, century. That too will pass and man’s in regular-sized panels with only followed by Todd thirst for truth and freedom, as Cap occasional departures for “pick ups” McFarlane Entertainment. reminds us, will eventually triumph. of character close-ups and zooms on “To know life, you must know death! particular objects and hand motions. Life’s brevity makes it precious beyond In fact, there’s little here to suggest understanding! Our species lives with the knowledge the revolution in comics that McFarlane would help that our loved ones will die...that we ourselves will to bring about only a few years down the road. A one day be dust. But we go on! That is courage! That revolution that would see traditional story layouts is spirit!” The Adaptoid is eventually defeated, not and scripting fall out of favor for art that resembled with fists, but by the force of Cap’s words, by ideas more a collection of poster prints rather than storytelling. and ideals that, like the star-spangled Avenger himself, It all started quite modestly for McFarlane who had would become increasingly anachronistic as the last no formal art training but through sheer perseverance vestiges of the Twilight Years faded away. and some native talent, managed to get himself 200

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noticed by writer Steve Englehart who gave him his first opportunity to draw a back-up feature in an issue of Coyote. After that, job offers arrived steadily from both DC and Marvel until McFarlane was tapped for the high-profile “Batman: Year Two”. Finally, he settled in to stay at Marvel when he took over the art chores on Hulk in 1987. It was with the Hulk that the artist came to the attention of readers in a big way. Quickly,

Incredible Hulk #342, page 17: Penciler Todd McFarlane’s overrendered style (like those of fellow artists Art Adams, Jim Lee, and Whilce Portacio) excited fans who often thrived on artistic detail over story content. The growing sales of books with such artists contributed to the misconception by some that writers were unnecessary to the success of a comic.

attracted by his larger-than-life, over the top even, depiction of familiar characters (his updated version of the Leader this ish, complete with oversized cranium veined in visible brain cells, was a perfect example), over rendered, hyperdetailed pencils (which at times made it difficult to distinguish between foreground, midground, and background action...a problem that would only grow worse over time), and bold, often in-your-face, figure work, McFarlane built himself a strong fan base that would soon propel him to rock star status in the small pond of the comics industry. Along with him would follow other young up and comers including Jim Lee, Erik Larsen, and Rob Liefeld, all of whom sported the same detailed, over-rendered style of art whose roots sprang more from Japanese manga than their predecessors in the American comics field. Like McFarlane, few had attended any kind of formal art training, let alone mentoring with an established artist as had Paul Gulacy, Craig Russell, and Val Mayerik with Dan Adkins. Worse, without first mastering the basics of comics storytelling, these artists were allowed to proceed immediately to developing their own styles, which favored full-page illustration or haphazard layouts that made stories difficult if not impossible to follow, particularly for new readers. The fact that narration and thought balloons had gone out of style didn’t help either. The whole phenomenon was compounded when sales of the books these artists worked on began to skyrocket, convincing them that the writers they were The Dark Ages

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paired with were expendable. Such was their growing hubris that they finally presented Marvel management an ultimatum: at least partial ownership of whatever characters they created, all expenses paid, and more creative freedom, or they would quit en masse. Leading the charge would be none other than McFarlane himself, and upon being refused, he led the walkout that ended in the creation of Image Comics, the first serious economic threat faced by DC and Marvel in decades. But that was still a few years off at the time of this issue that, nevertheless, was well into McFarlane’s run on the title. In it, we have a turgid tale by writer Peter David who has reverted the Hulk to his original gray tone and smart alecky chip on his shoulder demeanor. He’s also got the Leader back still looking for revenge on ole grayskin by way of useful idiot Half-Life. Ho hum.

Avengers #291 “Shadows of the Future Past!” Walter Simonson (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) “Let’s Party!” are the words on the cover of Avengers #291 (May 1988) signaling in no uncertain terms that the best days of the book were behind it. Replacing Ralph Macchio as the strip’s permanent writer is Walter Simonson, fresh off a successful (in terms of fan acceptance) stint as writer/artist and then just writer on Thor. His taking over on the Avengers would be a definite step down for the book, beginning here with

After stumbling out of the gate, writer Walt Simonson would finally get the feel of the Avengers just in time for the strong finish of the Cross-Time Kangs arc that ended with an interesting concept and a clever use of scientific lingo. Simonson’s career following his stint on the Avengers was commercially haphazard, with a 25-issue run on DC’s Orion the most notable of his projects.

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the first chapter in a new story arc that, going on for more than a single issue, turned out to be way too long. Focusing on one of the worst characters running around loose in the Marvel Universe (even John Byrne had to have his off days!) and unbelievably married off to the Sub-Mariner (well heck, they were both water breathers right?), the plot involves Marina reverting to her alien roots and turning into a gigantic sea serpent big enough to crush the state of Florida! The Avengers end up chasing her all over hither and yon trying to keep her from sinking both ships and whole islands until finally stopping her in Avengers #293. Along the way, the Black Knight inexplicably switches his speech patterns from colloquial English to Middle English, Jarvis shows up with an eye patch (!), and our heroes attend a black-tie affair in tuxedos and masks! The one bright spot (aside from the Buscema/Palmer artwork, which starts things off here with a great splash page) is a developing sub-plot involving the return of Nebula and the Council of Cross-Time Kangs via a scheme to turn Dr. Druid against his teammates (and apparently some confusion among the creators as to the nature of Kang’s mask...it is a mask after all, not his face...but at least one of the council leaders wears a mustache over it!). But overall, this issue is a definite step down from the Stern era with Simonson unable to measure up to his predecessor. But Simonson was primarily an artist, not a writer; although he attempted to join that new phenomenon of the 1980s, the writer/artist. Leading the way in spectacular fashion were Frank Miller and John Byrne, whose example would inspire others to try the same thing with less success, Simonson among them. But despite the undoubted abilities of Miller and Byrne, the trend they began would prove disastrous for the whole comics industry in the coming decade. For his part, Simonson began his career at DC rising to swift prominence on a Manhunter back-up feature in Detective with writer Archie Goodwin. His art improved quickly with a brief stint on Battlestar Galactica for Marvel before evolving past its peak with work on The Uncanny X-Men and the New Teen Titans one shot and later X-Factor. It was then he was given the assignment to revive the moribund Thor strip in 1983. Although his radical take on the character shook up the status quo and excited hard-core fans, it was ultimately unsatisfying, even wrong, for Thor, but the popularity of his star turn there was undoubted and placed unrealistic expectations on Simonson’s subsequent projects, which never managed to generate the heat his earlier work on Thor did. As things turned out, Thor would be the high point of Simonson’s comics career with his largely unexciting work on the Avengers proof that lightning had no intention of striking twice.

X-Factor #7 “Fall Out!” Louise Simonson (script); Jackson Guice (pencils); Josef Rubinstein (inks) Those who stuck it out hoping for an improvement on earlier issues were not rewarded with X-Factor #7 (Aug. 1988). The book was still being drawn by Jackson Guice who held to the same precise but lackluster style that isn’t helped by Josef Rubinstein’s overly faithful inks. Taking over the writing chores is Louise Simonson, who, proving to be a bit more polished than Bob Layton, handles dialogue and the strip’s somewhat complicated premise with the appearance of ease. Still in the mix were Cyclops’ personal problems, including his continued reluctance to tell Marvel Girl about his wife and child back in Alaska (both of whom seem to have mysteriously disappeared). Meanwhile, Jean begins to get suspicious when Scott keeps dropping the name “Madelyne” whenever he forgets himself. As noted by readers in this issue’s letter column, the depiction of anti-mutant hysteria among homo-sapiens in the Marvel Universe was reaching ridiculous levels. Given the fact that the world was overrun by people with super powers, both good and evil, it was difficult to understand why its residents would react so strongly to mutants as they do this issue to the extent of not even believing that they were human. In the past, the antimutant sub-text of the X-books was always present but subdued. The level at which it’s shown this issue for instance, had begun to stretch readers’ suspension of belief to the breaking point. Also adding its weight in throwing off the balance of the X-books was the sheer proliferation of mutants themselves. Once, during the Years of Consolidation, they were a small, hidden sect, a secret society whose members battled among themselves beneath the radar of most of humanity. But then X-scribe Chris Claremont blew the lid off that world when he introduced the Morlocks, hundreds, even thousands, of mutants who lived in the New York sewer system alone. In one scene, they were shown to be enough to fill a vast amphitheater! By inundating the Marvel Universe with so many mutants, he cheapened the concept originally created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and continued by Roy Thomas. What was once a cool concept was bowdlerized into something common and dime-a-dozen, leeching most of the drama from the X-Factor book. (Which perhaps explained its continued reliance on the Scott/Jean imbroglio). But that was all part of the larger, and growing problem of the X-verse itself. Here in X-Factor, it only served to add its weight to an already ponderous book, which as yet hadn’t even begun to give equal coverage to Beast, Iceman, and Angel the way it was doing to Cyclops and Marvel Girl. After taking over the book with issue #6, Simonson tried to shake things up a little with the introduction of

Marvel’s X-books would be adopted by the homosexual community, which identified with its mutants’ status as pariahs. Little could anyone suspect in the 1980s that tolerance of the lifestyle would contribute to a movement for full and complete acceptance of the practice... or else!

Apocalypse, a villain intended to serve as the team’s new archenemy. Unfortunately, the character was doomed to never achieve any real gravitas until well into the Dark Age and under a different writer. Meanwhile, X-Factor suffered another blow when Simonson was joined on the book by husband Walter on the art chores. Walter Simonson’s chunky, ill-proportioned figure work and uninspired layouts failed to ignite any more excitement among readers (who were further alienated when the Simonsons completely revamped the Angel, turning him into a tool of Apocalypse and subverting the original intention of the book ie to reunite the original X-Men). More radical changes were due down the road as the book was altered beyond recognition finding itself being dragged down with all the rest of the X-books into confusion and irrelevancy. Ultimately, the chaos would lead Marvel editorial to abandon any attempt to make sense of its own universe and instead, actively work to undermine it and squander the company’s heritage. It would not be a pretty sight.

Speedball #2 “Stuck on You!” Roger Stern (script); Steve Ditko (plot/pencils); Jackson Guice (inks) “Graffiti Guerrillas?” Roger Stern (script); Steve Ditko (pencils); Jackson Guice (inks) After many years away from the company, living legend Steve Ditko finally returned to the halls of mighty Marvel in 1979 re-introducing himself to The Dark Ages

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newer readers who perhaps were ignorant of his past achievements and old-time fans delighted just to have him back. In the intervening years since quitting Marvel abruptly near the beginning of the Grandiose Years, Ditko had worked for a number of different outfits beginning with Charlton where he redesigned Captain Atom and the Blue Beetle and

Speedball #2, page 22: Ditko “bounced” back in a sort of big way with the Speedball character whose accidental empowerment, extensive cast of supporting players, and schoolyard setting was more than reminiscent of Spider-Man. Unfortunately, it seemed that the concerns of modern teenagers had evolved beyond simple issues of heartbreak and acceptance that had propelled an earlier generation of readers allowing the Speedball feature only a brief lifespan.

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created the Question, and then DC, for whom he had a hand in creating such characters as the Creeper, Hawk and Dove, Stalker, and Shade the Changing Man. After DC, Ditko continued to do work for Charlton while freelancing elsewhere, including doing the Destructor for the short-lived Atlas Comics line. Coming full circle, Ditko returned to Marvel where he was given a number of low-profile assignments including filling in on strips like Machine Man, Micronauts, and Rom. Now and then, the artist would be assigned an annual or two to draw. One of those turned out to be Amazing Spider-Man Annual #22 where he and writer Tom DeFalco created a new teenaged super-hero called Speedball. Originally intended for editorin-chief Jim Shooter’s New Universe project, Speedball instead became part of the regular Marvel Universe and with Ditko on board as penciler and plotter and was quickly promoted to his own title. Unlike his colleague, Jack Kirby, who returned to Marvel in the mid-1970s, Ditko was not opposed to working with a scripter. For that reason, his work at Marvel and elsewhere was more palatable to the casual reader and in the case of Speedball, Ditko had one of Marvel’s best in Roger Stern. Also unlike Kirby, Ditko apparently cared little who inked his pencils and so was blessed with a number strong artists who often enhanced his work which had grown somewhat stiff over the years. For Speedball, the role fell to Jackson Guice, a promising penciler in his own right, but a much stronger inker as his work showed over John Buscema on Squadron Supreme and here over Ditko. As for the

Artist/conceptualizer Steve Ditko’s career between stints at Marvel in the ’60s and ’80s had its ups and downs. Though none of the features he worked on lasted long, some were better than others. For instance his Creeper and Hawk and Dove for DC and his revamp of Blue Beetle and his own creation the Question for Charlton all were entertaining reads while features such as Stalker and Shade less so. Even more eclectic characters like Mister A, Destructor, and the Missing Man barely registered on readers’ radar screens.

Speedball feature itself, due to its set-up with a teenager who finds himself with powers that he doesn’t fully understand, a largish cast of supporting players, and his own list of problems needing to be addressed all invited inevitable comparisons to Ditko’s earlier work on Spider-Man. And though Speedball fell somewhat short of that high mark, the strip had charms all its own. For instance, here in Speedball the Masked Marvel #2 (Oct. 1988), readers were presented by not one but two stories (not unlike early issues of Spider-Man) with the first growing out of Robbie Baldwin’s association with Hammond Laboratories, where new villain “the Sticker” is trying to steal the usual secrets. The Sticker himself strikes one as a throwback to earlier Ditko-style villains like the Sandman or Electro, and the way Ditko draws Speedball in action against him with his body contorting in crazy ways (unable to control his powers yet, which involve bouncing around haphazardly at faster and faster rates, Speedball just goes with the flow) is strongly reminiscent of how he used to draw Spider-Man in acrobatic action. In a second story that seems to reflect some of Ditko’s own opinions on the definition of art, the Graffiti Guerrillas go around defacing public property, including examples of modern art. (On the splash page, Ditko labels an abstract pendulum thing as representing “love”!)

Unlike Peter Parker, Robbie Baldwin has parents whom Ditko sometimes uses as foils to present both sides of an argument. “...graffiti can be a legitimate form of expression,” his mother tells her husband. “Artistic expression?!” exclaims his father. “Yes, dear! It’s part of the artistic tradition!” “The defacing of public property is not art!” insists the less progressive Mr. Baldwin. And like Peter Parker, Robbie quickly finds that having super powers means problems with his friends whom he has to put off for fear of their finding out about his abilities. (He can’t even risk a fast game of volleyball with them!) And like the old hard-luck Peter Parker, this issue ends with Robbie alone, unable to explain to his friends why he must remain apart, his powers slowly building a wall between them. With its solid scripting and characterization as well as art, Speedball was a pleasing change of pace for an increasingly grim and gritty comics universe, but one that was already an anachronism seeing as how it would not survive beyond its tenth issue.

The Mighty Thor #396 “Into the Realm of Death!” Tom DeFalco (script), Ron Frenz (pencils), Don Heck (inks) Whew! After Walt Simonson’s seemingly endless run on the title, the emergence of writer Tom DeFalco and penciler Ron Frenz on Thor was like a breath of fresh air! Gone was Simonson’s scribbly, messy art with its too-small heads and stories of hammer-wielding frogs and DOOMfaring aliens. Back in was the grandiosity of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby as the new creative team got back to basics both literally and visually, with emphasis on the visual, the most immediately recognizable change. For that, Frenz displayed his talent for mimicry doing here for Kirby what he did for Ditko on Spider-Man. Page after page, Frenz adopts Kirby’s penchant for big, quarter-page panels suitable for displaying the outsize action befitting battle among the gods. And within those panels, he unabashedly apes Kirby’s art style with larger-than-life figures frequently placed in poses swiped lock, stock, and barrel from any number of past issues from Marvel’s Silver Age. Some might knock Frenz for copying another’s work or even of outright theft, but his performance here is definitely in the way of homage as he returns Thor to glory after being held back too long by lesser creators. And egging Frenz on is DeFalco, who’d taken over as Marvel’s editor-in-chief in 1987 but had been looking for a writing assignment that would allow him to keep a hand in the creative process. Forced to deal with some of the effects of Simonson’s tenure on the book, he quickly shifted gears, placing the strip back into its former groove, populating it with a mix of guest-stars, old-time bad The Dark Ages

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to get Don Heck to come in and ink a couple of issues which was for me, it was just a huge thrill, because Don Heck was one of my earliest and favorite Marvel artists,” said Frenz in a later interview. Truly, this issue was a tour de force for the creative team leaving readers gasping for more as the next issue blurb screamed: “Asgard under siege! Balder wounded! Thor in chains! Loki enters the fray!” Hoo boy!

guys, and newbies in the Lee/ Kirby mold. Take the bad guy in Mighty Thor #396 (Oct. 1988) for instance: Seth, the Egyptian pantheon’s god of violence and chaos, seeks to invade Asgard with endless hordes of followers as Thor, Hogun the Grim, a new group of heroes called Earth Force, and the Black Knight fight a hopeless action to stop them. Meanwhile, back in Asgard, Balder prepares to steal Thor’s strength to stop the invasion at his end. From this issue’s cover (depicting Thor and the Black Knight fighting backto-back in Kirbyesque imagery complete with old-fashioned Marvel blurbs) to page 4’s near fullsize splash of Seth preparing to attack Asgard to page 11’s half-page illo of Balder facing down Sif, Frenz’s art is pure eye candy. But the icing on the cake has to be Kirby Kolleague Dashing Donnie Heck, who supplies the inks over Frenz’s pencils. As he did for Kirby a time or two during the Years of Consolidation, Heck does the honors this issue with his patented light touch, softening the images while at the same time firming them up and giving them just the right weight. Heck’s expert eye and experience come through wherever the reader looks with page 4 being the standout. There, with a background heavily reminiscent of Heck’s own stylized machinery designs executed for Avengers HQ or the Mandarin’s lab back the heady Years of Consolidation, he provides a retropop look to Seth’s palace hangout. Heck even goes the extra mile, supplying Zip-a-Tone for some neat special FX in the skies over Seth’s looming black pyramid on pages 17-18! “We were lucky enough...

The Mighty Thor #396, page 25: It was back to basics with this panoramic full-pager by penciler Ron Frenz and inker Don Heck as scripter Tom DeFalco came up with stories that were a mix of new and old. Even the cover designs with their Kirbyesque art and bombastic Stan Lee blurbs signalled that the fun had returned to a strip that had grown stodgy over the course of the Twilight Years. “For Asgard, and honor eternal!”

Avengers #297

“Futures Imperfect!” Walter Simonson (script); John Buscema (breakdowns); Tom Palmer (finished art) Although Simonson had been a distinct letdown following Roger Stern’s long and successful run on the title, the writer/artist did manage an

Professionals to the end, penciler John Buscema and inker Tom Palmer maintained the same level of quality to their work after Stern and Macchio left the Avengers strip as they did before. While Buscema would soon drop out, Palmer soldiered on, lending continuity to the art as other pencilers took over.

interesting extension of the Nebula/ Kang storylines of earlier issues that culminate here in Avengers #297 (Nov 1988) (with a title that ominously predicts the coming Dark Ages). Further confusing the identity of the real Kang, Simonson proceeds with a tale of cosmic proportions (while littering his script with such evocative phrases as “existential probabilities stabilizing,” “alternate probability nodes,” and “variable locus generator”) as Nebula takes control of the Avengers and forces them to help her steal a weapon that will supposedly make her mistress of the universe! Meanwhile, as the Avengers pierce a time bubble in space and observe alternative versions of themselves all racing to the same goal, Buscema and Palmer provide their last great joint effort on the art front, interpreting the space/ time action in appropriate yet awe-inspiring visuals (doing their own version of the “Kirby Krackle” effect!). Our tale ends with a shattered team of Avengers, including Dr. Druid who disappears into the time flux; the Black Knight laboring under the curse of his ebony blade; SheHulk, unable to bear having revealed what she really thought of her teammates, choosing to leave (good riddance!); and Thor deciding that he has better things to do in Asgard. Inadvertently perhaps, it turned out to be as good a place to call it quits as any. From this point on, the Avengers title would continue its long slide into ultimate obscurity, just as every other book in the Marvel stable would do as the effects of entropy became more and more obvious as the years rolled on. Nothing lasts forever after all. For the Avengers in particular, the end would be somewhat protracted at first thanks to a succession of lesser artists than Buscema/Palmer and lesser writers than Roger Stern (even a brief stint by John Byrne as writer and Tom Palmer’s continued inking The Dark Ages

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would fail to slow the descent). For his part, John Buscema would remain on the title for a few more issues as a reconstituted Avengers become involved in yet another convoluted inter-company crossover event (“Inferno”), something that would become increasingly, and tediously, prevalent as the Dark Ages progressed until any semblance of continuity, one of the key elements that enabled Marvel’s sudden rise in popularity during the Early Years, was completely abandoned. So let this issue be a symbolic end point, a last outrider of the House of Ideas that Stan and Jack and Steve and Don built nearly 27 years before. Marvel Comics: RIP.

The Punisher #14 “Social Studies” Mike Baron (script); Whilce Portacio (pencils); Scott Williams (inks) The Punisher #14 (Dec. 1988) finds writer Mike Baron still on the job but now teamed with rising star artist Whilce Portacio. While Baron himself turned out passable scripts for such independent fare as Nexus and Badger and disappointed with his first major assignment on a retooled Flash for DC, he found his mojo after taking on The Punisher. And although his work this issue was a bit disjointed, that may have been more the fault of the strip’s new artist who, as yet, was still somewhat wet behind the ears. Destined to enjoy a short but extremely hot period of fan interest a few years down the line, at this point, the self-taught Portacio had had a career mostly as an inker before being assigned to the Punisher with issue #8. Portacio was one of several younger artists just starting out at Marvel, including

Artist Whilce Portacio was a key factor in keeping the regular Punisher title in the plus column but without scripter Mike Baron, his pencils would not be enough to keep his slowout-of-the-starting-gate Wetworks effort from shooting blanks.

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Todd McFarlane, Rob Liefeld, Jim Lee, and Erik Larson whose work was influenced more by the dynamism of Japanese manga and the attention to meticulous detail in the work of colleague Art Adams than by Jack Kirby as an earlier generation had been. To be sure, Kirby’s power-packed penciling still echoed ghostlike in the halls of Marvel, but his real genius was in layout, the ability to tell a story that progressed from one panel to the next in a logical sequence thereby building a story that was at once exciting and understandable. Unfortunately, Portacio and his peers were lured away from basic storytelling by the adulation of an increasingly avid fanbase whose excitement level seemed directly related to their favorite artists’ ability to deliver big, poster-sized splash pages and colorful, larger-than-life (sometimes literally!) characters who stood around striking poses calculated to be as dramatic as possible. Having whipped their fans into a frenzy with their visual pyrotechnics (and propelled unit sales of the books they worked on into the stratosphere), the young artists began to think that the royalties they were earning were not enough, that it was their art, more than the characters or the writers they worked with, that was actually driving the sales engine. And so, when their demands for a bigger piece of the pie were not met by Marvel’s management, they walked away and formed their own company. Overnight, the new enterprise, called Image, became a major player on the comics scene with sales in the millions, matching even those of Marvel and DC. So overwhelming was its popularity and influence (every aspiring comic book artist began to ape the company’s splashy, confusing art style, making for empty, vacuous and flat-out ugly comics) that it marked a true sea change for the industry, one that hadn’t been felt at least since Lee and Kirby launched the Marvel age of comics in the early 1960s. But right there, in 1992 when Image was founded, there was a literal feeding frenzy among fans and investors that drove the new company’s sales into the millions of units for every title it released no matter how vapid or derivative (most seemed to be simple copies of various X-Men teams the young artists had been working on at Marvel before jumping ship, except that the names had changed). Soon, however, the Image creators felt the sting of criticism when some dared to question the quality of their scripting (or lack of it) and began to invite writers to join them. The sums they could pay were so astronomical that few could resist answering the call, even such luminaries as Alan Moore who had vocally refused to do any more writing for mainstream comics. To compete, Marvel and DC had to adapt and soon they too were hiring artists who could draw in the Image style and cranked out books

that seemed as trite and vulgar as any on the market. Eventually, the whole industry would be dragged into the heart of the Dark Ages where for years, barely any light was allowed to escape. But all that was down the road a piece, for now those young artists were just getting started, just beginning to attract notice, and with his work on The Punisher, Portacio was one of them. This issue for instance, the artist gets to draw the kind of student body no reader had likely ever seen before when Frank Castle poses as a social studies teacher to flush out a drug ring operating out of Malcolm Shabazz High School. Far from David Ross and Kevin Nowlan’s slick and polished jungle cat, Portacio’s Punisher is a chunky, squinty-eyed manmountain whose civilian clothes can barely contain his bulk. The beginnings of the kind of large-panel set pieces that the Image boys would make their trademark are in evidence as well as the Punisher follows his prey into the sewers beneath the city. Inks by Scott Williams (a friend of Portacio’s from his pre-professional days) add little in the way of mood, concentrating as they do on cross-hatching and adding such clinical details as wrinkles on clothes and outlining every nail and floor board in Castle’s classroom. Just the same, readers who jumped on the bandwagon early had the opportunity to see the Image boy style begin to emerge as Portacio’s confidence grew over the ten issues he did for The Punisher before being promoted to the even more high profile X-Men book.

Marvel Comics Presents #13 “Panther’s Quest” Don McGregor (script); Gene Colan (pencils); Tom Palmer (inks) “A Tooth For a Tooth” Bruce Jones (script/pencils/inks) In 1988, both Marvel and DC stumbled upon the same idea: why not create a book that featured a number of different characters in solo adventures, some stand alone and some serials, and then release it every other week or better yet, weekly? DC chose the latter and gave their version the venerable title of Action Comics Weekly while Marvel opted for the former calling theirs Marvel Comics Presents. At first, the comic was seen as yet another vehicle for the ubiquitous X-Men family of characters (who were already threatening to take over the comics world by the late Twilight Years) as well as a place where fan-favorite strips could be brought back with one or more of their original creators on the job but without much financial risk to the company. In fact, the first issue of the series featured a Man Thing serial by Steve Gerber and Tom Sutton and a Master of Kung Fu serial by Doug Moench and Tom Grindberg. They were okay but largely failed to capture the spirit of their original runs. After that, the series chugged

Gene Colan (left) was winding down his career in comics when he penciled the ambitious Black Panther serial in Marvel Comics Presents. Meanwhile, writer/artist Bruce Jones’ star was still in the ascendant during the latter Twilight Years.

along for a while with nothing to write home about until Marvel Comics Presents #13 (Feb. 1989) when a much-anticipated Black Panther serial began written by Don McGregor and drawn by Gene Colan and Tom Palmer. Destined to go on for 25 chapters, the story would prove that nothing much had changed for McGregor since he first wrote the character in the days of Jungle Action, namely that he continued to spare no words in the telling of his tale. As for Colan, by these years, the powerhouse of the early Twilight Years was beginning to run down, using much less expansive layouts (although that may have been due to having too much story to cover in too few pages) and increasingly awkward anatomy. Even the great Tom Palmer’s inks appeared sketchier than they’d ever been in the previous decade. The story itself, about the Panther’s mission to South Africa in search of his mother, quickly bogs down with a raft of uninteresting characters and one side incident after another that keeps the story from moving forward. If any readers remained after the eighth or ninth chapter, they had to have the patience of Job to stick with this turgid, slow motion tale! On the other hand, the true gem in this issue was a stand alone story of Shanna the She-Devil written and drawn by Bruce Jones! A concise little tale of murder and mystery on the African veldt, Jones’ handling of Shanna (surely one of the most preposterous characters ever conceived what with her prancing around the wild in nothing but what the latest Sports Illustrated swimsuit models were wearing that year) was on surer ground here than when he last handled her in the late, unlamented Ka-Zar book. (To be sure, there’s some The Dark Ages

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reference of Ka-Zar being back at home minding the baby while Shanna kicks butt in Africa!) Even better, Jones’ artwork seems not to have suffered at all in the years since he penciled on a regular basis for Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction, delivering a detailed, nicely laid out story worthy of Al Williamson, one of his influences. Although Marvel Comics Presents never featured that many really good strips, the Shanna story here is surely one of them. Told in only 8 pages, it still made the $1.25 cover price well worth it! Fun Fact: Shanna would return in even more spectacular fashion in “The Bush of Ghosts,” an 8-part serial written by Gerard Jones (no relation to Bruce!) and penciled by the still incomparable Paul Gulacy. Unfortunately, those books fall outside the 1980s and so will not be covered in any detail here; but the story itself surely ranks as a high point in an otherwise Dark Ages of the 1990s.

after several years retooling Superman at DC. And although the writer/ artist had achieved a superstar status in the wider media when he took over the Man of Steel, much of that cachet had begun to diminish by 1987 when Byrne returned to Marvel to work on Star Brand just before the vaunted New Universe collapsed. Byrne, who had attained a status among fans that only Jack Kirby had matched in the 1960s, stunned the comics world in 1985 when he failed to renew his contract with Marvel and became a freelancer. That shock was quickly overtaken by a subsequent move to DC following a disagreement with Marvel editor-

“One of Our Androids is Missing!” John Byrne (script/pencils); Mike Machlan (inks) By the 1ate 1980s and the very extremity of the Twilight Years, it had become common for artists and writers to cross over from Marvel to DC and back again, it happened so frequently in fact, that for a time, there was danger of individual house styles simply vanishing with no noticeable difference in the way books were produced between the two major companies. (That would change over the next decade, especially with the rise of British writers at DC and manga-inspired artists at Marvel). So it came as little surprise in the middle of the decade when John Byrne returned to Marvel 210

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West Coast Avengers #42

West Coast Avengers #42, page 22: Like Jerry Ordway, inker Mike Machlan falls short over John Byrne’s pencils, leaving them looking vaguely unfinished. Luckily however, that didn’t detract from Byrne’s inventive storylines, especially those centering on the Vision and Scarlet Witch.

in-chief Jim Shooter over plans Byrne had for the Hulk book he was due to take over. Byrne claimed that plans he had for the strip had been pre-approved by Shooter who then changed his mind after the writer/artist took over the title. So it was with some irony that Byrne’s return to Marvel began with Star Brand, Shooter’s signature title in the New Universe he’d created. But with Shooter’s own departure from Marvel, that universe soon imploded and Byrne moved on to the regular Marvel Universe, starting up a new She-Hulk series, teaming with John Romita, Jr. on Iron Man, and taking over writing and penciling the West Coast Avengers. The latter move was based on an agreement with new editor-in-chief Tom DeFalco that he be allowed to retell the origin of the Vision, which begins here in West Coast Avengers #42 (March 1989), a story that would lead to radical changes to the Scarlet Witch and erasing much damage done to the character over the years. Byrne, never at a loss for ideas, hits the ground running with a number of plots and sub-plots including an unexplained reversion of Tigra into a real tiger (never a great character, it would be a blessing if Byrne managed to write her out of the strip somehow), a semi-reunited Hank Pym (Ant-Man/Giant-Man/Goliath/Yellowjacket) and estranged wife Janet Van Dyne, the return of Mockingbird (Hawkeye’s wife!), the disappearance of the Vision, and an attack by Ultron! Whew!

Amazing Spider-Man #313 “Slithereens” David Michelinie (script); Todd McFarlane (pencils/inks) It was a measure of how far the X-Men franchise had insinuated itself over the entire line of Marvel’s comics when something like “the non-mutant super-hero” had to be placed above the masthead of Amazing Spider-Man #313 (March 1989) to remind fans that there were other kinds of characters than mutants. That, however, didn’t mean that the mutant mania that would become the stock in trade of the looming Dark Ages wasn’t already drawing other titles into its orbit, i.e. the second note on this issue’s cover reminding readers that “Inferno continues” within its pages. Inferno was a major crossover event centering on the X-Men (this time it’s mutants vs demons...ho-hum), a device that Marvel would use with annoying frequency as the years went on, irritating readers and creators alike who had to put up with story elements they could care less about and that interfered with ongoing storylines that usually were much more interesting than X-scribe Chris Claremont’s latest X-travaganza. Luckily, however, Inferno had little to do with the events this issue, albeit what story there is doesn’t add up to much anyway. Once again, Curt Connors as the Lizard is on the loose

(a character that ceased being interesting after his initial appearance in Spidey #6) and our hero has to stop him. As usual, not remembering who he really is, the Lizard is out to kill his alter ego’s wife and son. Spidey figures out yet another way to stop him and return him to normal, and after succeeding the story ends on a down note when Connors decides to separate from his family until he can find a cure for what ails him. The story by writer David Michelinie is pretty low-level stuff and may have been intended purely as a device to satisfy hot new artist Todd McFarlane’s desire to go hogwild drawing Spider-Man in his own twisty, spidery style. The self-taught McFarlane began his career at DC, learning the ropes during an extended run as artist of Infinity, Inc. and Detective Comics. From there, he jumped to Marvel where his inyour-face, over-rendered style on the Incredible Hulk quickly came to the attention of many fans. That nascent enthusiasm for McFarlane’s work was fanned into a flame after he moved on to the Amazing Spider-Man with issue #298. There, his art seemed to finally free itself from all restraints, bursting across the page with an avalanche of lines and detail that seemed to fill up every nook and cranny. Take page 5 of this issue for instance, where a narrowly vertical panel 1 shows the exterior of Aunt May’s house with ominous clouds taking up nearly half the upper portion, panel 2 is crammed with living room furniture, and the background of panel 4 is filled up with crosshatching. Even the space over the heads of characters in panel 3

Bookends: Artist Todd McFarlane earned his sea legs on DC’s Infinity Inc. before migrating to Marvel and, propelled by a rising tide of fan excitement, quickly moved up the assignment chain. Outgrowing the House of Ideas, he broke loose and ended his penciling career working on various iterations of his own multi-million copy selling Spawn.

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Amazing Spider-Man #313, page 27: The art style that took fandom by storm. In an era when youthful attention spans were beginning to shorten due to such pop-culture stimuli as fastmoving computer games, quick-cutting MT V videos, and increasingly graphic films, it was easy to see how Todd McFarlane’s flamboyant, in-your-face art could capture the imagination of readers who themselves had only begun to adapt to the era’s increased pace of visual stimuli. From now on, everything would have to be amped up: in film, there would be no more long takes, video games would require instant responses, and in comics, there would be no excess wordage to slow down the action.

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is occupied by long-out-of-favor symbolic hearts over lovestruck Kristy’s head and radiating force lines over Peter Parker’s head indicating shock and surprise. In many other panels showing closeups of characters, McFarlane ignores the old artist’s maxim that the more lines used on a woman’s face, the older she looks, and ends up proving how true it was. The influence of Japanese manga is also apparent in characters’ wide-staring eyes and background speed lines to indicate rapid movement without distortion of the central object. None of it seemed to be part of an overall plan with any sense that the layouts formed a cohesive whole, a problem that would plague McFarlane and his acolytes for years to come. But for many, those attributes were what made McFarlane’s work exciting, elements that would prove to be the basis for a coming evolution in comics art. Influenced by the similarly dynamic but detail-oriented Art Adams, the new style quickly spread to others and became the signature look of the group of artists who would soon quit Marvel at the height of their popularity to form their own company. That group would be led by none other than McFarlane, whose own popularity among giddy fans would crest after he took over both writing and drawing Spider-Man. Marvel accommodated McFarlane’s desire to do it all by coming up with a whole new book simply titled Spider-Man, whose first issue sold an amazing 2.5 million copies. But even as the royalty money poured in, McFarlane was not satisfied. He demanded more and, when it was not forthcoming, convinced a group of Marvel’s hottest artists (including Rob

Liefeld, Erik Larsen, Marc Silvestri, Jim Lee, Whilce Portacio, and Jim Valentino) to join him in leaving the company to form one of their own. The result was Image Comics, the first new comics company since the silver age to offer a serious challenge to the dominance of the industry by Marvel and DC. For better or worse, the over-rendered style of art popularized by the group became the new benchmark of comics art eagerly imitated by a legion of up and comers to the detriment of comics themselves. Together with the Image boys’ early disdain for writers, comics produced by their company as well as imitations by DC and Marvel, threatened to drive the industry to creative senescence if not financial doom (narrowly avoided following a boom brought on by starry eyed investors and collectors who bought up each new Image title by the caseload, resulting in sales in the millions of units with accompanying $ for their creators who now owned their characters without having to share profits with an employer). More than anyone, through his leadership in the Image revolution and the influence of his art style (made even more immediate by the huge success of Spawn, a title he created for Image that epitomized all that was wrong about the Dark Ages), McFarlane might properly be seen as the villain of the piece. But in truth, he couldn’t have come so close to ruining comics all by himself. The other companies, and Marvel in particular, by following the Image lead as slavishly as they did, coupled with the drive to dump the Comics Code and concentrate on satisfying the tastes of undiscerning adults, helped immeasurably in almost killing the goose that laid the golden egg. When the dust of the Image boom finally cleared in the new century, the industry was a shadow of what it had been even by the standards of the late Twilight Years. In coming years, the importance of comics to their corporate holders would be considered less for reading pleasure than for the generation of new characters and ideas that could be exploited by the infinitely more lucrative film industry.

West Coast Avengers #45 “New Faces” John Byrne (script/pencils); Mike Machlan (inks) Upon his return to Marvel, Byrne was given a number of assignments including of course West Coast Avengers, which had been initiated from an idea by Roger Stern who wrote the limited-series that introduced the team. Writer Steve Englehart then guided the regular book for 41 issues before the reins were handed over to Byrne. And although Stern was a strong storyteller (like Byrne, his encyclopedic knowledge of Marvel continuity and history enabled him to write good stories that grew organically out of past events), Byrne

Writer Steve Englehart had his strongest period in the first half of the Twilight Years. By the late 1980s however, his star had begun to wane and in the new century had fallen back on writing novels.

was no slouch in the idea department himself. And in the case of West Coast Avengers, he definitely had some ideas of his own including telling what he termed “my Vision story.” Apparently, Byrne held the belief that somewhere along the line, the development of the Vision had taken a wrong turn. Like Peter Parker marrying Mary Jane (or anyone for that matter), the Vision’s marriage to the Scarlet Witch “domesticated” the character, robbing him of much of his intrinsic interest as an artificial being struggling to discover its inner humanity. It was far more difficult then, to perceive the Vision as a cold, emotionless being, an object of resentment to ordinary humans, a dynamic set up by Roy Thomas way back in the Grandiose Years when he invented the character. Apparently Byrne understood that weakness in the Vision and determined to set things right by returning him to the status quo ante. Thus, one of the conditions he had in agreeing to take over West Coast Avengers was the freedom to redefine the Vision (and by extension, the Scarlet Witch as well). Editor-in-chief Tom DeFalco agreed, and Byrne took over the book with issue #42. The “Vision story” began immediately with the disappearance of the Vision and his being tracked down to a secret facility run by a group made up of an international cast of scientists charged with making sure the Vision would never again pose a threat to the world (as he did in Avengers #252-254). But the West Coasters arrive too late to “save” the Vision, who has already been dismantled (depicted in a fantastic opening splash page in issue #44!) Taking the Vision (or what’s left of him) back to their HQ, Henry Pym manages to restore him to the The Dark Ages

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point at which the Avengers first met him (as expressed on the cover of West Coast Avengers #45 [June 1989] designed as an homage to the original by John Buscema for Avengers #57). The Vision emerges as a pale-colored, emotionless robot, just as he was in his early appearances. In the meantime, something strange is going on with his and Scarlet Witch’s twin children; Tigra continues to experience periodic regressions; the U.S. Agent, a new, government-imposed member of the team is introduced; and team leader Hawkeye quits! Double whew! It was clear that Byrne intended to place his stamp on this book with ideas that were definitely his own. And they would keep on coming with dire consequences for the Scarlet Witch in particular.

Action Comics titles where again he managed to transform the venerable character from his stodgy 1950s persona to a hip ’80s action hero. It was a template that would endure for decades after Byrne left the character. In story after story, Byrne came up with new villains and revamped old ones (including a version of Lex Luthor that still stands today). He did the same for supporting characters. Stories were often single-issue tales, which made his churning out of clever, entertaining stories all the more

“With Friends Like These!” John Byrne (script/pencils); Mike Machlan (inks) By this point in his career, there could be no doubt in anyone’s mind that Byrne was a regular fount of ideas! It was proven that, as early as his takeover of the art chores on the X-Men from Dave Cockrum late in the 1970s, he became an important contributor to the stories that followed (when he left the book, the good ideas, and good stories, dried up). After he moved on to the FF and having complete control of that title, his contributions to the X-Men became even more apparent as he began churning out one great story after another...for years! When he finally left the Fantastic Four in 1986, the fresh ideas were still pouring forth (although some of them did prove to be half-baked). Moving on to DC, he took over the Superman and 214

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Avengers West Coast #47

Nice shock reveal by writer/artist John Byrne whose untimely interrupted run on West coast avengers would be filled with surprise twists and turns.

remarkable, a streak that showed no signs of running out of steam when he decided to leave DC and return to Marvel. The ideas kept on coming with West Coast Avengers, Iron Man (which he wrote only), and even the execrable She-Hulk, who was given her own new book just for Byrne who proceeded to turn the strip into a humor book! Unlike many of his peers, such as Frank Miller and Chris Claremont, Byrne’s ideas never seemed to run out and he rarely repeated himself. By the late 1990s, in fact, he was still turning out interesting stories with X-Men: The Hidden Years, a series telling untold stories of the first X-Men team that took place immediately following the cancellation of their original Silver Age run with X-Men #66. It would prove to be one of the precious few bright spots in all of the Dark Ages. But back to Avengers West Coast #47 (Aug. 1989) with its spanking new logo! This ish, the U.S. Agent has a run-in with Tigra who seems uncomfortably... well...frisky! Meanwhile, the Scarlet Witch is visiting Saunders College to meet a group of researchers who claim they can help restore the now emotionless Vision to his more human aspect. But not all is what it seems as the Scarlet Witch is thrown into a room and covered by a black, viscous substance that proves to be an ancient living creature, a creature that is now prepared to take over the earth from human beings by absorbing the genetic material of mutants! Meanwhile, back at West Coast HQ, the Scarlet Witch’s twins have disappeared...

Marvel Comics Presents #26 “Pharaoh’s Legacy” Howard Mackie (script); Rich Buckler (pencils); Josef Rubinstein (inks) “Panther’s Quest” Don McGregor (script); Gene Colan (pencils); Tom Palmer (inks) “Rise and Shine” Doug Moench (script); Paul Gulacy (pencils/inks) Post-Master of Kung Fu, Doug Moench became a hitor-miss scripter with a number of duds to his credit including mini-series such as Slash Maraud, Six From Sirius, and even James Bond (all done in collaboration with artist Paul Gulacy). His one regular run with Batman also failed to live up to expectations. On the other hand, he did have his moments and when he hit, he hit dead center with single-issue stories starring King Kull and the Black Widow, both for issues of Bizarre Adventures as well as a multi-part Batman tale for Legends of the Dark Knight. He was fortunate in these last to have titanic talents like John Bolton illustrate the Kull story and Gulacy again on the Widow and Batman. It was with Gulacy again that Moench teamed up for yet another winner with Coldblood-7, a character they created expressly for a 10-part serial in Marvel Comics Presents #26 (Aug.

1989). Coldblood’s numerical designation was a play on his real name, Eric Savin, a military man thought killed in a training accident whose body is salvaged and rebuilt into a combat cyborg (complete with a built-in computer with which he holds internal conversations). The first chapter opens this issue with Coldblood being activated and not knowing anything about himself or his whereabouts...which seem to be in a devastated New York City that he soon realizes is overrun by wild dogs, combat tanks, and robots...all apparently out to kill him. If it all sounds familiar, it’s no coincidence as the story had originally been conceived as a vehicle for Deathlok, a concept created by writer/ artist Rich Buckler back in the 1970s but since fallen by the wayside. In fact, Moench himself had been in on the early formulation of the Deathlok strip and even scripted the first issues. Anyway, something went awry with his plans to use Deathlok. For some reason, permission wasn’t granted so Moench recast his cyborg central character as ColdBlood-7 and let him loose in current continuity. Over the course of the subsequent chapters, Coldblood would learn his identity, reconnect with girlfriend Gina Dyson, and destroy mad scientist Mako, who was largely responsible for his creation. It would be a wildly inventive ride and a strong comeback for both Moench and artist Gulacy. The only thing wrong was that nothing was ever done with Coldblood after this story. Too bad, as its set up was sufficiently different from Deathlok that it could have been one of the most interesting strips of the ’90s...if the Dark Ages hadn’t

Writer Howard Mackie (left) teamed with artist Rich Buckler for a victory lap of sorts on the Havok serial in Marvel Comics Presents. Little did anyone realize at the time that such traditional storytelling would soon be going the way of the dinosaurs.

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Writer Doug Moench and artist Paul Gulacy also teamed up for independent projects such as Slash Maraud and Six From Sirius but though competently executed, disconnected from either the Marvel of DC universes, they tended to leave readers less than satisfied.

settled in. But believe it or not, even this late in the Twilight Years, there were still some glimmers of light including this issue’s installment of a Havok serial. Somewhat ironic was the fact that it was being drawn by Deathlok creator Rich Buckler even as a doppelganger of his character was blasting bad guys over in the Coldblood feature. Blandly written by Howard Mackie, the script is serviceable and the art, although not as visceral as Buckler’s work on Deathlok, still displays the realistic, down-to-Earth elements picked up from Neal Adams, one of the artist’s major influences back in the day. It was a style soon doomed to extinction with the rise of Rob Liefeld, Jim Lee, and Todd McFarlane, artists who drew their own influences from Japanese manga. Also included in this issue is the 14th chapter in McGregor and Colan’s seemingly interminable Black Panther serial as our hero interferes with a neighborhood execution and for his troubles has the tables turned on him. The issue is rounded out by a forgettable Hulk tale by scribe Peter David who would rise to inexplicable Dark Ages prominence on ole greenskin’s back.

Avengers West Coast #49

“Baptism of Fire!” John Byrne (script/pencils/inks) With the transformation of Marvel Girl into Phoenix and then “Dark Phoenix,” a new and powerful comics cliche was invented: the heroine who had previously displayed mostly defensive or passive super powers suddenly finds those powers augmented to the nth degree while having her personality altered from one of traditional female role model to feminist nightmare. 216

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Back when he partnered with Chris Claremont on the X-Men, Byrne had illustrated the Dark Phoenix storyline in which the mostly telekinetic Marvel Girl is possessed by some cosmic entity who turns her into a Galactus-level villainess. Byrne took that template with him after he began writing and drawing the FF. At first, he had Susan Richards, the Invisible Girl, defend her name and position on the team to a Barbara Walterstype interviewer; but as the series progressed, Byrne perhaps felt the need to prove his own feminist bona fides and began up-powering Susan until she became the most powerful member of the FF. Next, he made her leader of the team when husband Reed was absent from the scene. Finally, he completed the character’s evolution by having her transformed into an evil dominatrix whose powers of invisibility and shields made her virtually unbeatable. Now, in Avengers West Coast #49 (Oct 1989), he does it again, except this time his victim is Wanda Maximoff, the Scarlet Witch. Once, the Scarlet Witch simply had the power to alter probabilities but at some point it was decided to up the ante and give her magical powers after some tutelage from Agatha Harkness (apparently, just because the Scarlet Witch had the word “witch” in her name it was assumed she was capable of supernatural powers even though her mutant probability altering power was science-based). It was through the use of these newly discovered magic powers that Wanda was able to give birth to twins even though her husband was an unliving android. But in telling his “Vision story,” Byrne also decided that the story of domestic bliss built around the Scarlet Witch also made little sense and that it was time for things to be set right. By this issue, that effort had already started with a sub-plot dealing with the disappearance of Wanda’s children and continued with the scheme revealed last ish of an ancient being trying to adapt itself to homo superior in an attempt to supplant all human life on earth. In that regard, the Scarlet Witch is temporarily changed into a “dark Scarlet Witch” as she follows the established pattern for traditional heroines turned evil villainesses. But as would be seen in upcoming issues that fall beyond the scope of the 1980s, Byrne was not done with Wanda. In issue #s 51 and 52 it will be revealed that her twin sons were not real but only fragments taken from Mephisto (Marvel’s super-villain version of the devil) while Wanda suffered from the effects of a “hysterical pregnancy!” Realization of the fact throws Wanda into shock, the condition in which her father, Magneto, finds her. Taking advantage of the situation, he turns her to the dark side transforming her into a true “dark Scarlet Witch.” Unfortunately, Byrne would leave the book before concluding this latest story arc, one that promised to be one of his most interesting.

Marvel Comics Presents #30

“Pharaoh’s Legacy” Howard Mackie (script); Rich Buckler (pencils); Bruce Patterson (inks) “Panther’s Quest” Don McGregor (script); Gene Colan (pencils); Tom Palmer (inks) “Rise and Shine” Doug Moench (script); Paul Gulacy (pencils/inks) For a long stretch, there was nothing to crow about in Marvel Comics Presents with #30 (Oct. 1989) featuring much the same line-up as #26

Marvel Comics Presents #30, page 20: What spotting some blacks can do to enhance mood, atmosphere, and style! Here, artist Paul Gulacy gives inkers such as Mike Machlan and Jerry Ordway some lessons in how to use inks effectively.

and as it would till the Coldblood serial ended in #35. But then, who needed anything else so long as Moench and Gulacy were appearing again in a regular Marvel comic and firing on all burners? Take this issue for instance with a chapter at the midpoint of the Coldblood serial. Both penciled and inked by Gulacy himself, there apparently wasn’t going to be any slow-down in the action department as our hero finds himself outside his ruined New York training ground and in Las Vegas of all places. Here he encounters what appears to be a first class Gulacy style hooker who leads him to a room at the “Lucky 7” hotel (the numeral 7 again being a play on Coldblood’s real name...Eric Savin). Presumably undetected, Coldblood finds the time to access his internal computer to find out more about himself and in a two-page sequence, Gulacy treats the readers to a flashback done with a kind of wash tone effect as the former Lt. Col. Eric Savin is put on the trail of illegal expenditures and experimentation by Gina Dyson. Savin investigates Dyson’s charges that government scientist Mako is pursuing private research into the creation of a cybernetic organism that he plans to offer to the highest bidder. Then, just as Savin and Dyson become an item, Eric is literally blown to pieces. The next thing he knows, he’s a cyborg code named Coldblood-7 with a computer for a conscience! The entire Coldblood serial was a tour de force for Gulacy who’d made his mark on Master of Kung Fu during the glory days of the Twilight Years and had spent the ensuing years bouncing around at companies other than Marvel. Most famously, he’d teamed up with The Dark Ages

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Don McGregor (who coincidentally is also featured this issue in the ongoing “Panther’s Quest” serial with artist Gene Colan) on Sabre, a somewhat groundbreaking at the time feature they produced for Eclipse Comics that ultimately proved overly exploitative. (It did boast being the first graphic novel to be sold in the direct market though). From there, he teamed up at different times with Chuck Dixon, McGregor, and Moench, his former partner on MOKF, on a number of features for DC, Eclipse, Dark Horse, and others before landing back at Marvel with a manner of art that had evolved a little since his days on MOKF. Although less detailed, it was, on the other hand, more stylized, even having a two-dimensional quality that, coupled with a more liberal use of blacks, produced a striking and unique vision that transformed the balletic quality of the violence he was often asked to portray into a thing of beauty. Here, that effect (in a final page depicting Eric Savin being blown apart by a roadside bomb) is especially apparent, something quite in keeping with Deathlok, Coldblood’s precursor and inspiration. But imagine the shock to the senses of readers as they went from the last page in the Coldblood story to the first of Leir “Lord of Lightning!” An unfortunate attempt at art by Tom Morgan who found himself stuck with a so-called story by the unknown Sue Flaxman. Poor guy! But it wasn’t all bad for readers this issue. They still had the serviceable Havok serial to look forward to (despite its apparent need to be shored up with a guest appearance by the ubiquitous Wolverine...could readers in the late Twilight Years ever get away from him?) and the seemingly endless Black Panther storyline (don’t worry...only 6 of 25 chapters left to go!)

Gulacy preferred not to confine himself to Marvel or DC in the 1980s, contributing to chancy early independent projects such as Don McGregor’s Sabre and Airboy for Eclipse Comics.

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Avengers West Coast #50 “Return of the Hero” John Byrne (script/pencils); Mike Machlan (inks) This issue’s credits share the art kudos between Byrne and Mike Machlan suggesting that Byrne likely only did layouts or barely more than that. It shows. Like all great comics artists that came before him—Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, Don Heck, even Gene Colan—after spending decades in the business, Byrne’s skill as an artist began to flag. It may have begun as early as his late period Fantastic Four where he’d given up inking his own work and handed the job over to the likes of Al Gordon. In those issues, Byrne’s art looked rushed and unfinished. Like late-period Kirby, his panel layouts, though retaining the old dynamism, began showing signs of age as the same facial expressions, body language, and other tropes repeated themselves far too often. At DC, the artist managed to hold deterioration back for a while, but even with his earliest work there on the Man of Steel and Legends mini-series, his pencils were sparse; big panels took up page space but within those panels there was a lot of empty space. Back at Marvel, his initial work on Avengers West Coast was solid but still a far cry from the detailed work of his early FF or the slick, almost Adams-esque style of his pre-X-Men days. As the years passed, it often looked as if he skipped the pencil and inking stages of his art and simply drew the final product with a marker. Still, a certain dynamism would remain with his work, even at its most deteriorated as would be seen in his layouts for X-Men: the Hidden Years where he attempted to capture something of Neal Adams’ fluid style as well as on the Namor book he would write and draw following his stint here with the West Coasters. There, he began the strip with some enthusiasm as could be seen in his use of a kind of wash tone for underwater sequences. That careful style was abandoned as the series progressed until it ended in some of the worst art of his career. Which is the long way of saying that the deterioration of his art, in the form of rushing it, was on display here in Avengers West Coast #50 (Nov 1989). Want proof? Just take a gander at this issue’s opening splash page of Ann Raymond, wife of the deceased Toro (the original Human Torch’s human kid sidekick). Vague, scratchy feathering laid on with a heavy brush robs the woman’s image of fine details while backgrounds and everything else on the page is rendered in barely serviceable linework whose composition merely suggests windows, rugs, or piano. The horror continues onto pages 2 and 3 with characters delineated as hardly more than stick figures with a few dashes here and there to suggest facial features. Ann Raymond herself, who in later issues will appear as a youngish woman,

Writer/artist John Byrne had a history of shaking up the status quo. On Fantastic Four, he introduced Aunt Petunia, broke up the Thing/Alicia ménage, and transformed Susan Richards into a sado-masochistic pin up girl; at DC, he re-imagined Superman’s origin and powers and contributed to a realigning of the entire DC universe; and back at Marvel, retconned the Vision, revived the original Human Torch, and made it so that the Vision and Scarlet Witch’s children never existed!

here looks like an old lady the same age as Agatha Harkness. Ugh! Machlan, not the best of inkers, does Byrne no favors here. He might have been good over an artist who gave him more to work with, but left mostly to his own devices, he was woefully ill equipped to save the day. But despite the disappointing artwork, the tale itself is interesting as Byrne’s facility for storytelling hasn’t yet faltered. Following the epochal events in his “Vision story,” Byrne next moves on to the other side of the Vision’s origin, the one dealing with his being rebuilt, sort of, from the original Human Torch. That proves wrong, as Byrne proceeds to overturn everything fans thought they knew about the Vision and returns the original Torch to the Marvel Universe!

Marvel Comics Presents #35 “Panther’s Quest” Don McGregor (script); Gene Colan (pencils); Tom Palmer (inks) “Rise and Shine” Doug Moench (script); Paul Gulacy (pencils/inks) Although there would still be some good issues ahead, including “The Bush of Ghosts,” a Shanna the She-Devil serial by Gerard Jones and Paul Gulacy and “Weapon X,” a serial that for a while at least, finally revealed the long-awaited origin of Wolverine, courtesy of superstar writer/artist Barry (now sporting the middle moniker

of “Windsor”) Smith, for the most part, this title had run its course. Begun as an interesting, even exciting experiment in up-frequency comics and as a vehicle for fan-favorite features, its days were numbered right from the start when Wolverine, arguably the breakout character of the 1980s, was featured in a lead-off serial in the first issue. Since then, each had featured at least one mutant character, usually an X-Men-affiliated one, in the lead spot with Wolverine making guest appearances. More was to come. With the conclusion of the upcoming Shanna and Weapon X serials, mutants would virtually take over the entire book and down the line, as the Dark Ages went into full swing, slots would be given over entirely to the company’s hottest characters. Wolverine, of course, would become a permanent feature, as would a new Ghost Rider and others like Death’s Head, most drawn by rising stars of the Dark Ages. But why dwell on such depressing events when the final chapter of the Coldblood serial is featured right here in Marvel Comics Presents #35 (Nov. 1989)? In the final, climactic battle, McGregor and Gulacy pull out all the stops as Coldblood and Gina face off against Mako, who’s armored up in a “weapon walker!” An explosive page 2 (featuring a huge wash tone illo of a grotesquely smiling Mako) is quickly followed by a shot of Coldblood with his arm blown off while Gina makes a last stand with a big gun. In the heat of battle, Coldblood finds that his emotions haven’t been erased along with his former identity after all. And in a final scene, readers are reminded that this is, after all, not the Code-approved Silver or even Bronze Age comics of yore as Coldblood simply shoots down Mako, leaving him a charred husk. Finally, in a happy ending of sorts, Eric and Gina drive off into the sunset and a hoped for at the time (but doomed never to happen) regular comics series. Meanwhile, in chapter 23 of the Black Panther serial, T’Challa at last seemed to be coming to the end of his quest as he invades a South African estate where he believes his mother to be. But with another two chapters to go, it was a sure bet that there would be a few more hurdles aside from this issue’s armed guards, vicious dogs, lion pits, and bear traps that the Panther will need to get past first! The only interesting thing that can be said about the remaining pair of tales this ish, an (X-Men-related) Excalibur serial and a Her solo (don’t ask! All you need to know is that she’s the opposite of Him and an example of a misguided feminism that took root late in the Twilight Years that called either for creating female versions of existing male characters or simply turning male characters into female ones [i.e., Capt. Marvel/Ms Marvel, Hulk/ She-Hulk, Spider-Man/Spider-Woman, Him/Her... get it?] is that both were penciled by a sleepwalking Erik Larsen. Larsen, believe it or nuts, was destined to The Dark Ages

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become a hot artist at Marvel and a big wheel with his own comics company called Image that he would found along with a number of other Marvel artists who became popular items during the Dark Ages. The “Image boys” would become a large part of the reason why the whole comics industry nearly collapsed deep in the darkest part of the Dark Age.

Sensational She-Hulk #7, page 14: Refusing to let go, writer/ artist John Byrne returned to She-Hulk after coming back to Marvel from DC. Picking up where he left the character off in his FF run, i.e. a somewhat serio/comic take on the emerald Amazon, he put the pedal to the metal in a new series that removed her from any sense of reality or seriousness.

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Sensational She-Hulk #7 “I have No Mouth and I Am Mean!” John Byrne (script/pencils); Bob Wiacek (inks) For a throwaway character invented solely to protect the copyright of a female Hulk (from the producers of the Hulk TV show who, rumor had it, were considering spinning off a distaff version à la Bionic Woman, cutting Marvel out of potential ownership), the She-Hulk character has proved to be surprisingly durable. From her initial 25-issue series begun by Stan Lee and John Buscema (!) the character bounced around including lengthy stints on the Avengers and Fantastic Four, the latter courtesy of John Byrne. Her origin being undistinguished and born of corporate necessity, it’s a wonder why She-Hulk managed to stick around in one gig or another for so many years. The only logical explanation is that the people at Marvel, knowing they had few powerful females in their stable (though they were busy uppowering the ones that weren’t) wanted to keep the character around. Finally, when Byrne took her on for the Fantastic Four, he found a take on the character that seemed to fit: light comedy with more than a touch of sexiness thrown in. It was that version of the She-Hulk that he stuck to after he returned to Marvel from DC and took on the character in a new Sensational She-Hulk strip. (Byrne had also tackled the character solo in a 1985 graphic novel of the same name). This time, however, Byrne pulled out all the stops and turned the ongoing book into straight comedy, often taking the opportunity to satirize comic book conventions and pushing

the bounds of good taste. (In issue #37 for example, Byrne even leaves several pages completely blank as the action is supposedly rubbed out by the power of the Living Eraser! [Something Byrne did before in Alpha Flight] Which begged the question: did he still get his regular penciling and inking rate for those pages?) In between, he had She-Hulk squaring off with some of the more...off-beat, shall we say... villains in the Marvel Universe while frequently breaking the fourth wall to comment directly to the reader about the silly situations she frequently found herself in. In Sensational She-Hulk #7 (Nov. 1989) for instance, she finds herself a prisoner of Xemnu (remember him from Journey Into Mystery #62 [1960] where he was called “the Hulk?” Didn’t think you would), a furry white alien looking for companionship to ease his loneliness. Adding to the looniness, this issue also includes characters from Marvel’s deservedly defunct US1 comic and trucker “superhero” Razorback. Jokes good and bad litter the issue and no one is expected to take whatever happens seriously, especially the She-Hulk herself! Although Byrne can still weave interesting stories with the best of them (and in his time, he may have been the best), his artwork had suffered in the years since initially quitting Marvel. The decline had begun even before he quit the FF and though it improved while he was at DC, it sank again upon his return to Marvel. Not that it was that bad compared to almost anybody else working at the time, but it definitely had a flaccid quality not helped by his decision to be inked by others than himself. Later, the problem with his art would grow worse when he took to using a marker or sharpie to ink making for sloppy, less detailed work. Byrne wrote and drew the Sensational SheHulk from its first issue to #8 before quitting and returned again for issues 31-50. Due to momentum created by Byrne, the title would chug along until issue #60 before cooler heads prevailed and it was canceled in 1994.

imagine (apparently out and out foul language was still a no-no as this issue is littered with so many instances of #^%*$@! that it actually interferes with a proper understanding of what exactly the characters are saying), the Code Authority had finally written itself off into virtual extinction; something that would become fact in 2001 when Marvel stopped submitting its books to the Authority for review (it favored its own in-house ratings system) while DC did the same in 2011. The end of the Comics Code would not prove to be a boon for the industry overall however. As the Dark Ages advanced, quality and good taste retreated until most comics became unreadable junk to the general public...and to most young people who were at all literate. In fact, being illiterate was almost a prerequisite for a comics fan as the written word became an endangered species disappearing from the four-color page faster than the companies could raise their cover prices! But by the turn of the new century, such things would hardly matter as ever-shrinking comics sales became less important than their use as idea factories for the far more lucrative film industry. All that would come later but it had its beginnings in books like this issue of Punisher War Journal, featuring the early art of Jim Lee, who’d manage to hit the sweet spot when he took over the penciling chores on the X-Men just when the new bubble of collector mania swept the comics market. The rising tide would carry him and other young Marvel artists to a super stardom never seen in the industry before and tempt them to leave Marvel to start their own line

Punisher War Journal #11 “Shock Treatment” Carl Potts (script); Jim Lee (pencils); Klaus Janson (inks) It’s hard to believe that Punisher War Journal #11 (Nov. 1989) was approved by the Comics Code Authority! But then maybe it was the growing number of issues like this, containing multiple instances of shootings, stalkings, drug sales, beatings, stabbings, and disrespect for police, that prompted another revision of the Comics Code. This time it’s guiding light appeared to be political correctness: violence and perversion were in and little else was out. With the way open to practically anything creators could 221

Mar vel Comics in the 1980s

Scripter Carl Potts (left) didn’t make it easy for readers to understand much of what was going on in Punisher: War Journal but then, coherence was likely far less important than artist Jim Lee’s in-your-face imagery.

of creator-owned comics. Although each had their own styles of art, they also had features in common including a love of detail and an overuse of money shots that would develop into whole books made up seemingly of nothing but large, poster-sized panels with characters standing around in faux dramatic postures. That approach can be seen on this issue’s cover as well as a page 2 splash showing the Punisher standing over a pile of bodies and lugging a heavy machine gun. Adding to the drama is some pouring rain and the Punisher’s iconic skull insignia revealed beneath a duster draping his

Punisher War Journal #11, page 3: Influenced by Art Adams and Todd McFarlane in his attention to detail and penchant for manga style faces, artist Jim Lee displays the style here that placed him in the rarefied company of other soon to be Image Comics founders. He’d cement his rock star status after taking over Uncanny X-Men and relaunching it with a number one issue. Sales for the book shattered records and made Lee one of the hottest commodities on the market.

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shoulders. The effect is repeated in the bottom half of page 8, which is dominated by our hero as he kicks down a door and the top half of page 9 as a reverse angle shows him mowing down a half dozen bad guys with a single gunburst. Later, another half-page shot depicts a night-time scene with a shadowed Punisher taking a bead on an unsuspecting victim. Still early in his career, Lee’s overall art is rough, stiff, and with an unfinished look to it in too many places. Although unexceptional in quieter moments (for instance, if not for the color of their hair, it would be impossible to tell the difference between a grandmother and parole officer who share the same scene), his interest picks up some when it’s time for some action. The story by Carl Potts (who seems to have been promoted...or demoted...depending on one’s viewpoint, from being editor of the regular Punisher series to writer of War Journal) succeeds in directing the reader’s sympathy toward teenager Ron Salazar, who’s been arrested for drug dealing and sent to a boot camp instead of prison (at the time, a popular alternative to prison for young offenders). As the story unfolds (somewhat confusingly due to an almost complete lack of captions, awkward transitions between scenes, and what appears to be a sub-plot being developed for future issues), we see the Punisher determined on killing Ron believing that he has no intention of being rehabilitated. What suspense there is builds until the Punisher relents and wonders for the umpteenth time if he is “getting too soft.” In other places, Potts script reads like an ad from Ammo Magazine: “This new Hex G-11 is real sweet...,” exclaims the Punisher at one point. “Accurate three round burst with light caseless ammo. I can carry a lot more rounds with no added weight.” The emphasis on weapons is further underlined by a “Punisher’s Arsenal” one-page feature at the end of the story where artist Eliot R. Brown lovingly details our hero’s favorite weapons much like the old war comics used to do in their various “weapons of war” featurettes. Fun Fact: It was obvious that the radical changes in the content of a typical comic book in these years had not yet sunk in for some advertisers...either that, or Marvel’s marketing people just weren’t being truthful about their product...because a fullpage ad for “Mr. Bubbles” bath soap (presented in the form of a cartoony comic strip yet: “Bath time with Mr. Bubbles! Can’t wait! So much fun!” children shout in delight) was clearly aimed at little kids, presumably the age group that the suits at Airwick Industries thought were still reading comics in 1989.

Avengers Spotlight #22 “Grimm and Bear It” Howard Mackie (script); Al Milgrom (pencils); Don Heck (inks) “Once There Was a Swordsman” Lou Mougin (script); Don Heck (pencils); Don Heck and Luis Marzan (inks) Just as the very last flicker of the Twilight Years was going out, a giant of the Early Years returned for one last star turn on a character he co-created nearly 24 years prior! One of the “big four” that kickstarted the Marvel age of comics in 1961, Don Heck was on the scene in the pre-hero days with Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, and Stan Lee. His earliest assignment among the new super-hero characters being invented at the time was Iron Man, whose adventures he began recording in Tales of Suspense #39 and continued until #72. Sometime before then, he took over from Kirby on the Avengers just in time to depict some that group’s most seminal tales. After the Avengers, Heck bounced around on different strips from X-Men to Captain Marvel, his art suffering somewhat at the hands of inkers other than himself. “ A bad inker can kill artwork,” said Heck in a 1988 interview. “I once got some pages back from inking and I just tore them up, that’s how bad they were.” At last, as Marvel entered its Twilight Years, his art fell out of favor and he drifted over to DC where he toiled for a number of years. Sadly, Heck was not treated well in the fan press of the time and his name actually became synonomous for bad art (unbelievable as it may sound)! After delivering groundbreaking stories in all three of Marvel’s earlier phases, Heck’s career had seemingly ended in ignominy by the late 1980s. Of course, like all great creative people, including his own peers from Marvel’s early days, Heck’s art had weakened over the years from its more vigorous youth, but given the right circumstances, the man could still deliver the goods as he does here in Avengers Spotlight #22 (Sept. 1989)! And what makes “Once There Was a

Swordsman” doubly pleasurable is the fact that it stars the Swordsman, a character co-created by Heck and Stan Lee way back in Avengers #19. At the time, the Swordsman appeared full-blown as Hawkeye’s former mentor, a simple bad guy at first intent on petty larceny before getting the idea of joining the Avengers and using his membership to abet his unlawful schemes. But the story in this issue builds on that simple premise, giving the Swordsman a name: Jacques Duquesne. The son of a French colonialist somewhere in southeast Asia, he sympathizes with the native revolutionaries and, donning the costume of the Swordsman, joins their cause only to be betrayed by them when victory is won. Bitterly disappointed, the Swordsman turns his back on the idealism that had motivated him and becomes a self-serving cynic. It was a wonderful origin story by Mougin (sadly, outside of a little-known Inhumans story, the only real scripting the writer [known mostly as a comics indexer] ever did) that finally turned a classic Marvel villain into a threedimensional human being. And making this story all the more satisfying was having the art penciled and (mostly) inked by Don Heck himself (beneath a cool cover by artist Ron Frenz done in Kirbyesque style)! Somewhat weak compared to his glory days, the work is yet tinged with the old Heck magic proving once again that the best inker for Heck was Heck. If it was time for Heck to make his exit from the comics scene (and the final curtain come down on a once great comic book company), then this story was more than good enough! Fun Fact: Did you know that the young leader of the communist revolution in this issue is named Wong-Chu? The same tyrannical commissar responsible for the capture of a wounded Tony Stark in Tales of Suspense #39! Furthermore, the fictional state of Sin-Cong which the Swordsman helps to liberate was featured in Avengers #18!

Don Heck

It was perhaps fitting that artist Don Heck closed out the 1980s by

revisiting the Swordsman, one of the classic characters that he helped to create during the Years of Consolidation. As with the transition from the Grandiose Years to the Twilight Years, there’d be some overlap between the later Twilight Years and the Dark Ages that would begin in earnest in the next decade. It would be an era that was especially unkind, even hostile, to the architects of comics’ Golden, Silver, and even Bronze Ages.

The Dark Ages

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Roy Thomas

John Byrne

Gene Colan

Frank Miller

John Romita Jr.

Bob Layton

Stan Lee

Jim Shooter

woMorrows Publishing presents Marvel Comics in 1980s, the third volume in Pierre Comtois’ heralded series covering the pop culture phenomenon on an issue-by-issue basis! It covers Marvel’s final historical phase, when the movement begun by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and Steve Ditko moved into a darker era that has yet to run its course. The 1980s saw Stan Lee’s retreat to the West Coast, Jim Shooter’s rise and fall as editor-in-chief, the twin triumphs of Frank Miller and John Byrne, the challenge of independent publishers, and the weakening hold of the Comics Code Authority that led to the company’s creative downfall—and ultimately the marginalization of the industry itself. Comics such as the Chris Claremont/John Byrne X-Men, Frank Miller’s Daredevil, the New Universe, Roger Stern’s Avengers and Spider-Man, and the new wave of dark heroes such as Wolverine and the Punisher are all covered, in the analytic detail—and often irreverent manner—readers have come to expect from the previous 1960s and 1970s volumes. However, the 1980s represented years of upheaval in the comics industry—with Marvel at the center of the storm—so expect a bumpy ride in the 1980s decade that marked the beginning of the end of Marvel Comics as you knew them. the

Bill Mantlo

Mike Zeck

TwoMorrows Publishing Raleigh, North Carolina

ISBN-13: 978-1-60549-059-5 ISBN-10: 1-60549-059-8 52795

9 781605 490595

Don’t miss the previous volumes on the 1960s and 1970s!

Tom DeFalco

John Buscema

Pierre

Comtois was born and currently resides in Lowell, Massachusetts. A freelance writer, Comtois has had dozens of articles and short stories appear in magazines as diverse as Nocturn and The Horror Show, Military History, Civil War Magazine, Comic Book Marketplace, and Comics Source and books such as The Ithaqua Cycle, Book of the Dead, Lin Carter’s Anton Zarnak: Supernatural Sleuth, The Way the Future Was, an anthology of science fiction stories, and Our Lives, Our Fortunes, Our Sacred Honor: Capsule Portraits of Figures From the American Revolution. You can visit Pierre on the Internet at www.pierrevcomtois.com.

ISBN 978-1-60549-059-5 $27.95 in the U.S.

Sal Buscema