“You’ll find him popping off at Pop’s Sodium Shoppe….”

§ March 18th, 2024 § Filed under television § 5 Comments

I am still in “low content mode” here on the site for at least the next couple of days. Last week it was birthdays and family stuff, this week it’s medical stuff, which is a lousy birthday present. Anyway, I’m hoping to be back up to speed by Friday, but don’t be surprised if I go ahead and just start afresh on the following Monday.

At any rate, I’m going to, cough, “borrow” a topic from the esteemed Mark Evanier, who recently featured “Unsold Pilot Week” on his site. Now one of the pilots he featured particularly intrigued me, a 1967 attempt at a live-action Dick Tracy.

As Mr. Evanier notes, it was from some of the folks what brought you the 1960s Batman. show, which you’ll definitely get from factors such as the set design, the opening credit animation (which I liked, despite the most awful theme music), the “spinning hat” scene transition device, and so on. I ended up later watching it via the YouTube app on my Roku, and thought it was…interesting, and a slight shame we didn’t get more.

But when I later returned to my YouTube app to check out the latest capybara videos, I saw yet another unsold pilot in my suggested videos. And it was one that Mr. Evanier hadn’t featured, and I think the Unsold Pilot Week is over by now, so, hoping I don’t step on any toes, here’s the mid-1960s pilot for Archie, based on those very comics.

(Sorry, I’d embed it, but whoever uploaded the video has disabled sharing it in that way.)

Did I watch the whole thing? Sure I did! I think overall it did feel very…Archie-ish, with situations just outlandish enough to feel like they jumped off the comics page. I particularly enjoy the interaction between Archie and Mr. Weatherbee. It really is a shame this hadn’t gone to series. I can’t imagine how long it would have gone, as the probably 20-year-olds playing the kids would have likely become a little long in the tooth in short order.

Anyway, it was a fun watch, and if you’ve got a half an hour to spare, maybe give it a go.

55.

§ March 13th, 2024 § Filed under old § 11 Comments

Just in time for the U.S.’s National Maximum Speed Law to change to 65 MPH in 1987, here’s Sammy Hagar’s 1984 hit “I Can’t Drive 55.”

And also wish a hard-rocking birthday to my special internet pal, Andrew.

One must appreciate his sense of self-worth.

§ March 11th, 2024 § Filed under jack kirby, low content mode § 11 Comments


“Hmmm, what does he love? Fishing? Scrapbooking? Who can say?”

Anyway, that’s how you introduce a character. Well played, Jack Kirby or whoever it was that blurbed this on the cover of Forever People #4 (1971).

Content may be a little short on this site over the next week or two, but I’ll check in when I can. Thanks for reading, pals, and we’ll be back to normal service soon.

Alas, no Bloodshot Bellywash.

§ March 8th, 2024 § Filed under promo, valiant § 6 Comments

So my dad’s clearing out the wine cellar at his house, and next to his cask of Amontillado, he uncovered this particular bottle of spirits:


That is a bottle of Darque Brew, a beer distributed as a promotional item by Valiant Comics in the early 1990s. The label features Master Darque, one of Valiant’s villains.

Here’s a closer look at the label:


And here’s a pic of the label by the cap, where you can see it was produced by the Capital Brewing Company:


Now the real mystery of this bottle that was in my dad’s possession was…where did it come from? I mean, yes, the obvious vector here is me, the son what worked in the comics business for more decades than is likely healthy. But he didn’t remember me giving it to him, and I certainly didn’t remember ever having it in my possession.

I remember my former boss Ralph having a bottle of Armstrong Ale, another Valiant Comics beer featuring one of the stars of Archer and Armstrong. He had the bottle stashed away in the back of the shop for years and years and I’m sure I saw it about a million times just in the course of my work days there.

When I think of Valiant’s beers, which to be entirely honest is not something I dwelt upon with any regularity, what I think of is that Armstrong Ale. If you’d asked me in the last few years how many different beers did Valiant release in the ’90s, I would have said just the one. I had no recollection the Darque beer even existed until my dad showed me this bottle.

Anyway, I brought up this Darque Brew to Ralph, saying both my dad and I were puzzled as to how he got it. Ralph replied “yeah, it came to my store addressed to you, so you kept it and gave it to your dad since you don’t drink alcohol!” I absolutely have no memory of this ever happening. But Ralph was a little half-annoyed that I got it, since he wanted it to go with his Armstrong Ale, so that mild annoyance kept the memory stuck in his mind, I suppose, whereas my near-immediate passing along of the Darque Brew probably flushed it out of my short-term memory right away.

Another mystery pretty much solved by the fact that my brain’s capacity for comics trivia does in fact have its limits. Think I’ll probably go ahead and let Ralph have this bottle to finally complete the set. Oh, and I should note there was more Valiant Comics beer produced in 2016, it seems.

For some additional info about the original Armstrong Ale, here’s an article that features pics of the packaging and inserts that came with the bottle.

No, not the band that performed “Africa.”

§ March 6th, 2024 § Filed under marvel, publishing § 4 Comments

Bryan says in response to my assertion that Venom made his first “on-panel” appearance in Amazing Spider-Man #300:

“I’m too lazy to go look, but doesn’t ASM 299 end with a splash page of Venom?”

Bryan is indeed correct, and in issue #298 we get this bit of business at the end of the issue:


…and then in #299 we get this page and a half leading directly into the shocking events of the extra-sized next issue:


Now to be honest, in my mind I’d remembered Venom’s pre-300 appearance as being restricted to his face popping up in the bottom-of-the-page next issue blurb. I’d forgotten that his cameos in these previous two issues amounted to quite this much.

The Overstreet Price Guide refers to #298 as “1st app. Eddie Brock who becomes Venom, #299 notes “1st brief app. Venom with costume,” and #300 gets “1st full Venom app.” I mean, I guess getting Venom’s gloves in #298 isn’t enough for the “1st in costume” honor, but you can kinda see what sort of splitting of hairs is going on here. To be entirely strict about it, #299 should get the “first Venom” since it’s our first look at him in toto. But #300 is an anniversary issue, and it has that striking cover, and yes it is a full issue featuring Venom in action, and thus it’s the one that gets the most attention from collectors.

There’s precedent, of course, with Wolverine’s first appearances in Incredible Hulk issues in 1974. Issue #180 is the actual first appearance, with the ol’ Canucklehead popping up on the last page in this two-panel sequence:


But again, #181 was the full-length in-story appearance of Wolvie, and had a kick-ass cover showing him in action, thus making this the most in-demand issue of the run. (Wolverine also appears in the opening pages of #182, and as we all know, was never seen again.)

So, yes, my statement of “first on-panel appearance” for Venom was incorrect, as he clearly shows up “on-panel” prior to #300. But like I said, I thought his only visual representation was in a blurb, not in-story, so I genuinely remembered #300 as The First One. And as far as collectibility and value goes, #300 is the most important one selling for many times the cost of the other two comics, with “first full issue appearance” and “first full appearance” being usually just shortened to “first apperance.” And those other two comics are generally just “cameo appearances” as far as the back issue market goes.

And the people pushing the house ads for Incredible Hulk #181 that were in earlier Marvel comics as the actual first appearance? GET OUTTA HERE WITH THAT NONSENSE

This is the second post in a row I looked for a “Spider-Man” category to tag it with, but I didn’t have one.

§ March 4th, 2024 § Filed under marvel § 3 Comments

So last time we were talking about that scene in Fantastic Four #274 (1985), in which the alien symbiote that had been Spider-Man’s costume is freed from the lab where it had been contained. Here is a better look at the page in question (as drawn by John Byrne, Al Gordon and apparently Dan Adkins):


It was brought up in the comments that it was a little weird that this important moment in Spider-Man’s history happens in a Fantastic Four comic, but commenter “S” reminds us that the scene did appear in Amazing Spider-Man #261 (February 1985) by Tom Defalco, Ron Frenz and Joe Rubinstein:


Slightly embarrassing in that I read this Spider-Man comic and should have remembered, though I think I can be forgiven since it’s probably been close to forty years since I’ve done so.

S also mentions this drone incursion was possibly sent by the Kristoff version of Doctor Doom (remember that period?), which is confirmed by this panel from Fantastic Four #278 (May 1985) by Byrne and Jerry Ordway:


As we see in the Spider-Man page, “Doom’s” plan didn’t explicitly involve “freeing the alien symbiote,” but somehow that critter managed to attract the probe into investigating further. Hence, the release of the symbiote putting it well on its way to Venom-ness, and leading into the release just a couple of months later of Web of Spider-Man #1, where said symbiote plays a part.

So there you go. Hopefully these couple of posts sucked all the Venom out of my blood and it’s no longer in my system, and I can finally move on to different topics. Like the Spider-Man villain Carnage, I could probably do a couple of weeks on him.

I still can’t believe that “Corona” thing.

§ March 1st, 2024 § Filed under collecting § 13 Comments

So I was processing some back issues at the shop, and flipping through the pages of Fantastic Four #274 (January 1985):


…and I was reminded of this sequence from the end of the book:


…in which Spider-Man’s sentient and shape-changing black costume escapes from Reed Richards’ lab, which is where it had been kept since being forcibly removed from Peter Parker’s body in Amazing Spider-Man #258 (November 1984). And then eventually the costume, AKA “the symbiote” bonds with Eddie Brock, pushes Peter Parker onto a train track in Web of Spider-Man #18 (September 1986), then makes its on-panel debut as Venom in Amazing Spider-Man #300 (May 1988).

And, I don’t know, maybe I’m leaving some post-Peter Parker pre-Venom appearances of that pesky extraterrestrial outfit out of my little overview there, but I’m not really hear to give you an Amazing Heroes-style Hero History of the Alien Symbiote. Mostly the question that came up for me, while I was pricing up a stack of back issues for sale (as you can see what with the price guide visible in the photos above), is why isn’t this comic pricier than it is?

Look, I’m not trying to be the “hot” “key” “investor” guy here, but it struck me as odd that this weirdo appearance of the suit prior to its becoming Venom hasn’t been glommed onto by The Usual Suspects. Even the Hot Comics App just has it at three bucks and doesn’t even mention the symbiote’s appearance in the issue. On eBay I see a couple of folks getting a little more adventurous with their pricing (outside the always-overpriced “slabbed” copies), but by and large most of ’em are pretty cheap. Even when they note this particular cameo, that doesn’t seem to guarantee a sale or even a bid. It just seems like a big, fat “nobody cares.”

It wasn’t that long ago, during that mid-pandemic investment panic when collectors were looking for any reason to make any comic A Hot Commodity, that a comic like this would have been bought by the armful if they could. I mean, speaking of the pandemic, there was a Spider-Man comic that became a sought-after item because it introduced a villain named Corona. Did a feel a burning shame for our industry as a whole as I was typing that? I won’t say “no.”

I also won’t say this behavior has gone away completely, since I still see people with their apps out tracking down that secretly hot comic that’s had a sudden burst in demand that isn’t reflected by the price I put on the book, say, three years ago. But it’s not nearly as prevalent, especially as the prime mover of this form of collecting, the Marvel movies, are currently approaching the nadir of their cultural relevance, making comics with related character appearances to those in the films not quite as attractive.

Anyway, just an interesting trend I’ve noticed in the marketplace lately, at least locally. Your Market May Vary.

The Final ’80s Countdown, Part Twenty-Seven.

§ February 28th, 2024 § Filed under final countdown § 14 Comments

And here we are, at long last, with the final part of the ’80s Countdown, where I tallied up your votes for your favorite 1980s indie book and presented the winners, in ascending order, over a particularly extended period of time. But we’ve reached the conclusion, with the top vote getter, including my own vote, and it should be no surprise which title it is.

Love and Rockets (Fantagraphics 1982-1996)

For over forty years, the Hernandez Brothers (Jaime, Gilbert, and occasionally Mario) have been gifting the comics world with some of the best cartooning and most realized worlds and characters to have ever graced the medium. It’s hard to believe it’s been that long, as you look at the work being produced and you can see no decline, no lessening of their powers — only an ever-continuing evolution and refinement of their craft. The stories remain as entertaining and compelling as they ever were, the artwork perfectly expressive. Every new comic from them is a master class in How To Do Comics and we are lucky to get them.

Did I oversell it yet? Honestly, I don’t think I have.

Reams have been written on Love and Rockets and its ancillary works and I’m honestly not sure what else I can add to it. I can say this series has special meaning to me, in that the brothers hail from Oxnard, CA, as do I, and I can often recognize references to the area in their works. Especially when they just straight up put my previous place of employment in the background:


In full disclosure, I should mention that I’ve known the brothers for…well, about as long as I’ve been in the comics business, currently 35 years and counting. They were already friends with my former boss, Ralph, when I started working for him…they had even helped move his store when he upgraded from one tiny hole-in-the-wall to a slightly larger hole-in-the-wall. Ralph was, in fact, the first comics retailer to carry their original self-published version of Love and Rockets #1 (often referred to as the “black and white” edition), which I will show you here scanned from my own personal collection, he bragged:


But before I met them in person, I was already a fan. I kinda knew Jaime and Gilbert’s work already, in that their art would adorn stickers and fliers for various local punk rock bands…somewhere I think I still have a sticker or two by Jaime from ye olden tymes. But getting a whole magazine filled with their work…well, that was pretty great. And coincided with my specific attraction at the time to independently-produced comics outside the worlds of Marvel and DC. Not that I didn’t still love reading those, but getting to read different, “weird,” and personal comics scratched an itch that the four-color super books didn’t.

And Jaime and Gilbert (and sometimes Mario, who once drew my old boss Ralph into an issue!) have continued to scratch that itch over the decades, with ever-wonderful and innovative work. Jaime’s stories generally focus on the inhabitants of Hoppers 13 (essentially Oxnard), primarily Maggie and Hopey and their assorted friends, enemies, and frenemies. Gilbert’s focus is mostly on the Latin America town of Palomar, a generational saga based around Luba and her family, plus other inhabitants. Which isn’t to say there aren’t other unrelated stories and gags that appear during the run, but those are the biggies. And following these comics for forty years, watching the characters age and change, is a rare and rewarding experience in comics.

There have been five iterations of Love and Rockets over the years, starting with the self-published issue I scanned above. This was followed by the 50 issue run published by Fantagraphics from ’82 to ’96, which then published a twenty issue run in a standard comic book format (as opposed to the previous magazine-sized issues) from 2001 to 2007. This was followed by Love and Rockets: New Stories, publishing eight annual issues from 2008 to 2016 as squarebound graphic novels. Then Love and Rockets returned in 2016 in its original magazine format, and continues publication to this day.

Amongst those various L&Rs, Jaime and Gilbert released many minis and one-shots that, mostly, to various degrees, tied into their ongoing sagas. Of note was Gilbert’s Luba’s Comics and Stories (running eight issues from 2000-2006), Penny Century by Jaime (seven issues, 1997-2000), and Whoa, Nellie! also by Jaime (three issues in 1996).

The comics are usually in black and white, but there are been the rare color editions, such as the Mechanics mini in 1985, mostly reprinting some of aime’s work from the earlier issues with some new material. There was also the Maggie and Hopey Color Special in 1997, with new material by Jaime.

Gilbert has produced, and is still producing, several standalone graphic novels, tangentially related to the L&R Universe, featuring the character Fritzi in her various movies. Proof That The Devil Loves You is probably a good place to start with these.

And just so we’re clear, this doesn’t even cover all of the L&R material that has been put into the world. Usually in this series of posts I like to list the various reprintings of the comics being discussed, but boy howdy are there a lot of options here. A brief glace at the Fantagraphics catalog gives you an idea of what’s available. There are paperbacks devoted to either Jaime or Gilbert, reprinting their stories from the magazines and comics. Some comics have been reformatted into standalone graphic novels. For the adventurous among you, you can get the collection of the first fifty issues.

At any rate, there’s a lot of material here, and it’s hard to tell you where to start, other than “the beginning,” so maybe that “first 50” collection isn’t such a bad idea after all. But aside from just jumping onto the newest issue and hoping for the best, I’d probably recommend the collection Heartbreak Soup for Gilbert, and “The Death of Speedy” by Jaime (reprinted here). I mean, those are the obvious ones, but any given issue of the current series would probably give you an idea if these comics are for you. And I certainly hope they are, because they’re great.

• • •

And here we are, finally at the end of this series of posts that took, oh, only about ten months to finish. It was fun, though, looking back at all these indies and seeing what you folks liked and reminding myself of why I liked many of them. Thanks for participating in the poll, and…will I do another poll like this for 1990s indies? I don’t know, let me recover from this one first!

Ramona, Enrique, and Leroy.

§ February 26th, 2024 § Filed under obituary, publishing § 7 Comments


Legendary comics artist Ramona Fradon passed away this week at the age of 97, having only retired from her popular commissions practice a month or two ago. If you’ve seen any of those commissions, you know her illustrative skill hadn’t lost a step. (The official gallery of art appears to have been taken down, but Google up some of her art…you won’t be disappointed.)

Above is a great shot from Super Friends #28 from 1980, a comic I picked up ages ago as it’s nominally a Swamp Thing appearance. As you can probably infer from the dialogue (by E. Nelson Bridwell), those characters aren’t the real, but rather folks in costumes magically transformed into the beings they were dressed as. But, eh, close enough for horseshoes. It’s a fun story, featuring the various superhero stars of the TV cartoon fighting weird creatures, some of whom likely wouldn’t make it past the network’s Standards and Practices. (“Who’s this?” “Oh, that’s the Demon, he–” [giant DENIED stamp pounded on the script])

She was a great talent, and you can read Mark Evanier’s obituary (and follow-up post) to get an idea of the breadth of her work and the regard in which she was held by her peers.

So long, Ramona.

• • •

Should also note the passing of Enrique Badia Romero, artist of Modesty Blaise and Axa. Sorry I don’t have as much to say about his art, other than that it was expertly crafted and beautiful linework, but this overview should tell you all about him and present nice samples of his ability.

I mean, a long time ago I was selling some Axa books on eBay and they got bounced off for being “too adult” for the general listings. Meanwhile, plenty of Faust and Leather and Lace to be found there. Romero was just too sexy for eBay, I guess!

So long, Enrique.

• • •

So I posted links to my post on the EC Comics revival at Oni Comics on both Bluesky and Xwitter a few days back, It’s pretty unusual for me to use Xwitter now, but I still check in from time to time to say “hello” and of course shill for myself. But this time there was a nice payoff as the literal President and Publisher of Oni Press responded to my tweet:


So there you go, straight from the horse’s mouth, we’re getting the original Leroy-style mechanical lettering in the new EC books. Maybe this may sound odd to anyone not familiar with the original ECs, but that lettering will go a long way to selling this revival to me.

Now he also mentions that other comments I’ve made presaged some of their other plans for the books, and if you read the original post there’s not a whole lot I said that would sort of fit into that category. I’m guessing we’ll be seeing semi-consistent creative teams on some of these books. I don’t know, we’ll see, and I’m looking forward to finding out.

Spidey cars, Living Lasers, Aero / it’s a duck-blur!

§ February 23rd, 2024 § Filed under disney, marvel, publishing § 9 Comments

Just been a week for surprise comics news, I guess, as Marvel has finally announced that they’ll be doing an Uncle Scrooge McDuck comic: Uncle Scrooge and the Infinity Dime. Multiple covers, natch, with the “main” cover as such:


…and feast your eyes on the Alex Ross variant cover:

Now, if you read the description of the comic at the link, it certainly sounds like the most Marvel-type comic they could be doing with this Disney property. Is there a multiverse involved? Of course there is.

Speaking with a pal of mine, he asked “just who is the audience for this?” And ideally it should be children, and at my shop I get enough children passing through that children’s comics are a viable product line for me. I know this may not be the case at some shops, either by accident or design, but I think overall the target audience for this book may not getting exposed to it.

However, ain’t nuthin’ wrong with getting some of those Marvel readers to try out Uncle Scrooge too, either through some of that DuckTales nostalgia, or the fact that it’s being written by noted comics scribe Jason Aaron, or that Alex Ross cover, or that it’s being sold as a (quoting from the press release) “time-honored Marvel adventure,” and so on. Just getting the big push from Marvel may get more people to try it out aside from the usual Disney fans.

It looks like it’ll be fun, and. it’ll be a welcome return of Scrooge and Donald and the nephews to comic book stands. I hope it’s successful enough to generate follow-up comics, and that it creates new fans, especially young ones, for Disney comics.

I’ve seen several comments online hoping this means actual team-ups between Marvel’s heroes and the Disney gang. I would prefer this wouldn’t happen, but I can’t deny that they’d likely sell well until Marvel does too many of them. But I’ll tell you what, Donald Duck Vs. Howard the Duck: Battle for The Pants — Marvel/Disney, I would write that for (almost) free.

And the comics retailer in me has a wish or two of his own, like trade editions of Marvel’s previous forays into adapting Disney’s animation, like their Aladdin or Beauty and the Beast series. Or Marvel’s two Roger Rabbit graphic novels…people still like Roger Rabbit, they’d sell!

• • •

In even yet more news, DC Comics is returning to Wednesday on-sale dates for their new comics, starting this July. Just as well, since hardly anyone noticed the change to Tuesdays in the first place. I mean, there were a few early birds, but otherwise folks just waited ’til Wednesdays.

DC should do their own version of these Marvel variants from around the time DC originally made the move in 2020.


“DCs Back on Sale Wednesdays!” variants would be all the rage, I just know it.

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