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So there’s been some discourse online about editorial denial about specific events/characterizations both explicit and otherwise heavily implied in recent X-Men comics, specifically regarding Jean Grey, Wolverine, and Cyclops. I haven’t read an X-book in probably a decade-and-a-half, so I can’t speak to specifics, but it’s pretty clear the creative teams had one intention with the characters’ particular romantic triangle, and the highers-up are giving the ol’ “noooope” to the whole deal.
This put me in mind of other editorial decrees that seemed…oiut of place to me. This was a discussion on Bluesky, which started with my post here, and I fully acknowledge the contributions others made there with their replies in informing my blog entry here.
I’m going to address the second example I gave there first, in that it’s stated that the Hulk has never purposefully killed. Okay, I don’t know for sure that this was an editorial demand, but here in Incredible Hulk #110 (November 2007) by Greg Pak, Carlo Pagulayan and Jeffrey Huet, Hulk’s Really Smart Pal Amadeus Cho explains what’s going on:
He continues:
“How many times have you fought the military? How many tanks and helicopters have you smashed?
“And not a single soldier has died.
“Yesterday you brought down the Sentry’s Eyrie. You smashed the top of the Baxter Building.
“You pulverized all these heroes…
“…And yet you haven’t killed a single soul.”
Hulk brings up some examples where he has killed, but Cho counters these were instances of self-defense against other killers, as opposed to slaughter of innocents during mindless rampages. Basically, so long as the normal Bruce Banner/Hulk dynamic is in place, Banner is somehow running numbers/probabilities in the background, exerting some subtle influence to prevent Hulk from murdering people.
There is the caveat that Cho slips in there about “as long as your brain hasn’t been tampered with,” allowing for an “out” for examples of Hulk killing, like, say, during instances of Banner being entirely subsumed by the Hulk’s personality, or removed entirely.
This is all fine with me, to be honest. It feels counterintuitive, that there were no casualties during one of Hulk’s destructive rampages, but This Is Superhero Comics. This isn’t any worse or stranger than super-battles always demolishing abandoned buildings, for example, or like the Flash clearing the area of civilians before the rest of the Justice League fights the Shaggy Man or whatever. It’s not as much fun if you realize thousands of people got slaughtered because the Avengers didn’t get to the scene on time.
For some reason this puts me in mind of the events from Miracleman #15 (the Eclipse Comics numbering, from 1988) by Alan Moore and John Totleben. This is like the exact opposite of the “thank goodness these buildings are empty!” kind of explanation for why every superhero battle isn’t the equivalent of multiple 9/11s. In this issue, Miracleman has his final(?) battle with former sidekick-turned-evil Kid Miracleman, and it’s just mayhem and slaughter all over the place, and it’s not all done by the bad guy:
It works here in context because the superbeings have been presented as above normal human concerns, uncaring about mortal lives, and that when these “gods” battle it’s humanity that pays the price. It’s a theme of the book.
The theme of the Hulk is “man vs. himself,” Banner having to cope with the monster that lives within in. The additional guilt of “and that monster kills a lot of people” would have made it an entirely different book.
Another thing this all brings to mind is Wolverine, where, as I recall, an edict was put down by then editor-in-chief Jim Shooter that the ol’ Canucklehead has never killed anyone. You know, despite this happening in X-Men #133 (May 1980) by Chris Claremont, John Byrne and Terry Austin:
…which was later retroactively explained that these guys Wolverine was fighting were just “injured” and came back as cyborgs or whatnot. Look, I’m not a big X-Men reader, I don’t know the details, but this clearly is a case of obvious intent being subverted by editorial edict. I mean, I get it, the X-Men are heroes, you don’t want ’em killing folks left and right, but this was clearly to show how dangerous Wolverine could be when not kept in check. It’s characterization, it’s a plot element adding tension to the proceedings. It’s a reminder that he’s not just a tough-talking bloke that hangs out at the X-Mansion, he is literally One Savage Dude.
Anyway, you can get into a whole thing just on X-Men comics alone. Jean Grey had to die because as Dark Phoenix she killed millions of beings, that sort of business. She got better, obviously, and I’m pretty sure they’re less shy about letting Wolvie off baddies now.
Should note that Amadeus Cho, in that Incredible Hulk #110 I excerpted above, goes on to tell Hulk that Captain America probably killed a few Nazis during WWII, because, well, it was WWII. Hate to tell you this Mr. Cho, but Cap did a little more than that:
I mean, holy crap. Though to be fair, maybe Bucky did ’em all in.
More movie comic talk! Here comes JohnJ with
“Plus comic adaptations of movies also bear the occasional mistake by the artist. Kirby putting a helmet on Bowman in ‘2001’ before the explosive bolts scene still rankles me. Not as much because he did it but for the fact that God knows how many people saw the art before publication and nobody caught it? I have to believe Kirby would have appreciated the opportunity to fix that but if nobody told him, how could he?”
Ah, yes, the famous Jack Kirby adaptation of Kubrick’s film:
If you haven’t had a chance to check out this treasury edition, do yourself a favor and track down a copy. It may be the Kirbiest thing that’s ever Kirbied. Giant pages filled with King Jack doing cosmic space stuff as only he could. I had a copy of this myself for many years, though I gave it up to a customer whose need was greater than mine for the book and…yes, I occasionally regret it. But passing along the Kirby love to another person is, I think, a worthy sacrifice.
Plus I’m hoping for a reprint of this comic at some point, even possibly from DC Comics due to various rights shenanigans that I mentioned in this post here. Getting it all on nice paper under a hardcover with a fresh recoloring…ah, that would be nice.
JohnJ brings up the storytelling error in the comic, which, well, What Can You Do™? Bobody’s nerfect, not even the King, but at the very least we can take solace in the fact that it was a brilliantly illustrated error.
The Wikipedia section on this adaptation brings up a few other issues/differences worth noting:
“…differs in the fact that Kirby incorporated additional dialog from two other sources: the Clarke/Kubrick novel and a copy of an earlier draft script of the film that included the more colloquial-sounding version of HAL 9000, as originally voiced by actor Martin Balsam before Douglas Rain took over. In addition, the comic narrative captions describe the characters’ thoughts and feelings, a significantly different approach from that taken by the film.”
First, I wish I had a copy of this comic still, so I could go through and pick out some samples of HAL’s dialogue, because that would probably be amusing. And I’ve said before that the comic’s captions go out of the way to explain to you exactly what’s happening in the story:
It’s the same story, told with almost the exact opposite tone of the film. Which is great, of course. I love the movie, and I loved this adaptation. I can’t imagine anyone else taking on the task of squeezing this movie into a comic book, but that may very well be just because this is the version that’s been with us for decades. Who else at the time could do it justice? Al Williamson? Steranko? Okay, Jim Starlin just came to mind and I would pay real gosh-danged American money to see what he’d do with it.
Or Steve Ditko. A Steve Ditko adaptation of 2001. Just wrap your mind around that, effendi.
• • •
Okay, that went a little longer than planned. So more movie comic discussion soon, but in the meantime, a statement: Len Wein, Herb Trimpe, and John Romita Sr. created Wolverine. An editor trying to horn in as a “co-creator” for some larger paydays for himself is a load of crap. That’s not how it works, Roy.
And that’s this site’s official position on the topic.
So since opening up Ye Old Comics Shoppe in Camarillo, CA, available seven days a week for your funnybook purchasing needs, one of big surprises I’ve had in my acquisition of collections was just how many copies of Incredible Hulk #181 I’ve come across.
Now, maybe it’s not as surprising as the one and only time a copy of this showed up in my shop, but given the rather higher profile of this Hulk #181, being the first (full-length) appearance of Wolverine, it still amazes me every time I see it.
One thing about these #181s that I’ve been getting…more often than not, and I mean a lot more often than not, they have the Marvel Value Stamp cut out of ’em. (Read more about the Marvel Value Stamps right here!). This promotion of Marvel’s is the bane of many a dealer in old comics, as we gotta page through Marvel issues of a certain vintage and make sure that damned stamp hadn’t been cut out. And here’s the weird thing…about 98% of the time, when I’m checking most Marvels that have these stamps to make sure they’re still intact, they are. But when I’m checking Hulk #181s, the stamps are cut out, like, 90% of the time. It’s like those kids back in ’74 knew I was going to try to resell these. “Let’s stick it to that 5-year-old Sterling kid who’s gonna try to make a buck off these in about 4 decades or so!” Anyway there’s a reason why I made that #181 joke in this post.
Anyway, the thing about Hulk #181 is that they sell very quickly, stamp or no stamp. I’ve yet to have a copy in the store overnight, in fact. I either move it on eBay immediately, I call someone up on my list of Folks What Want the Fancy Books and they dash in and buy it, or a lucky walk-in grabs it. Good thing it sells so fast, because (gulp) I sure do spend a lot of money on these, and would like to recoup the cost right away (and make some much needed profit besides).
I’m bringing this all up because about a week ago I had another copy of Hulk #181 oome into the shop. And the reason I don’t have an actual picture of that copy of the comic I acquired (instead linking to the Grand Comic Database instead, just in case you needed a reminder of what this comic looked like) is because almost immediately after handing my guaranteed-good business check to the seller, completing the transaction of ownership over this back issue, I had someone in the store say “I’ll buy that!” Just as quickly as I’d acquired it, it was gone. Nice when a collection purchase turns out like that.
I did say “collection,” because there was more than just the Hulk #181. There was also Hulk #180, which I did take a picture of:
And if you don’t happen to know the significance of this comic…the reason I specified #181 being the first “full-length appearance” of Wolverine is that he appears throughout that entire issue. #180 is in fact his real first appearance, in the last panel of the final page of the book:
BONUS: reference in caption to Hulk’s green butt. You’re welcome.
Anyway, this issue doens’t have quite the demand the follow-up does in the collector market, despite literally being the character’s first in-story appearance. In one of the few times back issue demand actually makes some sense, the comic with the awesome red-background cover that actually features Wolverine, and contains Wolverine throughout the issue, is in much higher demand than the one where he pops up just in one panel on the last page, Hulk butt talk in the caption or no.
And this specific copy I acquired…hoo boy. Not only was the value stamp in this one missing as well:
…but some young person had gone scissor-mad with power after clipping the coupon, and trimmed a segment out of one of the center pages as well:
I had no real confidence in selling this book…well, okay, that’s not true. The ol’ Canucklehead’s panel was still intact, and you know, there’s always someone out there looking for this, regardless of condition, if it’s priced right. …Amd priced right it was, because I also managed to sell this very quickly. Not as fast as the #181, but still, it moved out the door faster than I expected.
It’s nice to get the big ticket items like this and turn ’em around almost immediately. It definitely helps subsidize the cost of the other items in the collection which aren’t as pricey and aren’t in nearly as much demand, and thus may sit around in the boxes a little longer. Which isn’t to say they’re turkeys, by any means…they’re just not Hulk #181. Or even #180. But it’s still, like, Kirby Tales of Suspense and that sort of thing. They’ll sell.
That’s one of the fun parts of owning a comic shop…never knowing what’s going to be in the next collection that walks in the door. I mean, sure, it’s usually a run of Team Youngblood or something, but once in a while, you get a nice surprise. Even if it does have the Marvel Value Stamp cut out of it.
So we finally made the time to go see Logan…for free, at the movie theater on the local Navy base, which is always the best way to see a movie in the theater because the other patrons are always so well behaved. No yapping during the film, no foolin’ around with phones, no acting up and causing disruptions…yup, I didn’t do any of those things this time.
As to the movie itself…hoo boy, I was told to expect a bit of the old ultraviolence, and that’s what I certainly got, but it’s not jut exploitative and…well, okay, maybe a little exploitative, but built on the story’s framework of aging, loss, and regret. It’s violent, but it’s serious and it’s funny and it’s sad, and it’s probably one of the more mature works in the superhero film genre. Tonally, it’s difficult to extrapolate Logan from Wolverine’s beginnings in the early X-Men films, which helped establish early on the formula for superhero films, but Logan wouldn’t work nearly as well without the character work performed by Hugh Jackman and Patrick Stewart in those movies, endearing Wolverine and Xavier to us.
But you all saw it already, so you know all that. One of the things I kept coming across online, in between the film’s opening and my seeing it this past weekend, were a handful of clickbait-y articles declaring that fans were confused by the end of the film. Now, I deliberately didn’t click on said articles, since I didn’t want the film spoiled for myself, and a cursory glimpse today in the various internet arenas where I spotted those particular headlines didn’t turn up anything. I didn’t see anything in the ending that looked like it needed any kind of explaining, so I turned my query to my Twitter pals to see what they had to say. Just what was so confusing about the ending of Logan?
(SPOILERS AHEAD, in case you hadn’t seen it yourself, yet.)
One possible point of confusion that was mentioned was the eulogy Laura recited at the graveside. The thought was that maybe, despite hearing the same speech during the bits of Shane shown earlier in the film, viewers may have forgotten that bit of foreshadowing and later wondered just what she was talking about. That’s a possibility, I guess, thought that scene where they’re watching the movie in the hotel room might as well have had the caption “WE’RE SETTING YOU UP FOR SOMETHING LATER IN THIS FILM” across the bottom of the screen.
The other bit that may have thrown people off is the nature of “Eden” or “sanctuary” that the kids are trying to reach, whether it’s real or not. There’s radio contact with an unseen someone who is trying to help the kids, and we never see the kids reaching their supposed safe haven after leaving their gathering place on this side of the border. And given that the coordinates for that gathering place were taken out of a comic book presenting the fictionalized adventures of the X-Men….well, there’s a lot to parse here, and I think this isn’t so much “confusing” as “deliberately vague.” This movie’s not about kids trying to reach safety. It’s about what Logan goes through to help these kids…any details as to what this safe haven is, and how the kids learned about it, who distributed those kinda terribly-printed X-Men movies, etc. etc., can all be explained in Logan II: Laura Strikes Back.
And the only other thing that struck me as possibly making viewers scratch their head is Laura turning the grave’s cross on its side to make an “X.” Let’s face it, that’s waaaaay subtle.
Also mentioned to me on Twitter, and everyone in my theater thought this too (I know this, thanks to the incredible telepathic powers I’ve developed after seeing every X-Men movie in the theater), was the idea that surely Wolverine’s clawed fist was going to thrust out of the grave in that very last second of the film. C’mon, you expected it too. I’m glad they didn’t, however…just letting the story end right there, as kinda depressing as it was, was the right move.
At least until Logan III: Return of the Mutant, coming Summer 2021.
…is the fact that they coexist in worlds with comic books based on them. For example, here’s ol’ Canucklehead holding an X-Men comic in the most recent Logan trailer:
…and here are the Three Mouseketeers reading a letter from a fan of the Three Mouseketeers comic wondering how mice are able to read and write:
…which begs the question, if Little Petey is so convinced of collective illiteracy of mice, then why did he address the letter to them? Unless of course Little Petey, as a big fan of the Mouseketeers, reluctantly buys into the premise that they can read and write, and is asking, in his somewhat rude way, for an explanation of their decidedly non-mouse-ical abilities. (The answer, of course, is that the mice went to school.)
Now Marvel Comics has long established that a version of Marvel Comics exists in the Marvel Universe, publishing semi-fictionalized accounts of the superheroes in their world, so seeing Wolverine holding a somewhat sloppily-manufactured X-Men comic in that trailer has precedence. But the idea that someone at DC Comics discovered a tiny community of talking, literate mice and decided “let’s make a comic book based on this!” instead of “let’s sell them to scientists who will dissect them and find out what’s wrong with them” or, more likely, “OH MY LORD KILL THEM, KILL THE MONSTERS” — well, that’s a bit weird.
Then again, it may be that Sheldon Mayer was a kind, gentle soul who believed in simply providing wholesome entertainment for kids and used the Mouseketeers as inspiration for his art. Though that wouldn’t stop someone else from tracking them down and exploiting them in more cynical ways. I mean, they’re getting mail…clearly they’re not hard to find.
from Three Mouseketeers #3 (Sept/Oct 1970, reprinted from Three Mouseketeers #6, Jan/Feb 1957) by Sheldon Mayer
“Oh, you have such good taste in comics! You certainly picked a top notch book to read! May I say again how much I admire your discerning eye for such excellent reading material?”
Um…I don’t think that’s what the “complimentary copy” stamp on your cover is supposed to mean.
“Okay, fine. Enjoy your lousy free funnybook, cheapskate.”
Well, it’s not really a “toy” as the term is generally used, and it’s not an item that’s been sitting around in our backroom for years and years (it’s from a box of another store’s stock dumped at our shop), so I’m abusing the title a bit, I guess. But it’s certainly a misfit item:
I don’t know if anyone’s still doing the mini CD-ROM “multimedia collector cards” thing, but I seem to recall a number of releases along these lines about ten years ago. (My particular favorites were the randomly-packed “chase card” die-cut CD-ROMs that came with
this Star Trek set.)
Anyway, as it says there, the CD (dated 2002) contains screen savers and desktop pics and “hotlinks to websites” that are probably defunct (aside from Marvel.com, if it’s there), and “Motion Comics,” which, sight unseen, I can safely guess are likely terrible.
And it’s in the 3-inch format, so you gotta tray-load this sucker:
…which means, even if I
wanted to open the package and check it out (which I’m not, since I’m throwing this bad boy on the eBay) I can’t put this in the front-loading slot drive on my Mac. I suppose I could bust out the old 3-inch CD adapter plastic ring (originally bought back in — ’87? — to play the original They Might be Giants “Don’t Let’s Start” 3-inch C-Dingle on my first CD player) but I wouldn’t want to run the risk of the disc coming loose from the adapter and spending the rest of the day trying to fish it out and boy am I on a tangent.
This is the first of a planned six, it seems:
“Collect all VI.” Oh you guys. Anyway, a brief Googling only turns up this same disc, so maybe that’s all that came out? I’m sure if someone out there
did buy all VI, they’ll let me know.
So it turns out we had one of these hiding in the backroom…a Wolverine Vs. Sabretooth statue:
One would hope that this will look a little less…suspect once the packing foam is removed from between the figures:
“NO! Bad dogs! Leave the beanbag chair alone!”
