My Fantastic Four-ay: Part Six.

filed under Categories fantastic four 13 Comments

I’m just about ready to move on from John Byrne’s 1981-1986 run on the Fantastic Four, but I wanted to touch upon this particular storyline because, among other things, it sets up a character that will return again and again in future creative teams’ efforts on the title.

I remember picking up issue #271 and being quite taken with the throwback cover to the 1950s/early ’60s Marvel monster comics, before Stan Lee, Jack Kirby and friends dived back into the superhero genre:


I’m not sure where I’d been exposed to that era of Marvel monster books initially…perhaps some of the reprints that popped up as filler material in some of the Giant-Sizes I’d collected, or a friend whose uncle had a handful of original copies of these books (before being all destroyed in a rainstorm, having left his box of them outside. But I was certainly familiar with them, and found them amusing and charming enough that I would eventually draw out my own spoof splash page of such a story (“FONDUU, THE CHEESE DISH THAT WALKED LIKE A MAN!”).

Byrne’s pastiche of the Marvel monster period (this time involving a pre-superpowered Reed and Sue as the intrepid humans against the alien menace) takes up the majority of this issue. It certainly succeeds in evoking the essence of that era, even if it suffers a little in retrospect as the bad guy is coincidentally defeated in pretty much the exact same way the bad guy is defeated in Avengers #250, released shortly afterward.

But of interest is the plot element that turns up in the “present day” section of the book…the fact that Reed is suffering memory loss, introduced in this dramatically effective panel:


He continues to say that other memories of his younger years are lost, and attributes this to their recent adventures in the Negative Zone, where Reed’s brain was drained and blah blah I’m not going to get into it, but some alien critter messed with his head and left it Swiss-cheesed.

So it’s decided for some reason that escapes me even though I just reread these three issues right before reading this to go back to Reed’s father’s mansion in California…and I just reread that section of the story and I’m still not clear why they did. Anyway, we learn that Reed’s father, a scientist, had disappeared about ten years ago (“three years” before the team got their powers, leaning into Byrne’s “seven year” span that he assumes the FF had been active).

Eventually Reed discovered that his father had created a time machine that shunted him into an alternate timeline, and in #272:


…the FF use Pops’ machine to follow him into the parallel universe. Look, okay, there are cowboys on flying horses on the cover, and we get some neat bits with a sci-fi tinged Old West in this other timeline, but the big story is that Reed’s father is apparently the hated Warlord, who rules over this world:


And that brings us to Part Three, #273:


…where you can see on the cover there that Reed and his dad finally meet face to face, which is a neat moment, but boy, this issue is undermined by the fact that Byrne decided to not only write and draw this issue, as he had been on the FF for the previous few years, but letter it as well, and, um:


…the man’s no Gaspar Saladino. I think when I first read this issue, even then I was all “what’s up with the lettering” when I noticed that there was no lettering credit on the issue. Eventually I figured out Byrne did it his own self, which kinda blew my mind just a little. I mean, artists lettering their own work was not a new idea to me, as comic strip artists did it all the time, natuarlly. But in Marvel and DC Comic Books, it was always a separate job that you got someone specifically to do.

I should have realized it wasn’t unprecedented, but I don’t think I realized Jim Aparo often lettered his own work, and it was around this time that Todd Klein was lettering his own scripts on Omega Men. Of course in many independent books, this was often the case…the Hernandez Brothers lettered their own work, Dave Sim did some wild lettering in Cerebus, but that seemed different from the usual assembly-line nature of the Big Two.

Regardless, it did seem like A Step Too Far when Byrne picked up the lettering gig for this issue. He was already perceived as being stretched too thin writing and drawing the multiple books he worked on per month, and adding the not-insignificant task of lettering an entire issue felt like one burden too many. Especially when the result was aggressively Not Good. It looked awkward, the lettering was inconsistent, lines of text looked crooked, and even the word balloons themselves were pretty janky. Lettering can’t be distracting when reading a comic book, and this job was nothing but distracting.

Despite all that, the story continues, with Reed pleading his case to the Warlord (only it turned out (SPOILER) to be Reed’s stepmom, who was acting as the Warlord without Pops’ knowledge).


Note that we are here in the third and final part of this story, and Reed is still emphasizing his loss of memory. Which is interesting because ultimately, when the story is resolved and Reed and his dad have their peaceful reunion…the whole “lost memory” subplot is completely forgotten. The problem that launched this storyline remains unresolved. Far as I know, to this very day Reed still lacks all those memories, because at no point over these three issues does he ever get them back.

I remember noticing this at the etime, and wondering what exactly happened to let that plot element go astray. They didn’t forget it was such, and it was brought up in the concluding issue. Just when everything was said and done, the instigating action to drive the characters into this other world exists only as that: an instigating action. It is not a problem to be solved, but a…is Macguffin the right word here? I feel like that’s not exactly it but my English is failing me here.

But it’s ultimately pointless and I think that made me really wonder how such a gaffe could be made in a professionally published comic book. Yes, I knew about Marvel’s “No-Prizes” sent out for folks spotting (and explaining away!) continuity mistakes, but this seemed like a much bigger problem than that. A problem of a creator getting Too Big for an editor to successfully edit? I didn’t know then, and I’m certainly not sure now.

The lasting legacy of the introduction of Reed’s father in this storyline (beyond the “surprise twist ending” of the story connecting him to the time-traveling villain(s) Rama-Tut/Kang) is that Reed’s dad will return in Avengers: Doomsday in future FF storylines, with alternating personalities. While a seemingly benevolent and kind man at the end of Byrne’s issues, he returns in the Tom DeFalco/Paul Ryan issues as a untrustworthy and manipulative figure, then returns again as a somewhat more positive character. But, as I like to say when talking about future FF events, I’ll say more when I get there.

The other note I wanted to add is something I noticed on my most recent rereading…the attempts at pinning down Reed’s exact age. In this panel from #271, Johnny Storm congratulates Reed on hitting “The Big One” for this year’s birthday:


I interpret that as either 40s (most likely) or 50s (still plausible, given Reed’s slightly older status compared to the other 20/30-something superheros at Marvel.

Then Reed says this in #273:


…which still leaves things open a little bit. Reed’s dad vanished about a decade prior, but it’s very possible Reed hadn’t seen him for many years prior to said disappearance. However, if you look closely at the lettering in the second word balloon, the word “twenties” was obviously lettered in after the fact. Apparently someone didn’t want to accidentally “age up” the character by even implying Reed was in his 30s, or older, “10 years ago.”

This run of issues grabbed my attention way back when in good ways (Byrne’s generally fun art and storytelling) and bad (oy, that lettering, and the unresolved plot) that, had I had a blog back then, I almost certainly would have commented upon. It was an experience to get a story with a strong beginning and a clunker ending, leaving me wondering what fell down to allow this to happen. It was just another piece in the puzzle reminding me this comics were made by Human Beings, and sometimes we Human Beings drop the ball, even with the best of intentions.

Next time: the big transition from Byrne to Post-Byrne!

Time for my legally-mandated quinquennial (or so) posting about Ghost Rider.

filed under Categories ghost rider, pal plugging, zines 12 Comments

So I’m sure you all remember this comic:


Released at the height of comic book gimmickry, this comic (by Howard Mackie, Ron Wagner and Mike Witherby) featured a cardstock “pop-up” foldout in the center of the book, which was a fairly unusual addition in comics at the time. And what was on said fold-out, you may ask? Well, something particularly lurid it seems, according to the original solicit in Diamond Previews:


Now that sounds all the world like we’re gonna see the actual act of Danny’s throat-ripping, as depicted in the most mature of formats, the pop-up page. And as expected, such a classy turn of events got quite the press, like this featured push in Wizard Magazine #8:


…which emphasizes the depiction of said throat-ripping in the pop-up.

Then there’s this front page headline in Comic Buyer’s Guide #950. BREAKING NEWS: THROAT-RIPPING:


As you see there, Marvel’s own sales director says this nigh-infamous pop-up “will make a Chicago butcher house look mild.” My Chicagoan readers, please let me know how carnage-filled a typical butcher house in your city is, compared to butcher houses in, say, Fairfax, or Portland. Any Portland. (EDIT: reader Matthew points out the connection that didn’t even occur to me…some English major I am.)

Anyway, what we’re being told here is that the throat-ripping we are about to behold in that pop-up in Ghost Rider #25 is gonna be something else. I mean, the butcher house comparison at least implies the pop-up’s gonna be a bloody mess, right?

Well, hang onto your flaming skull-emblazoned booty shorts, because here is a pic I took of comicdom’s most terrifying pop-up:


Ummmmmmmm, I don’t think this delivered what we were promised. There’s definitely some throat-action going on here, with the bad guy whose name I didn’t bother remembering has Ghost Rider by his. And there’s Danny, flat on the ground, post apparent throat-ripping.

The actual throat-ripping scene itself — and as an aside, I want to let you know that this is the most I’ve typed the words “throat-ripping” on my site, at least since the last time I wrote about dealing with comic distributors — appears on the page before the insert. Like so:


It’s…marginally more tasteful than what we were told to expect, I suppose. You know, as throat-rippings go. But as I recall at the time, the general feeling, at least around our store, was that Marvel may have had cold feet about something quite that brutal being depicted in what is essentially a gimmick common in children’s books, and thus did a last minute change to the art and story and pop-up.

I do not know if that was the case…and frankly, thinking about that now, I suspect that wasn’t the case. One possibility is that the lead time in producing this gimmick-laden comic would have precluded last-second changes to the final product, and I don’t recall Ghost Rider #25 was particularly late.

The other is that the content was being oversold, or that the promotion was being misinterpreted. But the original solicit, provided by Marvel, does say

“Blackout rips Dan’s throat out — a shocking turn of events depicted in an awesome, die-cut, 4-page pop-up center-spread!”

Oh, right, “Blackout,” that’s his name. But that’s pretty clear about what that pop-up was supposed to show. Not “Dan lying on the ground with his throat ripped out,” but actual, Stan Lee-approved throat-ripping, live and in color. (But in fairness to the sales guy, “bad guy fighting a leather-clad flaming skull dude in a cemetery” is probably much more extreme than what’s going on in your typical butchery, regardless of city.)

Ultimately, I don’t know what happened. Whether it was one thing then changed to another thing, or it was always intended to be like this and things just got exaggerated in the advertising, or what. But we were told one thing, and we got what we got.

This bit in Comics International #19 notes that speculation was afoot for this comic…not something I remember at our shop specifically at the time, but given the state of the comics market then, I don’t doubt it:


I like the incredulity of “a hot pop-up book.” I mean, like I sort of noted above, this gimmick is straight out of children’s books. Several comic book gimmicks came from children’s publishing. Hell, I had books with lenticular images when I was a child.

I don’t know if that speculation ever came to anything, as here in this dealer ad from Comic Buyer’s Guide #955, a few short weeks after that shocking headline feature, we got a guy just giving ’em away:


Speculator who got burned, perhaps? “What am I going to do with these 10 cases of Ghost Rider #25? Or those two cases of Magneto hologram cards, for that matter?”

This entire post came about because I just got to thinking about it again after pricing up a copy of this comic the other day. I have it at $4.50 in VF, by the way. You made $1.75 on that $2.75 investment!
 
 

Special thanks to Kwakk.info‘s ‘zine datebase, and Longbox Heroes’ library of ancient Previews! By the way, become a paid member of the Longbox Heroes Patreon so you can hear my contributions to their “Previewing the Past” podcasts!

And also starring Jesus’s twin brother, Thor.

filed under Categories dc comics, found art, marvel, this week's comics 9 Comments

So anyway, I was reading the new Spider-Man/Superman book released by Marvel this week (NOTE: THIS IS A NEW COMIC AND NOT THE SAME AS THE SUPERMAN/SPIDER-MAN COMIC RELEASED A MONTH AGO, DON’T LET IT FALTER IN SALES LIKE THE SECOND BATMAN/DEADPOOL TEAM-UP), and seeing one of the back-up stories,. the one by Geoff Johns and Gary Frank:


…it reminded me of somethin’. What we see here is a big battle between DC and Marvel characters, primarily good guys versus bad guys, though the Hulk as pictured is giving Superman what for. And what all that hoohar brought to mind was this bit from Doomsday Clock #12, also by Johns and Frank:

This was the bit at the end of this series where John forecast some future events in the DC universe, in particular what is obviously a Marvel versus DC battle in 2030. We’re still a few years off from that, of course, but who knows how long this current détente between the two publishers will last, and thus John ‘n’ Frank got in their predicted big battle a little early.

Granted, the “sacrifice” described in that Doomsday Clock excerpt doesn’t happen in this story. But as we’ve seen in these recent intercompany team-up books, the back-up stories often end after having resolved whatever emotional core existed at the center of the plot, leaving the traditional “good guys versus bad guys” battle for an unseen denouement. Perhaps, if you need to tie up a loose end from Doomsday Clock, this story can suffice as the foretold conflict, with the Hulk’s death still coming after the end of the story we see here.

Anyway, it’s fun to pretend.

• • •

Now, you sinners need some superhero love in your life, so here are some pics my old, old pal William took of a vehicle he spotted whilst out and about:


If you want bigger pics, William’s got ’em in this Bluesky post — let them pay for the bandwidth! But seriously, this vehicle is amazing. William and I live in the same general area, so I’m amazed I haven’t seen it driving around my own self. Unless it was just passing through on its way to spread the good super-Word throughout our country.

The starting date for Progressive Ruin.

filed under Categories blogging about blogging is a sin 3 Comments

Some search results (in particular, those powereed by “A.I.”) are stating the incorrect year for the beginning of my site. My very first post on this blog was December 5th, 2003. Unfortunately, I link to a specific “Wizard of Id” strip in that post that’s now blocked behind a paywall. Ah well. At least the link isn’t dead entirely, unlike so many other sites that I’ve linked over the last couple of decades.

Anyway – first post here: December 5th, 2003. Mark that down in your diaries.

My Fantastic Four-ay: Interregnum.

filed under Categories fantastic four, how the sausage is made 6 Comments

Aside from some time constraints and other topics popping up, I had this brief pause in this series of posts to give myself an opportunity to sort of consider what I’m doing here.

The reason I started writing these is because I recently read (or reread) a lot of the last 30 years’ worth of Fantastic Four, starting around the time Tom DeFalco and Paul Ryan were doing the book in the early ’90s. I didn’t read every issue…I skipped some of the runs I knew well (like the Walt Simonson issues and the Mark Waid/Mike Weiringo run), and read for the first time the aforementioned DeFalco/Ryan stories, and the suyrprisingly brief J. Michael Straczynski run, and the Dwayne McDuffie issues, and so on.

I also reread the issues I bought and read at the time, but hadn’t revisited in the years since, like the Jonathan Hickman/Matt Fraction consecutive runs of more recent years. It was nice to be reminded of those.

I’m also reading some of these storylines way out of order. I’m currently in the midst of the “John Harkness” issues of the late ’80s Fantastic Four, where series writer Steve Englehart worked under a pseudonym in protest nagainst the editorially-mandated direction of the book. But more on that when I get there.

Plus, I eventually want to reread the Dan Slott run that directly leads into the current Ryan North regime on the title. And I do want to go back and read Chris Claremont’s stretch of issues, despite being warned off of them. Hey, I knew the job was dangerous when I took it.

The intent of this series of posts is record my reactions to these individual runs, with commentary on the events within. It’s really supposed to be more “how do I feel about these books” than “let’s recap what happened,” and I felt like I was sliding more toward the latter than the former.

The “funny recap” (though I wasn’t necessarily trying to be overtly funny when talking about these FF books) was a staple of the Early Comicsweblogosphere, where we’d take some wacky comic of yesteryear and give it a good drubbing from our modern perspectives. I mean, I sure did it a lot, as did the consistently-funnier and better-written Dave’s Long Box and The ISB, to greater effect, but I had fun doing it all the same. But the one thing we all had in common was a deep knowledge of, and love for, the medium, lacking in certain other flash-in-the-pan sites who didn’t seem to know much of anything about comics other than “look at this dumb panel, isn’t it stupid.”

Of late I’ve preferred, when discussing comics like these, to try to go a little deeper than “this is weird.” For example, this post on the Mr. Grumpy comic. Or this oddball Wolfman Jack thing. More than just a recap, but an attempt at trying to dig up info about the item, putting it in context and giving an opinion other than “this is wild stuff.” (Though to be fair, some of that Wolfman Jack comic was real “just look at this” material.)

That’s what I’m attempting to do with these Fantastic Four posts. I’m trying to maintain that balance, but that Frankie Raye post, which started off okay, with my reactions to what was going on into the series, slid into “recap mode” for the rest of the post. Now, I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad post, but it was doing what I was trying not to do, and that’s just telling you with picked-out panels and some text, what was happening in these issue. Too heavy on the “here’s what happened,” light on the “and here’s how I feel about it.”

I suppose one could argue that the recap was necessary to give context to my reactions, but looking at that post it could have been a few panel scans and explanatory paragraphs shorter.

Anyway, that’s something I’ll be working on in future posts. The other thing I should mention: the John Byrne run of Fantastic Four was not included in my current rereadings of the series. And yet, I started off with that in my discussions.

As I’ve noted in this series of posts, the Byrne run starting with #232 is as clean as a break as can be managed in the continuity and storylines in the series. There are some callbacks and returning characters (such as Frankie and Terrax, as discussed in those previous posts), but the precedings are all given a “you don’t need to worry about anything before I took over the title” vibe by Byrne. In effect, Byrne initiates the Modern Era of the Fantastic Four, with an entirely separate look ‘n’ feel than the hundred-something issues prior and the 1970s of it all. This is despite Byrne deliberately evoking the 1960s era of the title by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.

The reason I didn’t reread these is that…I kinda don’t need to, other than doing a quick scanthrough of the issues i intend to discuss here. I’ve read them all at the time: as I bought them as back issues, I’d read ’em; as I bought them new on the shelf, I read ’em; as I pieced together the run, I read them again and again. Not committed to memory or anything (otherwise I would have mentioned this guy in that post about Byrne’s super-villains). They are, however, very familiar to me, which may be part of the reason why I’m so heavy on recap material versus personal reaction, as it’s so long since my first, earliest readings of the material. It’s hard to dredge up those emotions at this late date.

Now I could very well be obviously going on about nothing. You folks seem to be reacting well to these posts, so I’m perhaps overthinking a problem that only I see. At any rate, I wanted to give you a heads-up in case future posts in this series run a little differently than the earliest installments. I’m sort of just winging it a bit here, so I appreciate your patience as I knock “My Fantastic Four-ay” into some kind of shape.

I’ll be getting back into the comics with the next part of this series, as I may want to mention one or two more things about Byrne’s run before we hit that transitional period between the end of his tenure and the beginning of Steve Englehart’s.

But to give you a bit of a preview of what lies ahead in my series…boy, the Wizard shows up a lot. Like, almost as often as Doctor Doom.


But, oddly, not during Byrne’s issues.

“Comics Giveaway Day,” if you’re nasty.

filed under Categories blogging about blogging is a sin, free comic book day 3 Comments


Just a reminder that Free Comic Book Day is only a couple of weeks away, and I’m receiving my stacks of giveaways with my new comic shipments every week. What’s weird is that I hadn’t really thought about the approaching date until I started receiving those FCBD books a couple of weeks ago.

In the past, we usually started getting the promo stuff, like the posters and the shelftalkers and the window decals a little more ahead of time to start getting the word out. But, in the process of just, you know, running the store and doin’ things, I somehow never noticed that no such promotional materials had been offered this year.

I placed a call to Lunar Distribution, who’s handling the FCBD stuff in the U.S., and found out they hadn’t offered any such extra items for retailers. None of the buttons, shirts, posters, and so on, like Diamond would offer. I’ve speculated that perhaps the changing of ownership was finalized too late for such items to be put together for distribution this year…or maybe they just forgot about it, like I almost did.

Hopefully next year they’ll get their act together, but this year I had to print up my own posters and shelftalkers, and little flyers I’m giving out at the register. And, somehow, I still had a case of FBCD merchandise bags sittin’ around, so I’ve been using those. And a good sign: even when I ask the customers new to the store “so, do you know about Free Comic Book Day?” the answer is usually “yes, can’t wait!” Has FCBD become just common knowledge amongst the regular population?

So here’s hoping this year’s event continues the wild success of my previous years. And comics writer Amy Chase is coming back to sign more books and chat with customers, which went extremely well during her last appearance at FCBD. Alas, pal Dorian won’t be able to help out this year like he has before, but an old customer of mine, Deon, will be filling in! We should be on track for another good year, with any luck.

***

Just a brief blog note: I haven’t forgotten about the “My Fantastic Four-ay” series, I just took a break this week and I’ll be back to it next week. Those are a lot of work!

Now just to find the time to actually enjoy these.

filed under Categories kickstarter 4 Comments

So a message from my old pal Ben reminded me that I haven’t been keeping up on the Kickstartered projects that have grabbed my eyeballs and/or dollars of late. And that includes two that are ending within a day or so of my writing this, so I apologize for the late reminders if you’ve not known about any of these yet.

First up is a new Dreadstar graphic novel from creator Jim Starlin:


If you’re a longtime Dreadstar reader, you’ll see this features the return of Dreadstar’s daughter Kalla from the Peter David/Ernie Colon 1994 mini-series from Malibu. Speaking of which, a collection of said mini is also available in the same Kickstarter, either as an add-on to the new book, or you can just buy it on its own. This Kickstarter is already funded, and one of the stretch goals, a digital copy of the production notes for a since-cancelled proposed Dreadstar TV series, which I am really interested in.

This is the third of the Kickstartered Dreadstar books, and I enjoyed the first two so I’m looking forward to this one. It’s not the same as having a regular series on the stands, but I’ll take what I can get after having no Dreadstar for so long.

Next up, also funded and also ending soon, is a hardcover edition of Steve Bissette’s Tyrant self-published series from 1994:


Physical and PDF editions available, and all sorts of other goodies are being offered as add-ons, like puzzles and blacklight posters! Includes material from two unpublished issues. Several stretch goals already reached, primarily a whole lotta nice-looking prints of Bissette-drawn dinosaurs.

Now for an item that still has a few days to go on its Kickstarter, a remastered edition of the long-lost Mexican animated film Roy del Espacio:


Look, I can’t explain it, I saw it mentioned on another site and I love strange lost media. I didn’t even know that Love and Rockets‘ Gilbert Hernandez was providing an exclusive slipcover for the Blu-ray release. Anyway, seems plenty weird, which is up my alley.

Lastly, just added to the Kickstarter site, is Don Simpson’s Megaton Man Microbus:


This is a book reprinting the Megaton Man webcomic that ran in the late ’90s-early ’00s that I remember following and enjoying way back when. At one point, through that site Mr. Simpson offered a free Megaton Man magnet to anyone sending in a Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope, and I still have mine (the magnet, not the SASE). Here’s the magnet, fresh from my fridge and slightly faded after decades of kitchen display:


You can get just PDFs (two available…one with black and white scans of the original art, and one reprinting the lower-resolution web-ready color strips), or either hardcover or softcover autographed books with the scanned b&w art (which also include the PDFs). Several of these strips have made it into print before, but this is the first comprehensive collection. I’m a longtime Megaton Man fan, and I’ve been wanting a physical edition of these strips for a while, so this was a nice surprise.

Hasn’t quite met its Kickstarter goal yet, but it’s close so I suspect this will be fully funded in short order. It’s nice to get archival editions of things like this and Tyrant, material that’s on the obscure side but the creators at least have this method of getting their work into people’s hands. Like I say in the title to this post, I don’t know how I’ll find the time to read (and watch!) all of this, but it’s good that it exists.

The Final ’90s Countdown, Part Twenty.

filed under Categories final '90s countdown 5 Comments

Believe it or not, we’re nearing the end of the titles that received one vote in my Final ’90s Countdown survey! (And again, that’s no comment on the quality of the books, but rather the available variety of beloved comics people voted for.)

Star Wars: Tales of the Jedi (Dark Horse, 1993-1994)

The first thing that surprised me when I started doing my research on this title was just how few of them there were, and how short of a run they had. The first mini-series, Tales of the Jedi but later referred to as Knights of the Old Republic, ran five issues from ’93 to ’94. Then there were another half dozen or so mini-series, ending with Tales of the Jedi: Redemption in 1998. In my memory, it always felt like there was so much more than that, probably because I’m recalling the many times at the old job having to sift through the section and restock missing issues.

Anyway, I’m presuming the then-impending release of Episode I: The Phantom Menace may have put a minor kibosh on Extended Universe material dealing with the history of the Star Wars Universe. Or they just had the story they wanted to tell and it was told. I hear that happens too, sometimes.

Now a small problem here is while I did read some of the comics, I think this was about the time I began to realize that there was just no way I was going to be able to keep up with all the narrative Star Wars material. Look, I was eight when the original Star Wars came out, I sat in theater seats for multiple showing, I was all-in on this weird space thing. And as Star Wars books and comics an’ such came out, I did my best to keep up with all of them. (Though even the Marvel comics I kinda faltered on, later completing a run as an adult.)

But with this then-new renaissance of Star Wars material, with the new novels and comics and such, I kept up with everything.

Until I didn’t. And Tales of the Jedi was one of the breaking points. (X-Wing Squadron, too, come to think of it.) It wasn’t a matter of quality or anything, it was more a matter of just time and money. I couldn’t read everything, and I certainly couldn’t afford everything, so cuts were made. And TOTJ, which was okay but didn’t involve the characters I knew from the films, got the cut.

As such, it’s been a while since I’ve read it, and very little of the comics’ contents remain in my brain. I can tell you, thanks to my careful and diligent research, that the titles take place during two significant events in the Star Wars Universe: the Hyperspace War and the Sith War, which were thousands of years prior to the Original Film Trilogy. And these were written by Tom Veitch and Kevin J. Anderson, and as such I’m sure they were fine.

A lot of the Extended Universe material was…rejiggered slightly once Lucasfilm started doing new Star Wars content again. (Look up “Jaster Mereel” and how that was thrown into flux once we met Jango Fett in the films.) The TOTJ material had at least the advantage of being set so far back in time that even the prequels didn’t overlap much, though (again, not having read them in a very long time) I suspect what we learn of the Sith in the movies may contradict what we learn of them in these comics.

It’s pretty much moot at this point, as with the purchase by Disney, any Extended Universe material previously published has since been relegated to non-canon “Legends” status. Dark Horse even followed up these books with stories set even further back in Star Wars history: multiple minis of Dawn of the Jedi, taking place 35,000 years before the Original Trilogy. After the third series, Marvel acquired the Star Wars license, with a new canon “historical” series of books and comics under the banner of “High Republic” being released. These were set a more modest 100 to 500 years before the Original Trilogy.

Like I said, I started to fall off reading the ancillary Star Wars material with TOTJ, and that’s continued on ’til today, to the point where I only read the occasional SW thing. I tried to start with the new Disney-era novels, but decided “no, I already did this once, not again.” As such, I don’t know much of the TOTJ material has filtered into newer Star Wars releases. I’ve often lamented “if Young Mike knew that there were Star Wars characters Old Mike knew nothing about, he’d be very disappointed.”

At any rate, all the Tales of the Jedi series got their own individual paperbacks, as well as two omnibus trades, from Dark Horse. And from Marvel, the entire TOTJ line was reprinted in a series of three “Epic Collections.” The third Epic reprint also contains stories from Dark Horse Comics (the anthology series) and Star Wars Tales.

Outside of comics, West End Games published a sourcebook based on TOTJ for their Star Wars Role Playing Game. There were even a handful of Knights of the Old Republic video games from Bioware.

When this comic was coming out, I remember it being quite popular, in no small part because it provided some world-building for a fictional universe that was in need of some. I remember some of the comics even being (cough) “hot” to a certain extent. Even today any back issues I get in of any of the TOTJ minis fly out the door. After so many years, it still captures interest.

And I didn’t mention my “and he kills the Joker at the end” theory once.

filed under Categories batman 17 Comments

So it all kinda started with this post on the Blooskees:


…which was just me doing a little light afternoon internet trolling, managing to appall at least one professional comic book artist who hadn’t heard about what the film adaptation did to the Alan Moore and Brian Bolland classic one-shot from 1988.

For those not familiar, the flick in question was this 2016 direct-to-disc release:


…which had the not-inconsiderable virtues of that Bolland cover, and Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill reprising their long-held roles as the Batman and Joker respectively, and the not-inconsiderable vice of adding an extra half-hour, 40 minutes, whatever, to the beginning of the film.

Why was that extra stuff added? To establish a sexual relationship between Barbara “Batgirl” Gordon and ol’ Bats. Is this unnecessarily creepy? Oh yes indeedy. But apparently it was needed to give Batman added incentive to go after the Joker in the second half which attempts to adapt the actual comic book. Because “you shot my crime-fighting partner” wasn’t enough a motivation for Batman to seek out the Joker, I guess.

Anyway, I didn’t really come here to bury, or praise, that movie. But what did happen as a result of that first post is that I started looking into some of the back history of Batman: The Killing Joke. Which I started to do when I was supposed to be working, so I put the kibosh on that after a bit and decided to save it for You, the Blog Reader.

I should note here the invaluable resource that is this ‘zine search engine. While I do have, for example, every Amazing Heroes and every Comics Journal, forcing my withering eyeballs to peer at every page via candlelight within my cavernous library is perhaps too much to ask.

One of the topics I was trying to determine early one was the idea that The Killing Joke was originally intended as an out-of-continuity story, like the “Elseworlds” imprint that would being shortly after this comics release. I have a vague memory of that being so, many people online have a similar memory, and I suspect that may have been said at one point or another by someone associated with DC. However, in my extensive searching via that database, I can find no reference to such a thing.

Now, that doesn’t mean such evidence doesn’t exist…I could be missing references to early news stories about “UNTITLED BATMAN PROJECT” or passing references by Moore or Bolland to “this ‘What If’ story I’m doing.” But if anyone’s got an official reference from DC, or the creators, to the story being out-of-continuity, or even a news story along those lines, please send it my way.

I did find what may very well be the earliest reference to Killing Joke, from this Alan Moore interview in Amazing Heroes #71 (1985). Apparently, this all started as a proposed Batman/Judge Dredd crossover. Moore says:


Moore describes this deal not working out, then adds:


Okay, clearly Moore references an earlier Comics Interview article with Bolland, which was in #19 and doesn’t mention the “alternative Batman” project. (He does end the interview saying he’d like to do a Batman story.) Anyway, Moore’s comments are obviously light on details but I think it’s pretty clear this is the embryonic state of Killing Joke.

One thing I noticed in my searches were a couple of blurbs noting that the forthcoming Killing Joke was going to be colored by Bolland himself. For example, here’s one from Amazing Heroes #133 (1988):


Now, obviously the final product was not colored by Bolland, but by John Higgins. More recent editions have been recolored by Bolland (to a minor level of chagrin by some folks), so that’s been a long time coming, it seems.

Back to the continuity issue, it was pretty clearly in official DC continuity by the time it was released, given that DC preceded its release with a Batgirl Special:


As you can see in the above blurb from Amazing Heroes #137, and as I saw here in there in other things that came up in my searches, it was promoted as a Killing Joke tie-in. I mean, I read that special at the time, then Killing Joke, and frankly there was barely a thematic or artistic connection between the two (though the Mike Mignola/Karl Kesel cover is nice). It was pointed out to me that it was there to give some kind of happy ended to Batgirl’s story, given what happens to her, which, you know, fair enough.

And as we all know, the events of Killing Joke, specifically what happened to Batgirl, plays into later DC Universe shenanigans (specifically her stint as Oracle). We also had the story in…Legends of the Dark Knight which incorporates elements from Killing Joke. Plus, there’s that Three Jokers story from a couple of years back that ties into it as well, despite Three Joker‘s own questionable status of whether or not it’s in official continuity (despite the story’s impetus being in-universe and technically still unresolved).

There are probably other references I’m missing here, but the question of what is or is not in “continuity” can be bit of a chump’s game given DC’s history of rebootery. But however it may have began, Killing Joke remains in DC’s official history mix.

A couple other things i turned up: this bit from a Brian Bolland article in Comics Scene Spectacular #3 (1990):


Well, that would have been interesting. Never happened, but we got some swell Joker covers out of him, though.

Here, in Comics Interview #77 (1990), Yvonne Craig, 1960s Batman‘s Batgirl, talks about Killing Joke:


Oh c’mon, why would you do that to this poor woman.

Another thing because you guys are gonna bring it up: this new wild edition of Killing Joke, presented on the manufacturer’s site, but you might have an easier time looking at it here.

And finally, if you’re a Killing Joke completist, friend, you need a copy of Web of Spider-Man #50 (1989) by Gerry Conway, Alex Saviuk, and Keith Williams:

And now, links.

filed under Categories sir-links-a-lot 6 Comments

Hoo boy, Mark Evanier really lost a lot of original art to a robbery that was more awful than I expected. I thought he lost a handful of pages, but it was much, much more than that. I normally don’t hotlink files on other servers, but Mark wants the link spread around: here’s a PDF file listing all the stolen art that he’s been able to determine so far.

Spread that link around, let’s recover those pieces.

• • •

Now, an ElfQuest movie, based on the classic indie comics by Richard and Wendy Pini, has seemed like a possibility we were always hearing about in the fan press for the last few decades. And I am honestly shocked that some deal was never struck and an animated-something-or-‘nother never was released.

Richard Pini writes on the topic, explaining the history of the offers from various studios to translate their books to other media, and what the ultimate decision was that he and Wendy settled on.

I’ve noted this before, but the Pinis dropped by my previous place of employment a couple of times. They were very nice, and happily signed lots of books for the shop. I’m glad they’re doing well and that they came to a decision about the whole movie thing they can live with.

• • •

Just learned the Belgian comics creator Hermann passed away last month. I was not a big follower of his work, but his long-running post-apocalyptic series Jeremiah is certainly familiar to me. He lived a long life doing what I presume he loved, and that’s a good way to spend your time on Earth.

• • •

So the new Fury of Firestorm #1 is released today, which comes with this variant cover by Chris Burnham:


And if you see those little yellow bits on the edges? Why, those are Firestorm’s fingertips from the original 1978 first issue:


And if you were to go to Burnham’s Bluesky account, you can see this variant cover innovation in action!

Of course, I sold off my personal copies of the first Firestorm series through my shop long ago. But I do have the trade paperback (as discussed here):


…and it looks like the layout is the same, so maybe I can take advantage of this gimmick after all!