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Post by Hoosier X on Nov 10, 2017 14:40:50 GMT -5
I'm up to Captain Marvel #21, August 1970, and as this is where the title went on hiatus for two years, I'll be taking a break from Captain Marvel for a while. And probably tackling the short-lived Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. series next. The Gil Kane art has been very nice for the most recent issues. The stories have been a little more sporadic in quality. But you hardly notice from looking at the art. Dan Adkins has been on the inking chores since Kane's first issue (#17) and has done a great job. As you may recall, Mar-Vell had been given a new suit in #16 (Don heck's last issue) and also was trapped in the Negative Zone! But fortunately former-Hulk-sidekick-turned-folk-singer Rick Jones gets off a bus in the middle of nowhere in the desert and finds the Nega-Bands that allow him to bang his wrists together and change places with Mar-Vell when danger appears. That happens in #17. Which gives Mar-Vell the chance to get out of the Negative Zone for his revenge on Yon-Rogg in #18. Which I found to be a bit anticlimactic. They are fighting in a secret Kree military base under a mountain in Earth and Mar-Vell eventually knocks Yon-Rogg unconscious. But then the mountain starts to crumble and Mar-Vell only has time to save Carol Danvers, who is wandering around in the Kree base after escaping from a hospital and getting into a car with Yon-Rogg and then used as a hostage. So Yon-Rogg is dead! And Medic Una is avenged! Carol Danvers doesn't disappear entirely from the Marvel Universe right after this, as she appears in an issue of The Avengers and then in a few issues of Mar-Vell's series later in the 1970s. (Some or all of these may be flashbacks; if anybody remembers if Carol Danvers really popped up here and there, let me know.) And then, she gets her own shot at the colors when she becomes Ms. Marvel in her own comic in 1977. I'm pretty sure that Yon-Rogg isn't really dead, but I'm not sure how long it was before he showed up. In #19, Cap and Rick move on and away from all that Yon-Rogg stuff and fight an evil sociologist who is studying a bunch of people he has trapped in a high-tech murder house! This is not one of my favorites, despite the great art. It's cover-dated December 1969 and the series goes on hiatus for six months. Then it returns for two issues in the middle of 1970, and Rick gets the idea that Bruce Banner might be able to help figure out a way to free Captain Mar-Vell from the Negative Zone for more than three hours at a time. Of course, there are complications, the Hulk shows up (very well-rendered by the art team) and Mar-Vell must fight him. This is a pretty cool two-part story that I've read before and, if I remember correctly, it wreaks havoc with the continuity in Hulk's own mag, for anybody that pays attention to those things. And then after #21, Mar-Vell is on hiatus for two years for some reason.
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Post by Cei-U! on Nov 10, 2017 17:06:07 GMT -5
Yon-Rogg really did die in Captain Marvel #18, his only later appearance that I'm aware of is in Mar-Vell's deathbed hallucination in Marvel Graphic Novel #1.
Cei-U! I summon the headstone!
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Nov 10, 2017 17:23:09 GMT -5
Yon-Rogg really did die in Captain Marvel #18, his only later appearance that I'm aware of is in Mar-Vell's deathbed hallucination in Marvel Graphic Novel #1. Cei-U! I summon the headstone! He appears in what appears to be a flashback story in a title called Untold Legend of Captain Marvel 1-3.
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Post by Hoosier X on Nov 10, 2017 17:28:08 GMT -5
Thanks for the comments about Yon-Rogg. I thought I'd seen or read somewhere that he showed up alive and well much much later, maybe at such a late date that you can't even consider it part of the original continuity anymore. But I don't remember any of the specifics and I haven't really any time (or inclination really) to look into it.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 12, 2017 1:26:51 GMT -5
I am about halfway through Maggie the Mechanic, the first collection of Love and Rockets stories. This volume features Jamie Hernandez's stories featuring Maggie (hence the title). This is my first deep dive into Love and Rockets, which I only really know through reputation and hearsay, but it's been one of those seminal comics I should have already read for a long time, so finally getting around to making it one I have read. I've read other stuff by Los Brothers Hernandez and sample a couple of short stories from later in the Love & Rockets run, but this is my first exposure to the really early stuff, and a little different than I was expecting, but I am really digging it so far.
-M
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Post by Paste Pot Paul on Nov 12, 2017 11:35:17 GMT -5
to ...and now methinks, yon pile of dusty tomes doth speak in ways befitting mine ears...
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Post by Jesse on Nov 12, 2017 12:49:59 GMT -5
Freedom Fighters #1 (1976) After reading their appearance in Justice League I decided to check this out and I was not disappointed. This was a fun read that starts with the Freedom Fighters appearing in Manhattan after defeating the Nazi's on their Earth. They decide to come to the Justice league's Earth because they were bored! Immediately they stumble across the plot of a supervillain who turns people into silver by touching them. The issue ends with an exciting cliffhanger and I'm looking forward to reading the conclusion. Looks like this run only lasts 15 issues though.
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Post by Hoosier X on Nov 12, 2017 16:00:44 GMT -5
I read all 15 issues of the Freedom Fighters earlier this year and posted an overview, which you can find here, if you're interested in comparing notes when you're done.
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Post by Hoosier X on Nov 13, 2017 1:32:49 GMT -5
I'm up to Sub-Mariner #54, and it concludes a three-part story in which Namor fought a fanatic Japanese nationalist called the Dragon-Lord. Sunfire was allied with Dragon-Lord against Namor at first, but he eventually turned against Dragon-Lord. Ah, Sunfire. The Japanese super-hero. I guess we can give his creators credit that he wasn't a ninja. The best part about this issue is after Dragon-Lord has been defeated. Namor goes off to see how Namorita is doing. Namor left her with his old girlfriend Betty Dean Prentiss because Namorita is still a kid - about 13 or 14 - and needs guidance. Namoorita is proving to be a but of a handful, but Betty is very resourceful and inventive, so she tapes Namoorita's wings to her ankles so she can't fly away. (Namorita wants to go and help Namor.) Betty and Namorita are a great pair. Very amusing. I hope we get a few issues of issues of this, at least. And there's a story by Mike Friedrich and Alan Weiss where Namor meets some sea-mutants, including a beautiful mermaid! And also a reprint from the Golden Age about the first time Namor met Namora - Namorita's mother. They were just kids and Namor didn't want some girl tagging along! I'm putting Namor aside for a few days for a Golden Age break! But I'm looking forward to reading the last 15 to 20 issues of The Sub-Mariner very soon!
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Post by masterofquackfu on Nov 13, 2017 10:42:22 GMT -5
Today's reading:
Champions #4. This issue was written by Claremont. It mainly involved Hercules and Black Widow..getting attacked by mental patients imbued with the 'ol super soldier serum. Nothing really special about this issue...Grade: C
Senstational Spider-Man #19. Not really a "classic" comic(as it is from '97), but it had Spidey taking on a girl who gets the power of the Living Pharaoh. I really, really dislike the cartoony, anime art that became really prevalent in the mid to latter '90's. This book was definitely forgettable and will go my ever-growing stack of comics that I will never read again. Grade: D
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Post by chaykinstevens on Nov 13, 2017 12:30:53 GMT -5
Thanks for the comments about Yon-Rogg. I thought I'd seen or read somewhere that he showed up alive and well much much later, maybe at such a late date that you can't even consider it part of the original continuity anymore. But I don't remember any of the specifics and I haven't really any time (or inclination really) to look into it. i think Kelly Sue DeConnick resurrected him in Captain Marvel v7.
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Post by Jesse on Nov 13, 2017 16:01:58 GMT -5
Sgt. Rock #319"To Kill A Sergeant" written by Bob Kanigher, drawn by Joe Kubert and inked by Frank Redondo The artwork in this is outstanding and it's really exciting despite it mostly being a one-and-done story. It manages to show the horrors of war while also still being a really interesting action adventure climaxing with Rock being forced to fight another man to the death.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 15, 2017 0:03:02 GMT -5
I read the first collected volume of Flinch (issues #1-8) the Vertigo horror anthology from the turn of the century. Each issue had 3 stories, usually 6 or 8 pages long, from a variety of creators ranging from Richard Corben to Jim Lee (not a big Lee fan but the 8 pager in #1 is perhaps my favorite art from him I have seen), including but not limited to Jon J. Muth, Greg Rucka, Bill Willingham Kelly Jones, Phil Jimenez, Phil Hester, Garth Ennis, Brain Azzarello, Eduardo Risso, Paul Gulacy, Duncan Fregado, Ty Templeton, Bill Sienkewicz, Rich Burchett, Frank Quitely, Bruce Jones, Dean Motter, Kent Williams. Joe R. Lansdale, William Mesner Loebs, Mike Carey and others. There's a lot of craft here, it's very difficult to tell a full story, with beginning, middle and end, with compelling characters and an interesting horrific element in just 6-8 pages. Economy and efficiency are necessary to succeed and it is interesting to see how each creative team approaches it, what topics they tackle, how htey execute the ideas etc. and there are just plain a lot of good horror stories included. -M
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Post by urrutiap on Nov 15, 2017 3:49:03 GMT -5
Earlier tonight I read Alpha Flight # 1 to 3. Good stuff. Is it just me or that John Byrne has a thing for hairy men or something?
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Post by dbutler69 on Nov 15, 2017 13:01:46 GMT -5
Earlier tonight I read Alpha Flight # 1 to 3. Good stuff. Is it just me or that John Byrne has a thing for hairy men or something? Hairy men, and women with short hair (and big eyes). The Byrne run of Alpha Flight is one of my all-time favorite comic book runs, and criminally underrated, but it takes a serious nosedive after he leaves. If you continue to read the series, I recommend that you stop after Byrne's last issue.
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