Rise from the grave ye old forgotten thread

So, I abandoned the attempt at a chronological read as I got bogged down in the 1800s reading too much Poe and the lack of variety was getting to me. I have been dedicated to reading through my stuff this year, and doing a better job but still wanted to increase the variety of what I was reading. So I took a little inspiration form Coke & Comics and Action Ace and their shuffles to add a little variety to what I am reading, but still wanted a little bit of focus so to add a little complexity (what me over-complicate something, nahhhhh!) I worked out a way to merge randomness with a little focus.

I had 3 main foci for reading lately-Howard's prose, a couple of short boxes of completed runs/trades I wanted to read, and stuff available to me via Marvel Unlimited. I also had a stack of stuff out from the library I wanted to get to. I wanted to add a little randomness to that, so I added a fourth element-a random list using the cover dates of books.

Using an online random generator I randomly created a list of years of what I consider the comics book era (1938-2014) and then randomly generated a month for each year. Going through my list of books sorted by cover date, I selected a book (or run if it was part of a larger whole) for each month/year combo. These I called the random read list.

Then I created a list of 20 titles I was reading through from the short boxes & Marvel Unlimited, assigned each a number and randomly generated a list of 50 entries as to what title to read. When it's number comes up I will read one story/arc/trade volume worth of stories. These were called the Select list.

The third and fourth labels were Howard prose and library books.

Continuing the random theme-I randomly generated a list 100 entries long of 1-4 (1-random read, 2-Howard prose, 3-select list and 4-library selection) to determine what I will read.

I will review/comment/or muse on what I read here.

The first 2 results were from the random list and I have already read those

The first random result was March 1950 from which I selected the Seniorita Rio story from Fight Comics #57 (reprinted in Men of Mystery #68).

I was completely unfamiliar with the strip, so was going in cold. Seniorita Rio is an American women adventurer of sorts in Latin America and the story revolves around a group of rebels using an Incan legend to hide their secret base and armory, but the Seniorita intervenes, shows the natives they're legends are being expolited to foll them and breaks up the revolution attempt.

Pretty typical Cold War fare based on Domino Theory politics which were prevalent in '50 at the start of the Korean Conflict, can't let Democracy fall anywhere, especially in some two-bit Latin American region to the "revolutionaries" and pretty typical stereotypes of the great white hero among the Savages, but despite all that, fairly well drawn and enjoyable strip for its time.

The second random result was July 1942, and since I had the Men of Mystery issue out I chose the Miss Victory story from Captain Aero Comics #7 from that month which was also reprinted in there.

Another strip I wasn't familiar with. Miss Victory is a costumed mystery woman who in her secret identity works for the Dept. of Commerce. She is given a list of suspicious activity to copy and type at work, and recognizes some names form her old hometown on it, so decides to do a little investigating to see what she can turn up. Her friend's husband has been killed by a foreign agent who uses his credentials to get jobs in the defense industry and then sabotage the war efforts. Miss Victory saves her old friend, uncovers the spy/saboteur ring and protects her secret identity all in about 5 pages. The best part is that she defeats the armed thugs in combat by using a mop and soap bubbles. Got to love the Golden Age.

So we had three in a row from the random list, and choice 3 was July 1973, from which I selected Our Army at War #258. Great Kubert cover and a Sgt. Rock Story by Kanigher/Heath and a USS Stevens story by Sam Glanzman inside. Rock is in the Pacific, adrift on a raft seeking to survive and find food/water/a ship to get home. He comes across an island with a stranded Japanese soldier, but it lacks fresh water so they pool their efforts to find a way to survive. They spot a ship at sea, and the Japanese soldier warns Rock he must now attack him, but Rock prevails and kills the enemy. The ship turns out to be a gutted PT boat that didn't sink, so now Rock is adrift on that rather than the raft.

The USS Stevens story revolves around a soldier who received a KIYI letter about his son and who also learns his wife has passed back home and commits suicide. A very poignant but depressing story by Glanzman.

Choice 4 came up from the select list and at the top of the random reading order on that list was the Annihilation event. I had already read the prologue and the 4 lead in minis, so it was time to dive into the mini series proper. I read #1 at lunch today, and will get to the rest (and comment) tonight or tomorrow.

After Annihilation it came up with the random list again, and we got Nov 1955, from which I selected the Martian Manhunter debut story from Detective #225-I may or may not read a handful of the MM stories afterwards as well, we'll see.

So more reactions as I move on down the randomly generated list.

-M

Martian Manhunter stories from Detective Comics #225-230

I've liked the character since I first discovered him in the Justice League just before the JL Detroit days, and especially in the Giffen/DeMatteis/Maguire Justice League issues, and the American Secrets mini is one of my favorite comic stories from DC. But I had never read any of the early MM stories from Detective. I had stumbled on a couple from House of Mystery when I was still living in CT, and wasn't impressed, so had never tracked down any of the early stuff. By the time the Showcase volumes came out, my interests had moved on, but I did pick up both volumes on the cheap with Lonestar credit a year or so back (along with a lot of other Silver Age DC Showcase volumes), but had never gotten around to cracking them open until tonight. My randomizer landed on Nov 1955, the month the strip debuted in 'Tec 225, so decided to tackle the first half dozen or so since they were so short.

I enjoyed them for the most part, mostly becuase they were more detective strip (albeit with superpowers) than super-hero fare. Aside form a glimpse here and thee of his Martian form in flashboacks/intros, it is almost exclusively John Jones, Detective featured in these strips, not Martian Manhunter (a term not really used except for the title Manhunter from Mars). It does seem that the writers are randomly coming up with his Martian powers as they need them for each story. So far we got camouflage (his shape changing, but all we have seen is alternating between Martian form and human form to blend in like a chameleon), his extraterrestrial form (invisible and intangible-not one without the other), his ability to wind back the past in someone's mind (not telepathy per se, just a review of memories really), and ability to see into the future (seen in his first case as a detective The Magic Baseball-he sees what the outcome of the game was supposed to be) a power that seems to have been dropped or forgotten as I have never encountered it in a modern Manhunter story, super (Martian) senses (hearing & vision), extra lung capacity (i.e. super (Martian) breath) and tougher skin than humans. The powers come form emanations that radiate from Mars (as he loses all of his powers in the story in 230 because a comet is passing between Earth and Mars blocking the emanations-all that is except his chameleon power as he never loses his earthling disguise even though all his other powers are not working). Everything really does feel ad hoc, not like they sat down and figured out what his power set was when they created the character. I am guessing the power set will be in flux for a while until things get a little more settled on the strip (Jack Miller was the regular writer for a long time, but his first strip was the last one I read in #230, so there might be more consistency-but then again he is the one who brought the comet but kept the chameleon power working, so who knows. There is also inconsistency in the name of the scientist who brought the Manhunter to earth-Erdel in the origin story, but Urdel in 228 or 229 when a scientist crook finds his machine and tries to use it. I was also a it surprised that they established J'onn was a simple scientist not a lawman on Mars, as I was always used to that aspect, which must have been a later development.

If you don't like the Silver Age zeitgeist, these probably aren't for you, and they are more interesting to me as an artifact of the character than for the stories themselves, but they are fun little super-detective stories and enjoyable as that. I'll probably return at some point and check out some more, but onto the next random selection...

the randomizer chose the Conan prose/writings of REH category, and I am part way through the Black Stranger, so will finish that up for the selection.

-M

I was a Zook fan and lived to tell that tale

The Black Stranger by Robert E. Howard

The history of this story is almost as interesting as the story itself. It was written as a Conan story by Howard, but rejected. He rewrote it as a generic pirate story and that too didn't see publication. De Camp found the manuscript among the Conan papers and significantly rewrote the Conan story releasing it as the Treasure of Trancios in 1953, which is how I first discovered it in an illustrated novel with art by Estaban Maroto I found on a spinner rack of books in a grocery store in Vermont while we were on vacation visiting family in the summer of 1983. In 1976 Donald Grant published the non-Conan pirate story in a collection along with Black Vulmea's Revenge. It wasn't until 1987 that Howard's original Conan tale (unedited by de Camp) saw print in a collection edited by Karl Edward Wagner. It is this original version that appears in the Del Rey collection of Howard Conan stories that I read this time, my first reading the Howard original on this one.

There's a lot of diverse elements going on in this story, making it a bit overly complex and not quite straightforward, which is why it probably got rejected by Wright for Weird tales to begin with. You've got 3 or 4 plots being juggled-Conan in the lands of the Picts, The exiled Zingaran noble and the curse of the demon that hangs over him, the rivalry between the two pirates and Conan's attempt to resurrect his career as a pirate and his history with the two pirates, oh yeah and a lost pirate treasure they are all seeking that tries to hold it all together. Still it is a powerful and effective Conan story. Howard's theme of civilization vs. barbarism is laid bare and pretty on the nose throughout this story, put out there with no hint of subtlety or nuance (another possible reason for its initial rejection). Beyond the Black River (which was the Conan story I read previous to this one) is a better Conan vs. the Picts story as the Picts are more used as a backdrop and looming threat in this one rather than being the focus of the story, but this one does offer a better contrast of Conan vs. Pict vs. ignoble men (pirates) vs. supposedly civilized men (the Zingaran noble) allowing Howard a broader tapestry to play with when examining his thematic inclinations.

Conan is absent from large swaths of this story though (likely the biggest reason it was initially rejected) as parts focus on the conflicts between the pirates and the Zingaran nobleman, his niece? her ward, the curse that gives the story it's title, etc. which has to be fully set up before Conan is introduced into the plot to twist it all to hell. All in all, a solid Howard effort, but it is easy to see why it was rejected for weird Tales despite the strengths it offers.

Next up, something form the library pile.

-M

A little...

So my local library got a bunch of the DC Collections celebrating the 75th anniversary. The first one I checked out was the Flash volume, and with this dip into the library pile I read the 4 Golden Age Jay Garrick stories in the collection

-The Origin of the Flash from Flash Comics #1 (1940)
-The Secret City and The Planet of Sport from All-Flash #31 (1947)
-The Rival Flash from Flash Comics #104 (1949)

I've not read any of the GA Flash stories before. I've always liked the character of Jay Garrick as I have encountered him in Silver, Bronze and modern comics, but never had the chance to really read any of his original stories, so I looked forward to checking some of these out. They read like pretty standard Golden Age fare for me, fun, but not spectacular. It's a small sample, one story by Gardner Fox, two by Robert Kanigher and and one by John Broome, and I assume they would look for the best of the best to put in a collection like this, so I am working on the assumption these are representative of the rest. The Rival Flash almost seems a blue print for Professor Zoom later, and for Kid Flash, with someone recreating the experiment that created the Flash, and an anti-Flash, but it's more an interesting footnote than anything else. Thirteen pages is not a lot of room to develop a plot or characters, but they are still fun reads nonetheless. Carmine Infantino's art stands out among the four stories as well, but it is not that reminiscent of his later Silver Age Flash stuff; not sure how early in his career this is, but his work seems to continually evolve over the years, so it's not surprising that it looks different earlier in his career.

Next up, something from the random list that will put a little love in your life...Lovecraft that is.

-M