Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
Posts: 10,143 
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Post by Confessor on Feb 18, 2021 10:37:06 GMT -5
That's a great run on Dr. Strange. Probably the best and most enjoyable since the original Lee/Ditko run for me. I agree as far as story, and Brunner's art was second to none. But the first Colan/Thomas run of 172-183 had some of the most mind altering, innovative art of the Silver Age. I agree about the art on the Colan/Thomas run, but personally I found Roy's writing -- his dialogue particularly -- quite a slog to get through at times. I also find his writing on the Kree-Skrull War a bit of a slog too. And it's not that I just don't like Thomas's writing. Quite the contrary: I love his writing on titles like Amazing Spider-Man, Atari Force, Star Wars and the more recent Marvel Illustrated series. But yeah, his Dr. Strange always feels like hard work to me whenever I revisit that run. |
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Post by kirby101 on Feb 18, 2021 11:28:15 GMT -5
No one has written a Conan Comic as well as Roy.
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Crimebuster
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Making comics!
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Post by Crimebuster on Feb 18, 2021 11:38:44 GMT -5
Englehart's Dr.Strange 1973-1975: Started this in 2018 and finally finished it last March before my reading explosion. Great stuff, especially with Frank Brunner on art That's a great run on Dr. Strange. Probably the best and most enjoyable since the original Lee/Ditko run for me. It's up there in the top 4 Dr. Strange runs for me. I agree arguably the best post-Ditko run, but for me, I personally find the Stern run more enjoyable. |
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Post by profh0011 on Feb 18, 2021 13:47:16 GMT -5
I agree as far as story, and Brunner's art was second to none. But the first Colan/Thomas run of 172-183 had some of the most mind altering, innovative art of the Silver Age. When I re-read those some years ago (I have all the originals, not reprints), what they reminded me of the most, crazy enough, was the James Robinson-Tony Harris STARMAN. Maybe it was mostly the art. I find it amusing, looking back, that Roy Thomas said he felt he had "no idea" what he was doing when he started. It's no surprise he started out with a retold ORIGIN story (in my view, the BEST one from the period), then brought back Nightmare (Doc's 1st foe), the followed it up with Dormammu (Doc's arch-enemy). But after that... he started to get more creative. That all-too-short run is one of my favorite things Roy Thomas ever did by a wide margin, up there with CONAN.
I have mixed feelings about Frank Brunner. His art is ASTOUNDINGLY good. But his attitude that he was "bored" and so left to do... HOWARD THE DUCK... which he left even sooner... OY! It reminds me of later when Steve Lightle left LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES to do the DOOM PARTOL revival, then within a couple issues realized he'd made a mistake. I know Brunner did a lot of DS covers since then... but, did he EVER come back and do more stories? In all these years?
That said, Steve Ditko's DR. STRANGE is the one Marvel run I have re-read more times than any other run of any series from them. The ARCHIVE book helped immensely. I just wish I had more of the originals. (I do have everything from ST #135-up, plus the odd earlier ones here and there.)
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Post by Deleted on Feb 18, 2021 14:42:47 GMT -5
No one has written a Conan Comic as well as Roy. I just finished reading Roy's run again last month and I'd argue Busiek's run was better and I found some of Roy's attempts to adapt Howard's non-Conan tales and sword and sorcery tales by other authors (like Gardner Fox and Norvell Page) into Conan tales to be largely ham-fisted and poorly done. They neither felt like Conan tales nor that they fit in Howard's established Hyborian Age. They read mostly as square pegs being hammered into round holes. When he was adapting Howard Conan tales, or writing his own pastiche, it was very, very good, but the large swaths of poor attempts to adapt other stuff into Conan fare largely fell flat for me. -M |
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Post by chaykinstevens on Feb 18, 2021 15:47:56 GMT -5
VAULT OF EVIL: "Slayride" by Bruce Jones & Bob Hall. This is one of the SICKEST things I have ever, ever seen from Marvel. The story is insane, disturbed & depraved, and Bob Hall proves why he F***ing needs a decent inker. GEEZ!!! HAUNT OF HORROR: "The Survivor" by Marc DeMatteis, Jeff Isherwood, Ian Akin & Brian Garvey. An extremely-offbeat ghost story that screams "Jim Shooter" as it has some homo-PHOBIC undertones. Looks nice, reads awful. (And I generally like Bruce Jones' work.) Do you mean you generally like Marc DeMatteis' work? |
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Post by berkley on Feb 18, 2021 21:42:26 GMT -5
On Doctor Strange, as far as the writing goes for me there's the Ditko/Lee run and the Englehart: nothing else has come close to producing anything special. I don't get the love for the Roger Stern run at all - to me it comes across as very middle-of-the-road at best, and with this character middle-of-the-road isn't good enough.
The artwork is different: I'd probably rank Ditko, Colan, and Brunner at the top but there are others who aren't far off - Marie Severin and Dan Adkins are personal favourties and I'd probably rate the BWS and Michael Golden DS higher if their runs had been longer (and better written!).
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Post by profh0011 on Feb 18, 2021 23:26:21 GMT -5
In retrospect, decades after-the-fact, I think I've figured out the whole thing with Roger Stern.
Stern was ALWAYS at least "okay". Sometimes, much better than that. But here's the thing. HE DIDN'T SUCK. The side-effect of this was... whenever he would get on a book... he tended to look EVEN BETTER than he was. Because 9 times out of 10, any book he took over, tended to be totally chaotic, or just plain AWFUL, before he got there.
In the 70s, the same could be said for Steve Englehart.
It just occurs to me... both Englehart & Stern left THE AVENGERS before they planned to... because of EDITORIAL INTERFERENCE.
Those guys-- whose names I will NOT mention right now-- to this day, are on my S*** list.
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Post by Batflunkie on Feb 19, 2021 15:07:30 GMT -5
No one has written a Conan Comic as well as Roy. I just finished reading Roy's run again last month and I'd argue Busiek's run was better and I found some of Roy's attempts to adapt Howard's non-Conan tales and sword and sorcery tales by other authors (like Gardner Fox and Norvell Page) into Conan tales to be largely ham-fisted and poorly done. They neither felt like Conan tales nor that they fit in Howard's established Hyborian Age. They read mostly as square pegs being hammered into round holes. When he was adapting Howard Conan tales, or writing his own pastiche, it was very, very good, but the large swaths of poor attempts to adapt other stuff into Conan fare largely fell flat for me. I never had much of a taste for Conan, but I always thought Roy's attempts at adapting Michael Moorcock's Elric were pretty stellar |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 19, 2021 15:36:17 GMT -5
I just finished reading Roy's run again last month and I'd argue Busiek's run was better and I found some of Roy's attempts to adapt Howard's non-Conan tales and sword and sorcery tales by other authors (like Gardner Fox and Norvell Page) into Conan tales to be largely ham-fisted and poorly done. They neither felt like Conan tales nor that they fit in Howard's established Hyborian Age. They read mostly as square pegs being hammered into round holes. When he was adapting Howard Conan tales, or writing his own pastiche, it was very, very good, but the large swaths of poor attempts to adapt other stuff into Conan fare largely fell flat for me. I never had much of a taste for Conan, but I always thought Roy's attempts at adapting Michael Moorcock's Elric were pretty stellar His Elric x-over with Conan was good, and his adaptations of Elric stories themselves (as Elric stories) were excellent. But when he tried to turn a non-Conan Howard story or a story by someone like Norvell Page or Gardner Fox featuring other S&S characters into Conan stories the results were a mixed bag at best and often less than stellar with Conan having to act out of character to fit the plot and narrative of other characters or introducing things into the Hyborian Age that just didn't fit to try to make the story work in a setting (and often time period) it wasn't constructed for. Sometimes it worked ok (Gods of Bal-Sagoth was perhaps the best and even it had problems), but often they were just short of terrible, with only the artist's design sense and narrative skills giving it any redeeming qualities. But Thomas seemed bound and determined to make these fit as Conan stories, even when they didn't. -M |
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Post by Hoosier X on Feb 19, 2021 18:18:09 GMT -5
I decided to put my read-through on post-Ditko Spider-Man on hold until my Kirby/Lee Fantastic Four read-through catches up. I think it will be fun to read Spider-Man and Fantastic Four issues that came out at the same time. I did go ahead and read Spidey #45 because it’s the concluding chapter of a two-part Lizard story. Peter takes care of the Lizard and saves Dr Connors ... but his life is a mess otherwise! He sprained his arm, he didn’t turn in his Lizard photos when they were timely, he’s falling behind in school and he has to keep turning down MJ and Gwen when something fun is going on. Dude ... you need to manage your time better!
I read FF #27 last night, and Spidey #45 was published about the same time as FF #59! So it will be a few weeks before I get back to Spidey!
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Post by profh0011 on Feb 19, 2021 19:00:42 GMT -5
If you ever wanna get amitious, try re-reading ALL your 60s Marvelsd in the order they came out, one month at a time. it's amazing how much SUBTLE inter-book continuity reveals itself that way.
But there's a glitch. 4 books, the cover dates were one month off. (Or maybe just a week or two.) If you read those 4 LAST each month, even more subtle continuity becomes evident, MORE times than you'd think. This is hard to explain unless you've actually done it. I have!
THOR, THE AVENGERS, DAREDEVIL and X-MEN.
For example, if you have all the issues with "OCT" cover dates, read those 4 books LAST, before moving on to "NOV".
Somewhere in 1972 (I think), they skip a month, and those 4 books all fit normally into the schedule from then on.
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Post by commond on Feb 19, 2021 20:34:35 GMT -5
I began reading the Barry Windsor-Smith Machine Man limited series. It amuses me that it’s set in far-flung 2020.
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Post by Hoosier X on Feb 19, 2021 20:41:44 GMT -5
The distant future
The year 2000
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Post by Farrar on Feb 19, 2021 21:15:20 GMT -5
If you ever wanna get amitious, try re-reading ALL your 60s Marvelsd in the order they came out, one month at a time. it's amazing how much SUBTLE inter-book continuity reveals itself that way. But there's a glitch. 4 books, the cover dates were one month off. (Or maybe just a week or two.) If you read those 4 LAST each month, even more subtle continuity becomes evident, MORE times than you'd think. This is hard to explain unless you've actually done it. I have! THOR, THE AVENGERS, DAREDEVIL and X-MEN. For example, if you have all the issues with " OCT" cover dates, read those 4 books LAST, before moving on to " NOV". Somewhere in 1972 (I think), they skip a month, and those 4 books all fit normally into the schedule from then on. Yes, back in the 1960s the Avengers, DD, Thor and X-Men (and Sgt. Fury) were cover dated 2 months in advance of the release date; other Marvels cover dated 3 months ahead.**** So in May for example, on the stands there would be some Marvels--the 5 titles mentioned above--cover-dated July, with Spidey, the FF and the others cover-dated August. I thought this was well known among Marvel history aficionados--one only needs to look at a few months' worth of Silver Age Marvels bullpen bulletin checklists and/or house ads to see/deduce this!--but apparently it's not. I still come across blogs/posts breathlessly announcing this, as if it's some great puzzle they've uncovered/solved....not to mention there was a book about Stan's Soapboxes published a few years ago and the author/compiler completely missed this when talking about which comics the 1960s Soapboxes appeared in (I emailed him to let him know that there were two sets of cover dates in any given month; he said he hadn't known that and thanked me). Now of course we have Mike's Newsstand and other great online resources. Anyway, Marvel synched it up in August 1971 (for most of its monthly books). I remember I was on vacation with my family, so far from my usual neighborhood candy stores and I was worried I'd miss my finding monthly comics. But luckily there was a small stationery/souvenir store and I came across Avengers #93 and Fantastic Four #116. The problem was, both were cover-dated November, and I knew that couldn't be right, since the Avengers should have been cover-dated October. I remember being very worried that somehow I'd missed an Avengers issue! It didn't help my frame of mind that the Marvel comics were now giant-sized (for this month only, as it turned out) and cost more money, 25 cents instead of the usual 15 cents (this was Martin Goodman's famous one month tactic that ended up shafting DC). When we returned home from our vacation and I could check my comics, I saw I hadn't missed an Avengers issue; it was just the month had been moved up. So there's no October 1971-cover dated issue for the Avengers, DD or Thor (the X-Men had been canceled the previous year and was now a bi-monthly reprint mag; Sgt. Fury had become a "3 monther" in 1970 also). ***So, why the two sets of cover dates, both on sale within the same month? Hmm, perhaps some creative bookkeeping to get around the restrictive distribution deal with Independent News (which started out limiting Marvel to 8 books a month)?  |
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