The Final ’90s Countdown, Part Twenty-Six.

filed under Categories final '90s countdown 4 Comments

Behold, our second two-vote-receiver in the favorite indie comics of the ’90s poll…and it’s a title I’m pretty sure you’re all familiar with:

Gen 13 (Image Comics, 1994)

Even as the comics industry was starting to collapse all around us at the time, there were still the Hot Items that would hit the shelves and excite the comic readers who remained and toughed things out. Sure, shops were beginning to rely on POGs and Magic The Gathering cards to help shore up the sales that slipped far away from the Milk ‘n’ Honey times of the then very recent past, but there was still the occasional glimmer of hope on the stands yet.

Wizard Magazine, the comics industry hype man for all things new, popular, and investible, was at the height of its powers then, putting a price guide into the hands of The Common Man, versus that comparatively stodgy annual Overstreet Price Guide. And it would get the word out about all the Hot New #1s coming from your favorite publishers!

This was the world into which Gen 13 was unleashed. Nominally a super-team book, the initial mini-series introduced* to us Grunge, Free-Fall, Rainmaker, Fairchild, and Burnout, all superpowered teens. They are accompanied by the older, militarily-trained John Lynch. The initial five-issue mini-series was a hit, necessitating a second printing of the first issue. The youthful team, written by Jim Lee and Brandon Choi, featured the major selling point of J. Scott Campbell’s dynamic art. The exaggeratedly-legged and improbably-torsoed caricatures of the ladies read as “sexy” to potential readers, giving also-youthful comic fans an energetic and mildly-sensual alternative to boring ol’ comics aimed at their grandfathers, like Avengers and Justice League. This was a book for today’s mid-1990s young adult fans!

Given the mini’s popularity, an ongoing series was launched in 1995, with the relatively infamous thirteen variants for the first issue (discussed here). Trust me, for folks reading this who are newer to comics, at one time in the industry’s history “thirteen variants” actually seemed like a lot. But beyond everything else, those variants presented a cheeky sense of humor and a willingness to do some wild stuff with their comics. Of note in the second series is the three-part issue #13 (released as #13A, #13B, and #13C) in which Gen 13 crossed over with other companies’ characters, such as Jeff Smith’s Bone and, kinda surprisingly, the Archie Comics gang.

The second series continued on for 77 issues (plus a #0 mixed in there somewhere), wrapping up in 2002. With #37 the book became part of the Wildstorm imprint at DC Comics, and by this point the original creative team had left, leaving a variety of characters to carry on the book. Most notably, Adam Warren, of Empowered and Eclipse’s Dirty Pair fame, took over writing and cover art chores on the series, with interiors by Rick Mays, Ed Benes, and others, with the book concluding under his watch.

Along the way there were a number of tie-ins and spin-offs, most notably the anthology title Gen 13 Bootleg (which includes a story or two written and drawn by Warren, probably the best sellers from this run, at least at our shop). I mean, there were tons of them, and I’m just going to point you to the lists here and here instead of trying to transcribe every title into this post. I would like to note the Gen 13/Spider-Man intercompany crossover, as well as the Gen 13/Monkeyman and O’Brien mini, illustrated by Art Adams! Oh, and their crossover with the Maxx, and, and…well, you get the idea.

And speaking of Wizard, as we were earlier, here’s the cover to #44 from 1995, with the ladies of the team:


A brief aside: for all its failings, Wizard did succeed in, as I noted at the beginning of this post, hyping up comic titles to a certain core audience of readers, many of whom were new to the hobby, and more importantly, many of whom were young. Teenagers/young adults getting excited about comics that were aimed at them is something this business hasn’t seen in a while, at least until Absolute Batman caught on. I know Wizard could be juvenile, and that its taste could entirely be in its mouth, but boy, I preferred folks getting turned onto new books via a magazine they read versus them hunting books they see in the Hot Comics Apps like they do now.

And you know, that’s not really an aside. There have been attempts at revivals of the Gen 13 franchise, like reintroducing the team in a New 52-era issue of Supergirl, but Gen 13 may really have been Of An Age. As in, of that period in the ’90s when comics had been hot, but were on their way back out, but there was Wizard still pushing material to the kids who were still sticking around. But those kids are gone, the specific demographic that had been ready and willing to snap up a title like this, that was directly targeted at them, are gone. Or have moved on to, as I said, Absolute Batman. The niche is filled.

Look, I’m sorry to the two folks who voted for this title, and for any other fans reading this. I’m not trying to slag the comic. But it sort of feels like it was in a very small window of potential and opportunity, and those exact circumstances have yet to repeat themselves.

Or…have they? I’ve noted an uptick in back issue sales of the Gen 13 comics, so there may yet still be an audience. Maybe it’s nostalgia, maybe it’s new readers. But ol’ Gen 13 is still hanging in there.

Collected editions were wildly available during its heyday, but the most recent thing available is a Gen 13 Starting Over deluxe hardcover from a couple of years ago. It reprints the original mini, the first five issues of the second series, and some other material. Can’t tell if it’s in print or not…Lunar’s search engine tells me it exists, but won’t let me place an order on it, which maybe isn’t a good sign. Feels like this is one of those titles that would benefit from one of those super-thick paperback omnibuses, containing dozens of issues.

Anyway, Gen 13…a star that shined brightly for a little while, and maybe could reignite once again, someday. In the meantime, while you wait, you can watch this Gen 13 animation from 2000.
 
 
 
* Technically, they first appeared in Deathmate: Black, but no matter how hard people try on, like, eBay, literally nobody cares.

Whither the second printing?

filed under Categories dc comics, publishing, superman 4 Comments

I guess this post can be seen as an epilogue of sorts to my posts about the John Byrne reboot of the Superman titles in the mid-1980s. Essentially, I came across this 1988 issue of Superman from near the tail end of Byrne’s run:


…where you might see this oddly-formatted blurb in the corner:


Now around this time, DC Comics was making a big promotional push to let folks know the series was about to be released on a biweekly basis. To wit: Amazing Heroes #133 (the “Preview Special”) from earlier in the year contains this bit of information within its Superman coverage:


And just to gild the lily, here’s an excerpt from a house ad located right next to this entry, warning you of what’s to come:


As it turns out, the biweekly Superman plan is called off, as Byrne very publicly quits the Super-books around this time, He’s only involved in a couple more issues after this.

It’s my memory that the “Power Failure!” blurb you see on the cover of #19 had shown up in print ads and such prior to its release, containing instead an announcement of the title’s change in release schedule. However, try as I might, I couldn’t find one of those ads for today’s entry. Given how the lettering in the blurb leaves a lot of blank space, it is pretty clear that something else had been meant to be there.

But when I went to the Grand Comics Database to look up information on this issue (and, ahem, “borrow” a scan or two), much to my surprise I see this cover marked as a “Third Printing.”


And there it is, right in the corner, marked “Now Twice Monthly!” If you look at the entry for this cover specifically, it’s noted that the third printing came out quite a bit after the release of the first printing. Why the “Now Twice Monthly!” blurb is retained, I’m not sure, as the Superman title itself never goes biweekly. I suppose in combination with Adventures of Superman, maybe that counts as making Superman a twice-monthly title. However, I think Action is back to being a monthly title at this point, so it’s…three times a month?

Anyway, kind of an oddball thing I discovered. Maybe one of you has the answers! (Or at least where I can find a print ad showing the original version of that cover.)

Smith and Jones.

filed under Categories original art 6 Comments

So a little while back, comics artist Steve Lieber posted to his Bluesky account a piece of work of such shocking significance to the artform — nay, to the world — that I could not help but message him and ask how I could acquire this immortal piece.

Alas, quoth Steve, the illustration existed only in digital form, but he would be happy to reproduce it upon physical media, the nigh-mythical “ink” and “paper” treasured by our forebears, and send it to me via the postal mails with all haste.

And friends, Mr. Lieber was, as the gentleman that he is, true to his word, and very shortly I had that artwork in my possession.

Men, gird your loins; women, steel your nerves; all others…you’re tough, you’re probably good — get ready to behold…

…SLUGHEAD.


Truly, the world does not deserve such beauty. But man, I sure do.

Warning: lightly naughty covers ahead.

filed under Categories blogging about blogging is a sin, publishing 4 Comments

Okay, a lot of business to attend to here:

First, there’s been a small influx of A.I.-generated comments on the site, with links to A.I.-related companies. It’s particularly insidious, signing themselves in with real-sounding names and generating comments from stuff either I or other commenters have said. A couple just sounded like they were agreeing with me, but more often than not they were just slightly rewording what we’ve said. Ugh. Look, I think A.I. can have its uses (once they solve the whole, you know, energy/water usage thing), like in dealing with and sorting data, but we don’t need Newer, Better Spam. So, I’ll try to nip these in the bud as I notice them.

Second, I’ve got medical stuff going on in the middle of the week, so Wednesday’s post is gonna be quite short. By which I mean “actually, really short,” not “I’m going to keep this short” and suddenly I’ve written an Alan Moore script.

Third, some of you had some good suggestions regarding the earliest regular cover/opaque-bagged naughty variants. Brian F sends me to this NSFW reference page that may require some digging.

Another likely suspect, provided by Matthew, is Hellina: Taking Back the Night did have a polybagged nude variant (NSFW again) according to advance publicity, with obscuring black bars. Here’s one I found on eBay:


Out in 1995, a year after the Perg comic I talked about last time, which was in an entirely clear bag.

Barring my finding something in that list of books Brian sent me, that may be the earliest example so far of “adult variant for a non-adult book in an obscuring bag.” Even if, you know, that “obscuring” is restricted to a couple of small black bars, and not covering the entire image like the newer variants that triggered this whole discussion.

Fourth, in this post discussing some X-rated comics of the ’90s that had merit, some of you brought up Phil Foglio’s XXXenophile, which is indeed one of the great filthy books of the period. Wonderful art (mostly Phil, with a parade of inkers/finishers), short and clever stories, and, yes, lots of, ahem, shenanigans. It’s all joyful and hilarious and will likely offend somebody at some point. Like, I’m not going to vouch for the political correctness of this cover, but it’s plenty silly:


Again, there were plenty of adult comics that were well worth your time and attention, and XXXenophile was among the best of them. Like I said before, I’m not sure what sort of coverage of them I can get away with here, but at the very least I can acknowledge them.

To the Grand Comics Database: that was me looking up all those weird titles last night, I apologize.

filed under Categories publishing, retailing, undergrounds 14 Comments

[NOTE: seriously, some of the links for those comics are Not Safe for Work. You’ve been warned…quit your job before clicking.]

Your pal Mike’s been burning the candle at both ends lately, so I’m going to try to keep it (relatively) short for today’s entry by finishing up some old business. Keef asked this of me a while back:

“The more I get into weirdo undergrounds and ‘adult’ comix, the more I want to know about their history and perspective. When I worked at a shop around the turn of the century, we didn’t really have any Undergrounds– or if we did, I was entirely unaware of them. It took a while for me to get into Undergrounds. I suspect that a lot of that was just because it wasn’t covered in the mainstream comics media that I followed when I got into the scene– Wizard didn’t do any cover stories about the bizarre pointillist nastiness of Jim Osborne, for example– but also because it just wasn’t around. I enjoy this stuff now because there are so many weird niche rabbitholes to climb down.

“At my relatively-small college town shop, we stocked Eros stuff, but I thought of it as the ‘dirty old man’ section, and so I didn’t pay much attention to it– except for a few exceptions, mostly by people I knew. It’s only in the past few years that I’ve gotten into the Eros stuff, mostly for entertainment value (the Tom Sutton stuff) but also because some of it is genuinely good.

“Historically, has there been a shift in the way that you sell undergrounds / adult stuff? Do you avoid blogging about it because this is a ‘family friendly’ blog?”

Well, it’s a fair cop, I don’t talk about any of this stuff nearly as much as I should, given the amount of it there is, and the impact much of it has had on the medium as a whole. I do have an “undergrounds” category (which I don’t think tags every discussion of the topic on here), so I haven’t dodged things entirely, but there is certainly more to say.

In terms of “how do I sell the stuff,” I actually wrote a post about this in 2014, which, to be fair, I didn’t expect anyone to immediately remember. In fact, I had to Google it up myself to recall when exactly I discussed this. Interestingly, this was in August of that year, a mere month before I announced to the world that I was opening my own store. So, in that post, where I was talking about how we dealt with adult comics at my previous place of employment, I was almost certainly thinking to myself about how I was going to handle them at my new shop. I’m a little…bemused at that.

At my “new” (now nearly 12 years old) store, I handle adult and underground comics somewhat differently, mostly because there aren’t quite the numbers of overtly “explicit” comics that there used to be. By which I mean, we’re no longer getting comics with titles like Pee Soup, accompanied by covers that make no bones about what’s going on inside. (That link is mightily Not Safe for Work, by the way.) Instead, we’re getting comics with the very adult content like Money Shot, a sci-fi adventure book with plenty of Tab A going into Slot B (and variations thereof) inside, but the covers (aside from the naughty bagged variants we were talking about a few days ago) are mostly innocuous, or at least not any more salacious than what you’d find on your typical issue of Vampirella. These would just get racked in with the general population on the shelves, maybe wrapped in a clear plastic comics bag to discourage casual nosiness by a young’un, if I thought maybe there’s a chance of improper exposure.

Anything that would be deemed too explicit, and perhaps too much — y’know — on the covers may be bagged and put up in a specific portion of the top new comics shelf, sort of like what we did at the old store. There hasn’t been a lot along those lines (Tarot Witch of the Black Rose would fit into this category, for example), but that’s what I’d do. Or there are cases where the actual title is a bit much, like Cat Shit One. That would get snuggled into the upper section as well, perhaps overlapped by the magazine next to it so I don’t have something called “CAT SHIT ONE” obviously blaring from my top shelf.

Now “undergrounds” as a category for any new comics is more an honorary designation than anything else, and not “Warning: This Comic Is Aggressively Countercultural or Whatever,” necessitating separation from the regular stock to avoid upsetting the squares. They’re just “independent comics,” now, and even when Robert Crumb, Mr. Undergrounds his own darn self, puts out a new pamphlet, it’s just up there on the new comics rack between Superman #32 and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder #3. And it sold there just fine, thank you.

Older undergrounds have their own box behind the counter, as does older naughty stuff like Eros Comix, since I don’t necessarily want those out on the floor where Grandma can unknowingly pull one out and say “how about this one, Little Billy?” But really, that’s no big deal…I have a box full of Classics Illustrated behind the counter, too, because I don’t necessarily want these, in some cases, nearly 80-year-old comics being man-or-Grandma-handled without direct supervision. (In fact, a lot of my back issue stock is behind the counter, because I literally don’t have the floor space for everything to be within the customer’s reach.)

As to the actual quality of undergrounds and adult comics…well, that’s perhaps a subject for a more comprehensive post. Undergrounds probably don’t need the defending here so much as the more explicitly XXX-rated books that proliferated on shelves or behind the “18+” beaded curtains a few decades back. Yes, some were, like, “just go buy a copy of Hustler, why do you need a comic that’s tracing stuff from copies of Hustler,” but many were unique artistic expressions, too. Gilbert Hernandez’s Birdland, the inaugural title from Fantagraphics’ Eros line, is one that gets mentioned a lot. There’s the outrageousness of Don Simpson’s…excuse me, “Anton Drek’s” Wendy Whitebread Undercover Slut. There’s the relative cutesiness of Debbie Does Dallas (at least the early issues that were drawn by a former customer of mine!). There’s Ho Che Anderson’s early work I Want to Be Your Dog (about BDSM in the Black community), there’s Bill Willingham’s fantasy work Ironwood, there’s the just plain weirdness of Spank…I mean, there’s a lot of notable stuff happening under that “adult comics” label. And that’s not even talking about a lot of the European and Japanese material being rereleased under these imprints.

Anyway, it’s a rich mine to dig into, clearly. I’m not sure I want to spin off into a separate “Progressive Ruin…After Dark” site, so discussion of some of these may require some circumspection. I try to keep things mostly general audience friendly here…I mean, I’m assuming my readership is largely adult anyway, but I’m not putting up high-quality scans of anything unnecessarily Turgid or Sopping. I’m just not that kind of webpage. But reasoned discussion of adults-only material is not, and hasn’t been, out of the question. When I find I have something to say on the topic, I’ll be happy to write it up here. I just hope I won’t be forced to card any of you before doing so.

In which I ponder, weak and weary.

filed under Categories marvel, publishing 8 Comments

[Minor SPOILERS for Marvel’s Midnight comics ahead]

And so, the day has come. Marvel’s new Midnight imprint has been unleashed upon the world, and a lot of what I’ve been considering is about to pass. From the retailer perspective, I am curious if this will succeed in achieving at least a smidgen of the traction that DC’s Absoluteline of books has. From the reader perspective…are these any good?

Let’s take that first question first, even though I don’t quite have the data necessary based on the fact that I’m writing this the night before it’s on sale at my shop. Judging from the pull lists and the in-store requests, interest is reasonably high. However, once I knuckled down and started to process the pull lists, I received a lot of late orders for the variant covers, and usually the same specific variant covers. Everyone wanted the connecting covers, for example, which traditionally is not the sort of variant my clientele usually asks for, so naturally I did not have enough to go around. I’m hoping I can get a reorder on these, but we’ll see.

That’s all just sales stuff that I’ll know the answer to in just a few hours. The important part is, again, are they actually good comic books? I think the answer is “yes,” by and large. The stated purpose of Midnight is to bring Marvel’s superheroes into a more horror-tinged narrative, and overall I think they succeed to varying degrees. But the implicit purpose of this line is to duplicate DC’s creative success with the Absolute line, and its sales success in bringing new readers into comic shops. In this latter consideration, I think Marvel may be moving in the right direction here, mostly.


Midnight Fantastic Four #1 may be the best of the bunch, not just in terms of storytelling but in its emulation of the “Absolute” line’s “formula,” inasmuch as it has one. We begin at square one, where a disgraced Reed Richards’ scientific services are acquired by Susan Storm, who is accompanied by her bodyguard Ben Grimm and her brother Johnny. Like the Absolute books, we’re starting with our characters lacking their particular advantages, in this case specifically Reed not having his respected credentials, and in a larger sense, lacking his familial connection to the others in what would have been his team. There’s a definite tension to the proceedings, and while the horror elements are present, they aren’t necessarily overwhelming, though there is a bit of inferred body horror awaiting us, especially if you got a look at some of the variant covers.


Midnight Spider-Man reminds me a little of this Stephen King quote:

“I recognize terror as the finest emotion and so I will try to terrorize the reader. But if I find that I cannot terrify, I will try to horrify, and if I find that I cannot horrify, I’ll go for the gross-out. I’m not proud.”

There’s a lot of exploding bodies and blood ‘n’ such in this one, as Oscorp is experimenting on live human subjects who do not survive the process. Again, we’re starting from scratch, as young genius Peter Parker is recruited by the company, and from there…well, the body horror is more explicit in this one, so you can probably guess where things end up. It’s generally an interesting story, with a simplistic but effective conflict in Peter’s motivations. The art is…a little loose in places, where I’m not sure what I’m even looking at, but that may be my aging eyes more than anything else.


Midnight X-Men #1 is the odd man out, as we’re basically put in, as my old pal Dorian put it, a What If story. This isn’t a “ground floor” book, this is a world where the X-Men are already established, building a premise off old X-Men storylines, in which the mutants are mostly all vampires and we’re at war with them and so on. There’s nothing explicitly wrong with it — I mean, it’s all professionally told, though I tend to find writer Jonathan Hickman a bit dry at times — but of the three books, this one didn’t quite understand the assignment of “we need our own Absolute line.” To hear Midnight Spider-Man writer Phillip Kennedy Johnson tell it:

“…When people are making comparisons to Absolute and all that, but it’s really, I’m trying to think of a more apt comparison. I mean, the only similarity really to Absolute is that it is a reimagine. It’s like a Rebirth kind of a thing. And that way that it’s similar in that we’re completely burning the script and starting over. But we’re what we’re replacing it with is super different.”

Well, that’s not this book so much. Maybe we’ve got a lot of backstory in our future, and I imagine we do, but I don’t know if that will be as effective as an X-title that starts from the beginning rather than in medias res. If Midnight Spider-Man started with Peter Parker at around issue #100 of Amazing Spider-Man, and all that business where he had six arms, and continued from there…that’s basically Midnight X-Men #1.

…I don’t think it’s bad, I should emphasize. I’m actually interested to see where this is going, which is unusual for me since I’m not an X-Men guy. At least on that level, “does it keep a reader’s attention,” I think it’s managed that. That said, this isn’t really differentiated enough from the regular X-books to feel like it’s “new” and “different” enough to be its own thing. It leans hard on the “NEW IMPRINT FIRST ISSUE” status to make that hoped-for jump from “just another new Marvel #1” to “huge sales hit that’ll still be selling tenth printings of #1 two years from now,” and I don’t know that’ll be enough.

Look, I know I may sound hard on a couple of these. I don’t mean to. I want these comics to do well. DC hit that magic formula with their Absolute line, with comics that just continue to sell and sell and sell, printing after printing, with the trade paperback collections also selling, bringing new customers into comic book stores while also selling to the already converted. It’s great, and I’d be out of my mind if I, a comic store owner, didn’t want that again, but from Marvel.

So, we’ll see what happens. As a store owner, I hope it’s a hit. As a fan, I hope they continue to be enjoyable to read. As an observer of the industry, I’m sure they’ll give me plenty to write about in the near future.

Not being prurient in the slightest.

filed under Categories publishing 14 Comments

So I was chatting with Amy Chase (writer of Fixation, first issue currently available at your better comic shops, and at mine as well!) as I was ringing up her comic book purchase, when she pointed out the bagged copies of the Not Safe for Work cover of Gastronomique #2 that I had at the front counter. Why are they at the front counter? Because I’ve had problems with these particular types of variants…walking out the door without my knowledge, if you get my drift. Thus, I just keep them discreetly by the register, where the Normal Folks won’t pay attention but the Real Heads know what’s goin’ on.

Anyway, the reason Amy pointed out said bagged variant was to wonder aloud what the first “bagged adult variant” may have been. I mean, not the naughty comics, like Black Kiss (discussed here) where there was only one cover (oh, for those days again), but it was a bit rough for open display on the shelf, and the comic was polybagged with a card over that cover. She meant the comics where there were a handful of “all (appropriate) audiences” covers, along with one, or two, or five Not Safe for Work variants that were polybagged with boards or some other feature that hid the imagery.

I mentioned in that post I’ve already linked once that maybe the best known version of this particular publishing strategy was Sex Criminals where, say, issue #11 would have your wholesome cover suitable for Sunday schools:


…and you’d simultaneously have the Adults Only cover available in this opaque polybag:


…containing Godless filth distributed by Zdarsky and Fraction, Professional Pornographers.

Amy said that she thinks Sex Criminals was the first series to have a standard cover accompanied by a polybagged NSFW variant, which…I couldn’t dispute. At least, not without research (AKA Googling).

Sex Criminals #11 came out in 2015, and as far as I can tell, that was the first issue of the series to have the polybagged NSFW variants. (This is where I miss having access to Diamond Comics’ stock catalog, where I could look this up for sure.)

The first thing that came to mind was the 1989 Leather and Lace series, which came in a polybagged Adults Only version and a “general audiences” version (which I go into detail about here). But it’s not really the same thing, as these are, technically, two different comics: one with X-rated material and one with the X-rated material removed. Yeah, I know. The bagged adult edition did have slightly racier covers, but this wasn’t really the same thing as the Sex Criminals reg-vs.-NSFW covers, as in Leather and Lace‘s case, the adult comic is the main book, the “general” version is the weirdo variant. And oddly, I don’t think even the L&L adult covers featured any outright nudity.

Anyway, I thought about this question for a bit, dredging what’s left of my memory for any earlier examples of regular ol’ comics with bagged naughty variants. Ultimately, I turned to that aforementioned Googling, and turned up this:


Perg #6, published by Lightning Comics in 1994, came with a couple of Gold variants, both polybagged. One was just the same cover pictured here, just on a gold-foil paper. The nude gold polybagged edition had a similar but different image, this time with everyone in the altogether. (You can see all the covers here.)

This isn’t quite the same thing, as the polybag is clear and doesn’t hide the image (unless the included Certificate of Authenticity was put over the front of the cover). But so far this is the earliest comic that had a standard cover accompanied by a nude polybagged cover (obscured or not). But in terms of comics that had a Not Safe for That Workplace variant in an opaque bag, Amy may be correct that Sex Criminals was first out of the gate.

Now is the time where I’ll throw things out to crowdsourcing. Can you think of a comic with a main Safe for Work cover with a nude polybagged variant, either in a clear bag or not, that predates either of the comics above in either category? I promise not to call you a pervert if you have suggestions.

An elemental disagreement.

filed under Categories publishing 32 Comments

I don’t think I’ve mentioned it here, but I’ve certainly brought it up on Bluesky that I now have about 92% of the Elementals comics from the ’80s and ’90s, missing only a couple of the issues from the mini-series, and the very last couple of Elementals minis spit out by a dying Comico. (I’m only bothering with the first Elementals Sex Special since it’s the one with actual work from the series creator Bill Willingham.)

Anyway, I held off reading the Elementals Specials (not to be confused with the Sex ones) until after I finished the entire first series. I know Special #1 fits in somewhere during that first run, while #2 leads up to launch for Elementals #2. As such, as I was reading through the first series, I saw some letters page reactions to the first Special and it seems to be a fairly positive reaction.

I’d known for years Special #1 was a Very Important Issue, addressing the problem of child abuse, probably hinted at by that cover of haunted children’s faces (and one kid with glowy eyes, which is a thing from the story). Willingham draws the book with Rich Rankin inks, while Jack Herman scripts, and the story is…mmmm, not the greatest. A member of the Elementals, Tommy AKA Monolith has psychic visions of children being killed by some mysterious being, and we get a slew of dead kids in this issue, which is, needless to say, distressing. Which is the point, of course.

Spoilers for a 40-year-old comic, but the supernatural murderer turns out to have been the victim of abuse himself as a child, “repeating the cycle” as they say, and he’s talked down and neutralized.

Aside from that last little bit, we don’t really get too deep into the whys and wherefores of the topic at hand…it’s a lot of action and killing and Elementals lore and I don’t know what anyone would have taken from this, really. I mean, it’s fine as what is basically a solo Monolith adventure, but feels kinda shallow.

Of note, though, is the editorial page in this issue. Included is a letter where Comico’s rep reached out to an organization that was working against this sort of treatment of children, asking if they wanted to place an informational page in the comic as outreach.

The response that garnered was as follows, from the director of the organization:


Hoo boy, As it says in The Muppets (2011):


Now, I think she’s justified in saying no…the story is pretty violent, and I would imagine off-putting to someone I’m guessing hasn’t had much experience with comics. Willingham provides an editorial response, stating that this is a comic presented in the Elementals milieu, with supernatural beings and serial killers simply being just part of the context into which the topic of abuse has been slotted. Also, that “violent, upsetting” content should be used to get the point across to audiences. And here, in this case, I think I get what Willingham is saying

Not directly addressed is this accusation from the director’s letter:

“The graphic violence and physical abuse that occur probably will not help prevent child abuse and in fact may encourage it.”

Oh man, I think if I were Willingham that bit would have pissed me off the most. What a thing to say to someone, “your comic is so bad it may cause murders.” I mean, holy shit. Honestly, I can understand most of the points being made from both sides of this argument, but this add-on is just over the top.

This was the mid-1980s when all this was goin’ on. The general public’s increasing awareness of comic books was slowly creeping up. Watchmen wouldn’t come out until a few months after Elementals Special #1 was released, and thus hadn’t yet entered the conversation, but Batman: The Dark Knight had come out just the month before. Comics were on the verge of booming into enormous popularity, and with wider availability and access comes wider criticism.

At the time of this letter exchange, we weren’t quite there yet, but the stirrings of public unrest were there, as more “mature” content began to get mainstreamed (as much as a comic shop was “mainstream” then) into store racks. Discussions of violence in comics were increasing, like in this article from a 1985 Comics Journal: “The Ratings Debate – Violence and Sex in Comics: How Will Publishers Cope with It?” Or this article by Heidi MacDonald, which has lived rent-free in my head for nearly 40 years. And c’mon, X-Men fans had been long debating whether Wolverine was too violent…or not violent enough.

I don’t know that this director was exposed to any of this early tumult in the comics biz…well, actually, I’m pretty sure she wasn’t. This exchange, however, remains as a precursor to the debates and accusations and straight-up witch hunts that were to follow in the coming years.

Like I said, I didn’t think the Elementals Special was a great comic. I mean, kudos to the creators for using their platform to address an important topic, but it feels more exploitative than educational. That may just be the nature of the series’ overall tone, or the story in which it was expressed, or whatever. Just overall, the execution just didn’t work for me, but other folks wrote in and really liked it, so Your Mileage May Vary, as it always does.

EDIT: Lars recently did his own overview of this issue, with more visuals of the actual contents than I provided.

The one with Miss Piggy and Emma Frost was pretty good, too.

filed under Categories fantastic four, this week's comics, variant covers 6 Comments

So in general I usually just stick with the main covers of books, letting the variants stay on the shelves for the customers who want them. But sometimes…sometimes there’s a cover I have to have. Last time it was a variant featuring you-know-who, and this week it was this one:


Marvel’s celebrating the 50th anniversary of The Muppet Show, you see, so we’re getting these swell mash-up covers (as well as the equally-swell Muppets Take the Marvel Universe comic from last week). I couldn’t resist Statler and Waldorf and the Watcher. What an image.

Helping me make the choice was that I didn’t entirely care for the main cover, which looked like this:


…with a big portion given over to a banner identifying the book as part of the “DNX” crossover, sort of in the fashion of previous Marvel crossover events like Civil War. I’m not reading the DNX series, I’m not even entirely sure what it’s about, which is probably a bad thing to admit given I order and sell this stuff, but it’s basically another “event” book I’m not personally following.

Interestingly, the previously provided artwork for this cover for Fantastic Four #17 looked like this:


…with the artwork taking up the entire area. Come to think of it, the Muppet variant image we were provided prior to release did not contain the dialogue balloons:


Frankly, I liked it better that way…far more foreboding.

Now as to the issue itself, since I’m not reading the event, how did I like the book that’s tying into it? Now look, as a verified expert in comic book reading, I’m no stranger to reading a story that ties into another series I’m not reading and have no interest in doing so. I can usually extrapolate what I missed from what I have read, and if it’s a good comic book, the creative team will briefly catch you up under the assumption this book is the only one you’ve ever read, ever.

Needless to say, this is writer Ryan North we’re talking about, and he, along with artists Vincenzo Carratù and Edgar Delgado, presents us a story that requires no (or at least very little) previous knowledge of what’s going on elsewhere. The FF are stranded…somewhere, and none of them have their memories. Thus, it’s a story of them trying to work out who they are and where they’re at, and it is both amusing and exciting. It’s not ’til the end we get the explicit tie-in to DNX, but judging by the next issue blurb, it doesn’t seem like you’ll need to read any other comic to be able to follow part two of this story. Which is nice.

I suppose if you are reading DNX, this will enhance the experience. But if not, you’re good there too.

I did spot another variant this week I was tempted by:


…but alas, I’m not reading any of the X-books. Not even for Pepe the King Prawn.

My Fantastic Four-ay: Part Thirteen.

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Before I get into the main “trying your patience” portion of this post, let me note a couple of things:

First, pal Tegan celebrates installment #1000 of her “Tegan Reads a Comic Book” video series, where she looks at that anniversary issue of Fantastic Four I discussed not too long ago. She was kind enough to acknowledge my efforts here researching the origins of that comic, and she has, as she always does, interesting things to say about the book.

Second, I just discovered a few days ago that there was a five-part podcast series looking at the Fantastic Four movies entitled “Fantastic Fouray,” which was news to me. Well, I don’t think there should be any confusion between that podcast and my overlong text pieces, but just in case: I Am Not Affiliated with That Podcast, Honest, I Wasn’t Trying to Step on Any Toes Here. Anyway, reviews of the FF films sound like fun, so go check ’em out, let me know how they are.

Now, onto the mainstream of this evening’s symposium:

So when we last met, we were at that point in the Fantastic Four run, in late 1986, where John Byrne’s direct involvement has been over and done with for several months now. However, his influence still lives on, as we saw in the extra-sized anniversary issue #296, which followed a general outline of his initial plans but shaved off some of the details. And here we are in #297, by Roger Stern, John Buscema and Sal Buscema, dealing with the emotional detritus left behind by some of Byrne’s storytelling decisions.

As you can see on this cover (which I presented last time):


…the Thing is clearly not in a great place. Don’t worry, I’m not going to spend another full post on just a cover again, but there is a distressfully dark tone to that cover. Without actually saying the word “suicide,” you clearly get what is implied here. Needless to say, ol’ Ben is not in the best place right now. I mean, this cover isn’t a patch on “This Man, This Monster” as drawn by Jack Kirby:


…but it’s of a kind.

The cover only tells part of the story of what’s inside, as it’s got subplots a’plenty in the Mighty Marvel Manner, but you’d be disappointed if it didn’t. What supposedly are the A and B plots of the issue are the Fantastic Four working on some science doohickeys for the U.S. government to address some strange fluctuations in the Sun. Meanwhile, somewhere out in space, there’s war raging on a distant planet between two powerful warlords who just happen to be brothers. Here’s a quick family photo of the two of them:


If you think those initial two plots are going to collide at some point, well, give yourself a cookie.

And, of course, the third plot, the emotional journey of Ben Grimm from “depressed” to “probably even more depressed.” Despite the A & B plots clearly being on a collision course and the apparent main driver of the book, it’s C that, frankly, we’re all going to be the most concerned with. This is likely the main reason I kept reading the book, even considering Byrne’s departure and the mostly wet thud of the anniversary issue. I wanted to know what happened to the Thing.

At this point, in the few years I’d been reading Fantastic Four and related materials, I’d seen Bashful Benjy go through a lot. Gained his humanity, lost his humanity, been devolved, been further mutated, was stuck adventuring on an alien world, found out he could always turn himself back to human but lost the ability on said alien world, lost his girlfriend Alicia to his best friend, et cetera and so forth.

It wasn’t like I was waiting for an eventual “happy ending,” as the very nature of serialized superhero comic book adventures is happy-ending-adverse. I think I was looking more for an “equilibrium,” some middle ground where the Thing could have something resembling a normal life while still going on adventures. Like, right now, in the Ryan North scripted Fantastic Four series, the Thing is married (to Alicia…yes, that whole situation is eventually resolved, wait ’til you find out how if you don’t already know), he’s not constantly mutating, he’s not emotionally tortured…that’s about what I mean when I say “reached an equilibrium.”

In this issue, though, the Thing isn’t quite there yet, as he remains in a bit of turmoil, angered and shamed by his physical condition and brusque to the man he feels put him in this position, the FF’s leader Reed Richards. Unfortunately, Ben’s attitude results in a little friendly fire involving Reed’s young son Franklin:


…which of course only exacerbates the Thing’s renewed self-consciousness about his appearance, a symptom of recent events involving mutations of his form and his stint on Monster Island from the anniversary issue.

This drives Ben to don a suit that fully covers his body:


…as seen in this bit of business, where he, somehow unseen, overhears Johnny’s proposal to Alicia:


…that of course does nothing for his current state of mind.

The ultimate payoff of this plot thread comes when the FF all hop aboard their ship and take off into space to deploy their Sun-energy-detector-siphon doohickey. Once that’s deployed, the Thing decides to just let himself drift off into oblivion, like what we saw on the cover, only to be caught in the process by Johnny (wearing a Reed-designed outfit that allows him to Human Torch-ify himself in space):


Ben just lays out the reasons why he feels he’s no longer needed (including She-Hulk’s continuing presence on the team, which comes to a head of sorts shortly). Johnny of course thinks it’s a load of bunk and drags him back to safety, nearly doing himself in due to the limited supply of air in his special suit.

By the end of the issue, Ben’s back on board the ship and ready to pilot everyone back home, until the sun-device somehow makes contact with that alien world and drags the warring brothers back to our solar system, somehow merged into one being:


…and that’s our cliffhanger for the next issue.

I didn’t say much about the whole warring alien brothers situation, because, like I said, the important part of the story is the Thing’s continuing alienation from the rest of the team, and from the rest of humanity itself. It’s just all set-up for the big action-packed conflict for the next issue, but that said, I feel there’s still a connection between these two elements of the story. The alien warlords (named Umbra and Jaagur, just for future reference) could be seen as being in parallel to the relationship between Ben and Johnny. And Reed, too, perhaps, but given the main conflict for this story is for the former pairing, that’s the match that makes the most sense.

Between Ben and Johnny, we see an emotional conflict that is…well, not “resolved” as such, but at least brought to a position of understanding. With Umbra and Jaagur, the conflict between the two brings them into outright violent physical conflict, which gets interrupted by outside forces (Reed’s machine). And one presumes being merged into the same body doesn’t resolve those issues, but we’ll see what happens in the next chapter.

The Too Long, Didn’t Read version is that we have two different conflicts between two sets of brothers, both put on hold, with Ben and Johnny in a “but for the grace of God” circumstance in relation to Umbra and Jaagur. I mean, I don’t think Ben and Johnny were in any danger of being merged into a single body or anything, but Ben does bring up the bit of business from Monster Island where Johnny was made “ugly” by the Mole Man’s machinations, so in a way they did “share” a body, or at least a circumstance…and already my Too Long, Didn’t Read summary is longer than the bit I was trying to summarize.

In the end, what we have is a deep dive into the mental state of the Thing, still feeling the aftereffects of what he’d been through as a result of Byrne’s tenure on the book. Even after being gone for most of a year, Byrne still casts a long shadow. But of the remaining explicit changes Byrne made, the Thing’s issues find an eventual resolution (or equilibrium, as I talked about earlier), with Johnny’s marriage to Alicia, and Sue Richards’ alternate identity of “Malice,” stretching on even further still. But, more on those in future installments.