David Chelsea In Love #1 - Eclipse

July 1991 - Another odd little magazine I found at the 2008 NY Comic Con--I had absolutely no idea what this was, but for $1.00 I was willing to find out.

This is a long-form (43 pages!) story, written and drawn by David Chelsea about a guy looking for love named...David Chelsea. I guess this is what you'd a roman à comic.

Anyway, the comic book David Chelsea is your typical guy, shy and a bit too insecure, henpecked by his critical, over-mothering sister. He goes with her to a party and there he meets Minnie, a gawky, kinda goofy looking woman with whom he is immediately smitten. Of course, it's a bit more complicated than that.

Chelsea's art is an interesting hybrid of styles, and its pages like this, with their intricate backgrounds and heavy-lined figures popping off them, that make me think of Little Nemo, visually at least:

...indeed, there's even ad for a Little Nemo collection in the back of the issue.

Minnie has a boyfriend whose a jerk, and even though she's attracted to David, they can't quite consummate their feelings for one another. So David goes on a string of ill-advised hook-ups with other women (can't quite relate to that...if only I could), that are told in fairly sexually explicit terms.

We also get to see a bit of David's life a commercial artist:

(..."They just want a few changes"? I can relate to that, no problem.)

We also get to see things from Minnie's perspective, in pages like this that mix fanciful symbolism with gritty reality:

The minute you have "the boyfriend" hit a woman, the woman the protagonist is in love with, you've got a hissable villain as reliable as a Nazi in a war comic. Hopefully this part isn't based on anyone's real life, but I'm guessing it is.

The issue ends with David and Minnie about to meet up again, but she is sporting a bruise that David is one panel away from seeing, making for a pretty exciting cliffhanger of an ending, and enough to make me want to find the next issue, at least.

David Chelsea in Love was another of the experiments in the magazine format Eclipse tried, this one lasting four issues. Why they went for the magazine size we don't know, but it does give the feeling for the slightly more adult story that lies therein.

Aces #1 - Eclipse/Acme

Apr. 1988 - Aces was a sort of companion magazine to Point Blank, also released by Acme Press and Eclipse Comics, with a focus more on adventure strips rather than just private eye stuff (although there's some stuff like that in here too).

It opens with "Air Mail" by Attilio Micheluzzi, a strip about an air mail pilot named Clarence, with a splash page right out of those old classic adventure pulps:

Clarence gets involved in a lot more adventure and intrigue than your average air mail pilot, and the sequences with the planes are thrilling to behold, similar to the work of Alex Toth, with heavy blacks and crisp clean white spaces:

Following "Air Mail" is a two-page interview with Micheluzzi, and there's a few moments where it gets a little awkward:

...er, um, ok. Moving on...

Next is "Hollywood Eye" by Francois Riviere, J.L. Bocquet, and Philippe Berthet, about a private dick with the unusual name of Hippolytus Finn. Finn gets caught up in a situation he can't control, the set-up for any good film noir story. The art is beautiful, smooth and detailed, with just a hint of cartooniness:

There are some shots in this story that seemed to borrowed from the film Touch of Evil, which makes total sense of course, and adds a neat little touch of history to the story.

Last is Morgan in "R.I.P." by Antonio Segura and Jose Ortiz, about an ex-police commissioner who is having a bad day. A very bad day:

...this is his daughter. See, I told you he was having a bad day.

All three stories are solid, even if the latter two could also run in Point Blank, making Aces not all that distinctive from that book. The presentation is very slick, and Eclipse/Acme put together a good package here.

Aces lasted a bit longer than Point Blank--five issues instead of just two--but obviously they had a tough time finding an American audience for some of the finest European comic strips out there.

Marvel Preview #7 - Satana

Summer 1976 - Some warm weather has finally arrived, so what better time for some adventures with the sizzling hot--but deadly--daughter of Satan, Satana?

After an editorial by editor John Warner, Satana stars in "The Damnation Waltz", by Chris Claremont and Vincente Alcazar, and we get hit right in the face with what kind of story this is gonna be:

...yep, pentagrams, headless bodies, upside down crosses, geisers of blood. Strap in, comics fans, this is gonna be a bumpy ride!

The story is about the comely but frail Judith Chamber, who comes home to find her family as seen above. As Judith waits for the police to finish up, her husband's best friend and law partner, Brian Abelard, shows up to comfort her.

But when he finds Judith, she suddenly converts into some kind of horrible she-demon who starts muttering about "foolish spells", "damning souls" and "vengeance." What the Beelzebub is going on here?

She goes after Brian, but is tranquilized by a doctor. Here we see her innermost thoughts, where we see Judith encountering a mysterious, hooded cult which places a curse on her, banning Judith--or is it Satana?--from Earth.

Eventually, Judith makes her way to a strange club on the Sunset Strip, where she meets some people who seem to know her. They hand her a costume, and that transforms Judith into Satana! And what a costume it is:

...that outfit is one of Marvel's most ridiculous, which makes it awesome. I don't care how much of a goody-goody you might be, you could not turn down any woman dressed like that.

Anyway, these guys at the club have some nefarious things planned for Satana, but she doesn't take any crap:

"...All right, fools--who's next?!"

Satana plays hard--not only does she kick these guys' butts, but she even chases down one other guy, who begs for mercy. Satana responds by giving him a big sloppy kiss, which sucks the soul right out of him, leaving him an empty husk. (I've felt that way sometimes, myself)

There's more treachery, involving Abelard (who is not as benign as he first seems), while Judith continually struggles with this--thing--that's inside her.

Alcazar's art here is top-notch, his cramped, claustrophobic layouts perfect for this kind of story. People and objects are draped in shadows, and almost every panel is off-kilter in some way, making you feel as off-balance as Judith is:

This whole story feels a lot like Italian horror films of the 1970s, like Dario Argento's Suspiria, where a young, seemingly naive protagonist is in way over her head, with a seemingly never-ending supply of creepy people waiting to do her in. Alcazar's art only adds to this mood, and its very effective.

The story ends with a massive demon being unleashed, leaving a crater of devastation behind. Brian Abelard's soul ends up inside a butterfly(!), whom Satana crushes to bits, with "Go to hell, Brian Abelard...my father awaits you with open arms." Pwned!

But we're not done yet! This issue also features a text piece by Claremont called "From the Devil, A Daughter", featuring some nifty spot illustrations by Esteban Maroto and Mike Nasser, plus a back-up feature, about as different from the lead as possible: "The Sword in the Star!" by Bill Mantlo and a very young Keith Giffen!

This is part 2 of a story started in Marvel Preview #4, so I have no idea what's going on here. Plus, this is early Giffen, when he was in his Kirby Mode, which never appealed to me all that much (though I would become a huge fan of his later, more personal style). There's some spaceships, some robots, a blind oracle-type woman, lots of crazy goings-on, though nothing nearly as out there as what preceded it.

A smashingly awesome issue; the Satana story is wonderfully ghoulish fun, topped off with a, er, hell of a cover by Bob Larkin.

In fact, when I saw Mr. Larkin at the 2008 NY Comic Con, I went over and introduced myself, told him how much I liked his work, and asked him to sign this for me. He looked at the book and exclaimed "Hey, this was a good one."

It sure was!

Epic Illustrated #18 - Marvel

June 1983 - Another issue of the super-high class Epic Illustrated, Marvel's magazine of fantasy and science-fiction.

Behind the spooky cover by John Bolton is an issue stuffed to the staples with content, opening with "Dog in the Donor Bank" by Michael Saenz:

...told entirely in full-page panels, its a story of a space traveler driven by madness into a horrible act of violence. Creepy and odd.

Next is the cover feature, "Business Hours: Monday Through Friday, 9 To 5" by Chris Claremont and Bolton, a story with all the horror movie trappings--woman alone, deep shadows, threatening monsters:

...yet its all a goof, and the woman isn't quite as threatened as it might seem. A lot of fun. Plus, nudity!

Next is the fourth chapter of a serial called "Last of the Dragons" by Carl Potts and Terry Austin. I'm not sure exactly what's going on here, short of it being about the very bad idea of importing dragons to your land. But thanks to Potts and Austin's work, it sure is pretty to look at:

...I particularly love that negative space of the branches in the top panel.

"Bookview" is a text piece by Jo Duffy reviewing the book The Mists of Avalon, then "Mediaview" by Denny O'Neil doing the same for Videodrome.

Next is "Obsession", an early work by Peter Kuper! As you can see, a lot of the themes Kuper would play with in his later work are here:

I mean, you've got four mushroom clouds in just the first page.

Next is "Generation Zero" by Archie Goodwin and with a beautifully detailed art job by Pepe Moreno:

Next is "Garbage Scow" by Bob Aull, a three-page, EC-esque "message" story, ending with a nice full-page punchline.

Following is an interview with "visual futurist" Syd Mead, discussing his futuristic work, and then "The Art of Go Nagai", a look at the Japanese superstar artist. Mazinga!

Go Nagai also contributes "Oni", about the battle to contain the beast that lay within man.

Next is Rick Geary with "In Search of Einstein's Brain", one of his true to life stories about where the genius cranium actually ended up, but with a bit of a personal twist:

Last is "Lost Bones" by Duffy and Kent Williams, starring a character known as "Tail Gunner", whose job it is to provide escort for anyone willing to pay his price, no matter how dangerous. Nice moody art by Williams:

I can't imagine the amount of effort went in to just one issue of Epic Illustrated; with this many features by this many different people Marvel was clearly trying to get into the market that made Heavy Metal such a success. The ads are from big ticket, adult advertisers like the liquor and automobile industries, so they were able to compete, for a little while at least.

Marvel Movie Premiere #1: The Land That Time Forgot

Sept. 1975 - How could anyone turn down a book with cover like this? Not only is it exciting as well, but it was done by Nick Cardy, who rarely did work for Marvel (is this why he signed it "Cardi"?).

These pre-George Lucas sci-fi movies were the perfect fodder for comic book adaptations, since the special effects end of them hadn't really kicked into high gear, leaving comics to provide the visual spectacle that you couldn't really get anywhere else at the time.

This fifty-one page version of the movie is by Marv Wolfman and Sonny Trinidad, and it kicks off with a great, movie-poster-ish splash page:

(click to enlargify!)

The story opens on an unnamed soldier, manning a lonely post, who discovers a cannister floating in the water. It contains a letter describing a most amazing story...

A British passenger ship is torpedoed by a German sub, leaving just a handful of survivors in a small lifeboat. They manage to get aboard the sub and take command, and its during this that our storyteller, Bowen Tyler, starts to fall for the beautiful Lys, who shows grit and determination when she shoots one of the Germans to save Bowen's life.

The sub is shot at by another British ship, which forces it to drive and head vastly off course. So far off course that it sails into seas rarely visited by man, and its here they discover a mysterious island:

...wow, looks a lot like that Kryptonite island Lex Luthor created in Superman Returns.

They land on the island, and discover it truly is the Land That Time Forgot, as it is filled with dinosaurs and even cavemen!

After several life and death battles with both, our heroes begin to figure out that there is some approximation of a society on this island, with some of the cave people being more evolved than the others. And while the visitors try to co-habitate with their less evolved friends, sometimes its Survival of the Fittest:

..."Relax, he's dead!"

Eventually, some of the German sub officers figure out a way off the island, and they betray Bowen and Lys, and leave them behind! Unfortunately for them, the sub is damaged, and as they fight amongst themselves, it sinks into the inky blackness of the ocean.

Bowen and Lys decide to try and live the best they can in this new land, and they write down their story and send it into the ocean...who knows if anyone will ever read it?


Like I said at the beginning, stories like this are perfect for comics, because they weren't limited to the special effects at the time. Indeed, this magazine comes with some stills from the movie, and the comic is, well, way cooler:

There's also a text article about fantasy films called "Lost Races, Forgotten Cities" by Lin Carter, plus a reproduction of the movie's boffo poster on the back cover, which was printed on slightly thicker paper than the normal comic book cover, making for a really impressive package.

Sadly, this was the first, last, and only issue of Marvel Movie Premiere--why Marvel didn't continue with it as a series we'll probably never know. Its not like they didn't do like a thousand movie adaptations after this!

Monsters Unleashed! #8 - Marvel

Oct. 1974 - A classic (little bit of) sex and violence cover courtesy Earl Norem sets the tone for another issue of Monsters Unleashed!

Like previous issues, the inside cover features a "true" monster story, written by Tony Isabella and drawn by Ernie Chua/Chan, this time about:

...maybe it's because I grew up on all those "Unexplained Mysteries" books they had in school libraries, but I feel like I could read a whole issue of these things. A wonderful feature crammed into one measly page!

First up is "Frankenstein 1974" by Doug Moench and Val Mayerik. Picking up from the last issue, the Monster finds himself in the lair of James Sinoda, who we learned had lived a brutal life, totally without love but full of abject rejection.

So much so that it drove Sinoda mad, and he went about creating a whole "family" of freaks, all in an effort to get revenge on society. But when the beautiful Julia Winters turned him down for a date, Sinoda didn't take it to well:

...Mr. Sinoda, have you ever met Victor Von Doom?

Next is a Man-Thing text piece by the late Steve Gerber, with spot illustrations by Pat Broderick and Al Milgrom, followed by a text piece called "Swamp Stars of the Silver Screen" (focusing on one of my favorite monsters, the Creature From the Black Lagoon) by Don Glut.

Next is a real "lost" gem, "One Hungers" by Neal Adams and Dan Adkins about two wandering hippies who come across a creature in an old house that won't be satisfied with a flower in its, er, hair. I absolutely love Adams' just a tad cartoonish hippies:

...it has a weird, creepy ending. A minor classic.

Last is Gullivar Jones, Warrior of Mars!, in "A Martian Genesis!" by Isabella, Moench, and the art team of George Perez, Duffy Vohland, and Rich Buckler (whew!--that's a lot of names there). This was very early in Perez' career, and other than his trademark layouts, I can't see much of his--or Buckler's--work here:

Gullivar was your typical futuristic barbarian type, except for his willingness to trash-talk his opponents. On the last page, he tells his "human" captors: "...maybe I don't deserve to return to Earth. Its a cinch I can't buy the ticket from you...but let me tell you something--unlike you gutless wonders, at least the people back on Earth are still trying!"

He also calls them cretins and bozos. I like this Gullivar guy!

The Savage Sword of Conan #31 - Marvel

July 1978 - I saw this at the NY Con. For the $2.00 price tag, I simply could not turn down a Howard Chaykin Conan cover.

There's something so reassuring about Conan comics. Maybe if you read them month after month, it gets boring, but digging through these old issues like this, every so often, it almost a relief when you open the book and the story starts like this:

...you just know you're in for a good time, courtesy Roy Thomas and John Buscema.

After taking care of this guy (in just two panels), Conan shows up at the door of a friend, who is told by Conan that he (Conan) got into an argument with the local king, refusing to do the king's bidding.

The king wasn't too cool with being refused by a "low-born barbarian", and sent his men (of which our splash page guy was one) after him.

Then, a comely lass named Nanaia arrives, who tells Conan the king has put out a hit on Conan with Hakhamani the Informer, but to keep it a secret, since Conan has many admirers in this town, and it would cause a revolt.

Conan decides to head north, and take Nanaia with him, which will enrage the king even more! But since when has Conan worried about that?

Meanwhile, the king survives an assassination attempt, and is spooked when he sees his attempted assassin holding The Flame Knife, the mark of a mysterious cult called The Hidden Ones.

At this point, there's not a lot of point explaining more of the plot, because A)it would take forever (a lot happens in this issue!) and B)I don't want to ruin the issue for anyone who might go out and read it.

As solid as the issue is, there are a few surprised here and there. "Big" John Buscema's art being top-notch is no surprise, but in this issue he added a few more graphic/abstract touches, like these panels:

...I like the flat blacks of the running legs (reminds me a bit of Frank Miller's work from Dark Knight on), and the blankness of Conan's shoulder. Usually Buscema didn't go in for that kind of stuff, but I liked his attempts at it.

Another surprise the level of gore--most of the SSOC issues I've read have lots of violence, of course, but usually its drawn in a way that partly hides the contact of weapon to flesh, but not here:

There's lots of shots like that in this issue. Usually you only see monsters get it this explicitly.

There's also a dictionary of Conan terms, called "A Gazetteer of the Hyborian World of Conan" featuring some spot illustrations by Buscema and Marie Severin, and a surprising number of ads for adults only "art portfolios", one by Vaughn Bode, and one by Bruce Jones called Other Women, Other Worlds which seems to be all about lesbians. Face front, True Believer!

The Rampaging Hulk #3 - Marvel

June 1977 - Gosh, do I love The Rampaging Hulk.

Every time I buy one of these issues that I've never read before, I'm amazed I didn't buy them regularly as a kid. They are so fun, so exciting, and so goofy that I think as a six or seven year old I would've eaten these things up. Maybe it was the cover price?

Anyway, this is the third issue, "The Monster and the Metal Master!" by the ever-inventive Doug Moench, and a boffo art job by Walt Simonson and Alfredo Alcala, behind a beauty of a cover by Earl Norem.

As is usual with Alcala, you don't see a lot of the original pencils showing through, but what you can see is Simonson's trademark senses of layout and pacing, and the overall feel of the characters, like with the design of this robot:

...I mean, that's just an awesome robot.

The plot, picking up from last issue, involves an alien race named the Krylorians trying to take over Earth, and in this issue they are helped by another alien, a super-villain named The Metal Master, who I guess didn't check with Magneto first.

The baddies are chasing the Hulk, Rick Jones, and their alien comrade, a woman named Bereet. They find them in a small village outside Paris, where our heroes are trying to lay low.

Unfortunately, when Bruce Banner spots a friendly kid named Spirou get beaten up by his Dad, it causes him to Hulk out, and start letting the Dad this is unacceptable!

The Hulk's appearance is noticed by MM, who sends his nigh-indestructible robot to fight the Green Goliath. Then, the Metal Master tries using his powers on the "Spatial Distorter" of Bereet's, which causes all of them into another dimension, one where the laws of reality don't apply. This, of course, doesn't sit well with the Hulk:

..."Hulk does not like France. Ears not work right in stupid France." Ye Gods, did Doug Moench know how to write the Hulk.

The battle continues on in this dimension, while little Spirou tries to help his "Monster friend" by running off with the Spatial Distorter.

Then a bunch of stuff about "psychic energy" happens, and somehow Spirou is able to help Bereet affect what goes on in this dimension, giving the Hulk an extra edge. And after the Hulk has taken all he's going to take from the Metal Master, well...you know:

(click to Hulkify!)

This gets them all out of this dimension, and the story ends with little Spirou, safe and happy in the Hulk's arms. All is well...for now.

In addition to the Hulk feature, there's a two-page letter column, plus a back-up feature, "Bloodstone" by John Warner, Sal Buscema, and Rudy Nebres. Bloodstone is an adveture hero-type of guy, searching for fragments of a magical gem that would give him power over life and death.

No offense to the work of Misters Warner and Buscema, but I never got into Bloodstone too much, though this issue's story, where he tangles with IronMan, is fun in a classic "Action in the Mighty Marvel Manner" kinda way.

My lack of interest in Bloodstone doesn't matter too much though, because the Hulk feature is so fun. Moench's stories are particularly hard to summarize, because they seem to be very seat-of-your-pants, using bizarre, sometimes disparate elements that work fine in the context of the story but sound ridiculous when being analyzed like this.

Suffice it to say, the sheer enthusiasm with which these stories are told makes them enormously fun to read, and Simonson's storytelling is a perfect match--his Hulk is a squat, brutish figure, barely contained by the panel borders and given an extra level of fearsomeness from the wash tones used in these black and white books, instead of the usual full-color comic green.

I have to get the rest of these!

Marvel Super Special #15: Star Trek The Motion Picture

Dec. 1979 - Yes, you can relive the gripping excitement of Star Trek: The Motion Picture in comics form! See! Enterprise crew members talk! See! them talk some more! See! beloved characters act like they've been scripted by screenwriters who have never heard of the characters before!

As you can probably tell, I'm not a big fan of the first Star Trek movie. But that doesn't mean the comic won't be any good, so let's see...

Behind the nice cover by Bob Larkin (that Nimoy likeness is particularly spot-on) and some stills from the movie on the inside cover, we have the adaptation proper, scripted/edited by Marv Wolfman, drawn by the unusual combo of the late, great Dave Cockrum and Klaus Janson, with colors by Marie Severin. Marvel pulled out all the stops for most of these movie adaptations, using color and extra-nice paper.

I'm sure most of you know the plot, and this comic follows it pretty closely. Thankfully, though, scripter/editor Wolfman cut out large chunks of dialogue and extraneous scenes, so its only a couple pages before the V'ger plot kicks in, when in the movie it felt like that took approximately seventeen hours.

Wolfman captures each crew member's particular way of talking fairly well, though trying to write out the particular patois of Commander Scott looks awkward as heck:

Fun Fact: Letterer John Costanza charged extra for superferlous apostrophes. He bought a boat with the money he made from this issue.

Anyway, the combo of Cockrum and Janson works fairly well, if a bit ragged at times. The printing doesn't help; there are some spots where lines drop out, others sort of glob together.

Other times, though, a little more attention needed to be paid. Like after the horrifying scene where two Federation officers are obliterated by a malfunctioning transporter, where Kirk tries to reassure Yeoman Rand it wasn't her fault:

...why is Kirk smiling like that? This is serious, dammit!

Anyway, there's lots of nifty "special effects" in the art to convey star patterns, planetoid surfaces, and the like, many of them with color holds, and it works pretty well.

The storytelling is also pretty good, like this inventive page where we see what the Enterprise sees, as well as their reactions:

The adaptation runs 52 pages, which means it moves at a much brisker clip than the movie, so in a lot of ways this version works better. It's no classic--there's only so much you can do with this (IMO) ponderous Think Piece of a story, but Wolfman, Cockrum, and Co. give it the old Marvel try!

There's also a couple of text pieces, one a brief history of Star Trek by Tom Rogers, another is an interview with Jesco von Puttkamer--no, not another Denny O'Neil pseudonym, Jesco was a NASA staffer and served as the Science Advisor to the film. A pretty egghead interview for a comic book movie adaptation, I have to admit.

The final few pages consist of a Star Trek Glossary, again by Rogers, who gives us the official definitions for stuff like Nogura, Sensor Swarms, and Vegans ("High-domed aliens, members of the Federation", who presumably don't eat anything made from animals). Good to know.

It's ironic, really, that Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan was never adapted into a comic, even though it was by far the most action-packed, comic book-y of all the movies!