Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon.
***
February 1983 seems to have been, mostly, a month of massacres in various parts of the world. Being the peace-loving soul I am, I was, therefore, clearly, going to have to seek refuge in the world of television.
And it was within that cathode ray wonderland that we found a historic moment unfolding, as US comedy-drama M*A*S*H reached its last-ever episode. One which set a record, as that land's most-watched TV episode of all time, thanks to an audience of 125 million people.
With viewing figures like that, the cinemas were probably empty but, still, the silver screen soldiered on and gave us such fare as Videodrome, Local Hero, The King of Comedy and The Sting II.
Of those movies, I've only ever seen Videodrome and Local Hero, neither of which hugely floated my boat although Local Hero did, at least, have a catchy theme tune, even if I did have to sit all the way through the entire film to finally hear it.
On the UK singles chart, Men at Work kicked-off February at Number One with Down Under but, soon, they were displaced by Kajagoogoo's Too Shy which then had to make way for Michael Jackson's Billie Jean, the song which finally cleared up all misunderstandings, by making it clear the chair was not his son. I don't know about you but hearing that was certainly a load off my mind.
When it came to UK album performances, the first three-quarters of the month were dominated by Men at Work's Business as Usual, until the last week of February saw Michael Jackson's Thriller hit the top spot after already having spent 13 weeks on the chart.
No doubt, the galaxy's greatest comic was getting an audience of comparable size to that of M*A*S*H but just what was that audience being served up?
It was, as usual, being served up Robo-Hunter, Harry Twenty on the High Rock, Judge Dredd, Rogue Trooper and Tharg's Time Twisters.
It seems someone was a Steely Dan fan, as one of the Dredd episodes was called Pretzel Logic.
Then again, one of the Robo-Hunter tales was called Play it Again, Sam.
But, even more then-again, you probably didn't need to be psychic to have already spotted the adventures of Sam Slade might owe more than a little to the cinematic career of Humphrey Bogart.
For nostalgia buffs, it appears that pages from the comic's very first issue were reproduced in shrunken form.
And, as if that wasn't enough, we even got the chance to win a trip to Disney World!
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55 comments:
Charlie is a sapiosexual.
The Sheffield group ABC is rapidly moving up the charts in the USA this month, in 1983, with Poison Arrow. The idea that this is due to Sheffield's ultra-low bus fares, because it is a People's Republic and puts the people first, leaves Charlie week in the knees as he ponders what could have been if Chicago had free bus fares.
Please excuse Charlie for a few minutes...
A response to Sean from the last post:
Gog in ASM #103-104 was an alien baby, the only survivior of a ship that crashed in the Savage Land. He died, drowned in quicksand in ASM #104 but then popped up again alive with no explanation in the late 80s in (no adjective) Spider-Man as a member of the Sinister Six, replacing Sandman. This was only the third Sinister Six story. Hobgoblin had already replaced Kraven.
As for this post, I think you need to have a bit of Scotland inside you to really appreciate Local Hero. The gentle, sad buildup to the closing music just makes me yearn for the open air of the Highlands and leaves me close to tears. If I get a say in such things, it will be the closing music at my funeral (a long time in the future). I expect Steve and Charlie, though, will be playing Hot Stuff from The Full Monty for similar reasons.
Charlie had to google the Hot Stuff from The Full Monty... Charlie is suspecting that The Full Monty is much more present in UK's mind space that the US's.
But, that scene could be emotionally fun at funeral (notice the first 3 letters are indeed "fun.")
Many folks talk about a New Orleans style funeral up north here, though none have executed. But Charlie is willing to give it a try and put the fun back in funeral!!!
OK boys.. back to FA Cup soccer and watching Man U v. Leicester; it's half time. Charlie fondly recalls visiting his brother in London in 1987/8 whilst he was studying there. Charlie was instructed to get off at "Lester" Tube stop. Charlie then got a hurried second call (Charlie was living in Germany) from my brother spelling out Lester as Leicester, lol. And one of the highlights was a Barry Hunphries live performance, LOL. (We did search for a book store for some Beanos and Dandy's and Oor Wullies too!)
dangermash - This may be a whole new category - enfants terrible (Charlie can pluralize this correctly). You mentioned Gog, the alien babyn - last week M.P. (I think) mentioned 'brain child' - I can also recall a weird enfant terrible (only slightly older) in Ghost Rider # 34!
Local Hero owes a certain amount to Brigadoon, doesn't it, with the mists, just before Mac meets Capaldi? The scene with the Jaguars is an added bonus for those of us who are aviation fans. You also get the astronomical stuff, looking up in wonder, at the night sky - something for everyone. Plus, a critique of the capitalist system, for Sean & myself - something for everyone!
Phillip
I meant to delete the first 'something for everyone' !
Phillip
baby - not babyn!
I knew you'd know about Spidey and Gog, dangermash!
Steve, long live the new flesh! Videodrome floated my boat back in the day... but in retrospect it hasn't dated well and now I'm inclined to defer to your more discriminating aesthetic judgement.
Although it does have Debbie Harry in it, so thats a plus.
Steely Dan seemed to be one of those bands critics always rave about, but I just don't get it. For all the hype, their records just sound like middle of the road session-muso fuzak to me. Hope no-one takes any umbrage at that.
-sean
Normally I like to at least make a token comment on the comics Steve - it seems only right when you've gone to the effort of posting about them - but theres only so many times you can say this is an era of low thrill power in the progs.
Btw, nice to see you've included the whole of a wraparound cover this time, especially as its a good one by the underrated Massimo Belardinelli.
-sean
Phillip, if Steve did a 150 Years Ago This Month feature we could be discussing the start of the Paris Commune. A la lanterne!
-sean
Is that supposed to be Shakespeare on Prog 303 (left hand side for my US pals)? But then who is on the right? It don't look like Judge to Charlie.
It is terribly exciting to think that essentially nothing was written contemporaneously about Shakespeare, isn't it, and we essentially know nothing about the man.
Charlie, I like ABC!
I dunno why, exactly. Maybe 'cause that stuff was melodic. I remember telling one of my buddies that I had just bought their greatest hits on C.D., and he snorted at me in derision.
Since then it has been my dark secret.
How can somebody not like "When Smokie Sings"?
Sean, another one of my dark hidden secrets is that I always liked Steely Dan. I grew up hearing it on the radio, but I can see how it might be an acquired taste. My brother hates it and one of my sisters loves it, so go figure. I take no umbrage!
I think I could get into jazz, I listen to it on the car radio but the truth is it's too complicated and I'm too lazy.
It seems like you have to learn a lot to appreciate it fully, there's so much of it, and I'm getting too old to have to start learning a whole bunch of new bull$#!t.
M.P.
M.P., my dark secret is that I'm into jazz, but it doesn't help me get Steely Dan.
Their name is taken from William Burrough's Naked Lunch, but even though I approve in theory I just don't understand the connection.
-sean
MP since it's late out, and warm, Charlie's thoughts turn to other things than the Great White Buffalo...
Have you (or anyone else) watched "The Boys" on Amazon? It's like the other side of superheroes, lol. Wonderful!
It's springtime in the Dakotas, Charlie.
The robins are back and pretty soon the snakes will wake up...
Have not seen The Boys, but I am familiar with Garth Ennis. Not a big fan of superheroes, that guy...
With Watchmen I got the impression that Alan Moore actually liked superheroes, maybe to a great degree, although he also seemed to be saying they were problematic; they had an inherent dark side.
M.P.
Whether Moore liked superheroes or not M.P., he understood them well enough from having read loads of superhero comics.
Garth Ennis on the other hand hardly read any at all... but I think theres something to be said for approaching the genre as an outsider, without the preconceptions most comic book writers have. My problem with what I read of The Boys was more Ennis' sense of humour, which lets him down as a writer.
Pat Mills did the outsider non-fan writing a twisted take on superheroes thing much better with Marshall Law imo. But to be fair, he did have the advantage of working with the brilliant Kevin O'Neill, the only artist ever to be banned by the Comics Code.
Seriously. They allowed a Green Lantern short he did with Moore after a few changes were made, but told DC that in future they wouldn't pass anything else he drew, ever.
-sean
Sean, I know who Kevin O'Neill is but I'm only vaguely familiar with the Green Lantern Corps.
What was the deal with that story the Comics Code found so objectionable? Why was it condemned? You've piqued my curiosity.
I remember one story Moore wrote about Abin Sur, but I don't remember anything alarming about it. It was kinda dark, I'll admit...
M.P.
I remember Gog turning up in a Bronze Age Ka-Zar story. Ka-Zar was chasing Gemini who'd stolen one of SHIELD's jump jets and, in the last panel, Gog suddenly appeared. I have a suspicion it might have been Gog's 2nd-ever appearance but couldn't say so for certain.
I can take Steely Dan in small doses but not in large ones. All those needless jazz chords quickly become trying.
Charlie, I suspect the character on the right is also meant to be Shakespeare but in a different era. This is pure guesswork on my behalf.
Charlie - Ben Jonson (Shakespeare's contemporary) made some comments about Shakespeare's character. For these comments, see Jonson's 'Timber, or Discoveries Made Upon Men & Matter'. Jonson also - supposedly - made similar comments about Shakespeare to the Scottish poet, William Drummond, whom Jonson met on his walking tour, up to Scotland. The gist of it being Shakespeare was of an honest and open nature, but sometimes it would be better if he had applied the brake! There's also Shakespeare's contemporary Greene's silly diatribe about Shakespeare feathering his work from other birds' nests (everyone did it!) Look it up for the exact quote.
Phillip
Shakespeare - it's amazing this little cottage industry that built up over the past 150 years built on the notion that Shakespeare was "someone else:" male / female, English / French / Italian, was actually Sir Francis Bacon / et al. And these notions have been published in reputable rags on both sides of the Atlantic, lol.
Steely Dan - They were OK-ish imho. Charlie's "first thoughts" about them is that they seem to do the Bolero-like crescendo well like in Kid Charlemagne. But folks who like jazz seemingly have a stronger interest in them, though it's fair to say this group is unknown by persons under 40 at this point, and jazz is going the same way?
The Boys - It has that whiff of Astro City about it but I'm not sure why? Perhaps the costuming for like Homelander and Starlight in particular do it? I must say it is a bit naughty at times, lol, especially when the heroes frequent the sex club.
Pet Shop Boys - they are coming to Chicago this summer at Waverly Island! Yes!!!
The tickets in the cheap seats are like $200 each! Oh no!!!
So now Charlie, if he goes, is going to hang out at the Island the day of, hoping to get a no-show the cheap from Stub Hub. MP, KD, et al. any Pet Shop Boy fans out there Stateside???
(For you UK gents, it may be interesting AND entertaining to read about Chicago politics in action. Waverly Island (an actual island) was an airport known as Meigs Field. Then one night, the mayor (I think it was "Dum DUm" Daley at this time) defied the Federal Government and...)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meigs_Field
My father was Scottish but neither he nor I ever watched 'Local Hero' but we did watch 'Trainspotting'!
There is a theory that William Shakespeare is just a front for the real author of the plays, Francis Bacon. And it's not just cranks who think it - Mark Rylance and Derek Jacobi among others, believe that Shakespeare didn't write the plays. I remember one theory which claimed that Queen Elizabeth I was the real author!
Charlie - Nobody who knows anything about Shakespeare thinks he was somebody else, as everyone at the time - including Ben Jonson, Greene, and lots of others, make reference to him, as the author of his plays. Ben Jonson makes particular reference to a bit Shakespeare wrote, which he (Jonson)takes umbrage about, in Julius Caesar.
The alternative author theory came from a woman who was probably a bit "dotty." When Nathaniel Hawthorne worked in the UK, he met the American woman (a "Miss Bacon") who was responsible for the entire silly theory that Francis Bacon was Shakespeare (maybe she wanted to create an illustrious ancestor/namesake!) To Hawthorne, she simply wasn't the full quid. Miss Bacon read some vague reference in Francis Bacon's letters to something about a tomb, connected it to Shakespeare's humorous epitaph cursing anyone who dug his grave up - and put 2 & 2 together to make 5! She thought there must be some evidence under Shakespeare's tomb, to prove her silly theory! Since then, the general public, having heard other people say Shakespeare was really Francis Bacon, and repeat it, without knowing the idiotic story behind this supposed "theory".
Hawthorne writes about this in "Our Old Home" - i.e. the UK!
Colin will agree with this, as he's Shakespeare's biggest fan ;)
Today, the Scottish theme - started by Dangermash - followed by William Drummond, continues with Waverley Island!
Phillip
I meant to delete the 'and' before 'repeat it' !
Phillip
Phillip - Charlie found the UK's master of the synth and its application to New Wave to be rather intellectually stimulating.
And we all know (don't tell Charlie that we all don't know this!!!) that Sheffield was the epicenter for this!
So SDC = Sheffield = New Wave = Pet Shop Boys = Waverly Island = Shakespeare = Steely Dan! It's self evident! It's like asking the Oracle to read entrails to determine what comes next!
B.t.w. The advert on Talk Sport this morning, which played more than once (!), stated that Northern Ireland is the place to install one's business since Brexit! It's the EU's economic hotbed, according to the advert.
Steve - do you plan on relocating to reap greater profits from SDC? I figure you need something to replace the $MM you were raking in off the Amazon link that you discontinued?
Charlie, I'm booking my flight on that ferry, even as I type.
Charlie - Remember to ask Neil Tennant about his time working at Marvel UK!
- Your famous "Lassie Come Home" prediction of the dog stealing epidemic must fit into
the SDC formula!
- I've had my jab, today, and I'm the youngster of the group - so all the rest of you
must have already had it!
Phillip
I've been on the ferry to the north of Ireland quite a few times Steve - good luck getting a flight on it!
Still, I suppose its more practical than waiting for Boris Johnson's tunnel...
Charlie, did I not say in these very threads that Brexit was a fantastic opportunity?
You know what they say - Britain's difficulty has always been an opportunity for the Irish (;
-sean
M.P. Yeah, O'Neill drew the Abin Sur story. There was a really good interview with him in the Comic Journal website where he talked about in detail, but it doesn't seem to be online anymore.
I must have misremembered above (sorry) as there weren't any changes made to the story, and DC published it anyway without a code seal.
From the wiki - "the Comics Code objected to O'Neill's art. When DC asked what was wrong and if anything could be changed... the Authority replied that it was O'Neill's entire style they found objectionable".
-sean
Well, Sean, I remember that as a pretty dark story, but the Comics Code had apparently approved worse, like stories by Moore and others featuring Anton Arcane, which were about as dark and twisted as I assume the Code would allow.
That character set the bench-mark for being vile.
Phil, I tend to agree with you that Shakespeare wrote his own stuff, or most of it.
I am not at all knowledgeable on the subject, but my head would explode if I thought it was all a scam.
There was this movie Only Lovers Left Alive, where Christopher Marlow, played by the late great John Hurt, appears as a decrepit vampire who claims to be the true author of Shakespeare's works.
I don't buy it; Marlow was busy writing his own stuff.
...also, he probably wasn't a vampire.
M.P.
Sean, et al.
Any one going to buy the FF Treasury Sized written by Mark Waid and drawn by Neal Adams?
I went by my LCBS Saturday and they didn't know dick about it but then said "Wait Charlie! It's due out like 3/24!"
At $35 and 144 pages... it's like an investment.
MP - I have a great idea! You buy and then I'll come visit you this summer. We can smoke some peyote, sip some sasparilla, and read comics!
M.P., it wasn't the story as such the Code had a problem with, but O'Neill's style. They said they wouldn't approve of anything he drew in future, without even knowing what that would be, so clearly it wasn't about the stories.
Although as it happens Swamp Thing #29 - the one where Moore bought back Anton Arcane - was the first DC comic since the mid 50s to be published without Code approval. In that instance they did object to the story.
Charlie, I do plan to get the Adams' FF treasury. (And I'm also still planning to drop you a line through Steve - just thought I'd mention that in case you were wondering)
-sean
Huh! Okay, that makes sense. That was the issue where Abigail Arcane figured out that her husband, Matt Cable, was possessed by the spirit of her undead uncle, Anton Arcane.
And she had been having sex with him the whole time.
...yeah, I'm not surprised that the Comic Code Authority didn't wanna greenlight THAT.
Before too long, they came up with Vertigo.
M.P.
Colin - Elizabeth I was dead when Shakespeare's most famous tragedies (& his 'last plays')were written! Somebody - Anthony Hopkins, perhaps(?) - said never listen to anything actors have to say about anything! (Possibly a cruel generalization about his esteemed colleagues?)
M.P. - Yes, Marlowe's plays are written in a completely different style to Shakespeare - they are not a bit alike. You are also spot on with your qualification, as Shakespeare collaborated with somebody else on Henry VIII (a late work), and maybe the odd other one.
I think there's now software that tracks the linguistic "tics" (Sean, I'm shamelessly nicking this word from you!) of particular writers. Academics already know Shakespeare wrote his plays, but such software proves without a shadow of a doubt that Bacon, Marlowe, Oxford, etc didn't write them.
(M.P. - Thanks for earlier pointing out how grim Hogan resembles Charles Bronson - now you've pointed it out, it's somehow obvious, but I never noticed it!)
On the subject of Volstagg resembling Falstaff, have you ever watched 'Chimes at Midnight'? It's quite good as Shakespeare movies go. Orson Welles takes various bits with Falstaff in from several different Shakespeare plays, and melds them all together, to make Falstaff the central character in his own story, rather than merely a supporting character for prince Hal (later Henry V).
Charlie - What do you think about Sheffield's tree-felling fiasco, last year? Was it not like Saruman's attack on the trees, which provoked the Ents?
Phillip
Phil, I don't actually believe that Elizabeth I wrote Shakespeare's plays!!
The linguistics software you mentioned has also been used to prove whether Robert E. Howard wrote his novel "Almuric". The novel was published in 1939, three years after REH's death, and there have been many doubts over the years as to whether he actually wrote it - but the software proves that he really did, with maybe only the odd bit here and there written by somebody else.
Colin - Very interesting about Robert E. Howard. I suppose software like - at its most sophisticated - might also be able to track which writers inspired/influenced other writers.
Phillip
'software like that' - damn typos!
Phillip
That software would point out Sean's influenced my writing style! (linguistic "tics"!)
Phillip
Charlie - Of interest to you:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000tcr9
Phillip
I am not Phillip.
-sean
Hey! UK Gents! I was reading your comments on BitBA.
1) Sean - I about had a cardiac arrest reading your statement that "Dingbats was unimpeachable as one of the top-5 DCs of the Bronze Age!" I'm still laughing a day later!
2) Somehow I thought you folks could buy DC comics in the UK? It's just that DC never tried to re-package reprints in the UK, like Marvel, so you could only buy the current issues? But now after reading BitBA it sounds like DC was not selling any comics there? Maybe I am misunderstanding?
Phillip! Thanks for the link on the Beatles! I will check it our this afternoon and share with my son is really digs the Beatles.
Poor kid... such minimal exposure in his age group to the other Brit greats: Stones, Who, Led Zepp. However I did play Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon for him and he thinking it may be the best rock album of all time. He was wearing out my needle over Xmas playing Money, LOL.
I have played some Who for him (Can You See the Real Me, Going Mobile, etc.) and he does find each performer to be... I don't know the word... powerful? It's like they don't actually blend together as much as each has their own bombastic role side by side. And he quite enjoys them.
Cheers Gents!
Charlie, we could get DC comics easily enough but there were no UK DC reprint mags, like there were Marvel UK reprint books. At least, not in the 1970s. There were one or two in the 1960s but I don't think DC had a direct involvement in them.
There was a short-lived DC reprint mag called Zones - which reprinted the Wein/Wrightson Swamp Thing and Chaykin's Shadow - published through (I think) IPC around the time of the first Batman/Dredd crossover Judgement Over Gotham.
Charlie, I was similarly amused when whoever was using your account enthused about a comic drawn by Fr*nk R*bb*n.
-sean
Well... Ole Charlie was OK with Fr@nk R@bbins on Shadow and Invaders but only b/c he rationalized it as homage to those thrilling days of yester year when comic art could be a little rough.
I mean, Frank Robbins, Milton Caniff... they were not meant for men in tights in the Bronze Age, lol.
But CHarlie probably suffered more from D@n H@ck doing Daredevil, Captain Marvell...
MP (Or anyone else on this planet!) - If your weather sucks balls in South Dakota like it does over here in Chicago, 800 miles away, then I offer you some Brigette Bardot as she sings her home on the beach at St. Tropez.
The second link is a cover by two pretty french girls. Now doesn't that make you want to visit the St Tropez and get a tan?
La Madrague.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGVTGjsETgY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Q-qznAdxK8
You weren't tempted to head down to Florida for a spring break then, Charlie? I hear its an oasis of freedom in the US at the moment.
-sean
Sean - I was tempted sorely to go to Miami with my two adult kids and hang out with my cousin and his husband.
But they are in their 60s and have this phobia about the Covid and said "not this year" because my kids have had minimal interest in social distancing at the university, lol.
But honestly all of the USA (I think) is fairly wide open. There are mild things in place like wearing a mask and social distancing though more and more you see minimal masking in restaurants, health clubs.
I just wish my "Books and Bordeaux" book club was meeting in person vs. zoom. I'm the only dude, lol! AND - we are reading Bryson's Book on Shakespeare for May! I need you guys to give me some things to say so I seem highly intelligent for the Sapiosexuals! So, please break out your best insights to The Bard!
You could always try impressing your book group with Jack Kirby's designs for a production of Julius Caesar, Charlie, which you can see at -
https://kirbymuseum.org/blogs/effect/caesar/
Shakespeare was the Kirby of Elizabethan and Jacobean drama. Discuss.
(Hey, what kind of insight did you expect from a comic blog?)
-sean
Charlie - Michael Wood did the best Shakespeare documentary series.
If you want to sound cleverer than you are about Shakespeare, start quoting Keats' comments about "negative capability." Then again, they'll probably ban you from the group, for being a smart arse. I feel like banning myself just for mentioning it (plus, I'd have less to write tonight, before Public Eye starts.)
According to Keats, the state of mind of an artist - Shakespeare being the ultimate example - allows them to be amidst "uncertainties, mysteries and doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact or reason." Check the quote, because this is from memory, and it might have been "and reason", not "or reason". Keats also said artists (including poets, writers, etc) lack personality of their own, becoming whoever or whatever they are writing about. Many writers would disagree with this, as Hemingway, etc, were "big personalities".
Coleridge, Hawthorne & others are good for quotes, too.
Charlie - My brother's in a book group. I'd love inflicting my favourite books on other people, but wouldn't like to read books by Nora Roberts (?) etc, that women in his group recommend. Like Dangermash says, I'm just not a team player! However, Charlie - I'm sure you're very genuinely interested in all the chick-lit/romance fiction your all-women book group recommends(as we all would be), without any ulterior motive whatsoever ;)
Phillip
"..we could get DC comics easily enough..."
...speak for yourself, Steve! We didn't all live in places like Sheffield - I grew up in a little village on the outskirts of a small town.
Women, and their chick-lit and romance, Phillip... they don't have the good sense to spend their time commenting on old comics here (;
-sean
Yes, Sean - our blog is much more grown up, isn't it? I do like some women's fiction, however. As a kid, I loved Anne MacCaffrey's dragon books (brilliant Dragon Song cover art by David Roe.) I'm a big George Eliot fan, too. Nevertheless, in the past, female friends have recommended favourite authors to me (e.g. Donna Tartt, Anne Tyler, Angela Carter etc) and those novels didn't 'do it' for me, at all! Maybe you've had better recommendations. Then again, everyone's taste is different. Your individual life experience means one author strikes a chord, rather than another, not necessarily gender. An 'organisation man' probably wouldn't like Elric books. I'd assumed Charlie was inviting his mates to pull his leg!
Phillip
You have my condolences, Colin.
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