Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon.
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Once more, Halloween and Guy Fawkes Night are behind us and all we have to look forward to are lengthening evenings, increasing cold, and Christmas.
But what's that? We have something to look forward to that's almost as good as Christmas?
And that's a look at what Marvel was up to forty years ago?
Then what are we waiting for? Let's get cracking!
All of this means that, at last, Bernie realises Steve Rogers must be Captain America.
That's the Captain America who everyone's known for years is called Steve Rogers. Yes, I know he faked his own death to restore his secret identity but, as the new identity he adopted was also called Steve Rogers, it's hard to see how that tactic actually managed to work.
But, holy smokes, it's not so safe after all!
That's because a giant alien's now stolen that moon - including Attilan!
This can only be a job for Reed Richards!
Or is it?
After all, is everything as it seems?
And only Rick, Betty and Bereet can stop them!
So is Lonesome Pinkus!
I don't know which of those announcements is the more exciting.
I wish I could say more about this tale but I'm seriously struggling to recall anything that actually happens in it.
Fortunately, the thunder god instantly realises Darkoth isn't his true enemy and helps him thwart Mephisto's Satanic will.
And she's got a body filled with poison that'll kill her, within days, if she doesn't get help.
The problem is the one person who can help her is Daredevil but he's currently busy being overwhelmed by his out-of-control senses.
And only Stick can help him!
Strangely, in this issue, it's revealed that the radiation which gave DD his heightened senses wore off years ago and he'd never needed it because he'd always had those powers, even before the accident.
And it's not long before he and his new crewmates are having to fight giant spiders.
With only Wolverine having any real idea what's going on, how can they possibly hope to survive?
More importantly, I've always viewed the Brood as Alien rip-offs but this comic came out four years before Aliens, and the queen in it seems noticeably like the queen in that movie. Can it be the Alien franchise actually borrowed Brood-related ideas from the X-Men?
This sends Tony Stark on a trip to a Scotland filled, as always, with kilts and castles.
And, now, Rhodey's been captured by the Laird and covered in deadly venomous spiders of the type that are, seemingly, all-too-common in Scotland!
Can our hero realise his foe's not the genuine article, in time to avoid accidentally killing him?
I took a quick look at ASM #234. Nothing much seemed to be happening. And then in the last panel, the Tarantula is turned into a giant hairy tarantula!
ReplyDeleteWouldn’t surprise me if James Cameron borrowed some ideas from comics. I always felt his Ripley in Aliens was very similar to Casey on Ronin. And that Newt’s doll being called Casey was a nod to that.
ReplyDeleteYeah, it seemed to me that Avatar was basically derived from old Richard Corben comics, Matthew (as well as Roger Dean record covers).
ReplyDeleteAre we all excited at the prospect of the first issue of Ronin II dropping later this month, then?
Call it a wild hunch, but my suspicion is that it won't be as good as Daredevil #188.
Steve, getting superpowers from radiation was always a dumb idea, so I liked Fearless Frank's retcon of that. While it could be seen as an attempt to make the character more 'realistic', at the same time he also introduced Stick and the Chaste, who were quite far-fetched, so you couldn't really second guess where the series was going.
Unpredictability was a strong aspect of Miller's work back then. As I recall from a later letters page, there were a few complaints that the Black Widow might have been killed off at the end of that issue - how often do readers of superhero comics take that kind of cliffhanger seriously?
And... was Elektra really going to be revived by the Hand? Who could tell what was going to happen?
-sean
Oh God, yeah - Ronin 2. Count me out.
DeleteI guess it’s nice he’s not doing shit DC comics any more. There is that.
Oh dear, Avengers #225 is terrible. Steven Grant is no Pat Mills, thats for sure.
ReplyDeleteHuh. According to the Wiki, Dr Druid is Irish. Is that right...? I thought he was supposed to be British.
Perhaps he was appropriated, like Stonehenge.
-sean
I'm not as down on Fearless Frank as most people seem to be these days - he's earned the right to f@%& up occasionally without having it permanently held against him imo - but even I haven't been able to get up the enthusiasm to try the 300 sequel 'Xerxes' yet.
ReplyDeleteAnd it seems he actually did the work on that one.
-sean
Speaking of Pat Mills, I see, on Twitter, that his frequent collaborator Kevin O'Neill has died.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely gutted about that. His art on Nemesis Book 1 was the first comics art I was absolutely obsessed with.
DeleteNot just Pat Mills, but Alan Moore too, Steve.
ReplyDeleteSad news about O'Neill. Nemesis the Warlock, Marshall Law, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Nemo, Cinema Purgatorio, the only artist to have been banned by the Comics Code... its an impressive and distinctive body of work.
-sean
Only 69. Very sad.
ReplyDeleteHis Green Lantern short story 'Tigers', with Alan Moore, contained the art that led the CCA to label his entire style inappropriate. It's a brilliant piece and identified how out of touch they were. Fortunately it didn't impact O'Neill's ability to secure further US work. One of the greats.
DW
O'Neill didn't really secure that much work in regular US comics though - even after the Code became irrelevant, his style wasn't an easy fit with the mainstream, and I'm hard pressed to think of anything he did without Pat Mills or Moore. One of the greats, but I wonder how he would have got on without those two being really into working with him.
ReplyDeleteMoore has talked about how O'Neill was marginalised as an artist even in the progs -
www.youtube.com/watch?=qtDphCDULeQ
-sean
Steve, as well as lengthening evenings, cold and Christmas I'm getting fibre broadband installed on November 30th and I'm getting a new telephone which plugs into my router instead of the phone socket on the wall...or something. I wish I could say I'm looking forward to all this but I'm not. I recently renewed my contract with BT so I have to take fibre broadband too.
ReplyDeleteAs for the comics - the only one I definitely remember buying is Fantastic Four.
ReplyDeleteWith you on the whole broadband thing Colin. Internet reception isn't good enough everywhere to be able to handle everything. If I can't use the phone when the router's down and the router is plugged into the mains, how do I report a power cut?
ReplyDeleteI see these ads on the telly for some new sort of TV or TV service where people are talking about how amazing their telly is because it works via the internet and not through an aerial or a dish. They're deluded.
Hi DM. Use the smart phone to report outages? No router required?
DeleteI could try that Sean but whenever I need to use the phone it seems to be out of battery. That's the problem with a device that needs charging every four days rather than every day. If they ever come up with a brick sized phone that takes two AA batteries, then I'm in.
ReplyDeleteThat wasn't me dangermash. I agree with you. People deluded by technology - isn't that basically the point of most science-fiction?
ReplyDeleteWelcome to the shiny broadband future, where nothing can possibly go worng...
-sean
Dangermash, I'd totally forgotten about the Tarantula turning into a literal tarantula. Which is odd, as you'd think it's the sort of thing one would remember.
ReplyDeleteMatthew, I never knew that.
Sean, I'm not even familiar with Ronin I.
I always assumed Dr Druid was American.
Dangermash and Colin, do those phones not have a battery in case of power cuts? If not, it seems a strange decision by the company.
DW - thanks for your comment too. :)
Ronin (1) is well worth a look. Miller’s trying out all sorts of different drawing styles and storytelling techniques. Story is not so amazing, but really ambitious art and lovely colouring from Lynn Varley.
DeleteSean, I assume you deliberately misspelt 'wrong' as 'worng' to make your point?
ReplyDeleteI've got smart meters for gas and electricity which both work fine so far but I've heard that smart meters can be unreliable and send the wrong data back to the energy supplier so I check the meters regularly. Last week in Tesco the checkout machine was malfunctioning and insisted my card had no chip in it when I tried to pay with chip and PIN. The words "eggs" and "basket" definitely come to mind with regard to our increasing dependence on technology.
Just call it Ronin, Steve - I doubt very much theres ever going to be any real need to use the title Ronin 1.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure that Wikipedia entry for Dr Druid must be wrong - not only does it say he's Irish, it adds that he's a psychiatrist. Come on, who ever heard of an Irish psychiatrist?
-sean
Dr Anthony Clare was an Irish psychiatrist. He was on TV a lot in the '80s.
ReplyDeleteWell, theres always an exception Colin.
ReplyDelete-sean