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Who needs Jurassic Park?
Not our Stone Age ancestors.
They did, after all, have to share the world with dinosaurs, every single day of their life.
I know this because, during the evening of August 24th, 1974, BBC One thrilled the nation by showing legendary Hammer flick One Million Years BC.
Granted, some may claim it's not the most historically - or even prehistorically - accurate movie of all time but what kind of madman cares about that? It has allosaurusussusses. It has pterodactyls. It has cannibal cavemen, Raquel Welch and Martine Beswick. It even has constant shouts of, "Akita!"
I still, to this day, don't have a clue what, "Akita," is supposed to mean but, as every other word uttered by every character in that film is, "Akita," it must mean something impressive.
As Marvel UK's flagship title hits its 99th issue, we find the Hulk still in Europe and being declared a golem, as he takes the fight to the tyrannical fiend Draxon the Dictator. But how can even he hope to triumph against the dictator's new super-weapon?
On a smaller but no less deadly scale, Foggy Nelson must combat the Gladiator, having set up a fight with the menace in an attempt to convince Karen Page that he's Daredevil.
Fortunately for the lovestruck lawyer, the real DD's on the scene to deal with the buzzsaw-brandishing bad boy of binding, bobbin-threading and general couturier-related activity.
But that only serves to even more convince Karen that Foggy is The Man Without Fear.
And, probably worse, it convinces the Gladiator that he is.
Finally, the Fantastic Four come face to face with the Seeker who, if my memory doesn't betray me, tells them the gene-shattering history of the Inhumans, a secret race of people with superpowers, who've always lived alongside us.
This, inevitably, leads our hero to end the tale by declaring that, if people insist on viewing him as a menace, then, from this point on, he'll become one!
Meanwhile, Iron Man's still in the Mandarin's castle, out to punish him for wrecking Tony Stark's missiles. However, the villain has the upper hand and it seems the iron clad ironclad is truly doomed.
Elsewhere, the Destroyer's still loose in the middle of Asgard's Olympics and causing nothing but trouble. All of it thanks to Loki and his latest plan to take over the realm eternal.
I do believe this issue contains the conclusion of Spider-Man's first encounter with Shang-Chi, thanks to a Fu Manchu scheme to use a transmitter built into the Empire State Building to take over everyone's minds.
Needless to say, that vile plan fails and Spidey parts company with the master of Kung Fu, baffled that he's found himself battling a fictional character.
Elsewhere, Diablo's back, sporting a brand new look and, for reasons I can't recall, he gets the newly-revived Dragon Man to knock out and abduct Goliath.
I can only feel this must be bad news for humanity.
And for Goliath.
As for Dr Strange, I do believe the sorcerer supreme closes out the issue by losing a fight with Baron Mordo but is then reunited with Victoria Bentley who must have the most English name of any fictional character ever.
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27 comments:
“Buzzsaw-brandishing bad boy of binding and bobbin-threading” — (chef’s kiss)
b.t.
Raquel Welch, Brigette Bardot… who was the Brit equivalent?
Alas ChArlie does not know! Help!
Diana Dors?
Phillip
I think Diana Dors was always touted as being the British Marilyn.
I know the French often touted Kim Wilde as being the British Brigitte Bardot. Which always seemed a bit odd to me.
Interesting Steve. KIM WILDE did have numerous hit songs as did BARDOT.
I suppose you could map Wilde’s gardening shows /career onto Bardot’s activism for animal protection.
Not sure about Wild’s personal life being as wild as Bardot’s e.g., being involved in the likes of a Serge Gainsbourg’s?
But time wise Wilde is 20 years after Bardot so I am surprised the French would connect those two dots.
All that said the French were Gaga about her song “KIDS IN AMERICA.”
Diana Dors was too 50s and pre-permissive society, Phillip.
Sex was something foreigners did, so the British equivalent tended to be imported like, say, Britt Ekland. Or indeed Raquel Welch (One Million Years BC being a Hammer film).
There was Caroline Munro I suppose, but she wasn't an especially big star.
Steve, not only did Victoria Bentley have the most English name ever, but she lived in a castle in London. You can't get more English than that!
And of course when she finally appeared somewhere other than a Dr Strange story it was - appropriately enough - in the Two Alans' Captain Brexit run.
When you think about it, its actually quite surprising Chris Claremont never made her a recurring character in the X-Men.
-sean
Btw Steve, you forgot to mention that hairy Japanese free music outfit the Taj Mahal Travellers - so called because they came to Europe overland from Asia in a bus, man - recorded their legendary double album 'August 1974' at the start of this week.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPq1FyH1e50
It was all improvised in a single evening! Amazing, eh?
Although it didn't get released for another nine months or so.
-sean
So Victoria Bentley had a history prior to her cameo in Captain Britain? I did not know that. I’m pretty sure this week’s MWOM was the first I read, thanks to childhood chum GT.
DW
Chris Claremont's Marguerite D'Alescio (Blade) had a castle (in 'the North'); as did Claremont's Lady Daemon, who had a castle in Scotland. So, Sean's right for Lady Bentley to join those Claremont stalwarts. The trio should form a team called, "The Chatelaines" !
Phillip
There was a documentary about Diana Dors on BBC Radio 4-Extra just a few weeks ago. In her early career she was called Britain's Marilyn Monroe but she remained famous right up to her death aged 52 in 1984. Do any UK readers remember the Just William TV series in the mid-'70s? Bonnie Langford played the spoilt brat Violet Elizabeth Bott and Diana Dors played her social-climbing mother. And of course Diana Dors famously appeared in Adam Ant's Prince Charming video in 1981.
Its not just that, Phillip - Victoria Bentley had been introduced into the Moore/Davis CB as someone who'd be hanging around with Betsy Braddock.
Claremont missed out on having two posh Englishwomen turned into east Asian mutant ninja assassins for the X-Men.
DW, unless you were really into old Dr Strange comics there was no reason to have known Victoria Bentley was an existing character. She appeared in a few 60s Doc stories (with occasional cameos in the 70s). Probably introduced as a potential love interest - what else would a recurring female character have been for back then? - but Clea eventually got the job.
Its interesting in retrospect how much existing continuity Moore drew on with his CB run. Even quite obscure stuff that wouldn't have been much noticed at the time.
-sean
One Million Years BC had a sequel called When Dinosaurs Ruled The Earth from 1970 but I saw it when it was re-released in 1973 and it was the first film I ever saw at the cinema. There was a scene where the two leading characters, a man and woman, enter a cave and swim naked in a pool and let's just say that nothing is left to the imagination. My father took me to see the film and during that nude scene he turned to me and said "If I'd known this was in it I might not have brought you!" - my father was pretty liberal about such things and I was allowed to watch anything I wanted on TV but letting his 7 year-old son see full-frontal nudity was a bit much even for him!
By the way, that nude scene from When Dinosaurs Ruled The Earth was obviously cut out when the film was shown on TV and remained absent even when the film was shown late at night or in the early hours. A few years ago I watched the film on YouTube and the nude scene was still missing.
When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth - based on an original treatment by JG Ballard! Not a fact that generally appears in accounts of his work...
-sean
Mini-Cover-Theme of the Week: Both the SPIDEY WEEKLY and AVENGERS covers depict a massive, bald, overweight-but-strong bad guy taking a swing at a hero’s manhood and missing by mere millimeters. Tak’s huge fist has gotten so close to crushing Shang-Chi’s nutsack that it’s scared the wee decorative discs right off the hem of his pajama leg!
b.t.
b.t. - I was thinking how similar baldies Fisk & Tak look, dressed in green. Give Tak a pin-striped yellow waistcoat, and they'd virtually be twins!
Phillip
Colin - All I remember from 'Just William' is: "I'll scweam, and scweam, and scweam until I'm sick - and I can, you know!"
Also, Diana Dors played a battle-axe/mother-in-law from Hell, on the Sweeney.
Phillip
Phillip, Diana Dors also starred in an episode of Hammer House Of Horror in 1980 about werewolves.
I’m genuinely surprised she was only 52 when she died. If she posted here, today, she’d be considered a young one. I remember that Adam Ant video, and appearances on Blankety Blank and The Two Ronnies. Time flies.
DW
I forgot about The Two Ronnies, DW - Diana Dors was in The Worm That Turned, the mini-series about a future female-dominated Britain!
Colin, your dad sounds like he was a good guy....and a good dad!
I'm glad you recovered from that traumatic experience!
Sooner or later a kid is gonna see naked people...
M.P.
...on film, I mean. and at an appropriate age.
Perhaps I should have qualified that...
M.P.
MP, on September 2nd it'll be the 25th anniversary of my father's death (aged 71) and I often wonder what he'd make of the world today. I know he'd think Trump was a moron and he'd be appalled by Brexit as he was very pro-Europe to the extent that he even believed in a "United States Of Europe".
Yes, I survived my encounter with full-frontal nudity aged 7 and it didn't turn me into a rapist or anything which makes me think that children take such things in their stride. The censorship-obsessed conservative crowd are always bleating about protecting children from this or that but the kids themselves will most likely be fine without such meddling.
Colin:
I was one year older than you when I saw my first unclothed female in a movie (Pamela Franklin as an artist’s model in THE PRIME OF MISS JEAN BRODIE) and I don’t think it did me — or society at large — any lasting harm either.
b.t.
b.t., I was impressed that you noticed the little circles were missing from one of Shangalang-Chi's pyjama legs on that Avengers cover. Very observant.
-sean
On the subject of naked ladies - 'Psycho' is currently available to watch on BBC iPlayer.
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