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February. The month named after...
...
...
...whatever it is it's named after.
But will there be equal uncertainty within the pages that contain our favourite Marvel scrappers?
He's been turned into a frog!
By Loki!
Needless to say, he can't wait to get back to Asgard and sort out that pesky god of evil.
But, before he can do that, there's other matters to attend to.
Like helping a bunch of New York's finest frogs in their battle against evil rats, in some sort of remake of Watership Down that has everything in it but rabbits.
Or is he?
Is he, instead, Dr Doom who's tricked the team into helping him get back into that embassy, after discovering he can't access it now that his consciousness is trapped inside the body of a totally random bloke dressed as the Invincible Man?
But is even the power of the Phoenix enough to stop him?
And will she learn a valuable lesson, along the way?
But, hold on. Have I spotted a plot hole here? If Jean Grey was never the Phoenix - as recently revealed - how come her daughter's inherited those powers from her?
But, given that the Beyonder's all-powerful and all-knowing, how can the furry feline fury possibly do that?
As far as I can make out, the logic is the Beyonder's decided to fulfil the destiny of everyone he encounters and the Puma's been created to kill him. That means that, in order for the Beyonder to fulfil his stated mission, he has to let the Puma kill him.
Needless to say, the ever-interfering Spider-Man's got his doubts about it all.
Fortunately, there's a whole bunch of Marvel's mightiest heroes on hand to do that for him.
Except they fail miserably and Samson, feeling guilty about his part in it all, wants to tackle the brute, single-handedly.
Meanwhile, the She-Hulk must decide whether to let doctors perform a procedure that might bring Bruce Banner out of a coma but may also kill him!
Due to this, Nighthawk travels to our dimension, in a bid to get the Avengers to help him overthrow them.
But will they be interested?
And will Cap and he be able to thwart the antics of a trio of Silver Age DC style super-villains who've fled to this world, seeking to escape the Squadron Supreme's thuggish rule?
Needless to say, it's not long before that information's sold to the Kingpin and the rotundly rapacious rascal reckons he can recklessly wreck the reputation of Matt Murdock.
Unfortunately for him, by the issue's end, the lawyer's realised just who's behind his sudden run of epic misfortune, and is on the lookout for revenge.
And I have no doubt the battling barbarian will, indeed, turn out to be a saviour.
Little does our hero suspect that Beth Cabe and Madame Masque have swapped bodies, meaning the woman who looks like Beth is out to kill him and the woman who looks like Masque is out to save him.
Just the one issue from this month’s batch for me. But what an issue. The classic Daredevil #227. Miller, Mazzucchelli, Born Again. Arguable one of Marvel’s finest issues, and the first part proper of arguable one of Marvel’s finest storylines.
ReplyDeleteDW
I only had Thor #364 of the above issues. I missed most of the excellent Daredevil "Born again" issues at this time only picking it up the last 2 issues of the story arc ( and reading the full story in a collected edition)
ReplyDeleteAnd what the heck is a "Bi-Coastal Avenger" ???
Paul, a Bi-Coastal Avenger is one that goes both ways. East and west.
DeleteWe're in the era of the West Coast Avengers. Steve covered the first issue of their regular series here late last year (clearly you aren't paying enough attention ;)
www.stevedoescomics.blogspot.com/2025/10/the-marvel-lucky-bag-october-1985.html
Basically the West Coast Avengers and the New York based lot team up in that Hulk issue.
And it features She-Hulk too! Clearly an unmissable comic. Which I missed.
-sean
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ReplyDeleteI had this Thor, though my faulty brain always thinks the Frog Thor saga was much earlier in the run. Oh well - I was tuning out of the comic at this point, as Sal Buscema [RIP] was drawing a lot of issues but I was only really interested in Simonson's work.
ReplyDeleteDD 227! We're here at last.
Such a sense of validation, having hung in for the long, barren stretch since Miller's last run and seeing Mazzuccelli finally being put to good use.
I had an agonising wait for this issue. I'd been to Forbidden Planet a few months earlier and been startled to find DD229 [more on that in April]. But the previous two issues had sold out! So I had to wait in real time for this to turn up at the newsagents.
The compressed storytelling through this whole arc is exemplary, though it's an example fewer and fewer writers have gotten their heads around as time passes. Scenes that feel rounded and satisfying but only last a page or, in some instances, a couple of panels. The crosscutting between them that keeps up a breathless forward momentum. The first four issues might be Miller's best writing.
People rate Batman Year One, but that doesn't have the sense of moving forward into uncharted waters that Born Again did. How exciting it is to upend the status quo of decades.
Can I risk heresy and suggest that this isn't actually all that good a cover? It looks a bit awkward. Actually, looking at it, it has the same stiffness Mazz used to suffer from when inked by Danny Bulanadi [RIP].
Matthew
ReplyDeleteI tend to agree about the Daredevil cover. In fact, the only element that I think Batman Year One improved over Born Again was the original issue covers. Mazzucchelli really hit the mark with those, both with the illustration and design. With hindsight you can almost see him moving onto Rubber Blanket.
DW
I don’t think the DD cover is that bad, personally — it’s much better than most of the ones here. But it’s true that Mazzuchelli progressively loosened up over the course of “Born Again”, and got more experimental and un-predictable. It was very exciting to witness his evolution month by month.
Deleteb.t.
CH just read Spiderman this past weekend for the first time I think. Why I own it, no idea!
ReplyDeleteThe most interesting thing about it is the inside back cover with bullpen bulletins by Jim shooter. In it, he congratulates a handful of people who won a contest. Marvel was running to allow amateurs to submit art inking, lettering, etc., and be selected to then go and apparently try working for Marvel.
So the winner for art was MARK BAGSLEY. He went on to a several-years run drawing Spidey!
What was interesting, in order to confirm this was the same mark Bagley, I looked at his Wikipedia page and it confirms he won this contest iut of several thousand (?) participants. But what is funny is that in Wikipedia it says he won in 1983, not 1985/6, and it seemed as if Marvel /Shootet had totally forgotten (intentionally?) about It’s promise to give him a shot at a job. And then Mark apparently ran into Jim shooter at a comic convention in Florida, which is where Mark is from. And then the rest is history.
I concur with my esteemed colleagues DW and Matthew McK on Daredevil #227. And the cover.
ReplyDeleteLoved the Thor frog story - it was great to see Simonson doing something fresh and different after the series had dragged a bit during the later part of the Surtur epic. Although I'm somewhat puzzled by Matthew's comment, as the Our Pal Sal fake-Walt era doesn't start til later in the year.
Admittedly he did draw one issue of Thor in mid '85, but I wonder if the association with the frog stuff is more down to the Balder mini-series being published at the same time...?
Elsewhere, the big comic of the month was Miracleman #6 (which - so there's no confusion - had a February on-sale AND cover date). At last - the new stuff! Mostly.
Although the thrill of finally finding out what happened with Marv... uh, Miracledog was slightly tempered by some less than stellar artwork...
-sean
Ah! Miracleman 6!
ReplyDeleteI picked that up the same time as DD 229, same shopping expedition. That’s right - I remember now. My great grandmother who lived down South was ailing, so I came down to see her at the beginning of the year - unusually for me, as my visits were generally in Summer.
Yeah, the art was - and still is - very disappointing for all of the latter half of Book 2. I personally find the Veitch / Ridgeway stuff just as bad.
I’m very foggy with the latter half of Thor overall. I’m re-reading it again now as it’s published in Masterworks annually, but I have a feeling I was skimming the art back then. I was a bad fan as a teen.
Oh, it's quite easy to be vague about a fair bit of Simonson's Thor, Matthew. He had a particular approach to mixing Norse myth that was enjoyable, but could easily slip into auto-pilot (if that makes sense) and once he introduced Malekith - not an especially convincing character imo - the quality could be variable.
ReplyDeleteI had my own false memory of it, recalling that the Surtur storyline ended with a double-size #350. Which I realised was completely wrong when Steve covered the issue here and it turned out to be a regular single with the conclusion continuing in the next one. And the next one after that, and...
Not to knock Simonson though, as I'm sure it's not easy having sole responsibility - for story and artwork - on an A-list Marvel, month in, month out.
I think that's probably why 'Born Again' was Miller's best DD, as he could leave the grind of actually drawing it to someone else. Of course it also helped that Mazzucchelli was a much better artist...
On Miracleman, I actually liked John Ridgeway's work. He's very much in the mould of a particular kind of British comic artist of an earlier era, so while I can see why other people might not like his stuff for me the retro quality really worked on that MM story he did (and - in a different way - the first year or so of Hellblazer).
Agree about Veitch though. He was an improvement on Chuck Beckum, but that was a pretty low bar to clear, and the post-Warrior parts of Book 2 do not look good.
-sean
*mixing Norse myth with comics...
DeleteApologies for the poor edit there.
-sean
Sorry - I wasn't knocking Ridgway's solo work. His 50s-set stories were great [though slightly unwelcome at the time in Warrior when I was craving more of the main story after a lengthy wait between issues].
DeleteI was thinking of his inking of Veitch - that dry, slightly dusty pencil-shavings style doesn't sit well with Veitch's sparse pencils.
Ah, right. I was thinking of 'Red King Syndrome', the story about Miracleman trying to break free of Gargunza's dreamworld. I completely forgot Ridgeway inked the last bit of Book 2. Duh.
DeleteYeah, they weren't a good match. Although I don't recall the rest of Veitch's work on Book 2 looking any better.
-sean