Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Employment
I'll start work on Monday in a 50% English teacher position (i.e., two blocks of English in a school on the four blocks per semester system). Tomorrow'll reveal what the blocks are (two of eleven or one of eleven and one of nine), as well as what books are in the bookroom, but for now it's just joy.
It was about eight years ago this week that I started my practicum. Frankly, that's just weird to contemplate.
Monday, January 28, 2008
...there is a limit to the frustrations which any men can endure -- even communists!
Titles today - Fantastic Four #6-10, The Incredible Hulk #3-6, Tales to Astonish #39, Amazing Fantasy #15, and Amazing Spider-Man #1
This assortment doesn't quite get through 1963 - there's several issues of Fantastic Four to go yet, plus the Avengers' introduction - but it is a good start on catching up. Thankfully, this week marks the end of the first term of studies here in BC. This means two things - there's a bit of spare time to permit me some expansive blogging, and that openings for the second term need to be filled. The Globe and Mail online reminded me that prospective employers google candidates, and a quick check of my name yielded up my name at Old is the New New... and reminded me to blog. And so!
Today the selection of heroes increases substantially on this blog. I know that I've already done a fair bit on the X-Men, but I decided last year to go back and try to work through the titles from the sixties more or less as they appeared. Now, I don't have every title out there - I'm not sure where Ant-Man first appeared, and I'll probably be able to get by without Thor - but I'm pretty sure that I've got much of the Marvel that I'll need. But until these issues start to feature monthly checklists, ads for other Marvel titles on newsstands that month, or a full complement of 12 issues in a year on the DVD-ROMS, I'll have to guess for a bit. (Basically, it's all good once we get out of 1963.)
Briefly, Fantastic Four #6-10 feature Dr. Doom and the Sub-Mariner teaming up, Kurrgo (the Master of Planet X) kidnapping the FF to force them to save his planet, the introduction of the Puppet Master, Namor's attempt to lure the FF to their doom... in Hollywood, and Dr. Doom's return (in the offices of Marvel Comics)/identity switch with Mr. Fantastic/reduction to subatomic size.
"Scientifically," though, things are happening in most of these issues. Doom plays on the Sub-Mariner's heartstrings (cliches are contagious, sorry) by reminding Namor that "the glistening towers of your once-great civilization" were destroyed when "the barbarians from the surface [conducted] their underwater H-bomb test in this particular area..."(#6, page 8) Doom then demonstrates his a miniaturized supermagnet "grabber" ("Magnetic force is unlimited! And when it is amplified, it has the strength of giants!"), and Namor agrees to plant it in the Baxter Building. (When he flies free from the ocean, Namor is mistaken for an American Polaris missile test by a passing jet. We'll take up the mistaken military-industrial complex/superheroic later on.) Once the magnet's planted, of course, Doom turns on all of them and tries to hurl the entire skyscraper into the sun. (I'll accept the supposition that this tin-can sized device can effect such force, but it's just odd that it'd seamlessly unfix the building from its foundation.) Anyhow, Namor and the FF team up, Doom's hurled off into space by a speeding meteor, and the Baxter Building returns to earth under the cover of darkness. (Narrator's breathless commentary: "...and the stray individuals who later witness the silent return of the Baxter Building from the skies write it off as a bad dream... an hallucination resulting from the anxieties that plague our nuclear society..." (#6, page 23)
#7 features our only early counterculture dig for today: the Human Torch daydreams about the hash he'd make of a swanky tribute dinner in DC - "That reminds me of a joke I heard about two beatniks... or, ah, er, maybe you've already heard it?" (#7, page 2) Mr. Fantastic's not much happier about going to the dinner, since it means that he has to abandon a rocket fuel experiment that's just about to reach fruition. Anyhow, Planet X is about to be destroyed by a rogue planetoid, and Kurgo, the Master of said planet, sends his robot minion and one of the two starships they have to bring the Fantastic Four back so that they can save Planet X. (I'm hoping that more things take up such naming. I'd love to live in Housing Development X.) An American satellite notices the approaching alien craft, and it's first assumed that it might be "an attack by the Reds" before someone else comments that "no earth nation ever built a ship like that!" (#7, page 5) We'll ignore the hostility ray that turns the world against the Fantastic Four (used to blackmail the team into the plot... and somehow ineffectual on this infighty team...) and move along to the close. With the fate of five billion innocents in the balance, Reed devises a shrinking gas to miniaturize the entire population so that they can all travel to another planet and then use the antidote to restore themselves. Kurrgo, of course, plans to save the antidote for himself but instead is left behind when he is unable to decide between power and safety. (And there was no antidote! Oh, the irony!)
#8 is only really notable for two things - the Puppet Master uses "radioactive clay" to make small sculptures of people which permit him to control their actions, and the 22nd page where he describes his plan to destroy the United Nations and make himself king of the world (complete with a panel that shows Khrushchev, Castro, Mao, and perhaps Franco serving him dinner). The means of control is poorly explained - apparently, he has to manipulate these sculptures like marionettes in scale models - and the origin is left untold. ("But what would she say if she could know that ever since I discovered this quantity of radioactive clay, I have been carving it to gain power for myself!" - #8, page 7) But I suppose that's why there are recurring villains. This issue introduces the blind sculptress Alicia Masters as the Thing's love interest. (She's blind but sees the goodness in him!)
#9 is really quite funny. The FF are broke, and an offer of a movie deal delivers them into the plans of the Sub-Mariner! (He found out about their money woes on his undersea television set - apparently, a standard tube encased in a splatter of green algae-like material.) No science here, but there is the real Cyclops and an African tribe that has a potion which protects them from fire. Yeah, let's move along.
#10 brings back Doctor Doom. He uses Jack Kirby and Stan Lee, who are forced to call in Mr .Fantastic to "work out a plot iwith 'em!" "Strange," Mr. Fantastic muses, "we just finished discussing a new plot yesterday!" (#10, page 6) [Yep, the boldfaced emphasis was put on yesterday.] It turns out that Doom was saved from the vastness of space by the Ovoids, an alien race with "science and culture... a million years ahead of ours!" Able to control events around them by thought and to transfer their consciousness into new bodies when they age, Doom learned their secrets and returned for revenge. Before the rest of the Fantastic Four arrive to rescue Reed, Doom transfers their bodies... and assumes leadership. They imprison Reed (trapped in Doom's body) in a cell that will run out of oxygen (designed by Doom, of course, to be a death trap for Reed) and Doom gloats about the brilliant plan that will destroy the rest of the team.
Pages 15-16 of issue #10 are simply some of the funniest, oddest, and most Calvin and Hobbes of all the FF pages I've read so far. [If the link to www.transmogrifier.org doesn't provide the strip, just search for "F-14" to get the flavor.] Doom's stolen zoo animals and shrunk them, and all the tiny animals escape. But it's not the work of villainy - he's going to increase the FF's powers! See, the dinosaurs prove how this will be done: "...ages ago, the dinosaurs were the lords of Earth! But, unfortunately for them, their bodies grew too large while their brains remained the same -- until they simply grew themselves out of existence! But what if they have [sic] been smaller? If their bodies had been a fraction of their natural size, then their brains would have been much larger by comparison! Today, the dinosaurs might still be the rulers of the earth!" This explanation takes up two panels - the first, your standard image of tyrannosaur and triceratops about to throw down; the second, an image of tyrannosaurs with four-fingered human-like arms in space suits on an alien planet. There's a spaceship in the background and odd celestial bodies in the sky, and the foregrounded tyranno-man has a huge, spacey movie camera on a tripod. (This will lead to accusations that even these hypothetical tyranno-men faked the moon landing, of course.) Anyhow, Doom claims that he'll shrink the FF and then re-enlarge them - and in doing so, they'll retain their powers at a tiny size and then have them increase porportionally when they're enlarged. On page 17, Doom's thought bubble reveals that this little bit of "scientific double-talk can fool almost any other unsuspecting victims" since Reed wasn't there to call B.S. on Doom's patter. (I would like to read a story where Reed has to correct this lesson for Johnny. "Who taught you what about dinosaur brains?") Anyhow, Reed escapes, Doom's focus on the body-switch fades and the two scientists trade back to their own bodies, Doom's shot misses its target and switches on the shrinking ray... which shrinks him to nothingness. It seems that the science of evil beings always turns on its inventors in these tales.
Incredible Hulk #3-6 - issues 3-5 feature two stories per issue, and the 6th was the last issue for the first volume of the comic. (He gets moved over to Tales to Astonish later on, and it changes its name to The Incredible Hulk in 1968.) #3 has General Ross trick Rick Jones into tricking the Hulk on board an experimental rocket because "there isn't a man living who could stand the forse of its G-pull... we want the Hulk to ride that rocket, in the interests of national security!" (#3, page 3) Of course, the rocket's set to send the Hulk off into the depths of space. But once in space, the light of the sun changes the Hulk back into Dr. Bruce Banner... and the unshielded space craft enters a radiation belt "and once again Bruce Banner's body is subjected to thos mysterious, powerful rays about which so little is truly known! Rays of intense radiation, with the power to effect the most fantastic changes upon anything that lives!" But Rick discovers that this was all a plot, sidles up to the control panel and turns the payload back to earth. The signal, though, is affected by the radiation and ends up linking Rick to the Hulk - effectively putting the Hulk under the control of Rick. The rest features Rick and the Hulk dealing with the villanous Ringmaster - he hypnotizes towns so that his circus of crime can ransack a city! (No, I'm not kidding. Yes, Snake said it best in the Monorail episode - during the jam-packed town meeting - when he asked another looting criminal if Springfield could be any stupider.)
#4 has a few nice science-y moments. Page two has Betty Ross mooning over a picture of Bruce Banner and reminiscing. (When introduced to Banner, she unabashedly states, "It's a pleasure to find that America's most famous scientist is also so young -- and handsome!" (#4 page 2) You hear that, kids? You can become a famous young scientist! It helps if you're handsome! Hope you like chaste relationships with general's daughters!) Banner's helping the military-industrial complex along nicely, though, even when he's not there - on pages three and four, Ross is overseeing the testing of the "iceberg rocket" which will capture the Hulk. (They test it on a jet-powered copy of the Hulk, of course. It makes Betty shriek, of course.) Rick is brought in for questioning by the military, is saved by the Hulk (who runs amok a bit, including a brief bit of fun on a movie set), and then uses the gamma ray machine in the hidden lab/Hulk holding pen to turn the Hulk back into Banner. Rick messes up a little - he can't turn off the rays in time - but the weakened Banner tells him that it's not Rick's fault ("You're not a scientist!"). But Banner re-adjusts the machine and produces a Banner-controlled Hulk which is angrier and more impatient. That's fine in the second half, "A Gladiator from Outer Space" - an alien warrior called Mongu lands somewhere in the continental United States and challenges "Earth's mightiest warrior to met me in hand-to-hand combat!" (#4, second story, page three). Naturally, the Hulk and Rick Jones charter a mini-jet and fly to the Grand Canyon to meet his challenge. But it's a trap! Mongu was merely a robotized costume worn by Boris Monguski, and his squad of Soviet soldiers plan to bring the Hulk "back behind the Iron Curtain ... [where] our great scientists will learn the secret of your great strength and build for us a whole army of warriors such as you!" (#4, second story, page six). They brought an "ear-splitting sound-gun" with them which "doesn't affect normal ears... [but] prove torturous to the super-sensitive ears of the Hulk!" (#4, second story, page seven) I can't help but wonder if he has super taste, too.... Anyhow, this challenge is bested, Hulk forces them to surrender (since there is "a limit to the frustrations which any men can endure -- even communists!"), and sends them packing in their helicopter (and if they don't immediately set course "to Vodka-land by the time I hit earth, I'll be back!") (#4, second story, page 9). Newspapers, of course, assume that this was all a hoax perpetrated by the Hulk and he remains a pariah. (SNL circa 1976: "General Francisco Franco is still dead, and the Hulk is still a pariah.")
The first story in #5 can mostly be left aside - an immortal wizard called Tyrranus, imprisioned underground by Merlin, kidnaps Betty Ross and temporarily forces the Hulk to be a gladiator. Instead, we'll take up the next chapter of the Hulk as Red-buster. In "The Hordes of General Fang," the "iceberg rocket" is used upon the Hulk. It successfully finds its target and encases him in ice, but "the one thing "Thunderbolt" Ross did not take into consideration was the intense body heat of the captive Hulk! For, like an atomic pile, when the Hulk expends his almost limitless energy and power, his temperature rises to an unimaginable degree!" (#5, second story, page 2) And so he escapes. An urgent bulletin from the small nation of Llhasa informs us that "the bloodthirsty scourge of Asia, General Fang" is about to invade with his evil plunderers. (#5, second story, page 4. He's also atop a slave- or POW-borne litter. How decadent and evil.) Anyhow, the Hulk and Rick travel to "the Orient" on a jet for no reason other than the fun of watching Hulk rage at a clumsy stewardess spilling coffee on him. They escape over Formosa, though, and move along westward to Red China. (Ah, pre-1973 comics.) Hulk dresses up as the abominable snowman, wreaks havoc on the hordes, is captured, is freed by Rick, captures Fang, and drops him off in Formosa. Fang gets a chance to demonstrate his evil - he orders a soldier's execution for daring to counsel retreat in the face of the yeti - and his tactics - he employs a sophisticated projector which displays a massive lavender dragon (#5, second story, page 9). (The dragon looks kind of like Fin Fang Foom - which I think was a 50s Marvel monster before it was added to the Marvel universe. And Massive Lavender Dragon would be an excellent prog rock band name.)
#6 isn't terribly noteworthy except for three things. One is that the villain, the Metal Master (an alien conqueror) melts Banner's "space probe rocket" with its powers, and the second is that the reader letters in this issue were not impressed with Mongu-the-communist-plot. The third, though, is the most excellent. Hulk, defeated by the Metal Master, is summarily imprisoned by Ross, and blames it on Rick. Rick is "hurt, bewildered" and asks Ross where one would enlist in the army. Rick, only sixteen, is too young. "But I'm tired of bein' just a nothin'! I wanna be where the action is!" Ross knows how Rick feels, but tells Rick that if he "really [wants] to serve your country... the best thing to do is stay in school! America needs trained men, in every field -- even in the army! And then, when you're old enough..." (#6, page 12) Rick's dejected by this. Some unknown person in a brown suit argues that Rick should "just stick to [his] education! That's what the rest of us are doing!", but Rick ruefully thinks, "Sure, it's okay for him to talk! He was never the Hulk's partner! How can I go back to being an ordinary kid after something like that!" (#6, page 13) Rick immediately finds the answer, though. His cool friends show him the ham radio set they're playing with, and Rick sets up the Teen Brigade - a setup of "cats like us, all over the country" working together to "help the army, the police everybody" - and "they can't stop us on account of our age!" (#6, page 13). And, of course, they help the Hulk trick the Metal Master and save the earth - and the Hulk gives them most of the credit for helping to assemble the fake gun that the Metal Master couldn't destroy. (Is there anything that plastics and cardboard can't do?)
So that addresses the issues for the established heroes. Two new ones are introduced around this time.
Tales of Suspense #39 presents the reader with Iron Man's origin story. This'll be all over the media this year, so I may as well do it right by its Cold War origins. (I shudder to think about the likely War on Terror origins for the movie incarnation, but so it goes...) Tony Stark is a wunderkind inventor visiting Vietnam to demonstrate and field-test his industrialized magnets. Naturally, he needs to be guarded - "the commies would give their eyeteeth to know what he's working on now!" - but he's also a millionaire playboy bachelor (#39, pages 2-3). But all is not right in Vietnam - there's an evil warlord whose plundering hordes are marching through the countryside and wreaking havoc. (No, not General Fang, but good guess.) Wong-Chu likes to wrestle, plunder, and... be victorious. And he's mean. (Not much characterization, but I don't think any hero's expected to be set against their nemesis in the first issue. There was a great What If...? issue in the 80s that examined a different story for Iron Man and made Wong-Chu more important, but not necessarily more developed as a character. But, as Nigel Tufnel would remind me, "that's nit-picking, isn't it?")
Anyhow, the general in charge in Vietnam has a staggeringly painful time understanding the nature of guerrilla warfare ("Our heavy artillery could defeat them, but we can't transport such big weapons through the dense jungle!"), but Stark's midget transistors will allow US allies to carry mortars that aren't any heavier or larger than flashlights (#39, page 4). (Er... I thought he was testing magnets, not miniaturized mortars... continuity editor!) Brief skirmish ensues, Stark treads upon a booby trap and injures himself (and apparently kills his guards), and is captured by the red guerrillas. (That's all they're ever called. I wonder if things change later for Marvel.) Anyhow, the shrapnel's near his heart and inoperable (he's only got a week to live), and so Wong-Chu tries to trick him into inventing a superweapon by promising a surgeon for Stark if a new weapon's designed within the week. Stark sees through the lies, but agrees so that his "last act will be to defeat this grinning, smirking, red terrorist!" (#39, page 5) Wong-Chu, naturally, laps up the fact that Stark "would not hesitate to betray [his] country to save [himself]!" (ibid.)
The next day, Stark is given some help - the great scientist, Professor Yinsen, had been forced to work as Wong-Chu's "lowly manservant" but now would assist the inventing process. Stark, of course, read Yinsen's books in college, and thought that Yinsen was the "greatest physicist of all" but everyone thought he'd died. (#39, page 6) Once told of the plans for the Iron Man armor, Tinsen throws himself into the effort. It is full of transistorized, electronic goodness - and it features a device to keep Stark's heart beating. But! Once Stark puts on the armor it needs to be charged - and the guards are coming back early! Yinsen quickly acts to save Stark and the work that they've done, but is killed in the process. Iron Man hides in the rafters, and Wong-Chu decides to go wrestle peasants. (No, I'm not kidding.) Iron Man picks up a handy white smock and blue fedora and heads out to the wrestling ground to challenge Wong-Chu. (What is it with superheroes and wrestling in their origin stories?) As he holds Wong-Chu aloft, Iron Man states, "You are not facing a wounded, dying man now... or an aged, gentle professor! This is Iron Man who opposes you, and all you stand for!" (#39, page 10)
Naturally, Wong-Chu calls in his hordes, and they open fire with small arms and then progress to bazookas and grenades. The bullets "Kapow!" and "Painng!" away, and a reversed charge on a transistorized magnet repels the heavy stuff. Iron Man next hacks the PA loudspeaker to tell the hordes to desert and run away, and he reflects that "In panic, and without leadership, they'll soon be captured by South Vietnam troops!" He chases after Wong-Chu, and, because the latter is about to order the execution of all the prisoners, Iron Man ignites a stream of oil which leads to the ammo dump to end the threat. He liberates the prisoners, sends the reds running, and then puts on the hat and smock and walks away, David Banner-like.
(David Banner, of course, was the name used for the 1970s "The Incredible Hulk" TV show, and he always walked out in the midst of the sad song at the close of the show. This list is not about the close, but rather the ways in which the Hulk got his Hulk on. Again, we're not yet at this stage for the Hulk yet in the comics. Anyhow, if my schoolyard memories are accurate, his TV name was changed to "David" because someone thought "Bruce" wasn't a manly enough name. As I'm pretty sure MAD magazine noted in their parody, it's pretty odd that, in the decade of Bruces Jenner and Springsteen, NBC execs/TV writers/whoever would make such a change.)
Anyhow....
We close with Spider-Man today. I'm sure everyone knows this one by now - either due to Sam Raimi's films or the 1960s cartoon with the awesome theme song - but here goes again. Peter Parker, a nerdy wallflower being raised by his aunt and uncle in NYC, is bit by a radioactive spider and given amazing powers. But! When he fails to halt a thief who soon thereafter kills his beloved Uncle Ben, he learns that with great powers comes great responsibility. (Seriously, I could recite that one in my sleep. I probably have.)
Anyhow, Spidey first appears in the final issue of Amazing Fantasy - which was rebranded as The Amazing Spider-Man at the end of 1963 - as the main story. (Just like in Tales of Suspense, this was an anthology comic. I'll take up a couple of the B stories later.) I could say a lot about the art - Ditko's really astonishing, especially as an artfully gawky yin to Kirby's dynamic yang - but I'll comment on the text instead. Naturally, Peter tries to talk a girl into going to the Science Hall with him (just "Sally" - no MJ or Gwen Stacy yet), but is mocked: "Give our regards to the atomsmashers, Peter!" (#15, page 2) The fateful experiment doesn't make much sense - radiation sent from orb to orb like electricity, I guess - but Peter's post-bite swoon is mocked by the older science types. Nothing worse than lab bullies, really. I really like that one notes that "our experiment unnerved young Parker!" and the other replies "Too bad! He must have a weak stomach!" (#15, page 3) This works in many ways: one, the scientists have an attractive young woman with them, so even these scientists are cooler than Peter. Two, even these men of science who aren't Banner, Richards, or Stark conclude all of their sentences with exclamation marks. Three, and best of all, they seem to be making their science even more elitist and distant. Rather than concern themselves with the lack of stomach for radiation research - and, perhaps by extension, nuclear research in general - that a nerdy youth displays, they chalk it up to some deficiency of Parker's character or ability. It's a fairly effective tactic - Peter's set up as someone who knows science but is an all-around outcast, but he'll mostly stay out of the lab and not scare away the readers. This reminds me of a passage from Scientists in the Classroom... I'll have to look for that tomorrow.
Anyhow, Peter effortlessly designs webcasters (no organics here) and starts on his road to fortune. His just-looking-out-for-himself ethos is only relaxed for his kindly Uncle and Aunt - who get him the microscope he's always wanted on page 8 - and by page 11 he learns the shortcoming of his philosophy. Still, money is needed. In the first issue of Amazing Spider-Man (generally to be abbreviated as ASM), Aunt May's trying to find a way to make ends meet and Peter goes looking for work. Peter offers to drop out, but Aunt May won't hear of it: "Your uncle always dreamed of you being a scientist some day!" (#1, page 3) Peter decides to go back under the spotlights, but finds that he can't cash the check made out to "Spider-Man." By that point, J. Jonah Jameson has started his editorial campaign against Spidey, and there's no chance of further stage work. (JJJ also starts stumping for the heroism of his son John, a test pilot.)
In spite of all this, the story has Spider-Man save John Jameson from a guidance system failure on his test space capsule. Really, this is a ludicrous story - there's no real sense of the orbit that Jameson's in, there's several rescue attempts made which don't make much sense, Spidey convinces a pilot to fly him up to the area with the capsule, and then web-slings his way over to the capsule with a spare guidance system. But! There's no way to get in JJJ's good books, as he chalks up the crisis to Spider-Man's sabotage of the situation so that he could present himself as a hero.
The
Anyhow, Chameleon somehow is able to broadcast messages on the same wavelengths that spiders communicate (must have been some angry spiders in NYC that night...) and he draws Spidey out to the scene of his next heist. As the Chameleon escapes by helicopter, Spidey's able to use his Spider-sense to "tune in" the chopper and hone in on it. (Nope, none of those fancy Spider-tracers yet. I wonder if the Chameleon will get the credit for that one later on?) Spider-Man jams the hatch of the Soviet sub shut and he then commandeers the Chameleon's helicopter back to the scene of the crime. But! A smoke pellet provides the Chameleon with time enough to run off and disguise himself as one of New York's finest. Luckily, Spider-Man manages to help nab him, but he still feels abused by the world.
The B-stories for Amazing Fantasy and Tales of Suspense are odd. In TOS #39, there's "the Last Rocket" - with all but two humans fleeing the planet in the face of impending solar collapse. The two that stay dig the earth, love nature, and don't want to leave their homes. The sun nears its end, and then a new star explodes into place - and Adam and Eve talk about how they're going to populate this new earth. (I'll take Larry Niven's "How About Chocolate Covered Manhole Covers" instead - which does a nicer job of this, thanks.) And #39 ends with "Gundar!" - where the shipwrecked descendant of a Viking captain who'd cursed his mutinous crew frees them from the curse. (Yep, I've told that one back to front - they reveal his name at the end. I'm sure I've ruined that story for dozens now.)
In Amazing Fantasy #15 there's another religious parable - this time, in "The Bell-ringer!", the old man who stays on a volcano-imperiled island is taken heavenward from the chapel which he'd not deserted. (And yet it takes three pages to tell it!) Two sub-EC "surprise twist" tales round out this issue - in "Man in the Mummy Case!", a thief is offered refuge from the police by a mummy... only the refuge is through time, working as a slave on the work gang for the mummy's pyramid! And in "There are Martians among us!" a UFO crash-lands and the nation is alerted to the likelihood of human-sized martians among them. Weeks pass, and a quiet domestic scene of paranoia is shown - with the husband daring to go out, and the wife told to not admit anyone - but when the wife realizes that there's no coffee for after dinner, she dares to go and buy some... only to be surprised by footsteps and then captured! And when her husband comes home to find her missing and calls for help - if she's gone, then she's been caught and they'll know she's a Martian... and they'll come for him next! And as he says this, one hand is holding the phone to his head... another is mopping his cheek... and two others are held out in either surprise or jazz-hands! Quel surprise!
Monday, December 10, 2007
From these an empire was made?
Well, that's not an entirely fair description, since issue 4 of FF features the return of Namor, the Sub-mariner and issue 5 introduces Doctor Doom - but still...
For anyone who doesn't know the origin stories, the Fantastic Four gained their powers during a risky, unauthorized space trip - the shielding of their vessel wasn't up to standards, and they were bathed in cosmic rays. Naturally, these cosmic rays were attuned to ancient elements, as powers related to fire, earth, air, and water are bestowed upon them.
Unfortunately, they aren't granted a complete team mythos. Well, maybe that's unfair, but I expected a fully outfitted team from the get-go, or else a crash-landing that leads to their encounter with the Mole Man. (Yeah, I read the 1990s reboot.) Naturally, it takes them a little time to outfit their operation - but it just flashes into existence between issues 2 and 3. They go from having little more than signal flare guns to possession of the Baxter Building and a passenger ICBM. (So far, not used.)
And it's a little odd that they've not been held by the US government after their space escapades, or at least pursued - after all, they went joyriding in space on the taxpayer's dime!
Anyhow, issue one features nuclear hijinks, as the Mole Man has some subterranean behemoth steal nuclear plants. It's all resolved in a few pages, and little more is useful from that issue. The second issue features the debut of the shape-shifting aliens known as the Skrulls, who impersonate the FF in hopes of discrediting them so that an intergalactic invasion can ensue. (It concludes with the defeated Skrulls changing into cows and being hypnotized so that they forget what they are. I'll have to check wikipedia later to see if anything happened to the children that drank that milk...)
Issue three features the Miracle Man (not the British superhero who has caused such trouble for Todd MacFarlane), but other than the presence of the military during the "rampage" of Miracle Man's "creatures," there's little to discuss from this issue. Well, there's the Invisible Girl's fashion designs for the team, the introduction of the Baxter Building (more on it in a later post once they've used it), and the first use of the Fantasticar (a flying car that splits into four sections).
Namor was a golden age superhero who'd been lost since the end of the war. After the Human Torch and the Thing have a spat in issue three, the Torch leaves and encounters a powerful derelict in a flophouse in the Bowery. (Luckily, the Torch was reading a 1940s comic book while relaxing in the flophouse. Of course, old comics didn't quite have the same collectible value then that they have now, but it seems like a bit of a stretch that a 20-year-old comic would be waiting for him there. Yes, I'm aware that I'm taking issue with the presence of an old comic book in a building that houses a man who can burst into flame and coincidentally runs into a half-man, half-Atlantean amnesiac king of an undersea kingdom. And?)
Anyhow, Namor regains his memory thanks to the Torch, finds that his kingdom's been destroyed by H-bomb testing, and declares war on the surface world. New York is evacuated, a gigantic undersea creature goes on a rampage, and the Thing totes an atomic bomb down the creature's gullet (and escapes in the nick of time). (Is there anything that nuclear weapons can't solve?) Oh, and Namor falls in love with the Invisible Girl.
Doctor Doom - who proves to be the FF's nemesis - first appears in the next issue when he forces the men of the team to go back in time to steal Blackbeard's treasure. (Yep, I laughed, too. It even turns out that the Thing proves to be Blackbeard, since his disguise and his fighting prowess makes him out to be the captain of the captured pirates. He plans to stay behind and live with the pirates who've accepted him as a man, but a storm gets in the way.) Fortunately, Doom's not just about the bling, but interested in the magical properties of some of the jewels which had previously been the property of Merlin. Mr. Fantastic had left the jewels behind, though, and the FF manage to escape from the trap that Doom had prepared for them. (Doom also employs a doppelganger robot, which entirely fools the FF.) Doom, therefore, is set up from the beginning as the natural antithesis of Mr. Fantastic, as Doom's scientific abilities (shown in his origin story, his robot-making, and his powered armor) are matched only by his interest in mystic powers (which are not employed here).
Issue five also features the Human Torch reading issue one of The Incredible Hulk, and quipping that the Hulk looks a lot like the Thing. (Not even close, of course, given the grey skin of the early Hulk and the lumpy, rocky hide of the early Thing... but the Torch is just interested in teasing.) The Hulk is immediately laid out as a nuclear age Jekyll and Hyde, with the mild-mannered but aloof and arrogant Bruce Banner transformed into the angry, powerful Hulk by a mishap during the testing of the "Gamma Bomb." (A rebel-without-a-cause teenager, Rick Jones, drives out onto the testing ground to prove his courage, and Banner shoves Jones down into a protective ditch but is caught in the blast. Banner becomes a part-time superhuman, and Jones is completely safe. Totally safe - and all because he was shoved to cover! I smell sequel to "Duck and Cover..." - so long as they can re-sign the monkey with the firecracker from the instructional film.) Early on, the Hulk only comes into being when it's nighttime, not when he's angry.
Anyhow, the villains of the story are the "Red spy"/scientist Igor - who conveniently forgot to stop the test of the gamma bomb, and tried to steal its plans - and he alerts his superior, the Gargoyle, to what has transpired through the "sub-minature transistor shortwave sending set" on his thumbnail. (The first texter?) The Gargoyle immediately travels by "experimental man-carrying rocket" - launched by a Soviet missile sub - so that he can capture the Hulk and take him back to the USSR. The Gargoyle arrives safely in the passenger capsule, but "America's mighty defense structure unleashes its fantastic arsenal" and the body of the rocket is destroyed by "hunter missiles." (I know this isn't the first example of SDI, since Frances FitzGerald discusses this in Way Out There in the Blue.)
Anyhow, the misshapen Gargoyle's helped by Banner - not to become the Hulk, but to become normal. Banner knows how to use radiation to heal the Gargoyle, even though it'll destroy the Gargoyle's superintelligence. He readily accepts, and once transformed into a normal human he shakes his fist at a portrait of Khrushchev and denounces the work he'd been forced to do on secret bomb tests. But since an American cured him and he is "no longer a Gargoyle, [he] can defy you, and all you stand for like a man!" He promptly aids Banner and Jones, sending them back to the United States in his escape rocket although he does not escape. Instead, he glories in the fact that he is a man and has finished his work by setting off a self-destruct sequence so that he can "die as a man!" As Banner and Jones fly away, Jones notes that Banner not only made him "normal again" but also "turned him against the Reds!" As the destruction of the base sounds, Banner notes that "It's the end of the Gargoyle! And perhaps... the beginning of the end of the Red Tyranny, too!" (Yep, it was one spy named Igor and a mutated superintelligence which made the Soviets such a challenge. Meh, I shouldn't be so hard on the final panel of a comic...)
The less said about the threat of the Toad Men in issue two, the better. (No, I'm serious abou that threat.) Anyhow, Banner is kidnapped by the Toad Men, who've hunted down "the most brilliant scientific mind on Earth." I suppose they value weapons of mass destruction design over experimental spaceflight design (Mr. Fantastic), robotics (Doctor Doom), or miniaturized weaponry (Tony Stark, the Iron Man - who admittedly hadn't been created yet). So Banner is captured, it turns to night, Hulk smash (and muses about the power he has at his fingertips with the magnetic weaponry of the Toad Men - which would allow him to be the hunter instead of the hunted), and the US missile corps shoots down the UFO. (General "Thunderbolt" Ross: "If your radar shows an unidentified flying object above us, shoot it down, man! What do you think we're here for?" The rules of engagement for Ross are such fun.)
The UFO falls to the daylight side of earth, and Banner is arrested as a traitor. With the Hulk out of the way, the Toad Men signal the invasion fleet. (I guess when you've come all that way, a green-skinned behemoth won't faze you. Yeah, he's green now. I don't think he's grey again until the late 80s when he became a Vegas legbreaker. No, I'm not kidding.) Anyway, Hulk escapes while the magnetic technology of the Toad Men plays havoc with tides and they call for surrender. Once he reverts to Banner again, he turns to the gamma ray gun he invented and uses it against the Toad Men. Only thing is, he doesn't know what it'll do: "No one can predict what their effect would be on a field of magnetic energy!" But he goes with it anyway, and somehow it reverses the magnetism and sends the fleet off into space. Banner is cleared, but Ross remains suspicious of a connection between Banner "and that ding-blasted Hulk!" My thoughts exactly.
Saturday, December 1, 2007
Bounties of Media, Models of Major-Generals
I've not read a lot of the Civil War, so the particulars of that story arc may have made Steve Roger's death even more poignant, but it was still powerfully affecting. Yeah, it's a comic, and yeah, it's all made up, but... it was still surprising to see something like that done well, let alone done at all. The good news is that I've got 40 years of issues to read now (and I can always start picking up the alternative reboot of Ultimates, too).
Reading the Winter Soldier storyline prior to the assassination issue certainly provided an interesting counterpoint to things. For anyone who didn't hear, Captain America's original sidekick, Bucky Barnes, was brought back from the shadowy depths of presumed death as a former Soviet super-assassin. (Naturally, this demolishes the tryptch of "No one stays dead in comics except for Jason Todd, Bucky Barnes, and Uncle Ben." Only Spidey's uncle remains in the realms of the undead, but I'm hoping that he'll end up as a herald of Galactus before long.) It was a good storyline - compelling reading, emotionally charged, and centred more on the story than on bang-slam action scenes.
As for the last two weeks - my plans for this weekend's library trip were dashed when I was signed up as a substitute Drama teacher at a local school after a family tragedy. It's been a lot of fun working with the students on their performance of "Pirates of Penzance," but it's also been pretty time-consuming. Heck, it's even taking up some evenings and weekend time - such as today. Speaking of which, I'd better get ready - time to get moving and help with some tech before the rehearsal begins this afternoon.
Library trip, though? Well, we'll see when it can be planned. If the library's open after Christmas, I might have to travel down there and spend a few days in the glorious quiet of a university library during the holidays...
[Edit - And now that I've been accepted for the CHA this year, I'll certainly have to be ready and set with whatever I proposed...]
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Branching out in the comics reading - oddly
Oh, sure, I've read other things, but mostly of the canon - Maus, The Dark Knight Returns, Watchmen, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Bone. Noticeably, the only thing that could claim any possible continuity is Miller's TDKR, but it's mostly mythic and predictive, and it's not like anyone my age doesn't know the basics of Batman. (Vicki Vale's his one true pairing, right?)
But I have been reminded that there was more at work than Marvel at this time, and I've started to work on that. It's not as easy for DC, since their change in creator royalties in the mid-seventies plays havoc on any chance of a DVD compendium like Marvel's getting. (Still, I wouldn't mind if Batman, Green Lantern, Flash, Atom, and others like them were only printed up to that point...) I've started some investigations of MAD, and it's been interesting to see how much - and how little - it changed from the late 50s to the issues that I read as a lad in the 80s. (And our elementary school had a subscription! Of course, it's gone now...)
So here are the texts that I picked up this week at the library: Alison Behdel's Fun Home and Don Rosa's The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck. This is an odd pairing, to say the least, but they're a pretty interesting yin and yang of American comics.
I picked up McDuck mostly because of a note that I read in one of those "Bathroom Reader" books while I was in Vancouver last month. In a hard-hitting, completely bereft of annotation or citations article (shock!) on the realism of science in comic books, it noted that the classic McDuck comics of Carl Barks were pretty good on their science. (Oddly, Superman and the Flash had failing marks.)
Rosa's taken up the copious heritage of Duckburg and crafted a tale of McDuck's rise to the top of a vault of money. (I won't play with the made-up numbers for how much money, though.) So far, it's pretty good - I'm about 1/3 of the way through - and I can see why the Onion AV club put it on their list of good books that should get cinematic adaptations (it's number ten on the list). I'd never been a fan of funny animal books before, but Bone made me reconsider their possibilities. And I've never been a big fan of Disney, but I suppose that I've got to make some allowances from time to time.
What's really interesting about this serial story, though, is the ways in which it presents stock Horatio Alger-style storymaking without annoying me or putting me off of the character. Part of it's the whole way in which McDuck's money tells him how he made it - this dime from a shoeshine, that silver dollar from a riverboat adventure - but part of it's the realization that these comics are huge in Europe. (Bigger than David Hasselhoff, I hear.) I'll have to look up some of the scholarship that's been done on this stuff by readable Marxists - it could be interesting. (At the very least, it'd be interesting to use some pages of this for a high school assignment on ideologies - how would a communist read this page? A Lockean liberal?)
Fun Home, on the other hand, is a critically-lauded graphic novel memoir by a woman who examines her family's history, the circumstances of her sexuality, and literary themes while she tries to understand her parents. It may sound dreadful - depending on your tastes for comics - but coming from someone who didn't absolutely love the graphic novel Ghost World, it's absolutely spellbinding. There's not a lot here for research - other than the few times where she's buying MAD magazine - but there's a lot here for literary fun. In many ways, it reminds me of The Corrections. I wonder if this one'll get on Oprah's list?
This one's for all my comic scientists
So there's a few things that have percolated over the last few weeks on the subject of scientists in comics.
My Facebook status for the day had me thinking about comic book mad scientists, which quickly drew a reply from a colleague with an interest in such topics. The usual suspects were discussed - Richards, Banner, Doom - but I was mostly thinking about some of the last few scientists to be presented in the pages of X-Men.
The main one I was thinking about - still - isn't really a scientist (regardless of any arguments made about social science), but Bolivar Trask, the anthropologist-turned-Sentinels-inventor, presents a few of these interesting issues most readily.
One is that these science-type guys are just brilliant, in the whole "I just invented a self-perpetuating robot" sort of a way. It doesn't matter what their research is in: once they've got a PhD, they're just a few years away from a technological quantum leap which will not only imperil mankind but also be potentially toyetic. [Note to self: hurry up on this dissertation! And think merchandising, goshdarnit...]
Two, they rarely require any help. Trask doesn't appear to have any assistants or grad students or even a wife to pitch in. (I'm pretty sure he has a son who shows up later, but I can't recall. Still, this doesn't necessarily mean that he had a wife if latter-seasons Simpsons writers were involved in that storyline.) If they need help, they usually invent it.
Three, these robots aren't that bright and they certainly don't have anything like strength of convictions. I'll have to check again, but I'm pretty sure that Professor X uses his telepathic powers to stop the Sentinels a few times. (Something about a highly advanced positronic brain emulating the human brain? We'll have to see how that holds up with re-reading, or if later issues provide a good retcon for that event.)
A side note here about robots and communism: in Savage's Comic Books and America, he discusses the ways in which the communist threats in comic book plots often originated with one key villain who had duped all of the follower-underlings. The heroes then either had to convince the followers of their mistake so that the villain could be defeated or had to defeat the villain to convince the followers of their mistake. To some extent, it may be that there's some sort of corollory present here, except that the robots aren't latent westerners but instead mistaken machinery, programmed to evil yet easily put off task. (And doctrinaire! They just can't adapt to new situations and always require leadership, as was the case when the unexpected X-Men threat led one Sentinel to turn around for reprogramming.)
So if this is the case, then one can usually assume that the technology that modern science creates is not to blame, and that the science itself is not to blame, but that the scientist who creates is. ("Science doesn't kill people - mad scientists kill people.") The good thing about scientists, though, is that they use science, and its rational processes should bring them to the "truth" in the end. And if the scientist in question does not have the adjective "mad" in front, then they may be reasoned with, or may even reason things out for themselves, as was the case with Trask. (If they're not reasonable, then they're mad. Or a brainwashed commie, I suppose, though we've not met him yet here. The Red Ghost, though, provides us with a possible example over in the pages of the Fantastic Four.) Science, then, is on the side of good.
Back to our list, and taking up this previous issue: the fourth item is that scientists can often be trusted to do the right thing. Beyond Trask, another example is found with the Mimic's father in issue 19. Rather than invent a machine which would make his erratic, proto-villain son into a powerful threat, he secretly creates a device which will nullify his son's powers. Alas, the angry mob imperiled this plan and inadvertantly killed him. (Then again, Mimic's also a proto-hero, if I recall correctly - not only in these pages, but also in alternate realities. Or do we call them counterfictionals now?) At the rate by which scientists solve things, I'm really hoping that the "SCIENCE!" guy from that Thomas Dolby song shows up soon with solutions.
Finally, the important thing to keep in mind when evaluating a scientist is whether or not the government approves of him. (I don't think we've seen a female scientist yet.) Professor X occasionally shows up unannounced in the midst of police action or military situations, but once
word comes down from the Pentagon or Washington that he can be trusted, the authorities trust the heck out of him. They may question his long silences/naps - from when he goes astral to examine the situation on a different plane - but they don't turn him away. (And they certainly need the solutions that he divines.) Then again, Professor X has to work in a more circumspect manner than Reed Richards, since the former's got a secret identity to hide. (Not a costume, just a status that he keeps quiet. Oh, the superpowers that dare not speak their name...)
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Enter the Story Arc... and the Sentinels
Well, it's surprising to see how long it's been since last I posted. Alas! It's also somewhat odd to see how verbose I've been for just a couple of issues, particularly when I've many more issues to discuss, two Asimov novels, and some random thoughts. But we'll keep things focused with just nine X-issues for today.
X-Men #11-19 take the team through some of a storyline for their mythos and some general filler issues. #11 sees a extraordinarily powerful alien called The Stranger come to Earth and steal away Magneto and the Toad as specimens of mutation. (His people are just nuts about mutations. Go figure.) #12-13 introduce Professor X's super-strong step-brother, The Juggernaut, and provide a sizable amount of backstory for Prof. X. #14-16 make the most important contribution here, as they introduce the Sentinels - mutant-hunting androids - to the Marvel Universe. #17 has a mysterious villain - Magneto - subdue the battle-weary X-Men, and #18 sees Iceman rescue the rest of the team and thwart Magneto's attempts to create an army of mutant androids (more detail to follow). #19 introduces the Mimic - a villain who is able to copy the powers of others.
There's some items of note in these issues. The background tale for Professor X begins with his father's funeral after he dies in an atomic blast ("that fateful holocaust") in
Xavier, of course, first uses his power to steal answers in class and excel at sports, and his success infuriates Cain. They end up serving in
#14 sees the X-Men become a monthly title - just in time for the winter holidays - and ups the ante for anti-mutant hysteria. Other than Magneto's diatribes and the occasional angry pedestrian, there really didn't seem to be much to the notion of fear and hate of homo superior by ordinary homo sapiens. Heck, Spider-Man always seemed to get it worse. But "in another city" Dr. Bolivar Trask, one of America's greatest anthropologists (according to a reporter), holds a well-attended press conference where he warns of the mutant threat: "We've been so busy worrying about cold wars, hot wars, atom bombs, and the like, that we've overlooked the greatest menace of all! Mutants walk among us! Hidden! Unknown! Waiting--! Waiting for their moment to strike! They are mankind's most deadly enemy! For only they have the actual power to conquer the human race!" Now, all of this takes four text balloons and two panels. (And the following panel sees "Mutant Menace!" on the cover of the "Daily Globe" - not sure if this means that that JJ Jameson's got better things to publish, if this is a riff on the "Daily Planet," or if this is supposed to be the paper of record for Boston in the Marvel Universe.) It's a fun passage for me for many reasons - not just the explosive power of the academic voice - but the key's all the notes of fear about
Clearly, Prof. X reads the Japanese version of the "Daily Globe" - bad art on page six with the newspaper cover on the wrong side - and he takes in the feature article: artwork of vaguely Namor-like mutant overlords forcing mere humans into slavework and gladiatorial sport. Professor X calls up the National Television Network (yawn) and challenges Dr. Trask to a televised public debate. Naturally, NTN lives for this sort of thing: "It will be a privilege to present a scientist of your stature on our network!" (In times like this, there's only the Simpsons: "Hey everyone! An old man is talking!")
And so the debate. Continuity is still tricky for Marvel at this stage - Xavier's introduced as an education authority, not as a geneticist, and as "an articulate spokesman for
It's got to be said - I've yet to meet an anthropologist's robot. Maybe there's some special school for robot mechanics which grants PhDs in anthropology, but Trask either was trying to impress a girl with his robot hobby or else was able to really branch out once he gained tenure. Anyhow, the Sentinels turn on Trask - because of all their power and ability, it is their destiny to command, not to be commanded - and they take Trask to their base. (Xavier reflects that "Trask was an anthropologist--not a robotic expert! His knowledge of cybernetic brains was inadequate!", which only makes me wonder what school offered degrees in advanced idea mechanics or in evil medicine in the Marvel Universe.) Xavier summons the team - the Beast and Iceman are once again in
#15 introduces the Master Mold - the android that Trask created to make Sentinels - who mentally probes the Beast's origin story and forces Trask to design new Sentinels ("I do not possess the knowledge to create other Sentinels! You shall do it for me!") During the Beast's story debriefing, he states that the X-Men's mission is to protect mankind, and Trask becomes remorseful about his mistake ("a blind -- dangerous fool!"). The Beast's father was a labourer at an "atomic project" whose radiation likely caused his mutation, and the Beast naturally used his powers for athletic gains at first. The Sentinels prove to be quite unadaptable to invasion, as they frequently leave to gain new instructions when presented with novel events. (They clearly don't have the overriding primary goal of "destroy mutants" hardwired into them yet.) Prof X somehow finds a way to use his abilities to attack the Sentinels - I'll leave the philosophical possibilities for someone else - and the Master Mold grimaces as "a strange force" scans its "thinking apparatus!!"
#16 brings the whole Sentinel saga to a close - Xavier finds a means to disrupt the control signals for the Sentinels and is given full support by
There are three major techs of note for #17-18. The first is the "new laser-induced hypodermic" which the ER doctor creates to help the injured Iceman, but the second is key to Magneto's plot. Somehow - naturally, not well explained - Magneto uses the lab equipment of Professor X to construct a device that will "analyze... and duplicate" the body cells of the Angel's parents. Since their son is a mutant, Magneto will be able to use these cell patterns to create an army of mutant slaves, even control the types of mutations that they receieve. The third tech is the atomic power plants of the museum-quality starships held on the Stranger's planet; Magneto quickly reactivates one and rockets back to Earth (though he abandons the Toad there). Of course, Magneto's plan is thwarted, the mutant androids/slaves/whatever they're called (it's really not too clear what they'll be like - probably something like the Age of Apocalypse's Infinites), and the Stranger chases Magneto away.
#19's Mimic isn't a mutant - or certainly doesn't appear to be given his origin story. Still, it's classic Silver Age stuff. Calvin Rankin's father is "a scientist, working on a strange, dangerous experiment", and the headstrong lad's curiousity leads him to tinker with the beakers and unleash a gas by mistake. After this, he was able to rapidly assume the abilities of those around him, but only temporarily. As the locals became suspicious, his father worked on a machine which would give permanence to the Mimic's powers, but the threat of an angry mob led to an explosives mishap which buried the father and his device. With the powers of the X-Men, Mimic is able to uncover the device which turns out to be a nullifier rather than a stabilizer for his powers.
In other news, I never thought I'd be grateful that Cyclops ended up with the White Queen (a 21st century development, not something here), but the fact that even the Angel notices in #14 that Scott's into Jean just makes this whole slow-motion love story annoying, particularly since Angel's the first attempt at a love triangle here. (For once, Wolverine definitely makes things more interesting.) No wonder the rest of the team had no luck with the ladies - all this attention was showered on these two. Still, it's a little less notable overall here than it was earlier.
Letters of note:
- #11 sees a grad student in Calculus (and member of the Marvel Mathematicians Comic Club) writes in support of the Hulk and Doctor Strange and notes that his educated parents wait for him to send various issues home so they can read them.
-#12 leads off with a letter by a student of evolution who takes umbrage with the technical errors in issue #10's
-#15 featues a discussion of Darwinian and DeVriesian mutation, and how the X-Men do not suit these theories, and #19 sports a rebuttal by another fan. (#19 also has a letter by the boys of Phi Kappa Tau at RPI asking that someone mention "Hey You! Get off of my cloud!" by the Rolling Stones for some reason.)
-#18 has a question about whether or not Angel is a mutant, since his wings didn't develop until he was in his teens, and the editor actually admits that they're not Charles Darwin. (Considering other responses, that's awfully contrite of Stan Lee.)