FANTASTIC FOUR, Vol. 1, No. 39 (Lee / Kirby; Marvel, 1965)

Every Wednesday morning, I make a blind pull from Siri's (randomized) choice of one of the 20 alphabetically-organized shortboxes that constitute my comics collection, (re-)read it, write about it, and publish the resultant review / memory / whatever. Earlier installments live here.

(Box09): Of all the "greats" in comics, Lee and Kirby's FANTASTIC FOUR (or, Kirby’s FANTASTIC FOUR with Stan Lee dialogue) has been something of a blindspot for the entirety of my collecting days and decades: I've read an issue here and there – the earliest issues, the greatest of the greats, No. 51 (This Man, This Monster), among others – and, in each case, doing so reminds me a.) how good the Fantastic Four can be, and, b.) to just buy that omnibus.

The more I've reacquainted myself with Marvel's 1960s output the more it's become clear that there are really only a handful of stories being told – the hero is a coward!? the hero(es) lose their powers! the hero quits!? the heroes fight each other! the heroes team up! the hero's life outside the mask impedes on the life in the mask! among others – under an overarching villain-of-the-month plot (the "filler" issues being largely nothing more than a villain-of-the-month): the brilliance of 1960s Marvel was in their ability to stack and transpose these plots to different characters and combinations of characters while keeping everything within the parameters of each character (even though everyone sounds like Stan Lee, FELLA! PAL!, the overlording Jobs in a bullpen of genius Wozniaks) and the nascent Marvel Universe as a whole: in this case, the FF lose their powers and team up with Daredevil (who had popped in to help the FF with their wills) to defeat Doctor Doom who, by the end of this issue (I've also got issue 40 in the boxes, so I might cheat and read ahead) has, after being de-hypnotized by a Latverian court hypnotist, learned the truth and is ready to (in what I'm sure will be his undoing) toy with the powerless FF before slaying them all once and for all and ensuring the world knows who did said slaying; a tree falling in the forest Doom is not.

While I wouldn't consider this to be among the greatest of the great FF adventures, it's nonetheless an idea-packed explosion of creation and drama that sings and thrills as only mid-60s Marvel could do. Will it spur me to finally devour the rest of the Lee / Kirby run? In theory, it absolutely should. In practice? TBD.

DOCTOR FATE, No. 28 (Messner-Loebs / Giarrano; DC, 1991)

Every Wednesday morning, I make a blind pull from Siri's (randomized) choice of one of the 20 alphabetically-organized shortboxes that constitute my comics collection, (re-) read it, write about it, and publish the resultant review/memory/whatever. Earlier installments live here.

(Box09): Finally, something from the latest wave of comics procurement, the hybrid "grab fascinating things at random antique malls / make highly calculated offers on ebay for specific issues and complete series" wave, this issue being part of the former.

While the Doctor Fate mythology was, is, and remains somewhat murky (to my fantasy-incompetent brain), I've held a nigh-lifelong fascination with the character – a fascination no doubt initiated via the wave-two Super Powers figure (which should, at some point, become part of the latter hybrid procurment wave) and I do love what little I gleamed here: that the 1991 incarnation was Inza Nelson (I think I've had the issue where she assumes the mantle since it came out, one of those 10-year-old Rite-Aid grabs in the first phase of the great procurement), while Kent Nelson, the usual Doctor, has remained young "through becoming Dr Fate and now possessing a new body through The Lords of Order... and that (his) old body is now possessed by a particularly right-wing Lord of Order named Shat-Ru" (love his old body's opening line, "Humankind is a filthy mass of grubs, battening on lust and deceit"); it doesn't hurt that Messner-Loeb's writing makes me want to read the next issue which I don't have and, further, makes me want to collect the entire run (written by one of my favorite writers, J.M. DeMatteis) – which seems to be the way as I've been making my way through these late-eighties DC series which I was too young to appreciate or read when they first came 'round, the O'Neil / Cowan THE QUESTION series being at the peak of that list.

Short version: very cool stuff that makes me wish that Doctor Fate – and Pierce Brosnan – had gotten a better big-budget film debut than a Doctor-Strange-meets-Professor-X knockoff (at least DC and Marvel were honest about it in the 1996 Amalgam Comics combo when the characters merged during DC VS MARVEL into Doctor Strangefate) in a shitty vanity project. Such a great character yet to be used to their full potential – though this series is a solid start.

52, Week 21 (Johns, Morrison, Rucka, Waid / Giffen, Bennet; DC, 2006)

Every Wednesday morning, I make a blind pull from Siri's (randomized) choice of one of the 20 alphabetically-organized shortboxes that constitute my comics collection, (re-) read it, write about it, and publish the resultant review/memory/whatever. Earlier installments live here.

(Box09): Probably not the best narrative to channel switch into 21 issues in but fond memories of DC's post-INFINITE CRISIS continuity experiments (One Year Later was mostly a success, IMO – mostly) and scrapped ideas nonethless manifest: in addition to Ralph Dibney and Dr. Fate's helmet looking for an entrance to hell and some mechanic in the middle of nowhere rebuilding Red Tornado, I'd forgotten that Lex Luthor had his The Seven in Infinity Inc ("The Everyman Project": in addition to Natasha Irons's "Starlight" codename, we get Lex in full LexCorp/Vought mode – Giancarlo Esposito's already playing him in THE BOYS, might as well make him Lex in SUPERMAN LEGACY because he'd be perfect); we even wade into anti-nepo-baby ("blood brat," excellent term) superheroics – before Lex kills one of them for ratings.

As for the 52 series as a whole (its sequel, COUNTDOWN, left much to be desired; think I made it a few issues in before giving up), my fondest memory is it being both the debut of Batwoman and Renee Montoya's The Question, two of my favorite characters of that era. In Rucka I trust, always; the GOTHAM CENTRAL omnibus beckons.

Always thought that weekly comics would make a great digital comics exclusive: how would 52 worked in today's iPad / DC Universe Infinite world? Given how piss-poorly mainstream comics are adjusting to and making use of digital possibilities, probably not as swimmingly as it should.