THE QUESTION, No. 19 (O'Neil / Cowan; DC, 1988)

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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 whatever emerges. Earlier installments live here.

(Box14): Among the joys of joys in this, the latest phase of my comics collecting, has been experiencing much DC's post-TDKR / pre-Death of Superman (86-+/-92) output for the first time (I was a little young – I doubt six/seven year-old me would have appreciated them as much as the present 42-iteration does though who knows; I did read DRACULA for the first time when I was six): BATMAN: THE CULT; RONIN (though that was '82/'83, but still) DOCTOR FATE; and, most utterly – because I can't come up with a better word for how much I adore this series — O'Neil and Cowan's THE QUESTION.

That this week's blind pull was one of my favorite issues of one of my favorite series of all time featuring one of my top five comics characters (will list them at some point) was nothing short of intellectual manna: everything great about the O'Neil/Cowan run distilled into 28 pages: a done-in-one takedown of topical, corrupt prescience (in this case, plastic guns) by a social justice warrior in both his faced and non-faced identities who takes the time to engage in verbal sparring (more often than not whist in an impressive yoga position) with the best mentor/father figure in comics (I love you Alfred, but Tot will always win out for me), all with a sympathetic Hub City eccentric (Augie Lumberg and Doll – would anyone guess that the most gut-punching moment of the issue would come when a rubber love doll is shot in the head?) – whose connection to the main story becomes apparent only in the moment of utmost impact and danger – stuck in the middle.

One of the things that I've written about over my years of writing about comics is that the best, most enduring characters are those that are what I term "elastic": pliable enough to be molded into who they need to become so that the creative team to do their job as caretakers and shepherds while maintaining the very things that kept made the character so sacred in the first place. The Question, while not a objectively an "A-lister" – though both Vic and Montoya are to me – fits this and then some: in the hands of his creator, he was a less-stark vehicle for Ditko's Randian/objectivist proclivities; in the hands of O'Neil and Cowan, a zen social justice warrior; in Veitch and Edwards's, an all-seeing, weird-ass poet shaman attuned to the chi flowing through Metropolis; in Rucka's, a hard-noir vehicle of redemption; in Lemire's, one of resurrection: the Question's mask is nothing short of a tabula rasa for any type of story imaginable – and O'Neil and Cowan's 36 issues remain, three+ decades on, the bar beyond which all of our imaginations must reach.

the collection: foci

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As I seem to have shifted my collecting (re-collecting?) interests back to comics, finally starting my third era – the first being the early-mid 90s and the second being mid-late 2000s – thought it might be useful to share a few brief thoughts on why I've chosen to add what I’ve added to The Collection in this third era if only to solidify said choices for myself.

  • Early Silver Daredevil: easily my favorite Marvel character; I have a fascination with the yellow suit and the transition to the red and how haphazard his early issues felt: unlike other Marvel creations, there didn't feel like there was a grand design behind him and they were making it up as they went along (I know this was generally the case with the early Marvel, but it feels really pronounced with Daredevil). As I now have issues 2-7, my willpower on holding off on issue one is waning. Also have AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 16, featuring a Ditko DD in yellow suit AND Spidey - what more could I ask for?

  • (PS Electro would have made a fantastic full-time Daredevil villain.)

  • The Question: "Created by Steve Ditko" has a wonderful ring when you open up a comic. I just love the character – from Ditko's objectivist meanderings to O'Neil's left-wing eastern mystic / Kaine in KUNG FU to Rick Veitch and Tommy Lee Edwards's poetic ass-kicker (in one of my favorite representations of Metropolis ever) to the Timm-verse JLU iteration to Rucka's genius transformation of Montoya into the second Question: the character is one of the most elastic – a blank face and a suit tend to lend themselves as such – ever created; that he seems to be languishing again is more than slightly heartbreaking.

  • Early Silver Marvel in general: this was prevalent during my first era of collecting, largely guided by cheap back issues of early MARVEL TALES. In this present iteration, I've amassed a pretty solid collection of Lee/Ditko Spideys and the aforementioned Daredevil, but I'm also grabbing up important issues in the development of the Marvel Universe: the first Cap story in TALES OF SUSPENSE No 59; the first issue of the Hulk's own ongoing series, No. 102 (having spun out of TALES TO ASTONISH); STRANGE TALES ANNUAL No. 2, just because it includes a weird Kirby Spidey tale (I have a thing for Kirby drawing Spidey). Speaking of:

  • Kirby's Fourth World: have the omnibus, love the insanity behind all of it. NEW GODS, MISTER MIRACLE, and FOREVER PEOPLE first issues are in my possession as is Kirby's first DC work, SUPERMAN'S PAL JIMMY OLSEN 133. Not an active pursuit, but I'll always pick them up should the opportunity arise.

  • Complete runs of CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS (historical import and Perez art); BATMAN: YEAR ONE (Mazzuchelli Bats); Andreyko's MANHUNTER (several holes in my collection of one of DC's best series ever – which would be a perfect candidate for Max series adaptation: it screams for a merging of GOLIATH and PEACEMAKER, maybe a bit of ELI STONE thrown in); Bendis / Brubaker DAREDEVIL runs - had them all, lost them all in one of the moves; the Moench / Jones BATMAN run (still my favorite run in the whole of the character); I also need to get my hands on ALL-STAR SUPERMAN 12, as I have the first 11 issues then moved and all of it went to hell in the proverbial handbasket.

  • Outside of comics-comics: 1939-41 Superman merchandise – the early Siegel and Shuster iteration and the Fleischer cartoon version remain my favorite incarnation of Supes, the cornerstone of my collection being my 1939 Ideal composition doll as well as a first edition 1942 Lowther/Shuster ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN book and a 1940 Valentine’s Card featuring Superman about to punch a puppy because apparently that was a prerequisite for pre-war romance, IDK.

  • All foci above are, of course, in concert with the forever interests of The Shadow (I even have a complete run of the eight-issue Archie series coming because, in my passion for historical completion, I'm nothing if not a glutton for punishment) and Dick Tracy, though both tend to be more towards toys, radio premiums, and Big Little Books, but I still snap up comics whenever I see them.

Do I have any idea what I'll do with all of this? Not in the slightest: I did, after all, run a half-marathon distance with no desire to run an actual half-marathon (with numbers and people and such) and now seem to have opened my own comic shop / museum with no customers or intention to sell anything so who knows.

penguin commandos and gremlin vinyl

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In which an impromptu trip to an antique mall while killing time before going to the accountant’s office (taxtime, settling the final bit of my mother’s estate) yielded terrific and strange results:

O’Neil and Cowan’s THE QUESTION is high on the “have to get the whole thing” list. Among the group was my favorite issue so far, the sixth, “… that small rain down can rain…,” which remains brutal every time I read it.

And who could pass up die-cast Penguin Commando and Duckmobile?

Nevermind the GREMLINS story record… I mean, come on.