Reviews Of Old Comics: Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes #230

This review is inspired by an article coming up based on a rejected pitch to CBR. This issue has two stories inside, each from some of the best creators the Legion of Super-Heroes ever had. 

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes #239

August 1977 - DC Comics

Writer: Paul Levitz
Pencillers: James Sherman and Mike Netzer (as Mike Nasser)
Inker: Jack Abel
Colorist: Liz Berube
Letterer: Bill Morse
Cover Art: Neal Adams

This was when Superboy's solo title became a team book featuring adventures with the Legion of Super-Heroes. At this point, it had been for around three years. Much of this was based on the strength of artists like Dave Cockrum and Mike Grell. The quality would be mixed for some time, but part of the high points would be the writing of Paul Levitz and artists like Mike Nasser and Jim Sherman.

SYNOPSIS:

"The Creature Who Conned The Legion"

The planet Remor is honoring five Legionnaires when quakes endanger the population. An alien named Sden appears and promises the quakes will return. When questioned by the Legion, he explains that a magic crystal is causing destruction to empower itself. The Legion agrees to retrieve the crystal.

After finding the crystal in a volcano, Dream Girl is skeptical that it's the cause of the quakes. The Legionnaires put the crystal in a chest. When Sden gets the chest, he causes more tremors and reveals himself as a villain. The crystal increases magical abilities, and Sden opens the container to destroy the Legionnaires.

However, when opened, flames shoot out, weakening Sden. Element Lad put a phosphorus coating around the crystal, causing the fire. Dream Girl foresaw that Sden would have used the crystal to defeat the Legion and then the sorcerer Mordru. She also noticed him avoiding Sun Boy and his fire-generating power. Sden is taken to Takron-Galtos, and Superboy takes the crystal to the 20th century.

"The Day Bouncing Boy Bounced Back"

While the Legion is burying Chemical King on Shanghalla, Bouncing Boy watches the headquarters. Since he lost his powers, he's been relegated to the Legion reserves. The intruder alarm goes off and Bouncing Boy rushes to catch the intruder. The intruder turns out to be Science Police officer Roon Dvron. While he and the former Legionnaire fight, gas and energy spheres capture both combatants. 

After waking up, Dvron says he was tasked with watching Legion headquarters while everyone was away. The Science Police didn't know the Legion reserve would have that duty. Dvron even damaged the security controls in a way that didn't recognize Bouncing Boy. Frustrated, the former Legionnaire hits the energy shield and finds that it inflates his hand like when he had his powers. Throwing himself into the energy sphere, his powers return in full, allowing him to break out. He and Dvron keep the return of Bouncing Boy a secret, and the Legion returns, none the wiser.

REVIEW:

Both stories are excellent, taking only as much space as they need to tell the stories. Paul Levitz knew how to write the Legion, breaking the team into smaller squads for specific missions. Every Legionnaire has a purpose, keeping Superboy from dominating the story.

Dream Girl really shines. At this point in Legion history, she was still discounted as mostly eye candy, with many writers not knowing how to treat her precognitive powers. Suspicious based on her visions, she takes command of the situation and proves strategic and intelligent. Within a few years, she would become an effective leader for the Legion. Looking at this story, one can see why.

James Sherman and Jack Abel's art in the first story has moments where it is sparse in the details. There are moments, especially a close-up of Dream Girl, where it becomes technically perfect. Liz Berube's colors are a fine compliment in both stories, using unconventional colors like a near-perfect cyan and straight magenta. 

Mike Netzer shows a mastery of form and likeness. Bouncing Boy is consistent, looking like a young adult carrying extra pounds. Netzer's work on Superboy and the Legion remains some of the best ever on the title from a technical point of view.

RATING: 7.0 (out of 10)

NOTES: 

Currently available online on DC Universe Infinite. It has been reprinted in Legion of Super-Heroes Archives Vol. 13. A brief search online shows that a physical copy should run a few dollars. Someone can find a lower-grade copy in a bargain box, but something of this era may not be readily available in such a situation. There is a variant containing an insert for a Mark Jeweler advertisement. This is slightly more valuable than the regular edition of this issue. Completists should also know about this variation.

Reviews Of Old Comics: New Mutants #18 (Updated)

New Mutants #18 debuted a new artist on the mutant books, Bill Sienkiewicz, who had made a mark on Moon Knight and a few other books. This was a real turn, as Marvel's style was far from artsy, and the comics industry was still recovering from the heavy influence of Neal Adams. Sienkiewicz developed an art style based on illustration techniques. It showed in page layouts that set the stage for the modern age method of irregular panel shapes, overlapping images, and borderless panels.

New Mutants #18

August 1984

Writer: Chris Claremont

Artist: Bill Sienkiewicz

Colorist: Glynis Wein

Letter: Tom Orzechowski

SYNOPSIS:

We open on New Mutant team leader Dani Moonstar having a terrible nightmare of the Demon Bear that killed her parents. We then see the X-Mansion under attack by the military as a young, red-haired girl uses her powers to shield herself as she makes her way to Professor X, trying to reason with the troops telepathically only to be killed. It's revealed that these are the memories of a young woman from the future, the girl from the before, just older and looking much more ragged.

The New Mutants, except Dani and Illyana Rasputin, train in the Danger Room and prove successful, albeit with some difficulty. Illyana answers the front door to find the red-haired young woman who runs off in tears since she remembers seeing Illyana die.

In space, an alien named Warlock is on the run from his brutal father. This Interlude leads to Dani training in the Danger Room against holographic bears to the confusion of Illyana. That night Dani sets out in the snow to confront her Demon Bear, as she knows it's close. She uses her mutant power on the bear to find its deepest fear is her and finds the strength to apparently slay it with surprising ease. It's then she realizes that she made a terrible error.

Rahne wakes screaming from the rapport she shares with Dani and leads the New Mutants to the woods, where they find Dani unconscious and lying in a pool of blood.

REVIEW:

This is a beautifully drawn comic. Glynis Wein must've had a helluva time doing the coloring on this issue. Sienkiewicz made good use of black areas. Each character is unique in their depiction. Illyana is cute as a button. Cannonball is lanky and awkward, a quality no other artist since has been able to capture like Sienkiewicz did. Previously in this series, Dani was sexualized, which is disturbing, given that the character is still in her teens. Sienkiewicz managed to make her attractive and exotic without being sexual about it. The only drawback is the technology of the time, as I sit and think of what this comic would've looked like if it had been printed with today's technology and paper quality. Heck, thinking about what kind of work he's doing now, what would this book look like if today's Sienkiewicz had drawn this book.

The script is Chris Claremont at his peak, as he foreshadowed a subplot in a way that was intriguing and made time travel seem not quite so hokey as the previous times he used it. While cliché, Dani's motivation is written well enough to be believable.

FINAL RATING: 9.0 (out of a possible 10)

NOTES:

This issue has been collected twice, first in 1990, 2006, and 2018. Prices vary, but the most recent collection is 2020's New Mutants Omnibus, for those who like spending money on thick, comprehensive collections. Finding a physical copy will cost a few dollars, but twenty dollars for a raw, unslabbed copy would be too much. Fortunately, the book is available digitally on Marvel Unlimited. 

Those inspired to look for more Sienkiewicz, look for Elektra: Assassin, Stray Toasters, and even some art books collecting Sienkiewicz's work.

Reviews Of Old Comics: John Byrne's Next Men #6 (Updated)

 

John Byrne influenced a generation of comic book artists. In the 1990s, after bouncing between Marvel and DC for over a decade, he turned a proposal for Marvel's 2099 line into 2112, a graphic novel that became the basis for Next Men. This was the issue that tied those two together because after reading 2112 and John Byrne's Next Men #0-5, it was not apparent that they were linked in any way except that both had a character named Sathanas, which could or could not be the same. They certainly didn't look alike. Then this issue was published.

JOHN BYRNE'S NEXT MEN #6

July 1992 - Dark Horse Comics

Story and Art: John Byrne

Colorist: Matt Webb

SYNOPSIS:

In an Antarctic research station, an earthquake rocks four scientists who quickly deduce it came from an explosion 30 miles away. They investigate to discover around a hundred mangled, mutilated, and not-quite-human bodies at the site. One of them is alive, and it quickly attacks the group draining each member's life force to save itself. Recognizing one of the scientists as Fleming Jorgenson, the creature, horribly injured, relishes in that the year is 1955.

Cut to the United States and the home of Congressman Aldus Hilltop, who is hosting Dr. Jorgenson, who returned from an apparent explosion of the research station that killed all other scientists there. Aldus Hilltop places his political career above all else. Jorgenson has had Hilltop help retrieve a case from Antarctica in the most confusing and complicated way possible. Inside the crate is the creature he discovered in Antarctica. Named Sathanas, the being is an energy vampire that awakes and brings Hilltop into his grand plan with the promise of power.

Hilltop starts a program with Jorgensen while providing Sathanas with young women to feed off, including Hilltop's own young wife. They are undetected because their corpses resemble old women after Sathanas feeds off them. Jorgensen and Hilltop's program buys infants from teen mothers to mutate into deadly and powerful soldiers. Jorgensen disagrees with the military direction of the project that he and Hilltop have directed under Sathanas's instructions, using historical knowledge to shepherd the project around the chaos of many historic administrations. When Jorgensen makes a veiled threat to give the secrets to another government, he dies in a car accident, which Hilltop had nothing to do with, to the surprise of those around him.

The subconscious education network the test subjects are hooked to has developed a "feedback" that has the test subjects seemingly talking to each other and living in an imaginary reality while training for a life as soldiers. When asked about it, Sathanas confesses that not only will the project produce soldiers, but that they will be well educated and well rounded. He assures Hilltop that in twenty years, the project will succeed, and Hilltop will be President of the United States, confessing that what Hilltop thinks is the future is all in the past for Sathanas.

REVIEW:

This issue is the only one of this series to stand alone. One of the challenges of this series was that John Byrne was telling a larger story. However, this story gives the reader a complete sense of the level of villains the Next Men will face. Sathanas is a patient schemer, willing to sit behind the scenes for the larger plan to unfold. If there is one fault to the story, it covers so long a period that it seems a bit jumpy. 

Hilltop is so centered on his self-interests that his methods can only be described as Machiavellian. At one point, he exhibits racial prejudice, which is one extra thing that's unnecessary to establish Hilltop's evil nature. He has already fed at least two wives/lovers to Sathanas and manipulated a eugenics program that would make the Nazis envious. Later in the series, Byrne would add other elements to Hilltop's evil nature, but there is enough here to let the reader know that Aldus Hilltop does not have a redeemable bone in his body. 

John Byrne's art is sometimes sketchy and betrayed by the colors from a more primitive computerized coloring process. One cannot fault the craftsmanship in Byrne's ability to repeatedly draw the same character, making them instantly recognizable even though they age by decades. Aldus Hilltop at the end of the book is the same Aldus Hilltop from the beginning, but with all the attributes that come with age. Byrne's layouts are easy to follow. Even using relatively large panels, he manages to tell a lot of information here. The appeal of John Byrne's art style is a personal preference, but one can't find fault in the merits of craftsmanship.

FINAL RATING: 7.5 (out of a possible 10)

NOTES:

This issue has been collected in the trade paperbacks published by Dark Horse, and it should be relatively easy to locate a copy of either the single issue or the trade paperback. IDW also published a Next Men Omnibus that reprinted this story in a larger format. As an individual back issue, the 1990s had print runs on even the most marginal books that were larger than today's average print run of X-Men. Do not be surprised if you can pick up a copy of this in a bargain bin. Digitally, it can be read on Amazon's Kindle reader, but the quality may suffer for the format.

Reviews Of Old Comics: Unity #0 (Updated)

In the early 1990s, the speculation boom brought new customers into comic shops. Some professionals in the industry thought it might be a good time to create new universes to draw these new readers in, and some used purchased licenses to build those universes around.

Valiant was one of those companies. Structured around purchased Silver Age Gold Key characters Solar, Man of the Atom and Magnus, Robot Fighter, Jim Shooter directed the construction of a universe complete with new characters, brought in creators like Barry Windsor-Smith and Dave Lapham, and engaged readers on a level not seen in years. Valiant seemed like it might survive the eventual bursting of the speculation bubble, but it was not to be.

However, for one bright, shining moment, it looked very spectacular. Unity arrived at just that moment when Valiant tried to ultimate gimmick in getting new readers to try out their crossover. They gave it away for free.

UNITY #0

August 1992 - Valiant Comics

Writer: Jim Shooter
Penciller: Barry Windsor-Smith

Inker: Bob Layton

Colorists: Janet Jackson, Maurice Fontenot, and Jorge González 

Letterer: Jade Moede

SYNOPSIS:

Above Chicago, Illinois, a naked Erica Pierce falls from the sky, unhurt and exhibiting strange powers. Months later, Solar and the Geomancer Geoff are investigating her death. Solar explains that Erica gained similar powers to him in the same nuclear accident. He assumes that she was physically abused by her husband and killed him, then herself. The inanimate objects in the house tell Geoff that Erica was killed by another Erica Pierce, who kidnapped Erica's son. Geoff deduces that Erica Pierce is the fabled demon that will destroy everything.

Solar takes Geoff to a lost land with both dinosaurs and future technology. Almost immediately attacked by robots, some disguised as dinosaurs, Solar decides to send Geoff back for his safety. Geoff insists on bringing back help from Gilad, the Eternal Warrior. Using Solar's detached hand, Geoff returns to Earth.

Unable to reach Gilad on a pay phone, Geoff wills Solar's hand to find other people that can help, returning later that night with the Harbinger renegades and Aric, possessor of the alien X-O Manowar armor. The pay phone rings, and it's Gilad. Using Solar's hand, Geoff teleports the Eternal Warrior to his location. Gilad then uses the power in Solar's hand to recruit his brother Aram and his young companion, Archer.

With help recruited, Geoff and the others return to the lost land, where Solar has met up with Magnus, Rai, and a future Gilad. Witnessing this from afar, Erica Pierce and the dead Erica's son Albert send a massive force against the heroes in the first step she must take towards Unity.

REVIEW:

Jim Shooter started crafting a true crossover in the style of Secret Wars. He makes good use of a hero with almost limitless power and gives us an equally powerful villain with none of the moral restraint. The story doesn't give us a complete sense of how crazy and depraved she becomes pursuing that goal, saving it for some of the crossover comics to explain. That is the flaw in this issue, but the strength in it is the first chapter of a larger story. After reading this story, you'll likely be inclined to read the rest of the story.

The art is by Barry Windsor-Smith, yet it's colored at the beginning of comic books using computer coloring, so not much modeling is done with his forms. That's for the best because Barry Windsor-Smith's art needs to be the focal point, and adding a ton of variance in a pair of pants takes doesn't add anything to great art. Only a select group of artists get that leeway since most comic book artists usually benefit from a good colorist.

As a whole, the art is great, but it gets hurt a couple of times by the mundane nature of some scenes. The story is very quick paced and it seems we miss a huge chunk in the middle while Geoff is fetching the Harbinger kids and X-O Manowar. All in all, though, this is the way to build a cohesive universe with a single crossover. It's quite possibly, one of the best company-wide crossovers of the 1990s.

FINAL RATING: 8.5 (out of a possible 10)

NOTES:

Unity has been collected, but those collections are out of print. In back issue bins, you should be able to find copies at a very reasonable price. The other chapters in the crossover might be hard to find. Collecting the entire story might take a while.

Reviews Of Old Comics: Hansi, The Girl Who Loved The Swastika (Updated)

Hansi, the Girl Who Loved The Swastika

February 1994 - Spire Christian Comics

Story and art: Al Hartley

Lettering: Bill Yoshida

The trick about talking about Religiously-themed comics is doing so without inserting personal feelings about said religion into the commentary. Hansi was published in 1976 by Spire Christian Comics, who produced a series of Christian-themed comics featuring Archie. It is the biographical story of Maria Anne Hirschmann. Hansi is an anagram for her ministry, meaning Helping America to a New Spirit and Insight. So yes, this comic is primarily propaganda for her ministry. Many people who know about this comic may not have realized that because it's not blatant propaganda.

SYNOPSIS:

Hansi is a young girl living in the Sudetenland in 1938 when the Nazis invaded and gave her books to read. She is thrilled by this because the Bible was the only book she was allowed to read while growing up. She wins a contest to go to a Hitler Youth Training Camp and says goodbye to her family and home.

In the camp, Hansi becomes enthralled by the message of the Third Reich, no matter what may happen to shake that belief. She also falls in love with Rudy, a young German soldier with whom she corresponded before meeting in person. He proposed marriage immediately, but his wealthy parents disapproved, so Hansi urged Rudy to forget her.

When the war takes a turn for the worse against the Germans, Hansi stands firm, even denouncing the pleas of besieged soldiers for Bibles to be sent to the front line. After Hitler commits suicide, Hansi is taken to a Russian labor camp. Submitted to abuse at the hands of the soldiers, Hansi and many of the other girls escape into West Germany, where Americans are in control but are slightly better with female prisoners. Hansi is suspicious but quickly realizes that the Americans are nowhere near the monsters that their Russian allies are. After giving her clean clothes, warm food, and a place to rest, they take her to the Red Cross.

There she becomes a teacher and discovers that Rudy was thought dead in the war but is alive and still in love with Hansi. Unfortunately, after getting married, they find something missing in their marriage. Rudy brings home a bible, and the two become good Christians and eventually immigrate to America. There, Hansi sees a country that has lost any sense of purpose and reason. Hansi is inspired to open her home to troubled kids and introduce them to Christ, thereby changing their lives. She and Rudy broaden their ministry to prisons, finding continued success and fulfilling their purpose in life.

REVIEW:

Again, the problem comes from not reviewing this without personal bias. As a product of its time, Hansi uses some broad strokes to paint groups of people. The Russians are portrayed as rapists (without directly referring to rape) and monsters. The Americans are all presented as Christians. Once in America, they meet no conflict, as Americans are just lost and awaiting ministry to introduce them to Christ.

The story is brief in parts, a problem of telling a life story in just over 30 pages. The plot is consistent from beginning to end, and to the credit, Hansi is a flawed person who only becomes idealized by her salvation, which she refuses numerous times. One can appreciate the character growth, although it is unbelievable it was like this, as they never really meet with resistance to their ministry.

The art by Al Hartley is basic but consistent. The colors are too bright in the places where the story is dark. When stated that Hansi is thin, Hartley fails to draw her as skinny. The clothes are not depicted as dirty or damaged. Hansi’s appearance changes very little throughout the story, despite the passage of at least twenty years. There are moments where Hartley takes the opportunity to use page layout to his advantage. He also uses some good illustrative techniques to convey many things at once.

It still could be much better, but this book is about drawing attention to the HANSI ministry. Over time, that appeal has become lost, becoming a joke among comic fans. The shame is that the comic has a purpose and does it well. As a comic book, it falls into mediocrity.

FINAL RATING: 6.0 (out of a possible 10)

NOTES:

To the best of my knowledge, this comic has not been collected. Finding a copy will be difficult. If priced according to the condition, it might get expensive. There are two versions, one with a 39-cent price and another with a 49-cent price. The 49-cent version warrants a higher price. It cannot be found online through conventional means, but some hunting can track it down, albeit in varying quality. 

Characters I Like: Hellcat

My fondness for old comics led me to start liking characters I never did when I was younger. My subscriptions to DC Universe Infinite and Marvel Unlimited have fed this need to read everything I can about characters that I never realized were cool until I rediscovered them. In some cases, these characters also get liked by many people - fans and professionals alike. Lately, I keep finding myself drawn to Patsy Walker, AKA Hellcat. 

I'm not talking about the series from a few years ago. I'm talking about the character and the comic that prompted this little diatribe, Hellcat #1 by Christopher Cantwell, Alex Lins, K.J. Díaz, and Ariana Maher. Patsy goes in depth about her history, continuing to play off the Netflix series Jessica Jones's use of the golden age Patsy Walker comics as something published in-universe. I personally would rather comic book stories be incorporated into canon and continuity. 

This story starts with a good hook, Patsy being arrested for murder. Unfortunately, it's a little confusing who's dead. It gets explained, but there's extraneous information, which makes getting there harder. There's also the introduction of a character from the failed 90s series Sleepwalker. I've recently re-read some Sleepwalker comics and discovered the quality is mediocre, at best. Some people fondly remember them. They are just not my cup of tea.

The art is pleasing. Alex Lins's style has a quality that Marvel is fond of, reminding one of Stuart Immonen. It's got a little more energy, with the colors by K.J. Díaz meshing well with the art, but sometimes falls into that realm where there are a lot of browns where the color theme builds on blending complementary colors. It's good, and Patsy's Hellcat costume really punches. There are not a lot of yellows for it to compete with. 

Overall, it's a good comic. It's helped by my fondness for Patsy Walker, Hellcat or not. 

MY RATING: 7.5 (out of 10)

So I'm getting an itch...

I've been getting the itch to draw some comics lately. Naturally, what I'm wanting to draw is some Jet-Pack Jenny. I didn't leave her where I wanted her to end up, so I really feel a weird guilt about stopping where I did. However, I do not relish the thought of getting back into a schedule of drawing strips, then trying to collect them, feeling the pressure to take it to conventions and try to sell it to people really just there to buy Batman stuff.

Fortunately, this weekend, Brian Churilla posted an analysis of what he made drawing comics last year, which was followed by Bleeding Cool posting a photo of average page rates for all of the various roles that go into producing a comic, with mainstream work only netting about twice of what Mr. Churilla made working on comics that he didn't own.

If I do this, I'm doing it for me. I will share it when it's done, and not a second before. I am not going to post previews and teasers on DeviantArt or Facebook, or Twitter. I'm doing the story that I want to do and then I'll throw it up online. I don't care to print it, so I probably never will.