|
Post by berkley on Dec 6, 2019 21:37:18 GMT -5
I hated that ending the the Yellow Claw story! SHIELD is boarding the Yellow Claw's aerial fortress, via jey packs and grappling hooks, from the Helicarrier, Fury chases down YC, travels through some gateway, gets all kinds of psychedelic, then YC is a robot and Doom and Prime Mover are playing chess. WTF was Steranko smoking? Makes the ending of Philip Wylie's Gladiator look like it was telegraphed. Maybe he was watching The Prisoner a lot at the time.
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 7, 2019 20:35:18 GMT -5
Master of Kung Fu #61Shang Ch vs Skull Crusher, the most hen-pecked assassin in the world. See, he can never escape the old ball & chain! BA-DUMP, CHSSSH! Creative Team: Doug Moench-writer, Jim Craig-pencils, John Tartaglione-inks, Pete Iro-letters, Phil Rache-colors, Archie Goodwin-edits Synopsis: Chi si at Restons and Leiko is at her place, both moanin' about splitting up and both, amazingly, listening to Fleetwood Mac... Miss Greville is being released from the hospital and Nayland Smith drops buy and bring her roses and work, while Clive eventually comes in to take her home and presents her with an orchid. Tarr goes out to meet Smith and look in on Miss Greville and stops at a gallery to inquire about a Frazetta print (Silver Warrior...... ...) Someone is watching him; but he moves on. Chi heads out, later and runs into the dude watching Tarr...Skull Crusher. They fight and Chi avoids his balls, but gets wrapped up in the chains. He relaxes and moves closer, into punching range and unloads on Skull Crusher, then shows his mastery in the art of spade fighting... Skull Crusher is trying to prevent Chi from leaving London. meanwhile, Miss Grenville is sorting through correspondence and comes across a letter, from Hong Kong, addressed to Chi (care of MI-6, like the Royal Mail is just going to deliver that!). Clive takes it, then opens it. He then leaves, with Miss Greville and runs into Leiko, who is lonely and too late. reston is a bit of an a-hole and leaves her behind, while he goes to find Chi. Skull Crusher takes off and reston delivers the letter to Chi. It is from Juliette, the lover of Shen Kui, The Cat... Thoughts: Moench is finally back in form and Craig is right there with him, is not quite where Gulacy was. Moench sets the mystery and intrigue and gives us a new assassin. Craig handles the action well and the slower parts, though he is trying to emulate Gulacy's layouts. I assume Moench was the Fleetwood Mac fan, as the lyrics to "Dreams" are used thematically, throughout the issue and Craig does an impressionistic rendering of the album cover (same with the Frazetta Silver Warrior painting). Both Chi and Leiko are plagued by dreams, yet have lost one another. Leiko is especially torn up and seeing Clive with Miss Greville tears her down that much more. When Tarr meets Nayland Sith, he talks about times having changed and even he is feeling torn about the actions of MI-6 and is contemplating leaving. Skull Crusher is an interesting new gimmick assassin; but, a fairly successful one. He's no Pavane or Razor Fist; but, he's not bad. This is the beginning of the China Seas epic, where Moench and Craig pay homage to Milton Caniff and his masterpiece, Terry & the Pirates. Chi and Black Jack will be traveling through Hong Kong and mainland China, reuniting with Shen Kui, Juliette, Pavane, and lots of pirates. We'll have to see if they run into Terry Lee, Pat Ryan, Connie, Burma and/or the Dragon Lady.
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 7, 2019 20:37:54 GMT -5
ps Roger Boughton and his ACG revival finally brought us an unpublished Charlton Hagar the Horrible comic, which spoofed Frazetta's masterpiece...
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 8, 2019 21:32:08 GMT -5
Master of Kung Fu #62WAAAAaaaaaaaa.............eat foot, sucka! Creative Team: Doug Moench-writer, Jim Craig, pencils, John Tartaglione-inks, Karen Kish-letters, Phil Rache-colors, Archie Goodwin-edits Synopsis: Chi is in Hong Kong, headed to the club where Juliette worked as a singer. While he goes in the front, a truck, with a mysterious robed person pulls up to a loading dock, in the back. Chi asks for Juliette and is told the singer takes the stage in a few minutes. The robed person says something about Moonsong and some guys start loading the truck, before "he" is aware of what is going on. The robed person leaves a crate, marked with an X, as payment for the stuff they are taking. The singer is not Juliette and when she finishes, Chi asks after Juliette and the singer, Mei Ling, claims to have never met her. The goons open the marked crate and an explosion occurs, interrupting a bouncer from pushing Chi into kicking his butt. Instead, Chi goes to investigate, while everyone else runs out in panic. Chi chases after the truck but misses it. He then hops a speeding ato to try and catch it. Leiko goes to Clive's place to find out where Chi went, cries, and is told that he went to Hong Kong, where Clive and Miss Greville are headed, then he leaves Leiko alone. Chi is able to follow the truck to the harbor, thanks to the car he jumped on and sees the cargo being loaded on a sampan, by some piratically inclined dudes... They throw weapons at him and hotfoot it away, but, Chi catches the side of the boat before it can get far enough from the pier. Mutch chopping and scoking occur, but the robed figure revents the pirates from shooting Chi in the back. The bodies pile up until only the helmsman remains and he gives a go and gets dumped over the side. The robed person tries to hit Chi from behind, with a belaying pin and gets a shot to the mush. It turns out the robed person is Juliette and now she has a bloody nose. Oh, and Skull Crusher reports to his master, who turns out to be Shen Kui, the Cat. Also, the owner of the club, who died in the explosion, is the brother of Shen Kui and now he is really mad. Thoughts: Well, Leiko is a bit too weepy and Clive should change his name to Richard, with the way he is acting towards her. That's a sideshow, though, and not much of one. Chi is back in Hong Kong, looking for Juliette, and finds her, after some intrigue. Shen Kui is the one who sent Skull Crusher after Shang Chi. Juliette and Shen Kui are split up. Lots of mystery, with only a couple of answers. Plenty of action and intrigue, some cliched emotional drama, and another decent chapter. Art is a bit inconsistent, on pages; but, overall pretty good. No Pat Ryan, Terry Lee or Dragon Lady; so we are still more thematically paying tribute to Terry & the Pirates. Juliette is pretty much Burma, a con artist and singer.
|
|
|
Post by brutalis on Dec 9, 2019 7:43:06 GMT -5
Master of Kung Fu #61 Having missed most of Craigs earlier MOKF on the spinner rack, this was my 1st Craig issue and this action page absolutely blew my teenage mind. I was running around for months trying to search out the prior issues. With the lousy distribution in Phoenix, I missed out completely on 51 and 54 new off the racks until finding both nearly a year later at a used bookstore. Managed to get 56, 57, 58, 59 and 60 by having a friend drive me all over town popping in and out of Circle K and 7-11!
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 10, 2019 1:18:05 GMT -5
Master of Kung Fu #63Dr Doom is going to be pretty mad about these guys talking about him, behind his back! Creative Team: Doug Moench-writer, Jim Craig-artist, Karin-letters, Phil Rachelson-colors, Archie Goodwin-edits. Karin is Karin Kish and GCD lists Gaspar Saladino as lettering page one. Synopsis: Juliette moans about her breakup with Shen Kui, who has a new lover. Juliette disguised herself as a smuggler to nab Shen Kui's cargo, which he is using in Red Chinese interests. She didn't know about the explosive crate. Meanwhile, Shen Kui is chewing out Skull Crusher for going to London and failing to kill Chi. He must die for the death of Shen Kui's brother; but, honor forbids the Cat from doing it. He decides Skull Crusher will do it, with back up. Clive and Melissa *Greville) arrive in Hing Kong and just miss seeing Mr Lee heading to Mr Han's island. Miss Greville is still with MI-6 and just left a note that she was going AWOL, which Nayland Smith hasn't seen. He and Dr Petrie are sitting around in smoking jackets, drinking brandy and discussing a smuggling operation in Hong Kong, which Black Jack Tarr is checking out, as a "favor" to Nayland Smith... Hmmmm....two middle aged (senior, really) bachelors, living together, lounging around in bathrobes with liquor. Nah, probably nothing. Tarr meets up with the smugglers, looking for Kogar. He is directed into a boat, blindfolded, then pistol-whipped. You know, most security precautions don't involve concussions. Leiko leaves her place, in London, and Chi's cat (in the care of a friend. Shen Kui has a job for his lover. Juliette and Chi come to a jungle river and move up it. Tarr arrives at the smuggler's base... The decor is by the same person who did Diabolik's lair... Tarr loses the blindfold, kicks the hinders of the guys who slugged him, and meets Kogar and his Swiss Army....arm... Kogar hires him. Meanwhile, Juliette and Chi arrive at a mansion, by the jungle river and go inside to find Skull Crusher. They fight and Chi avoids the balls and it's 50/50, when Juliette is dumped from above. They look up and see the Cat's new lover......PAVANE!!!! Thoughts: Well, I'd say we got our Dragon Lady. Kogar is an homage to many of the pirate adversaries for TATP, while also mixing in some grotesque James Bond flavor. The grotto HQ is pretty cool and we are still dealing in intrigue. Craig is doing a fine job, trying his best to emulate Gulacy. He's not as polished; but, he gives it a good try. It looks good, overall. His fights are dynamic, his staging is moody and exotic. The colors add some atmosphere, with the magenta tones softening things and Chi and Juliette catch up with one another. Clive & Miss Greville are arrested by Hong Kong Police, when they go to check out the Jade Peacock; so, sucks to be them. We still don't know what is in the crates Juliette stole, nor who Kogar works for. Is he tied to Shen Kui or Juliette? It will take us two months to find out, as Craig can't meet the deadline andwe get a fill in, next issue, with Mike Zeck on art.
|
|
|
Post by berkley on Dec 10, 2019 1:40:18 GMT -5
In addition to the other problems the series was undergoing at the time - Gulacy's departure, fill-in issues, Jim Craig's inconsistency, a prolonged feeling of anti-climax after the tremendous heights of the great Fu Manchu epic that ended in #50 - on top of all that, distribution irregularities even more severe than usual pretty much killed this long storyline for me at the time: I missed some of the crucial set-up, introductory issues and from then on had only a hazy idea of what was going on, and in any case we only saw about 2/3 of the whole thing in my area, so I never did get into the flow of the story.
When I finally managed to fill in all the holes in my MoKF collection - around 15-20 years ago, I think this would have been - and read this story in its entirety for the first time, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked it, in spite of all the other problems that still remained. Yeah, you can't help wondering what it might have been had Gulacy drawn it - or the Zeck/Day team, or Gene Day solo - but I still have very positive feelings about it on the whole. I remember I was really happy at the time to be able to read the whole thing.
And I agree, you can see that Jim Craig has the right idea in what he's trying to do, but either the pace of a monthly series was too much for him or he didn't quite have the necessary skill to quite pull it off at this point in his career. There are some really nice moments, though - the Bond-style underground base being one of them.
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 10, 2019 14:00:01 GMT -5
I came into the storyline late, with issue #66, having not seen any of the past issues. It was several years before I assembled the full storyline.
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 11, 2019 21:20:30 GMT -5
Master of Kung Fu #64Great Gulacy cover, softening the blow of another fill in, in the middle of an epic. Creative Team: Scott Edelman-writer, Mike Zeck-pencils, The Tribe-inks, Annette Kawecki-letters, George Roussos-colors, Archie Goodwin-edits. Synopsis: Shang Chi, literally runs into an old acquaintance, Shoh Teng, who does a runner. Shoh Teng escapes down to a subway platform and hops a train, and Chi jumps on the back end. He then flashes back to blind Master Po and Phillip Ahn....oh, wait....that's Kung Fu. He sees himself sparring with Shoh Tenng, until Fu shows up to yell at his teacher and Shoh Teng. Later, ST turns up and says he has something to show Chi and sets him up to be kidnapped. However, Li'l Chi kicks their keesters! Chi eventually gets bested by one called Death Dragon and knocked out. He is taken away and we learn that Fu set this up. Chi gets to hang around a bit (literally, as he is suspended by chains, on a wall) and then Fu turns up to "rescue" him. Fu stops Death Dragon from calling him "master" as he swiftly kills him, though Chi catches the slip. Fu tells him he has dealt with Shoh Teng and to trust no one. It was a ruse to continue to keep Chi loyal to his father and no other influence. Now, Chi sees that ST is alive. ST tries to fight again, convinced Chi wants revenge. Chi eventually subdues him and tells him they have no quarrel. ST doesn't believe him. Chi finally gives up and walks away. ST hurls a Si-Fan knife at Chi's back, which misses. He then shouts "Long Live Fu Manchu!" and dives onto the electrified third rail of the subway and des. Chi walks away. Thoughts: This isn't bad; but it's completely, "Been there, Done that." Every fill in and most of the Deadly Hands stories were pretty much this plot or some variation, involving someone from Chi's past and Fu's deceptions. No imagination. Zeck's art is dynamic, though the quality varies a bit. The Tribe doesn't give it the polish we will see from Gene Day. Personally, I'd rather they ship the book late than deal with yet another fill in issue. Better still. Start your people further ahead, so they can get some distance on their deadline.
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 12, 2019 9:17:57 GMT -5
ps There is no excuse for the coloring of Fu Manchu, in 1978. This is not the 1920s or 30s, with Sax Rohmer or Flash Gordon. Marvel had already been taken to task on this a few years before. Surprised they didn't throw Whitewash Jones into this.
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 12, 2019 22:14:52 GMT -5
Master of Kung Fu #65I assume Chi is running so weirdly because he is holding the giant Juliette by his side. Pavane's panther can apparently fly, as he has moved in an arc from his starting point. Creative Team: Doug Moench-writer, Jim Craig-pencils, Ricardo Villamonte & John Tartaglione-inks, Joe Genovese-letters, Francoise Mouly-colors, Jim Shooter-edits. Yep, that's Francoise Mouly, aka Mrs. Art Spiegelman, who worked for a time as a colorist at Marvel. GCD credits Gaspar Saladino with letters on page one. It also credits Villamonte with inks on pages 1-19, and Tartaglione with 11-31. However, there are really only 17 pages of story. Shooter is now the Fu Manchu of the company. Synopsis: When last we left them, Chi was caught between Skull Crusher and Pavane, while Juliette had been Pearl Harbored. Chi is being attacked at both ends by flailing weapons. Cue the soundtrack... Pavane and Skull Crusher don't exactly work together as smoothly as the Midnight Express (which would make Shen Kui their manager, Jim Cornette). Skull Crusher is a male chauvinist pig and tells Pavane to shut up, then he gets downed by Chi, with Pavane going quickly, though she tells her panther to get out. Chi gets distracted and gets hit by SC, who hot foots it. Chi hogtie's Pavane and then grabs Juliette in a fireman's carry and walks off with her. We cut to Clive and Miss Greville, who have been arrested by the Hong Kong police. They are stuffed in a car and driven away; but, they do not head to the station nor do they meat Jackie, the Supercop. They smell a rat and get free and run. Leiko turns up at the MI-6 HQ, in Hong Kong (which according to the Bond films, is on the partially sunken Queen Elizabeth). She says she is looking for Chi. Meanwhile, the object of her search is in the mansion, with Juliette waking up, as Pavane is stuck playing Bettie Page. Juliette says she was set up by Kogar, the smuggler, with whom she was working. He set her up to kill Shen Kui's brother and steal the crates for him. Now Shen Kui hunts for his ex-lover and Chi. Chi asks about the crates, but Juliette doesn't know their contents. She passes out and Chen makes sure that Pavane is secure then goes to take a look. He wonders who Kogar is working for, since Shen Kui is working for the Red Chinese. We cut to Kogar's little villain's grotto, where he and Tarr converse. One of his pirates, Chang, swims through the waterfall entrance to tell him about Juliette and Chi. His men close in on the house. Meanwhile, Pavane has escaped and Skull Crusher runs into Shen Kui, who beats him like a yellow dog, telling him he kills Chi or Shen will kill him. Kogar and his men head for the house. Chi runs into Pavane and they fight, while she plays Gloria Steinum, yelling for him to fight her, then wishes she had played demure, when she is thrown through a window, after he takes down her cat and she attacks him in anger. Juliette is still in a bad way and Kogar and the pirates turn up in the house, and Black Jack blows his cover by yelling out when he sees Chi. Shen Kui isn't far behind... Thoughts: Everyone is crashing together, as the players move to the center of the board. The question really is who is Kogar working for, as we learn he is the one who set up Juliette, to steal the crates, meant for the Chinese masters of Shen Kui. Skull Crusher is getting beat more than Peter Lorre in a Bogart movie. The art varies with the inking. Villamonte's earlier pages don't look as crisp as those done by Tartaglione, who seemed more in sink with Craig. I'd really like to see more of Kogar, at this point, as he is the most entertaining character and his Swiss Army arm is played a bit for visual gags, as he previously produced a lighter from it, for his cigar and now uses a knife blade to cut an orange. You can see what looks like a corkscrew on it, too. We will see more of that attachment. Too bad he never got a Mego figure; the accessories would have been awesome. Also, his smuggles dress like storybook pirates, with loose shirts, buccaneer boots, headscarves and hats, earrings, and Kogar has a hook attachment and an eye patch. Only thing missing is Robert Newton.
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 12, 2019 22:17:13 GMT -5
ps wanna know the really cool thing about Kogar> The prosthetic is on his left arm and he has a pistol holstered on his left side, butt facing rearward. So, he could only draw it with his nonexistent left hand. Now that's badass!
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 15, 2019 17:25:35 GMT -5
Master of Kung Fu #66I imagine Chi and Kogar's conversation, here, went something like this... Creative Team: Doug Moench-writer, Jim Craig & Mike Zeck-pencils, Many Hands-inks, Joe Rosen-letters, Francoise Mouly-colors, Jim Shooter-edits. GCD lists Craig as pencilling pages 1-12 and Zeck the rest. Many Hands belonged to John Tartaglione, Bob McLeod, Pablo Marcos, and 2 unidentified inkers (pgs 7-9). Gaspar Saladino is credited with letters on page 1. Synopsis: When last we left, Chi had whooped Pavane and Skull Crusher was in the s@#$house with Shen Kui. Kogar and his pirates, including Black Jack Blue (alias Black Jack Tarr), who gives away that he knows Chi. Kogar questions whether Juliette is sided with Shen Kui or not and how Blue knows Chi. he says they were mercs together. Kogar asks if he minds if Kogar kills Chi and Blue has to answer no. They fight and Chi defends himself with books, against Kogar's harpoon, then Kogar tags him with a right cross... He switches to his corkscrew attachment, which is actually an energy weapon. Chi hits him with a kick to the midsection and Kogar folds. His henchman Sklar starts to order the pirates to aid, Kogar, when Kogar reminds him to stay out of it. Chi closes into punching and grappling range, while the sounds of combat are heard outside and Juliette's men smash through a window to help. Tarr attacks them, to keep his cover and the distraction allows Chi and Juliette to escape. Kogar orders his men after them. They get to the sampan and take off. Kogar's pirates head to their funky boats and follow... Shen Kui and Skull Crusher turn up and he orders the incompetent dude to get a boat, while he attends to Pavane and swears vengeance if she is hurt. He goes into the store house and finds the one crate that had been offloaded, which has bricks of hashish in them. Chi and Juliette take it to a fork in the river and throw off a crate to make Kogar think they took one direction, while heading in the other. Kogar isn't stupid and sends two boats in the direction of the crate and the third following the direction the sampan actually took. Reaching a lagoon, Chi and Juliette rest and she tells how it all fell apart with Shen Kui, when he went back to working for the Chinese. Juiette decided to intercept the smuggled shipment, when Pavane entered the picture and ended any feelings Juliette had left for Shen Kui. She makes a move on Chi, which makes him think of Leiko. We cut to her, where she is briefed by the local MI-6 station chief. Kogar operates against British and Hong Kong exporters and has done favors for the Red Chinese. He is allowed to operate from their waters. Shen Kui and Juliette are split and Pavane is in the picture. They haven't found Kogar's base and offer Leiko the job of locating it, to keep the Chinese from noticing a search. She goes to the area where Kogar has operated and decides to check out a waterfall, by swimming into it. She finds the grotto inside. meanwhile, after eluding the fake Hong Kong police, Clive and Melissa turn up at the section house and hear that Leiko had been there. Chi wakes Juliette and looks into the crates, and finds the hash. Shen Kui explains to Pavane that each brick has a microdot, with a portion of a major plan, but needs all of the microdots to fill in everything. Kogar's men catch up to Juliette and Chi... Thoughts: This was the first issue of this storyline I ever read. It is a fantastic chapter, field with the excellent fight between Chi and Kogar, plus the added intrigue of what's in the crates. Drug smuggling is bad enough; but, the microdots hint at something very big. We still don't know who Kogar is working for, as it isn't the Chinese. Could it be MI-6, in a double bluff? The CIA? SHIELD? HYDRA? The AFL/CIO? The Hong Kong Plumbers Union, Local 601? We need answers! Craig finishes of with some fine art; but, can't get the issue finished. Either he was fired off the book or begged help and Zeck comes on. There is a messy transition that makes a page or two look like neither of the artists, then Zeck comes through more clearly. His stuff looks much better than his fill in issues, with Pablo Marcos inking them (per GCD). Zeck will remain as the regular penciler, with a few interruptions. Bruce Patterson will end up being his main inker, until Gene Day comes on board. Jim Craig was starting to get his stride on the book, in terms of characters and storytelling; but, wasn't able to maintain a monthly pace. The smart option was to let him get ahead of the game, before running the issues; but, comics didn't really work that way, as the detailed plots weren't yet written. In the 80s, it became more common to work the artists ahead, if possible. Later writers and editors worked stories in between, to allow the main artist to work on the next saga, using fill in artists. James Robinson was probably the best at it, with the Times Past stories on Starman, allowing Tony Harris a break for an issue or two, before moving on. Gene Ha was one of the regular fill in artists on those stories; but several were used. Jim Craig started out doing ad work for Marvel, then some work for Chip Goodman's Atlas revival. Roy Thomas tapped him for the first issue of What If?. MOKF was his only sustained run on a book, as he did one other What If?, a Marvel Premiere (3-D Man), a Marvel TIO annual, three issues in different Spider-Man one shots or minis, and X-Men/Captain Universe. Carig started out in Canadian Fandom, in Toronto, where he helped revamp the hero Northern Life, for Orb. After his primary Marvel work, he worked for Nelvana animation as a storyboard artist, and then for film and tv production companies, including Johnny Mnemonic, Sea of Love, Dead Zone, the Twighlight Zone and Robocop tv series, and was art director on Nelvana's Mythic Warriors/Guardians of Legends animated series. So, it worked out pretty well, in the end (and probably paid better than comics). So, we continue with the China Seas epic, as the players are all coming together and Mike Zeck is in the house, to stay (for a while).
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on Dec 17, 2019 0:11:23 GMT -5
Master of Kung Fu #67Awesome Gulacy cover! Uh, oh; does that mean fill-in? Nope!! Creative Team: Doug Moench-writer, Mike Zeck-pencils, Fred Kida-inks, John Costanza-letters, Bob Sharen-colors, Roger Stern-edits. Shooter has handed over direct supervision to editors and their assistants, as Marvel had been too big for one guy to act as editor, since Roy's day. Fred Kida may not be familiar to some. He was a Golden Age artist who is best known for his work on Airboy, for Hillman. Kida was a Japanese-American, born in Brooklyn, who attended the American School of Design, along with Bob Fujitani, who would also work extensively for Hillman. He started out in Jerry Iger's shop (after his buyout of Eisner) and then Quality Comics, before moving to Hillman. He also worked as an assistant to Eisner on the Spirit. in the 50s, he freelanced for Atlas, before moving on to work in magazines and newspaper strips, working as an assistant to Dan Barry, on Flash Gordon, Milton Caniff, on Steve Canyon, and George Wunder, on Terry & the Pirates. In the 70s, he started doing inking work for Marvel and also handled the Spider-Man newspaper strip, in the 80s. He died in 2014. Kida was one of the greats of the adventure comics of the 40s. Synopsis: Kogar's pirates have caught up to Chi and Juliette and attack. Chi hops on their boat and cleans house with a pike (or bo staff of whatever it is) and then grabs a handgrenade. He tells Juliette to take off at speed and hops aboard, then tosses the grenade, minus the cotter pin, back to the pirate boat... They go back to the mansion and hide the sampan. Then, Ci and Juliette swap spit. Leiko continues her infiltration of Kogar's lair, via the monorail system (hope Lyle Lanley didn't set it up), while Kogar returns, with Blackjack and his lone crate. He examines it and finds the microdot hidden inside. Shen Kui has his crate and a boat and makes contact with his masters to learn the location of Kogar's base to go after him. Clive and Melissa get MI-6 to drop them where they left Leiko and they spot her boat. They go in through a cave entrance, above the waterfall, where they spot guards and take them out. Miss Greville shoots one of them. Black Jack is kept out of viewing the microdots and goes skulking around. Leiko sees him from above, then runs smack into Clive and Melissa and the ex-lovers stomp all over operational security and draw attention to themselves. Blackjack meets up with them, they shoot a generator and plunge the place in darkness. before all hell broke loose, Tarr heard the content of the microdot: plans for the neutron bomb! Chi leaves Juliette and makes his way to Kogar's lair and runs into his pirates. He takes out most, but is taken down by the rest and brought before Kogar, claiming he left Juliette and wants to join Kogar... Thoughts: Clive Reston is a blithering idiot. He takes a secretary into the field, to the lair of dangerous smugglers, with no training in any fieldcraft, on her part. She asks to go and he lets her. Then he shouts out when he runs into Leiko, alerting the guards. She isn't much better. No wonder Shang Chi is always bailing these fools out! Chi gets some lovin and we now know what's on the microdots; but, smuggling them in bricks f hashish would seem to be not the most subtle method of transport. It invites a piece to go missing when one of the smugglers checks the crates, which is bound to happen. Kogar has a monorail! Zeck's work is a bit overpowered by Kida; but, Kida knows this stuff like the back of his hand. It aso looks like Zeck has at least watched some martial arts movies, as Chi's stances and use of the staff are pretty accurate.
|
|
|
Post by berkley on Dec 17, 2019 3:08:01 GMT -5
I wonder how both Craig and Zeck might have looked with different inkers around this time: with Zeck, I'm pretty sure his artwork could have come out much better with someone else inking because we saw not too much later how good it was with Gene Day - and even before then with Bruce Patterson it looked way better than it did here. I found both Kida and the Tribe way too muddy and sloppy to bring out Zeck's strengths as a penciller.
|
|