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Post by Icctrombone on Sept 24, 2021 5:45:50 GMT -5
Reading through a Cloak And Dagger TPB, featuring their origin in Peter Parker, Spectacular Spider-Man, through their appearance in New Mutants, drawn by Sin-kev-ich. The Mantlo-written stories are great, in spite of some really rough Ed Hannigan art, with a real understanding of the characters' motivations, and powers. Then there's a bunch of Spider-Man issues written by Al Milgrom (and sadly, drawn by him as well), which were pretty tedious, and didn't seem to understand their powers at all. Then the Mantlo/Leonardi Mini Series, which was beautiful and well-written, the pinacle so far. Then back to some PPSSM issues, tedious again. Next up is the New Mutants issues... I remember liking those back in the day, and have high hopes for them. I guess this was published to tie in with the TV show a couple of years ago (which was really well-done, and I really enjoyed). I know it's not a widely-held opinion, but I think Mantlo was an excellent writer on PP:TSSM. As someone who was regularly buying Spider-Man comics at this time, I feel that during this period PP:TSSM was often a better and more consistent read than Amazing Spider-Man. If you're talking about the run from around 30's to 100, I totally agree. Spider-man was never better than the early 80's. At the same time in the Spider-man title, they were having the Hobgoblin mystery unfolding.
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Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
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Post by Confessor on Sept 24, 2021 5:58:31 GMT -5
I know it's not a widely-held opinion, but I think Mantlo was an excellent writer on PP:TSSM. As someone who was regularly buying Spider-Man comics at this time, I feel that during this period PP:TSSM was often a better and more consistent read than Amazing Spider-Man. If you're talking about the run from around 30's to 100, I totally agree. Spider-man was never better than the early 80's. At the same time in the Spider-man title, they were having the Hobgoblin mystery unfolding. Yeah, that's roughly the period I mean. I'm not criticising or trying to detract from the excellent stories appearing in ASM at the time, but the stuff over in PP:TSSM was just as good and often better, IMHO. Add to that issues of Marvel Tales, which were reprinting the early Lee/Ditko and Lee/Romita issues from ASM (which were my first exposure to that material), and overall it was a hell of a good time to be a Spider-Man fan.
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Post by dbutler69 on Sept 24, 2021 7:22:43 GMT -5
I read Avengers Annual #1. I love this comic! It's one of the very first back issues I ever bought, back in the late 70's, so there's some nostalgia, especially just looking at the cover.. This gathers everybody who had been an Avenger up to that point, versus Mandarin and a bunch of Avengers villains. The are is so-so. It's kinda lazy in places, with some of the fight scenes lacking detail. Still, this is one of my favorite 60's comics. More than any other issue, that was Roy Thomas' tribute to the Justice Society of America.
John Buscema was recruited to "fill in" on the regular book to give DON HECK time to do all 49 those pages.
The problem, of course... George Roussos SUCKED as an inker. He was only marginally better than Don Heck at the time or Vince Colletta. But he was no John Romita, or Wally Wood, or Frank Giacoia, or Chic Stone. Hell, he wasn't even a Dick Ayers. And he certainly wasn't Syd Shores or a Tom Palmer.
Worse, Heck lost "his" regular series as a result of that book and the "fill ins" provided by John Buscema.
Decades later, Thomas admitted he "regretted" what happened. Of course, as far as I can tell, HE was the one responsible for it happening.
So Don Heck got Wally Pipped?
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Post by kirby101 on Sept 24, 2021 10:21:02 GMT -5
So Don Heck got Wally Pipped? Had to Google that one. (but it is better known than one would think)
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Post by profh0011 on Sept 24, 2021 13:02:02 GMT -5
Hell, Roy Thomas & Gil Kane were responsible for BOOTING Archie Goodwin, Don Heck AND Syd Shores off CAPTAIN MAR-VELL, just when it looked like the book might actually turn around and become GOOD.
Goodwin was by far the BEST writer on the series until Jim Starlin arrived. And "thanks" to Thomas, he never had a chance.
I don't know exactly why Gil Kane left GREEN LANTERN, but my impression is, for whatever reason, he really wanted to do CAPTAIN MAR-VELL, presumably, because it was the closest thing Marvel had to GL. But the results (in my view) were ABYSMAL.
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Post by tonebone on Sept 24, 2021 16:06:55 GMT -5
If you're talking about the run from around 30's to 100, I totally agree. Spider-man was never better than the early 80's. At the same time in the Spider-man title, they were having the Hobgoblin mystery unfolding. Yeah, that's roughly the period I mean. I'm not criticising or trying to detract from the excellent stories appearing in ASM at the time, but the stuff over in PP:TSSM was just as good and often better, IMHO. Add to that issues of Marvel Tales, which were reprinting the early Lee/Ditko and Lee/Romita issues from ASM (which were my first exposure to that material), and overall it was a hell of a good time to be a Spider-Man fan. Yeah, just in the trade I read, there was a marked difference in Mantlo's stories, which were extremely readable, even re-readable... but the Milgrom stuff was tedious and seemed to be written using a checklist of all the revolving sub-plots. I have always loved Mantlo's Rom, Micronauts, etc. but had never read any of his Spidey stuff.
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Post by tonebone on Sept 24, 2021 16:09:45 GMT -5
Reading through a Cloak And Dagger TPB, featuring their origin in Peter Parker, Spectacular Spider-Man, through their appearance in New Mutants, drawn by Sin-kev-ich. The Mantlo-written stories are great, in spite of some really rough Ed Hannigan art, with a real understanding of the characters' motivations, and powers. Then there's a bunch of Spider-Man issues written by Al Milgrom (and sadly, drawn by him as well), which were pretty tedious, and didn't seem to understand their powers at all. Then the Mantlo/Leonardi Mini Series, which was beautiful and well-written, the pinacle so far. Then back to some PPSSM issues, tedious again. Next up is the New Mutants issues... I remember liking those back in the day, and have high hopes for them. I guess this was published to tie in with the TV show a couple of years ago (which was really well-done, and I really enjoyed). Agreed about the limited series being the best. And also about the Milgrom run. I had those issues when I was younger and bought the Premiere Hardcover to get them again, but every time I open it up in consideration of a re-read I'm like... nahh. But it does have the Marvel Fanfare issue (Mantlo + different artists on each chapter) which should still be good. I know I post this sentence often, but I bought the trade at Ollie's Outlet a week ago, and it was like 6 bucks ($35.00 retail)
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Post by badwolf on Sept 24, 2021 16:58:10 GMT -5
Agreed about the limited series being the best. And also about the Milgrom run. I had those issues when I was younger and bought the Premiere Hardcover to get them again, but every time I open it up in consideration of a re-read I'm like... nahh. But it does have the Marvel Fanfare issue (Mantlo + different artists on each chapter) which should still be good. I know I post this sentence often, but I bought the trade at Ollie's Outlet a week ago, and it was like 6 bucks ($35.00 retail) Good deal. I almost never find anything good at my Ollies.
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Post by Cei-U! on Sept 24, 2021 17:48:47 GMT -5
Hell, Roy Thomas & Gil Kane were responsible for BOOTING Archie Goodwin, Don Heck AND Syd Shores off CAPTAIN MAR-VELL, just when it looked like the book might actually turn around and become GOOD. Goodwin was by far the BEST writer on the series until Jim Starlin arrived. And "thanks" to Thomas, he never had a chance. I don't know exactly why Gil Kane left GREEN LANTERN, but my impression is, for whatever reason, he really wanted to do CAPTAIN MAR-VELL, presumably, because it was the closest thing Marvel had to GL. But the results (in my view) were ABYSMAL. Funny how two people can read the same comics and have completely opposite reactions: I thought Captain Marvel was an unreadable mess with sub-par art *until* Thomas and Kane's reboot. The title was worth reading for the first time since Gene Colan's departure after #4.
Cei-U! I summon the different strokes!
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Post by Batflunkie on Sept 24, 2021 21:40:37 GMT -5
Man-Thing #9-#11 and Giant Size Man-Thing #1 & #2
#9 and #10 were pretty good two-parters revolving around an elderly couple living in the swamps. Really loved Mike Ploog's artwork in these stories, he gives a sense of otherworldliness to the characters, especially Man-Thing. Ploog's rendition of mouths, when speaking, often almost look like pieces of flesh being pulling
The Giant-Size entries were "okay". One boiled down to a monster fight while the other felt like a send-off to King-Kong in some respects
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Post by spoon on Sept 24, 2021 22:17:24 GMT -5
I read The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Volume 1 TPB by Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill. It was interesting how the various pre-exiting classic fictional characters, but to be honest I was disappointed by all the racist stuff. I was waiting for deconstruction, parody, examination of the outdated bigoted tropes, but it never came. It just ended up being unironic repetition of stereotypical demonization of Egyptian and Chinese people. I just don't see the point in an "homage" to that. I look at it as more a case of Moore being unflinchingly true to the prevailing social tastes and attitudes of the era. Moore is, after all, a passionate armchair student of all things Victorian and the series is something of a love letter to those times -- warts and all. But I get that that might not be to every modern reader's tastes. I like classic movies. Sometimes they have undated, bigoted content - like the blackface segment in Holiday Inn or Mickey Rooney's part in Breakfast at Tiffany's. But those are historic documents. They have value in that they offer insight into views of the era; they're not entertaining. My problem with Moore is two-fold. First, if he's wholly mimicking past works, what's the value? Just read the original works. There's no need to generate new instances of racist stereotyping. For example, if one were to write a Sherlock Holmes pastiche, I don't think there's anything redeeming in uncritically replicating the racist Holmes in The Adventure of the Three Gables rather than a more intelligent compassionate Holmes from earlier stories. It would actually add something if one contrasting stereotypical perceptions with reality, instead of just replicating the stereotypes. But second, I don't think it's true Moore is simply replicating the elements of past works. He's making choices of what to retain and what to transform. Granted, it's been a while since I read any of the books, The League of Extraordinary Gentleman, so I admit my recollection could be off. But Moore makes Mina Murray into a leader, which I think is more assertive and feminist than Mina Harker as depicted in Dracula. And Moore & O'Neill cater to modern tastes for violence in fiction by several depictions of Mr. Hyde tearing people limb from limb, which is more graphic than I remember the violence being in source material. So if Moore chooses to retain some element and transform others, he chooses the racist depictions. I had an experience while reading it that crystalized to me how it bothered me. When I saw the Arabic word balloons when Mina fetches Quartermain in Cairo, I took a pic of the page and texted it to a Lebanese friend to see if she can read it. Turns out Egyptian and Lebanese Arabic are different enough that it wasn't coherent to her (she could just tell it was Egyptian). She asked where it was from, and I told her. But when I got reading it, I told her that the depiction was pretty shitty. All that was shown of this Middle Eastern country was opium addiction and attempted rape. It's sort of embarassing to discuss it with a Lebanese-American, and that was a big signal to me that I couldn't justify what Moore was doing.
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Post by Ozymandias on Sept 25, 2021 1:54:20 GMT -5
Been reading Next Men lately, and can't sake the feeling that Mr. Horowitz is Byrne's take on Stan Lee.
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Confessor
CCF Mod Squad
Not Bucky O'Hare!
Posts: 9,419
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Post by Confessor on Sept 25, 2021 3:36:04 GMT -5
I look at it as more a case of Moore being unflinchingly true to the prevailing social tastes and attitudes of the era. Moore is, after all, a passionate armchair student of all things Victorian and the series is something of a love letter to those times -- warts and all. But I get that that might not be to every modern reader's tastes. I like classic movies. Sometimes they have undated, bigoted content - like the blackface segment in Holiday Inn or Mickey Rooney's part in Breakfast at Tiffany's. But those are historic documents. They have value in that they offer insight into views of the era; they're not entertaining. My problem with Moore is two-fold. First, if he's wholly mimicking past works, what's the value? Just read the original works. There's no need to generate new instances of racist stereotyping. For example, if one were to write a Sherlock Holmes pastiche, I don't think there's anything redeeming in uncritically replicating the racist Holmes in The Adventure of the Three Gables rather than a more intelligent compassionate Holmes from earlier stories. It would actually add something if one contrasting stereotypical perceptions with reality, instead of just replicating the stereotypes. But second, I don't think it's true Moore is simply replicating the elements of past works. He's making choices of what to retain and what to transform. Granted, it's been a while since I read any of the books, The League of Extraordinary Gentleman, so I admit my recollection could be off. But Moore makes Mina Murray into a leader, which I think is more assertive and feminist than Mina Harker as depicted in Dracula. And Moore & O'Neill cater to modern tastes for violence in fiction by several depictions of Mr. Hyde tearing people limb from limb, which is more graphic than I remember the violence being in source material. So if Moore chooses to retain some element and transform others, he chooses the racist depictions. I had an experience while reading it that crystalized to me how it bothered me. When I saw the Arabic word balloons when Mina fetches Quartermain in Cairo, I took a pic of the page and texted it to a Lebanese friend to see if she can read it. Turns out Egyptian and Lebanese Arabic are different enough that it wasn't coherent to her (she could just tell it was Egyptian). She asked where it was from, and I told her. But when I got reading it, I told her that the depiction was pretty shitty. All that was shown of this Middle Eastern country was opium addiction and attempted rape. It's sort of embarassing to discuss it with a Lebanese-American, and that was a big signal to me that I couldn't justify what Moore was doing. That's a fair and valid point about Moore's transforming of Mina Harker into a more kickass or feminist heroine than she ever was in the book Dracula. But I still think that, in the example of the Egyptian's attempted rape, Moore is absolutely and deliberately perpetuating the 19th century British/Colonial perception of "those dirty, filthy Arabs" as a way to add then-contemporary flavour to a book that is something of a period piece. Personally I have no problem with that and don't find that kind of archaic racism -- even if it is new archaic racism, if that makes sense -- particularly offensive. Your mileage obviously varies. But I still see this as simply "set dressing" and "Victorian pastiche", rather than anything more sinister in Moore's part.
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Post by Icctrombone on Sept 25, 2021 6:34:36 GMT -5
Agreed about the limited series being the best. And also about the Milgrom run. I had those issues when I was younger and bought the Premiere Hardcover to get them again, but every time I open it up in consideration of a re-read I'm like... nahh. But it does have the Marvel Fanfare issue (Mantlo + different artists on each chapter) which should still be good. I know I post this sentence often, but I bought the trade at Ollie's Outlet a week ago, and it was like 6 bucks ($35.00 retail) I HAVE to find an Ollies!
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Post by dbutler69 on Sept 25, 2021 12:24:26 GMT -5
I read Justice League of America #85-88. Denny O'Neil then Mike Friedrich. I love my preachy 70's comics!
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