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Incredible Hulk Marvel Masterworks volume 11


By Len Wein, Herb Trimpe & Sal Buscema & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-0349-7 (HB)

During the 1970s, the Incredible Hulk settled into a comfortable – if cathartically destructive – pattern. A globe-trotting, monster-mashing plot formula saw tragic physicist Bruce Banner perpetually running and hiding whilst seeking cures for his gamma-transformative curse, alternately aided or hunted by prospective father-in-law General Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross and his daughter – unobtainable inamorata Betty – with a non-stop procession of guest-star heroes and villains providing the battle du jour.

Herb Trimpe had made the character his own, displaying a penchant for explosive action and an unparalleled facility for drawing technology – especially honking great ordnance and vehicles. Beginning with Roy Thomas – unofficial custodian of Marvel’s burgeoning shared-universe continuity – a string of skilful scripters effectively played the afflicted Jekyll/Hyde card for maximum angst and ironic heartbreak as the Jade Juggernaut became a sturdy pillar of Marvel’s growing pantheon.

This chronologically-curated hardback and eBook compendium re-presents issues #184-196 (encompassing cover-dates February 1975-February 1976) and opens with author Dewey Cassell reviewing the end of an artistic era in his Introduction…

The action commences with ‘Shadow on the Land!’ by Len Wein & Trimpe, which finds the wandering man-mountain battling insubstantial extraterrestrial invader Warlord Kaa – a revival from the company’s pre-superhero monsters & aliens anthology era – who foolishly takes possession of the Hulk’s shadow and thinks himself indestructible…

This close encounter leads to Banner’s capture by Hulkbuster Base commander Colonel Armbruster just in time for the US President’s visit and a shocking ‘Deathknell!’ as the truth about Banner’s love rival Glenn Talbot (and Betty’s new husband) is revealed when the so-trustworthy major attempts to assassinate the Commander-in-Chief.

During the attendant death and chaos, Hulk busts out and General Ross regains his shattered credibility by recapturing the man-beast, but Soviet infiltration of the base is rife as a cunning traitor dons super-armour to continue the deadly attacks in ‘The Day of the Devastator!’

This time, when the Jade Juggernaut smashes their common foe, the American army are suitably grateful…

Sometime later, SHIELD intelligence gathers discover the real Talbot is a prisoner in Siberia and that Hulkbuster Base’s current problems have been caused by a Soviet mutant genius they’ve all battled before…

‘There’s a Gremlin in the Works!’ (Incredible Hulk #187, with Joe Staton joining the team as inker) features the return of the son of the Green Goliath’s very first foe The Gargoyle – a vicious juvenile mastermind with plans far beyond merely serving the Soviet state.

The little maniac is holding Talbot at his Bitterfrost fortress and fully prepared for Ross and SHIELD agent Clay Quartermain to stage a rescue bid, but all the cyborg super-soldiers and giant mutant monster dogs in the world are not enough when mission stowaway Bruce Banner gets scared and goes green…

The Russian fiend’s personality-altering technology is exposed in ‘Mind Over Mayhem!’, but as the heroes desperately flee the base with Talbot’s comatose body, Hulk seemingly dies in Bitterfrost’s explosive death-throes. Nothing could be further from the truth and #189 sees the monster battle the Mole Man to secure a miracle-remedy for a sightless little Russian girl in ‘None Are So Blind…!’

Veteran Hulk illustrator Marie Severin inks Trimpe on ‘The Man Who Came Down on a Rainbow!’ as alien philanthropist Glorian whisks the solitary man-monster to a veritable promised land in the stars, only to have the idyll shattered by invading Toad Men hungry for the secret power fuelling the ready-made paradise…

After murdering Glorian, ‘The Triumph of the Toad!’ (Trimpe & Staton) is short-lived and catastrophically self-destructive after the enraged Hulk and the cosmically divine Shaper of Worlds extract a measure of justice for their fallen friend…

Unwillingly banished back to Earth, the Green Giant lands in Scotland in time to get between feuding hotheads with violently opposing attitudes to ‘The Lurker beneath Loch Fear!’! after which Banner makes his way to America where Ross and Quartermain have recruited a famous psychologist to fix the catatonic Glenn Talbot…

‘The Doctor’s Name is… Samson!’ finds the formerly Gamma-powered psychiatrist falling victim to another scientific gaffe and accidentally reborn as a green-haired superhero, yet still unable to cure his patient. For that he needs Banner, but when this wish comes true, Leonard Samson just isn’t tough enough to hold onto him…

After almost a decade pencilling the strip Trimpe moved on to other things and Incredible Hulk #194 saw Sal Buscema take over in ‘The Day of the Locust!’ (with Wein & Staton still doing what they did best).

Lost in the American heartland, the Hulk stumbles upon young lovers pursued by an overly possessive dad determined to end the affair. However, this angry, overreaching parent is a former X-Men adversary who can enlarge insects to immense size, so the kids are more than grateful for the assistance of a Jolly Green Cupid…

With Samson and the US army one step behind him, the Hulk then befriends a small boy running away from home in ‘Warfare in Wonderland!’ Eager for any advantage, Ross tricks gamma-powered maniac the Abomination into attacking the Jade Giant but is unprepared for the green gladiators to team up rather than tussle in #196’s ‘The Abomination Proclamation!’

Sadly, the villain’s innate viciousness quickly alienates his temporary ally and, after winning another spectacular fight, Hulk blasts off on a runaway rocket and is apparently atomised when it blows up…

To Be Continued?

This fast and furious fun-filled tome also includes the covers from and some interior pages from Hulk-themed Marvel Treasury Edition #5, crafted by John Romita, Marie Severin and Trimpe, as well as the latter’s double page pin-up of Hulk foes from that tabloid-sized graphic treat, as well as house ads, the cover to Giant-Size Hulk #1 and a gallery of original art including unused Trimpe covers.

And gilding that bunch of viridian lilies is Sal Buscema’s 1960s try-out art page…

The Incredible Hulk is one of the most well-known comic characters on Earth, and these stories, as much as the movies, cartoons, TV shows, games, toys and action figures are the reason why. For an uncomplicated, earnestly vicarious experience of Might actually being Right, you can’t do better than these yarns, so why not Go Green – even if it’s only in monochrome and in your own delirious head?
© 1975, 1976, 2017 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Frank: The Incredible Story of a Forgotten Dictatorship


By Ximo Abadía, translated by Esther Villardón Grande (Europe Comics)
No ISBN (digital-only edition)

In these days of unrelenting crisis, a relentless harrowing of democratic principles and the seeming triumph of imbecilic venality, it’s perhaps of some comfort to realise that, in many ways, it’s always been like this…

On view today is another Europe Comics digital-only edition from the pan-continental collective imprint which collaborates to bring a wealth of fresh and classic material to English-speaking fans. Moreover, if you like your books solid and substantial, it’s a happy note to discover some adventures are being picked by companies like Cinebook, Top Shelf and IDW.
Not this one, though. Not yet…

Illustrator Ximo Abadía was born in Alicante in 1983, and reared in both that rural countryside idyll and the seasonally-cosmopolitan resort metropolis of Benidorm. Upon reaching 18 years of age he moved to Madrid for his further education. His first graphic novel – Cartulinas de colores – came out in 2009, and in 2011 follow-up CLONk saw him nominated for the Best New Author Prize at the Barcelona Comics Festival. That was topped a year later by La Bipolaridad del chocolate.

In 2018, he turned his masterful eye for stunning visuals and compelling symbolic design onto a period in his country’s recent history that seems to have been carefully, wilfully and voluntarily whitewashed from history. That book earned Abadía the Best Illustrated Album award at the 2018 Heroes Comic Con.

Feeling like a seditiously subtle children’s primer, Frank: La increíble historia de una dictadura olvidada examines with garish glee and irresistible simplicity, the rise and demise of Generalíssimo Francisco Franco Bahamonde and his Nazi/Italian National Fascist Party backed totalitarian reign as Caudillo of Spain from 1939-1945. In strident imagery the author also asks why nobody in the country today is willing or comfortable to talk about those years when the country seemingly vanished from the wider world…

Stunningly evocative, the parade of iconic images deftly presents events and synthesises opinion: making no judgements but nevertheless delivering a shattering testimony and appraisal of the depths some men can descend to, and how entire populations and nations can be complicit in cover-ups in the name of an easy life…

This not a history book. It’s a giant, irritant question mark no one is comfortable acknowledging. And as we all know: things left to fester don’t get better, they erupt in poison and soon spread…
© 2019 DIBBUKS EDICIONE – Abadía. All rights reserved.

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Superman: Emperor Joker

By Jeph Loeb, J.M. DeMatteis, Mark Schultz, Joe Kelly, Ed McGuinness, Mike Miller, Doug Mahnke, Kano, Duncan Rouleau, Todd Nauck, Carlo Barberi, Scott McDaniel & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-1193-6 (TPB)

In the arena of superhero stories, the terms of narrative are often determined more by the antagonists than the gaudily costumed champions doggedly duelling with them. That’s never been more apparent than in tales featuring the Clown Prince of Crime such as this one…

Originally available as a trade paperback and now in a selection of digital formats, this outlandish yarn collectively spans September and October 2000, as originally published in Superman #160-161, Adventures of Superman #582-583, Superman: The Man of Steel #104-105, Action Comics #769-770 and Emperor Joker #1.

First 4-part story arc Superman: Arkham begins in Superman #160 with ‘It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad World!’ by Jeph Loeb, Ed McGuinness & Cam Smith. The night is broken with hideous screams. Every night.

A black-clad maniac dubbed Superman smashes out of grim asylum Arkham, only to be subdued again and re-incarcerated by warped clone Bizarro before day breaks.

Every night a diminutive and greatly distracted pixie of a man dashes to an appointment only to be hit by a train, or a giant weight or something else gigantic, weighty and somehow non-fatal…

In a sky that rains custard pies hangs a moon with the Joker‘s face. What is going on and when will it all end?

The madness spreads to Adventures of Superman #582 and ‘Crazy About You’ (by J.M. DeMatteis, Mike Millar & José Marzan Jr.) where unlikely nun Supergirl is tormented by visions whilst evil billionaire genius Lois Lane sets her incomparable intellect to solving the mystery of the constant Arkham escapee.

A ghastly warped convocation of the JLA resumes their terrorising activities as Superman: The Man of Steel #104 ‘No Axioms’ (Mark Schultz, Doug Mahnke, Tom Nguyen & John McCrea) sees the perennial escapee meet up with inspirational inventor armourer John Henry Irons; a man afflicted with astounding ideas and concepts torturously leaking out of his brain. As he strives to create a suit of Steel to aid the prisoner, Bizarro and the powered-up posse attack…

And elsewhere the little man remembers who he is. Now there’s a ghost of a chance to save and correct Reality…

Forced to toil as ineffectual fast-food peon Super Burger Boy, rebel teen Conner Kent witnesses a war between wonder beings and his clouded thoughts stir in ‘SupermanamrepuS’ (Joe Kelly, Kano & Marlo Alquiza from Action Comics #769). As Irons and the prisoner invade the JLA’s moon citadel, the kid’s powers revive too…

When 5th Dimensional trickster Mr. Mxyzptlk finally arrives to beg the Men of Steel’s assistance, they initially assume he’s the cause of the universe’s woes… until he makes them look at the Earth they’ve just come from…

Answers if not solutions are forthcoming in Emperor Joker #1. ‘It’s a Joker World, Baby, We Just Live in it!’ by Kelly, Loeb, Duncan Rouleau, Todd Nauck, Carlo Barberi, Scott McDaniel, Alquiza, Jaime Mendoza & Richard Bonk reveals how the beyond-deranged Harlequin of Hate appropriated the immeasurable power of Mxyzptlk, what he did with it and how his whimsical changes are threating all existence.

As the crisis encompasses a host of transformed and tormented guest stars, the disparate remnants of the former Superman Family launch a desperate last-ditch scheme to save everything, leading to closing story arc ‘The Reign of Emperor Joker’ and beginning with Superman #161.

Loeb, McGuinness & Smith’s ‘You Say You Want a Revolution?’ finds Superboy, Supergirl and the Action Ace picking off the Joker’s minions and invading his awesome Hahacienda, only to discover what the Joker has done to his greatest obsession The Batman…

The infernal realms are assaulted and overturned in Adventures of Superman #583’s ‘Life is but a (Very Bad) Dream’ (DeMatteis, Millar & Armando Durruthy), resulting in a shocking resurrection and counterstrike before even more unlikely revivals converge on the mad clown in ‘All the World His Stage’ (by Schultz, Mahnke & Nguyen from Superman: The Man of Steel #105).

After an inconceivable final battle that rocks all reality, the universe is set aright in Action Comics #769-770’s ‘He Who Laughs Last’ by Kelly, Kano & Marlo Alquiza, but don’t think for a moment that all’s right with the world…

Although not a new plot, this tale of a time and place where compulsively interventionist god the Joker employs Fifth dimensional magic to literally remake creation in his own image just so he can torture the heroes who have so often thwarted him, actually works. Maintaining breakneck pace and peppering the action with in-jokes and sly asides, the narrative of Superman under terminal pressure to save the universe is truly gripping and the eventual denouement actually succeeds in both contextual terms and delivery of a powerful payoff. This is a marvellous piece of comic eye-candy.

Although taken from a particularly grim and humourless period in Superman history, this thinly disguised tribute to the zany genius of Chuck Jones, Tex Avery and those wacky Warner Brothers cartoons reads like a breath of fresh air when gathered together in one collection and comes with closing contrary codicil ‘The Codex Comicon’ from Joe Kelly under his nom de plume Professor B. Zarro.
Thrilling, fun and full of perfect comics moments, this is a book every Fights ‘n’ Tights fan should have.
© 2000, 2007, 2016 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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Benny Breakiron volume 2: Madame Adolphine


By Peyo, with backgrounds by Will, translated by Joe Johnson (Papercutz/NBM)
ISBN: 978-1-59707-436-0 (HB Album)

Pierre Culliford was born in Belgium in 1928 to a family of British origin living in the Schaerbeek district of Brussels. An admirer of the works of Hergé and American comics licensed to Le Journal de Mickey, Robinson and Hurrah!, he developed his own artistic skills but the war and family bereavement forced him to forgo further education and find work.

After some time toiling as a cinema projectionist, in 1945 Culliford joined C.B.A. animation studios, where he met André Franquin, Morris and Eddy Paape. When the studio closed, he briefly studied at the Brussels Academy of Fine Arts before moving full-time into graphic advertising. In his spare time, he began submitting comic strips to the burgeoning post-war comics publishers.

His first sale was in April 1946: Pied-Tendre, a tale of American Indians in Riquet, the comics supplement to the daily L’Occident newspaper. Further sales to other venues followed and in 1952 his knight Johan found a permanent spot in Le Journal de Spirou. Retitled Johan et Pirlout, the strip prospered and in 1958 introduced a strange bunch of blue woodland gnomes called Les Schtroumpfs.

Culliford – who now used the nom de plume Peyo – would gradually turn those adorable little mites (known to us and most of the world as The Smurfs) into an all-encompassing global empire, but before being sucked onto that relentless treadmill, he still found time to create a few other noteworthy strips such as the titanic tyke on view here today.

In 1960 Benoît Brisefer – AKA Benedict Ironbreaker and/or (in Dutch) Steven Sterk – debuted in Le Journal de Spirou #1183 (December 1960). With a few slyly added tips of the hat to Siegel & Shuster’s Superman, the wryly bucolic adventures celebrated a small boy with superhuman strength living in a generally quiet and unassuming little Belgian town.

Quiet, well-mannered, gentle and a bit lonely, Benny just happens to be the mightiest boy on Earth; able to crush steel or stone in his tiny hands, leap huge distances and run faster than a racing car. He is also generally immune to all physical harm, but his fatal and rather ubiquitous weakness is that all his strength deserts him whenever he catches a cold…

Benny never tries to conceal his abilities but somehow no adults ever catch on. They generally think he’s telling fibs or boasting and whenever he tries to prove he can bend steel in his hands, the unlucky lad gets another dose of the galloping sniffles…

Most kids avoid him. It’s hard to make friends or play games when a minor kick can pop a football like a balloon and a shrug can topple trees…

Well-past-it Brits of my age and vintage might remember the character from weekly comics in the 1960’s. As Tammy Tuff – The Strongest Boy on Earth – and later as Benny Breakiron and Steven Strong – our beret-wearing champion appeared in Giggle and other periodicals from 1967 onwards.

With Peyo’s little blue cash-cows taking up ever larger amounts of his concentration and time, other members of his studio assumed greater responsibilities for Benoît as the years passed. Willy Maltaite (“Will”), Gos, Yvan Delporte, François Walthéry and Albert Blesteau all pitched in and Jean Roba created many eye-catching Spirou covers, but by 1978 the demands of the Smurfs were all-consuming and all the studio’s other strips were retired.

You can’t keep a good super-junior down, though, and after Peyo’s death in 1992, his son Thierry Culliford and cartoonist Pascal Garray revived the strip, adding six more volumes to the eight generated by Peyo and his team between 1960 and 1978.

Thanks to the efforts of US publisher Papercutz, the first four of those gloriously genteel and outrageously engaging power fantasies are available to English-language readers again – both as robust full-colour hardbacks and as all-purpose eBooks – and this second translated exploit begins in the sedate city of Vivejoie-la-Grande, where the kid goes about his rather solitary life, doing good deeds in secret and being as good a boy as he can….

After another day of being shunned by everyone around, disconsolate Benny heads for the park and is befriended by a sweet old lady named Adolphine. No respecter of old graceful retirement, the old dear romps boisterously and disgracefully with the lad – to the disgust of the other park patrons. Eventually, Benny escorts her to his home where she has a strange fit and collapses.

When even a doctor refuses to help, Benny finds a phone number in her bag and a rather strange gentleman comes to collect her. He’s none too gentle in his behaviour and even throws the old lady in the boot of his car…

Even more distressingly, when Benny sees her in the street next day, Madame Adolphine claims to have never met him before…
Baffled but unwilling to let the matter go, Benny tracks her down to a toyshop run by inventor Serge Vladlavodka and finds her standing over the tinkerer’s unconscious body with a massive mallet in her hand. Moreover, her manner is brusque and almost callous…

The belligerent biddy bustles off whilst Benny is trying to revive her prone victim, but when Serge recovers, he also rushes off, fearing the harm she might cause. Accompanying him, Benny learns a starling secret…

There are two Adolphines and one is indeed a sweet old lady. Unfortunately, the other is an increasingly unstable, aggressive and just plain mean robot doppelganger who soon begins robbing banks and terrorising the public, so guess which one the police subsequently arrest?

As indignant Benny single-handedly breaks the organic pensioner out of prison, the automaton Adolphine forms a gang of professional thugs and goes on a crime spree the cops are helpless to stop.

Good thing Benny is made of sterner stuff…

This superbly surreal spoof has delicious echoes of classic Ealing Comedies such as The Ladykillers and The Lavender Hill Mob as it follows the little wonder boy’s resolute, dynamic and spectacular campaign to save his friend: blending deft wit with bombastic and hilarious slapstick. Madame Adolphine is another fabulously winning fantasy about childhood validation and agency, offering a distinctly Old-World spin to the concept of superheroes and providing a wealth of action, thrills and chortles for lovers of incredible adventure and comics excellence.
© Peyoâ„¢ 2013 – licensed through Lafig Belgium. English translation © 2013 by Papercutz. All rights reserved.

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Thor Marvel Masterworks volume 13


By Gerry Conway, John Buscema, Rich Buckler, Sal Buscema, Arvell Jones, Keith Pollard & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-8856-8 (HB)

Disabled doctor Donald Blake took a vacation in Norway only to stumble into an alien invasion. Trapped in a cave, he found an ancient walking stick which, when struck against the ground, turned him into the Norse God of Thunder! Within moments he was defending the weak and smiting the wicked.

Months swiftly passed with the Lord of Storms tackling rapacious extraterrestrials, Commie dictators, costumed crazies and cheap thugs, but these soon gave way to a vast kaleidoscope of fantastic worlds and incredible, mythic menaces, usually tackled with an ever-changing cast of stalwart immortal warriors at his side…

As this bombastic compendium (available in hardcover and digital formats and reprinting Mighty Thor #217-228, spanning November 1973 through October 1974) opens, our cosmic cast returns to long-abandoned Asgard after interstellar escapades and bravely endured exile. However, before the narrative wonderment begins there’s time for more candid revelations and contextual history from sole scripter Gerry Conway in his Introduction ‘Lo. There Shall Come an Ending’…

Thor #217 sees the triumphant return of Thor and his fellow heroes – with their recently rescued from alien enslavement All-Father Odin – discover a mysteriously rebuilt Eternal Realm filled with their fellow Asgardians who brandish ‘All Swords Against Them!’ (with art by Sal Buscema inking brother John). Facing them are as impossible doppelgangers of Odin, Thor and the rest, all offering murderous hostility. Whilst the Thunderer furiously struggles to unravel this latest mystery and defeat the invading doppelgangers, in another sector of the universe the all-conquering Colonizers of Rigel are put to flight; abandoning their worlds to an all-consuming force of sheer destruction…

Issue #218 proves there is no rest for the weary as the again-victorious true Asgardians once more take ship to the stars to prevent the Rigellians’ doom from reaching Earth. ‘Where Pass the Black Stars There Also Passes… Death!’ (illustrated by J. Buscema & Jim Mooney) finds the hard-travelling heroes facing a nomadic race of colossal, decadent star-farers who fuel their unending flight by converting thriving civilisations into food and power.

In distant Asgard, war woman Hildegarde‘s young sister Krista is slowly falling under the sway of sinister seductive evil, even as her hereditary protectors are a cosmos away, daringly infiltrating one of the Black Stars’ cosmic scoops and encountering a race of mechanical slaves in ‘A Galaxy Consumed!’ (inked by Mike Esposito) before they and their charismatic messiah Avalon are at last freed – and untold galaxies subsequently saved – from callous consumption in ‘Behold! The Land of Doom!’

With scripter Conway firmly in the driving seat and legendary illustrator John Buscema (aided by inker Mike Esposito) delivering the art, the mythic mayhem intensifies with ‘Hercules Enraged!’ as Thor brutally invades Olympus, in search of the Grecian Prince of Power.

After Asgardian maiden’s Krista abduction, the All-Father has seen a vision of her chained in Hades with the Thunder God’s trusted ally gloating over her beside vile Grecian netherlord Pluto…

By the time lordly Zeus stops the shattering clash that follows, half of the celestial city is in ruins, but in that breathing space he proves Hercules’ innocent of the atrocious act and the abashed comrades duly turn their attentions to the true culprit…

Inked by Joe Sinnott, Thor #222 finds the earnest comrades in search of Hercules’ insidious impersonator and taking advice from a scary sorceress even as war-god Ares receives an eldritch summons to meet his co-conspirator ‘Before the Gates of Hell!’

Sadly for him, the war god is intercepted by our heroes before he gets there and receives the sound thrashing he deserves, prior to the enraged companions storming their way into the netherworld itself. At the moment of their triumph, however, Pluto snatches up his hostage and vanishes. The infernal trail leads straight to Earth where one final confrontation results in ‘Hellfire Across the World!’ (Esposito inks) and leaves kidnapped Krista wounded unto death…

After a lengthy hiatus, 224 finds Thor resuming his mortal alter ego of surgeon Don Blake to operate on the dying Asgardian, even as elsewhere in Manhattan, a rash scientist accidentally reactivates Odin’s unstoppable battle construct and discovers ‘No One Can Stop… the Destroyer!’

With Krista saved, Thor joins sorely-pressed Hercules and – although outmatched by the Asgardian killing machine – devises a way to stop its human power source, only to then face ‘The Coming of Firelord!’ (inked by Sinnott). The tempestuous, short-tempered herald of planet-consuming Galactus has been sent to fetch Thor and will brook no refusals…

Issue #226 sees the voracious space god on Earth again, beseeching the Thunder God’s aid in ‘The Battle Beyond!’ (Esposito) against living planet Ego, who has seemingly gone mad and now poses a threat to the entire universe…

Deftly channelling Jack Kirby, penciller Rich Buckler (aided by his pals Arvell Jones & Keith Pollard) joined Conway & Sinnott in #227 as the Storm Lord God and Hercules – with Firelord in tow – go ‘In Search of… Ego!’ Penetrating deep within the sentient-but-raving planet and defeating incredible biological horrors acting as planetary antibodies, the trio reach his malfunctioning brain and experience the incredible origin of the “bioverse” in ‘Ego: Beginning and End!’, before contriving an earth-shaking solution to the wild world’s rampages. In a final act of unlikely diplomacy, the Thunderer then finds a replacement herald and secures Firelord’s freedom from Galactus…

To Be Continued…

This collection also includes assorted House ads, covers created by John Romita and a frontispiece by Marie Severin for the Thor-starring Marvel Treasury Edition plus a Buscema double page pin-up of the Asgardian cast, as well as an always enticing selection of original art pages.

Thor is one of modern comics’ greatest attractions and a cornerstone of the Marvel Universe. Always a high-point in graphic fantasy, his longevity is all the more impressive for the sheer imagination and timeless readability of the tales crafted by an army of creators. This chronicle is an absolute must for all fans of the medium and far-flung fantasy thrills.
© 1973, 1974, 2017 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Internet Crusader


By George Wylesol (Avery Hill Publishing)
ISBN: 978-1-910395-51-6 (TPB)

I did consider saving this nifty novel enterprise for our upcoming Occultoberfest (not a Real Thing, except right here) month of horror and supernatural samplings, but – just like a sugar-deprived, axe-wielding kid in fancy dress – I simply couldn’t wait…

Baltimore-based George Wylesol (Ghosts, Etc.) is a cartoonist with lots to say and divers ways of doing so, and in Internet Crusader he channels his avowed fascinations (old computer kit and livery, religious iconography, the nostalgic power of commercial branding and signage) with his ongoing faith in the narrative power of milieu and environment – as opposed to characters – into a spookily sublime tale of demonic incursion and plucky outsider kids saving the world…

You won’t see them, however, except via their actions, as this gripping yarn is told in the form of a diabolically delightful epistolary novel, with all the action taking place on craftily reconstructed computer pages, packed with all the distracting screen furniture, intrusive pop-ups, message pings and emails and barrages of ads that infest modern tech interfaces.

And that the cleverest part here as the kid answering to the handle “Internet Crusader” is a typical, anti-social 12-year old drawn by Christian-supported porn-site come-ons into playing a game devised by the Devil to cripple Heaven through Denial-of-Service attacks and subvert humanity’s free will through similar modern arcana.

Thankfully, God still has a back door or two in reserve, and a desperate plan to save his creation from itself using the “insane gaming skillz” of select youngsters…

But in the eternal war of lies and willpower, can anyone, any message be taken at face value…?

A smart and compulsive experience seamlessly wedding plot to graphics and employing modern cinema’s ubiquitous (if perhaps comfortably obsolescent) computer interface imagery as narrative device is further enhanced for readers by the addition of a comics insert freebie: a faux users guide of the Evil One’s Portal 2 Hell Crusader’s Manual, layering in further immersive context to your reading gestalt.

Ignore the big words: this is clever and witty and fun, but not – as yet – available in electronic formats. Maybe that’s God’s Will too…

Supremely enjoyable, this is a book and experience that’s hard to fault, a joy to read and ideal to give as gift in the fraught months to come…
© George Wylesol 2019. All rights reserved.

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Toys in the Basement


By Stéphane Blanquet, translated by Kim Thompson (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-402-6 (HB)

It’s a bumper time if you have kids who love the grimmer side of storytelling.  Here’s a superb slice of macabre all-ages Euro-whimsy, courtesy of the wildly talented and incredibly prolific Stéphane Blanquet (more than 64 art books, graphic novels, collaborative works and books for kids published since 1994 including Dungeon: Monstres volume 2, Kramer’s Ergot, and Zero Zero).

Do you remember the heart-wrenching scene in the 1964 stop-motion television classic Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer when he finds the Island of Misfit toys? Do you recall how all they wanted was children to love them? Hold on to that thought…

At a Halloween fancy-dress party a disgruntled little boy is sulking. In his heart he’s a vicious pirate king, but his cheapskate mother would only pay for a pink bunny costume nobody else wanted…

As the other kids tease and bully him, he retreats to a corner where he meets a geeky kid in a chicken suit.

Poultry boy has a broken leg and a raging thirst, but his friend – a girl in a kitten outfit – has been down in cellar fetching drinks for ages. After some pleading, Pink Bunny, keen to avoid further embarrassment, or to be seen with a nerd dressed like a chicken, goes after her.

At the bottom of the stairs he finds her paralysed with fear: the basement is filled with maimed and broken toys, alive, angry and determined to wreak bloody vengeance on the cruel children who maltreated and abandoned them. Luckily, because of their stupid outfits, the toys assume the kids too are dolls, because if they were real children…

Playing for time, Catgirl and Bunnyboy follow the maladjusted playthings to a vast underground cavern where all broken toys are massing, readying for the day they will rise and take over. The children gasp in horror at the artificial army’s secret weapon – a gigantic ravenous Frankensteinian beast named Amelia, cobbled together from thousands of discarded toy fragments, all hungry for righteous slaughter…

It’s at that moment Chicken-boy stumbles upon them and blows their cover…

Dosed with dry, mordant wit and just the right tone of macabre Ghost Train suspense, Toys in the Basement is a simply terrific goose-bumpy thriller rendered magical by the wildly eccentric, brilliantly imaginative and creepily fluid artwork of Blanquet. This dark delight – sadly only available in physical hardback form – also has the perfect moral message for loot-hungry, attention-deprived youngsters – and their kids and grandchildren too.
© 2005 Editions La Joie de Lire SA. This edition © 2010 Fantagraphics Books. All rights reserved.

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Captain America Marvel Masterworks volume 9


By Steve Englehart, John Warner, Tony Isabella, Bill Mantlo, Marv Wolfman, Sal Buscema, Frank Robbins, Herb Trimpe & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-3029-0345-9 (HB)

Created by Joe Simon & Jack Kirby in an era of frantic patriotic fervour, Captain America was a bombastic, dynamic and highly visible response to the horrors of Nazism and the threat of Liberty’s loss.

He faded away during the post-war reconstruction but briefly reappeared after the Korean War: a harder, darker sentinel ferreting out monsters, subversives and the “commies” who lurked under every brave American kid’s bed. Then he vanished once more until the burgeoning Marvel Age resurrected him just in time for the turbulent, culturally divisive 1960s.

By the time of the tales gathered in this nifty ninth Masterworks volume (available in luxurious hardback and accessible eBook formats and re-presenting issues #176-192 of Captain America and the Falcon from August 1974 to December 1975), the once convinced and confirmed Sentinel of Liberty had become a lost symbol of a divided nation, uncomfortable in his red, white and blue skin and looking to carve himself a new place in the Land of the Free. Calamitous events were about to put paid to that particular American dream…

Following an informative behind-the-scenes farewell reminiscence from scripter Steve Englehart in his Introduction, the action opens here with a shocking transformation.

At this time America was a nation reeling from a loss of idealism caused by Vietnam, Watergate and the (partial) exposure of President Richard Nixon’s crimes.

The general loss of idealism and painful public revelations that politicians are generally unpleasant – and even possibly ruthless, wicked exploiters – kicked the props out of most Americans who had an incomprehensibly rosy view of their leaders, so a conspiracy that reached into the halls and backrooms of government was extremely controversial yet oddly attractive in those distant, simpler days…

Following an attempt by sections of the elected government to undemocratically seize control of the country by deceit and criminal conspiracy (sounds like sheer fantasy these days, doesn’t it?) Captain America had foiled and exposed the plot but could no longer be associated with a tarnished ideal.

Issue #176 sees shocked, stunned Steve Rogers search his soul and realise he can not be the symbol of such a country. Despite the anxious arguments and advice of his Avenging allies he decides that ‘Captain America Must Die!’ (by Englehart, Sal Buscema & Vince Colletta).
Unable to convince him otherwise, staunch ally Sam Wilson/the Falcon carries on alone, tackling the following month an invasion by body-snatching old X-Men foe in ‘Lucifer be thy Name’ before wrapping up the threat in KIf the Falcon Should Fall…!’

Meanwhile, as Steve Rogers settles into an uncomfortable retirement, a number of painfully unqualified civilians begin trying to fill the crimson boots of Captain America… with dire results…

Captain America and the Falcon #179 finds unsettled civilian Rogers hunted by a mysterious Golden Archer whose ‘Slings and Arrows!’ convince the ex-hero that even if he can’t be a Star-spangled sentinel of liberty, neither can he abandon the role of do-gooder: leading to a life-changing decision and ‘The Coming of the Nomad!’ in #180. Typically, the sinister Serpent Squad turn up again with psychotic Princess Python in tow and maniac nihilist Madame Hydra murderously assuming the suddenly vacant role of the Viper…

When “the Man Without a Country” tackles the ophidian villains, he fares badly but stumbles across a sinister scheme by the Squad and Sub-Mariner‘s arch-nemesis Warlord . The subsea tyrant – in the grip of ancient evil forces – seeks to raise a sunken continent and restore an ancient civilisation in ‘The Mark of Madness!’…

At the same time Falcon is ignoring his better judgement and training a determined young man to become the next Captain America…

A glittering era ended with #182 as Sal Buscema surrendered Captain America and newspaper-strip creator Frank Robbins came aboard for a controversial run, beginning with ‘Inferno!’ (inked by Joe Giella). Whilst Nomad successfully mops up the Serpent Squad – despite well-meaning police interference – Sam and Cap’s substitute encounter the Sentinel of Liberty’s greatest enemy… with fatal consequences…

The saga shifts into high gear as ‘Nomad: No More!’ (inked by Frank Giacoia) find shamed, grief-stricken Steve Rogers once more taking up his stars and stripes burden as the murderous Red Skull simultaneously attacks the hero’s loved ones and dismantles America’s economy by defiling the banks and slaughtering the financial wizards who run them.

Beginning in the chillingly evocative ‘Cap’s Back!’ (Herb Trimpe, Giacoia & Mike Esposito), rampaging through the utterly shocking ‘Scream of the Scarlet Skull!’ (art by Sal Buscema, Robbins & Giacoia), it all climaxes in ‘Mindcage!’ (with additional scripting from John Warner and art by Robbins & Esposito) wherein our titular hero’s greatest ally is apparently revealed as his enemy’s stooge and slave…

The Red Skull, in all his gory glory, gloatingly revealed that his staggeringly effective campaign of terror was as nothing to his ultimate triumph, and that the high-flying Falcon had been his unwitting secret weapon for years: originally a cheap gangster named “Snap” Wilson, radically recreated and reprogrammed by the Cosmic Cube to be a perfect partner for Captain America and a tantalising, ticking time bomb waiting to explode…

Captain America and the Falcon #187 opens on ‘The Madness Maze!’ (Warner, Robbins & Frank Chiaramonte) with the Skull fled and a now-comatose Falcon in custody of super-spy agency S.H.I.E.L.D. Suddenly, the Star-Spangled Avenger is abducted by a mysterious flying saucer and attacked by alchemical androids employed by a rival espionage outfit, culminating in a ‘Druid-War’ (Warner, Sal B & Colletta), before Tony Isabella, Robbins & Chiaramonte put Cap into an ‘Arena For a Fallen Hero!’ wherein psychological warfare and unarmed combat combine into a risky shock therapy to kill or cure the mind-locked Wilson.

Just as the radical cure kicks in, an old foe takes over S.H.I.E.L.D.’s flying HQ in ‘Nightshade is Deadlier the Second Time Around!’ (Isabella, Robbins & Colletta), after which the crimes of forcibly-reformed Snap Wilson are re-examined and judged in an LA courtroom in climactic wrap-up ‘The Trial of the Falcon!’ (Isabella, Bill Mantlo, Robbins & D. Bruce Berry): proffering a predictable court ruling, a clutch of heroic cameos and a bombastic battle against the sinister Stilt-Man – hired by mob bosses to ensure Snap’s silence on his gangland activities…

With the narrative decks cleared, Captain America and the Falcon #192 featured an ingenious, entertaining filler written by outgoing editor Marv Wolfman, illustrated by Robbins & Berry, wherein Cap hops on a commercial flight back to the East Coast and finds himself battling deranged psychiatrist Dr. Faustus and a contingent of mobsters on a ‘Mad-Flight!’ thousands of feet above New York.
With all plots safely settled, the stage was set for the return of Captain America’s co-creator: Jack Kirby was returning with a bombastic fresh take that would take the Sentinel of Liberty into regions never before explored… but that’s the concern of another book and review…

Back here, however, there’s still more fun to be had via selections from Marvel fan mag FOOM #8: an all cap issue.

As well as a John Romita & Esposito cover, there’s historical overview “Well Come on, All You Big Strong Men…” by Roger Stern – and with early art from John Byrne -, text profiles of Bucky (‘Manchild in a Troubled Land’) and Falcon (“He Was Only Waiting For This Moment to Arise…”) and a photo-feature on the wartime cinema serial in ‘Star of the Silver Screen’.

The extracts conclude with bio page ‘Joe Simon and Jack Kirby: “By their works shall ye know them” and a back cover by Romita and Byrne, after which the cover of all-reprint Giant-Size Captain America #1 precedes a gallery of original art pages by Ron Wilson, Romita & Giacoia, Buscema & Colletta, and Robbins and Chiaramonte & Berry. Wrapping up the extras are the Cap & Falcon pages by Romita from The Mighty Marvel Calendar for 1975.

Despite the odd cringe-worthy story moment (I specifically omitted the part where Cap battles three chicken-themed villains for example, and still wince at some of the dialogue from this forthright and earnest era of “blaxsploitation” and ethnic awareness) these tales of matchless courage and indomitable heroism are fast-paced, action-packed, totally engrossing fights ‘n’ tights that no comics fan will care to miss, and joking aside, the cultural significance of these tales were crucial in informing the political consciences of the youngest members of post-Watergate generation…

Above all else ‘though, these are fabulously fun tales of an irresistible American Dream…
© 1974, 1975, 2017 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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JLA Deluxe volume 8

By Chris Claremont, Chuck Austen, Joe Kelly, John Byrne, Ron Garney, Doug , Jerry Ordway, Tom Nguyen & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-6342-3 (TPB)

When the Justice League of America – driving force and cornerstone of the Silver Age of Comics – were relaunched in 1997, the sheer bravura quality of the stories propelled the series back to the forefront of industry attention, making as many new fans as it recaptured old ones. However, fans are fickle and the intoxicating sheen of “fresh and new” never lasts. By the time of these tales – spanning May to November 2004 from JLA #94-106 plus material from JLA Secret Files 2004 #1 – there had been numerous changes of creative personnel… usually a bad omen… and a certain straying from the clear missions of the earliest adventures…

As you’ve come to expect by now, this volume is available in all digital formats as well as traditional trade paperback…

After battling all manner of contemporary and futuristic foes, in ‘Suffer the Little Children’ the World’s Greatest Superheroes now find themselves pitted against an ancient malevolence from out of Earth’s oldest nightmares. Contrived by a trio of the industry’s biggest talents – Chris Claremont, John Byrne & Jerry Ordway – the expansive saga originally ran in issues #94-99 of the monthly title.

When team mystic Manitou Raven divines that a great evil has come hunting, he is suddenly silenced before he can warn his comrades. As Batman and Flash follow a rash of global child disappearances, Superman is astonishingly defeated by a pair of strange juvenile runaways.

Comparing notes with other JLA members the heroes discover a pattern of metagenic abductions: someone or something is taking super-powered children…

Meanwhile an enthralled Man of Steel has become the slave – and ambulatory lunchbox – of diabolical vampire lord Crucifer, whose race of undying leeches has been secretly working to conquer the world since their initial defeat and extra-dimensional banishment by the Amazon warriors of Themyscira thousands of years previously.

‘The Enemy Within’ sees team boffin The Atom lost in a microverse within a magic artefact and meeting a lost race with a hidden connection to the crisis, even as a mysterious third force of freaks maneuverers for advantage in the background. When Wonder Woman consults ancient scroll records she is betrayed and attacked by her closest ally and the crucial data is erased…

As the beleaguered and outclassed heroes strive to cope, ‘The Heart of the Matter’ sees Martian Manhunter use his unique gifts to trace the Atom, but even as master tactician Batman works to counter the infallible plans of their hidden enemy, his ace in the hole Faith falls to Crucifer’s power…

And in the background, that shady band of outcasts undertakes their own plan to save the day…

‘Interludes on the Last Day of the World!’ sees the vampire resurgence edge ever closer. With Crucifer’s abducted metahuman victims acting as shock troops and physical hosts for the bloodsucking arcane exiles, the embattled remnants of the JLA reconsolidate and ally themselves with the skulking outsiders watching them, just as the vampire lord opens a hole into hell and bids his kin to freely enter…

The fightback begins in ‘Convergence’ with the rescue of the Atom whose fresh data provides the answer to the mystery of Crucifer’s seeming invulnerability, leading to a mass assault and ultimate victory by the competing teams of heroes in ‘Heartbreaker!’

The former X-Men creative team supreme reunited for this supernatural romp, but their old magic was sorely lacking: Byrne co-writing with Claremont and pencilling for the criminally underappreciated Jerry Ordway to ink and embellish is a far better “look” than “read”.

Comic fans love these sorts of nostalgia stunts, but sadly, the results here don’t really live up to expectations, resulting in a competent but predictable heroes-versus-vampires yarn that suffers greatly because it’s painfully obvious that the whole thing is a high-profile, extended gimmick designed to kick-start Byrne’s then-forthcoming reinvention of the Doom Patrol, and not really a JLA story at all…

Most comic books – indeed all popular fiction – are a product of or reaction to the times in which they are created. In the grim, authoritarian, morally ambiguous climate of post 9-11 America writer Joe Kelly wrote an issue of Action Comics (#775) addressing the traditional ethics and practices of ultimate boy scout Superman in a world where old values were seen as a liability and using “The Enemy’s” own tactics against them was viewed with increasing favour by the public.

‘What’s So Funny about Truth, Justice and the American Way’ (not included here) introduced super-Esper Manchester Black and his team of Elite metahumans who responded proactively and with extreme overkill to global threats and menaces in such a drastic and final manner that Superman was forced to take a long, hard look at his core beliefs before triumphing over a team who saw absolutely no difference between villains, monsters or people who disagreed with them…

In a distressing sign of those times, The Elite proved so overwhelmingly popular that they returned in JLA #100. ‘Elitism’ – by Kelly, Doug Mahnke & Tom Nguyen – depicts how the team, led now by Black’s cyborg sister Vera, at first oppose and eventually cooperate with the traditionally-minded JLA to save Earth from a catastrophic ecological and metaphysical meltdown – but all is not as it seems…

Vera Black correctly assesses the fundamental flaws in her methodology but also similar weaknesses in the JLA’s. She proposes becoming the League’s “Black Ops” division, gathering intel, working undercover and decisively dealing with potential threats before they become global crises. Her team will get their hands dirty in a way the JLA simply cannot afford to…

Over Superman’s protests, but with stringent oversight in place and using a combination of Elite and League volunteers, the plan is adopted and Justice League Elite subsequently won their own 12-issue series with Major Disaster, Green Arrow, Manitou Raven, and Flash joining Vera, energy manipulator Coldcast, human bio-weapon arsenal Menagerie and Naif al-Sheikh (a human spymaster who acts as): Director, Adjudicator and Conscience for a unit designed to neutralise organizations and nations that threaten World Security before things ever reach a boiling point.

JLA Secret Files 2004 develops the controversial theme in ‘Same Coin’, by Kelly, Byrne, Mahnke & Nguyen, wherein the two teams work separately – and mostly at odds – to stop a Hitlerian Ragnarok from occurring thanks to illicit use of mystic doomsday weapon the Spear of Destiny…

Getting over a post-celebration hump is always tricky for a long-running comic series. An anniversary or centenary is usually celebrated by some large-scale cosmos-shaking exploit which it’s impossible to top, leading to an anti-climactic “day in the life” venture. In the case of story arc Pain of the Gods – reprinting JLA #101-106 – Chuck Austen & Ron Garney take that hoary tradition, and indeed the equally tired plot of heroes’ soul-searching angst after a failure to succeed, and run with it to produce a stirring, potent exploration of humanity too often absent in modern adventure fiction.

Each chapter deals with an emotional crisis affecting an individual Leaguer who fails to save a life, beginning with Superman in ‘Man of Steel’ as the perfect hero misjudges the abilities of a new costumed champion and witnesses the wannabe hero perish in explosive conflagration…

‘Scarlet Speedster’ treads similar ground as Flash misses two children whilst evacuating a burning building and Green Lantern misjudges the homicidal determination of a domestic abuser in ‘Emerald Gladiator’. Throughout each of these tragedies a single family reappears; fuelling the emotional turmoil pushing each hero into obsession and psychosis.

In ‘Manhunter from Mars’ team telepath and philosophical lynchpin J’onn J’onzz is forced to confront the life-long emotional barriers distancing him from his companions and resulting from surviving the death of his entire species, whilst Wonder Woman faces her own mortality whilst battling a super-killer in ‘Amazonian Warrior’ before Batman ultimately must acknowledge that he can’t know and do everything alone in ‘The Dark Knight’…

The entire story can be viewed as a treatise on fallibility and post-traumatic distress with superheroes acting as metaphors for Police and Firemen, and the cleverly-inserted sub-plot of a seemingly mundane family seeking redress plays well against the tragic grandeur of the stars. It’s grand to see a superhero tale that thinks with a heart rather than acts with gaudily gloved fists for a change…

The JLA – in all its incarnations – has endured a long history of starting strong but losing focus, and particularly of coasting by on past glories for extended periods. Luckily the team still had a few more tricks left during this period and a little life in it before the inevitable demise and reboot for the next generation after Final Crisis: offering plenty of fun and thrills for casual readers and full-on fans alike.
© 2004, 2016 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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The Umbrella Academy volume 3: Hotel Oblivion


By Gerard Way & Gabriel Bá, with Nick Filardi & Nate Piekos (Dark Horse)
ISBN: 978-1-50671-142-3 (TPB)

Superheroes have been around so long now that they’ve been able to evolve into different sub-sets: straight Save-the-World continuity types as championed by DC and Marvel, obsessively “real” or rationalist iterations such as Marvelman, Crossfire or Kick-Ass, comedic spins like Justice League International or Next Wave and some rare ducks that straddle a few barstools in between.

Addressing the same Edgy, Catastrophic Absurdism as Grant Morrison’s classic Doom Patrol, the archly anti-didactic antics of The Umbrella Academy offered readers a subtly subversive take on the idiom which impressed the heck out of everybody and lured many disillusioned fans back to the pitifully tired and over-used genre when first released. Author creator Gerard Way even parlayed the extraordinary success of the Weird Science heroes into a TV series for the team and built a second creative career steering DC’s outré, off-the-wall Young Animal imprint of alternative heroes…

Now a decade later, a new miniseries has resulted in the long-awaited third collected volume (available in trade paperback and digital formats) and is presented here with an effulgent Introduction from star writer and late-converted fan Jeff LeMire…

Once upon a time a strange event occurred. All across Earth, 43 babies were unexpectedly born as the result of apparent immaculate conceptions – or perhaps some kind of inexplicable parthenogenesis.

The births even surprised the mothers, most of whom discarded, abandoned, sold or arranged adoption of their unexpected, terrifying newborns.

Notorious scientist, entrepreneur and closet extraterrestrial Sir Reginald Hargreeves – inventor of the Levitator, mobile umbrella communicator, Clever Crisp cereal, Televator and a process which enabled chimps to speak – had a secret plan, and he knew these kids would all be special. He thus acquired seven of these miracle babies for an undisclosed purpose, subsequently rearing and training the children to become his private superhero team to enact it.

He was in no way a “good” parent…

The callously experimental family, after a spectacular early career, eventually proved to be unmanageable and the Umbrella Academy – created and trained “to save the World” – sundered in grief and acrimony, but not before poor Ben, Number 6 AKA “The Horror”, pointlessly lost his brave young life and Number 5 “The Boy” took a short trip into the future and never came back…

The surviving members of the utterly dysfunctional superhero team parted but were reunited twenty years later when the news broke that Hargreeves – whose nom de guerre was The Monocle – had died. You shouldn’t believe everything you hear on the news…

In the interim, Number 1 son Luther had become an off-earth defender and pioneer, so hideously damaged by a doomed journey to Mars that to save him, Hargreeves had grafted The Spaceboy‘s head onto the body of a colossal Martian Gorilla.

Poor, neglected Vanya, whose musical gifts Hargreeves deemed utterly useless, became a drop-out and wrote a scandalous tell-all book before becoming a voluntary exile amidst Earth’s lowest dregs. When Number 7 returned she was again rejected by her “family” and summarily seduced by a manic musician who unleashed her true potential and almost destroyed the world with her untapped power…

The Boy returned after 60 years of ranging through the time-stream and materialised in the body of the 10-year old he had been. However, his physical form was frozen and he stopped aging at that moment…

Favourite friend, technologist, housekeeper, actual lifelong care-giver and talking chimp Dr. Pogo had died in Vanya’s – or rather The White Violin‘s – apocalyptic attack which had left Allison (Number 3, The Rumor) with her throat severed, apparently forever deprived of her talent for warping reality with a word…

Diego (Number 2, The Kraken) remained the obsessive scary vigilante psychopath he’d always been but Klaus (Number 4, The Séance) was even weirder than before: a floating, shoeless space-case who talked to the dead and pulled the wings off the laws of physics…

Once upon a time, long ago and whilst still children, the Umbrella Academy saved Washington DC from an animated and extremely angry Lincoln Memorial. They’ve had an odd relationship with American Presidents ever since…

Having saved the entire world from prophesied destruction, the dysfunctional quintet were at a loss and killing time in the rubble of their old home until a fresh crisis boiled over and was cleaned up after The Boy’s hidden sponsors (ruthless chronal cops the Temps Aeternalis) sought to make him fulfil the mission they had originally recruited and rebuilt him for…

Now in the aftermath of the global carnage that generated, the battered survivors recuperate unaware that old ‘Evil’ is manifesting in their midst. Long ago, Hargreeves had taken steps to create the ultimate penitentiary for the violent, vicious, crazy and too-powerful foes of his pet Academy, but now the “guests” of his Hotel Oblivion are successfully checking out…

As The Boy explosively pursues the minion’s of The Perseus Corporation, elsewhere Spaceboy is consulting with aged savant Doctor Zoo. The old duffer is planning a trip into the bizarre region dubbed “Afterspace” in search of a lost legend…

The Séance has fallen very low, trading seedy encounters with dead loved ones for drugs, but when he attempts to scam his biker-thug minders events overtake him just when his old allies leave the universe behind in KMiniature War in a Miniature Home’…

With Hargreeves’ guests loose in the hotel, ‘Violence’ mounts in a range of places and dimensions but the greatest threat comes as the nigh-omnipotent Scientific Man gathers his god-like powers and the deadly Murder Magician secures a televator back to Earth…

Chaos increases exponentially as the Academy heroes battle alone against a host of foes and heir own selfish agendas even as Spaceboy braves ‘The Labyrinth’ and discovers lost legend St. Zero hibernating in

The crisis breaks after The Boy’s current target – Perseus X – infiltrates the hotel to liberate his dad and realises that he’s too late… and that something even more diabolical is ‘Free’…

With a host of monsters and super-creeps like Doctor Terminal, the Mothers of Agony and Medusa ravaging Earth, as well as the quandaries of an imminent attack by a trans-dimensional behemoth and a mysterious wonder baby and its revenant, rampaging mother to deal with, the scattered young comrades grudgingly work together against ‘The Fear You Cannot Speak’ but their late collaboration is all for naught as a new team of empowered players materialise with a shocking revelation in concluding chapter ‘Reunion’.

Sadly, the big reveal is a cosmic cliffhanger so be prepared for some major frustration…

Big on mood, bafflement-by-design and astounding action, this is compelling adventure if you’re fully au fait with the previous books and prepared to give the events your full attention, but Hotel Oblivion is only the beginning of the drama and should not be consumed casually. Trust me, though, it’s going to be worth it in the end…

Accompanying all the meta-real wonderment are a wealth of sketches, character drawings and variant covers by Way and Bá under the broad remit ‘Designing the Umbrella Academy Hotel Oblivion’.

Whilst happily swiping, homaging, sampling and remixing the coolest elements from many and varied comics sources, The Umbrella Academy offers a unique synthesis to achieve its own distinctive originality within the tired confines of the superhero genre. It’s a reading experience no jaded Fights ‘n’ Tights fan should miss.
© 2019 Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá. All rights reserved. The Umbrella Academy™ and all properties are trademarks of Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá.