For those who may have recently come to the blog, I hope you'll find that I try to be on the whole positive. I don't write about everything I'm reading, but I like to mention or post highlights of either things that I think are significant from a continuity or history perspective, or things I really liked. I tend to have three different reading lists:
- Current comics. I'm normally 2-3 months behind depending on the title and publisher.
- Golden Age Read through: I'm currently in October of 1941 (I started with some from 1936), and I tend to group these by publisher within the month, so right now the focus is on DC.
- Marvel Silver Age Read through: I'm currently on December 1964. I read everything except the Millie the Model and Patsy Walker type-stuff. I'm not a snob against them, but it is basically Archie/Katy Keene comics in the Archie-house style. When I finally got access to some, I had 3 years to read-through to catch up with where I was in my order with everything else, and ultimately, decided it wasn't worth it.
The first book I want to briefly mention is Batman #7. Two stories out of the four I thought were worth a mention. In the first, the Joker returns from the dead (again), but he enlists and blackmails a group of practical jokers to work for him. He gets them addicted to ever-increasing chaotic and dangerous pranks, until the city is in panic as the cover to his crimes. I thought it was neat angle. In the last story, Bruce Wayne is framed for a murder. When put on trial, Batman appears (an escaped Wayne) to declare Wayne's innocence with no evidence. The DA attacks the word of the vigilante, and Commissioner Gordon gives a stirring oration in the support of Batman. Wayne is cleared with the real gunmen makes a deathbed confession, and Commissioner Gordon backs up his words by deputizing Batman and Robin. If you were wondering when or how that came about, its this story.
The issue that I've liked best out of my current backlog that I've read recently is Amazing Spider-Man #3. Since it is of a more recent vintage, I'll try to be more spoiler-sensitive. The story boils down to how the Human Torch reacts when he hears that his former home and headquarters, the Baxter Building, has been purchased by Parker Industries. I like the heart shown in this issue, how Slott conveys the Johnny Storm/Peter Parker friendship, and how Peter treats his friends in general. The only negative is while not everything has to be spelled out, I felt like there was tip-toeing by Slott on this issue because of what is and is not known about certain characters do the delay in the over-hyped, over-blown, mostly late Secret Wars event.
Next, I'm going to make an exception to my always talk about the positive rule. I try to read the letter pages if I can when I read comics, and in the November 1964 books, there have been a few praising Stan for his new humor mag, Monster to Laugh With. Lies, and plants, folks, those letters are lies and plants. I've read them (as Andy Leyland sometimes likes to say -- so you don't have to). They are 36 pages of horror movies stills, of varying vintage, with one-liner word balloons. The jokes are almost always a quote of an Ad slogan -- "Calmay, take me away!" or along the lines of "I have exaggerated feature (wrinkles, bandages, and fangs being the most common). Don't I look funny?" Nothing to elicit so much as a chuckle. Nothing to see here folks. Nothing to see....
Finally, some reader feedback. Kirk Groeneveld requested some pictures of Egghead's android from Tales to Astonish #61. I've included two below one color, and one black and white. I should clarify in case I mislead anyone. When I called him a prototype Vision, I meant it from the perspective of it being a density changing android, not in terms of visual design.
Kirk Greenfield replied to the ending of my post on Strange Tales #127, that the original amulet of Dr. Strange was called 'Harold'. If that were true, wouldn't the new one contain the Eye of Agga-Maude-O? (And that's why I'm in IT and not a stand-up comic).
And here I didn't think anyone would get the "Harold" joke. Groan!
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