Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION Dr. Gym'll's Cultural Rarities Kewl moments of Comics Past

My favorite Miller/ Daredevil story EVER!! It's hard to pick a moment, but one of the most unforgettable was actually his introduction of the Avengers! He totally captured their status as modern gods walking the earth ("A voice that can command a god ... and *does*"), which very effectively contrasted with who Daredevil was.

Hey! A "Rom" fan! I *loved* Terminator (that poor bastard)!! I remember trying to find Clairton, West Virginia on the map when I was a kid.

One cool moment that popped into my head for some reason was the one panel splash of Alan Scott in JSA as he reclaimed his rightful name of *GREEN LANTERN!!* ("now and forever" .. or something like that)

Mordru revealed in JSA was pretty cool.

Cliched and all that, but the final scene of the Dark Phoenix storyline when the Watcher comes in and provides the epilogue to the death of Jean Grey.

This is so NOT on anyone else's list, but Atlantis Attacks was the first time I followed a companywide crossover, and was my introduction to a whole lot of Marvel characters.

Another X-Men moment: The end of Inferno, with Maddie dead and a very confused group of mutants--the X-Men were considered dead by everyone, X-Factor were supposed to be mutant hunters, Magik gone, Maddie's memories absorbed by the resurgent Jean Grey, etc. The last really good X-Crossover.

The Subs save Earth, Earth gets blown up. One of my favorite Legion stories.

"Eat it, grandpa!"

Mon-El takes out the Time Trapper, despite the fact that it will erase him from existence.

End of an Era--the finale always gets me--Long Live the Legion, fade to white.

Wildfire blows up his costume when Dawnstar leaves--"Dawny!!!"

This one is only cool because of the revenge and the "Oh, NOW I get it" factor: In the second League of Extraordinary Gentlemen series, when Hyde finds, rapes, and kills the Invisible Man. Absolutely chilling.

The final battle between the Squadron Supreme and the Redeemers in the original limited series. SSupreme was the first series I went into the back issues of my comic shop to find. Still among my favorites ever.

I can't remember where exactly it was that it came out, but the discovery that Cable was Nathan Christopher Summers was pretty kewl.

"A Midsummer Night's Dream" from Sandman. Will Shakes and company perform the play for the actual Oberon and Titania, while a real and much more menacing Puck works his mischief.

Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow is one of the greatest stories ever.

Speaking of companywide crossover...

FF ANNUAL #3 -- "Bedlam At The Baxter Building!" / the wedding of Reed & Sue.

One of my favorite bits in this is when, following a fight inside the Baxter Building, Reed runs into his lawyer Matt Murdock in the lobby, and tells him he'd be best off sitting down and taking a rest. So Matt decides to unwind-- as Daredevil. One minute on the street, and he runs across a speeding truck carrying an atomic bomb, on which a group of armed thugs are being told, "Hurry! Hydra will pay you DOUBLE if we flatten the Baxter Building within the next 5 minutes!" D.D. takes care of the Hydra goons, commandeers the truck, and drives off with it (a blind guy driving a truck-- great image, huh?).

Meanwhile, as if every other super-villain in the country isn't already heading to attack the Baxter Building at once, down at the docks, undersea barbarian warlord ATTUMA has picked that moment to attack NYC. At that moment, the speeding truck driven by Daredevil arrives at the pier, he drives it off the edge into the river, where, he thinks, "It'll explode HARMLESSLY." Yeah, right! It explodes-- taking Attuma's entire invading army with it-- and D.D. never even knew!

And this was just one "minor" interlude in the whole story-- which, incredibly, took a measely 23 pages to tell.

Captain America and the Falcon #185, I believe, in which Cap doffs his identity as the Nomad to take up the mantle of the defender of liberty again. That final page splash of Cap by Frank Springer, grim and determined to avenge his replacement who'd been ritually killed by the returned Red Skull, was incredibly compelling to my young eyes.

The T-Bolts revelation also dropped my jaded jaw when I first read it.

A minor Avengers moment, but my first one, so it remains a fave: Avengers 144- the Assassin slipped Hawkeye some poison to get by him so he could complete a mission, only to be disarmed by the bowman later, who admitted that the only reason he was alive was the fact that his sensitive stomach caused him to vomit up the poison before it could have it's fatal effect.

Nice moments, Kid Metal. A few points...

Frank Robbins was the guy who took over from Sal Buscema in the middle of Steve Englehart's Nomad story. Sal had done almost every issue during Roy Thomas' run as editor. The minute Len Wein took over, the book went into creative-team turmoil. Robbins was best known for the JOHNNY COMET newspaper strip (I think) and later as writer of many early-70's BATMAN stories, including when Dick Grayson left to go to college. He also pencilled several SHADOW comics, where his style seemed very out-of-place when compared with Mike Kaluta's. Similarly, his "cartoony" style was initially CONDEMNED by most C.A. fans, though his later runs on THE INVADERS, HUMAN FLY and MAN FROM ATLANTIS are probably thought better of.

Herb Trimpe did the issue following the one you described; but strangely didn't stick around. Robbins & Sal Buscema continued to do issues, until Jack Kirby returned to Marvel, which I recall at the time feeling was a HUGE improvement over the issues following Steve Englehart's abrupt departure.


The 2-part Assassin story was by Tony Isabella. Most of his early writing tended to be overly-wordy and overly-jokey. A good example was the POWER MAN issue where Luke Cage fights the super-villain whose name he'd unknowingly begun using. A punch sends Cage flying in a full page spread, with the narrator saying, "This is an example of terse writing." Pages later, Cage returns the favor, the narrator says, "This is an example of a lazy writer trying to get away with murder twice in one issue." The 2-part AVENGERS story was, I recall, the first time Isabella tried to play things straight, AND keep his mouth shut for the most part!

During Simonson's run, Asgardian warriors storming Hel with M-16's. That was kewl!

"God Loves, Man Kills" graphic novel, Wolverine does the "two claws on either side of the face" thing for the first time, "Wanna go for three?" Yeah, that was SO kewl!

Gotta echo Arms' praise of the SQUADRON SUPREME maxiseries.

And now, a single comic that is equal parts funny, heartbreaking, touching, thought-provoking and infuriating.... and totally kewl.

The CRISIS had just ended, causing much continuity damage all over the DCU, but especially in a little comic called INFINITY INC, and especially with a primary member of that team named Lyta Trevor AKA Fury, daughter of the golden-age Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor.

Golden-age Steve and Diana had no longer EVER officially existed by the end of Crisis... but how then do we explain Lyta's memories of them?

In a tale that is primariy a flashback, Lyta remembers back when the JSA gathered at her parents' house for a wingding at the White House. Lyta was about 10 at the time. Joining her were 3 other "JSA brats" and future members of Infinity Inc, Rick Tyler (son of Hourman), Al (Nuklon) Rothstein and Hector (Silver Scarab) Hall, son of the Hawks.

Well, needless to say, the 4 preteens engage in a few hilarious adventures before being busted out by the JSA.

Dsperately clinging to her childhood memories and full of despair, Lyta falls into a tearful sleep.

And then, the single most horrifying non-violent moment in comics I had or HAVE ever read...

Lyta's despair is so intense, it has touched the mind of fellow InfInc-er Brainwave Jr. He enters Lyta's bedroom and completely eradicates her memories of her Mother and Father with his powers.

Lyta's next panel shows her no longer crying, but sleeping with a smile cuddled up to her baby Kanga, while Brainwave Jr. prays he has done the right thing.

I never have forgiven the bastard for it.

INFINITY INC # 27: An absolutely amazing comic.

In a connected and spooky moment, over in ALL-STAR SQUADRON (somebody look up the issue # for me), a group photo of the entire membership of the group is taken, developed, put into an envelope and mailed off to FDR...

...but when he opens the envelope and looks at the photo, it's been CHANGED by the alterations in the timeline. (No more Superman, no more Batman, no more Wonder Woman..........) Excuse me, what was I talking about just then? Can't seem to remember...

LEGENDS OF THE DARK KNIGHT #15-- Prey (part 5) -- Hugo Strange, dressed in a Batman costume and molesting the Mayor's daughter (a dead ringer for Marina Sertis), is confronted by the REAL Batman, who, to his utter frustration, has NOT gone insane from all his scheming. He runs out of the building, where he is suddenly GUNNED DOWN by Gotham Police, who still have a shoot-on-sight order issued against Batman (he forgot he was wearing the costume!!!). Was there ever a better bit of poetic justice? And this was BEFORE the big 9-page kung fu fight with Strange's brainwashed stooge started...

Just re-living this as part of my 60's Marvel re-reading project...

TALES OF SUSPENSE #60 (Dec'64)-- In the previous issue, Tony Stark's armor momentarily failed him, and he almost DIED. He get so paranoid, he's afraid he can no longer take his armor off. Natutally, his employees get suspicious when he disappears and his armored "bodyguard" is reportedly given authority to run the factory.

AVENGERS #10 (Nov'64)-- The group ask Iron Man if they can help regarding the disappearance of Stark, since Iron Man is under SUSPICION of either kidnapping or murder! He assures them nothing's wrong, and it'll be taken care of-- soon.

SUSPENSE #61 (Jan'65)-- Happy discovers Stark at home-- in bed-- "sick". (Actually, he's hiding the fact he's got his armor on under the blankets.) Happy STILL suspects something's not right-- since Stark looks SCARED-- not sick. The news that Stark is at home, broadcast on TV, was not such a good thing to do... as The Mandarin uses the info to target Stark's house with a KILLER SATELLITE, blowing his house to pieces, and presumably taking Stark with it! Iron Man barely escaped in time-- but Happy STILL wonders if somehow, he wasn't responsible. IM, meanwhile, tracks the route of the blast to China, and goes there to confront his ARCH-ENEMY-- and is prompty beaten, captured, and strapped to a revolving table. But before he dies, he's gonna be forced to endure an ORIGIN story...!!!

AVENGERS #11 (Dec'64)-- The group is dismayed at the news of Stark's apparently death-- and while Thor wonders why Iron Man hasn't asked for their help, Giant Man and Captain America explain it's a matter of honor that he feels he must solve the case on his own. (Iron Man appears on this issue's cover-- but is NOT to be found inside! That's because, clearly, it takes place at the SAME TIME as SUSPENSE #61-- or maybe even between #61 & 62, if you wanna look at it that way. I guess DON HECK drawing both series really helped here!)


Now, the interesting this about this is, I was able to read these 4 stories in the OBVIOUSLY correct order.... ONLY by putting THE AVENGERS issues one MONTH behind the cover dates. Someone pointed out in a magazine article how the book, for years, was inexplicably one month behind every other book Marvel put out... and I've discovered, they were right!

That was an interesting summary, prof, and a good example of how Marvel interwove subplots among various titles without always spelling everything out for the reader.

Another "kewl" comics-related moment for me was when I discovered the Marvel Index series written by George Olshevsky. It consisted of 11 or so, book-sized, softcover volumes that ran from about 1975-82. Each volume covered a series of related titles. Volume 3, for example, covered AVENGERS, DEFENDERS and CAPTAIN MARVEL.

Every issue of each title was represented by a black and white cover reproduction, and an organized listing that detailed 1) what was happening on the cover, 2) the story title and page length, 3) credits, 4) notable guest-stars, appearances and cameos, 5) the villain, and 6) commentary on anything else of importance.

Long before I'd read most of the first 115 issues of AVENGERS, I'd read about them, thanks to Olshevsky. His work provided a valuable resource in the days before comics shops and back issues were plentiful. Thanks to him, I learned what I had missed and became more determined than ever to hunt down those back issues. Olshevsky is to thank (or blame) for my comic book collection expanding voluminously.

As time went on, the indices became ever more elaborate and detailed. By the time of the X-Men index, circa 1982, Olshevsky was tracking appearances of every major and minor character from book to book (a practice that many fans continue to this day). His work even inspired a series of comic book-sized indices for DC, written by Lou Mougin (I believe) in the 1980s.

I've always thought that Olshevsky's work inspired Marvel to create their MARVEL HANDBOOK series, as well. The success of the indices must have convinced Marvel that there was a significant interest in the minutiae of their universe. Once that can of worms was opened, everybody wanted to get as detailed as possible.

Wonder whatever became of Olshevsky. Does anybody know?

I have most of those, and continue to use them-- quite frequently of late-- to double-check cover credits as I've slowly been cleaning up covers for Nick Simon's SILVER AGE MARVEL site. I never did get the AVENGERS issue (if I did, it's "among the missing").

I think the later issues got the right balance. Just the right amount of detail. The later MARVEL HANDBOOKs spent WAY TOO DAMN MUCH time on excessively-detail sypnopses of every issue. If you know every single detail of a book, why would you ever want to read it? A lot of TV series books suffer from this same problem. (Of course, "flashbacks" to previous issues in the comics themselves also made reading back issues redundant. If you missed an issue, for example, there was NO POINT in going back to read it, if you'd already read the next one. This became a real "problem" during Jim Shooter's run as Editor.)

I loved how Stan Lee would deal with continued stories. If you missed the 1st half of a 2-parter, you'd know just enough not to get lost. But if you then went back and found Part 1, 95% of it would be a surprise!


"Hercules has come to Earth! He's got the big eye for Thor's chick. Goldilocks is bugged, but good! So they're fighting it out. (There. That's as painless as we could make it.)"

The Avengers index was noted for a Neil Adams cover that featured (if memory serves) Vision, Scarlet Witch, Valkyrie and Captain Marvel fighting off some alien uglies.

I bought -- and still have -- the entire run, except for Volume 2, which covered Conan and related titles. I was never into sword & sorcery.

I agree with you, prof, about the excessive details of Marvel's later "reference" works. This is why an outside source is helpful in compiling these sorts of books. Olshevsky possessed a level of objectivity which made you look at the Marvel Universe with a more critical eye while still appreciating its enormous strengths. (For example, he was the first writer I knew of who questioned Reed Richard's decision to bring his girlfriend and her teenaged brother along for the space ride).

Olshevsky also assumed that the Marvel Universe took place in real time (which was a reasonable assumption in the late '70s). He went so far as to create plausible birth years for most of the heroes in his character summaries. While this aspect of his work was non-canonical, it helped me view the MU with the same sort of "fictional history reverance" that other fans have for STAR TREK and STAR WARS.

I also got on a kick of creating my own MU timeline for several years, until Marvel made the practicality of such a project useless with their compression of time theory.

Since I've only skimmed through this posting, I may have missed this if it was listed. One of the most impressive Avengers moments came in #37 of the 1st series. That was where one panel shows Black Widow threatening to snuff an opponent if he doesn't surrender. Intense!
The actual quote went pretty much like "But I am not an Avenger, Ixar! So choose quickly or die!"

The best thing was that she MEANT it!

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